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Full Idea
One thing cannot have two beginnings of existence, nor two things one beginning. …That therefore that had one beginning is the same thing, and that which had a different beginning in time and place from that, is not the same but divers.
Gist of Idea
One thing cannot have two beginnings of existence, nor two things one beginning
Source
John Locke (Essay Conc Human Understanding (2nd Ed) [1694], 2.27.01)
Book Ref
Locke,John: 'Essay Concerning Human Understanding', ed/tr. Nidditch,P.H. [OUP 1979], p.328
A Reaction
Chris Hughes has a nice example of a bicycle which is dismantled, parts are swapped with another, then the originals collected up and reassembled, which appears to give the bike two beginnings. This is necessity of origin, not essentiality.
| 12505 | One thing cannot have two beginnings of existence, nor two things one beginning [Locke] |
| 21302 | If a ruined church is rebuilt, its relation to its parish makes it the same church [Hume] |
| 12851 | Intermittence is seen in a toy fort, which is dismantled then rebuilt with the same bricks [Chisholm, by Simons] |
| 16499 | A restored church is the same 'church', but not the same 'building' or 'brickwork' [Wiggins] |
| 16515 | A thing begins only once; for a clock, it is when its making is first completed [Wiggins] |
| 17577 | When an electron 'leaps' to another orbit, is the new one the same electron? [Inwagen] |
| 12856 | Intermittent objects would be respectable if they occurred in nature, as well as in artefacts [Simons] |
| 12885 | Objects like chess games, with gaps in them, are thereby less unified [Simons] |