11965
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Could possible Adam gradually transform into Noah, and vice versa? [Chisholm]
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Full Idea:
If Adam lived for 931 years in a possible world, instead of his actual 930 years, ..then Adam and Noah could gradually exchange their ages and other properties...and we could trace Adam in a world back to the actual Noah, and vice versa.
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From:
Roderick Chisholm (Identity through Possible Worlds [1967], p.81-2)
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A reaction:
[very compressed] Chisholm was one of the first to raise this problem for possible worlds, though it had been Quine's objection to modal logic all along. Only Adam having essential properties seems to stop this slippery slope, says Chisholm.
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16236
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Maybe our persistence conditions concern bodies, rather than persons [Olson, by Hawley]
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Full Idea:
Instead of attributing person-like persistence conditions to bodies, we could attribute body-like persistence conditions to persons, …so human persons are identical with human organisms.
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From:
report of Eric T. Olson (The Human Animal [1997]) by Katherine Hawley - How Things Persist 5.10
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A reaction:
In the case of pre-birth and advanced senility, Olson thinks we could have the body without the person, so person is a 'phase sortal' of bodies. A good theory, which seems to answer a lot of questions. 'Person' may be an abstraction.
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6669
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For 'animalism', I exist before I became a person, and can continue after it, so I am not a person [Olson, by Lowe]
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Full Idea:
According to 'animalism', I existed before I was a person and I may well go one existing for some time after I cease to be a person; hence, I am not essentially a person, but a human organism.
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From:
report of Eric T. Olson (The Human Animal [1997]) by E.J. Lowe - Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind Ch.10
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A reaction:
There is a very real sense in which an extremely senile person has 'ceased to exist' (e.g. as the person I used to love). On the whole, though, I think that Olson is right, and yet 'person' is an important concept. Neither concept is all-or-nothing.
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