I have been reading Stanford Encyclopedia's article on the "non-identity problem

I have been reading Stanford Encyclopedia's article on the "non-identity problem

I have been reading Stanford Encyclopedia's article on the "non-identity problem". I find it very interesting, but in the whole article it is assumed that one person is the same person in two alternative realities if and only if he or she came out of the same egg (genetically and perhaps atom by atom) produced by her biological parents. I find this idea very wrong. Consider an alternative reality where a man named Nelson Mandela did the same important things that Nelson Mandela did in our reality, but who was conceived and born two months later than our Nelson Mandela. Does it make any sense to say that he would not have been Nelson Mandela? It doesn't, it makes sense only for philosophers who don't want things to make sense at all.... And what if the same egg produced a person completely different from our Nelson Mandela and with a different name? Would that person be Nelson Mandela? I am sure he wouldn't, for no reason, except if you *stipulate* that it has to be that way. Now you may ask: where do you stop? What if the alternative Nelson Mandela was born 5 years later than our Nelson Mandela? What if he had been given another name? What I feel is that it all depends on what is relevant for some subject. I don't believe in "identity" without some purpose or context.

Read another response by Michael Cholbi
Read another response about Identity
Print