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From: flink@umcp-cs.UUCP (Paul V Torek)
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Re: LAST WORD on "souls" (I hope!)
Message-ID: <1411@umcp-cs.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 27-Aug-85 17:02:48 EDT
Article-I.D.: umcp-cs.1411
Posted: Tue Aug 27 17:02:48 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 29-Aug-85 21:01:48 EDT
References: <581@utastro.UUCP> <1322@umcp-cs.UUCP> <588@utastro.UUCP> <1364@umcp-cs.UUCP> <1589@pyuxd.UUCP>
Reply-To: flink@maryland.UUCP (Paul V Torek)
Organization: U of Maryland, Computer Science Dept., College Park, MD
Lines: 26
Summary: ah, progress

In article <1589@pyuxd.UUCP> rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen) writes:
>> BUT:  it just ain't implied by a person's existence at time A, and later at
>> time B, that he must have existed during the time between.  (It happens
>> to be always true in the real world, but as a matter of physical law and
>> boundary conditions, not as a matter of logic.) [TOREK]
>
>True, Paul.  But what makes the person at time A the same person at time B?
>What relates the two "persons" such that they can be said to be the same
>person?

Well, for example, the person at time B might have the exact same physical
structure, molecule by molecule, as the person had at time A.  He would
then have all the same mental qualities (assuming, as I think we two agree,
that Cartesian dualism is wrong).  He would then be, for all practical
purposes, the same person.  I'm not saying that all this is physically
possible, of course (but then, I don't believe in Wingate's God).

(Technically though, the person at time B (call him Bob) would not be the 
same person as the one at time A (call him Al), unless he was causally 
descended from A in such a way that there could not be two identical people
produced at time B by the same process.  Otherwise, Bob would "merely"
be an exact *copy* of Al.  I put the word "merely" in scare-quotes because,
rationally, it should not make a difference to anyone, including Al,
whether Bob will be Al or an exact copy.)

--Paul V Torek, umcp-cs!flink