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I find there to be nothing interesting about it. This, like so many other “philosophical quæstions” is a futile quibble of semantics that answers nothing. The

I find there to be nothing interesting about it. This, like so many other “philosophical quæstions” is a futile quibble of semantics that answers nothing. The simple answer to this problem, and many other problems, is that the exercise of giving clouds of atoms in vicinity to one another “identities” is not one based in salient thought. — there is no such thing. All Theseus' Ship shows is that, indeed, this theory is flawed, and easily reduced to the absurd, but that is a trivial conclusion an unindoctrinated child should be able to easily make in a multitude of ways. It's as though one come with a thought experiment that demonstrates that the borders of countries are an artificial man-made construct, rather than an actual physical property of the universe. — it is rather obvious.

otabdeveloper4 6y ago
> The simple answer to this problem, and many other problems, is that the exercise of giving clouds of atoms in vicinity to one another “identities” is not one based in salient thought. — there is no such thing. Are you implying identies don't exist? Because that either has to be sophistry (i.e. trolling) or insanity.
- bobthebuilders 6y ago
  Way to engage in good faith discussion.
- Blikkentrekker 6y ago
  “exist"? I would hardly use such words in this frame of reference. I'm saying that “identities” are a fuzzy human “You know it when you see it, and different men see it differently.” category that is bereft of any definition that can be objectively measured and reasoned about, and that what I just said is a trivial and obvious conclusion. They “exist” in the same way that borders between different oceans exist, arbitrarily drawn, and different people will think differently as to where they lie. If you wish to call that an “existence”, then be my guest, though many others would præfer to not call it such. — ironically the border between “existence” and “nonexistence” is of a similar quality.
  - keiferski 6y ago
    The fact that borders exist doesn’t imply that there are different centers of power. In fact, for most of history borders were notoriously ill-defined.
    - Blikkentrekker 6y ago
      But power in practice does not adhere to how different parties arbitrarily define where borders lie. Most of nations of the world officially define Crimea to be within the Ukrainian border, but it is the Russian government who wields the actual, practical power there. It took a rather long time for many countries to stop defining mainland China as falling within the power of the R.O.C. government, despite the R.O.C. wielding no practical power there any more, and the R.O.C. still defines mainland China as falling within it's power. If “borders” of nations were defined descriptively based on sovereign entities having control over them, then they would certainly be more useful, but, this would also assume a simplified world where it is easy to decide what powerbase is sovereign, and what powerbase binarily has control over what surface of the planet; it is often not so simple and often multiple parties vie for control over a single area, and whether a powerbase be sovereign is not so easy to simply answer.
      - keiferski 6y ago
        Power in practice does adhere to borders, just not 100% of the time. Reality isn’t a computer program. The fact that some rules are broken occasionally doesn’t mean that they aren’t rules.
        Blikkentrekker 6y ago
        That's very much what a law of physics is. If the law is observed broken once, that is a falsification of the entire theory. And I assume you live in a rather peaceful area if you think powers adheres to borders. In many parts of the world governments have a harm time enforcing their law upon fringe areas where effective anarchy is quite common. — the picture is certainly not as simple as you paint it.
- tsimionescu 6y ago
  The notion of an object, in the human sense, doesn't have any solid relationship with the physical world. I hope we are agreed on this much. For some objects, there is a stronger correlation between the human concept and the physical world (i.e. you could find a formal definition that matches to some extent what I mean by a particular spoon), but for other objects in our minds there is nothing in the physical world that truly matches our understanding (the Atlantic Ocean, as an object separate from the Pacific Ocean, is not a physical object, it is just a human abstraction). In particular, our notion of the identity of an object has no relationship with the physical world, as the Ship of Theseus shows. Our idea that objects "shatter" and "transform", so that if I break a glass the pieces are a different object than the glass; or if I mix of bowl of flower with water and roll it into a dough, the dough is a different object than the bowl of flour and the water - these are not physically definable notions. When it comes to human identity, the identity perceived by myself, the same logic MUST apply, unless you believe in a soul. The fact that I can think of myself as the same identity as myself 2 seconds ago, or myself when I was a handful of cells in my mother's womb, is obviously an artifice of the human mind. There is no such continuity in the physical world. And this has all been said from the perspective of classical physics. If you go into QM, where any notion of identity of particles would contradict the theory and observations of it, things really break down.
pontifier 6y ago
I tend to agree. It's difficult to draw a good shell around what I call myself. Yes, there is the body, the brain, some part there somewhere that is "Me", but I also have children, and ideas that are part of my identity. I tend to draw the border of self a little looser than most. I'm a human, a living being, and a piece of me extends both forward and backward in time far beyond the start and end of this meat bag at a keyboard.
Razengan 6y ago
Someone pooh-poohing something while claiming to provide a "simple answer to many problems" is ironic at best, and insufferably arrogant at worse.
- Blikkentrekker 6y ago
  It's a “simple answer to many problems” in the same way “Hoṃœopathy is nonsense.” is a “simple answer” to explain the complexity of “how can water have a memory?”. There is no problem, and there is no answer. There is only a complex problem from assuming a falsehood and trying to explain it. — there is nothing arrogant about calling out obvious nonsense.

otabdeveloper4 6y ago

> The simple answer to this problem, and many other problems, is that the exercise of giving clouds of atoms in vicinity to one another “identities” is not one based in salient thought. — there is no such thing. Are you implying identies don't exist? Because that either has to be sophistry (i.e. trolling) or insanity.

bobthebuilders 6y ago
Way to engage in good faith discussion.
Blikkentrekker 6y ago
“exist"? I would hardly use such words in this frame of reference. I'm saying that “identities” are a fuzzy human “You know it when you see it, and different men see it differently.” category that is bereft of any definition that can be objectively measured and reasoned about, and that what I just said is a trivial and obvious conclusion. They “exist” in the same way that borders between different oceans exist, arbitrarily drawn, and different people will think differently as to where they lie. If you wish to call that an “existence”, then be my guest, though many others would præfer to not call it such. — ironically the border between “existence” and “nonexistence” is of a similar quality.
- keiferski 6y ago
  The fact that borders exist doesn’t imply that there are different centers of power. In fact, for most of history borders were notoriously ill-defined.
  - Blikkentrekker 6y ago
    But power in practice does not adhere to how different parties arbitrarily define where borders lie. Most of nations of the world officially define Crimea to be within the Ukrainian border, but it is the Russian government who wields the actual, practical power there. It took a rather long time for many countries to stop defining mainland China as falling within the power of the R.O.C. government, despite the R.O.C. wielding no practical power there any more, and the R.O.C. still defines mainland China as falling within it's power. If “borders” of nations were defined descriptively based on sovereign entities having control over them, then they would certainly be more useful, but, this would also assume a simplified world where it is easy to decide what powerbase is sovereign, and what powerbase binarily has control over what surface of the planet; it is often not so simple and often multiple parties vie for control over a single area, and whether a powerbase be sovereign is not so easy to simply answer.
    - keiferski 6y ago
      Power in practice does adhere to borders, just not 100% of the time. Reality isn’t a computer program. The fact that some rules are broken occasionally doesn’t mean that they aren’t rules.
      - Blikkentrekker 6y ago
        That's very much what a law of physics is. If the law is observed broken once, that is a falsification of the entire theory. And I assume you live in a rather peaceful area if you think powers adheres to borders. In many parts of the world governments have a harm time enforcing their law upon fringe areas where effective anarchy is quite common. — the picture is certainly not as simple as you paint it.
tsimionescu 6y ago
The notion of an object, in the human sense, doesn't have any solid relationship with the physical world. I hope we are agreed on this much. For some objects, there is a stronger correlation between the human concept and the physical world (i.e. you could find a formal definition that matches to some extent what I mean by a particular spoon), but for other objects in our minds there is nothing in the physical world that truly matches our understanding (the Atlantic Ocean, as an object separate from the Pacific Ocean, is not a physical object, it is just a human abstraction). In particular, our notion of the identity of an object has no relationship with the physical world, as the Ship of Theseus shows. Our idea that objects "shatter" and "transform", so that if I break a glass the pieces are a different object than the glass; or if I mix of bowl of flower with water and roll it into a dough, the dough is a different object than the bowl of flour and the water - these are not physically definable notions. When it comes to human identity, the identity perceived by myself, the same logic MUST apply, unless you believe in a soul. The fact that I can think of myself as the same identity as myself 2 seconds ago, or myself when I was a handful of cells in my mother's womb, is obviously an artifice of the human mind. There is no such continuity in the physical world. And this has all been said from the perspective of classical physics. If you go into QM, where any notion of identity of particles would contradict the theory and observations of it, things really break down.

pontifier 6y ago

I tend to agree. It's difficult to draw a good shell around what I call myself. Yes, there is the body, the brain, some part there somewhere that is "Me", but I also have children, and ideas that are part of my identity. I tend to draw the border of self a little looser than most. I'm a human, a living being, and a piece of me extends both forward and backward in time far beyond the start and end of this meat bag at a keyboard.

Razengan 6y ago

Someone pooh-poohing something while claiming to provide a "simple answer to many problems" is ironic at best, and insufferably arrogant at worse.

Blikkentrekker 6y ago
It's a “simple answer to many problems” in the same way “Hoṃœopathy is nonsense.” is a “simple answer” to explain the complexity of “how can water have a memory?”. There is no problem, and there is no answer. There is only a complex problem from assuming a falsehood and trying to explain it. — there is nothing arrogant about calling out obvious nonsense.