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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 13 April 2010
In Part 1 of this paper I will define a sense of “person” which is importantly connected with ordinary notions of personhood. It is a consequence of my definition that each person exemplifies a specific “egoicity”. In Part 2 I will argue, on the basis of empirical facts about monozygotic (“identical”) twins, that egoicity is not determined by bodily constitution. In Part 3 I will conclude with a brief discussion of implications for The Mind-Body Problem.
1 It could be retorted at this point that neither is the word “experience” understood in such a manner that being an experience entails egoicity (in a sense having nothing to do with physicality). I admit this. But it suffices for my purposes that common sense subscribes to the notion of experience-“ownership”. Admittedly, the ordinary usage of “experience” does not base upon a clear understanding of what, precisely, this “ownership” amounts to. However the usage of the word does presuppose, I think, that an experience is necessarily an “owned” experience, also that “ownership” is compatible with the possibility that experiences are non-physical. I introduce the technical term “egoicity” with the object of explicating “ownership”. Ultimately what I am doing is proposing a reconstruction of the ordinary, rather unclear, notion of an experience.
2 Norman Malcolm, “The Privacy of Experience”, as reprinted in Thought and Knowledge: Essays by Norman Malcolm (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1977), 118–119Google Scholar. Italics in text. The essay originally appeared in Stroll, Avrum, ed., New Essays in the Theory of Knowledge (New York: Harper and Row, 1967).Google Scholar
3 More accurately, specific egoicities are comparable with specific shades of red, blue, green, etc. Red, blue, green, etc., are themselves determinables, which specific egoicities are not.
4 Richter, Jean Paul, “Aus Jean Pauls Leben”, Sämtliche Werke (Berlin: G. Reimer, 1862), XXXIV, 26Google Scholar, as translated in Spiegelberg, Herbert, “On the ‘I-am-me’ Experience in Childhood and Adolescence”, Psychologia: An International Journal of Psychology in the Orient (1961), 135Google Scholar. I have taken both translation and bibliographical data from Chisholm, Roderick, The First Person (Minneapolis, MM: University of Minnesota Press, 1981), 90–91Google Scholar. I have omitted from the passage, as cited by Chisholm, some German words enclosed in brackets.
5 It could be questioned whether appeal to Richter's experience really strengthens my case that “egoicity” names a metaphysically significant attribute. Egoicity, it could be argued, is a fabrication based merely upon the fact that people use “I” and “me” for purposes of communication. In the first place, I wonder if this short way of dealing with egoicity accounts adequately for the profound sense of revelation attending Richter's experience. In the second place, it seems clear that the semantics of “I” and “me” presupposes a self-concept not founded on language. Indeed there even appears to be empirical evidence that this is the case. One of the referees makes the following interesting and supportive remark for which I am grateful: “The work initiated by Gordon Gallup, Jr. and first reported in Science (1970)Google Scholar, richly replicated since, shows that some higher ape species without symbolic language, namely, chimpanzees and orangutans, already possess such a concept [i.e., a self-concept], as witnessed by their ability to learn to use a reflecting surface out of reach to groom their bodies, etc. Monkeys and other primates, including the mighty gorilla, are unable to do this, but instead treat the conspecific in the mirror as a hostile rival in the adjoining cage. How could the chimp and the orang learn to do this if they did not have at hand a concept of self that allows them to think, ‘Hey, that's my body,’ in some languageless form of reasoning?” As the same referee suggests, there may be further points of entry for an empirical approach. But I am more concerned in this paper to adduce purely philosophical grounds for supposing egoicity is not language-bound.
6 Evidently egoicity and content are related in somewhat the same manner as pitch and loudness. Pitch cannot be exemplified all by itself; each pitch is necessarily associated (in its actual exemplification) with some degree of loudness. But a particular pitch does not necessitate a particular loudness. E.g., G-sharp can occur now with this degree of loudness, now with that degree. Similarly egoicity cannot be exemplified all by itself; it is necessarily associated with content. But a particular egoicity does not dictate a particular content.
7 My approach thus far—i.e., basing individuation of experiences and unity of consciousness upon egoicity—is similar to that of Madell. See Madell, Geoffrey, The Identity of the Self (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1981)Google Scholar. The term “egoicity” (in the relevant technical sense) originates with me. See my paper “Would Survival Have to Be Survival of an Astral Body? A Reply to Professor Flew”, Canadian Journal of Philosophy 4/3 (03, 1975), 488–494.Google Scholar
8 To say that something is amongst the causal antecedents is not meant to preclude its being the sole one. At the same time I want to leave this open for reasons which will become clear in part 3.
9 As stated below, this definition is intended to capture more or less the paradigmatic case of a person. A more satisfactory and cautious definition would nonetheless countenance at least the possibility of multiple streams associated with a particular body, insisting only on the point that one of the streams be dominant in an appropriate sense. (Compare the Leibnizian idea of a dominant monad.) However, a definition in terms of dominance would merely complicate the ensuing discussion without affecting its substance.
10 I doubt there is any one usage of “person” which can be singled out as the ordinary usage. In saying the ordinary usage of “person” is flexible, what I really mean is that “person” has various usages.
11 This definition leaves open the possibility of “reincarnation”. It is logically possible that segments of one and the same stream might be strongly associated with different bodies during each of their respective lifetimes. In this case there would admittedly be two persons (on the given definition) but the same stream would have “incarnated” twice.
12 In order not to unduly complicate the discussion, I ignore from now on the question whether what is at issue is a stream or, strictly speaking, only a segment of a stream.
13 Disconnectedness of memory and character are not always evidence of a plurality of streams associated with a particular body. “Split personality” need not be interpreted as multiple streams. However, one can envisage circumstances in which the hypothesis of multiple streams might well seem the best explanation of disconnectedness. The vast literature relating to “possession” and similar phenomena is relevant in this context.
14 Dobzhansky, Theodosius, Genetics of the Evolutionary Process (New York: Columbia University Press, 1970).Google Scholar
