VML-5/22/02

[Guest guest]

When I eat, I think of myself as eating. I am identified with eating.

When I run, I and the running are not two separate things. Thus the

argument from personal identity does not seem to be very strong. The

other argument from memory is also weak. If the identity of my being

is represented by my memory, many things which I have forgotten are

lost from that identity. And we know that people under certain

conditions forget their whole past. In many cases of lunacy a man

will think of himself as made of glass, or as being an animal. If the

existence of that man depends on memory, he has become glass, which

not being the case we cannot make the identity of the Self depend on

such a flimsy substance as memory. Thus we see that the soul as a

limited yet complete and continuing identity cannot be established as

separate from the qualities. We cannot establish a narrowed-down,

limited existence to which is attached a bunch of qualities.