An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, Volume 1: MDCXC, Based on the 2nd Edition, Books 1 and 2Locke, John
Philosophy
An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, Volume 1: MDCXC, Based on the 2nd Edition, Books 1 and 2
Locke, John
Knowledge, Theory of -- Early works to 1800
That this is so, we have some kind of evidence in our very bodies, all
whose particles, whilst vitally united to this same thinking conscious
self, so that WE FEEL when they are touched, and are affected by, and
conscious of good or harm that happens to them, are a part of
ourselves; i.e. of our thinking conscious self. Thus, the limbs of his
body are to every one a part of himself; he sympathizes and is
concerned for them. Cut off a hand, and thereby separate it from that
consciousness he had of its heat, cold, and other affections, and it is
then no longer a part of that which is himself, any more than the
remotest part of matter. Thus, we see the SUBSTANCE whereof personal
self consisted at one time may be varied at another, without the change
of personal identity; there being no question about the same person,
though the limbs which but now were a part of it, be cut off.
14. Personality in Change of Substance.
But the question is, Whether if the same substance which thinks be
changed, it can be the same person; or, remaining the same, it can be
different persons?
And to this I answer: First, This can be no question at all to those
who place thought in a purely material animal constitution, void of an
immaterial substance. For, whether their supposition be true or no, it
is plain they conceive personal identity preserved in something else
than identity of substance; as animal identity is preserved in identity
of life, and not of substance. And therefore those who place thinking
in an immaterial substance only, before they can come to deal with
these men, must show why personal identity cannot be preserved in the
change of immaterial substances, or variety of particular immaterial
substances, as well as animal identity is preserved in the change of
material substances, or variety of particular bodies: unless they will
say, it is one immaterial spirit that makes the same life in brutes, as
it is one immaterial spirit that makes the same person in men; which
the Cartesians at least will not admit, for fear of making brutes
thinking things too.
15. Whether in Change of thinking Substances there can be one Person.
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