ken wrote:
So, which one is it? Does the I have an identity, or, is the I an identity? There is a huge difference.
I don't think so. My I doesn't think so, either. It is, we are, I am
both, just as the inside of a house looks different from the outside, while being the same house, equally valid and necessary to its existence.
Skip wrote:You start off with the 'My' word so that means the I has an identity.
It means only that English sentence construction makes any other designation grammatically awkward.
As: That complex of sensations, emotions, memories, ideas, desires, knowledge, perceptions, actions, reactions and relationships to which this unique personality experiencing this unique moment in this universe is currently attempting to identify to another, largely unknown, complex of.... etc, etc.
"My identity" seems a bit more efficient and less Dontaskmeesque.
.. BUT who/what is the I, which has an identity, is the issue. What is the identity of the I Itself?
WHY is that an issue? I agree that it seems to occupy an inordinate amount of philosophy forum space. But why does it so preoccupy so many otherwise healthy and productive individuals who know the "issue" is infinitely self-reflexive (A Strange Loop)
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/123 ... range_Loop and thus unresolvable.
I propose the Identity Known as I does not have a gender.
You can propose that as an intellectual concept, but no conscious vertebrate can experience it as a reality.
[S - From the outside, every newly-encountered other I is a cypher - unknown: potentially any sex, gender, age, ethnicity or species.]
All just labels used to separate persons into separate groups.
No, that's a description - though not a comprehensive one, of what you
don't know about them.
Strangers do wear identifying markers: clothing, hair, etc; have voices, accents and physical attributes that give you clues as to their classification, yes. But you can't always see the people you encounter: on the telephone, their labels are fewer and less obvious; on the printed page, even fewer and sometimes deliberately disguised. You can't even be sure they're all from this same planet.
Sorting into groups - or classifying - is essential: the more groups and types you separate out, the closer you get to identifying the unique individual whom you may, at some later date, be called upon to pick out of a police lineup.
