Can we make true distinctions among people?

Philosophy Forums Philosophy
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The “Epistemology, old Father Christmas, and Nah” thread gave me the idea for this post.

What if I had twins that were both my brother, Jon and Ben, who had been randomly switching places back and forth for many years, going back to be before I was born. So over the years I assumed I learned to know them and distinguish between them very well, from the way they dressed and acted. I have what I think are distinct memories of each respective person. Later they’re both decide to move away and stop talking to me (let’s say to a small island with no phone or internet). Before they leave they tell me what they’ve been doing all along.

Would there be any use in trying to sort out who was who? Maybe if I was studying acting or the psychology of personalities, but otherwise it wouldn’t matter. The distinctions I remembered wouldn’t needed to be analyied to fit “reality”.

That was an extreme example, but I think it helps show how the identity of others is completely relative and how any idea distinction, whether it be between people, things or concepts/ideas, can be turned into nothing through enough abstract examples.

If there’s any objections based on the idea that there’s an objective difference between the twins in a corporeal sense, then I’ll take the example even farther. You only need to apply what I guess would be called the “gestalt” to the situation. The twins are people that are completely intertwined within the world like everyone else, the distinction we make between them and anyone else corporeally is artificial.

If there are still objections let me take the example further. Say there was a strange form of intelligent life, where one’s offspring consisted of two different heads each with a brain and a detached body which they had to take turns sharing. Let’s say that the head that happened to be detached at any given time would be self sustaining, but “asleep”. Now take the twin example I gave, it would only come down to wondering who’s head it was in any given situation.

To go even further. Let’s say that the body already has an incomplete head with an incomplete brain with significant neurologic functions that must be supplemented when connected to one of the two seperate heads, which are also incomplete. Say that the heads don’t fit into the body’s head in a simple way, but as an extremely integrate 3d puzzle piece. Let’s say all three incomplete heads, the two initially separate ones and the one perpetually attached to the body, had the same mass and volume, when one of the separate heads connects to the body’s head the now interconnected head has the same volume but twice the mass. This is an integration of heads would be very difficult to untangle and understand.

If one still wishes to object saying that there are still three pieces and two different physical combinations, I guess I could take the example as far as you want, but I would think one could already anticipate what I might say when pushing the example further.

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Eventually when you evolve spiritually, you’ve got to let go of your old self, and even if you don’t, it will wash away, naturally. We must put energy into the preservation of ideas, to control our future and our fate. Important lessons usually aren’t spread between people. The wise few die out and everything reruns.

“True distinctions” ? Not even the self is truly distinct, nevermind what it imagines.

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In your twin example, you already answered your own question I think: no, you couldn’t distinguish between them. That was part of the narrative. That you were obviously unable to do so.

Does that mean that no difference exists between them in reality? No. It just means you got duped. I don’t see the profundity in that example that you apparently see.

And I really have no clue what the relevance is of your 3-headed alien example. I think you just wanted to come up with a weird alien, and you’re using this thread as an excuse to talk about weird aliens.

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Dan~ and Flannel Jesus, thanks for your comments.

I do enjoy writing science fiction in order to explain my philosophical ideas. I’ve written another, such story, on mixing brains, to show the incoherency of the static self, the story has been said to be in its own right a classic of incoherency, but I of course disagree.

Rather than aliens and brain transplants, I’ll try another approach.

That twins A and B are both separate coherent entities would seem to be irrefutable. To a physician it would be irrefutable. That is because they will almost certainly focus on nothing but the body. Of course they’re well aware of the body’s connection with the world, but by necessity it is usually only a second thought for them. Lines of thought such as that, and possibly even human’s natural inclinations, make it very hard to see the body as fully integrated in the world.

But, I’m not concerned about which twin’s body has a heart condition because of eating more grease than the other, and which twin’s body has lung problems from chain smoking in the past. I’m only concerned with their minds. I use twins in the following example, but any two people, even those who’ve never met could work. The two twins, even to someone they never would fool, can be said to have a combined mind as well as two separate ones. You may say about twin A, “what is he thinking?” And then you may say at another time, speaking of them both, “what are they thinking?” The later isn’t a play on words anymore than the former, if it’s a play on words then all talk of the mind and thinking is one.

So far I admit they are still distinguishable mentally and physically. So I’ll speak on their “states of mind” and its causes. Assuming I’m one they wouldn’t try to fool, let’s say I’m waiting for twin A at a restaurant. I already know A’s going to show up, but I may ask myself, “who’s going to show up this time, will it be happy twin or sad twin?” So far that doesn’t make my case, we have A-happy, A-sad, B-happy, B-sad, four individuals all very different.

But, the twins have a very stable mood, it’s very rare for any circumstance or person to upset them or make them happy, but they do argue amongst each other. Whoever started the argument makes the other sad. Now we have A-H, A-S-because-of-B, B-H, B-S-b-o-A. Now A-S-b-o-B and B-S-b-o-A are still different physically, but despite knowing who’s named who and who’s body’s whose, when I meet them separate or together I always quickly find out if one’s sad and if one is then rather than trying to worry about looking closely to distinguish who’s body is who’s I match sadness and happiness to clothing with no regard to appearance otherwise.

When sad they both relate and need to be related to in the same way, and the more I speak to them when they’re sad the more I learn how to help them. Let’s say I spent a year trying to help A, because B was always starting arguments. I learned a lot about A, and then the next year A was starting all the arguments and spent a lot of time trying to help B. My experience with A had prepared me to help B in a manner indistinguishable (by myself) from if I was to spend that year helping A again.

Happy A and Happy B started to act differently over the years, complicating manners, there was now in my mind not just happy twin and sad twin, but A-H, B-H, and sad twin. I knew three people. They were both very careless with their distinguishable health problems, A’s heart issues and B’s lung issues. So I went with each respective twin to the doctor and sometimes consulted with him alone, in that case there was still only two individuals because the doctor didn’t care who was sad. But, to help me deal with them, I consulted a therapist by myself. Soon she learned that it was useless to ask the twins name when I was talking about a sad twin, because it was irrelevant and I often forgot the current sad twin’s name. But, when I was talking about the currently happy twin (or twins if they were both happy at the time) there name was important, so soon she started to think in terms of three individuals as well.

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I think I may in fact agree with that.