The Same and Identity

Philosophy Forums Philosophy
1

There is a difference between the Same and Identical, which I suspect stems from the Time and Space orientations necessary within the organism – environment dialectic. Same and Different very likely has its roots within the topological production and codification of Space, the distinguishing between the “here” and “there” that Plotinus called the ultimate question of all philosophy. If we ground the Same within the territorialization of Space we realize that the Same perhaps would be all things that fall within a certain boundary. These things would be the Same, but not Identical. They would be the Same in reference to a particular index, a manner of relating, and as such participate in that Space, perhaps with Bergsonian la durée. Yet the productivity of their differences can easily be established by changing the index, redrawing the boundary in a different manner. Indexes need not be categorical lines, but can also be gradations of proximity, ratios of either Time or Space, working such as perhaps the proximates that circumscribe the field of immediate possible movement around an organism, a kind of floating territory. In this way thresholds also operate as indexes by which the Same is established. So the Same – for instance that of the reference of the proverbial “bachelor” and the “unmarried man”- is only operant to various indexes of meaning, but in no sense are they identical, that is in reference to all indexes equally. So not even a is a, for there are indexes by which a is not a. Further, only through the somatic effects of linguistic considerations do such equivalences gain meaning, the stability of references and interpretations of events. The spatializations of these events, the body-forming of which language plays a very large part, is simply an abstraction of what essentially is an animal event, the ritualized production and demarcation of Space.

Dunamis

2

Psychology has a lot to do with how equivalences gain meaning too. It’s one thing being told that a certain word means something and then actually accepting it as the meaning. There’s this psychological disorder called Agnosias. A person suffering from this disorder is unable to interpret sensory stimuli (such as sound and images). Hence even if they are told what an object is, they see/interpret it differently because of how their brain is wired. The spatialization/body forming has a lot to do with the mind and not only with language and so the mind may also influence this demarcation of Space, and sometimes the animal may have no direct control (via language, etc) over this process.

Peace

3

Nature gives us an entirely anthropocentric example of this in a pair of super-identical Twins. Two who in form are Identical yet are clearly not the Same. Take two such twins named Harry and Larry. No matter how much they look the same they are never the same.

Every thing has its own space. While it might move in relation to all other things, no thing, at least the the level of ordinary human perception can occupy the same space as another thing at the same time. All real things have a boundary.

4

Xander,

“Two who in form are Identical yet are clearly not the Same.”

Just to quibble so as to keep the terms straight. In my description “identical twins” would be the “Same” to a particular index(es), for instance descriptions of genetic make up, but not “Identical” to every index. The reason for straightening this out is that in part this thread is in response to the analytic attempt to perserve Identity, that is “x is x”, as a foundational principle of telling what is real. Identity, that is Sameness to every index, does not exist. I assume that this is what you meant by your example, but since the terms were switched, I thought I should point them out once more.

Dunamis

5

The difference is between qualitative identity, and numerical identity.

Suppose I say that I have the same book as you. I suppose that might mean (as it usually does) that I have a copy of the book you have. (You have a copy of Gibbon’s “The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire” and I have copy of Gibbons’ “The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire”. That is qualitative identiy. But I might mean that I have the very same (or “one and the same”) book as you do. Not a copy. The “very same”. You don’t have it any more, I now have it. Then, “same” means “numerically the same”.

What is the criterion of numerical identity? Leibniz’s Law of Identiy, tells us that X and Y are the numerically the same if, and only if, every property of X is a property of Y’s, and conversely, every property of Y is a property of X’s. Thus, for instance, Mark Twain and Sam Clemens were one and the same person, because (for instance) if Mark Twain had a mustache, so did Sam Clemens, and if Sam Clemens had a mustache, then so did Mark Twain.

Leibniz’s Law is also known as the Indiscernability of Identicals.

6

Very nice, Ken.

That post was informative for me. Thank you.

7

Ken,

“The difference is between qualitative identity, and numerical identity.”

Each is identitical (the Same) to a different index, and neither in pure distinction can tell you anything about the world, except when functioning to that index through experience. Without experience, they are meaningless to the world, but in no way is the world reducible to them.

“every property of Y is a property of X’s. Thus, for instance, Mark Twain and Sam Clemens were one and the same person, because (for instance) if Mark Twain had a mustache, so did Sam Clemens, and if Sam Clemens had a mustache, then so did Mark Twain.”

Sam Clemens’ name has ten letters. Mark Twain’s name has nine, i.e. they are not identitical. In fact there are many differences. That you see many of them as superfluous is simply a matter if the indexes you are using. Mark Twain of T1 isn’t even Mark Twain of T2 to all indexes, let alone Mark Twain to Sam Clemens. Take a dip in Heraclitus’ river… :slight_smile:

Dunamis

8

This is questionable, I think. He is supposing that there can be different Qualities in things that are of the same kind. He is wrong to suggest that a Copy is equivalent to an original, even as an issue of Quality. Just as the attributes of the original Book are infinite inventories, so is the Copy. “A” does not equal “A” here, and Quality difference does not exist where two things can’t be compared. A change in Quality is a change in category.

For example, The Book would be taken to mean ‘the understood lyrical contents in the pages’ and not the actual matter of the Book. Here he makes a Platonic reference to the Idea of Book as ‘the contents’ and not the Book itself. So the identity of the Book wouldn’t neccesarily depend on the physical characteristics of the Book, rather the meaning understood in the Book. If this is the case, there could be no objective Qualitative Identity just as there would be no duplicate understanding of its contents. A “Copy” is an original-copy, a new “A,” not a duplicate of another. That is impossible.

How would you answer this?

I like the Numerical Idenity, though.

9

detrop,

A “Copy” is an original-copy, a new “A,” not a duplicate of another. That is impossible.

This is what functions as well in the case of apparently Numerically identical Mark Twain and Sam Clemens. Mark Twain is a first edition signed copy of “x” and Sam Clemens is a Penguin paperback reprint, each conditioned by social relations. Neither of them is an original, nor an identical reference to a Platonic real, the-human-being-behind-the-various-names. Mark Twain and Sam Clemens in each of their historical instances are inventories of an unknowable “thing” assumed to be fixed by convention alone.

Dunamis

10

“All indexes are equal; yet some are more equal than others.”

“Mark Twain at T1 is not Mark Twain at T1” - this I hold to be the logical extension of your argument.

Yet I think this kind of reduction is invalid.

Or another voice might say; “Mark T1 and Mark T2 cannot be discreet objects, because we could always take our discretion and magnify it into infinity, in which case it becomes equally valid to move in the opposite direction, and simply apply a broader category, i.e. ‘Mark T1/2’.”

A third voice, which is perhaps unable to appropriate the above argument, rather says something like this; “A name can act as a rigid designator, where the preeminent index of essentiality is not refuted by any Quinean arguments about the apparent arbitrariness of our manner or picking out objects with referents.”

Sorry I am not really motivated to anything more extensive at this time.

Regards,

James

11

James,

““Mark Twain at T1 is not Mark Twain at T1” - this I hold to be the logical extension of your argument.”

It is simple. Mark Twain T1 and Mark Twain T2 are not the Same to all indexes, and therefore not identical. What you mean by “invalid” I have no idea. T1 and T2 need only be an index of change.

Dunamis

12

I could well pick and choose from several possible meanings. For instance, I might offer binaries such as:

  1. “Inferior…(in relation to the superior)”
  2. “Less useful…(in relation to the more useful)”
  3. “A less comprehensive and self-consistent description…(in relation to…etc etc)”

…and so forth.

It is still for me to think some more about this idea of mine (not the above but the original observation), which is the crux or fulcrum of my observations in the heavy mod thread.

How about these;

“If it is useful to describe them in terms of identity, then it is true that they are identical.”

Someone might say;
“This could be a point about essence, which is where identity is posited. Whatever is not necessarily identical, is not identical; yet there is such a thing as necessity, and so there are cases of identity.”

or

“If they are the Same to some indexes, then perhaps this means that we have established gradations of identity, and posited Identity. It is merely a matter of whether it makes sense to speak of Mark Twain at T1 and Mark Twain at T2, or whether the latter becomes ‘fhiruwgfc at T2’.”

The question would then be, not whether they are the same to all indexes, and therefore identical, but whether it is Mark Twain in both instances, and whatever that implies.

Regards,

James

13

James,

"1. “Inferior…(in relation to the superior)”
2. “Less useful…(in relation to the more useful)”
3. “A less comprehensive and self-consistent description…(in relation to…etc etc)”

How about:
4. “True and insurmountable”, as long as we are inventing meanings for “invalid”. :slight_smile:

“If it is useful to describe them in terms of identity, then it is true that they are identical.”

Sure, then they are the Same to operational indexes. No problem there, as they would fall within the pragmatism of truth. They simply would not be Identical. As you know, I have no problem with Pragmatic definitions of truth.

Dunamis

14

Is that the best you can do? :sunglasses:

Yes which is precisely why I phrased it as such. However I do not feel the same tendency to disbar the notion of identity in the manner which you do. Perhaps this is a semantic dissimularity over the respective uses of ‘same’ and ‘identity’. Your definition of the latter seems to be (admittedly more than this but at least partially) an ideal form of the former - what is identical is what is the Same in ‘reference to all indexes equally’. (One must also remember that we are thinking also the difference between so-called ‘qualitative’ and ‘numerical’ identity.)

Perhaps what we might call the Same in all indexes, is called elsewhere the Same in ‘all possible worlds’ - if this were a legitimate rephrasal, then I could make better sense of your argument, as it would translate into anti- or non- essentialism. If only one ‘property’ was evidenced in all possible worlds, then we would call this property ‘necessary’, and it would form an essential property of the thing, returning us in a sense to a very Leibnizian terminology. This would give us ‘identity’.

With this rephrasal my observations would also become more intelligible, if they are not already so.

My major worry though is how we are thinking the notions of the Same and Identity in their temporal aspects. I think that it is part of the discourse which includes objective time, that it (the discourse) should corrode or antagonise against its own notion of ‘identity’.

Regards,

James

15

James,

Perhaps what we might call the Same in all indexes, is called elsewhere the Same in ‘all possible worlds’ - if this were a legitimate rephrasal, then I could make better sense of your argument, as it would translate into anti- or non- essentialism. If only one ‘property’ was evidenced in all possible worlds, then we would call this property ‘necessary’, and it would form an essential property of the thing, returning us in a sense to a very Leibnizian terminology. This would give us ‘identity’.

What is missing from your wriggle-room analysis is that it is purely categorical, and therefore linguistic, arbitrary to reference and ultimately tautological. Primary to my meaning as to indexes is that these are spatio-temporal consonances, not just juxtaposed abstractions. Indexes are body-creating, ways of material interaction with matter, so supposed. They do not exist apart from their doing. Knowing is doing. To abstract and say that something “has a property” is to inscribe oneself within a discourse, within the spatio-temporal indexes of that discourse, as experienced by the body. The very best we can manage are the indexes that form measures by which to operate within the world. No “knowledge”, that is no doing can operate beyond these indexes. So to hypothesize about categories is simply to adopt new indexes, new bodies in which to describe, and hence experience stability. None of these would be the definitive “knowing” as you would hope and dream it to be.

Dunamis

16

The grammar here is too ambiguous; would you mind rephrasing?

I suspect that it is in the supposed possibility of something purely ‘linguistic’ or ‘categorical’ that we are in disagreement here. The arbitrariness of linguistic reference is no argument against what I have said (though it is not a voice which I claim full responsibility for).

What might an ‘abstraction’ be, at this level of analysis? The use of the rubric of properties was a contrivance of convenience, unless what you want to say is that the need to find a way to speak here is itself indicative of a reaching towards the unsayable; yet it seems implied in some way or another in the use which you make of the Same, whatever our conception of the object of ‘knowledge’ might be.

This is somewhat more subtle, I guess; but I bet you can do better yet. :wink:

Regards,

James

17

James,

The grammar here is too ambiguous; would you mind rephrasing?

The analytical, if it indeed existed, would have no connection to the world.

What might an ‘abstraction’ be, at this level of analysis?

An ‘abstraction’ would be something taken to be without consideration of its bodily effects, its doing.

The use of the rubric of properties was a contrivance of convenience,

More than a rubric, it is part of the analytical heritage that wishes to turn Being into a grammatical event, which it can be, but a grammar in the expression the body under those indexes.

unless what you want to say is that the need to find a way to speak here is itself indicative of a reaching towards the unsayable;

Ultimately any saying is a speaking from the body, and as such adopting the indexes of language, making measure by differentiation, a differentiation that will split any Same with only a shift of the index. This is the productivity of Being.

yet it seems implied in some way or another in the use which you make of the Same, whatever our conception of the object of ‘knowledge’ might be.

The Same becomes a product of its index(es), and therefore a relational state.

This is somewhat more subtle, I guess; but I bet you can do better yet.

There is no reason to do better. Knowing is doing. No way past that. :slight_smile:

Dunamis

18

Whereas the orthodox response would be; analyticity is a semantic notion, whereas necessity is metaphysical. What do you make of this fundamental analytic posit?

Haha well this is either a clever response, or a misunderstanding. The subtlety I spoke of was in the attempt to position me in the dialogue. Yet the level of implication at play here…;

…left me with little choice in way of response. :slight_smile:

Regards,

James

19

James,

What do you make of this fundamental analytic posit?

Nothing. There is no such thing as an analytic posit. There are only the bodily affects of indexes, experienced as stability…

“As a plastic spoon is burnt, for example, the carbon atoms within it are incorporated into carbon dioxide molecules which are dispersed into the air. Let us think of the possible fate of one of these molecules. It may be absorbed by a nettle leaf, and the carbon atom may then be assimilated by photosynthesis into a sugar molecule, and thence through a series of biochemical transformations into a protein molecule within one of the leaf cells. This part of the leaf may be eaten and digested by a caterpillar of the peacock butterfly, and the carbon atom may end up in a DNA molecule in the butterfly’s body.”
– R. Sheldrake, The Presence of the Past

The “carbon atom” is just one more Heraclitean river.

Dunamis

20

Well this is all good and well; however it does not really give me much that I can work with (beyond what you have already given).

Thanks for taking the time with these responses, though. I have to run off to my sociology class now.

Cheers,

James