Job Openings: Philosophy and Prompts

Thought Experiment #7

Traditional philosophy: rebuilding the Boeing 747.

Imagine that you're looking at a computer - you very well might be.

It's pretty old and it has cracks, scratches, occasional software errors or hardware crashes, the whole shebang.

You're pretty attached to it and can't bring yourself to throw it out and buy a new one. Instead, you replace the parts that break down and wear out, one by one.

Eventually, you replace the last part and set it aside on the table, amazed that you pulled off another surgical miracle without a hitch.

But it gets you thinking... if all of the original parts have been replaced, and none of the original parts remain... is it still the same computer that you loved so much?

If you say that, yes, of course it is, then what would happen if you gathered up all of the original parts and put them back together like they used to be on the table next to the other computer?

Which one is your beloved computer? The one with the new parts? The one with the old parts? Both? Neither?

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Taking this a mile farther, imagine you as you were when you were five years old. For this experiment, I'll use myself as an example, but feel free to consider your own experiences, too.

I was about three feet tall with long, tangled blonde hair, blue-grey eyes, tiny square teeth, and hand-me-down clothes from my mom's friend from work. I was a boyish little girl who had an entirely too common female name that I wanted to change to 'James' to be like my favorite character from the Pokemon anime, wanted to cosplay as Brak from "Space Ghost Coast-to-Coast" every day for the rest of my life, and I wanted to be a veterinarian when I grew up. My favorite color was yellow and I thought that money literally grew on trees.

Today, I'm a 5'8" tall trans guy with short and slightly butchered tawny brown hair that I cut myself, partially dyed teal for a few laughs and groans. My adult teeth aren't so pretty and straight because of years of coffee and crowding, and my eyes turned more of a green color over time, too. And I finally, finally buy my own god damned clothes. They're all t-shirts, anyway, because I'm a classless slob. I now have a really uncommon, masculine-neutral name that no barista ever knows how to spell. I haven't watched Pokemon in years even though I still play the games, and I don't remember the last time I even thought about Space Ghost or Brak. I gave up on being a veterinarian when I realized that I should have been volunteering from middle school onward because vet medicine programs are disgustingly competitive. My favorite color is teal, hence the shitty Kool-Aid hair dye. I currently have $8 in my bank account, and I'm twenty-four years old.

We've all changed so significantly since we were five years old, and most cells in our bodies are replaced every decade or so, except for our neurons.

Am I the same person?

Would I be the same person even if all of my neurons were replaced?

Would I be the same person if my brain was transplanted into a different body, or a tank of sugary fluid? (That's a crisis for another day!)

Would I be the same person if my neuron patterns were programmed into a computer to replicate my organic impulses?

Would I be the same person if I was in this body with another person's brain inside of my skull?

What are the boundaries of a static identity, and what makes us us? How much can we change before we aren't the same person, the same entity anymore?