Sunday, March 4, 2012

Response to idea that who we are is simply memories/perceptions


We briefly talked in class about whether we would be the same person if we lost our memories, or if our memories, made up through chemicals in our brain, are all we are. This sort of thinking would follow Hume’s idea that “[Human beings] are nothing but a bundle or collection of different perceptions.” Split brain theory was given as an example of this. However, I think the movie The Vow argues differently(the trailer can be seen below since the movie is too new to find clips from). (Spoiler alert) In this movie Paige is an artist living in downtown Chicago. About 4 years earlier she had been engaged to Kyle and was attending law school. However, after she found out that her dad had cheater on her mom with one of her friends, she broke off her engagement to Kyle, dropped out of law school and moved to downtown Chicago. After moving to downtown Chicago she eventually met and married Leo. However, they were rear ended while they were driving around town one evening. The wreck resulted in her losing all memories pertaining to the last four years. This included meeting Leo, dropping out of law school, breaking off her engagement, and discovering her father’s infidelity. If we follow Hume’s idea that who we are is simply made up by our memories and perceptions, then Paige would not be the person that Leo knew. She no longer remembers the discover about her father that made her life, so after the wreck she found herself very happy going back into her old life and didn’t find Leo to suit her at all. Instead she was pursing her ex again. However, she slowly finds herself going down the same path that had resulted in her moving to downtown Chicago. She even ends up breaking up with Kyle again and breaks up with him for all the same reasons despite the fact that she was not severely traumatized by discovering her dad’s infidelity. She even moves back into the city and becomes an artist once again. At this point she starts dating Leo again. This would seem to suggest that despite the fact that the chemicals that held those memories and perceptions were gone, she was still the same person. She still found that her identity was not a law student, but an artist instead. 


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