Yes(ish), on the basis that the change between me(expr1) and me(expr2) is small enough that assigning them a single consistent identity is more convenient than acknowledging the differences.
But if I’m operating in a more rigorous context, then no; under most circumstances that appear to require epistemological rigor, it seems better to taboo concepts like “I” and “is” altogether.
I share something like this attitude, but in normal non-rigorous contexts I treat me-before-sleep and me-after-sleep as equally me in much the same way as you do me(expr1) and me(expr2).
More generally, my non-rigorous standard for “me” is such that all of my remembered states when I wasn’t sleeping, delirious, or younger than 16 or so unambiguously qualify for “me”dom, despite varying rather broadly amongst themselves. This is mostly because the maximum variation along salient parameters among that set of states seems significantly smaller than the minimum variations between that set and the various other sets of states I observe others demonstrating. (If I lived in a community seeded by copies of myself-as-of-five-minutes ago who could transfer memories among one another, I can imagine my notion of “I” changing radically.)
More generally, my non-rigorous standard for “me” is such that all of my remembered states when I wasn’t sleeping, delirious, or younger than 16 or so unambiguously qualify for “me”dom, despite varying rather broadly amongst themselves. This is mostly because the maximum variation along salient parameters among that set of states seems significantly smaller than the minimum variations between that set and the various other sets of states I observe others demonstrating. (If I lived in a community seeded by copies of myself-as-of-five-minutes ago who could transfer memories among one another, I can imagine my notion of “I” changing radically.)
Nice! I like that reasoning.
I personally experience a somewhat less coherent sense of self, and what sense of self I do experience seems particularly maladaptive to my environment, so we definitely seem to have different epistemological and pragmatic goals—but I think we’re applying very similar reasoning to arrive at our premises.
Jobs are a particularly egregious case where tabooing “is” seems like a good idea—do you find the idea that people “are” their jobs a particularly useful encapsulation of the human experience? Do you, personally find your self fully encapsulated by the ritualized economic actions you perform?
But if ‘I’ differ day to day, then doesn’t this body differ day to day too?
Certainly. How far do you want to go? Maps are not territories, but some maps provide useful representations of territories for certain contexts and purposes.
The danger represented by “I” and “is” come from their tendency to blow away the map-territory relation, and convince the reader that an identity exists between a particular concept and a particular phenomenon.
Yes(ish), on the basis that the change between me(expr1) and me(expr2) is small enough that assigning them a single consistent identity is more convenient than acknowledging the differences.
But if I’m operating in a more rigorous context, then no; under most circumstances that appear to require epistemological rigor, it seems better to taboo concepts like “I” and “is” altogether.
(nods) Fair enough.
I share something like this attitude, but in normal non-rigorous contexts I treat me-before-sleep and me-after-sleep as equally me in much the same way as you do me(expr1) and me(expr2).
More generally, my non-rigorous standard for “me” is such that all of my remembered states when I wasn’t sleeping, delirious, or younger than 16 or so unambiguously qualify for “me”dom, despite varying rather broadly amongst themselves. This is mostly because the maximum variation along salient parameters among that set of states seems significantly smaller than the minimum variations between that set and the various other sets of states I observe others demonstrating. (If I lived in a community seeded by copies of myself-as-of-five-minutes ago who could transfer memories among one another, I can imagine my notion of “I” changing radically.)
Nice! I like that reasoning.
I personally experience a somewhat less coherent sense of self, and what sense of self I do experience seems particularly maladaptive to my environment, so we definitely seem to have different epistemological and pragmatic goals—but I think we’re applying very similar reasoning to arrive at our premises.
So in the following sentence...
“I am a construction worker”
Can you taboo ‘I’ and “am’ for me?
This body works construction.
Jobs are a particularly egregious case where tabooing “is” seems like a good idea—do you find the idea that people “are” their jobs a particularly useful encapsulation of the human experience? Do you, personally find your self fully encapsulated by the ritualized economic actions you perform?
But if ‘I’ differ day to day, then doesn’t this body differ day to day too?
I am fully and happily encapsulated by my job, though I think I may have the only job where this really possible.
Certainly. How far do you want to go? Maps are not territories, but some maps provide useful representations of territories for certain contexts and purposes.
The danger represented by “I” and “is” come from their tendency to blow away the map-territory relation, and convince the reader that an identity exists between a particular concept and a particular phenomenon.
Is the camel’s nose the same thing as his tail? Are the nose and the tail parts of the same thing? What needs tabooing is “same” and “thing”.
I have also found that process useful (although like ‘I’, there are contexts where it is very cumbersome to get around using them).