To be is to identify -
I -
The only way we know ourselves is by being ourselves. We can perceive other things, cups, tables, computers, but only get certain types of data out of it (how hard/soft it is, how it appears, and so on). Our own selves we can know to an infinitely greater extent, even without any scientific knowledge of the inner workings of the body, by existing inside our bodies. We know what it is to be ourselves and this is beyond the understanding of anyone but ourselves.
II -
If I am all that I experience, then everything that I experience (the wall, the sensation of air against the skin) is part of my identity. I am still individualized, separate from all of these things (as I have the ability to close my eyes for instance), but without this external world, what is left inside me? Imagine a child who spends her entire life in a dark abyss, what will she know, and what will she be? That child would only be darkness itself. She would not know what it meant to be alive, or dead, having no way to distinguish anything. She would not have an understanding of anything, with no means to think of anything, but would only feel raw experience itself. To my mind, this means that by nature we are only provided with the means to deal with the world as we sense it, as opposed to our nature having any kind of meaning or significance on its own.
III -
In terms of understanding other people, we know only so much about them: We cannot always fully interpret ourselves, let alone another person! Other people have secrets and memories unavailible to us - it is this that differentiates them from yourself, or any other person (it sounds obvious enough, but sometimes philosophy is here to restate the obvious). And to push things further, let us imagine being in a state where we know all that there was to know: To know all things, we would have to constantly observe them from every distance and direction simultaneously. This is equivalent to being part of everything.
IV -
Our identities are built then on human limitations. It becomes harder to understand the further we move away from this humanity (what is it like being a jellyfish - is it anything at all or just a natural process?). We cannot begin to conceive how immortality, or extending the human being to massive far-reaching proportions will alter what the individual identity means. Imagine existing in two places at once, or at every point in the cosmos at once! It would be quite a significant change (again, with the obviousness).
V -
To be is to identify. All of our experiences are part of this identity, and it is only by our limitations that we are able to have an identity at all.
By Selim 'Selim' Talat
The Philosophy Takeaway 'Identity' Issue 37
