'every cell of your being is replaced' so what about your consciousness/ soul whatever u wanna call it cuz if it's same then you are still the same person who made that choice.
But how they both are the true ship of Theseus because the ship is called ship of Theseus the presence Theseus makes the ship the ship of Theseus so the ship A is the true ship ? Explain 🤔🤔🤔
@Femboy Friday Interesting…According to biology every cell in your body is replaced roughly every 10 years. I am 21 so would that mean I am a copy of my 10 year old self? Definitely something to think about
To clarify, imagine if I had a book with over half the pages water damaged. I could theoretically have the pages replaced and the book would tell the same story. The idea and soul of the book has remained. However, if I had the first edition copy and did the same thing there would be a lot of controversy if I tried to sell it as a first edition.
Suppose we have "The story of Theseus" and it is rewritten every year and the previous version burned and there are no copies. After thousands of years of accumulated mistakes it might well tell a completely different story and yet nobody would know and they would still call it "The story of Theseus"
@@maunglay8833 neither. Both are actually their own “real” flying robot. But not the original. One has no mind stone and the other one has no original organic material.
I speculate that both Flying robots are "Fake". But because both Flying robots are remnants of the "True Original Flying Robot", they just Represent "Values/Purposes" of the former but Free to pursuit a Uniquely New Identity.
MalcolmCooks - But the very same question can be asked about anything else, for an example you! How many of your bodies atoms do I have to replace until you are no longer yourself? Where did the new 'you' come from? Can I rearrange the atoms back to be the original 'you' again?
that is where the problem lies. there should be one ship only, and that is the one on a museum. the next problem is: where does the white vision come from? 🤔
@@late-bloomstrategy9694 dude, white vision is literally the original vision Or you can say his body and now thanks to the hex vision the white vision got his memory back
@@late-bloomstrategy9694 white vision came from parts of vision. But memory suppressed. Hexvis however has memory but no real body. So this is where the theory comes in. Is hexvis the real vis or is whitevis? Which white vis answers "neither are the true ship, both are the true ship"
I immediately relate this with cloning and possibly quantum teleportation. You can even stretch it to surgery, once a part is replaced you would no longer be you. I believe having an educational discussion on it being only a ship helps to discuss it in a non-personal way, separating emotions from the logical possibilities. Once we make it so personal as a human being, we tend to immediately push it morally, instead of using logic.
I'm from roughly ten years into the future from the person you were when you wrote this comment. You are physically now almost a completely different person. Consider that nearly all if not all atoms in your body will be replaced over the course of your life and that it's thought to happen roughly once per decade. You seemingly remain the same consciousness. This strongly implies that the identity of any given consciousness isn't derived from any particular physical particles but rather the abstract manifestation of a particular mathematical structure between arbitrary particles. Why am I me and you are you? Individual particles have identity but apparently our own identities aren't the sum of those many particle identities; rather, the two of us are separate abstract mathematical ideas. This is essentially a much more complex version of me simply being the number 7 and you some other arbitrary number. Ergo, we should then expect that a form of "teleportation" that actually scans and destroys us, sends the information signal, and reassembles us elsewhere from different particles should actually work. That pattern can't simply exist elsewhere without me experiencing it; I *am* that pattern. The idea doesn't even make sense. The elephant in the room, however, is this: What then if we transmit the information and create the "copy" without destroying the original? That's a bridge we'll have to cross when we get there. Perhaps we'll simultaneously experience both bodies via some undiscovered form of mathematical entanglement analogous to more physical quantum entanglement but again completely abstract in nature. That's certainly one route to transmitting information faster than c (the speed of physical causality). On the other hand, perhaps we actually are the sums of particle identities overall but this individual emergent identity is preserved so long as the majority of the particles aren't replaced at any one moment, identity always belonging to the majority. In this model, we should be able to replace our brain structures one at a time and maintain our identity even once completely cybernetic. Here's the scariest possibility of all, though: We are purely the sum of specific particle identities and we in fact *aren't* the same consciousness we once were at all after those particles change. Perhaps our consciousness dies over and over, always replaced by one only just born but that is oblivious due to having the memories of the previous one stored in the brain it inherited. Perhaps I'm not even the same consciousness that started this comment, now here at its end.
@@gamerone7390 This also makes me wonder who I'll be after I completely replace my biological brain structures with cybernetic counterparts. I detailed how I think this might work in my previous comment.
I've had a solution for a long time that I'm surprised to see is not only absent from this list, but I've never seen mentioned by any philosopher throughout history. I think everyone's has had it wrong. The problem is not mathematical, logical, nor philosophical in nature. Rather it's semantic. No object, shape, or color exists as a predefined object or an identity tied to it, but rather is given an identity by observers. This identity is a definition, hence the semantics. A ship is not a ship in and of itself, but simply a large collection of atoms arranged in such a way that we choose to identify, loosely, as a ship. The same is true for anything in the universe. Ships, stars, houses, horses, humans, shapes, and so forth. Choosing to call ship A or B the Ship of Theseus is a question of semantics and is simply to subject to human convention (assuming of course that humans are the only observers we're considering as opposed to some other intellectual entities). If you see a collection of stars in the sky arranged a perfect circle, you're not really seeing a circle. The stars simply have locations in space independent of each other, and your perception that there is a circle there does not make them a circle. That's just the semantic description you're applying to it. The same is true for the Ship of Theseus. All things in the universe exist in a given state at any time independent of observers applying an identity to them.
I think this is a good way to approach this issue. The approach being used to answer the question seems to mix up what a physicist could identify as The Ship of Theseus and what is contained in our mind.
This is actually how Buddhist philosophers have been approaching the problem of "Emptiness" for thousands of years. Without going into too much detail, Emptiness as a philosophical term in Buddhism means that all objects are "empty" of self: meaning that all things come into being because of certain causes and conditions, and they are composites of atoms, molecules, and other parts which had to come before them chronologically to make them. So then the identities we associate with real world items are empty of self-identity, especially because all things change temporally through time as well as spatially. Buddhist philosophers have invoked this problem of Theseus' ship for milennia in some form or another to show how pointless it can be to try to attach ourselves to the illusion that things exist in any sense of permanence. I think your argument for how this issue has alot to do with perspective is very much in line with Buddhist views.
not a questions of definition but one of actual substance and its simple. if you have one, thing and you take something from it or replaced something, is it the same thing you had? simple question simple answer NO. by definition that is not that when that seizes to be what that was.. i feel stupid having to explain it
I think the question is more than just semantics.. You mentioned the stars in a circle are just that, stars in a circle, their existence are given meaning by us, through our own perception. But the question, properly applied, would be, what if small parts of the stars (let's name them x) are removed over a period of time until x is completely replaced by new parts, and the twist comes as what if the original parts of x are used to rebuild itself, resulting in two groups of stars, which group would you say is the real x? The original x, the rebuilded x, or both? Under what principle or logic would you have, to choose your answer?
I honestly have rewatched that scene several times, bc I love Vision suse of learning to be human, but also the times he shows his intellect. Two Visions together being philosophers is just awesome to me 😂
Wouldn't it be easier if we say the ship is an abstract entity only made concrete through its parts and arrangement? This would then allow us to keep the idea of having one ship but two physical manifestations.
To all the people saying that this problem is only one of semantics and/or has no value or meaning: Consider that this question also arises very uncomfortable implications for the nature of human consciousness and the idea of 'self'. If the ship of Theseus is meaningless semantics, then human consciousness is also a meaningless, semantic construct. And while I imagine some people think this problem is entirely semantic nonsense and *also* believe human consciousness is equally semantic, I would wager not all of them would. The Ship of Theseus is just a simplified abstraction, but it can be applied just as well to the human brain.
Good point. The condition of the possibility of apprehending a manifold as the same manifold over time is the transcendental unity of apperception as Kant states. The identity function of any sort; whether it be the ascription of the same function to the percepts (objects) or not, is conditioned upon the identity of the self which Kant deems as transcendental unity of apperception; so without the transcendental unity of apperception, as the transcendental condition of all identity functions, there could not have been any ship of Theseus which pertains to its identity over time.
@@dukeofbanfe I was thinking the same thing. But I guess instead of a soul or conscious we have given it a name. The name 'ship of theseus' represents that soul. This paradox is asking, "is this ship still the owner of that soul/name even after the parts are replaced."
This applies to people as well. I seriously doubt that I share a single molecule with myself from when I was 5 years old. But it would be foolish to say I am no longer the same person. Bizarre.
Sometimes the best way to introduce philosophy to common folk is to be mentioned by main characters (both protagonist and antagonist) in a popular tv show.
@@gaccsi1762 let me guess. You either don't like marvel or you think endgame was the official end for mcu. If it's any one of those, I respect you man. Have a great day. But do check it out, it's really good.
@@thomaspanditfan2435 I came because I have an old BMW E38 that is going through a major restoration and a friend of mine called it the Ship of Theseus, which is very relatable in my case... But I do like Marvel and wish to see WandaVision, just didn't have the time for it so far.
@@gaccsi1762 Alright then. And dont mind please, but don't you think the name of ship of theseaus is weird for an e38. Arent they supposed to be great rally cars. The name doesn't suit that personality of a car.
I think it is up to each individual's perspectives. If i donate my kidney to another person, it doesn't mean I am no longer the original "me", and the receiver becomes the new "me". Identity is set by human own standards, if it is like Tao, there is no need to be affirm on identity, but follow the natural course of life.
I know people might think that you are here after Wanda Vision but I know you have always been a great fan of Theseus work and you really wanted to know which actually is Theseus ship.
My take is that it doesn't matter what material the ship itself is made out of, if the people all agree that the physical object still represents the original then it is still the Ship of Theseus. It's the same reason why things like gold and silver have monetary value, because people agree on what they're worth. If everyone agrees its still the original ship it doesn't matter whether it is or not
Here's another one. Every seven years the human body completely replaces all its cells. Seven years from now will you still be Youssef Helwa? Are you the Youssef Helwa whom your parent/guardian named at birth?
Solution 5 makes the most sense to me. The whole problem only arises because of changes overtime because time allows (imposes even) changes on things, but, since everything humans know exists within space AND TIME, if you really want to get to the bottom of it, something is only truly and completely what it is (the way we perceive them) in a very specific moment in time and space. If you change the time, the thing is now different (think how people change overtime) even if, as far as matter and space are concerned, they are basically the same. If you don't consider time, you end up falling into solution 3, which isn't bad, but, since we are not considering the full extend of the things existence, it is incomplete. Once you make the change in perspective that solution 5 does, you can now consider the whole of the thing and solve the problem while still keeping true to all other principles and keeping the sense of identity (which I guess is the true question here) while simultaneously acknowledging the changes that occurred and that the objects A and B aren't entirely the SOT (Ship of Theseus) while also sharing part of themselves with it (a very good way to account for time and its ever changing nature). P.S. Why are so many people talking about Wandavision?
In the metaphysics of identity, the ship of Theseus is a thought experiment that raises the question of whether an object that has had all of its components replaced remains fundamentally the same object.
I would define the ship by its agency or utility. Once Theseus died so did the ship, because it’s now just a ship, no longer Theseus’s ship, the ship *of* Theseus. Like a house when the occupiers move out, it feels dead, and quickly turns to a ruin, no longer the home it once was.
I've read a lot of the comments here and I don't think many of you actually understand the nature of the problem. When faced with the question "How to define the Ship of Theseus?" most of you seem to answer "carefully". As a joke, it's funny. As a serious answer, it's inadequate, because it's not addressing the real problem here. The author of the video has already given a definition for the ship: a collection of 1000 planks of "superwood" that never decays. What we are talking about here is the justification of referring to either A or B as the real Ship of Theseus when it undergoes change. When you say "it's a matter of definition" or "if we just defined it as exactly as possible, there would be no ambiguity" you are missing the point. ANY definition would have to answer the questions presented in the video: does the Ship of Theseus survive gradual change? If taken apart, would it go where its parts go? Does it only have three spatial dimensions or does it also have a temporal one? You can't avoid having to answer these questions even if the definition was purely a semantic issue, and whichever of the presented answers you chose, you would have to give justifications for it. Most of you are actually just choosing Solution 1 and denying the principle that objects go where their parts go without realizing or justifying it in any way. Someone in the comments also said: "All things in the universe exist in a given state at any time independent of observers giving an identity to them." Does that include the identity you, as an observer, give to yourself? Those of you who claim "there is no real Ship of Theseus" or "it's just a matter of point of view" should think of yourselves as the Ship of Theseus. Imagine you, a conscious being, were somehow dismantled into atoms by some teleportation device and then reassembled somewhere else. How can we know you're still the same person who disappeared at the other end? Would you need to consist of the same atoms and have all the same memories for it to be you? What if some were replaced or lost along the way? We can take this even further: what if the machine malfunctions and creates an identical copy of you on one end while you were still on the other? Or if parts of you were taken away and replaced with new ones so you ended up with a new body (like in the video) but somehow your old body was reassembled and brought to life and it retained all your memories? Who would you be then? Maybe "you" would be where your consciousness is, but the other version of you would also have consciousness and from their point of view they simply moved from one place to another. How would you go about convincing your special other that (s)he should be with this particular version of you and not the other? The problem here is that even if it was a matter of point of view and identities weren't "real" or "part of the physical reality" they are still part of our social reality. Social realities are in no way less "real" than physical ones - they very much exist and influence our lives and surroundings. Problems like the Ship of Theseus and their solutions have real implications for things like legislation, relationships and politics, so they're not just "moot semantics".
So why don't metaphysicists study the "consciousness" in experiments? I've always wondered that. I think it is a more efficient way to figure out this problem than the way of thinking only "speculatively""
No I think it is a matter of definition. If the definition of the object called SoT is a "collection of 1000 planks of "superwood" that never decays", then if ever that object not meet the definition of its name, it stops being that object. In this case, Ship of Theseus. However, if at any point more than one object meet the definition of the name SoT, then SoT turns into the name of a category or set of those objects.
Some philosophers endorse something like the view you are advocating, Praps A . The view is called 'mereological nihilsm'. The idea is that there is no such thing as the parthood relation; really, there are only things that have no parts. Maybe that includes quarks and electrons, but not much else. So tables, chairs, you, me, the Sun --- none of that exists. That is not a majority view.
Nice video. My thoughts on this are as follows… Obviously this whole thing is a metaphor for human beings but in terms of the ship for now, the ship will always be The Ship of Theseus for so long as even 1 person remembers it being so no matter how it is changed. This same rule applies to ourselves. The cells in our bodies break down and are remade constantly so that effectively every 7 years or so we are a completely different set of cells however our consciousness remains and therefore our identity also remains. The problem some might have with that though is that if, for example, John Smith loses his memory in an accident, does he suddenly become a different person? My answer would be no. So long as at least 1 other person or piece of evidence remains to identify him as John Smith then he will always remain as John Smith. Returning the boat, the reason why the second ship built of the original TSoT parts isn’t also known as TSoT is because someone else built the second ship and would therefore have given it a different identity. The same thing would be true of any building that has been built using the materials from a building that had been torn down. The same bricks, doors, windows etc might have been used but if what was a hospital is now a school, you wouldn’t continue to call it a hospital. On the flip side of that though, just because an item undergoes a change of identity doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s a truly different product until everyone who remembers it’s original identity ceases to remember. For example, the chocolate bar Snickers used to be called Marathon. If you asked me to buy you a marathon, I wouldn’t immediately reject your request and say such a thing doesn’t exist because to me, a Snickers and a Marathon are the same thing. In fact, this is actually a really good example of a real world, current day scenario of this paradox because like TSoT, the Marathon bar has had numerous changes made to it such as the wrapper, the size of the bar itself (yeah they’re definitely smaller nowadays, I’m sure lol), maybe even the peanut/nougat/chocolate ratio etc but to me it’s still the same Marathon chocolate bar. Anyone have any thoughts on this?
I REALLY APPRECIATE the pan out at the end of the episode. Reviewing the entirty of the lecture mapped out so graphically and demonstrably is so helpful! Please carry on!
In Conscious Universe theory, all objects have a consciousness. This concept is also prevalent in many Eastern traditions. The Ship of Theseus is based on the conscious entity known as the Ship of Theseus. No matter how many parts change, the consciousness remains with the original. Each plank that is lost has it's own consciousness and when the new ship (B) is formed with all the old planks, it is a new consciousness that is composed of the parts of the old ship. Identity relates to consciousness both for what we perceive as living and non-living creatures.
A few points: 1. I learned this as 'Humes' broom' - he had owned the same broom for many years, changing the head 3 times and the handle twice - etc. This phrase 'Humes' broom' seems to have disappeared now. Not important. 2. For those who want to dismiss this as simply pointless playing with words, consider the very real vintage car market, where the value of restored cars is definitely dependent on the proportion of the original vehicle that remains. Collectors of such vehicles do not want a car consisting entirely of spares (their motives in this are, of course, part of the puzzle). Ordinary people are having to find practical monetary answers to this puzzle. 3. I am amazed that these Wireless Philosphy videos are not attempting to introduce Wittgensteinian analysis to such problems; personally I feel this is the most penetrating way to go. In particular, trying to understand how our language leads us into many of these famous philosophical traps is at the heart of the issue. Note that calling them 'traps of language' is not the same as dismissing the puzzles as unimportant, but it's a pointer to the direction that analysis should take. 4. Indeed, how does an entire series on epsitemology jump from Russell to late 20th century philosophers, missing out Wittgensteing entirely, when he seems to me to have much the most intelligent (though hard to understand) things to say.
So, we can say White Vision is the Ship on Scenario 1, because he had every part of his reforged/replaced, and 'memory vision' is the Ship on scenario 2 because he looks, thinks, feels and acts as the Original Vision, but he isn't physically made of the original Vision, but still is, for intents and purposes, Vision. Amazing
I believe it is not about the ship of Theseus but the associations we attach to anything. The ship of Theseus is a conception and our associated thoughts make the replica of the ship more like the actual ship than the aged parts of the first, because it is truer to how it existed when it was Theseus's ship. The original parts being aged means that another dimension (time) has cast them beyond the point of return to their original existence, thus a replica is truer and the aged original is less true.
i think people who say the ship isnt the same in senario 1 really hold on to things. like they get attached to things people who say its the same can easily accept and let go of things
I go for the "evolutionary change". Every plank replaced is a new generation of the same ship, but that plank also becomes part of a new ship after 1000 years, both ships having a common ancestor, which is the Ship of Theseus, and since nothing can escape their ancestry, both ships are the Ship of Theseus AND on top of that, a new ship, whatever name they have been given.
Disclaimer :This comment section is soon going to be overtaken by the "Wandavision Finale, Vision vs. White Vision library talk" brought me here. In the name of all MCU Fans I apologize in advance 😂😂😂
Ah, I was first made aware of this when I watched Star Trek Enterprise (Archer) and the transporter was mentioned. Like, when you "beam up" the captain, is that really the captain? Or just some imposter? A copy? A clone? Do you murder the captain every time you do that? Hu, Mr. Scott? In the series it gets dismissed out of hand as "supersticious nonsense". Basically, as long as the application of the science has no negative consequences, why argue about it? Yet, the practical application leads to Riker being duplicated in Star Trek The Next Generation (Picard), and thus precicely to the discussion we're having. All of a sudden something that "has never happened before" happens. Star Trek has always had a more "objective Reality" approach to things, especially in TNG. If they'd taken a "subjective" reality approach, the discussion would have been a lot more interesting.
I am liable to ramble on here for a while, so pass over this comment if you so wish. EDIT: I don't know if I am using the term "universal" correctly, so just know that I mean "something that doesn't change with time". I'll start by defining identity. My intuitive sense of what identity is (Gah, more loopiness! I'm identifying identity!) is that it is a quality that we sentient beings apply to our perceptions when we wish to segregate them into categories. This, of course, is not something we usually choose to do. Evolution favored our ancestors being able to identify a loose rock as separate from the ground, so our brain is able to segregate categories quite effortlessly at this point in a (dare I say "subjective"?) manner. The problem with this is that our brain is so complicated that people label the point at which a changing object becomes a new object "ambiguous" if there is no absolute way to define when it is rechristened, and leave it at that. Ambiguity in identity is not always a bad thing. The processes in our brain (including that wonderful, pesky thing called consciousness) receive inputs about the object constantly, and frequently reevaluate it to see if it has changed in any way that would deserve recategorization. In many ways, it is a better, more flexible system than many an absolute boundary we could devise. Our current understanding of our universe on the molecular level does, however, allow us some seemingly absolute definitions for what separates objects spatio-temporally. We could, for instance, define the number of atoms in the depletion zone of a transistor to be 50 across, which, in this case, is more useful than anything our brains could muster, because we cannot discern such small distances, and because we don't want it to be reevaluated. Sometimes it's useful to have standards. These standards, however, must be defined by us. They do not inherently exist! Remember what I defined identity as: a quality assigned by sentient beings. Now that I think about it, however, laws of nature and our system of logic seem to be quite fixed over time. Empirically, we have had great success assuming that the laws of nature don't change much, and that mathematics is constant, so we can infer from this that the laws of nature and our system of logic are constant. Therefore, it's safe to assume their identity will never change (i.e. we will never wake up to find ourselves governed by a new system of logic, discernible from the old one by). Perhaps I could amend my definition of identity to include such universals as these by calling it: a quality discovered by sentient beings. This changes things quite a bit, but I like it more. When a rock lies on the ground, or when a transistor sits on a chip, our intuitive sense of the universe and the progress we have made in understanding it leads us to believe that it is made up of one configuration of atoms (Disregard Schrodinger's cat for now. I don't know enough about quantum theory to include it in this discussion, but I'm working on it!) that changes over time. We, as observers of this universe, discover the configuration of atoms to some approximation, and then apply our superficial categories of identity. This way, the definition for identity allows us to ascribe a single identity to a single object at a single point in time, or a single identity to universals throughout time, while also enabling us to give changing objects like the Ship of Theseus the same identity over time through subjective means that our brain handles for us, allowing us the utility of calling our bodies the same bodies even though most of the cells are replaced (though I think that has to do more with our continued feeling of consciousness, and permanence of memory). So, going back to the ship... This definition for identity would say that at every point in time every object has a distinct identity (values at points in a continuous function can be defined, so I will assume that logic affords the same luxury to time and space in our universe as well). Universals have persisting identities, while everything else does not, but our brain, in all its glory, is capable of assigning "blanket identities", if you will, to objects with continuously changing identities. I realize that I am not going back to the ship analogy, but I don't think it matters. I just realized that my use of the word "identity" has taken on two distinct definitions, which I will attempt to... elucidate. identity (lowercase i), will henceforth in this UA-cam comment denote a "blanket identity" assigned by a sentient observer for the sake of utility. Identity (capital 'eye'), on the other hand, will denote the single configuration at a single point in time of everything in the universe, including universals. This is tricky. You see, I wanted Identity (capital 'eye') to somehow be able to distinguish the rock from the ground, but doing so requires an observer and/or a decision procedure for segregation of rock from ground, and thus it seems identity must come before Identity, but surely universals don't require observers in order to be segregated from the rest of the universe. Now that I think about it, I've stumbled into a bigger problem, and one that I think is difficult to solve. We as human observers are graced with a conflict between the intuition of realism and the fact (hmm) that we are observers. We would like to think that our blanket statements of identity, especially about universals, apply in our absence and the absence of all observers like us, but those blankets were kitted by us in our presence, so we can make no inferences as to how the universe would be categorized in our absence, because doing so would imply our presence to make observations and categorizations, a contradiction, and one that definitely grinds my intuition gears. Absence doesn't have to be death. What if everyone went to sleep at the same time, or what if everyone's consciousness was temporarily interrupted by stimulation of the claustrum at the same time? But it doesn't have to be us making the categorizations, right? A decision procedure is all that is needed. No consciousness required. A simple input/output machine, with a few feedback loops, and maybe it could be really compact, and have a mechanism for moving around and taking in observations, and perpetuating itself, and adapting to a changing environment, and improving itself over time. Sound familiar? So maybe the deal is that there will always be a decision procedure somewhere in the universe. Meaning can, after all, be extracted from anything, although at a certain point it becomes nonsense. A decision procedure represented somewhere in the universe for identifying a rock from the ground by seeing if 2+2=5 takes no input from the system in question, and will only return one output when observed, but it could still be used as a decision procedure. So we run into another interesting tidbit. identity (lowercase i) can be defined by multiple decision procedures and/or sentient observers, and thus is, by intuitive definition, subjective. My sense, however, is that Identity (uppercase 'eye') is objective in the way I have defined it, even if the definition itself is certainly subjective. Going back to the end of the "So, going back to the ship..." paragraph, I'd like to tie some loose ends off. When I said "identity must come before Identity", what I think I meant is "observers must come before categories". This seems to be a reasonable assumption. The universe is laid out in a certain way, sometimes clearly, and sometimes blurry and ambiguously. It is up to us to categorize the blurry and ambiguous as we go along, but again we run into the problem of having to concede the universals as subjectively categorized when our intuition screams the opposite. I propose (to myself :P) that the definition of Identity (capital 'eye') be amended to "the single configuration at a single point in time of everything in the universe, EXCEPT universals". This way, we can say that observers must create the categories in order for them to exist for everything except universals, which I think is reasonable. It's merely an issue of semantics, speaking of which, we probably need an analogue to the words identity and Identity for universals, which I will set to be "state". So, three new definitions to think about problems of identity with: Identity: An instantaneous state of everything that changes over time in the universe. identity: A quality that sentient observers and/or decision procedures give some section of Identity that meets their requirements for categorization. State (capitalization doesn't matter): When referring to universals, the qualities that a universal possesses, by which it can be distinguished from other aspects of the universe. If I wasn't so deep into this, I would rename "Identity" to be "reality", but it was less confusing to just go with it. So, really going back to the ship: I think Theseus's ship has a subjectively defined identity, constitutes a constantly changing chunk of Identity, and has nothing to do with universals. There's your tl;dr. Good night!
Reading these comments makes one thing clear. A lot of people are missing a good presentation in order to look smart by being dismissive. You are fooling no one.
It all depends on what you are referring to when you when you say 'the ship of Theseus'. If it is the idea of the "ship of Theseus" then it only exists in the collective consciousness of the people. Now if we presume that the idea still manifests itself in a physical object a 1000 years later, then whichever ship the majority of the people, familiar with the idea of the ship of Theseus, think is the one will be the ship of Theseus. If we are talking not about the idea of the Ship of Theseus but the actual physical object on which Theseus undertook his adventure, then before the puzzle can be framed, one instant [moment in time] has to be agreed upon when the physical object is being referred to as the ship of Theseus. Eg When the ship just just finished being built or may be the moment when it docked after the return of Theseus from his adventure. Outside of that instant, the said agreed upon ship does not exist as some change in the physical object is taking place at every instant.
From the standpoint of just physical reality nothing spooky or hard to understand is going on here. This is just a case of us getting bewitched by our own language. The question of which is the ship of Theseus simply doesn't have an answer in the same way that the question of how much mass the ship has at any given point does. The cool thing about this thought experiment is the exposition of the fact that we imagine our conceptual projections onto our world have absolute objective meaning when they do not.
Indeed. A is a modified object originally the ship of theseus and B is an object replica of the original ship of theseus None of the ships of the same year are identical, they are different. Why create an abstract problem over concrete reality? For fun...but a waste fo time in this case
There are many people who restore old aircraft, some for museums and some to fly again. One man bought and sold spare parts for these older aircraft: he had 'a spares holding' of never-used, reconditioned and reclaimed parts. Over years people restoring old planes, let's say it was a Hawker Hurricane (because it was), rebuilt one to fly, using a real original aircraft in an incomplete condition, some old parts carefully conserved so that they and their paperwork maintained according to regulations showed that they were airworthy, and parts made especially for the project to original or better specifications. The parts taken off the original were traded vie the spares holder, new parts were sourced from several other re-builders, the spares holder and from other incomplete Hurricanes. The end result was a flying Hawker Hurricane, a spares holding, and a complete museum-quality but not flyable Hurricane owned by the spares holder. Now, the planes and parts were all documented as real and either airworthy or not by legal specifications and long-established paperwork. Now: which aircraft is a real Hawker Hurricane srial number (frex) RR213, and which is the 'bitsa' a replica built from other lanes? This has really happened, as opposed to a philosophical abstract, so which, or what? Fun, eh? ;-)
I past my Wittgenstien seminar with a c-. Don't look at me.lol My hands were trembling when I wrote that final paper. His intelligence was on a whole other level.
I'd say that the original ship acted in the slow change of it's self, giving form and support throughout, becoming a father to it's replicated self. In this way it lives on. Plus, if like with crime scene logic, once a room is entered the properties of one's self and room become mixed, on leaving you take something with you, and leave something behind, even if all is replaced some evidence of interaction here remains, the scene of today is the effect of past events, the old ship caused (like a tool it's self) the new ship, leaving it's self in evidence inside the presence of the new ship. So as far as the frist situation goes I'd say that the old ship is present in part as DNA and in part as a crafters production.
Identity is not solely tied to the physical. The human body replaces itself almost entirely over time but we remain the same person. With the ship metaphor.. a ship is more than the sum of its parts, therefore its identity stays constant.
*I always thought, as each plank was added to SoT: Year 0, it was absorbed into the identity of that original ship. And by SoT: Year 1000, every component of each ship is "of Theseus". However, since all of the original components are back to their original form, we then have a "Sr./Jr." situation, or as you put it, SoT-A & SoT-B. SoT-A being SoT: Year 0 that was simply built twice. Then, SoT-B being SoT: Year 1000 which is made up of secondary/replacement components that absorbed the SoT name while serving their purpose, i.e., the "B" ship.*
I think this is quite simple thing. it depends on naming principal. if you name ship by its experience, (sail, adventure) ship with original component would called 'old Theseus' (with old adventures). and ship with new component just called 'new Theseus'(with new adventures). so, both could be Theseus. but in this case, if new ship doesn't have experience, it couldn't have the name. its just replica. if you name ship by it's component, ship is actually changing 'Theseus(100%)' to "Theseus(n%)". when you call the ship, you just omit the parentheses. so actually two ships are actually something like 'Theseus(73.8%)' , 'Theseus(26.2%)'. but we can't actually name that percentage, so naming will depends on observer. like 'Theseus(almost)'', 'Theseus(Eh, not really)'. this seems hard question because people confuse these naming principle.
Random thoughts I had. What if you think of the "Spot" in existence that ship A and B are at is a placeholder. Thinking Ship A was always the ship of Theseus, Everything its parts touched made it so. As the years went by the "area" that the ship touched from the water, other parts etc. became part of it. In that thought that would give Ship B's "area" that same amount of time to acclimate its own "area" to ALMOST become the ship of Theseus. So when all pieces are moved ship be is as much as Theseus's ship as it can be. Why almost? There are still influences on ship A that hold it as The Ship of Theseus, and always will be. (Jar of marbles Theory) Jar A is full and Jar B is empty at first. Slowly as in the Theory of The Ship of Theseus (TSOT) parts are replaced and reconstructed. As jar B gets more and more marbles Jar A will always have just one more marble added to its jar. Outside influences add the marbles to Jar A and there for decides what Jar's marbles are the original. So do the outside influences have authority over whomever replaces/moves the marbles? (Or me tortise theory.) The ship just slooooooooooooooowly moved.
I’d go with the torturous theory. Only because the ship only serves as a memorial and as such the one made of the planks Theseus touched and sailed on has a stronger clam as a memorial.
Isn't it like a pair of pretenders to a throne? Both have good claims - it's about whose story you find more compelling. It's not contradictory to say X and Y both have good claims to be the King of England even though there can only be one King. Equally both ships have good claim to be THE ship of Theseus but there's a degree of flexibility based on the peculiar nature of the scenario.
True, but I don't think they were accounting for the idea of the originality of the object in this in saying it IS the ship. In stead I think the point is how much of a collective quantifies the name of the collective. It's like saying how many parts can you place on a classic car, before it's all but a shell. Your right in the context of what IS the real and original ship of Theseus as both can claim it, but really their only variations to an original as it was first constructed by the ship makers.
I think that setting this in a different scenario could help define this one. What if someone built a 1 for 1 replica of the ship after the original had been lost. We might call it the ship of Theseus. But then suppose the original ship of Theseus what’s found largely preserved. And a team of specialists disassembled it cleans it and reassembled it in a museum. People would probably remark even well looking at the newer ship floating in the harbor that the real ship of Theseus was sitting in a museum. Therefore I would claim that in the original situation as soon as the ship being build from the original parts had more original pieces of the ship that Theseus actually touched than the one floating in the harbor it would become the real ship of Theseus.
The human body is replacing every cell and replacing the proteins that make up the cells that that don’t replace. The solution is that both sips are the ship of theseus.
Well, FWIW, ship builders consider the keel board to be the identity of the ship. When the keel was removed, A stopped being the ship of Theseus. When the keel was laid to make the new ship B, *that* was the ship of Theseus.
The question of How Objects Survive Change is more about the mind than reality. It's about human cognition, and human language. Is an object just the sum of it's parts? Obviously not. There are more aspects to "A Thing" than the physical parts. There is function, purpose, and real life social context ( how do real people perceive and talk about this object?) - all aspects of the mind. Change is not just physical change but how cognition of a an object changes over time. This video presents another aspect to the Whole/Parts question: this is not only a ship, but "Theseus's Ship", i.e. it has meaning based on it's past - - this object has a known history. The questions of how we attach meaning to an object and how meaning persists over time and over the deterioration of an object (and repair) is definitely not a logical problem as this video implies - or at least we do not get much insight from logical analysis - - it's about meaning, which is about language and social cognition of our world as co-created in our linguistic interaction. Ask the Athenians if they think of that ship in their harbor as "Theseus's Ship" 100 years, 400 years, 800 years hence. Why is logical analysis not helpful? Because it's too reductionist. Just because logical abstraction works with quantification, i.e. mathematics (we abstract the concept of 1 unit for each thing, and then apply operations to those units, like addition and multiplication), doesn't mean it works with IDENTITY. The Identity of a Thing over Time is a complex feature of consciousness, memory and language/communication. Identity cannot be abstracted and reduced to operational components: a thing is not just parts. That we have single words for things gives the illusion of singularity, but it's just a feature of language and our linguistic logic.
The Theseus ship was anchored in the harbor all of a sudden the ship its function and its meaning changed it became a memorial. Given the fact that two objects cannot occupy the same space, the XY coordinates of the memorial provides the key to the puzzle
All things exist as a pattern in a mind. Some things also have an external referent. Both the internal neutral correlate and the external physical referent (if any) must have a unique position in each of the three physical dimensions; space, time, and scale.
Solution 6: As far as the physics is concerned an object is defined by the sum of it's parts, meaning a finite set of particles. As far as humans are concerned an object is a general idea, dependent upon one's own perception. Both the particles and our perception are subject to change, but not in precisely the same manner, and therein lies the issue. Philosophical paradoxes are what happens when you hold the false assumption that the logic of the universe and the reasoning of the human brain are one and the same.
I usually present this in the "My grandfather's hammer" question. Simple with two parts. The head and the handle. You can even add a twist by saying that my grandfather carved his name in the handle, adding sentiment to the argument.
I personally think it's a mix of solutions as solution 1 because the orginal is the first to exist and the orginal parts are used to recreate the ship B, solution 2/3 because if it gets upgraded/repaired and becomes thesus1.4-but we never really count those steps/replacements- and the end(year1000) an entirely new ship(A) with new planks and new name is formed and can be thought as a copyright.
There's another practical solution, one that actually applies metaphysics. The Ship of Theseus is that which bears the crest, seal, coat of arms, etc. Regardless of the parts replaced or not, it remains the Ship of Theseus due to this heraldry. Just as an individual person remains that individual, regardless of amputation or replaced parts, they retain their mind. Conscious existence cannot be replaced or duplicated.
So which one is the real ship of theseus? and what really makes the ship of theseus THE ship of theseus? Is it the ship of theseus because it still looks the same with different parts? Is a person the same when they get old? even though all their cells have been replaced by new cells? what defines that person? What defines me? Am I the same person as when I was a kid? Or are the Memories that define us? Whereas objects have none. Something to think about eh
The whole argument changes when we conclude that everything is always in constant change due to entropy. Hence the concept of the same cannot exist beyond an instant in time in a finite universe
A thing is a set of attributes and boundary conditions in a mind which differentiates things according to purpose. If you value the original provenance of the ship, the reassembled pieces will do the job for you, even though they're decrepit and can't function as a ship any longer. The continuity of a thing is part of it - how it changes. Any ship, to be a ship, must be able to act as a ship in some functional manner. Replacing broken parts is part of the continuity of the identity of the Ship of Theseus.
This is how I see it, if you serve the same purpose you’re the same ship, but if you change one of their purpose, it becomes different, still the same ship but with different purpose, no matter the original parts
4:27 The turning point would be at the year 501, when the new planks outnumber the original planks. There was no need to find an arbitrary number at all.
That argument implies the Ship of Theseus is really a single plank, because removing just one plank in the year 501 transfers the ship’s identity to another ship. Picking the halfway point does seem nice and reasonable, but it’s just as arbitrary as any other point.
@@infinityphoenix1 plank 501 wouldn’t necessarily be a random number, as this would be the point when the ship has more ‘new’ planks than it would have surviving from year 0. At this point, it would be said that the identity of the ship would have changed as a whole, and it would not be accurate to describe this as the ship of Theseus as it was in year 0. It does not retain the original identity of year 0, but has not lost it entirely. Instead of being duplicitous in whether or not it is or is not the ship of Theseus at year 501, it would be better to describe it as a ‘partial replica’.
Objects don’t “survive” change. Words do. It’s just people looking at patterns and placing labels. There’s no right answer to the ship of Theseus question, it’s a decision we make, or in this case, it’s a decision we don’t make, and instead leave it as a question. As an individual though, I’ve decided to answer the question as I see it. I don’t think the ship is ever the same ship. Even before the boards were replaced, they were decomposing, drying out, soaking up sea water. Their atoms were shifting around in new configurations, the electrons moving about infinitely and chaotically, only partially related to one another through attraction, and all connected to some mass er call a ship that never exists in the same way, in the same place in space or time as our planet whizzes through time and space endlessly. The only reason we believe anything remains the same throughout the progression of time is because our mind is a pattern recognition machine, endlessly searching to identify and compartmentalize familiar shapes and give them some sort of subjective object permanence, when the reality is that it’s all just a mass of subatomic particles and waves, all moving about endlessly in funny patterns, all part of some grand pattern that we call change, and that change being nothing more than a ripple on the surface of a pond flying through 4 dimensional space, colliding with the virtual particles that keep everything from settling.
Almost a zen koan. Also brings to mind the Diamond Sutra. And, of course, Donovan: first there is a mountain, then there is no mountain, then there is.
![The 'Ship of Theseus' Problem [Illustrated]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/iVlIZJTwgyQ/mqdefault.jpg)
Can i use this in court ?
"Sorry lad. Every cells of my being have been replaced.
I'm not the same guy that committed murders few years ago"
ironically this is a philosophical topic as well.
'every cell of your being is replaced' so what about your consciousness/ soul whatever u wanna call it cuz if it's same then you are still the same person who made that choice.
Neurons stays same, so the point invalid
Objects are not conscious like us to assume that
They are each part of them
^this guy is living in the year 3030
"Neither are the true ship". "They both are the true ship".
But how they both are the true ship of Theseus because the ship is called ship of Theseus the presence Theseus makes the ship the ship of Theseus so the ship A is the true ship ? Explain 🤔🤔🤔
@Femboy Friday Interesting…According to biology every cell in your body is replaced roughly every 10 years. I am 21 so would that mean I am a copy of my 10 year old self? Definitely something to think about
Nice mam
time is the ship that carries us all to the final destination.
@@greatpower6063 I knew somebody would bring that up. Let's go to atomic level, well now it get's really confusing.
“I require elaboration”
who’s the popsicle?
@@TheAniMenga and who’s that impostor pietro
@@TheAniMenga Stfu Bohner🥒
"I am Vision"
Sorry for being that guy, but it’s actually “I request elaboration.”
*Fans watching WandaVision finale*
Fans after the finale: "I require elaboration"
I really do
Request *
Is scenario B restoring the old rotten blanks and using them again for the ship is Theseus??
@@MiguelA.Zapata r/woosh
We stoopid so instead of requesting elaboration, we require it
Facts
To clarify, imagine if I had a book with over half the pages water damaged. I could theoretically have the pages replaced and the book would tell the same story. The idea and soul of the book has remained. However, if I had the first edition copy and did the same thing there would be a lot of controversy if I tried to sell it as a first edition.
Especially if someone took all of your damaged pages and made another first edition.
Suppose we have "The story of Theseus" and it is rewritten every year and the previous version burned and there are no copies. After thousands of years of accumulated mistakes it might well tell a completely different story and yet nobody would know and they would still call it "The story of Theseus"
@@SmileyEmoji42that is how the meanings of some concepts change over time
@@SmileyEmoji42that’s just religion but with extra steps
@@Jasondurgen I was going to say that before I read your comment.
welcome to the “i’m here from the wandavision finale” club.
Took the words right out of my mouth. The fight between Vsions was glorious
Yessir
🪵
Woo
Sup
Here because I didn't get what the 2 flying Magic Robots are talking about.
Which one is the real flying magic robot? 🤔
@@maunglay8833 neither. Both are actually their own “real” flying robot. But not the original. One has no mind stone and the other one has no original organic material.
@@constantineramirez450 My brain hurts😧
@@I-speak-U-shut-it it’s somewhat complicated but easy to understand at the same time
I speculate that both Flying robots are "Fake". But because both Flying robots are remnants of the "True Original Flying Robot", they just Represent "Values/Purposes" of the former but Free to pursuit a Uniquely New Identity.
Philosophers sure had lots of time back then...
Lmao 😂
after playing ac valhalla m, yes they had.
@@kentgabucan
Why waste time and money of that failure of an "AC"?
@@paulmayson3129 had fun actually. i just like this very open world kind of games.
2500 years to be exact.
The paradox arises because humans define objects. The "ship of theseus" doesn't exist as anything beyond a label we apply to a collection of wood.
That’s kind of the point of said paradox
THANK YOU I was thinking of this the whole time. you can't apply language and culture to common sense every time.
Would an equivalent paradox arise regarding when the label "ship of theseus" applies to the collections of planks and when it doesn't?
MalcolmCooks - But the very same question can be asked about anything else, for an example you!
How many of your bodies atoms do I have to replace until you are no longer yourself? Where did the new 'you' come from? Can I rearrange the atoms back to be the original 'you' again?
Exactly!
Here to kickstart the “who’s here from wandavision series finale”
“I request elaboration” -White Vision
Why am I up even searching this shit. I got work tomorrow.
Me
dang it... you beat me to it lol
Yeah, didn't expect a philosophy lesson today but here we are
So in layman terms, "neither is the true ship. Both are the true ship."
Dude I'm confused!
that is where the problem lies. there should be one ship only, and that is the one on a museum. the next problem is: where does the white vision come from? 🤔
@@late-bloomstrategy9694 dude, white vision is literally the original vision
Or you can say his body and now thanks to the hex vision the white vision got his memory back
@@late-bloomstrategy9694 white vision came from parts of vision. But memory suppressed. Hexvis however has memory but no real body. So this is where the theory comes in. Is hexvis the real vis or is whitevis? Which white vis answers "neither are the true ship, both are the true ship"
Schrodingers ship?
I immediately relate this with cloning and possibly quantum teleportation. You can even stretch it to surgery, once a part is replaced you would no longer be you. I believe having an educational discussion on it being only a ship helps to discuss it in a non-personal way, separating emotions from the logical possibilities. Once we make it so personal as a human being, we tend to immediately push it morally, instead of using logic.
Logic a plank or morals bigger part of shit?
I thought of cybernetics
I'm from roughly ten years into the future from the person you were when you wrote this comment. You are physically now almost a completely different person.
Consider that nearly all if not all atoms in your body will be replaced over the course of your life and that it's thought to happen roughly once per decade. You seemingly remain the same consciousness. This strongly implies that the identity of any given consciousness isn't derived from any particular physical particles but rather the abstract manifestation of a particular mathematical structure between arbitrary particles.
Why am I me and you are you? Individual particles have identity but apparently our own identities aren't the sum of those many particle identities; rather, the two of us are separate abstract mathematical ideas. This is essentially a much more complex version of me simply being the number 7 and you some other arbitrary number.
Ergo, we should then expect that a form of "teleportation" that actually scans and destroys us, sends the information signal, and reassembles us elsewhere from different particles should actually work. That pattern can't simply exist elsewhere without me experiencing it; I *am* that pattern. The idea doesn't even make sense.
The elephant in the room, however, is this: What then if we transmit the information and create the "copy" without destroying the original? That's a bridge we'll have to cross when we get there. Perhaps we'll simultaneously experience both bodies via some undiscovered form of mathematical entanglement analogous to more physical quantum entanglement but again completely abstract in nature. That's certainly one route to transmitting information faster than c (the speed of physical causality).
On the other hand, perhaps we actually are the sums of particle identities overall but this individual emergent identity is preserved so long as the majority of the particles aren't replaced at any one moment, identity always belonging to the majority. In this model, we should be able to replace our brain structures one at a time and maintain our identity even once completely cybernetic.
Here's the scariest possibility of all, though: We are purely the sum of specific particle identities and we in fact *aren't* the same consciousness we once were at all after those particles change. Perhaps our consciousness dies over and over, always replaced by one only just born but that is oblivious due to having the memories of the previous one stored in the brain it inherited.
Perhaps I'm not even the same consciousness that started this comment, now here at its end.
@@gamerone7390 This also makes me wonder who I'll be after I completely replace my biological brain structures with cybernetic counterparts. I detailed how I think this might work in my previous comment.
First. There was the Ship of Theseus. Now there is Ship of Theseus one and Ship of Theseus Two. Soon enough he will have an entire fleet.
thank you sir!
Not really because every thousand years the boards need to be replaced, and how may times can you keep recycling the same planks
But only the first one will be seaworthy. (aka a ship)
Who's here after Wandavision?!,
I've had a solution for a long time that I'm surprised to see is not only absent from this list, but I've never seen mentioned by any philosopher throughout history. I think everyone's has had it wrong. The problem is not mathematical, logical, nor philosophical in nature. Rather it's semantic.
No object, shape, or color exists as a predefined object or an identity tied to it, but rather is given an identity by observers. This identity is a definition, hence the semantics. A ship is not a ship in and of itself, but simply a large collection of atoms arranged in such a way that we choose to identify, loosely, as a ship. The same is true for anything in the universe. Ships, stars, houses, horses, humans, shapes, and so forth. Choosing to call ship A or B the Ship of Theseus is a question of semantics and is simply to subject to human convention (assuming of course that humans are the only observers we're considering as opposed to some other intellectual entities).
If you see a collection of stars in the sky arranged a perfect circle, you're not really seeing a circle. The stars simply have locations in space independent of each other, and your perception that there is a circle there does not make them a circle. That's just the semantic description you're applying to it. The same is true for the Ship of Theseus. All things in the universe exist in a given state at any time independent of observers applying an identity to them.
I think this is a good way to approach this issue. The approach being used to answer the question seems to mix up what a physicist could identify as The Ship of Theseus and what is contained in our mind.
This is actually how Buddhist philosophers have been approaching the problem of "Emptiness" for thousands of years. Without going into too much detail, Emptiness as a philosophical term in Buddhism means that all objects are "empty" of self: meaning that all things come into being because of certain causes and conditions, and they are composites of atoms, molecules, and other parts which had to come before them chronologically to make them. So then the identities we associate with real world items are empty of self-identity, especially because all things change temporally through time as well as spatially. Buddhist philosophers have invoked this problem of Theseus' ship for milennia in some form or another to show how pointless it can be to try to attach ourselves to the illusion that things exist in any sense of permanence. I think your argument for how this issue has alot to do with perspective is very much in line with Buddhist views.
not a questions of definition but one of actual substance and its simple. if you have one, thing and you take something from it or replaced something, is it the same thing you had? simple question simple answer NO. by definition that is not that when that seizes to be what that was.. i feel stupid having to explain it
I think the question is more than just semantics.. You mentioned the stars in a circle are just that, stars in a circle, their existence are given meaning by us, through our own perception. But the question, properly applied, would be, what if small parts of the stars (let's name them x) are removed over a period of time until x is completely replaced by new parts, and the twist comes as what if the original parts of x are used to rebuild itself, resulting in two groups of stars, which group would you say is the real x? The original x, the rebuilded x, or both? Under what principle or logic would you have, to choose your answer?
What no one is laughing at it?
The two vision convo was soo interesting I had to find answers about “the ship of Theseus”😃
I honestly have rewatched that scene several times, bc I love Vision suse of learning to be human, but also the times he shows his intellect. Two Visions together being philosophers is just awesome to me 😂
Logics and reasoning
This is going to blow up after WandaVision
Wouldn't it be easier if we say the ship is an abstract entity only made concrete through its parts and arrangement? This would then allow us to keep the idea of having one ship but two physical manifestations.
You make the most sense here,its been 9 years but i hope you are doing good!
The discussion of this was probably my favorite moment from the whole season.
To all the people saying that this problem is only one of semantics and/or has no value or meaning:
Consider that this question also arises very uncomfortable implications for the nature of human consciousness and the idea of 'self'. If the ship of Theseus is meaningless semantics, then human consciousness is also a meaningless, semantic construct. And while I imagine some people think this problem is entirely semantic nonsense and *also* believe human consciousness is equally semantic, I would wager not all of them would.
The Ship of Theseus is just a simplified abstraction, but it can be applied just as well to the human brain.
Good point. The condition of the possibility of apprehending a manifold as the same manifold over time is the transcendental unity of apperception as Kant states. The identity function of any sort; whether it be the ascription of the same function to the percepts (objects) or not, is conditioned upon the identity of the self which Kant deems as transcendental unity of apperception; so without the transcendental unity of apperception, as the transcendental condition of all identity functions, there could not have been any ship of Theseus which pertains to its identity over time.
I would agree except the ship of Theseus has no soul or consciousness.
@@dukeofbanfe I was thinking the same thing. But I guess instead of a soul or conscious we have given it a name. The name 'ship of theseus' represents that soul. This paradox is asking, "is this ship still the owner of that soul/name even after the parts are replaced."
POV: You're here after WandaVision finale.
I request elaboration
@@Alienull naturally
yes
I am lol
I am vision
A buddhist would claim neither are the ship of theseus. this is a paradox they handle quite gracefully.
Not really. They just smugly laugh at anything challenging and say something about how all is one or whatever.
I guess wandavision was written by a monk 😂
This applies to people as well. I seriously doubt that I share a single molecule with myself from when I was 5 years old. But it would be foolish to say I am no longer the same person. Bizarre.
I mean, you are yet you're not
@@emptyallen3334 your comment is so useless
Sometimes the best way to introduce philosophy to common folk is to be mentioned by main characters (both protagonist and antagonist) in a popular tv show.
White Vision just got his memory back and dipped lmaoo
But what about his feelings
But the other one had the mind stone.
@@markynio I think because of his lack of the mind stone he can retain memories but he won’t be able to process or show emotion
@@Xillaaa BINGO
White Vision is like Tin Man from Wizard of Oz. No heart no Mind Stone. Just emotionless
@@markynio White Vision doesn't have feelings.
POV: You are here after watching WandaVision.
"What the hell is a white vision?"-Wireless Philosophy
Jennifer Wang just chilling at home and her notifications blowing up because of WandaVision
It's kinda not their fault tho. Everyone who have watched wandavision got this recommended (me included). Still, greatt video
@@ikhwanmauaja1184 why would it be a fault, isn't it beautiful people want to learn about philosophy because of a tv show
@@oldcowbb deep
Is anyone here because of WandaVision?
Yup
Nope
@@gaccsi1762 let me guess. You either don't like marvel or you think endgame was the official end for mcu. If it's any one of those, I respect you man. Have a great day. But do check it out, it's really good.
@@thomaspanditfan2435 I came because I have an old BMW E38 that is going through a major restoration and a friend of mine called it the Ship of Theseus, which is very relatable in my case... But I do like Marvel and wish to see WandaVision, just didn't have the time for it so far.
@@gaccsi1762 Alright then. And dont mind please, but don't you think the name of ship of theseaus is weird for an e38. Arent they supposed to be great rally cars. The name doesn't suit that personality of a car.
- I want you to tell me the difference between this Vision and that Vision
Pam: They are the same Vision
Vision to Vision: Maybe, we're both the real ships.
I think it is up to each individual's perspectives. If i donate my kidney to another person, it doesn't mean I am no longer the original "me", and the receiver becomes the new "me". Identity is set by human own standards, if it is like Tao, there is no need to be affirm on identity, but follow the natural course of life.
I know people might think that you are here after Wanda Vision but I know you have always been a great fan of Theseus work and you really wanted to know which actually is Theseus ship.
This was posted over 7 years ago 🤣
@@JohnJones-cm7xg 😂😂
My take is that it doesn't matter what material the ship itself is made out of, if the people all agree that the physical object still represents the original then it is still the Ship of Theseus.
It's the same reason why things like gold and silver have monetary value, because people agree on what they're worth. If everyone agrees its still the original ship it doesn't matter whether it is or not
I came here for answers regarding Vision's explanation and I left with an existential crisis...
😂😂😂
Here's another one. Every seven years the human body completely replaces all its cells. Seven years from now will you still be Youssef Helwa? Are you the Youssef Helwa whom your parent/guardian named at birth?
@@AaronPaulIbarrola ur cells changed but not ur mindset 😉
Solution 5 makes the most sense to me. The whole problem only arises because of changes overtime because time allows (imposes even) changes on things, but, since everything humans know exists within space AND TIME, if you really want to get to the bottom of it, something is only truly and completely what it is (the way we perceive them) in a very specific moment in time and space. If you change the time, the thing is now different (think how people change overtime) even if, as far as matter and space are concerned, they are basically the same. If you don't consider time, you end up falling into solution 3, which isn't bad, but, since we are not considering the full extend of the things existence, it is incomplete. Once you make the change in perspective that solution 5 does, you can now consider the whole of the thing and solve the problem while still keeping true to all other principles and keeping the sense of identity (which I guess is the true question here) while simultaneously acknowledging the changes that occurred and that the objects A and B aren't entirely the SOT (Ship of Theseus) while also sharing part of themselves with it (a very good way to account for time and its ever changing nature).
P.S. Why are so many people talking about Wandavision?
In the metaphysics of identity, the ship of Theseus is a thought experiment that raises the question of whether an object that has had all of its components replaced remains fundamentally the same object.
All things are a pattern with a purpose and the purpose determines the pattern.
POV: You read the comments and are already late
I'm not the same person before and after watching the video
If we are to become immortal by uploading our minds to computers, this is the most important philosophical quandary ever IMO.
I would define the ship by its agency or utility. Once Theseus died so did the ship, because it’s now just a ship, no longer Theseus’s ship, the ship *of* Theseus. Like a house when the occupiers move out, it feels dead, and quickly turns to a ruin, no longer the home it once was.
So everyone’s just here rn cuz of Wandavision huh
I need the elaboration
I am here for my Philosophy Exam 💀
i feel like philosophy majors just do way too much acid.
no, this goes to the core of logic and identity
@@pexfmezccle great thinking 💡💡
I mean you’re not wrong though...
I request elaboration.
I AM VISION
I've read a lot of the comments here and I don't think many of you actually understand the nature of the problem. When faced with the question "How to define the Ship of Theseus?" most of you seem to answer "carefully". As a joke, it's funny. As a serious answer, it's inadequate, because it's not addressing the real problem here. The author of the video has already given a definition for the ship: a collection of 1000 planks of "superwood" that never decays. What we are talking about here is the justification of referring to either A or B as the real Ship of Theseus when it undergoes change. When you say "it's a matter of definition" or "if we just defined it as exactly as possible, there would be no ambiguity" you are missing the point. ANY definition would have to answer the questions presented in the video: does the Ship of Theseus survive gradual change? If taken apart, would it go where its parts go? Does it only have three spatial dimensions or does it also have a temporal one? You can't avoid having to answer these questions even if the definition was purely a semantic issue, and whichever of the presented answers you chose, you would have to give justifications for it. Most of you are actually just choosing Solution 1 and denying the principle that objects go where their parts go without realizing or justifying it in any way.
Someone in the comments also said: "All things in the universe exist in a given state at any time independent of observers giving an identity to them." Does that include the identity you, as an observer, give to yourself? Those of you who claim "there is no real Ship of Theseus" or "it's just a matter of point of view" should think of yourselves as the Ship of Theseus. Imagine you, a conscious being, were somehow dismantled into atoms by some teleportation device and then reassembled somewhere else. How can we know you're still the same person who disappeared at the other end? Would you need to consist of the same atoms and have all the same memories for it to be you? What if some were replaced or lost along the way? We can take this even further: what if the machine malfunctions and creates an identical copy of you on one end while you were still on the other? Or if parts of you were taken away and replaced with new ones so you ended up with a new body (like in the video) but somehow your old body was reassembled and brought to life and it retained all your memories? Who would you be then? Maybe "you" would be where your consciousness is, but the other version of you would also have consciousness and from their point of view they simply moved from one place to another. How would you go about convincing your special other that (s)he should be with this particular version of you and not the other?
The problem here is that even if it was a matter of point of view and identities weren't "real" or "part of the physical reality" they are still part of our social reality. Social realities are in no way less "real" than physical ones - they very much exist and influence our lives and surroundings. Problems like the Ship of Theseus and their solutions have real implications for things like legislation, relationships and politics, so they're not just "moot semantics".
So why don't metaphysicists study the "consciousness" in experiments?
I've always wondered that. I think it is a more efficient way to figure out this problem than the way of thinking only "speculatively""
I guess there’s no real answer
No I think it is a matter of definition. If the definition of the object called SoT is a "collection of 1000 planks of "superwood" that never decays", then if ever that object not meet the definition of its name, it stops being that object. In this case, Ship of Theseus. However, if at any point more than one object meet the definition of the name SoT, then SoT turns into the name of a category or set of those objects.
Some philosophers endorse something like the view you are advocating, Praps A . The view is called 'mereological nihilsm'. The idea is that there is no such thing as the parthood relation; really, there are only things that have no parts. Maybe that includes quarks and electrons, but not much else. So tables, chairs, you, me, the Sun --- none of that exists.
That is not a majority view.
Nice video. My thoughts on this are as follows… Obviously this whole thing is a metaphor for human beings but in terms of the ship for now, the ship will always be The Ship of Theseus for so long as even 1 person remembers it being so no matter how it is changed. This same rule applies to ourselves.
The cells in our bodies break down and are remade constantly so that effectively every 7 years or so we are a completely different set of cells however our consciousness remains and therefore our identity also remains. The problem some might have with that though is that if, for example, John Smith loses his memory in an accident, does he suddenly become a different person? My answer would be no. So long as at least 1 other person or piece of evidence remains to identify him as John Smith then he will always remain as John Smith.
Returning the boat, the reason why the second ship built of the original TSoT parts isn’t also known as TSoT is because someone else built the second ship and would therefore have given it a different identity. The same thing would be true of any building that has been built using the materials from a building that had been torn down. The same bricks, doors, windows etc might have been used but if what was a hospital is now a school, you wouldn’t continue to call it a hospital. On the flip side of that though, just because an item undergoes a change of identity doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s a truly different product until everyone who remembers it’s original identity ceases to remember. For example, the chocolate bar Snickers used to be called Marathon. If you asked me to buy you a marathon, I wouldn’t immediately reject your request and say such a thing doesn’t exist because to me, a Snickers and a Marathon are the same thing. In fact, this is actually a really good example of a real world, current day scenario of this paradox because like TSoT, the Marathon bar has had numerous changes made to it such as the wrapper, the size of the bar itself (yeah they’re definitely smaller nowadays, I’m sure lol), maybe even the peanut/nougat/chocolate ratio etc but to me it’s still the same Marathon chocolate bar. Anyone have any thoughts on this?
The ship is not dependent on the particular pieces, it's the pragmatic continuity of the pattern.
I REALLY APPRECIATE the pan out at the end of the episode. Reviewing the entirty of the lecture mapped out so graphically and demonstrably is so helpful! Please carry on!
In Conscious Universe theory, all objects have a consciousness. This concept is also prevalent in many Eastern traditions. The Ship of Theseus is based on the conscious entity known as the Ship of Theseus. No matter how many parts change, the consciousness remains with the original. Each plank that is lost has it's own consciousness and when the new ship (B) is formed with all the old planks, it is a new consciousness that is composed of the parts of the old ship. Identity relates to consciousness both for what we perceive as living and non-living creatures.
So, in short, Solution 3?
Dude I wrote that comment 6 years ago. I don't even remember what solutions 1, 2 or 3 even are. Please remind me.@@UltimateDragon-ne5ui
Wanda: _fighting for her life_
Vision: *we're ships*
😂
A few points:
1. I learned this as 'Humes' broom' - he had owned the same broom for many years, changing the head 3 times and the handle twice - etc. This phrase 'Humes' broom' seems to have disappeared now. Not important.
2. For those who want to dismiss this as simply pointless playing with words, consider the very real vintage car market, where the value of restored cars is definitely dependent on the proportion of the original vehicle that remains. Collectors of such vehicles do not want a car consisting entirely of spares (their motives in this are, of course, part of the puzzle). Ordinary people are having to find practical monetary answers to this puzzle.
3. I am amazed that these Wireless Philosphy videos are not attempting to introduce Wittgensteinian analysis to such problems; personally I feel this is the most penetrating way to go. In particular, trying to understand how our language leads us into many of these famous philosophical traps is at the heart of the issue. Note that calling them 'traps of language' is not the same as dismissing the puzzles as unimportant, but it's a pointer to the direction that analysis should take.
4. Indeed, how does an entire series on epsitemology jump from Russell to late 20th century philosophers, missing out Wittgensteing entirely, when he seems to me to have much the most intelligent (though hard to understand) things to say.
What is wittgenstein answer to this one?
So, we can say White Vision is the Ship on Scenario 1, because he had every part of his reforged/replaced, and 'memory vision' is the Ship on scenario 2 because he looks, thinks, feels and acts as the Original Vision, but he isn't physically made of the original Vision, but still is, for intents and purposes, Vision.
Amazing
no. you are wrong.
I believe it is not about the ship of Theseus but the associations we attach to anything. The ship of Theseus is a conception and our associated thoughts make the replica of the ship more like the actual ship than the aged parts of the first, because it is truer to how it existed when it was Theseus's ship. The original parts being aged means that another dimension (time) has cast them beyond the point of return to their original existence, thus a replica is truer and the aged original is less true.
i think people who say the ship isnt the same in senario 1 really hold on to things. like they get attached to things
people who say its the same can easily accept and let go of things
I go for the "evolutionary change". Every plank replaced is a new generation of the same ship, but that plank also becomes part of a new ship after 1000 years, both ships having a common ancestor, which is the Ship of Theseus, and since nothing can escape their ancestry, both ships are the Ship of Theseus AND on top of that, a new ship, whatever name they have been given.
Disclaimer :This comment section is soon going to be overtaken by the "Wandavision Finale, Vision vs. White Vision library talk" brought me here. In the name of all MCU Fans I apologize in advance 😂😂😂
White Vision - I request elaboration
Ah, I was first made aware of this when I watched Star Trek Enterprise (Archer) and the transporter was mentioned.
Like, when you "beam up" the captain, is that really the captain? Or just some imposter? A copy? A clone? Do you murder the captain every time you do that?
Hu, Mr. Scott?
In the series it gets dismissed out of hand as "supersticious nonsense". Basically, as long as the application of the science has no negative consequences, why argue about it?
Yet, the practical application leads to Riker being duplicated in Star Trek The Next Generation (Picard), and thus precicely to the discussion we're having. All of a sudden something that "has never happened before" happens.
Star Trek has always had a more "objective Reality" approach to things, especially in TNG. If they'd taken a "subjective" reality approach, the discussion would have been a lot more interesting.
Yes, indeed. I totally agree
Wanda vision brought here . Hope white vision will come back
I am liable to ramble on here for a while, so pass over this comment if you so wish.
EDIT:
I don't know if I am using the term "universal" correctly, so just know that I mean "something that doesn't change with time".
I'll start by defining identity. My intuitive sense of what identity is (Gah, more loopiness! I'm identifying identity!) is that it is a quality that we sentient beings apply to our perceptions when we wish to segregate them into categories.
This, of course, is not something we usually choose to do. Evolution favored our ancestors being able to identify a loose rock as separate from the ground, so our brain is able to segregate categories quite effortlessly at this point in a (dare I say "subjective"?) manner. The problem with this is that our brain is so complicated that people label the point at which a changing object becomes a new object "ambiguous" if there is no absolute way to define when it is rechristened, and leave it at that. Ambiguity in identity is not always a bad thing. The processes in our brain (including that wonderful, pesky thing called consciousness) receive inputs about the object constantly, and frequently reevaluate it to see if it has changed in any way that would deserve recategorization. In many ways, it is a better, more flexible system than many an absolute boundary we could devise.
Our current understanding of our universe on the molecular level does, however, allow us some seemingly absolute definitions for what separates objects spatio-temporally. We could, for instance, define the number of atoms in the depletion zone of a transistor to be 50 across, which, in this case, is more useful than anything our brains could muster, because we cannot discern such small distances, and because we don't want it to be reevaluated. Sometimes it's useful to have standards. These standards, however, must be defined by us. They do not inherently exist! Remember what I defined identity as: a quality assigned by sentient beings.
Now that I think about it, however, laws of nature and our system of logic seem to be quite fixed over time. Empirically, we have had great success assuming that the laws of nature don't change much, and that mathematics is constant, so we can infer from this that the laws of nature and our system of logic are constant. Therefore, it's safe to assume their identity will never change (i.e. we will never wake up to find ourselves governed by a new system of logic, discernible from the old one by). Perhaps I could amend my definition of identity to include such universals as these by calling it: a quality discovered by sentient beings. This changes things quite a bit, but I like it more. When a rock lies on the ground, or when a transistor sits on a chip, our intuitive sense of the universe and the progress we have made in understanding it leads us to believe that it is made up of one configuration of atoms (Disregard Schrodinger's cat for now. I don't know enough about quantum theory to include it in this discussion, but I'm working on it!) that changes over time. We, as observers of this universe, discover the configuration of atoms to some approximation, and then apply our superficial categories of identity. This way, the definition for identity allows us to ascribe a single identity to a single object at a single point in time, or a single identity to universals throughout time, while also enabling us to give changing objects like the Ship of Theseus the same identity over time through subjective means that our brain handles for us, allowing us the utility of calling our bodies the same bodies even though most of the cells are replaced (though I think that has to do more with our continued feeling of consciousness, and permanence of memory).
So, going back to the ship... This definition for identity would say that at every point in time every object has a distinct identity (values at points in a continuous function can be defined, so I will assume that logic affords the same luxury to time and space in our universe as well). Universals have persisting identities, while everything else does not, but our brain, in all its glory, is capable of assigning "blanket identities", if you will, to objects with continuously changing identities. I realize that I am not going back to the ship analogy, but I don't think it matters. I just realized that my use of the word "identity" has taken on two distinct definitions, which I will attempt to... elucidate. identity (lowercase i), will henceforth in this UA-cam comment denote a "blanket identity" assigned by a sentient observer for the sake of utility. Identity (capital 'eye'), on the other hand, will denote the single configuration at a single point in time of everything in the universe, including universals. This is tricky. You see, I wanted Identity (capital 'eye') to somehow be able to distinguish the rock from the ground, but doing so requires an observer and/or a decision procedure for segregation of rock from ground, and thus it seems identity must come before Identity, but surely universals don't require observers in order to be segregated from the rest of the universe.
Now that I think about it, I've stumbled into a bigger problem, and one that I think is difficult to solve. We as human observers are graced with a conflict between the intuition of realism and the fact (hmm) that we are observers. We would like to think that our blanket statements of identity, especially about universals, apply in our absence and the absence of all observers like us, but those blankets were kitted by us in our presence, so we can make no inferences as to how the universe would be categorized in our absence, because doing so would imply our presence to make observations and categorizations, a contradiction, and one that definitely grinds my intuition gears. Absence doesn't have to be death. What if everyone went to sleep at the same time, or what if everyone's consciousness was temporarily interrupted by stimulation of the claustrum at the same time? But it doesn't have to be us making the categorizations, right? A decision procedure is all that is needed. No consciousness required. A simple input/output machine, with a few feedback loops, and maybe it could be really compact, and have a mechanism for moving around and taking in observations, and perpetuating itself, and adapting to a changing environment, and improving itself over time. Sound familiar?
So maybe the deal is that there will always be a decision procedure somewhere in the universe. Meaning can, after all, be extracted from anything, although at a certain point it becomes nonsense. A decision procedure represented somewhere in the universe for identifying a rock from the ground by seeing if 2+2=5 takes no input from the system in question, and will only return one output when observed, but it could still be used as a decision procedure. So we run into another interesting tidbit. identity (lowercase i) can be defined by multiple decision procedures and/or sentient observers, and thus is, by intuitive definition, subjective. My sense, however, is that Identity (uppercase 'eye') is objective in the way I have defined it, even if the definition itself is certainly subjective.
Going back to the end of the "So, going back to the ship..." paragraph, I'd like to tie some loose ends off. When I said "identity must come before Identity", what I think I meant is "observers must come before categories". This seems to be a reasonable assumption. The universe is laid out in a certain way, sometimes clearly, and sometimes blurry and ambiguously. It is up to us to categorize the blurry and ambiguous as we go along, but again we run into the problem of having to concede the universals as subjectively categorized when our intuition screams the opposite. I propose (to myself :P) that the definition of Identity (capital 'eye') be amended to "the single configuration at a single point in time of everything in the universe, EXCEPT universals". This way, we can say that observers must create the categories in order for them to exist for everything except universals, which I think is reasonable. It's merely an issue of semantics, speaking of which, we probably need an analogue to the words identity and Identity for universals, which I will set to be "state". So, three new definitions to think about problems of identity with:
Identity:
An instantaneous state of everything that changes over time in the universe.
identity:
A quality that sentient observers and/or decision procedures give some section of Identity that meets their requirements for categorization.
State (capitalization doesn't matter):
When referring to universals, the qualities that a universal possesses, by which it can be distinguished from other aspects of the universe.
If I wasn't so deep into this, I would rename "Identity" to be "reality", but it was less confusing to just go with it.
So, really going back to the ship:
I think Theseus's ship has a subjectively defined identity, constitutes a constantly changing chunk of Identity, and has nothing to do with universals.
There's your tl;dr.
Good night!
Who else is here after the WandaVison finale?
Reading these comments makes one thing clear. A lot of people are missing a good presentation in order to look smart by being dismissive.
You are fooling no one.
the irony. you dummy you didn’t consider the irony
*3 years later*: I am Vision
It all depends on what you are referring to when you when you say 'the ship of Theseus'. If it is the idea of the "ship of Theseus" then it only exists in the collective consciousness of the people.
Now if we presume that the idea still manifests itself in a physical object a 1000 years later, then whichever ship the majority of the people, familiar with the idea of the ship of Theseus, think is the one will be the ship of Theseus.
If we are talking not about the idea of the Ship of Theseus but the actual physical object on which Theseus undertook his adventure, then before the puzzle can be framed, one instant [moment in time] has to be agreed upon when the physical object is being referred to as the ship of Theseus. Eg When the ship just just finished being built or may be the moment when it docked after the return of Theseus from his adventure. Outside of that instant, the said agreed upon ship does not exist as some change in the physical object is taking place at every instant.
From the standpoint of just physical reality nothing spooky or hard to understand is going on here.
This is just a case of us getting bewitched by our own language. The question of which is the ship of Theseus simply doesn't have an answer in the same way that the question of how much mass the ship has at any given point does. The cool thing about this thought experiment is the exposition of the fact that we imagine our conceptual projections onto our world have absolute objective meaning when they do not.
Indeed. A is a modified object originally the ship of theseus
and B is an object replica of the original ship of theseus
None of the ships of the same year are identical, they are different.
Why create an abstract problem over concrete reality? For fun...but a waste fo time in this case
Arising-Tale Buddha said "Only ponder such things if someone is going to pay you or for fun.
There are many people who restore old aircraft, some for museums and some to fly again.
One man bought and sold spare parts for these older aircraft: he had 'a spares holding' of never-used, reconditioned and reclaimed parts.
Over years people restoring old planes, let's say it was a Hawker Hurricane (because it was), rebuilt one to fly, using a real original aircraft in an incomplete condition, some old parts carefully conserved so that they and their paperwork maintained according to regulations showed that they were airworthy, and parts made especially for the project to original or better specifications.
The parts taken off the original were traded vie the spares holder, new parts were sourced from several other re-builders, the spares holder and from other incomplete Hurricanes.
The end result was a flying Hawker Hurricane, a spares holding, and a complete museum-quality but not flyable Hurricane owned by the spares holder.
Now, the planes and parts were all documented as real and either airworthy or not by legal specifications and long-established paperwork.
Now: which aircraft is a real Hawker Hurricane srial number (frex) RR213, and which is the 'bitsa' a replica built from other lanes?
This has really happened, as opposed to a philosophical abstract, so which, or what? Fun, eh? ;-)
Wittgenstein turns in his grave at this misuse of language. Ship A is the Ship of Theseus because it is the one called such.
greenghost2008 I hope we can get someone to make some Wittgenstein content for us. I think that will be great!
I past my Wittgenstien seminar with a c-. Don't look at me.lol My hands were trembling when I wrote that final paper. His intelligence was on a whole other level.
I am calling my cat "greenghost2008". It is you now.
I'd say that the original ship acted in the slow change of it's self, giving form and support throughout, becoming a father to it's replicated self. In this way it lives on.
Plus, if like with crime scene logic, once a room is entered the properties of one's self and room become mixed, on leaving you take something with you, and leave something behind, even if all is replaced some evidence of interaction here remains, the scene of today is the effect of past events, the old ship caused (like a tool it's self) the new ship, leaving it's self in evidence inside the presence of the new ship.
So as far as the frist situation goes I'd say that the old ship is present in part as DNA and in part as a crafters production.
*Watches WandaVision once*
You know, I’m something of philosopher myself.
Identity is not solely tied to the physical. The human body replaces itself almost entirely over time but we remain the same person. With the ship metaphor.. a ship is more than the sum of its parts, therefore its identity stays constant.
i don't understand what vision was saying,, that's why im here
The practical question would be, in which ship you want to be when you are in the middle of the storm.
*I always thought, as each plank was added to SoT: Year 0, it was absorbed into the identity of that original ship. And by SoT: Year 1000, every component of each ship is "of Theseus". However, since all of the original components are back to their original form, we then have a "Sr./Jr." situation, or as you put it, SoT-A & SoT-B. SoT-A being SoT: Year 0 that was simply built twice. Then, SoT-B being SoT: Year 1000 which is made up of secondary/replacement components that absorbed the SoT name while serving their purpose, i.e., the "B" ship.*
This is the best explanation I’ve read yet! I like it.
@@dukeofbanfe *Too kind, too kind. Muchos thank yous!* 😁
I think this is quite simple thing. it depends on naming principal.
if you name ship by its experience, (sail, adventure) ship with original component would called 'old Theseus' (with old adventures).
and ship with new component just called 'new Theseus'(with new adventures). so, both could be Theseus.
but in this case, if new ship doesn't have experience, it couldn't have the name. its just replica.
if you name ship by it's component, ship is actually changing 'Theseus(100%)' to "Theseus(n%)".
when you call the ship, you just omit the parentheses.
so actually two ships are actually something like 'Theseus(73.8%)' , 'Theseus(26.2%)'.
but we can't actually name that percentage, so naming will depends on observer.
like 'Theseus(almost)'', 'Theseus(Eh, not really)'.
this seems hard question because people confuse these naming principle.
PoV: You (Channel Owner) got a lot more views from Wandavision Final EP.
Random thoughts I had.
What if you think of the "Spot" in existence that ship A and B are at is a placeholder.
Thinking Ship A was always the ship of Theseus, Everything its parts touched made it so. As the years went by the "area" that the ship touched from the water, other parts etc. became part of it.
In that thought that would give Ship B's "area" that same amount of time to acclimate its own "area" to ALMOST become the ship of Theseus.
So when all pieces are moved ship be is as much as Theseus's ship as it can be.
Why almost?
There are still influences on ship A that hold it as The Ship of Theseus, and always will be.
(Jar of marbles Theory)
Jar A is full and Jar B is empty at first. Slowly as in the Theory of The Ship of Theseus (TSOT) parts are replaced and reconstructed.
As jar B gets more and more marbles Jar A will always have just one more marble added to its jar.
Outside influences add the marbles to Jar A and there for decides what Jar's marbles are the original.
So do the outside influences have authority over whomever replaces/moves the marbles?
(Or me tortise theory.)
The ship just slooooooooooooooowly moved.
I’d go with the torturous theory. Only because the ship only serves as a memorial and as such the one made of the planks Theseus touched and sailed on has a stronger clam as a memorial.
Isn't it like a pair of pretenders to a throne? Both have good claims - it's about whose story you find more compelling. It's not contradictory to say X and Y both have good claims to be the King of England even though there can only be one King.
Equally both ships have good claim to be THE ship of Theseus but there's a degree of flexibility based on the peculiar nature of the scenario.
True, but I don't think they were accounting for the idea of the originality of the object in this in saying it IS the ship. In stead I think the point is how much of a collective quantifies the name of the collective. It's like saying how many parts can you place on a classic car, before it's all but a shell. Your right in the context of what IS the real and original ship of Theseus as both can claim it, but really their only variations to an original as it was first constructed by the ship makers.
I think that setting this in a different scenario could help define this one. What if someone built a 1 for 1 replica of the ship after the original had been lost. We might call it the ship of Theseus. But then suppose the original ship of Theseus what’s found largely preserved. And a team of specialists disassembled it cleans it and reassembled it in a museum. People would probably remark even well looking at the newer ship floating in the harbor that the real ship of Theseus was sitting in a museum.
Therefore I would claim that in the original situation as soon as the ship being build from the original parts had more original pieces of the ship that Theseus actually touched than the one floating in the harbor it would become the real ship of Theseus.
The human body is replacing every cell and replacing the proteins that make up the cells that that don’t replace. The solution is that both sips are the ship of theseus.
Well, FWIW, ship builders consider the keel board to be the identity of the ship. When the keel was removed, A stopped being the ship of Theseus. When the keel was laid to make the new ship B, *that* was the ship of Theseus.
The question of How Objects Survive Change is more about the mind than reality. It's about human cognition, and human language. Is an object just the sum of it's parts? Obviously not. There are more aspects to "A Thing" than the physical parts. There is function, purpose, and real life social context ( how do real people perceive and talk about this object?) - all aspects of the mind. Change is not just physical change but how cognition of a an object changes over time.
This video presents another aspect to the Whole/Parts question: this is not only a ship, but "Theseus's Ship", i.e. it has meaning based on it's past - - this object has a known history. The questions of how we attach meaning to an object and how meaning persists over time and over the deterioration of an object (and repair) is definitely not a logical problem as this video implies - or at least we do not get much insight from logical analysis - - it's about meaning, which is about language and social cognition of our world as co-created in our linguistic interaction. Ask the Athenians if they think of that ship in their harbor as "Theseus's Ship" 100 years, 400 years, 800 years hence.
Why is logical analysis not helpful? Because it's too reductionist. Just because logical abstraction works with quantification, i.e. mathematics (we abstract the concept of 1 unit for each thing, and then apply operations to those units, like addition and multiplication), doesn't mean it works with IDENTITY. The Identity of a Thing over Time is a complex feature of consciousness, memory and language/communication. Identity cannot be abstracted and reduced to operational components: a thing is not just parts. That we have single words for things gives the illusion of singularity, but it's just a feature of language and our linguistic logic.
Me watching here after WandaVision is just satisfying
Agreed 👍
The Theseus ship was anchored in the harbor all of a sudden the ship its function and its meaning changed it became a memorial.
Given the fact that two objects cannot occupy the same space, the XY coordinates of the memorial provides the key to the puzzle
All things exist as a pattern in a mind. Some things also have an external referent. Both the internal neutral correlate and the external physical referent (if any) must have a unique position in each of the three physical dimensions; space, time, and scale.
neural*
duck autocorrect
Solution 6: As far as the physics is concerned an object is defined by the sum of it's parts, meaning a finite set of particles. As far as humans are concerned an object is a general idea, dependent upon one's own perception. Both the particles and our perception are subject to change, but not in precisely the same manner, and therein lies the issue.
Philosophical paradoxes are what happens when you hold the false assumption that the logic of the universe and the reasoning of the human brain are one and the same.
Assuming them outha b the same... Expecting anything work the way as if coming that way..
Who else came here because of the Vision vs Vision logic battle in Wandavision?
I usually present this in the "My grandfather's hammer" question. Simple with two parts. The head and the handle. You can even add a twist by saying that my grandfather carved his name in the handle, adding sentiment to the argument.
You might be wondering why I called you here?
The answer is simple :: We needed elaboration.
I personally think it's a mix of solutions as solution 1 because the orginal is the first to exist and the orginal parts are used to recreate the ship B, solution 2/3 because if it gets upgraded/repaired and becomes thesus1.4-but we never really count those steps/replacements- and the end(year1000) an entirely new ship(A) with new planks and new name is formed and can be thought as a copyright.
Who else is here after Wanda vision episode 9🤣🤣 ?
There's another practical solution, one that actually applies metaphysics. The Ship of Theseus is that which bears the crest, seal, coat of arms, etc. Regardless of the parts replaced or not, it remains the Ship of Theseus due to this heraldry. Just as an individual person remains that individual, regardless of amputation or replaced parts, they retain their mind. Conscious existence cannot be replaced or duplicated.
So which one is the real ship of theseus? and what really makes the ship of theseus THE ship of theseus? Is it the ship of theseus because it still looks the same with different parts?
Is a person the same when they get old? even though all their cells have been replaced by new cells? what defines that person? What defines me? Am I the same person as when I was a kid? Or are the Memories that define us? Whereas objects have none. Something to think about eh
The whole argument changes when we conclude that everything is always in constant change due to entropy. Hence the concept of the same cannot exist beyond an instant in time in a finite universe
Who's here after Wandavision? 😂
A thing is a set of attributes and boundary conditions in a mind which differentiates things according to purpose. If you value the original provenance of the ship, the reassembled pieces will do the job for you, even though they're decrepit and can't function as a ship any longer. The continuity of a thing is part of it - how it changes. Any ship, to be a ship, must be able to act as a ship in some functional manner. Replacing broken parts is part of the continuity of the identity of the Ship of Theseus.
This experiment could be replayed with a LEGO ship (and sufficient spare parts).
This is how I see it, if you serve the same purpose you’re the same ship, but if you change one of their purpose, it becomes different, still the same ship but with different purpose, no matter the original parts
4:27 The turning point would be at the year 501, when the new planks outnumber the original planks. There was no need to find an arbitrary number at all.
That argument implies the Ship of Theseus is really a single plank, because removing just one plank in the year 501 transfers the ship’s identity to another ship. Picking the halfway point does seem nice and reasonable, but it’s just as arbitrary as any other point.
@@infinityphoenix1 plank 501 wouldn’t necessarily be a random number, as this would be the point when the ship has more ‘new’ planks than it would have surviving from year 0.
At this point, it would be said that the identity of the ship would have changed as a whole, and it would not be accurate to describe this as the ship of Theseus as it was in year 0. It does not retain the original identity of year 0, but has not lost it entirely. Instead of being duplicitous in whether or not it is or is not the ship of Theseus at year 501, it would be better to describe it as a ‘partial replica’.
Objects don’t “survive” change. Words do. It’s just people looking at patterns and placing labels. There’s no right answer to the ship of Theseus question, it’s a decision we make, or in this case, it’s a decision we don’t make, and instead leave it as a question.
As an individual though, I’ve decided to answer the question as I see it. I don’t think the ship is ever the same ship. Even before the boards were replaced, they were decomposing, drying out, soaking up sea water. Their atoms were shifting around in new configurations, the electrons moving about infinitely and chaotically, only partially related to one another through attraction, and all connected to some mass er call a ship that never exists in the same way, in the same place in space or time as our planet whizzes through time and space endlessly. The only reason we believe anything remains the same throughout the progression of time is because our mind is a pattern recognition machine, endlessly searching to identify and compartmentalize familiar shapes and give them some sort of subjective object permanence, when the reality is that it’s all just a mass of subatomic particles and waves, all moving about endlessly in funny patterns, all part of some grand pattern that we call change, and that change being nothing more than a ripple on the surface of a pond flying through 4 dimensional space, colliding with the virtual particles that keep everything from settling.
Listening to the two toasters talk about this brought me here
This breakdown is really well done. Reminded me of Derek Parfit with the clone of man on mars scenario
Its even weirder when you consider the concept of swapping human organs
Almost a zen koan. Also brings to mind the Diamond Sutra. And, of course, Donovan: first there is a mountain, then there is no mountain, then there is.
Woww Wireless-Philosophy is close to Wanda-Phision