PHL105Y5 Lecture : Locke Notes (Identity Theory)
Document Summary
Locke had to remain faithful to the mechanistic philosophy, and so he proposed the principum individuationis. Let us suppose an atom existing in a deteremined time and place; it is evident that, considered in any instant of its existence, it is in that instant the same with itself. Identity of a human being (or living thing): An animal is a living organized body; and consequently the same animal is the same continued life communicated to different particles of matter, as they happen successively to be united to that organized living body. Ingenious observation puts it past doubt, that the idea in ur minds, of which the sound man in our mouths is the sign, is nothing else but of an animal of such a certain form.
