Nothing we categorize in the world avoids arbitrary abstractions. — Apustimelogist

Quite so. Not wanting to be picky, but what makes these abstractions arbitrary? Isn't it rather that the idea of natural kinds proposes a certain kind of model, but the facts (nature) undermine it. Where's the necessity?

Because it was that web of circumstances (conception) that is the point of time when the actualized person that is the you right now could have come to be in the first place — schopenhauer1

That's right. The web, not just one element in it. Given your extraordinarily rigid version of determinism, we can also say that as the causal web constantly changes and develops, any other point in time is also a point when the actualized person that it the you right now could have come to be. There is no reason to pick out any one moment in my life (or before it, or after it) as more or less important than any other.

Why do you speak of the actualized person that is the you?.... Surely the same applies to everybody else, so you would do better to say the actualized person that is <insert anyone's name> ......

By speaking of "you", you posit the person you address as a participant in the language game (or whatever other kind of practice we are engaging in). Genomes are incapable of participating in these practices. People do, and their identity as people amongst people is revealed (or perhaps created) in their participation. This is an unusual take on personal identity, but given our starting-point, it seems inevitable.

But the point is that it becomes a posteriori necessary, which is Kripke's controversial theory. — schopenhauer1

Well, if Kripke is right, it becomes a posteriori necessary. But that's a big "if", so I prefer to wait and see. It doesn't seem to matter, one way or the other.

that doesn't mean humans are their genome. — Moliere

No, patently not. But while we are speaking precisely, we need to bear in mind that we exist at three levels (at least). a) the physical object (the body), the animal (homo sapiens - a misnomer if ever there was one - and the person (which is an essentially social concept).

though very little in comparison. — Moliere

Yes but they are still necessary for the properties of water like electrical conductivity, even if little in comparison - if they were not present, it would imply there was no water there or at least that the water didn't possess its characteristic properties. Hence why different concentrations lead to different properties. The isotope example is also interesting because its not trivial at all the changes it makes. D2O can kill things because of how different it is to water.

I think the concept of idealization always strengthens this kind of direction you are going in since at the very least it questions or complicates the idea that people are actually referring to what they say they are referring to when they use particular terms or phrases.

It just means that H2O represents more than just "H2O" perhaps. — schopenhauer1

Yes, I was reading an article suggesting that it isnt really problematic for saying H2O is water since you can say that all that is required (under certain conditions) is that you have many H2O molecules and in their interactions, these ionization phenomena happen... so you still don't need anything more than H2O really. I don't have a problem with saying H2O is water since there is a pragmatism of ignoring these kind of details.

But at same time to me that means acknowledging an aspect of pragmatism or choice into it about where I draw the lines/boundaries. It complicates the notion that we are talking about some essentialistic natural kind here imo.

But the point is that it becomes a posteriori necessary, which is Kripke's controversial theory. The evidence provides the necessity of identity's content, which can be changed with more evidence. So the content can change, but the link of necessity does not, with whatever it is that that content provides. — schopenhauer1

Yes, I see this but it seems that was is posteriori necessary trivially depends on what I happen to decide I should call something so to me it doesn't seem that interesting or have deep consequences. Can you even call that necessary?

Then it comes to the issue of deciding what is water in all possible worlds. Does that trivially mean that water in all possible worlds is identical to water in this world? Or might there be other possible worlds with water that is different in some way but still similar? It seems this is down to my decision in some ways about what I want to deem as water or not depending on what I want to ignore in possible worlds.

Quite so. Not wanting to be picky, but what makes these abstractions arbitrary? Isn't it rather that the idea of natural kinds proposes a certain kind of model, but the facts (nature) undermine it. Where's the necessity? — Ludwig V

That's right. The web, not just one element in it. Given your extraordinarily rigid version of determinism, we can also say that as the causal web constantly changes and develops, any other point in time is also a point when the actualized person that it the you right now could have come to be. There is no reason to pick out any one moment in my life (or before it, or after it) as more or less important than any other.

Why do you speak of the actualized person that is the you?.... Surely the same applies to everybody else, so you would do better to say the actualized person that is <insert anyone's name> ......

By speaking of "you", you posit the person you address as a participant in the language game (or whatever other kind of practice we are engaging in). Genomes are incapable of participating in these practices. People do, and their identity as people amongst people is revealed (or perhaps created) in their participation. This is an unusual take on personal identity, but given our starting-point, it seems inevitable. — Ludwig V

So ironically, you are arguing along similar "nominalist" grounds that I am arguing regarding identity and land in the Israel/Palestine thread. That is because I wholeheartedly agree with you that personal identity is very much personally and socially constructed. It's more an existential issue than a biological issue. Or I should say, if everything human is a biological issue, it isn't in the same way that let's say the ATP cycle is biological or other cellular processes.

So, as I admitted earlier in this thread, "personal identity" should have been changed in the title, and "identity as this individual rather than another" or some other phrase or word should have been used.

So, even though I think things like identity as an ethnic group, nationality, personal beliefs, friend groups, attitudes, personality are very much dependent on social construction, can there be something "essential" to an individual on a physical basis? I think there can be, and that is the causal-historical and substance of a particular set of gametes. Now, why am I picking that, if we all agree that "personal identity" is social, and arbitrary. Can't we just pick anything as setting one apart as an individual?

And here is where I point to Kripke and the necessity of identity as there being some physical basis for an individual. Why? This is the main question I am trying to answer, and the again the answer is:

"Is there a point in causal history whereby there could be no possibility of the person reflecting back on their origins could have even existed in the first place (whatever other contingent paths they could have taken from that point)?" And my answer was, "Yes, at the point of the "web of circumstances" surrounding conception of a particular set of gametes at a causal-historical place/time (period)". BEFORE that time, the possibility of may have existed, but if anything changed, even by a microsecond, you would not have been able to actualize. Thus, it is at the point of conception that at least the opportunity for the actual you that is now reflecting, would be able to exist.

Yes, I see this but it seems that was is posteriori necessary trivially depends on what I happen to decide I should call something so to me it doesn't seem that interesting or have deep consequences. Can you even call that necessary?

Then it comes to the issue of deciding what is water in all possible worlds. Does that trivially mean that water in all possible worlds is identical to water in this world? Or might there be other possible worlds with water that is different in some way but still similar? It seems this is down to my decision in some ways about what I want to deem as water or not depending on what I want to ignore in possible worlds. — Apustimelogist

So an individual is even more complicated than a natural kind. A natural kind can in theory be determined just by a substance (we can even keep Aristotle's notion of 'substance' as matter/form of some kind, and in modern day, probably of a scientific determination). However, an individual on top of a substance identity, needs a causal-historical identity (THIS thing, not just a thing). So as I was answering to another poster, what is it that makes an identity necessary for an individual person?

Well, there is a causal-historical point (or points), whereby a "web of circumstances" took place of conception (we need not even have to go over every scientific concept related to this), whereby THAT individual would not have even come about in the first place, unless that web of circumstances occurred. Any change prior to this, would have changed the circumstances and thus changed the person/individual who came about as a result. THAT person who came about would have been different than the YOU who is reflecting right now.

I'm not so certain that the account of a posteriori necessity works very well for water, though. Even the water in my cup right now. This is because I tend to agree with Hume on causation -- that it is a habit of ours as creatures who look for patterns, and that tomorrow water could turn out to be something aside from what we thought it was by exploring those patterns. This is a feature of most scientific knowledge: the knowledge is always provisional, and built around technical problems of a particular group of knowledge-producers. If water is H2O, then water is necessarily H2O -- of course! But is it actually H2O? — Moliere

What is happening here is a bit more than just an observation. No number of observations could show that in every case, what we would call water is what we would call H₂O. The problem of induction intervenes. What happens is more akin to an act of fiat, a decision on our part to only call stuff mad of "H₂O" water. So we look around and see that every sample of water we check is made of H₂O, and so decide that thenceforth if some sample of what we thought was water turns out not to be H₂O, we were mistaken, and it's not water.

Logically, as it points out in the article cites, "What is not being claimed is that water is necessarily H2O, but conditionally, if water is H2O then water is necessarily H2O." The antecedent is not proven on empirical grounds so much as taken as a definition of water - it;'s decided by fiat that we will only use the word "water" for stuff that is made of H₂O.

This is the point made earlier, that if @schopenhauer1 decides that schopenhauer1 has by fiat some specific genetic code, then in any possible world in which someone has that genetic code, that someone is schopenhauer1; and further, if in some possible world there is a person with all the attributes of schopenhauer1, but with a different genetic code, then that is not schopenhauer1 .

What it is important to note here is that this is a choice about how we use the names "water" and "schopenhauer1"; not solely an issue of empirical observation.

This is basically my argument. My only quibble would be here:

This is the point made earlier, that if schopenhauer1 decides that schopenhauer1 has by fiat some specific genetic code, then in any possible world in which someone has that genetic code, that someone is schopenhauer1; and further, if in some possible world there is a person with all the attributes of schopenhauer1, but with a different genetic code, then that is not schopenhauer1 . — Banno

Because then someone will just mention twins/clones. This is why the causal-historical aspect has to be considered as well. It would have to be this specific event (web of circumstances surrounding the combination of gametes). Perhaps, with some empirical evidence, I can reduce it to just substance as there can be differences epigenetically between twins, but even that might not quite do it because of the reliance on contingencies. Rather, both came from the same set of gametes, so there has to be a differentiation in some other aspect.

Edit: And that aspect was the causal-historical aspect of the formation of the divided set of gametes. At that, for that set of gametes, is as far back as you can go before there is no possible world with X person in it.

The twin example simply shows that personhood is far more complicated than could be captured by a simple algorithmic definition such as has been proposed.

Why folk insist on trying to make use of the anachronistic notion of substance is beyond me.

Yes but they are still necessary for the properties of water like electrical conductivity, even if little in comparison - if they were not present, it would imply there was no water there or at least that the water didn't possess its characteristic properties. Hence why different concentrations lead to different properties. The isotope example is also interesting because its not trivial at all the changes it makes. D2O can kill things because of how different it is to water.

I think the concept of idealization always strengthens this kind of direction you are going in since at the very least it questions or complicates the idea that people are actually referring to what they say they are referring to when they use particular terms or phrases. — Apustimelogist

I best be careful then. If my account means that people cannot refer then it's in trouble since we do successfully refer!

Isotopes are a good example with respect to water: the notion of elements changed with isotopes because it was recognized there were different kinds of the same element when separated by mass. It changed how we chose to categorize.

So why I say YOU, is I am discussing the person that has actualized all the events leading to the very present. THIS person (the present you, not a counterfactual you that could have actualized differently), could not have been THIS person without certain factors. As far as the main factor that differentiates the range of possibilities that led to THIS present you from a range of possibilities that would NEVER include the YOU that is present right now, that would be the set of gametes that developed into the current YOU. That is to say, it's as far back as we can go whereby if the circumstances were different (there was a different set of gametes), there was no possible world that the current actualized YOU would have existed as YOU are right now looking back on your life. — schopenhauer1

This just seems to assume too much on the part of causation for me. And while I understand that we're talking about features of a body I think that, as far as the continuity of a person is concerned, we should probably include these other levels mentioned by @Ludwig V as well:

But while we are speaking precisely, we need to bear in mind that we exist at three levels (at least). a) the physical object (the body), the animal (homo sapiens - a misnomer if ever there was one - and the person (which is an essentially social concept). — Ludwig V

It seems to me that the other two levels aside from the body are just as important to the continuity of a person, though importantly I should say I don't think the body is irrelevant, only that it's sometimes relevant rather than always. It's because of this "sometimes" that I'm having a hard time accepting that there's a necessary relationship between genome and person, that there is no possible world in which some part of me was slightly different. I just don't have that level of confidence in causation.

What is happening here is a bit more than just an observation. No number of observations could show that in every case, what we would call water is what we would call H₂O. The problem of induction intervenes. What happens is more akin to an act of fiat, a decision on our part to only call stuff mad of "H₂O" water. So we look around and see that every sample of water we check is made of H₂O, and so decide that thenceforth if some sample of what we thought was water turns out not to be H₂O, we were mistaken, and it's not water.

Logically, as it points out in the article ↪schopenhauer1 cites, "What is not being claimed is that water is necessarily H2O, but conditionally, if water is H2O then water is necessarily H2O." The antecedent is not proven on empirical grounds so much as taken as a definition of water - it;'s decided by fiat that we will only use the word "water" for stuff that is made of H₂O.

This is the point made earlier, that if schopenhauer1 decides that schopenhauer1 has by fiat some specific genetic code, then in any possible world in which someone has that genetic code, that someone is schopenhauer1; and further, if in some possible world there is a person with all the attributes of schopenhauer1, but with a different genetic code, then that is not schopenhauer1 .

What it is important to note here is that this is a choice about how we use the names "water" and "schopenhauer1"; not solely an issue of empirical observation. — Banno

I think I'm tracking? We'll see. If the rigid designation takes place by fiat that's much easier to get along with, though I'm not sure that @schopenhauer1 agrees that this is just fiat -- it seems there's a causal connection that makes sense of the position. It's the causal properties or something along those lines which makes the genome so important rather than by fiat.

Why folk insist on trying to make use of the anachronistic notion of substance is beyond me. — Banno

I think it captures a good shorthand for physically what is relevant to an object- its matter and form. It really hasn't been improved upon much, simply elaborated in detail. Hydrogen and Oxygen can be considered a substance, its relations in their bond can be considered their form, etc.

But, when dealing in metaphysics, you start somewhere, usually objects or processes of some sort. Sometimes people go to idealism so some mental aspect or even mathematical relations themselves. But here, I am working at getting a grounding on the metaphysics of an individual by way of thinking about it causally. At what point causally, would any change to that thing result in there never being a possibility of that person?

it seems there's a causal connection that makes sense of the position. — Moliere

As if cause were easier to understand than how to use a proper name.

I am working at getting a grounding on the metaphysics of an individual by way of thinking about it causally. — schopenhauer1

And I'm pointing out that what counts as an individual is nothing to do with substance, but with how we choose to use names.

You are using a screw driver as a hammer.

And I'm pointing out that what counts as an individual is nothing to do with substance, but with how we choose to use names.

You are using a screw driver as a hammer. — Banno

Can you define, "What counts"? Surely, prior to humans there are individuals, no? Individual animals, individual items? I think this is ripe for the terms "overmining" and "undermining" objects to see whereby things get misconstrued as their relations or by their nominal names, but I'd have to see where you take your skepticism.

What it is important to note here is that this is a choice about how we use the names "water" and "schopenhauer1"; not solely an issue of empirical observation. — Banno

That's ok so far as it goes. But there are complexities in that "we". It isn't a choice that we make by getting together, debating and voting. It's many choices made by individuals in the context of their pragmatic and social context.

This model - of stuffs or substances - what are sometimes called "mass terms" works reasonably well for some cases, which for some reason have become paradigmatic. But the idea that it has general application seems to me to be an instance of philosophical over-generalization.

First, things can often be classified in a number of ways, depending on circumstances and interests. We were discussing the case of a piece of wood that is a door, or the plant that is a crop and food and so on. Do we posit two natural kinds here, or just one?

Second, at first sight, hydrogen and oxygen look like natural kinds just like water. So, if H20 defines water, what defines hydrogen? Again, are there two natural kinds here or just one?

Third, there are some things that do not appear to consist of stuff at all. Rainbows, for example. They are natural, but don't seem amenable to the same questions as water. Or, one might think that water and clouds both consist of H20. But then, what is the difference?

Thus, it is at the point of conception that at least the opportunity for the actual you that is now reflecting, would be able to exist. — schopenhauer1

Yes, but a great deal has to happen before I exist. Why isn't the development of the heart or the brain also a point like the moment of conception? Why isn't the moment when my parents meet or marry, just as important? What about the moments when my mother and father were conceived? Aren't they also critical? It's a web.

I'm sorry if this seems outdated by what has appeared since I started writing it.

A funny thought:

If water is H₂O then water is necessarily H₂O
It is possible that water is not H₂O
Therefore, water is not H₂O

I'd say this is a reductio as long as we accept the second premise. My thought here is that in common usage we don't distinguish between the elements that are within a glass of water. Technically speaking there are minerals dissolved air and other such things which are not captured by our usual usage of "water" -- we usually mean the whole glass and not just the H₂O in the glass.

Premise 2, being a statement of identity, can be reversed and I think the distinction between H₂O and water is easier to see there:

It is possible that H₂O is not water.

The lone H₂O molecule floating through space is not wet, and so there are some predicates which apply to water but which do not apply to H₂O, and so we can say that these are two different things.

Yeah I think that introducing "cause" creates more problems than it solves. Which causality?

Stochastic causality, for instance, could have a necessary relationship in the sense that there is a definite probability for some event, but as long as it falls in-between 0 or 1 then the event and its negation are possible.

The lone H₂O molecule floating through space is not wet, and so there are some predicates which apply to water but which do not apply to H₂O, and so we can say that these are two different things. — Moliere

The lone molecule of H2O is equally understood to be a lone molecule of water, so I don't think this argument stands up.

And I'm pointing out that what counts as an individual is nothing to do with substance, but with how we choose to use names.

You are using a screw driver as a hammer. — Banno

I think this is right as far as it goes, but on the other hand biological organisms can generally be identified by their DNA, and this would seem to be the most reliable method of identification.

If we wanted to posit that an organism could be you or me, but have a different DNA, then what criteria could be used to identify the organism as you or me? As I see it, stipulation won't cut it.

Following my thought to its (seemingly) logical conclusion -- there are no lone molecules of water. Insofar that we're willing to use chemistry in a philosophical manner then I'd say that water is a molar aggregate of H2O molecules. The extension of "water" is not the same as the extension of "H2O".

there are no lone molecules of water. — Moliere

Are there lone molecules of H2O?

Yes.

Citation please. I searched and could find no clear answer to this question. They are obviously not bonded as they are in either liquid water or in ice. In any case, when water evaporates, it is referred to as water vapour.

I can offer a common sense thought:
 
Clouds don't instantly appear because H2O molecules have been individualized in the gas phase. You only see clouds because enough H2O molecules have started to aggregate together, but that could only happen if they were individualized in the first place. Humidity is a measure of how much H2O is dissolved in the air relativized to how much can be dissolved in the air without it becoming a liquid.


But if you're questioning the discreetness of atoms or something like that then that won't be enough.

I searched and could find no clear answer to this question. They are obviously not bonded as they are in either liquid water or in ice. In any case, when water evaporates, it is referred to as water vapour. — Janus

I'm confused here. A lone molecule of water, to my mind, is one floating in space somewhere around a planet that happens to have water, and given the number of molecules that there are it's entirely plausible that one molecule of H2O managed to get into space. That one molecule is not wet. But water is. And when water evaporates it's referred to as vapour or in the gas phase but it eventually disappears, and the usual thought there is that the gas phase is when molecules separate and float about in a manner that approximates the ideal gas law.

There are wet vapours, but not all H2O is wet.

Hah. OK I did use "lone molecule of water" though.

Quite so. Not wanting to be picky, but what makes these abstractions arbitrary? Isn't it rather that the idea of natural kinds proposes a certain kind of model, but the facts (nature) undermine it. — Ludwig V

Yes, I think you are right about proposing a certain kind of model and it being undermined in the sense that either the model is outright wrong or the idealization ignores meaningful distinctions.

I was meaning that once you lift the lid on the issue of the model and probe past what was once seen as some essential nature; then, in probing the specifics about how something like H2O may behave in different contexts then there is not really a limit on how specific you want to go or where you want to place the boundaries for classification or on what basis you want to make separations between different things. H2O with different ion concentrations, isotopes. Ice, vapour, etc. We can always cut arbitrary lines or boundaries.

Well I think this is a different topic to what I was saying in my post you replied to but I would say this causo-historico thing presumes a coherent ontology of the individual to which the causo-historical connection has a non-trivial consequence for. When I think about it deeply, I am skeptical about such coherent ontology of the individual where the causo-historico thing has any signicance beyond a kind of bookkeeping role of keeping track of things.

I best be careful then. If my account means that people cannot refer then it's in trouble since we do successfully refer! — Moliere

I think there's been some wires crossed as I don't understand whats being implied here.

Other notes:

It seems to be idealizations everywhere though. Even if you want to go past the idealization of water=H2O, then the less idealized descriptions will include idealizations as per the nature of chemistry where various models still involve idealization.

I think even if a model is considered true, there are ways that we can envision it being underspecified in some way. Maybe the example of quantum mechanics interpretations. Two different interpretations may afford the same empirical description of water in terms of quantum theory, physics, theoretical chemistry. Yet they may have radical metaphysical different implications for what water is. So then, is water picking out the same thing everywhere if it cannot distinguish between interpretations of H2O with extra interpretational or underlying structure like this?

I think there's been some wires crossed as I don't understand whats being implied here. — Apustimelogist

I was thinking that:

I think the concept of idealization always strengthens this kind of direction you are going in since at the very least it questions or complicates the idea that people are actually referring to what they say they are referring to when they use particular terms or phrases. — Apustimelogist

Meant I should reconsider some things because I think people are actually referring to what they say they are referring to. The difference between "water" and "H2O", in a technical sense, seems to depend on this. If what people really mean by "water" is "H2O" then I have no case at all.

Yes, yes. I think we must have got some wires crossed in this topic. I don't think people necessarily really mean h2O when they say water.

Yes, but a great deal has to happen before I exist. Why isn't the development of the heart or the brain also a point like the moment of conception? Why isn't the moment when my parents meet or marry, just as important? What about the moments when my mother and father were conceived? Aren't they also critical? It's a web.

I'm sorry if this seems outdated by what has appeared since I started writing it. — Ludwig V

So sure, all that causally does have to be in place, and I am not denying that this causal chain has to be in place. However, the terminus for which this has to take place, where otherwise you would not even be there in the first place to reflect back is the conception. Anything after that, could still be a version of you, perhaps. Anything before would not even be a version of you, but a version of someone else. It would be someone else's range of possibilities (including the actualized one there is now looking back).