From jcowan@reutershealth.com Wed May 30 07:45:07 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: jcowan@reutershealth.com X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-7_1_3); 30 May 2001 14:45:07 -0000 Received: (qmail 65209 invoked from network); 30 May 2001 14:44:04 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.26) by l8.egroups.com with QMQP; 30 May 2001 14:44:04 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO mail.reutershealth.com) (204.243.9.36) by mta1 with SMTP; 30 May 2001 14:44:04 -0000 Received: from reutershealth.com (IDENT:cowan@[192.168.3.11]) by mail.reutershealth.com (Pro-8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id KAA16975; Wed, 30 May 2001 10:47:09 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: <3B150688.4060308@reutershealth.com> Date: Wed, 30 May 2001 10:41:12 -0400 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux 2.4.2-2 i686; en-US; rv:0.9) Gecko/20010505 X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Robin Turner Cc: lojban@yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: Enemy [Was: [lojban] Request for grammar clarifications References: <01053015222506.06088@neo.fen.bilkent.edu.tr> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit From: John Cowan X-Yahoo-Message-Num: 7366 Robin Turner wrote: > I don't see any harm, however, in using {du} to emphasise that the > expressions on either side have the same referent. That is, indeed, its purpose. Identity The term is used loosely. We speak of identical twins. We say that you and I drive identical station wagons. But for all the looseness of common usage, the term in its strict sense is as tight as a term can be. A thing is identical with itself and with nothing else, not even its identical twin. David Hume was puzzled. Identity seems like a relation, but it does not relate things pairwise as a relation should; things are identical only to themselves. How then does identity differ from a mere property? Moreover, it applies to everything. How then does it differ from the mere property of existence, the property enjoyed by everything? It is hard to project oneself into the confusions of even so gifted a mind as Hume's, after those confusions have given way to the progress of science. A [binary] relation is now clearly conceived as consisting of pairs of objects; the uncle relation comprises all the uncle-nephew and uncle-niece pairs. The identity relation comprises all and only the repetitious pairs, ; is still not to be confused with x. ...And there are the makings of further confusion in the following reflection: evidently to say of anything that it is identical with itself is trivial, and to say that it is identical with anything else is absurd. What then is the use of identity? Wittgenstein put this question. Genuine questions of identity can arise because we may refer to something in two ways and leave someone wondering whether we referred to the same thing. Thus I mention Simon, someone mentions Peter, and we explain that Simon /is/ Peter; they are identical. It is neither trivial to say so nor absurd to doubt it. There is little need to give a man two names, nor much interest in developing an identity-concept solely for that contingency. What is more important is reference to something not by two names but by two descriptions, or by a name and a description. We need to be able to identify Ralph with the man who mows the lawn, and his house with the one nearest the station. Identities such as these permeate our daily discourse. [section on continuity of identity snipped] A vital use of identity lurks unobserved in much of our use of 'only' and 'else' and 'nothing but'. When I say that the hiding place is known to Ralph and only him, nobody else, I mean to say two things: that Ralph knows the hiding place and that whoever knows the hiding place is identical with Ralph. To say that there is no God but Allah is to affirm, of whatever Gods there be, that Each, or He, is identical with Allah. --W. V. Quine, _Quiddities_, s.v. "Identity" -- There is / one art || John Cowan no more / no less || http://www.reutershealth.com to do / all things || http://www.ccil.org/~cowan with art- / lessness \\ -- Piet Hein