Is self-identity essential to objects?

Tracing the identity of objects.

This article considers how people judge the identity of objects (e.g., how people decide that a description of an object at one time, t(0), belongs to the same object as a description of it at another time, t(1)). The authors propose a causal continuer model for these judgments, based on an earlier theory by Nozick (1981). According to this model, the 2 descriptions belong to the same object if...

Physical Objects, Identity and Vagueness

The paper presents an approach to constructing an ontology of physical objects founded on a theory of the spatio-temporal distribution of matter types. The starting point for this construction is the formal theory O of ‘space, time, matter and things’ given in (Bennett 2001c), in which physical objects are modelled as maximal self-connected portions of some matter type. However, that theory is ...

Kohonen Self Organizing for Automatic Identification of Cartographic Objects

Automatic identification and localization of cartographic objects in aerial and satellite images have gained increasing attention in recent years in digital photogrammetry and remote sensing. Although the automatic extraction of man made objects in essence is still an unresolved issue, the man made objects can be extracted from aerial photos and satellite images. Recently, the high-resolution s...

A Sociological Approach to Self and Identity*

Split identity: intransitive judgments of the identity of objects.

Identity is a transitive relation, according to all standard accounts. Necessarily, if x=y and y=z, then x=z. However, people sometimes say that two objects, x and z, are the same as a third, y, even when x and z have different properties (thus, x=y and y=z, but x≠z). In the present experiments, participants read stories about an iceberg that breaks into two icebergs, one to the east and the ot...