[ExI] Next moment, everything around you will probably change

[Jef Allbright]

On 6/22/07, Lee Corbin <lcorbin at rawbw.com> wrote:
> So now you'll want to defend a variation of the "agency" point of
> view concerning personal identity?  So how do you handle the
> case I presented to Jef:  a policeman on duty is clearly constitutes
> a different role (or agency?) than he does that evening when he's
> out with friends and family (even if he's still packing).

We know the person (the abstract entity) only in terms of our model of
the person.  To the extent that we see only the policeman (one role of
the agent) then our model is dominated by policeman characteristics,
but of course we're aware that he has a personal life and include that
in our model as well.

> Has the
> agency changed?  Is he still the same person?  (Just trying to
> get at what you might mean.)

The agent, acting within the world, is changing all the time. The
agent affects its environment, the environment affects the agent.  In
the case of a human agent, it can vary in physical condition, mood,
emotional state, suffer an injury, lose a limb, lose memories, form
false memories, update its values, change its behavior, an so on, and
any observer (including this particular biological organism) will
continue to associate this agent with a certain entity, on whose
behalf the agent is seen to act.

- Jef