Wife mother daughter sister daughter-in-law sister-in-law cousin niece granddaughter great-niece. Godmother, goddaughter. Friend. Ex-employee. Ex-girlfriend. Ex-friend. Ex-citable. The one on the bus. The one in the pub. The one that goes 'bingly bingly beep'. The one with funny coloured hair. The one with a funny peculiar sense of humour. The one who answers questions like this.
I think there's a Me in there too. But some days it's hard to locate her.
I am the person who maintains PuTTY. I am the person who maintains ARM's C library. I am the person who is called Simon Tatham by people who know him and many who don't. I am the son of Nick and Jill Tatham. I am an ex of Vicky's. I am the sole tenant of a flat in Metcalfe Road. I am the holder of a specific NI number, and of a variety of debit and credit card numbers, and a bunch of other such numbers too. I am the person who gave your girlfriend a lift to the Chinese takeaway and back last night.
All of these things are "provided, defined, delineated, stamped, sanctioned, numbered, and approved by others", they are what other people call me, and they are all the sort of thing of which that nice Mister Sebastian would disapprove strongly. But they are all means by which someone else can work out whether they are talking to me, or to someone else.
Aside from that lot, who am I? I'm just me. I am one of many human-level intelligences on this planet, undistinguished from the others in any particularly major way that isn't either in the above list or obviously missing from it. I am an above-averagely intelligent one (which hardly makes me unique), and I am one with an above average drive to do good things for my fellow humans (likewise); but fundamentally, the concept of "me" is only really defined by the continuity of one particular pattern of consciousness, by the fact that if you tracked the movements of the person who shared half a crispy duck with you last night you would find that that same person is also the ultimate origin of the signals comprising this LJ comment this morning.
I'd have loved to say all that lot to Sebastian, too, although I'd probably have had to plead in advance to be allowed to finish my explanation without being impatiently zapped. I wonder what he'd have made of it as an answer.
(You note he never actually did consider any of Delenn's answers to "who are you" to be acceptable! He moved on from that question after a while and got on to the serious meat about destiny. I'm fairly sure that there are no really good pat answers to "who are you", and I have a suspicion that the main aim of asking is simply to see how people behave under pressure when told each of their answers is unacceptable...)
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-27 03:25 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-27 03:29 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-27 03:26 pm (UTC)I think there's a Me in there too. But some days it's hard to locate her.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-27 03:41 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-27 03:54 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-28 01:17 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-27 03:42 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-27 03:52 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-27 04:01 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-27 04:03 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-27 11:32 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-28 12:21 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-28 12:35 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-28 01:21 am (UTC)I am the person who maintains PuTTY. I am the person who maintains ARM's C library. I am the person who is called Simon Tatham by people who know him and many who don't. I am the son of Nick and Jill Tatham. I am an ex of Vicky's. I am the sole tenant of a flat in Metcalfe Road. I am the holder of a specific NI number, and of a variety of debit and credit card numbers, and a bunch of other such numbers too. I am the person who gave your girlfriend a lift to the Chinese takeaway and back last night.
All of these things are "provided, defined, delineated, stamped, sanctioned, numbered, and approved by others", they are what other people call me, and they are all the sort of thing of which that nice Mister Sebastian would disapprove strongly. But they are all means by which someone else can work out whether they are talking to me, or to someone else.
Aside from that lot, who am I? I'm just me. I am one of many human-level intelligences on this planet, undistinguished from the others in any particularly major way that isn't either in the above list or obviously missing from it. I am an above-averagely intelligent one (which hardly makes me unique), and I am one with an above average drive to do good things for my fellow humans (likewise); but fundamentally, the concept of "me" is only really defined by the continuity of one particular pattern of consciousness, by the fact that if you tracked the movements of the person who shared half a crispy duck with you last night you would find that that same person is also the ultimate origin of the signals comprising this LJ comment this morning.
I'd have loved to say all that lot to Sebastian, too, although I'd probably have had to plead in advance to be allowed to finish my explanation without being impatiently zapped. I wonder what he'd have made of it as an answer.
(You note he never actually did consider any of Delenn's answers to "who are you" to be acceptable! He moved on from that question after a while and got on to the serious meat about destiny. I'm fairly sure that there are no really good pat answers to "who are you", and I have a suspicion that the main aim of asking is simply to see how people behave under pressure when told each of their answers is unacceptable...)
(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-28 02:45 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-28 03:21 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-28 03:57 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-28 11:02 am (UTC)not sure it is still true...
Date: 2003-10-28 02:23 pm (UTC)i am the darkness by which the light may be seen...
(no subject)
Date: 2003-11-06 08:01 pm (UTC)