On Identity

I started dreaming up Spyshakers back in 2003. Back then I was fresh off my philosophical courses at Saint Vincent College. I had an outstanding professor at Saint Vincent. His name was Dr. Guess. He doesn’t teach philosophy anymore (I believe he went into High School Chemistry?). I like to say that he had to quit teaching philosophy because I answered all his questions. Haha. We had good discussions though. I had a lot of fun in Metaphysics. I came to peace with many philosophical questions that I had. Those answers influence everything. They establish beliefs. It is funny how close belief and fact are related. If 2 + 2 = 4 is a fact, don’t I first have to believe in the 2, believe in the +, believe in the = and believe in the 4 for the equation to even make sense?

Mind you before I go further my major was not philosophy (it was Computer Science). I have not been in college for a while! Nevertheless I tried to build Spyshakers around philosophy when possible. I will explain over time.

Enter the concept of an identity. If you want to build the world’s premier identity website, it would help to construct the definition of identity. Merriam-Webster defines identity as “sameness in all that constitutes the objective reality of a thing”. At the time of writing Merriam-Webster has four definitions for identity. Lets break down the aforementioned. If an identity is sameness in all that constitutes the objective reality of a thing, is my sameness as a baby equal to my sameness as an adult? Hardly. What is the difference between the two identities? Many things. When did the sameness change? Vaguely and through time. By who’s testimonial did anything change? By the perception of someone who witnessed. No wonder everyone has such a hard time coming up with good identity solutions. The definition is wrong! Haha.

A better definition of identity would be “the perception of an entity assigned by a witness in the context of time and space”. If perceptions are being assigned within time and space, that means the identity of an entity is subject to change. In English that means identities for real world things can change!

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