John Perry's theory of personal identity Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

John Perrys theory of personal identity - Essay ExampleThe paper will also explore the objections made against Perrys arguments, and present a variety of the possible replies and the responses made about the issues raised. Lastly, the paper will draw conclusions from the issues discussed, highlighting the overall woodland of Perrys argument.Perry developed four theories, in explaining the reality of life, personality identity and immortality. The four theories include the soulfulness theory, the body theory, the brain theory and the memory theory. In presenting the memory theory, Perry argues that memory is the most iconic contribution of a persons identity, and maintains that it is not just about the activities they engaged in, in the past. Perry explains that memories be the systems be mannerisms, behavior, feelings and attitudes about divers(prenominal) issues (Perry 34). The memory is the principle function involved in the formation of psychological behaviors, for example, the silent smile expressed towards a neighbor and the sadness that results from the loss of a loved one. More importantly, this status of a human enables them to recognize others, not only from their looks, but also from the shared memories about different things and issues.In the case of memory loss, it is impossible for the given individual to stop being themselves, and that is mainly because individuals are controlled by different sets of memories, including the conscious and the subconscious. In such a case, the individual losses their interactive mogul with others, but there is the subconscious side of their memory which is spared (Perry 35). These memories are those that control areas like walking style, display case of laugh and the instruments they can play. Due to the sharp contrast in the areas lost and those maintained, this theory has been criticized in umteen ways.It is important to make a comparison of the memory theory with the body, which maintains that, an ind ividual is