The Biological Basis of Individuality

Abstract

Philosophers have had much to say on the question of personal identity, though I must confess that I have not found any of it very helpful. Most of you, I suspect, would find yourselves in agreement with John Locke whose robust common sense has I think a special appeal to medical men, perhaps because he was one himself-that we each have an intuitive knowledge of our own existence. Some of you, on the other hand, as good sons of Edinburgh, may prefer the sophism of David Hume, and affirm that man is nothing but a bundle of perceptions-though Hume himself later in life appeared to have doubts about this. Perhaps, though I hope not, a few of you may believe that Society or The State is the smallest unit worth bothering about, and that what we call an individual is merely an abstraction.