For this blog, I'm going to talk about X-men. What could X-men possibly have to do with philosophy? I'm not quite sure myself, but the authors of X-men and Philosophy certainly do. While the book seems to draw upon quite a bit of BS, I'm willing to trust it in order to get this blog post in the air.
In the movies, Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) loses his memory and has to deal with issues of personal identity. Who is he, if he is unable to remember his past? This has implications in ethics; if someone is unable to remember committing a crime, are they morally responsible for it? Or was it "someone else" that did it?
A couple of people I've referenced before, Locke and Hume, had opinions on personal identity and "selfhood." Locke thought that the self was based off of memory. In other words, if you can remember being that past self, you are morally responsible for what you did. This gets a little tricky when you think about mental diseases like Alzheimer's that might allow you to remember your childhood and yet nothing else. To borrow from Wikipedia:
"According to Locke, personal identity (the self) "depends on consciousness, not on substance" nor on the soul. We are the same person to the extent that we are conscious of our past and future thoughts and actions in the same way as we are conscious of our present thoughts and actions."
Hume, on the other hand, thought that the self doesn't really exist. Since Wikipedia kinda fails at explaining this (which is kinda odd) here's a Yahoo Answers link. Basically, Hume couldn't see any reason that an eternal self existed. If this is the case, however, it's really tough to get moral culpability up and running.
So can we hold Wolverine responsible for his actions before his amnesia? If we do, are we following through merely for appearance's sake (i.e. to make sure no one else shanks their enemies with metal claws, deterring them when they realize the punishment)? And is our "selfhood" only held together by memories, or is it something beyond that? Perhaps there's nothing to selfhood at all (damn Buddhists!)
Here's an amusing review of X-men Origins. That is all.
Hahaha, yes, very amusing review of Origins.
ReplyDeleteI don't generally enjoy superhero movies, but I've always enjoyed X-Men... but Origins was a major disappointment! Funny review.
ReplyDeleteReview=hilarious and i agree with his points
ReplyDeleteI haft to say that whether or not someone is held responsible for their actions in the past, even if they don't remember them, depends on the person and the situation. Hume sounds like a philosopher who couldn't make up his mind so he just blabbered on with nonsense hoping to confuse everyone enough that they wouldn't question his "logic". Apparently it worked.
Yeah, Hume's main goal was freaking people out. He kinda succeeded, although he admitted himself that some of his arguments didn't really relate well to the world, even if they seemed logically sound upfront.
ReplyDeleteWow, I never thought Wolverine could be so deep :) Now I'll have to rewatch X-Men Origins and keep this in mind.
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