Philosophy Basics: Law of Identity

Reading some Objectivist philosophy basics, metaphysics.

http://www.importanceofphilosophy.com

Aristotle's Law of Identity, Noncontradiction Non-contradiction

Category:

Education

Tags:

• objectivism
• philosophically
• primer
• ontology

[sherlockfury]

I'm contradicting the video's quote: 1:45 "a car can be both blue and red, but not at the same time, or not in the same respect. Whatever portion is blue cannot be red at the same time, in the same way.  Half the car can be red and the other half blue, but the whole car can't be both red and blue. These two traits, blue and red, each have single particular identities."

I was just stating that an identity's qualities aren't necessarily mutually exclusive.

[DaveDoggOwns]

How does that contradict the law of identity? The car is blue from one angle and red from a different angle. It may be composed of certain characteristics (all of which have their own identity) but that doesn't change the fact the car is still has one identity.

[sherlockfury]

can't you have a car paint that is different colors depending on the viewing angel. So wouldn't that car be both blue and red. And which one is seen is dependent on the observer's position?  And really the colors aren't in the car, but we perceive that reflected light, and so can't one person's mind perceive blue, and that same experienced "color" is called RED by another?

[LordImmolation]

Have you read much David Lewis or Saul Kripke on identity? Lewis has a great quote:

More important, we should not suppose that we have here any problem about identity. We never have. Identity is utterly simple and unproblematic. Everything is identical to itself; nothing is ever identical to anything except itself. There is never any problem about what makes something identical to itself; nothing can ever fail to be. (Lewis 1986).