The Ship of Theseus Paradox

Unfathomable Tao · Jun 29, 2016

I was reminded of this paradox just today by a good philosopher friend, so I figured we should have a thread about it.

This paradox's origins are in the story of the Ship of Theseus. Plutarch said the Greeks maintained a ship they held belonged to Theseus, and philosophers started asking the question if it could still be called the same ship, even if it had been repaired to the point that none of the wood was the same as the original- the beams and such.

I would think this is a good paradox to relate to what we know about natural changes and evolution no?

In the modern John Locke reworded this as a sock with a hole in it that you would keep patching until the entire thing was patches. Would this be the same sock?

Can we say that things have an essential essence or nature in anything other than our sentimentality about those things- in light of say evolution or particle physics, which admit only of variation and adaption, and say nothing of an ideal man, or some such Aristotlean notion?

The Emperor of Mankind · Jun 29, 2016

Unfathomable Tao said:
I was reminded of this paradox just today by a good philosopher friend, so I figured we should have a thread about it.

This paradox's origins are in the story of the Ship of Theseus. Plutarch said the Greeks maintained a ship they held belonged to Theseus, and philosophers started asking the question if it could still be called the same ship, even if it had been repaired to the point that none of the wood was the same as the original- the beams and such.

I would think this is a good paradox to relate to what we know about natural changes and evolution no?

In the modern John Locke reworded this as a sock with a hole in it that you would keep patching until the entire thing was patches. Would this be the same sock?

Can we say that things have an essential essence or nature in anything other than our sentimentality about those things- in light of say evolution or particle physics, which admit only of variation and adaption, and say nothing of an ideal man, or some such Aristotlean notion?

Would this be inspired by the same sort of thinking as Heraclitus' 'You can't step into the same river twice'?

beenherebeforeagain · Jun 29, 2016

Well, humans (and in fact all life forms) are a constant flow of atoms in and out. Those that are in you today will mostly be gone within a few weeks, with the last stragglers (calcium atoms in the bones) having a half-life of about 7 years. All the hydrogen, oxygen, carbon and nitrogen atoms turn over with half-lives measured in weeks to months. So, you and I and everyone else are not the same atoms that we were even a few weeks ago, and will be almost entirely different in a few weeks...

And yet we maintain the same physical pattern, and our same memories, behavior patterns, etc., over longer periods, or so it appears. So, if the atoms aren't the same, how can the patterns of behavior, etc., be the same? The cells have all changed all their constituent parts, but the neurons in the brain still fire in the same patterns so we can breathe and eat and get on the internet, so that we haven't changed, have we...?

I don't think we humans have the proper concepts in our language right now. We still perceive and think and believe the same way that the ancient Greeks did. We think things are things, when--according to our increased knowledge of the nature of the universe--most things are really processes, actions taking place...

Revoltingest · Jun 29, 2016

Unfathomable Tao said:
I was reminded of this paradox just today by a good philosopher friend, so I figured we should have a thread about it.

This paradox's origins are in the story of the Ship of Theseus. Plutarch said the Greeks maintained a ship they held belonged to Theseus, and philosophers started asking the question if it could still be called the same ship, even if it had been repaired to the point that none of the wood was the same as the original- the beams and such.

I would think this is a good paradox to relate to what we know about natural changes and evolution no?

In the modern John Locke reworded this as a sock with a hole in it that you would keep patching until the entire thing was patches. Would this be the same sock?

Can we say that things have an essential essence or nature in anything other than our sentimentality about those things- in light of say evolution or particle physics, which admit only of variation and adaption, and say nothing of an ideal man, or some such Aristotlean notion?

It's not a paradox.
It's only a question of labeling a thing.
Is it a question of percentage of the original material being there?
Is it a chain of existence in a particular use?
How much restoration outside of historical context has been done?

As with restorations of historical artifacts, something extensively worked on will typically be called "original", but with presentation of artifacts history.
It is what is, wrangling over labels notwithstanding.

Unfathomable Tao · Jun 29, 2016

Revoltingest said:
It's not a paradox.
It's only a question of labeling a thing.
Is it a question of percentage of the original material being there?
Is it a chain of existence in a particular use?
How much restoration outside of historical context has been done?

Its a question of a lot of those things actually. Even if the ship were partly renovated with different materials, a philosopher might ask is it the same ship?

Revoltingest · Jun 29, 2016

Unfathomable Tao said:
Its a question of a lot of those things actually. Even if the ship were partly renovated with different materials, a philosopher might ask is it the same ship?

Different people will look at its composition & history, & then apply different labels.
The more important question is.....
What significance to whom does it still have?
A collector wants it to be as original as possible.
A museum wants its provenance to be meaningful.

fantome profane · Jun 29, 2016

Revoltingest said:
It's not a paradox.
It's only a question of labeling a thing.

I think that is true of all paradoxes. They seem to be self-contradictions, but when examined closely you will often find that the contradiction only exists in how we label things.

fantome profane · Jun 29, 2016

beenherebeforeagain said:
Well, humans (and in fact all life forms) are a constant flow of atoms in and out. Those that are in you today will mostly be gone within a few weeks, with the last stragglers (calcium atoms in the bones) having a half-life of about 7 years. All the hydrogen, oxygen, carbon and nitrogen atoms turn over with half-lives measured in weeks to months. So, you and I and everyone else are not the same atoms that we were even a few weeks ago, and will be almost entirely different in a few weeks...

And yet we maintain the same physical pattern, and our same memories, behavior patterns, etc., over longer periods, or so it appears. So, if the atoms aren't the same, how can the patterns of behavior, etc., be the same? The cells have all changed all their constituent parts, but the neurons in the brain still fire in the same patterns so we can breathe and eat and get on the internet, so that we haven't changed, have we...?

I don't think we humans have the proper concepts in our language right now. We still perceive and think and believe the same way that the ancient Greeks did. We think things are things, when--according to our increased knowledge of the nature of the universe--most things are really processes, actions taking place...

A good metaphor for this is a water fountain.

As long as the water pressure, and the size and shape of the openings remain constant the form of the water will remain constant, with perhaps some variation due to the wind. But the water that creates this shape is constantly changing.

We are water fountains.

beenherebeforeagain · Jun 29, 2016

fantome profane said:
A good metaphor for this is a water fountain.

As long as the water pressure, and the size and shape of the openings remain constant the form of the water will remain constant, with perhaps some variation due to the wind. But the water that creates this shape is constantly changing.

We are water fountains.

Excellent! I usually use clouds, a lake, or a river as a metaphor/example, but I love these (and waterfalls), and they do illustrate the point well...

I'll note, though, that the metaphor ends BEFORE anyone notes that fountains are artificial, designed and created by an intelligence...

fantome profane · Jun 29, 2016

beenherebeforeagain said:
Excellent! I usually use clouds, a lake, or a river as a metaphor/example, but I love these (and waterfalls), and they do illustrate the point well...

I'll note, though, that the metaphor ends BEFORE anyone notes that fountains are artificial, designed and created by an intelligence...

Yes, but fountains do exist in nature if the conditions are right. But a river or a waterfall make would do the same.

Unfathomable Tao · Jun 29, 2016

Revoltingest said:
Different people will look at its composition & history, & then apply different labels.
The more important question is.....
What significance to whom does it still have?
A collector wants it to be as original as possible.
A museum wants its provenance to be meaningful.

Yes I quite agree with you there, hence I mentioned sentimentality. Its a view some may have about the thing, despite the truth.

Thief · Jun 30, 2016

Unfathomable Tao said:
I was reminded of this paradox just today by a good philosopher friend, so I figured we should have a thread about it.

This paradox's origins are in the story of the Ship of Theseus. Plutarch said the Greeks maintained a ship they held belonged to Theseus, and philosophers started asking the question if it could still be called the same ship, even if it had been repaired to the point that none of the wood was the same as the original- the beams and such.

I would think this is a good paradox to relate to what we know about natural changes and evolution no?

In the modern John Locke reworded this as a sock with a hole in it that you would keep patching until the entire thing was patches. Would this be the same sock?

Can we say that things have an essential essence or nature in anything other than our sentimentality about those things- in light of say evolution or particle physics, which admit only of variation and adaption, and say nothing of an ideal man, or some such Aristotlean notion?

too bad this isn't posted where it counts.....
I am not the same spirit I was when I was younger

GoodbyeDave · Jul 1, 2016

I suppose it depends on what you consider to be the most important attributes characterising a thing. The Western museum creator or antique dealer would say the ship is not the same. On the other hand, consider the Shinto shrines in Japan. The Naikū Shrine at Ise was built in the 680s yet it looks as good as new: that's because it's replaced by an exact replica every 20 years. Obviouly for them it's the design that makes it the same.

Rick O'Shez · Jul 1, 2016

Unfathomable Tao said:
In the modern John Locke reworded this as a sock with a hole in it that you would keep patching until the entire thing was patches. Would this be the same sock?

It's much the same with our bodies.

Rick O'Shez · Jul 1, 2016

Unfathomable Tao said:
Can we say that things have an essential essence or nature in anything other than our sentimentality about those things- ?

No, I don't think we can.

beenherebeforeagain · Jul 1, 2016

Rick O'Shez said:
No, I don't think we can.

Interesting if I read you correctly...you're saying that despite our ongoing personality, memories, etc., the changes in the atoms in our body make all that sentimentality?

Don't get me wrong; I'm not taking a position in opposition--to the contrary, I just want you to expand a bit on it.

My view: I think the English language in particular, and maybe all human languages, simply can't capture the reality that we (and all things) are verbs, not subjects/objects. We are process, action, a pattern in the flow.

Is the pattern our essential property, essence or nature? Or is the energy and material that flows through that pattern? The combination of the two? Or is the pattern and flow nothing except our "sentimentality" (and I'm not exactly sure what this word means in this context...)? Where does our sentimentality come from, then?

VioletVortex · Jul 2, 2016

Well, let's say you have a car. Parts keep going bad, and the owner keeps replacing them. Finally, the only thing that hasn't gone bad is the windshield. Is that still the same car? Where does one draw the line? Personally, I draw it at 50% because that makes the most sense to me, but it's really subjective. I would say that a ship that's entirely made of replaced parts is no longer the same ship. None of the material used is the same material.

LuisDantas · Jul 2, 2016

My reading of the idea of Theseus' Ship is that it illustrates the contrast between defining an entity by its role and defining it by its physical parts.

By a certain perspective, the Ship is entirely lost once all of the original parts have been substituted. But that perspective has little practical value and suggests a sort of mystification of the physical parts.

In reality, most usefully-defined entities are subject to change of some form or another - and that is not necessarily relevant to what defines them for practical purposes.

The contrasting examples are even more enlightening. For instance, how much meaning is there is saying that a political party remains the same when both the specific people and the ideological directives change every few decades at most? Are people still the same people when so much about their goals and behavior changes if they are starving or intoxicated?

We should strive to have a clear idea of what we mean by saying that something is equal to some other permutation of the same thing, and avoid mistaking one meaning of "same" for another.

idav · Jul 2, 2016

Unfathomable Tao said:
I was reminded of this paradox just today by a good philosopher friend, so I figured we should have a thread about it.

This paradox's origins are in the story of the Ship of Theseus. Plutarch said the Greeks maintained a ship they held belonged to Theseus, and philosophers started asking the question if it could still be called the same ship, even if it had been repaired to the point that none of the wood was the same as the original- the beams and such.

I would think this is a good paradox to relate to what we know about natural changes and evolution no?

In the modern John Locke reworded this as a sock with a hole in it that you would keep patching until the entire thing was patches. Would this be the same sock?

Can we say that things have an essential essence or nature in anything other than our sentimentality about those things- in light of say evolution or particle physics, which admit only of variation and adaption, and say nothing of an ideal man, or some such Aristotlean notion?

It is an interesting paradox since life is very similarly rebuilt constantly. All of our cells become replaced to the point that none are the original. Does this make us a different person other than getting older? If the essence somehow remains then it isn't a different being.

Unfathomable Tao · Jul 5, 2016

idav said:
It is an interesting paradox since life is very similarly rebuilt constantly. All of our cells become replaced to the point that none are the original. Does this make us a different person other than getting older? If the essence somehow remains then it isn't a different being.

I don't know if there is a fundamental or lasting essence, being of an eastern worldview that puts some emphasis on voidness. I think the western mind likes to think in terms of fundamentals, essence, images, ground, and the like. As I see it, life is a constant changing flux, and essentialism might only be a human idea.

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