[MD] Many Avatars, Many Selves

[Arlo Bensinger]

[Ron]
But you still evade the question of responsibility. You divert to 
questions of identity once again.

[Arlo]
Okay, fair enough. I though I answered this already, but you don't 
think I have. I'll take another crack at it.

Responsibility is social law, Ron, and this law is based on the 
belief that there is a thread of continuity running through all the 
selves that inhabit a particular brain. We agree, socially, that this 
continuity exists and therefore can punish the "entirety" of the 
selves in a brain for the actions of any one. I agree with this, and 
find it a necessary law to preserve social stability. I've said 
several times in this thread that holding the illusion of "the real 
Arlo" accountable for the actions of any one of his many "pretend 
faces" is just and necessary social law.

What I am pointing out, over and over, is that this thread of 
continuity is not real, its an illusion. A valuable one, to be sure, 
and one we NEED to ensure social stability. But we have to be very 
careful we don't start seeing this illusion as a dogmatic reality. It 
serves us, we should not be serving it.

Does this answer your question?

In other words, in cases where social stability is threatened we use 
this illusion to preserve our social world. In cases where this is 
not the case, we need to step back and see that this thread of 
continuity has no existence apart from the immediate, contextual 
activities of the moment. When social stability is threatened, we can 
lock up "Mark" for the crimes of "Julia". But otherwise, when we 
really think about "Mark" and "Julia" we must remember that the 
illusion of continuity we build is only a social convention and not 
some absolute real self pretending to be someone else.

[Ron says of "the source"]
That ball of yarn with many faces which the words and ideas you 
submit originate from.

[Arlo]
You are saying, if I understand, that the "source" is the sum-total 
of all our "selves"? And it includes our physiology as well?