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Analysis: A Dialogue On Personal Identity And Immortality By John Perry

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INTRODUCTION:
This paper will argue that in John Perry 's “A Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality”, despite Weirob being correct in her belief that personal identity is not purely represented by the immaterial/unobservable soul, personal identity is the product of the integration of the material and immaterial experience of an individual. (50)

EXPOSITION:
Perry 's “A Dialogue...”, features Gretchen Weirob, a philosophy professor, coming to terms with her own mortality after suffering life-threatening injuries from a motorcycle accident. Two friends come to chat with Weirob, and the three engage in a debate over how to qualify personal identity and the possibility of identity existing beyond death of the physical body.

In their debate, Weirob is in opposition to her friends in her belief that personal identity is vested in her physical, or material, existence. Because of this, she does not believe in the continuation of her identity past her physical death. Weirob 's friends, however, contend that personal identity is not exclusively bound to material existence. Instead, they believe personal identity is immaterial, being composed of thoughts, memories, opinions, etc., which can exist beyond death of the physical body.

Despite their efforts, Weirob 's friends ultimately fail to convince her …show more content…

When it is said that the immaterial “substantiates” the material existence, this means that the immaterial determines and justifies the behaviors of the material body in its environment. Without the material and immaterial interacting in such a way, the physical body would behave irrationally and possibly in ways that would undermine its ability to facilitate a functional individual. Additionally, the immaterial motivations and methods of achieving of the material body 's pursuits, be those pursuits as basic as shelter, warmth and food, or as complex as a presidential campaign, both exhibit traits that are specific to an individual and constitutes personal

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