Page - 146 - in Cyborg Mind - What Brain–Computer and Mind–Cyberspace Interfaces Mean for Cyberneuroethics

146 • Cyborg Mind sense of a living being remains one and the same being throughout his or her life trajectory in the three dimensions of space and over time. In this case, two perspectives are generally presented, namely: • a biological perspective that reflects the continuous biological being remaining one and the same whole being over time as a biological entity in space, despite some qualitative changes, such as those arising from the replication and division of cells making up this being;191 • a psychological or biographical perspective that reflects the relation- ship a living being has to itself as remaining one and the same whole individual over time, despite some qualitative changes. This gener- ally includes continuity of consciousness, experiential contents or the maintaining of psychological connections or capacities, such as memories. These different perspectives can, of course, be examined separately or together, enabling the living being to be considered a psychosomatic unity. – Qualitative identity, which examines similarities between the same indi- vidual in different settings or between distinct individuals. For example, two beings may be similar from a biological perspective, but may exist in different settings of space and/or time. In this way, identical twins are qualitatively but not numerically identical. Each twin exists in a different setting of the three dimensions of space, though they generally live at the same time.192 – Narrative identities, which are based on how individuals might describe or perceive themselves (or be described by others), comprising aspects of memories, experiences and details that define the question: ‘Who am I?’193 Narrative identities concern aspects of self-conception instead of per- sistence over time. This means that numerical identity could remain the same, despite significant changes in narrative identity. – Social identities, which are generated through roles and relationships between people and the wider social as well as cultural contexts. These include family relationships, friendships, membership of communities and attachment to particular places. Interestingly, from a philosophical perspective, because human beings are always changing over time and are not exactly the same at any two moments, questions can be asked as to whether some of the above identities remain the same. This is especially important if a person is put on trial for a crime that ‘he’ or ‘she’ committed many decades beforehand, since it is pos- sible to ask whether the same person is still present. In response, it can be stressed that a person may consider himself or herself to be a whole person, in a continuous sense, since the beginning of his or her existence and until the present time. This open access edition has been made available under a CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 license thanks to the support of Knowledge Unlatched. Not for resale.