ABSTRACT
A slogan "no entity without identity" and a phrase criterion of identity have achieved great popularity in recent philosophy and have been used with more freedom than caution. This chapter discusses the slogan and argues that it expresses no very powerful principle. It describes the phrase and argues that, as at present employed, it expresses no single clear idea and should either be dropped from the philosophical vocabulary or be employed only under quite severe restrictions. The sense of the general term gives the individual essence of the general thing. So there is no need for general criteria of identity for things of the kind to which the general thing belongs. The chapter defines a sort of such particulars by reference to the technique employed in delimiting them; and this would yield a general principle of identity applicable to all the particulars delimited by a specified general technique.
