ABSTRACT
Historically, the voluminous literature on what the self is stems from two basic puzzle cases. The first is Locke’s example of the prince and the cobbler. The second is Bernard Williams’ idea that it might be possible to print off multiple versions of a single person. The great majority of the literature on personal identity is based on reflection on a single example, Locke’s case of the prince and the cobbler. Williams' suggestion seemed to be that to avoid this kind of puzzle, human should stick with the conception of the identity of the self as equivalent to sameness of the body. The trouble is that “printing-off” of bodies also seems possible. The basic point discussed is that nothing stands to the use human actually make of the first person as perception of the tree stands to the use that human make of the term, “that tree.”.
