Memory, Soul and Animalistic Theories
Lockean memory theory states that “A person stage at an earlier time and a person stage at a later time are parts of the same person’s life if and only if the later person’s stage can remember an experience that the earlier person stage had,” (stitch and Donaldson, 224). The memory, therefore, implies that people are defined by the memories they behold, and as long as they are still in remembrance of these memories, they are still the same person. Locke gives an example of a prince and a cobbler switching bodies and concludes that the new cobbler is still a prince and should be judged for whatever mistakes made by the prince. One’s ability to reckon past events is, therefore, an important aspect of identifying a person, according to memory theorists.
Having established this, it is inevitable that memory theorists would oppose Garrett’s conviction. Because they define personal identity with a person’s ability to recall events that happened in the past, they would dismiss Garrett’s mistakes. He is unable to recall stealing from the bank nor taking one of the guard’s life. He is therefore a different person. He shouldn’t be charged for something he does not even recall doing. In the relation of the prince of the cobbler, Locke states that “It would be a great injustice if the man who woke up in the palace with the prince’s body and the cobbler’s memories were to be punished for some past deed done by the prince since he has no memory of doing that deed,” (Stich and Donaldson, 223). In the same way, a memory theorist would feel that it would be unfair if Garrett was convicted of a crime he could hardly remember committing.
Soul theorists believe in the existence of a non-material and non-physical matter that gives the definition of a person, that is, the soul. They incline their definition of who a person is on the presence of the same soul, meaning, two different people can be described as the same person as they are attached to the same soul. This is as shown by the phrase, “If a body at one point in time and a body later in time are linked to the same soul, then the complex consisting of the body and the soul at the earlier time is numerically identical with the complex consisting of the body and the soul at the later time; they are the same person, no matter how physically similar or dissimilar the bodies maybe,” (Stitch and Donaldson, 217-218).
Given this, soul theorists would, therefore, be in support of Garrett’s conviction because even though he lost memory of the offenses he had committed, he still beholds the same soul, and is, therefore, the no different to the person who committed the murder and robbery. Loss of memory did not mean the loss of his soul. According to soul theorists, the memory loss does not give rise to another person, the loss of the soul does. Garrett has the same soul in him and is, therefore, responsible for murder and robbery. Because they believe the soul being the reason for being in any human, they would judge that it is still the same being that exists in Garrett that led him to commit these crimes.