Dear X-David,
I find fascinating your self-image.
But, please, allow me to quote something other-than-Poetical,
the (maybe by now dated) Theory of Identity *
according to which the private mental states you are conscious of,
could be identical and equivalent
with certain dimensions of the brain that, apparently not only in principle,
could be make
accessible to public observation, by mean of scientific technique and
devices
(one would need to embellished David' head with many wires and electrodes
and switch on a few buttons).
One's identity, in this case, could be viewed as contingent and empirical
(as the example reported by the author of the Identity Theory, - DM
Armstrong - which surely would compare the complexity of David's nervous
system with all his outputs to a lightning )
which should, in principle, correspond to a David
equal to a visible flash of energy , an electrical discharge seen in the
sky.
With this, I am not here denying , the existence of a X David X, someone
entering David's dreams, disrupting his walks by mean of endless chatting or
exploiting his bank accounts and income,
(I though that was a something only us as wives were allowed to do! )
nor do I wish to reduce all these problematic of the Self to a materialist
calculation of the existing possibilities we have to actually meet David
Bircumshaw at the Cheltenham Festival.
(please, David, assemble your molecules into a complex but well-defined
structure and make yourself
join us.)
Erminia
(*DM Armstrong. A Materialist Theory of the Mind, 1968)
----- Original Message -----
From: david.bircumshaw <[log in to unmask]>
To: brit poets <[log in to unmask]>; erminia
<[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Sunday, August 20, 2000 7:32 AM
Subject: Re: RF Langley's Collected Poems
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: erminia <[log in to unmask]>
> To: david.bircumshaw <[log in to unmask]>; brit poets
> <[log in to unmask]>; Nate and Jane Dorward <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Tuesday, October 19, 1999 4:13 PM
> Subject: Re: RF Langley's Collected Poems
>
>
> > The Personality of the Author? hoots, man, Does He Exist?
> > >
> > > cheers
> > >
> > > david dot bircumshaw
> >
> >
> > You are an Author, David, and You Do Exist.
> > (someone must have seen you, smelled you, tasted you, digested you...)
> >
> > David, do not come out with Identity Problems just now ( I am dealing
with
> > that of my neighbor, who is a psychoanalyst as well as an Author... She
> does
> > not want to accept that she wrote the books that she recently wrote,
why?
> > Only because there are a few misprints in the Authors' list.
> > What a cirle...Good God! She jus left my house after one Manhattan and
two
> > Negroni(s)......)
> >
> > (I want to go to the Cheltenham Festival: who wants to join me?)
> > XXX Erminia
>
>
> My dear Erminia, I can assure you We have no Identity problems whatsoever.
> Only the other day I sent myself a very stiff note on the subject of
> Individual Integrity and Consistency of Self and I am glad to report I am
> told that a reply has already been delivered to, to... erm ... oh, old
> whatsisname - he talks to me sometimes. In my sleep. Or on the way to
work,
> whistling, distracted.
> I'd love to go to the Cheltenham Festival with you Erminia but someone
keeps
> spending all my money for me - he has access to my accounts you know -
I'll
> prove it one day - and besides which I don't gamble. Never trust a nag, as
> they say.
>
> David I mean david i mean dave (I think)
>
>
>
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