If you replace every plank and nail in a ship...

[Ilium]

Well, I insist I'm still me, even though all my molecules have been replaced many times over. So, yeah, same party.

 

[Merkuri]

Just to let you know where I'm coming from, there's a riddle (I guess you'd call it a koan, since it has no answer) that says, "If you repair a ship gradually until every plank and nail has been replaced and there is no part of the original ship remaining, is it still the same ship?"

I like to add, "And if you take those planks and nails from the original ship and reassemble them elsewhere so it is exactly like the first ship, which one is the original ship? Both? Neither?"

Just something to think about.

 

[ThirdWizard]

Personally, I see a party as a collection of individuals, so I say it isn't. This is influenced by my character-centric approach to D&D.

 

[Mishihari Lord]

Just to let you know where I'm coming from, there's a riddle (I guess you'd call it a koan, since it has no answer) that says, "If you repair a ship gradually until every plank and nail has been replaced and there is no part of the original ship remaining, is it still the same ship?"

I like to add, "And if you take those planks and nails from the original ship and reassemble them elsewhere so it is exactly like the first ship, which one is the original ship? Both? Neither?"

Just something to think about.

Those are interesting points, but people are not planks. If you were to slowly chage out people in a group the norms of the first group would mostly remain, but the norms of the second would be new-formed due to the different circumstances, i.e. the switch-out, different number of people in the group, etc. I would say the first group is the original and the second is not.

 

[Olaf the Stout]

Probably yes. Sociology has show that a social group is more than the individuals. There are norms, traditions, processes, methods, and so on that are accepted by the members and define how they relate to each other and to the outside world. If these survive, I would say that it is the same group.

An interesting example of this was an experiment done on a group of gorillas. A group of gorillas was in a cage and some food was placed (IIRC) at the top of some stairs, but if any gorilla tried to get the food, all the gorillas in the cage got zapped. They learned this very quickly and any gorilla that strayed too close to the zap location got dogpiled by the rest of the gorillas. The experimenters then replaced the gorillas in the group one by one. Of course the new gorilla would try to get the food and be summarily dogpiled by the rest. The interesting thing was that the behavior continued even once all of the gorillas that had experienced a zap were removed. The behavior had become a group norm even though none of them knew why.

This may be a more serious answer than you were looking for, but I think this is awfully interesting stuff.

I find these sorts of studies interesting and yet cruel at the same time. Hopefully the shocks were very minor. Even still I don't think that it would have been very plesant for the gorillas.

Olaf the Stout

 

[Mishihari Lord]

I find these sorts of studies interesting and yet cruel at the same time. Hopefully the shocks were very minor. Even still I don't think that it would have been very plesant for the gorillas.

Olaf the Stout

I more or less agree with you. IIRC the shocks were painful but not physically damaging. If you think this was bad, the things that psychologists used to be able to do to people in the name of science were unbelievable. Fortunately experimental review boards seem to have made large steps towards ethical experimentation.

 

[Merkuri]

If you think this was bad, the things that psychologists used to be able to do to people in the name of science were unbelievable.

You mean like this? Or this?

 

[Mishihari Lord]

You mean like this? Or this?

That's spooky. Those were exactly the two experiments I was thinking of.

 

[Merkuri]

That's spooky. Those were exactly the two experiments I was thinking of.

Maybe we took the same Psych 101 class.

Those are actually pretty famous experiments. I wouldn't be surprised if there were more than just the two of us thinking of them.

 

[Raven Crowking]

There is no such thing as "conservation of identity". The term "party" and its definition is a matter of personal perspective. Thus, the question is largely meaningless. If the party considers itself to be the same party, then from its perspective it is. If not, not.

I'm fairly certain that none of the original members of the Salvation Army are still alive, but the Salvation Army continues to exist because we still identify a certain set of people as belonging to that group.

Even were we discussing an object -- like the ship replaced plank by plank -- we could still claim it were the same object because we are discussing identity, as opposed to a physical property of said object.


RC