Meta-Programming as a Model Creation Technique

First, Locke began by explicating the meaning of identity and he renders it thus:

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Another occasion the mind often takes of comparing, is the very being of things, when, considering anything as existing at any determined time and place, we compare it with itself existing at another time, and thereon form the ideas of identity and diversity. When we see anything to be in any place in any instant of time, we are sure (be it what it will) that it is that very thing, and not another which at that same time exists in another place, how like and undistinguishable soever it may be in all other respects: and in this consists IDENTITY, when the ideas it is attributed to vary not at all from what they were that moment wherein we consider their former existence, and to which we compare the present.¹⁴⁶

Two things come out clearly from the above passage; first that identity is formed by the mind comparing things at any determined time and place and secondly, that in all respects, the things being compared must be alike and undistinguishable from each other. This is to say that the idea of identity is hinged on the mind‘s ability of comparison and logic. It is in consonance with one of the laws of thought, precisely the law of identity which states that ‗everything is what it is‘.

According to this law A is A and not A and something else. Thus, the identity Locke was distinguishing in this section or context may be christened numerical identity in which, for example, Wesley is identical to himself at one and the same location at one and the same time, there cannot exist two different Wesleys of the same kind. So, by this principle, if two things began in two different space-time locations, they are not numerically identical. Exact resemblance in this regard in which, for instance, Wesley is identical to his twin brother, Presley does not consist or fit into Locke‘s kind of identity description. In all, Identity is founded on the assumption that no two things can exist at the same time in the same place. From that it can be deduced that nothing can have two beginnings and no two things can have the same beginning, thus giving something its individuality, or identity.¹⁴⁷

Furthermore, Locke asserted that we have ideas or notions of three sorts or kinds of substances—

God, Finite intelligences and Bodies. For the first sort of substance, God, Locke maintained that

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concerning His identity condition there can be no doubt, because God is without beginning, eternal, unchanging and omnipresent. For the second kind of substance, finite intelligences or spirits, in this case humans, Locke affirmed that so long as each had its determinate time and place of beginning to exist, the identity condition is hinged on or depended on this time and place of beginning of existence. What Locke is saying is that humans are individuated according to their beginning locations in space and time, even as far as minds are concerned. For the third sort of substance, bodies, in this regard material objects, Locke said what applied to finite spirits apply to them also, i.e., if one and only one particle of matter can exist at a determinate or particular location in space and time then its identity condition is anchored on the starting point of existence in relation to time and place. More so, now, each of these types of substances excludes other substances of the same type from existing at that same place and time (which means, effectively, that there can only be one God), but you can have three different substances existing at the same location in space and time (e.g.: my mind, my body and God all exist right here right now).¹⁴⁸

All other things, other than the ones mentioned above, being modes and relations terminated in substances. Hence, their identity and diversity are the same way determined, given that their existence is hinged on the particular substance. But for those things only, whose existence is in succession, especially as demonstrated by the action of finite beings; motion and thought in this regard, and continued in that trend of succession, there will be no questioning or doubt about their diversity, because they perish the moment they begin; as such they cannot exist in different times and different places, whereas permanent beings are capable of existing at different times

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and distant places. Thus, no motion or thought, considered as at different times, can be the same, each part therefore having a different beginning of existence.¹⁴⁹

It is essential to note that the subject matter of Locke‘s inquiry is principium individuationis, that is, existence itself, which defines or determines a being of any kind to a definite place and inexpressible to two beings of the same kind. Here, ―the idea of existence and identity is applied to compounded substances or modes. Assuming that an atom determined to be at a certain time and place in any point of its existence the same with itself must continue in the same way as long as its existence, a group of atoms would be said to exist similarly and have an identity. Should an atom be removed or added the substance changes and so does its identity for the period of time it exists as such.‖¹⁵⁰ Whereas concerning the identity of living things or organisms, their identity is determined differently as we shall see in the next section. In all, this section is explicitly summed up this way:

that existence is the principle of identity: as long as an atom exists, it is the same atom. (this is identity through time.) This principle can be enlarged to cover collections of atoms. Thus, a ―mass‖ is the same as long as it consists of exactly the same atoms (―let the parts be every so differently jumbled‖), but if it loses or gains even one, it is a different mass (even though the atoms themselves will not lose identity, they will remain the same atoms), however, different identity conditions must apply to living things, because an acorn becomes an oak tree while changing drastically the matter it is composed of.¹⁵¹