Thomas Reid came up with an example showing a weakness in Locke's way of thinking about what it is to be a person. An old soldier can remember his bravery in a battle when he was a young officer; and when he was a young officer he could remember that he had been hit when as a boy he'd stolen apples from an orchard. But in his old age, the soldier can no longer remember this event from his childhood. Surely this pattern of overlapping memories would mean that the old soldier was still the same person as the boy? Thomas Reid thought it was obvious that the old soldier was still the same person
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