Compresence
noun.
The simultaneous presence together of properties or experienced qualities. (Oxford)
I don’t know about you, but I’ve often felt as if I were at least 2 different people. At least.
I’ve talked about this a lot in the past, mainly because I’ve been in a lot of therapy. I talked about how I couldn’t decide if I was a good person or a bad person. My gut told me that I was a bad person. I kept doing things I knew were wrong, and I couldn’t stop myself. I said to my therapist, “Amy, it’s like I’m two separate people. It’s like there’s Good Katie, and there’s Bad Katie. Good Katie knows what’s going on, and she know’s what’s right and what’s wrong, but she’s stuck in a glass box. She sees everything, but she can’t do anything about it. She bangs on the walls and screams, but nobody can hear her. Or, maybe Bad Katie can hear her, but she just doesn’t care. She does what she wants.”
I’m going to tell you a little bit about Bundle Theory, because someday you’re going to be at a party and there’s going to be one of those awkward lulls in conversation, so you’ll want to know. The question is, “What constitutes an object?” There are those who will say that an object is a substance which possesses certain traits or characteristics. In other words, my mug is a distinct substance which has the properties “being made of ceramic”, “being filled with tea”, and “possessing a picture of a cat”. Then, there are those who will say that my mug is literally nothing but its bundle of properties. My mug is not a substance which has characteristics. It is, simply, its characteristics.
The former folks are called Substance Theorists, and the latter folks are called Bundle Theorists. I suggest you read more about it so you can wow your buddies with the breadth of your knowledge. My purpose at the moment is not to provide more evidence that Metaphysics was the only class I ever paid attention to in college.
Let’s get back to talking about me. This is my identity crisis for the day. I have a hard time taking responsibility for things I’ve done sometimes, because often when I look back it seems like someone else was doing them, someone who was immoral and didn’t give a shit about anything. I generally like to think that I have something resembling a moral compass, so who was that person, and why are we occupying the same body?
And what constitutes a person anyway? Maybe a person is a substance which possesses characteristics like Goodness and Badness. Maybe a person is something separate, that is not necessarily defined by its properties. Or, maybe a person is simply Goodness and Badness, and red hair and thoughtfulness and insecurity and social ineptitude, all mushed up together. Sometimes, I can’t imagine myself without my Badness, the same as I can’t imagine myself without a cat.
I don’t know about you. Maybe you have this all figured out.