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Personal Identity

Clones

(Work In Progress: output at 15/01/2026 19:59:31)

Plug Note¹

• Thesis Text:
  1. Cloning features in₂ several TEs³.
  2. We need to contrast two forms of cloning:-
     1. The metaphysical possibility of atom-by-atom cloning.
     2. Biological cloning which uses existing structures, and interferes unnaturally in a fairly minor way.
  3. I am not concerned (as far as my thesis goes) with the medical ethics of biological cloning. There is never any suggestion that clones in this sense are logically identical, any more than so-called identical twins are.
     1. That said, there is something of a link – in the metaphysics, if not the ethics – with a critique of Parfit⁴’s “identity doesn’t matter” account of personal identity.
     2. Since my clone has my (innate) properties and capacities, Parfit might think I have all that matters (or much of what matters) to me if my clone, rather than I myself, survives and I do not.
     3. The following papers seem to follow this approach:-
        → "Agar (Nicholas) - Cloning and Identity", and
        → "Brennan (Andrew) - Survival"
     4. In particular, the paper by Andrew Brennan suggests that persons might be types rather than tokens which – while an interesting proposal – is about as far from the truth as you can get. Tokens suffer, types do not, qua types. One token of the same type may be luxuriating while another is being tortured.
  4. What I am interested in is whether atom-by-atom cloning (where the original exemplar is destroyed) can ever preserve identity⁵. Because of the logical possibility of the non-destruction of the “original”, I take it that it cannot. This argument depends on modal logic⁶ – and the rejection of the possibility of contingent identity⁷. For further discussion, see under Teletransportation₈.
  5. We may also need to discuss causality⁹ to further explain why identity is not preserved during a cloning event. This is particularly the case when discussing Dean Zimmerman’s Falling Elevator model of resurrection¹⁰, where – it is supposed – there is a causal connection between the expiring body¹¹ and its clone in the next world.
     1. Is it agreed that this is indeed a clone, as it seems to be, or …
     2. Is this body supposed to be the same body, created by supernatural processes by immanent causation – albeit across space and maybe other dimensions – much as a body at one time is self-identical to a body at a later time by natural metabolic processes?
     3. This would imply – in the absence of perdurantism¹² – the non-identity of the living organism¹³ and the post-mortem corpse¹⁴.
     4. See "Hershenov (David) - Van Inwagen, Zimmerman, and the Materialist Conception of Resurrection" for the argument that Zimmerman’s resurrected body is a duplicate¹⁵.
     5. For Zimmerman’s arguments, see:-
        → "Zimmerman (Dean) - The Compatibility of Materialism and Survival: The “Falling Elevator” Model", and
        → "Zimmerman (Dean) - Bodily Resurrection: The Falling Elevator Model Revisited".
        
  6. The very term ‘Cloning’ seems to deny the possibility of the logical identity of an original and its clone. It implies that there are two things – the original and the clone – and two things can never be one thing, so cannot be logically identical¹⁶.
  7. I note here – for want of a better place – that there’s a “no-cloning” principle₁₇ in Quantum Mechanics¹⁸, which forbids the making of an exact copy of an unknown quantum state. This – it seems – is relevant to the difficulties for error-correction in Quantum Computing.

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  Further Remarks:
  1. Cloning is related to – or is involved in the analysis of – topics such as₁₉
     • Duplication²⁰,
     • Fission²¹,
     • Replication²²,
     • Resurrection²³ / Reincarnation²⁴,
     • Teletransportation²⁵.

References

• Relevant Works cited above:
  1. "Agar (Nicholas) - Cloning and Identity", 2003, Internal PDF Link, Read = 7%
  2. "Brennan (Andrew) - Survival", 1984, Internal PDF Link, Read = 5%
  3. "Hershenov (David) - Van Inwagen, Zimmerman, and the Materialist Conception of Resurrection", 2002, External Link, Internal PDF Link, Read = 11%
  4. "Zimmerman (Dean) - Bodily Resurrection: The Falling Elevator Model Revisited", 2010, Annotations, Internal PDF Link, Read
  5. "Zimmerman (Dean) - The Compatibility of Materialism and Survival: The “Falling Elevator” Model", 1999, External Link, Internal PDF Link, Read
• For a Page of Links²⁶ to this Note, Click here.
• Works on this topic that I’ve actually read²⁷, include the following:-
  • Aeon:
    1. "Aeon - Video - Norman, norman", 2020, External Link
  • General:
    1. "Ball (Philip) - Beyond Weird: Why Everything You Thought You Knew About Quantum Mechanics is ... Different", 2019, Book
    2. "Dennett (Daniel) - The Mind's I - Fantasies and Reflections on Self and Soul: Introduction", 1981, External Link, Internal PDF Link
    3. "Dworkin (Andrea) - Sasha", 1998, No Abstract
    4. "Gale (Richard) - On Some Pernicious Thought-Experiments", 1991, External Link, Internal PDF Link
    5. "Ishiguro (Kazuo) - Never Let Me Go", 2005, Book, Footnote₂₈
    6. "Nussbaum (Martha) & Sunstein (Cass R.) - Clones and Clones - Introduction", 1998
    7. "Shoemaker (David) - Personal Identity and Immortality", 2009
    8. "Tuttle (Lisa) - World of Strangers", 1998, No Abstract
    9. "Zimmerman (Dean) - Bodily Resurrection: The Falling Elevator Model Revisited", 2010, Annotations, Internal PDF Link
    10. "Zimmerman (Dean) - The Compatibility of Materialism and Survival: The “Falling Elevator” Model", 1999, External Link, Internal PDF Link
• A further reading list might start with:-
  • General:
    1. "Agar (Nicholas) - Cloning and Identity", 2003, Internal PDF Link, Read = 7%
    2. "Brennan (Andrew) - Survival", 1984, Internal PDF Link, Read = 5%
    3. "Briggs (Rachael) & Nolan (Daniel) - Utility Monsters for the Fission Age", 2015, Internal PDF Link
    4. "Harris (John) - Clones, Genes and Immortality: Ethics and Genetics", 1998, Book, Read = 1%
    5. "Hershenov (David) - An Argument for Limited Human Cloning", 2000, External Link, Internal PDF Link, Read = 8%
    6. "Hershenov (David) - Van Inwagen, Zimmerman, and the Materialist Conception of Resurrection", 2002, External Link, Internal PDF Link, Read = 11%
    7. "Johnston (Mark) - A New Refutation Of Death", 2010, Read = 3%
    8. "Kamm (F.M.) - Moral Status and Personal Identity: Clones, Embryos, and Future Generations", 2005, Internal PDF Link
    9. "Nussbaum (Martha) & Sunstein (Cass R.), Eds. - Clones and Clones: Facts and Fantasies About Human Cloning", 1998, Book, Read = 4%, Footnote₂₉
    10. "Swinburne (Richard) - How To Determine Which Is The True Theory Of Personal Identity", 2012, External Link, Internal PDF Link, Read = 40%
    11. "Wiggins (David) - Identity, Individuation, and Substance", 2016, Internal PDF Link, Read = 63%
    12. "Wolf (Susan) - Ban Cloning? Why NBAC Is Wrong", 1997, Internal PDF Link, Read = 17%

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• For a list of Works that have been considered, but have missed the cut for inclusion in this Section of my Thesis, see the following:-
  1. Read: No items to list.
  2. Further Reading: No items to list.
• This is mostly a place-holder³⁰.

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In-Page Footnotes:

Footnote 2:

1. No doubt it does, but I need to specify which!
2. See "Gale (Richard) - On Some Pernicious Thought-Experiments", which is also a vague reference!

Footnote 8:

1. Teletransportation is sometimes rather tendentiously referred to as “Telecloning”.
2. Yet, calling it “Teletransportation” is equally tendentious, and
3. “Telecloning” has at least the virtue of being the correct description!
4. See "Brennan (Andrew) - Survival".

Footnote 17:

1. See "Ball (Philip) - Beyond Weird: Why Everything You Thought You Knew About Quantum Mechanics is ... Different", pp. 267 – 272.

Footnote 19:

• I’ve included the papers primarily treating of these topics under the reading list for this topic where they mention cloning, though they will feature elsewhere.

Footnote 28:

• This is even less relevant than Nussbaum – being a novel. It raises ethical questions in a futuristic situation.

Footnote 29:

• This book is concerned with the ethics of medical cloning, so is mostly tangential to my concerns.
• However, the items in Part I: Science, and Part II: Commentary are likely to be of use.

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Table of the Previous 12 Versions of this Note: (of 14)

Date	Length	Title
06/07/2023 00:43:12	6798	Clones
20/09/2022 11:24:00	6301	Clones
12/05/2022 21:27:22	5920	Clones
11/02/2021 11:29:46	5613	Clones
30/12/2020 10:58:05	5201	Clones
13/09/2020 23:52:48	4830	Clones
24/04/2018 00:12:58	5823	Clones
10/04/2017 23:38:24	4853	Clones
18/12/2010 19:58:05	1478	Clones
21/08/2009 14:45:36	1483	Clones
21/08/2009 14:38:24	1268	Clones
21/08/2009 10:50:53	368	Clones

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Note last updated	Reading List for this Topic	Parent Topic
18/03/2026 09:46:34	Clones	Thought Experiments

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Summary of Notes Referenced by This Note

Awaiting Attention (Personal Identity)	Body	Causality	Contingent Identity	Corpses
Duplication	Fission	Logic of Identity	Modality	Note Links Explanation
Organisms	Parfit	Perdurantism	Plug Note Apologia	Quantum Mechanics
Reincarnation	Replication	Resurrection	Teletransportation	Thought Experiments
Works Read - Explanation

To access information, click on one of the links in the table above.

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Summary of Notes Citing This Note

Baillie - What Am I?	Closest Continuer	Duplication	Jen_080303 (Olson, Baillie)	Non-Human Persons
PID Note, Book & Paper Usage, 2, 3, 4, 5	Psychological Continuity - Forward	Teletransportation, 2, 3	Thesis - Chapter 01 (Introduction)	Thesis - Chapter 03 (What is a Person?)
Thesis - Chapter 04 (Basic Metaphysical Issues)	Thesis - Chapter 10 (Thought Experiments), 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9	Thesis - Personal Identity, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9	Website Generator Documentation - Functors, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6	Williams - The Self and the Future, 2, 3, 4

To access information, click on one of the links in the table above.

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Authors, Books & Papers Citing this Note

Author	Title	Medium	Extra Links	Read?
Agar (Nicholas)	Cloning and Identity	Paper	2
Baillie (James)	What Am I?	Paper		Yes
Baker (Lynne Rudder)	When Do Persons Begin and End?	Paper		Yes
Barilan (Y. Michael)	One or Two: An Examination of the Recent Case of the Conjoined Twins from Malta	Paper
Brennan (Andrew)	Survival	Paper
Briggs (Rachael) & Nolan (Daniel)	Utility Monsters for the Fission Age	Paper
Clark (Andy) & Kuhn (Robert Lawrence)	Aeon: Video - Andy Clark - Virtual immortality	Paper	2	Yes
Dennett (Daniel)	The Mind's I - Fantasies and Reflections on Self and Soul: Introduction	Paper	2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8	Yes
Gale (Richard)	On Some Pernicious Thought-Experiments	Paper	2	Yes
Gasser (Georg)	Personal Identity and Resurrection: Introduction	Paper		Yes
Harris (John)	Clones, Genes and Immortality: Ethics and Genetics	Book
Ishiguro (Kazuo)	Never Let Me Go	Paper	2, 3, 4, 5	Yes
Johnston (Mark)	A New Refutation Of Death	Paper
Kingma (Elselijn)	Were You Part of Your Mother?	Paper		Yes
Lyons (Siobhan)	Death and the Machine: Intersections of Mortality and Robotics	Book		Yes
Nussbaum (Martha) & Sunstein (Cass R.)	Clones and Clones - Introduction	Paper	2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10	Yes
Nussbaum (Martha) & Sunstein (Cass R.), Eds.	Clones and Clones: Facts and Fantasies About Human Cloning	Book
Puccetti (Roland)	The Conquest of Death	Paper
Richmond (Alasdair)	Philosophy of Time Travel Course Guide 2014/15	Paper		Yes
Savulescu (Julian)	Should a human-pig chimera be treated as a person?	Paper		Yes
Shoemaker (David)	Personal Identity and Ethics - Introduction	Paper	2	Yes
Shoemaker (David)	Personal Identity and Immortality	Paper		Yes
Swinburne (Richard)	How To Determine Which Is The True Theory Of Personal Identity	Paper	2, 3, 4, 5
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Chapter 01 (Introduction)	Paper		Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Chapter 03 (What is a Person?)	Paper		Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Chapter 04 (Basic Metaphysical Issues)	Paper		Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Chapter 10 (Thought Experiments)	Paper	2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9	Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Closest Continuer	Paper		Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Duplication	Paper		Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Non-Human Persons	Paper		Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Personal Identity	Paper	2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9	Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Psychological Continuity - Forward	Paper		Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Teletransportation	Paper	2, 3	Yes
Wiggins (David)	Identity, Individuation, and Substance	Paper
Williams (Bernard)	The Self and the Future	Paper	2, 3, 4	Yes
Wilson (Jack)	Beyond Horses and Oak Trees: A New Theory of Individuation for Living Entities	Paper	2	Yes

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References & Reading List

Author	Title	Medium	Source	Read?
Ackerman (Felicia)	Flourish Your Heart in This World	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Aeon	Video - Norman, norman	Paper - Cited	Aeon, 31 January 2020	Yes
Agar (Nicholas)	Cloning and Identity	Paper - Cited	Journal of Medicine and Philosophy, Volume 28, Number 1, February 2003, pp. 9-26(18).	7%
Ball (Philip)	Beyond Weird: Why Everything You Thought You Knew About Quantum Mechanics is ... Different	Book - Cited	Ball (Philip) - Beyond Weird: Why Everything You Thought You Knew About Quantum Mechanics is ... Different	Yes
Brennan (Andrew)	Survival	Paper - Cited	Synthese June 1984; 59: 339-362	5%
Briggs (Rachael) & Nolan (Daniel)	Utility Monsters for the Fission Age	Paper - Cited	Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, Volume96, Issue3, September 2015, Pages 392-407	No
Brock (Dan W.)	Cloning Human Beings: An Assessment of the Ethical Issues Pro and Con	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Dawkins (Richard)	What's Wrong with Cloning?	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Dennett (Daniel)	The Mind's I - Fantasies and Reflections on Self and Soul: Introduction	Paper - Cited	Hofstadter & Dennett - The Mind's I - Fantasies and Reflections on Self and Soul	Yes
Doniger (Wendy)	Sex and the Mythological Clone	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Dworkin (Andrea)	Sasha	Paper - Cited	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	Yes
Elshtain (Jean Bethke)	To Clone or Not to Clone	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Epstein (Richard A.)	A Rush to Caution: Cloning Human Beings	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Eskridge (William N.) & Stein (Edward)	Queer Clones	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Gale (Richard)	On Some Pernicious Thought-Experiments	Paper - Cited	Thought Experiments in Science and Philosophy, Ed. Tamara Horowitz & Gerald J. Massey, 1991	Yes
Gasser (Georg) & Stefan (Matthias), Eds.	Personal Identity: Complex or Simple?	Book - Cited (via Paper Cited)	Bibliographical details to be supplied	4%
Gasser (Georg), Ed.	Personal Identity and Resurrection: How Do We Survive Our Death?	Book - Cited (via Paper Cited)	Bibliographical details to be supplied	96%
Gould (Stephen Jay)	Dolly's Fashion and Louis's Passion	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Harris (John)	Clones, Genes and Immortality: Ethics and Genetics	Book - Cited	Harris (John) - Clones, Genes and Immortality: Ethics and Genetics	1%
Harris (John)	Clones, Genes and Immortality: Ethics and Genetics	Paper - By Subtopic	Harris (John) - Clones, Genes and Immortality: Ethics and Genetics	1%
Hershenov (David)	An Argument for Limited Human Cloning	Paper - Cited	Public Affairs Quarterly, 14:3, July 2000, 245-258	8%
Hershenov (David)	Van Inwagen, Zimmerman, and the Materialist Conception of Resurrection	Paper - Cited	Religious Studies, 38 pp. 1-19 (December 2002)	11%
Hofstadter (Douglas) & Dennett (Daniel), Eds.	The Mind's I - Fantasies and Reflections on Self and Soul	Book - Cited (via Paper Cited)	Bibliographical details to be supplied	14%
Horowitz (Tamara) & Massey (Gerald J.)	Thought Experiments in Science and Philosophy	Book - Cited (via Paper Cited)	Bibliographical details to be supplied	3%
Ishiguro (Kazuo)	Never Let Me Go	Book - Cited	Ishiguro (Kazuo) - Never Let Me Go	Yes
Ishiguro (Kazuo)	Never Let Me Go	Paper - By Subtopic	Ishiguro (Kazuo) - Never Let Me Go, 2005	Yes
Johnson (George)	Soul Searching	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	Yes
Johnston (Mark)	A New Refutation Of Death	Paper - Cited	Johnston (Mark) - Surviving Death, 2010	3%
Johnston (Mark)	Surviving Death	Book - Cited (via Paper Cited)	Bibliographical details to be supplied	13%
Kamm (F.M.)	Moral Status and Personal Identity: Clones, Embryos, and Future Generations	Paper - Cited	Paul, Miller & Paul - Personal Identity, 2005	No
Miller (William Ian)	Sheep, Joking, Cloning and the Uncanny	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
National Bioethics Advisory Commission	Recommendations of the Commission	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
National Bioethics Advisory Commission	Religious Perspectives	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
National Bioethics Advisory Commission	The Science and Application of Cloning	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Nussbaum (Martha)	Little C	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Nussbaum (Martha) & Sunstein (Cass R.)	Clones and Clones - Introduction	Paper - Cited	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	Yes
Nussbaum (Martha) & Sunstein (Cass R.), Eds.	Clones and Clones: Facts and Fantasies About Human Cloning	Book - Cited	Nussbaum (Martha) & Sunstein (Cass R.), Eds. - Clones and Clones: Facts and Fantasies About Human Cloning	4%
Paul (Ellen), Miller (Fred) & Paul (Jeffrey), Eds.	Personal Identity	Book - Cited (via Paper Cited)	Bibliographical details to be supplied	0%
Phillips (Adam)	Sameness Is All	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Posner (Eric A.) & Posner (Richard A.)	The Demand for Human Cloning	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Rothman (Barbara Katz)	On Order	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Shoemaker (David)	Personal Identity and Ethics: A Brief Introduction	Book - Cited (via Paper Cited)	Bibliographical details to be supplied	Yes
Shoemaker (David)	Personal Identity and Immortality	Paper - Cited	Shoemaker (David) - Personal Identity and Ethics: A Brief Introduction, 2009, Chapter 1	Yes
Sunstein (Cass R.)	The Constitution and the Clone	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Swinburne (Richard)	How To Determine Which Is The True Theory Of Personal Identity	Paper - Cited	Gasser (Georg) & Stefan (Matthias), Eds. - Personal Identity: Complex or Simple? 2012	40%
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Clones	Paper - By Subtopic		Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Personal Identity	Paper - Referencing		Yes
Tracy (David)	Human Cloning and the Public Realm: A Defense of Intuitions of the Good	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Tribe (Laurence)	On Not Banning Cloning for the Wrong Reasons	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Tuttle (Lisa)	World of Strangers	Paper - Cited	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	Yes
Wiggins (David)	Continuants: Their Activity, Their Being, and Their Identity	Book - Cited (via Paper Cited)	Bibliographical details to be supplied	14%
Wiggins (David)	Identity, Individuation, and Substance	Paper - Cited	Wiggins (David) - Continuants: Their Activity, Their Being, and Their Identity	63%
Williams (C.K.)	My Clone	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Wilmut (I.), Schnieke (A.E.), McWhir (J.), Kind (A.J.) & Campbell (K.H.S.)	Viable Offspring Derived from Fetal and Adult Mamalian Cells	Paper - By Subtopic	Nussbaum & Sunstein - Clones and Clones	No
Wolf (Susan)	Ban Cloning? Why NBAC Is Wrong	Paper - Cited	The Hastings Center Report, Vol. 27, No. 5 (Sep. - Oct., 1997), pp. 12-15	17%
Zimmerman (Dean)	Bodily Resurrection: The Falling Elevator Model Revisited	Paper - Cited	Gasser (Georg) - Personal Identity and Resurrection: How Do We Survive Our Death? 2010	Yes
Zimmerman (Dean)	The Compatibility of Materialism and Survival: The “Falling Elevator” Model	Paper - Cited	Faith and Philosophy, Vol 16, Issue 2, April 1999, pp 194-212	Yes

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Text Colour Conventions

1. Blue: Text by me; © Theo Todman, 2026

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