There are three theories of personal identity presented in the third chapter of Mary Lich’s, “Philosophy Through Film”, that include The Physical Continuity Theory, The Same-soul Theory and The Psychological Continuity theory1. This essay will cover what these conjured terms mean, and their application toward describing the problems related to personal identity found in Christopher Nolan’s Memento. The movie will also receive a brief summary of relevant information for this essay, prior to discussing the relationships between all of these things.
In Memento, we’re presented with Lenny. Lenny’s got a condition that impacts his memory and visibly interferes with his notion of personal identity. Every few moments, randomly since a point in time in his life, he forgets everything that’s happened since that moment. Lenny navigates a live of external manipulators and observers, and uses physical objects in place of his memory on a personally validated scale of trust based on his pre-existing notion of values that he ascribes to these physical objects in valuing their importance to him without the ability to form new memories. The event that induced this affliction on him seems to’ve also damaged him psychologically in that he’s later described in the movie to’ve got flaws in his memories surrounding the event that caused him to not be able to form new memories. Physically, Lenny appears to be the same guy he always was, aside from his disheveled hair and tattoos.
The first of these theories from Lich is that of Physical Continuity. It encompasses the notion that there exists such a continuous process that’s sufficiently empowered to maintain a level of confidence held by an external observer to a system such that the amassed physical composition of matter in non-mass-manufactured things with identities (such as human identities) being observed is thus, by extension of the continual execution of this process, considered to be continuous by mere implication and assumption. In humans, this continuous process would be maintained when we eat and breathe, which provides physical inputs (energy, minerals, elements, chemicals) to this presumed-valid physically biological process that both culls and reproduces the physical cells that “are supposed to be all there” by a process that’s implied to regulate this process in order to sufficiently retain the proposed identity that’s wholly contained within that resulting mass of person.
The second of these theories from Lich is that of Psychological Continuity. Of particular interest in this discussion’s that Lich doesn’t mention The Psyche to be a part of one’s psychological continuity, likely as an attempt to prevent folks from conflating her notions of Same-soul and Psychological Continuity theories due to the crossover between the field of Psychology and Mythology that the notion represents. Lich says that, in much the same way of “clusters” of mental abstractions, an identity is psychologically continuous when its various parts that include, “my personality, disposition, value system, long-term desires, continuous stream of consciousness, memory,” are continuous (Lich 63)2. The term “psyche” wholly encompasses the conscious and unconscious aspects of the mind of which these clusters of terms she did offer are all sub-parts of. Were it to be the case that one’s conscious or unconscious self changed drastically enough, they’d no longer be psychologically continuous, because multiple psyches can’t exist in the same continuous identity per Lich. There’d be two identities in one physical body and while there are studies of this happening, it’s not generally the default case that they consciously conflict with each other. That Lenny carries “memories” of these different personalities indicates that he’s not personally psychologically continuous, but finds a limited ability to be so through physical notes such as photos, handwriting and tattoos.
The third of these theories from Lich is that of Same-soul. Under the domain of this theory’s precisely the religious connotation of a disembodied, immortal soul. Note here the choice of wording to be in line with the other two theories herein presented, because a biological death would likely terminate one’s assumed identity as described in both previous theories unless, in either case, there was to be a general acceptance that to not be terminated would necessarily incorporate aspects of this theory. Therein lies the discussion of both “mortal” and “immortal” souls that naturally precipitates from this discussion whereas a “mortal” soul’s displayed in Memento as the multiple psychological identities portrayed by Lenny potentially “die” every few moments as he forgets his memories. The “alternative Lenny’s” cease to exist, therefore discontinuity is partially implied and thus leaves the notion that there’s a reliance on “immortal soul” or “physical continuity” for explaining the continuation of his assumed identity3.
All of these theories could apply toward one’s understanding of Lenny’s personal identity in some way.
Lenny’s identity in the domain of physical continuity is certainly a very apparent one, even the referenced character of Sammy Jankis. Both of these people could be identified based on their physical appearance and physical characteristics, which Lich mentions to be the stand-in for the determination of physical continuity. In this regard, there are a singular Sammy and Lenny in this movie. In the case of Sammy, Lenny’s insurance company denied Sammy’s claim to be paid for physical disability on the grounds of a psychological problem affected Sammy, and not a physical problem with his body that created his assumed identity (Memento 39:29 – 39:55).
The situation’s similar for Lenny, but the additional revelation by Teddy that Lenny mixed up details of his own life and Sammy’s presents an issue (Memento 1:42:45 – 01:43:48). As an external observer, we can’t know whether Teddy’s lying or not, and it’s later revealed that Lenny was complicit in lying to himself with his internal monologue that lead him to investigating and killing Teddy (The opening scene) by manipulating his “source of memory”. The notes were his source of identity, thereby making Lenny complicit in being psychologically discontinuous, which cast doubt on there being a physical problem with Lenny (Memento 01:47:31 – 01:48:33). What continuous bit of personal identity could’ve spurred such a reaction where, despite having different psychological identities across moments, Lenny retained a series of seemingly continuous identities in the physical continuity and same-soul theories? As was stated in the story, Lenny wasn’t originally a killer, and wouldn’t conceivably have the resolve to set himself up to knowingly murder someone out of “wanting to make things right” because he would’ve originally thought murder to be wrong (Memento 01:47:15 – 01:47:20). That this was an aspect of his original personality (possible, but not discussed), or otherwise one originating from the notion of a soul, could explain the behavior. According to Lich’s Same-soul theory, it could be argued that Lenny’s source of identity was coming from a soul, because he didn’t biologically die, and it could be said that his soul would’ve never “detached” from his body, allowing him to maintain an imbalanced notion of identity.
This essay’s covered three theories of personal identity as introduced by Mary Lich which were discussed in relation to understanding some of the issues regarding personal identity. Each served as a cross section to attempt to further navigate the nature of personal identity from a philosophical perspective in film. A summary of the movie Memento pertinent to this essay was included and then various assertions were made that indicated that the characters depicted, Lenny and Sammy, challenged notions of personal identity despite being physically distinct and individual people.
In conclusion, the disjointed psychological nature of the resulting identities on display in Memento worked to show various aspects of personal identity that’d draw a viewer to consider that, despite a lack of apparent psychological continuity, there seemed to be a level outside of simple psychological identity and there possibly was something that unified their personalities despite being psychologically discontinuous. A much more robust discussion regarding the deeper aspects on personal identity could be had using Lich’s theories and just this movie, but the aim of this paper was to simply introduce the notion that these tools are sufficient to analyze philosophical content in film.
Works cited
Lich, Mary M. “Personal Identity.” Philosophy Through Film, 4th ed., Routledge, New York, New York, 2021, pp. 58–82.
“Memento.” Newmarket, 2001.
1 These theories are first introduced by Mary Lich. As a disclaimer, it’s a devastatingly grievous effort for one to look into the history of the existence of these three theories prior to Lich almost offensively hallucinating them in her book. Any reader of this essay will be left with an infuriating lapse of understanding were they to not have the associated contextual discussion that Lich incorporates while casually introducing the terms, without much reference or discussion on the nature of their origin. A cursory investigation would lead to observing that these terms are an iniquitously regurgitated gallimaufry of notions appearing to originate from John Locke’s Theory of Personal Identity, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Brittanica’s current (23Jul2024) entry on Personal Identity and then conjointed with a destitute application of pauperized mathematical notions such as that of “continuity” which in the context of reading this book is understood to be a nebulous term that loosely correlates to the mathematical and logical notions of the concept. Please momentarily suspend any retained and sufficiently advanced understanding of Continuity discussed within all of linear algebra, series, vector, multi-variable or discrete mathematics, stopping maybe around the level of depth with which one might take away in understanding the notion of Mathematical Continuity after Calculus 1 or 2, in very much the same way one might believe in the Santa Claus story when they were six years old. Disclaimers aside, it’s helpful to note that new ways to model thought experiments such as embedding philosophical thought into the film medium begs the idea that new tools of analysis to accommodate these new models come to ones aid in very much the same way you won’t go and buy a tool until the day you need it. Locke et. al. certainly didn’t have the same level of access to film media that we do and as such couldn’t’ve precipitated tools with which to consider as precisely the notions able to be displayed in them. Consider that I was initially so put off by these notions that I felt the need to figure out how to add footnotes and visited the thesaurus in one morning, for which I have Mary Lich to thank for having expanded my horizons here.
2 It’s important to note here, that Lich refers to other folks as having presented the abstractions as examples of basis that sufficiently constitute psychological identity when listing these terms, but then continues in her discussion without really asserting these to be a part of this theory. Also lacking is a citation of these sources outside of referring to John Locke and David Hume at the end of the chapter – but it should then logically follow that she would’ve provided two sentences, and not three that she did, when she refers obliquely to “some” and “others” in listing these properties.
3 These three theories, by design, are presented as a way to be arbitrarily exclusive in order to enable them to be used as tools of cross sectional analysis of personal identity using familiar and popular concepts. Valid arguments can be made that’d equivocate The Same-soul Theory to The Psychological Continuity Theory through the notion of Psyche and from there reduce The Physical Continuity Theory to some metaphysical argument rooted in quantum mechanics that’d likely sufficiently reveal that all three of these are one part of a more generalized theory, but that’s not the focus of this essay that aims to use these theories as presented to explore notions of personal identity – because yes I will build a house with nothing but hammers for tools is that’s all I’m to have.