Who on Earth are You?

This is more or less the question that Peter Russell used to have on his answering machine, commenting that many people spend their lives thinking about this and inviting people to leave a message if they still want to. It begins with Nick's bank is writing to ask him to prove who he is, which forms the point of departure for an extended reflection on the nature of identities. I recently had a similar request for a birth certificate in order to access my teacher's pension. Nick begins with some conceptual clarification about the nature of identity and its many contexts, including the facts are successfully expressed in words. Much of identity derives from our culture and family, but we also like to define ourselves (decided identity) and can ask deep metaphysical questions in doing so, perhaps having an identity crisis in the process. Self-knowledge has always been a key part of the philosophical quest. The book is then divided into two sections: outside in, and inside out. The first explores such aspects as name (do we really have one?) body, face, voice, documentation, inheritance and reputation. This is followed by reflections from the inside out on remembering, suffering, time and even immortality. Few readers will realise beforehand how many dimensions there are to identity, which makes this stimulating reading while reminding us of our common humanity.