Are There Limits to What People Can “Identify As”?

The modern world is familiar with the idea of “identifying as.” This may be the Transgenderism of a biological sex “identifying as” a different gender. It may be the transracialism of a white woman “identifying as” a black woman. It may even be school children identifying as cats (“furries”), or identifying as mushrooms.

Examples like these raise issues of “identity.” They can be explored from the different perspectives of religions, rights, laws (etc.). But they also raise a set of questions about thinking, and about whether there are more and less appropriate ways to think about the issues raised by “identifying as.”

1. Definitions and Descriptions

When people “identify as X,” they are describing themselves as an X. When they insist that they alone have the right to determine what they identify as, they are effectively asserting the infallibility of their “identifying as.”

Can there be infallible (self) descriptions?

Since David Hume (d. 1776), philosophers have traditionally distinguished between two kinds of claims: DEFINITIONS and DESCRIPTIONS. (See Hume’s Fork.)

DEFINITIONS link ideas (or concepts) by expressing logical relationships between them. A classic example is the claim that “bachelors are unmarried.” That claim is telling us the meaning of the word “bachelor.” So, if we are going to describe a person X as a “bachelor,” then it is logically necessary that we also describe the person as “unmarried.” DEFINITIONS tell us nothing about things (like people). They just tell us about how to link ideas through language.

With a modest stretching of language, we could even say that DEFINITIONS involve a kind of infallibility. If (and as along as) “bachelor” is DEFINED as “unmarried,” then a person is infallible in describing a bachelor as unmarried.

DESCRIPTIONS typically relate to things, not ideas. If we assert that a particular person X is a bachelor, we are describing a person (not an idea). Maybe our DESCRIPTION of the person is true, maybe it is false. Maybe X sincerely thinks that he or she is a bachelor, but X could be wrong (due to amnesia or brain damage).

DESCRIPTIONS are always fallible. People can always err when describing things, either through accidental mistakes or through deliberate deception. This is why the Scientific Method always demands evidence, and the risk of error means that it can only (empirically) “confirm,” rather than (logically) “prove” its claims about how the world works.

When people confuse DEFINITIONS and DESCRIPTIONS, a muddle about ideas and things can easily drift into confusion about whether a claim is fallible or not.

When it comes to questions about “identifying as,” people are typically talking about real things (i.e., themselves), not just ideas. So they are proposing DESCRIPTIONS, not DEFINITIONS. This means that when people “identify as,” they are making fallible claims about themselves, even if they are unaware of those fallibilities.

2. Cotard’s Syndrome

We can see why self-descriptions are fallible if we consider the very different set of issues raised by a medical condition such as Cotard’s syndrome. People suffering from Cotard’s syndrome believe that they are dead. To put it another way, those with Cotard’s syndrome “identify as” dead.

The syndrome often has very serious consequences. If people think that they are already dead, then they see no need to eat or to avoid risky behavior. After all, if you are dead, then you cannot die, so risks of injury and death become irrelevant.

Those suffering from Cotard’s syndrome are sincere and absolutely convinced of their current status of being dead. Documented cases involve people becoming agitated and violent if their demands to be buried are not carried out.

When people say that they are dead, they are describing themselves. We know that (self) descriptions are always fallible. (See above.) So we know that “identifying as dead” is a fallible self-description. In the particular case of Cotard’s syndrome its fallibility is easily visible. If people are alive enough to claim to be dead, then they cannot be dead.

3. Facts and Feelings

When people make claims about objective (empirical) FACTS, their claims are generally subject to evidence and they are potentially correctable (i.e., corrigible). If a person says that “it is raining,” someone else can look at the weather and use its evidence to offer a correction: “No it’s not raining, it’s snowing.”

When people make claims about their subjective FEELINGS, those claims are not subject to correction (i.e., they are incorrigible). This is because the objective evidence which enables correction of (empirical) FACTS is not typically available in the case of FEELINGS. If a person says “I feel ill,” others can say whether the person looks ill, but no one has access to the inner subjective information inside a person to challenge claims about how the person really feels. Thus, a claim to “feel ill” is incorrigible.

There is some value in a distinction between corrigible FACTS and incorrigible FEELINGS, but there is also a serious potential problem. If FACTS are real, then it is too easy to assume that what they are contrasted with (i.e., FEELINGS) must be unreal. Yes FEELINGS are not objectively real, in the sense that they can be observed by other people, but that does not mean that they are not still real, albeit subjectively real.

This is particularly clear in cases where people have FEELINGS of pain. If pain is an objective FACT, then people have sometimes assumed that it must be (empirically) observable, using equipment like brain scanners. But no matter how strongly correlated FEELINGS of pain might be with FACTS about signals in regions of the brain, it seems implausible that a third party could ever use equipment to tell people claiming to be in pain that they are mistaken. Pain may not be an objective FACT, but claims to be in pain are not delusions. Pain is a very real phenomenon, even if it is a subjective FEELING, rather than an objective FACT.

When people “identify as,” they are often talking about their inner awareness of themselves in their subjective FEELINGS. If so, then “identifying as” can be thought of as an instance of an incorrigible claim. It is asserting a subjectively real claim, which needs to be taken as seriously as when people talk about FEELINGS of pain.

4. Is Incorrigibility a Form of Infallibility?

René Descartes (d. 1650) argued: “I think, therefore I am.” This is a transcendental argument, rather than a typical inductive evidential argument, or a deductive logical argument. It can be thought of as moving from an (incorrigible) inner subjective thinking, to an assertion of the objective factual existence of the thinker.

With a modest stretching of normal philosophical language, we could describe this kind of reasoning as an argument from incorrigibility to infallibility. Incorrigible inner experiences cannot be challenged, so its conclusion cannot be shown to be not-true.

Is this a safe way of reasoning?

There is reason to think not. Films like The Matrix and thought experiments by philosophers like Nick Bostrom have asked us to contemplate the possibility that we are dreaming reality, or that we are just characters in an alien computer game. (See Simulation Hypothesis.) Rather than arguing “I think therefore…,” we now have to ask ourselves how we can be sure that there is an “I” doing any thinking at all. Maybe we are all just clever bits of code in a galactic game of Earth SIMS? Maybe what we are inclined to view as thinking is just simulated thinking. After all, has anyone experienced the difference between real thinking and simulated thinking, so how could we ever rule out a simulation hypothesis?

What this suggests is that apparently incorrigible beliefs or feelings may still be capable of erring. So, people should not jump automatically from incorrigible inner experiences to infallible claims.

5. Phantom Limb Syndrome

We can see examples of how incorrigibility can involve mistakes when we consider Phantom Limb Syndrome. This occurs when people have had limbs amputated, but they still seem to feel pain in the removed limbs.

Feelings of pain in a missing limb are a subjective reality in people’s minds. It would be wrong to dismiss the feelings as objectively unreal, or as merely imaginary, just because there is no longer a limb which can be in pain. On the contrary, people with Phantom Limb Syndrome can suffer intense pain and distress, and they can need serious medication for pain relief.

However, despite the reality of pain, there is also a mistake present in Phantom Limb Syndrome, as people cannot feel pain in a limb which is no longer part of their body. If we imagine that an amputated limb has been incinerated, then in cases of Phantom Limb Syndrome there is literally “no-thing” which can be causing or suffering pain, even though a person feels that it is so.

People’s feelings of pain are incorrigible, and so they must be taken seriously. But aspects of the feelings nevertheless involve mistakes. This shows that people cannot jump from an incorrigibility of feelings to an assumed infallibility about what the feelings mean, or about how they should be explained.

6. Sex and Gender Claims

To say that “identifying as” is making a fallible claim does not mean that the claim is necessarily wrong. When a person born as a male (or female) “identifies as” a female (or male), due to incorrigible feelings of self-awareness, then the person could well be correct. Gender Dysphoria can, and does, occur.

But a recognition that incorrigible claims are not infallible means that when a person “identifies as,” then there is also a possibility that the person could be mistaken. If there were no possibility of error, then incorrigibility would entail infallibility. But we have seen above that incorrigible claims are not infallible. So, logically, when a man (or woman) identifies as a woman (or man), then there must always be a possibility of error.

We can see possibly mistaken cases of “identifying as” when people regret transitioning decisions. (See Man regrets transitioning to woman and Woman regrets transitioning to man.) People are even going to the courts to sue over what they view as wrongness in the transitioning processes which they have undergone (see “Legal Action may change transgender care in America”).

There are many possible ways in which a transitioning process could involve fault. One of the most fundamental ways involves rationality. Where there is a deficit of rationality, liability invariably arises.

If those “identifying as X” are automatically considered to be X, then there is a potential deficit of rationality, because that kind of thinking is treating incorrigibility as infallibility. But incorrigibility is not infallibility.

So, a thoughtful approach to those who claim to be “identifying as” would ensure that there was always an appropriate process of discernment in place, so that there is potential mitigation for the risks of mistakenly “identifying as.”

7. What Does It All Mean

When people “identify as,” then their feelings must be taken seriously, as feelings are incorrigible. This means that it is as inappropriate, as it is insensitive, for a male white interviewer to ask why he cannot “identify as” a black lesbian. (See Piers Morgan exposes the absurdity of gender and racial self-identity, especially from the second minute.)

However, when people make claims about incorrigible feelings, those claims should not be taken as automatically correct. Incorrigibility does not mean infallibility. (See above.) This means that aspects of what people feel can be wrong, even when it relates to themselves. This is why there are cases of people who seem to regret a mistaken transitioning.

So, to return to the initial question: are there limits to “identifying as”? The incorrigibility of feelings means that anyone can identify, in any way. But the fallibility of “identifying as” means that others should not automatically assume the correctness of such claims. A thoughtful approach to “identifying as” will therefore be sensitive and supportive, whilst also discerning; so that those “identifying as” are aided appropriately, in order to reduce the risk of mistakes.