Personal Identity and Online Communities
- Selene Arfini, University of Pavia, Pavia, Italy
- Lorenzo Botta Parandera, University of Pavia, Pavia, Italy
- Camilla Gazzaniga, University of Pavia, Pavia, Italy
- Nicolò Maggioni, University of Pavia, Pavia, Italy
- Alessandro Tacchino, University of Pavia, Pavia, Italy
AbstractHow has the diffusion of online communities changed how their users construct, view, and define their identity? In this paper, we choose to approach this issue by considering two particular philosophical problems related to personal identity: 1) The Characterization Question, namely “which actions, ex- periences, beliefs, values, desires, character traits, and so on can we attribute to a given person?” 2) “How do self-other re- lations affect the ethical implication of identity construction?” To address them, we adopt a comprehensive framework com- posed of cognitive niches and cognitive niche construction the- ories, and we discuss different philosophical and technological notions. In particular: the Filter Bubble problem, the concept of affordances, and the Sartrean idea of Bad Faith.