Is Cole always Cole? Or is Cole sometimes not Cole? Who is Cole???

 John Locke in Of Identity and Diversity provides interesting insights seeking to tackle the questions of personal identity. He strives to answer questions like who are we? And what exactly makes us who we are?

After watching the movie 12 Monkeys, it left me wondering what the heck did I just watch! It left me pondering what was the purpose behind the movie (besides fantastic entertainment), and it also made me think of the main character James Cole (Bruce Willis) in relation to John Locke’s Of Identity and Diversity.

From the readings, I learned that personal identity correlates with consciousness (or at least according to Locke), or in other-words us being conscious helps us know our identity. This assertion that Locke makes is similar to the Cogito argument that Descartes makes, “I am, I exist”. Locke also believes that personal identity is simply a matter of psychological continuity.

Sooo after doing the reading, I have a plethora of questions about the protagonist Cole in 12 Monkeys. These questions stem from one basic question. This question is: Who is Cole? All we know about him really is that he was plucked out of a cage in a underground retro yet futuristic looking base, and was ordered to time-travel by his superiors. These superiors order him to accomplish a certain mission, which is to discover who created the deadly virus that wiped out billions of people in the late 90s.  He is also led to believe by his superiors, that it is the 12 Monkeys who unleashed this bio-chemical weapon.

So all we know about Cole is that he is on a mission to find out about the 12 Monkeys and discover the source of the virus. And we also know that he is being pretty much forced to accomplish this mission, and if he does accomplish the mission he will obtain a pardon.

We don’t know anything about his past, besides what he tells us. Yet, funnily, the really only thing he says about his past is that he is from the future!  So what would Locke think of the time-travelling, prisoner Cole? Like would Locke argue that the Cole we originally see getting plucked out of a cage in the first five minutes of the movie be the same (spoiler) Cole that gets shot in the end of the movie?

This is an important question to ask ourselves, because if our personal identity is determined by psychological continuity/consciousness then it would seem the first Cole we see is not the same person as the last Cole we see.

For instance, Cole’s superiors, who have him imprisoned, clamor about how great his memory is. They say that he is their best time-traveler, because he does not completely lose his memory like the others. Yet, we know that Cole does in fact lose his memory. At one point, he is completely tranquilized and drugged up to the point where is just a mindless, wheelchair bound person. He also cannot properly remember one of the most important events of his life (the final scene in the airport), as it is playing out.

So did Cole’s superiors lie to him about how great his memory was? Did they lie to him about everything? Because it seems that in the closing scene of the movie, we are led to believe that they knew about the source of the deadly virus all along. I could be wrong, though, but that’s just the feel I got.

He seems to only remember distinct sounds, certain faces/images, and his mission, which isn’t really too much. Specific noises, faces, and images are usually the only things that babies can really remember.

Ultimately, I believe Locke would say that the first Cole we originally see (getting plucked out of his cage) is different from the last Cole we see. How about yall?

The movie kind of blew my mind, so there is a decent possibility I am wrong.