F-Copper mass storing removes Identity

[Newly Awakened]

Okay, so I was just wondering, what would happen if a two Feruchemists were to store all their memories in a unsealed copperminds and then switch copperminds and tap all of the other person's memories? Would you become that person in a new body? Could someone keep doing this to effectively be immortal?

[alder24]

4 hours ago, Newly Awakened said:

Okay, so I was just wondering, what would happen if a two Feruchemists were to store all their memories in a unsealed copperminds and then switch copperminds and tap all of the other person's memories? Would you become that person in a new body? Could someone keep doing this to effectively be immortal?

No. Memories fade. It would be weird for sure but it would fade eventually. And they both have their own identity (we don't know if storing identity works like F-copper or other metals), their own connections, and their souls are different. 

But that's possibly a way of experiencing for a short time what someone else is. Especially if those memories would be in a vision, like Kelsier's one in BoM. 

[Spearguy]

It would remove your identity but not your Identity.

The memories stored in a coppermind are a cognitive aspect, while Identity is a spiritual one, also while your Identity does contain part of your personality it is both more and less than that. In addition they wouldn't have they same perception of those memories that the original owner does, the Feruchemist A wouldn't necessarily gain the exact same personality as Feruchemist B.

3 hours ago, alder24 said:

No. Memories fade. It would be weird for sure but it would fade eventually. And they both have their own identity (we don't know if storing identity works like F-copper or other metals), their own connections, and their souls are different. 

 

I don't think that Feruchmical memories fade any faster than normal memories, but that might just be with their original host. This may be a bit like soulstamping where eventually the spiritweb "rejects" these new memories. 

[Quantus]

As a concrete counter example: WOB confirms that you cannot store the "memory" of learned skills like Muscle Memory, so there's a confirmed swatch of the person's whole Self that is not included.  They might remember being a soldier or craftsman, but would not gain any of the learned skills.  

 

Quote

 

Stormlightning

Can you coppermind muscle memory?

Brandon Sanderson

No. Good question, I've haven't ever been asked that before.

Skyward release party (Nov. 6, 2018)

 

 

 

Separately, there is a very long standing (real world) philosophic debate on how much Memory = The Self. It's one of the Big Questions, and spirals around questions of head trauma, Alzheimer's, etc. that can impact memory in a person.