AIRPORT PHILOSOPHY PART 1: IDENTITY OF INDISCERNIBLES

“The identity of indiscernibles is an ontological principle that states that there cannot be separate objects or entities that have all their properties in common. That is, entities x and y are identical if every predicate possessed by x is also possessed by y and vice versa; to suppose two things indiscernible is to suppose the same thing under two names.”

Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz

Or, to put it simply, if two things are the same, at least one of them doesn’t exist. Or, to put it simpler still, to exist you have to be different from everything else. A simple enough idea I picked up in a philosophy tutorial way back and somehow have never quite shaken off.  In fact, I think of it often, and drop it into conversation. When conversation is slow.  Which can cause some problems, because people tend not to believe you.  Oh come on, they say, what about those coffee beans. Or those baked beans. They’re all the same.  And all exist.  No they’re not the same, I counter.  They have equivalent physical properties, but positionally they are quite different, i.e. one’s here, one’s there.  Therefore they’re not the same.  And the doubter retreats, not so much vanquished, as bored.

Yes, it always seemed to me that Mr Leibniz had it sown up, and no amount of bean-orientated conversations would ever change my commitment to the absolute truth of the principle. Until now.  

It’s 0640 hours in Edinburgh Airport.  A frequent flier, I amble casually through the heady delights of duty free, past perfumed sirens plying trays of liquor, 'twixt mountains of Toblerone, to the departure board.  A quick check and I’m sauntering to Gate 19 to catch the 0700 to Stansted.  Although of Speedy Boarder rank, I decide to forego the privilege on this occasion and languish instead in the comparative comfort of the lounge and watch the sad-old queue gradually squeezes itself out past the guardians of the security desk into the frigid staircase beyond.  Until there’s just me left, at which point I’ll stroll stylishly through the doors and straight onto the plane. Because that’s the way I roll. I’m not a queuer - I’m a duty-free spirit.


Just as I’m about to stir myself and join the herd, I glance up at the board, and suddenly this trip to London becomes note worthy. I’m about to get on the wrong plane. True this is the 0700.  And true it’s going to Stansted. But it’s not Easyjet. It’s Ryanair. With the blood beating loud in my ears I rush over to take another look at the departure board and my worst nightmare is confirmed. There are two planes flying to exactly the same place at exactly the same time, and I’m about to get on the wrong one. And the other one is leaving about now, twelve gates away.

In that moment of panic I have no one to blame but … Gottfried Wilhelm.  Because of him I had foolishly thought that two identical planes would not be able to leave for exactly the same destination at exactly the same time, so had not even bothered checking the operator of the first ‘0700 to Stansted’ my eyes alighted on. Thanks to Gottried Wilhelm I was now at the wrong end of the airport facing the unbearable prospect of having to tell my worldly, well travelled colleagues in London that I wouldn’t be with them today because … I tried to get on the wrong plane. Never did I think that disproving a philosophical principle could be so embarrassing.  

And as I clattered through the terminal my mind turned to the ramifications of what had been revealed to me that morning. I would have to rebuild my life around the principle that two things can indeed be identical and still exist. My eldest would have to be allowed to get that Lego Bionicle for Christmas even though it’s the same as the one he got last year except its left elbow’s green. There would be no excuse for not watching the Queen’s speech, or the next James Bond film, and I might even have to take an interest in who becomes the next Tory leader.  

Finally Gate 7 honed into view. And no sooner had I started dismantling my old belief system, than it was time to put it back together again. As was.  Because the queue was still intact, the flight delayed.  So there you have it. Gottfried Wilhelm - you’re off the hook.  

It must all have been a huge mistake. Probably the fault of the eagle-eyed gentleman in the control tower.  Eagle of eye perhaps, but not sharp of mind.  It was probably the terribly clever, silk-tongued Easyjet pilot who put him straight, pointing out that although he’d been given the go-ahead to push back and fly off to Stansted, he couldn’t do it because there was Ryanair plane about to do exactly the same thing, and the identity of indiscernibles principle as expounded by Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz states that there cannot be separate objects or entities that have all their properties in common. So wouldn’t it be better if he waited for a bit?

And so I caught the plane with my, and Gottfried Wilhelm’s, reputation intact.  

So, dear fellow air traveler, what have we learnt from this? Well, airlines may be good at many things, but refuting philosophical principles and overcoming the inherent restrictions imposed by physical space and time are not two of them. So the next time you see two flights going to the same place at the same time, they’re not.

If you like airports, airlines and associated train links as much as I do, you should also be reading:

Recovered

Angel Road

1 Day, 2 Flights, 5 Shit Excuses

Coming up Airport Philosophy Part 2: Metaphysical Solipsism.


@jesoverthinksit