Such issues raise interesting questions about how the mind represents objects in terms of originality after they have been repaired. The custodians of the Cutty Sark were quick to point out in early press releases hours after the fire that at least half the ship was already safely in storage. How did they come up with such a proportion so quickly? Was it based on weight or volume? I suspect it was based on the intuition that sudden damage to more than 50 per cent of the ship would have been regarded as the catastrophic loss of the original.
This modern act of vandalism reminds us of Plutarch, the Greek historians who told of an ancient conservation project undertaken to preserve the ship belonging to the legendary Athenian king Theseus. Over the years the boat was kept in service by simply replacing the timbers that wore out or rotted with new planks, to the extent that it was unclear how much of the original ship remained. Plutarch asked whether this was still the same ship. What if the replaced planks had been kept and reassembled to form a second ship? Which ship, Plutarch asked, would be the original Ship of Theseus?
Psychologists have begun to look at these questions of authenticity and essential reasoning towards objects in the lab. For example, five-and seven-year-olds and adults were shown a picture of Sam’s ‘quiggle’, a nonsense object created for the purpose of the study.9 One group was told that it was an inanimate paperweight, and the other group was told that it was a type of weird pet. Participants were then told that Sam went away for a very long holiday and that while he was away various parts of the quiggle were gradually replaced. The participants were presented with a sequence of photographs showing how the quiggle changed each week. Finally, they were presented with two pictures: one of the quiggle that had been gradually transformed and now looked completely different from the first picture, and another of the quiggle made out of all the removed parts recombined to look like the original quiggle before Sam left. The question of interest was, after he returned from his journey, which was Sam’s quiggle?
Children and adults were more likely to say that the gradually transformed quiggle was the original, even though it looked very different and the reconstituted quiggle made of the replaced pieces was more similar to the picture of the original quiggle. This effect of continued identity over change was strongest when the quiggle was thought to be a type of living animal. This response fits with the intuitive biology of young children we discussed earlier. They understand that living things have something inside them that makes them what they are and that, despite outward appearances and changes, living things are essentially the same. This way of thinking is perfectly reasonable because we as individuals undergo significant change over our lifetimes as we age. Not only does our outward appearance change radically, but so do our insides. The body is continually replenishing its own structures and cells over the course of a lifetime, though few of us are aware of such biological details. For example, if you are in your middle age, most of your body is just ten years old or less.10 Now that’s a fact worth remembering when we consider our attitudes toward ageing bodies! However, for the older children and adults, even the quiggle that was described as a paperweight was regarded as the same object after undergoing radical transformation so that it no longer looked anything like the original. Younger children did not make this judgement. These findings show that with age we increasingly think of an object as being the same even though all of it is replaced with entirely new parts. In other words, there is something in addition to the physical structure of an object that makes it what it really is. What is this additional property? Where is it? It does not really exist, but we infer that it must be there. This is the essence that defines an object. As we grow older, we increasingly apply our developing intuitive essentialism to significant objects and living things in the world. I think this psychological essentialism is one of the main foundations of the universal supernatural belief that there is something more to reality. Where and when does this inclination to treat certain objects as special and irreplaceable first emerge? Remarkably, it may begin as early as in the crib.
SECURITY BLANKETS
I was listening to the radio this morning when I heard Fergie’s latest hit record, ‘Big Girls Don’t Cry’.11 In the chorus, she sings, ‘And I’m gonna miss you like a child misses their blanket.’ Any parent who has raised a child attached to a blanket or teddy bear will readily know what Fergie is singing about and will be familiar with the intensity of emotion that such a loss can incur.
Estimates vary, but somewhere between half and three-quarters of children form an emotional bond to a specific soft toy or blanket during the second year of life. These items have various names, including security blankets, attachment toys, and transitional objects. They are ‘security blankets’ because children need them for reassurance when frightened or lonely. They are ‘attachment items’ because of the emotional connection the child forms with them. And they have been called ‘transitional objects’ because one theory is that they enable the infant to make the transition from sleeping with the mother to sleeping alone. This may explain why such objects are more common in Western culture whereas they are relatively rare in societies such as Japan,12 where children continue to sleep with their mothers well into late childhood.
Although I was familiar with security blankets from the Linus character in the Peanuts comic strip, who is always seen carrying his blanket around with him, I did not fully appreciate the significance of such behaviour until my first daughter developed an excessive attachment to her ‘Blankie’, a multicoloured, fleecy blanket that was in her crib. Blankie went everywhere with her. If she became upset, she needed to have Blankie.
FIG. 19 A desperate ‘Wanted’ poster to return Laurel’s ‘Mouse’, lost in a Bristol park. IMAGE © KATY DONNELLY.
It can be disastrous when these items are accidentally lost. When I was talking about the items on radio phone-ins, I fielded calls from distraught parents who had suffered the consequences of their child losing their attachment object. It’s a fairly common tragedy and, as with lost pets, parents will post missing notices, such as the one shown in the picture overleaf.
I contacted the mother of the little girl who posted this note in a local park. I was curious to discover whether her little girl’s mouse was ever found. She told me that it hadn’t been found, but, remarkably, someone saw the plea and took the picture of the missing toy to their grandmother, who knitted a copy of ‘Mouse’ using the same materials. Despite the kindness of strangers, little Laurel did not accept the replacement mouse. It did not have the essence of the original.
Around the time children begin school, most abandon their attachment objects. Still, many children grow into adults keeping their prized possession. When I began researching this phenomenon, I surveyed two hundred university students and found that three-quarters said that they had had a childhood attachment object, usually a stuffed toy or blanket. There was no difference between males and females in remembering that they had had such objects. However, most males had abandoned their attachment objects by around five years of age. In contrast, one in three female students still had their childhood object as an adult. These figures are based on a straw poll of memories from a select group of students and cannot be used to describe the general population. Most people are too embarrassed to admit that they still have their sentimental childhood objects. However, a recent survey of two thousand solitary travellers by the UK Travelodge hotel chain revealed that one in five men slept with a teddy bear – more than the female travellers.13