It's in your nature to destroy yourselves
“The snake which cannot cast its skin has to die. As well the minds which are prevented from changing their opinions; they cease to be mind.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche
One of the defining characteristics of the human condition is our linear perception of time. This straight line progression results in us outgrowing people, places and things. However, despite the frequency with which we leave things behind, the experience remains challenging. Our inability to accustom ourselves to this recurring event highlights a gap in our operating system. In turn, this gap raises a question which challenges our understanding of what it is to be human.
To demonstrate this, we will use a universal experience - leaving the childhood home.
When passing this existential milestone, a strange situation occurs. As we take a final look at the place we will leave behind, there is a pause - either externally or internally, where multiple perspectives can be perceived. This is due to three different people viewing the moment simultaneously:
The person that lived in the childhood home
The person that developed in the childhood home
The person that has now outgrown the childhood home
This overlapping of perspectives is comparable to time travel, in that for a moment we detach from our linear existence, and perceive an event from three separate points in time. It challenges not only the connection between time and identity, but also the notion of the self as an individual.
This final section in the Terminator analysis will explore this idea in detail, highlighting its presence throughout the film, and as a result, will provide perspective on the future of the series.
Time and identity have an uneasy relationship. Neither one is static, yet character is commonly defined as permanent. With this pigeon holing of reality, we create a paradox within ourselves. When this paradox is then analyzed, it reveals a startling truth; and challenges our understanding of what - or rather ‘what number’ we are.
This notion, as with all great sci-fi concepts, can be presented as a question. It’s at the core of T2’s thematic identity, and also contributes to the film’s timeless appeal.
The question is as follows:
Are you a single, permanent individual existing on a linear path, or, are you a series of individuals that occupy the same timeline – with each iteration overwriting the previous one?
Or, to put it simply:
How many people have you been?
In looking at this question through the lens of Terminator 2, we aim to understand the impermanence of our identity, and how time deconstructs the notion of the ‘singular I’.
“Observe constantly that all things take place by change, and accustom thyself to consider that the nature of the Universe loves nothing so much as to change the things which are, and to make new things of them.”
Marcus Aurelius