This kind of thing (mono-valued, mechanical thinking) is a problem in general, with how we are trained to think about »meaning and identity in and by Western (and some other) languages. There are catastrophic issues with our category systems, and the substitution of relatively primitive (or even advanced) mechanical ideas, and ideas of causation in English »thought. We are trained to think in mostly bipolar terms (two-valued) for actual situations that not only »cannot be two-valued, but must have »many layers (a topology model) as well as a spectrum of values. Drugs have »semi mechanical effects, but organisms are unimaginably sophisticated ‘standing wave’ phenomenon. This is, in part, why modern ‘medicine’, while partly mechanically adept, can go horribly wrong when applied to individuals. There are no modern allopathic methods for even »evaluating individuals adeptly (for the purpose of categorization, diagnosis and treatment). With few exceptions, nearly all of the ideas, models and diagnostic criteria come from »statistical studies of »groups.

Meaning and identity are more successfully evaluated and discussed when the modelling methods are many-layered, infinitely-valued (see Korzybyski), and examined in multiple passes from differing perspectives (and purposes) rather than the methods we are trained in. Most of these methods are so crude and ineffective that it would be better to call them mistakes… than methods at all… except for extremely simplistic evaluations (i.e: is this water warm or not).