  Thus far we have been assuming that the criterion of identity relevant to our practical concerns will answer to what Schechtman 1996 calls a  reidentification question: What are the conditions under which a person at one point in time is properly reidentified at another point in time? Answering this question calls for a criterion of diachronic numerical identity, a criterion of what makes something one and the same thing as itself at different times. But according to Schechtman, what is actually more appropriate for the relation between identity and ethics is an answer to the  characterization question: What are the conditions under which various psychological characteristics, experiences, and actions are properly attributable to some person?