 Issues about the persistence of people are the subject of an entire encyclopedia article in their own right (see the separate entry on  personal identity),  but it is worth highlighting points where the arguments discussed in earlier sections have special consequences for personal survival. People have various distinctive features: we have moral status, we have mental properties like reasoning and being conscious, and we are associated in an intimate but somewhat puzzling way with living organisms.  Moreover, most of us seem to have a special concern for our own future, and are willing to limit current pleasures like smoking, shopping, and not writing encyclopedia articles, because we believe that sacrifices made now will benefit us in the future. We also feel a distinctive kind of pride or shame about our own past actions, and are bound by our own past promises but not by those of other people.