Hi Alan,

Thanks for taking the time to respond to my comment on your article. This is critically important stuff!

I will, if I may, disagree with you (again!) when you attribute our differing takes to our asking different questions.

I find that many practitioners refer to the ‘philosophical’ in some sort of dismissive way, as you seem to here, as if it need not concern them. Yet the philosophy I invoke here is very much of the applied variety, manifest amongst practicing psychologists, sociologists, etc. i.e. those professions very much interested in and dedicated to human flourishing.

One cannot really claim to be usefully or even ethically ‘practical’ while ignoring these insights. Would you argue with that? How useful can it be to manifest a technical architecture that not only fails to support our best understanding of how to nurture human flourishing but actually goes against it?

I’m reminded of the aphorism attributed to Einstein & Roger Sessions: everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler. In ignoring the natural and unavoidable complexities of human identity today’s digital identity practitioners are guilty of over-simplification, often epitomised by an individual-centric focus rather than human- or life-centredness.

Your reference to practicality is simply contradictory. The concept of personal data exists only in law. Practically speaking, it doesn't ‘in the real world’, by which I mean any ecology of which I’m aware including human community. So your argument calls only on practicalities as and when it suits. As I’m sure you’d agree, this must be challenged.

In short, if the answer to your final question in your comment here is shown to conflict with the understanding you claim for the qualities of being human, then it’s incumbent upon you and your colleagues to change what you’re doing or argue against my critique with the same rigour as it is offered. Shockingly, I’ve been writing these critiques for four years now with many nods from reviewers and other experts but without any substantiated retort from practitioners.