In her novel, Who is Julie? Barbara Harris invents the strange case of "Julia and Mary Frances." Mary Frances is out for a walk with her young child when suddenly the child breaks away and runs in front of a streetcar. Julia, who is nearby, sees what is about to transpire and throws herself in front of the child, pushing her to safety. Unfortunately, a double tragedy ensues. Julia, in her effort to save the child, falls across the tracks and is crushed by the streetcar. Meanwhile, Mary Frances, fearing that her child will be hit, has a stroke and collapses on the sidewalk. Both women are clinically dead.But just then, Dr. Matthews, a brilliant neurosurgeon, happens by. She directs the emergency workers to take the women to her nearby clinic where she performs a macabre procedure. While the trunk of Julia's body was crushed in the accident, her brain was untouched. Mary Frances, however, suffered irreparable brain damage though her body remained intact. Dr. Matthews decides that, for the sake of both, she will insert Julia's good brain into Mary Frances's good body.The operation was a success. The question is, however, who is the person lying in the recovery room?The underlying question of this situation is: "what makes a person who he/she is?" Once that is determined, the "Julia and Mary Frances" case can be easily solved. A large number of people would argue that the mind is what makes each of us different from each other. Yet, where is the mind, what is the mind, how does the mind work? Many people believe that the mind is a part of the brain. Somewhere within that brown mushy stuff is your mind. Unfortunately, science and technology has not been able to accurately pinpoint the location of one's mind. The last two questions are even harder to answer. The mind is not something physical that one can dissect and have all their questions answer. Instead, the mind is something that has been hypothesized and believed t...
