What’s the argument for premise (2)? After all, we do make our selves, at least in the garden-variety way in which we make other things: we plant gardens, cook dinners, build boats, write books and, over the course of our lives, re-invent, re-create, and otherwise “make something of ourselves”. Of course we don’t do any of these things “from scratch”, without help from anyone or anything else, but it’s impossible (or at least impossible for human beings) to make anything from scratch. The truth