If you got a car and replaced every existing part on it, would it be the same car?

People correcting grammar is cringe. Why do you do it?

Sup Theseus.

This reminds me of when Penn Julet said "If I got Houdini's sand and replaced both the tips and the main part it would only be the same wand if nobody has the old parts."

Seeing conflicting answers ITT. Let me offer a comparison:
With firearms in the United States, the only part that's legally a firearm is the receiver. In most circumstances, every other part is treated as nothing more than a chunk of steel, wood, ect that can be bought and sold without paperwork. The receiver, however, is what requires a background check and paperwork to purchase. If your state has registration, it's the receiver that's registered. The receiver is considered to be indivisible and if you were to cut two receivers in half and weld the halves together, both original guns would be considered destroyed and two new guns created.
So what's the "receiver" of a car, if there is a comparable part?

bump

You can't replace the body the same way you would replace the boards on a ship, Theseus.

The body and or the frame.

The unibody of a unibody car and the frame of a BOF vehicle would be the equivalents, but a frame or unibody shell may have been salvaged and thus is just a chunk of metal that can be bought and sold like scrap, the machine only becomes a car, legally, when all the other components are attached to it to make it drive.

You could take an S10 pickup, replace the frame with a junkyard one, and it would, as far as the law is concerned, be the exact same vehicle. Not sure if you can do the same with a unibody car without breaking the law, but you can certainly try and hide the VIN discrepancy that will become obvious if the car is ever run through a state inspection by swapping the plates.

Why not assemble a new car with parts at that point?

I know what a frame is, but I'm wondering if he means body as well.

The body and frame by all intents and purposes is legally the car.

It why when cars are being restored and its uncovered that the vin on the frame has been covered up altered, and stolen, the frame is seized.

Yes but you could take a salvaged frame, bolt it to an existing clean body and still report the registration with the body's VIN. No DMV employee, inspection tech or cop would look twice.

Obviously if the frame is from a stolen car and someone goes looking you're gonna have problems, but if the plates are intact and it was legally acquired, you could get away with it.

The area on the firewall with the vin plate riveted to it

This, really. Why do you think burned down exotic chassis are worth thousands? People want to take their replica and bolt the legitimate exotic's vin onto it.

Let's say, if you buy a Beetle and replace every single piece of it, but the chassis, it wouldn't be the same.
If you took 2 indentical cars and canibalised one for another, then you literally made a better car from 2 worse ones.
If you have 2 separate cars (A Beetle like and the example and say, a Fiat) and took the pieces from the one and hooked on the body of another, what you got is a Fiat with a Beetle body.
Anything in-between this, makes the car a mongrel, for instance swapping the engine of the Beetle with that of a Fiat, but nothing else, makes it a Fiat-engined Beetle, so it stays a Beetle, but not a pure one.

Ship of theseus paradox, nice.

None of the original water is in the Mississippi River from when it was named, yet it's still called the mississippi.

If you replace the head on your old grandfather's old axe, then a few years later replace the handle, is it still your grandfather's old axe?

I actually agree; it's a very condescending way to shut someone down.

Person A: *says opinion*
Person B: No
Why is this even a thing human beings do?

It really is. I don't know why it makes me so angry, but it does. There's just something so snotty and smug about it. Especially when they put "Umm" in front of it.

>Umm. No.

Makes you sound like a 13 year old girl.

They say your body is a completely new set of cells every 11 years.

Are you a new person?

>tfw i will always be me no matter how many cells replace themselves

Good cars have a soul. You can't replace a soul.

You know, a Body kit Fiero with a LS swap might be cool. I mean still kind of cheesy but cool.

That has no relevance to the discussion at hand.

Just becuase the authorities 'don't know' doesn't mean the car is some how a different car.