Personal Identity

by Gasser, Georg; Stefan, Matthias

• ISBN13: 9781107014442
• ISBN10: 1107014441
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2013-01-07
• Publisher: Cambridge Univ Pr
• More Book Details

Summary

We take it for granted that a person persists over time: when we make plans, we assume that we will carry them out; when we punish someone for a crime, we assume that she is the same person as the one who committed it. Metaphysical questions underlying these assumptions point towards an area of deep existential and philosophical interest. In this volume, leading metaphysicians discuss key questions about personal identity, including 'What are we?', 'How do we persist?', and 'Which conditions guarantee our identity over time?' They discuss whether personal identity is 'complex', whereby it is analyzable in terms of simpler relations such as physical or psychological features, or whether it is 'simple', namely something that cannot be analyzed in terms of more fundamental relations. Their essays offer an innovative discussion of this topic and will be of interest to a wide readership in metaphysics.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Framing the Question

Chitchat on personal identity

In search of the simple view

Personal identity, indeterminacy, and obligation

Personal identity and its perplexities

Arguments For and Against Simplicity

How to determine which is the true theory of personal identity

Against simplicity Sydney

The probable simplicity of personal identity

Reply to E. J. Lowe Sydney

The non-descriptive individual nature of conscious beings

Reconsidering Simplicity

Personal identity: a not-so-simple simple view

Is 'person' a sortal term?

Materialism, dualism, and 'simple' theories of personal identity

The morphing block and diachronic personal identity

References

Index

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