Studies in the Metaphysics of Personal Identity Over Time
Valerio Buonomo (Ed.)
Abstract
We ordinarily believe that the inhabitants of the world – including ourselves – persist over time. Such an idea, however, has puzzled philosophers for centuries. How can we change and still be the same? More specifically, is there any constitutive condition of our identity over time? And if so, does this condition involve mental aspects (such as memories, believes, experiences, etc.), physical aspects (such as the body, or the continuity of the organism), or something else? Or is rather personal identity primitive and unanalyzable, so that our persistence is nothing but a brute fact? This volume is a collection of new essays from leading figures in the field analyzing the persistence of persons and the criteria of personal identity over time. It presents an extensive discussion of the most relevant views on personal identity in contemporary metaphysics and provides new treatments of the constitutive conditions of personal persistence.
About the Editor
Valerio Buonomo is Ph.D. Candidate in Philosophy at the University of Milan, a member of the Centre for Philosophy of Time – University of Milan, and a research fellow within the OntoForMat project. His areas of specialty are metaphysics, ontology, the philosophy of time. His research mainly focuses on the problem of personal identity and the constitutive conditions of persistence. He is also interested in the history of analytic philosophy, metaphysics, and philosophy of mind. He has been visiting scholar at Columbia University in the City of New York (2017), at Logos Research Group – University of Barcelona (2014), and at Eberhard-Karls University of Tübingen (2010-2011).
Contents
| List of contributors | xi |
| Acknowledgments | xiii |
| A brief guide to personal persistence VALERIO BUONOMO |
7 |
| PART I. PERSISTENCE AND CRITERIA OF IDENTITY | |
| 1. The simple and complex views of personal identity distinguished HAROLD W. NOONAN & BENJAMIN L. CURTIS |
21 |
| 2. Primitive persistence of persons over time LYNNE RUDDER BAKER |
41 |
| 3. Personal capacities – Persons – Personal identity CHRISTIAN KANZIAN |
55 |
| 4. Identity, change, and criteria of identity ERWIN TEGTMEIER |
79 |
| 5. Simple subjects, the first-person- perspective and persistence GEORG GASSER |
91 |
| PART II. PERSISTENCE AND PSYCOLOGICAL CONTINUITY | |
| 6. Memory-based personal identity without circularity THOMAS SATTIG |
117 |
| 7. Selves outside the world ANDREA BOTTANI & ALFREDO TOMASETTA |
135 |
| 8. Making the self real MICHELE DI FRANCESCO, MASSIMO MARRAFFA, & ALFREDO PATERNOSTER |
155 |
| 9. What’s next? Time travel and phenomenal continuity GIULIANO TORRENGO & VALERIO BUONOMO |
183 |
| PART III. PERSISTENCE, HUMAN ANIMALS, AND LIFE | |
| 10. Animalism, persistence conditions, subjecthood, and aporia CHRISTOPHER HUGHES |
205 |
| 11. Memory, organisms and the circle of life RINA TZINMAN |
243 |
| 12. Life is complicated: a cluster criterion of personal identity MARYA SCHECHTMAN |
275 |
| Index | 301 |
