Persons,animals, and identity

The paper is concerned with how neo-Lockean accounts of personal identity should respond to the challenge of animalist accounts. Neo-Lockean accounts that hold that persons can change bodies via brain transplants or cerebrum transplants are committed to the prima facie counterintuitive denial that a person is an (biologically individuated) animal. This counterintuitiveness can be defused by holding that a person is biological animal (on neo-Lockean views) if the “is” is the “is” of constitution rather than the “is” of identity, and that a person is identical with an animal in a sense of “animal” different from that which requires the persistence conditions of animals to be biological. Another challenge is the “too many minds problem”: if persons and their coincident biological animals share the same physical properties, and mental properties supervene on physical properties, the biological animal will share the mental properties of the person, and so should itself be a person. The response to this invokes a distinction between “thin” properties, which are shared by coincident entities, and “thick” properties which are not so shared. Mental properties, and their physical realizers, are thick, not thin, so are not properties persons share with their bodies or biological animals. The paper rebuts the objection that neo-Lockean accounts cannot explain how persons can have physical properties. To meet a further problem it is argued that the biological properties of persons and those of biological animals are different because of differences in their causal profiles.     

Determination and Mental Causation

Yablo suggests that we can understand the possibility of mental causation by supposing that mental properties determine physical properties, in the classic sense of determination according to which red determines scarlet. Determinates and their determinables do not compete for causal relevance, so if mental and physical properties are related as determinable and determinates, they should not compete for causal relevance either. I argue that this solution won't work. I first construct a more adequate account of determination than that provided by Yablo. I then consider two common accounts of the mental, token identity theories and dispositional theories, and argue that on neither do mental and physical properties satisfy the requirements for determination.     

Hard Luck: How Luck Undermines Free Will and Moral Responsibility

I reconcile the spatiotemporal location of repeatable artworks and impure sets with the non-location of natural numbers despite all three being varieties of abstract objects. This is possible because, while the identity conditions for all three can be given by abstraction principles, in the former two cases spatiotemporal location is a congruence for the equivalence relation featuring in the relevant principle, whereas in the latter it is not. I then generalize this to other ‘physical’ properties like shape, mass, and causal powers.     

GRIEF: A NARRATIVE ACCOUNT

Grief is not a kind of feeling, or a kind of judgement, or a kind of perception, or any kind of mental state or event the identity of which can be adequately captured at a moment in time. Instead, grief is a kind of process; more specifically, it is a complex pattern of activity and passivity, inner and outer, which unfolds over time, and the unfolding pattern over time is explanatorily prior to what is the case at any particular time. The pattern of a particular grieving is best understood and explained through a narrative account, and not merely through a causal account, for narrative accounts in such cases have powerful explanatory, revelatory, and expressive powers which causal accounts lack. Although I will not argue for it here, I believe that this view of grief can be generalised to other kinds of emotion. If this is so, then many philosophical accounts of emotion are at fault in identifying emotion with a kind of mental state or event.     

Causal relevance and Nonreductive physicalism

It has been argued that nonreductive physicalism leads to epiphenominalism about mental properties: the view that mental events cannot cause behavioral effects by virtue of their mental properties. Recently, attempts have been made to develop accounts of causal relevance for irreducible properties to show that mental properties need not be epiphenomenal. In this paper, I primarily discuss the account of Frank Jackson and Philip Pettit. I show how it can be developed to meet several obvious objections and to capture our intuitive conception of degrees of causal relevance. However, I argue that the account requires large-scale miraculous coincidence for there to be causally relevant mental properties. I also argue that the same problem arises for two apparently very different accounts of causal relevance. I suggest that this result does not show that these accounts, on appropriate readings, are false. Therefore, I tentatively conclude that we have reason to believe that irreducible mental properties are causally irrelevant. Moreover, given that there is at leastprima facie evidence that mental properties can be causally relevant, my conclusion casts doubt on nonreductive physicalist theories of mental properties.     

Persons,Simplicity, and Substance

A novel argument has recently been advanced against materialism—the view that human persons are identical to composite, material objects. The argument claims that pairs of people are not conscious and that the only viable explanation for why they are not is because pairs of people are not simple. The argument concludes that only a simple thing can be the subject of conscious states. In this paper, I offer an alternative explanation for why pairs of people are not conscious: pairs of people are not substances. I provide two characterizations of substantiality. The first proposal claims that substances have irreducible causal powers, and the second claims that substances cannot have other substances as proper parts. The alternative explanation based on these characterizations of substantiality shows that being conscious is compatible with materialism.     

GUIDELINES FOR THEORIZING ABOUT REALIZATION

Realization can be roughly understood as a kind of role‐playing, a relationship between a property that plays a role and a property characterized by that role. This rough sketch previously received only moderate elaboration; recently, however, several substantive theories of realization have been proposed. But are there any general constraints on a theory of realization? What is a theory of realization supposed to accomplish? I first argue that a view of realization is viable, in part, to the extent that physical realization under that view explains or accounts for why instances of realized properties are necessitated by how things are physically in a modally strong sense. In this sense, I claim that physical realization should explain physical supervenience. I then call into question two alternative desiderata and raise a challenge for attempts to explicate realization in terms of isomorphism or analogy. Finally, I explain how a causal‐functional account of realization, as well as less demanding accounts, can meet the preferred desideratum.     

Part-Whole Physicalism and Mental Causation

A well-known ``overdetermination'argument aims to show that the possibility of mental causes of physical events in a causally closed physical world and the possibility of causally relevant mental properties are both problematic. In the first part of this paper, I extend an identity reply that has been given to the first problem to a property-instance account of causal relata. In the second, I argue that mental types are composed of physical types and, as a consequence, both mental and physical types may be causally relevant with respect to the same physical effect, contrary to the overdetermination argument. In further sections, I argue that mental types have causal powers, consider some objections and reject an alternative version of part-whole physicalism. Throughout I assume that causal relata are tropes and property types are classes of tropes.     

TWO CHALLENGES THAT CATEGORICAL PROPERTIES POSE TO PHYSICALISM

What are physical objects like when they are considered independently of their causal interactions? Many think that the answer to this question involves categorical properties– properties that make contributions to their bearers that are independent of any causal interactions those objects may enter into. In this paper, I examine two challenges that this solution poses to Physicalism. The first challenge is that, given that they are distinct from any of the scientifically described causal powers that they happen to convey, categorical properties will not qualify as being ‘physical’ properties. Given the right definition of ‘physical’, this challenge can be overcome. I argue, however, that the only way we can have a positive grasp of the nature of categorical properties is via ‘acquaintance’– a non‐physical relation. This second challenge to Physicalism cannot be overcome. ¹ 1 I would like to thank Brendan O'Sullivan for helpful comments on an earlier draft of this paper.
     

Memory and identity

Among the many topics covered in Sven Bernecker’s impressive study of memory is the relation between memory and personal identity. Bernecker uses his grammatical taxonomy of memory and causal account to defend the claim that memory does not logically presuppose personal identity and hence that circularity objections to memory-based accounts of personal identity are misplaced. In my comment I investigate these claims, suggesting that the relation between personal identity and memory is more complicated than Bernecker’s analysis suggests. In particular, I argue (1) that while he shows that some memories do not presuppose personal identity he fails to show that those that are appealed to in memory-based accounts of personal identity do not, and (2) that the features of his view that allow him to define memory without reference to personal identity also obscure important features of memory that must be part of a complete account.     

The common‐sense view of physical objects

When I perceive a physical object I am directly aware of something. This something may be called a sense‐datum, leaving the question open whether it is indeed the physical object itself. Still, this question must be asked. It seems impossible that the sense‐datum can be identical with the physical object for we do not always say we have different physical objects when we say we have different sense‐data. On the other hand, the plain man does not think of the physical object as something other than the sense‐datum. It is suggested that the plain man regards the sense‐datum as in a sense identical with the physical object he is perceiving. But it is a peculiar sense of ‘identity’ which is in question, one which does not conform to the rules logicians lay down for this word.     

A conditional theory of trying

What I shall do in this paper is to propose an analysis of ‘Agent P tries to A’ in terms of a subjunctive conditional, that avoids some of the problems that beset most alternative accounts of trying, which I call ‘referential views’. They are so-named because on these alternative accounts, ‘P tries to A’ entails that there is a trying to A by P, and therefore the expression ‘P’s trying to A’ can occur in the subject of a sentence and be used to refer to a particular, namely an act or event of trying. A conditional account such as mine avoids having to answer questions about those alleged particulars, for example their location and their causal relation to physical actions, or alternatively their identity to physical actions. In brief, the analysis I propose eschews any need to quantify over any sort of trying particulars. I both clarify the proposal and deal with five possible objections to it: (1) metaphysically impossible actions: (2) cases of finking and reverse-cycle finking; (3) the empirical emptiness of preventers and blockers; (4) proximate intentions and trying; and (5) alleged explanatory loss.     

AN INQUIRY INTO THE ORIGINS OF LIFE ON EARTH— A SYNTHESIS OF PROCESS THOUGHT IN SCIENCE AND THEOLOGY

An initiating event in the development of life on earth is thought to have been the generation of self‐replicating catalytic molecules (SRCMs). Despite decades of work to reveal how SRCMs could have formed, a chemically detailed hypothesis remains elusive. I maintain that this is due, in part, to a failure of metaphysics and question this research program's ontologic foundation of materialism. In this essay I suggest another worldview that may provide more adequate ontologic underpinnings: Whitehead's process philosophy of dynamic, relational becoming. Here we come to see molecules not as unchanging objects but rather as processes that possess the capacity for subjective experience. Molecular transformation is driven by experience, both internal and external. Process thought accounts for the world's creative impulse by positing a God who lures the becoming of all entities toward greater complexity and value. Chemical evolution is now seen as divine motivation of molecular becoming and, as such, possesses the potential for introducing true novelty into the world. The “causal joint” between God and world is hypothesized to be an energy transduction at the molecular level that allows divine action without violation of chemical principles or physical laws.     

Constitution,Over Determination and Causal Power

Kim's exclusion argument threatens to show that irreducible constituted objects are epiphenomenal. Kim's arguments are examined and found to be unconvincing; that a constituted cause requires its constituent to be a cause is not an adequate reason to reject the causation of the constituted object (event or property‐instance). However, I introduce and argue for, the Causal Power Uniqueness Condition (CPUC). I argue that CPUC and the causal closure of the physical, implies that constituted objects or property‐instances are not novel causal powers.     

Will it be me? Identity,concern and perspective

Self-reflexive or egocentric concern has been taken to present a serious problem for reductionist and eliminativist metaphysical accounts of personal identity. Philosophers have tended to respond in one of three ways: by continuing the search for a metaphysical account of identity that (prudentially if not morally) justifies egocentric concern; by accepting that egocentric concern can hold between persons who are not numerically identical; or by advocating the abandonment of egocentric concern altogether. All these approaches, however, distinguish between metaphysical ‘facts’ and affective responses to them. Exploring a well-known example from Bernard Williams, I argue that egocentric concern presents itself as irreducibly first-personal and as making its own set of numerical personal identity claims on the phenomenal level. Williams' example also points to the need to complicate the first/third person schema by factoring in a further distinction between present-tense and implicitly atemporal perspectives on the self. Once this move is made, we can see that the identity claims figured in first-person present-tense experience and those arrived at through metaphysical deliberation need to be distinguished. We should resist the temptation to privilege one perspective over the other in all instances, or to collapse them into a unitary account of selfhood.     

The Obligation to Know: Information and the Burdens of Citizenship

Contemporary persons are daily confronted with enormous quantities of information, some of which reveal causal connections between their actions and harm that is visited upon distant others. Given their limited cognitive and information processing capacities, persons cannot reasonably be expected to respond to every cry for help or call to action, but neither can they defensibly refuse to hear and reflect upon any of them. Persons have a limited obligation to know, I argue, which requires that they inform themselves and others about their role in harmful social practices, with a view toward challenging the norms that sustain such practices. In this paper, I explore this obligation to know, and the related idea of excusable ignorance, offering accounts of the epistemic burden that it entails for persons in their capacities as citizens and in the context of global climate change and of reproach as a potentially effective tool for rectifying rather than excusing ignorance.     

The Generalization Problem and the Identity Solution

For some time now, Jaegwon Kim has argued that irreducible mental properties face the threat of causal inefficacy. The primary weapon he deploys to sustain this charge is the supervenience/exclusion argument. This argument, in a nutshell, states that any mental property that irreducibly supervenes on a physical property is excluded from causal efficacy because the underlying physical property takes care of all of the causal work itself. Originally intended for mental properties alone, it did not take long for his critics to suggest the argument generalizes across all of the special science properties as well. Kim responds in two different ways to the generalization problem. The first response, which I call the higher-level solution, is ably dismissed by numerous critics. The second response, which I call the identity solution, has not faced comparable scrutiny. In this paper I argue that the identity solution faces numerous problems of its own.     

Place and the self: An autobiographical memory synthesis

In this article, I argue that the relationship between place and self can be accounted for by recent theoretical work on autobiographical memory. The link between place and self is conceptualized as a transitory mental representation that emerges as a “place of mine” (personal autobiographical experience) from a “place” (declarative knowledge). The function of “place of mine” is to guide personal memory and self-knowing consciousness of periods of our lives. I combine inquiries of memory, self, and place in a triadic relationship, a synthesis, suggesting a conceptual model for the phenomenon of place-related self as a sub-system of the self. This is formed by a causal progression from a physical place across time via emotional and cognitive bonds, components of the autobiographical information grounding the self, apportioned across declarative memory. Finally, using the methods of factor analysis and structural equation modeling, I show that the proposed model accounts for previous and new data on place-related identity.     

Negative causation in causal and mechanistic explanation

Instances of negative causation—preventions, omissions, and the like—have long created philosophical worries. In this paper, I argue that concerns about negative causation can be addressed in the context of causal explanation generally, and mechanistic explanation specifically. The gravest concern about negative causation is that it exacerbates the problem of causal promiscuity—that is, the problem that arises when a particular account of causation identifies too many causes for a particular effect. In the explanatory context, the problem of promiscuity can be solved by characterizing the phenomenon to be explained as a contrast between two or more events or non-events. This contrastive strategy also can solve other problems that negative causation presents for the leading accounts of mechanistic explanation. Along the way, I argue that to be effective, accounts of causal explanation must incorporate negative causation. I also develop a taxonomy of negative causation and incorporate each variety of negative causation into the leading accounts of mechanistic explanation.