PHIL 741
Metaphysics 2
Please note: this is archived course information from 2014 for PHIL 741.
Description
The course will be concerned with aspects, primarily metaphysical, of the contemporary debate about Persons and Persistence.
Here’s a seed question from which puzzles about personal identity over time (personal persistence) grow: “Suppose at some time t1 there is a person p who around that time performs certain actions and has certain experiences. Suppose that at some other time t2 there exists an entity e. What conditions are required for p to be numerically identical with e?”. This leads to fundamental questions about numerous aspects of philosophy, including ontology, identity and philosophical methodology. These topics have particularly flourished over the past four decades and the contemporary literature on it is vast. After an initial survey of the topic we will work our way through a selection from the main debates. A couple of historical authors may be briefly touched on but the aspiration is to pursue issues in contemporary metaphysics and the philosophy of identity in general, not history of philosophy.
Availability 2014
Semester 1
Lecturer(s)
Coordinator(s) Dr Denis Robinson
Reading/Texts
Reading will include various notes and articles by the lecturer, journal articles and chapters of Harold Noonan, Personal Identity, Second Edition (Blackwell, 2003). Note that the Library has electronic access to this work as well as having it in hard copy.
Recommended Reading
Harold Noonan, Personal Identity (see above), Chs. 1 – 3. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (online), entries on Identity (Harold Noonan), Personal Identity (Eric Olson), Identity Over Time (André Gallois) and Personal Identity and Ethics (David Shoemaker).
Students contemplating taking this course are strongly advised to read at least Chapter 1 of Noonan and the Noonan and Olson Stanford Encyclopedia entries listed above, before deciding whether to enrol.
Points
PHIL 741: 15 points
Prerequisites
Corequisites
Restrictions
