David S. Oderberg

Corruptionism is the view that following physical death, the human being ceases to exist but their soul persists in the afterlife. Survivalism holds that both the human being and their soul persist in the afterlife, as distinct entities, with the soul constituting the human. Each position has its defenders, most of whom appeal both to metaphysical considerations and to the authority of St Thomas Aquinas. Corruptionists claim that survivalism violates a basic principle of any plausible mereology, while survivalists tend to reject the principle, though without as much detail as one would like. In this paper I examine both the key exegetical issues and the mereological question, arguing that Aquinas cannot be shown to have supported the principle in question, and that the principle should be rejected on independent grounds. If correct, some key planks in support of survivalism are established, with others to await further examination.

Antonio Ramos Díaz has recently given an extensive critique of what I have called the “storage problem” for materialism about the human mind. I respond to Díaz, showing that his critique fails. First, I rehearse the storage problem, explaining what claims it does and does not involve. I then consider Díaz’s “strong” and “weak” interpretations of my argument, explaining why I do not subscribe to the strong version, which misinterprets my position, especially concerning the meaning of the term “concrete.” His weak version of my argument is closer to what I intend, but Díaz’s own unpacking of this interpretation also commits me to claims I do not, for very good reasons, accept. Díaz does not, in the end, show the storage problem to be—as he thinks—an unsound way of arguing for dualism. Getting concepts into a purely material human intellect still looks like the metaphysical equivalent of fitting a square peg into a round hole.

Contemporary liberal societies are seeing increasing pressure on individuals to act against their consciences. Most of the pressure is directed at freedom of religion but it also affects ethical beliefs more generally, contrary to the recognition of freedom of religion and conscience as a basic human right. I propose that freedom of dissociation, as a corollary of freedom of association, could be a practical and ethically acceptable solution to the conscience problem. I examine freedom of association and explain how freedom of dissociation follows from it, showing how dissociation protects freedom of religion and conscience. Extreme cases, such as the problem of the Satanist nurse, can be handled within a dissociationist framework, so it is reasonable to think less extreme cases can also be dealt with. The serious objection that dissociationism entails unjust discrimination is answered primarily by appeal to the need for ‘full and fair access’ to goods and services by all groups. I then allay important concerns about what kind of liberal society we should want to live in. Next, I refute the charge that a dissociationist society violates liberalism's ‘higher good’, arguing that liberalism strictly does not have a higher good. I conclude with some reflections on what a dissociationist society might look like.

I build a case for the impossibility of natural necessity as anything other than a species of metaphysical necessity – the necessity obtaining in virtue of the essences of natural objects. Aristotelian necessitarianism about the laws of nature is clarified and defended. I contrast it with E.J. Lowe’s contingentism about the laws. I examine Lowe’s solution to the circularity/triviality problem besetting natural necessity understood as relative necessity. Lowe’s way out is subject to serious problems unless it is given an essentialist turn, which he declines to do. Further, his defence of contingency in terms of possible variation in the natural constants is found wanting, as is a related defence given by Kit Fine. I examine and raise problems for a recent, Lowe-inspired defence of a hybrid view of the modal status of laws given by Tuomas Tahko. Aristotelian necessitarianism, by contrast, can account for the sorts of phenomena to which contingentists typically appeal.

There are a number of ways in which a person can share the guilt of another's wrongdoing. He might advise it, command it or consent to it. He might provoke it, praise it, flatter the wrongdoer, or conceal the wrong. He might stay silent when there is a clear duty to denounce the wrong or its perpetrator; or he might positively defend the wrong done. Finally, he might actively participate or cooperate in the wrongdoing. These various activities, apart from cooperation, typically occur before or after the commission of the wrong itself, only provocation being essentially before the fact. As such they fall into the categories of seduction or comfort, seduction being essentially pre-commission and comfort post-commission. In seduction, the seducer typically leads another into doing wrong who has not definitely made up his mind. He does not assist in the commission, but he leads to its occurring. If the principal has made up his mind, actions which might otherwise amount to seduction are best characterized as amounting to scandal, since they do not lead to wrong but reinforce the principal in his wrongful intent or provide to third parties a bad example since they connote approval of the principal's action. Closely related to the concept of seduction is that of solicitation, though perhaps these are best thought of as two aspects of the same kind of activity. Seduction can be thought of as a strong form of inducement to wrong, typified by command, counsel and enticement through praise or provocation. Solicitation is a softer form of inducement typically involving requests, appeals, and invitations. Whereas the seducer or solicitor leads another into wrong but does not assist in its commission, the co-operator does not lead the principal into wrong but assists in its commission.

Things change. If anything counts as a datum of metaphysics, that does. Change occurs in many ways: it can be accidental or substantial; essential or non-essential; intrinsic or extrinsic; subjective or objective. Changes can be physical, spatial, quantitative, qualitative, natural, artefactual, conceptual, linguistic. Events are arguably best defined as changes in an object or objects. All change is from something and into something, and hence is at least a two-term relation, involving a term from which and a term to which.

To the extent that dualism is even taken to be a serious option in contemporary discussions of personal identity and the philosophy of mind, it is almost exclusively either Cartesian dualism or property dualism that is considered. The more traditional dualism defended by Aristotelians and Thomists, what I call hylemorphic dualism, has only received scattered attention. In this essay I set out the main lines of the hylemorphic dualist position, with particular reference to personal identity. First I argue that overemphasis of the problem of consciousness has had an unhealthy effect on recent debate, claiming instead that we should emphasize the concept of form. Then I bring in the concept of identity by means of the notion of substantial form. I continue by analyzing the relation between form and matter, defending the traditional theses of prime matter and of the unicity of substantial form. I then argue for the immateriality of the substantial form of the human person, viz. the soul, from an account of the human intellect. From this follows the soul's essential independence of matter. Finally, although the soul is the immaterial bearer of personal identity, that identity is still the identity of an essentially embodied being. I explain how these ideas are to be reconciled. Footnotesa I am grateful to Stephen Braude, John Cottingham, John Haldane, David Jehle, Joel Katzav, Eduardo Ortiz, and Fred Sommers for helpful comments and discussion of a draft of this essay. I would also like to thank Ellen Paul, whose suggestions have helped greatly to improve the essay's style and content

This article challenges the view most recently expounded by Emily Jackson that ‘decisional privacy’ ought to be respected in the realm of artificial reproduction (AR). On this view, it is considered an unjust infringement of individual liberty for the state to interfere with individual or group freedom artificially to produce a child. It is our contention that a proper evaluation of AR and of the relevance of welfare will be sensitive not only to the rights of ‘commissioning parties’ to AR but also to public policy considerations. We argue that AR has implications for the common good, by involving matters of human reproduction, kinship, race, parenthood and identity. In this paper we challenge presuppositions concerning decisional privacy. We examine the essential commodification of human life implicit in AR and the systematicity that makes this possible. We address the objection that it is an ethically neutral way of having children and consider the problem of ‘existential debt’. After examining objections to the thesis that AR is illegitimate for reasons of public policy and the common good, we return to the issue of decisional privacy in the light of considerations concerning the legitimate role of the state in matters affecting human reproduction.

Freedom of belief is one of the entrenched values in modern society. Interpreted as the right not to be coerced into believing something, it is surely correct. But most people take it to mean that there is a right to false belief, a right to be wrong. People think that freedom of thought is a good thing, and this must include the freedom to make mistakes. It is also often thought that making mistakes is a life-enhancing and essential part of personal development. I argue that these ideas are false. Beginning with an examination of the basic good of truth, and making comparisons with other goods like health and friendship, I argue that there is a duty to believe only the truth, which thus logically excludes the right also to believe falsehood. I distinguish between the strict wrongness of false belief and the fact that, because of our epistemic limitations, we are not always to be blamed for our false beliefs. Even in the case of those beliefs which are involuntary, there is no right to have them if they are false, even though we are not to be blamed for having them. The right to be wrong, I conclude, is a modern myth.