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727Fiction and Fictions: On Ricoeur on the route to the selfSouth African Journal of Philosophy 25 (4): 329-335. 2006.In reaching his narrative view of the self in Oneself as Another, Paul Ricoeur argues that, while literature offers revealing insights into the nature of the self, the sort of fictions involving brain transplants, fission, and so on, that philosophers often take seriously do not (and cannot). My paper is a response to Ricoeur's charge, contending that the arguments Ricoeur rejects are not flawed in the way he suggests, and that his own arguments are sometimes guilty of the very charges he lays a…Read more
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662Our Identity, Responsibility and BiologyPhilosophical Papers 3-14. 2004.Eric Olson argues in The Human Animal that thought-experiments involving body-swapping do not in the end offer any support to psychological continuity theories, nor do they pose any threat to his Biological View. I argue that he is mistaken in at least the second claim.
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39Should We Tolerate People Who Split?Southern Journal of Philosophy 30 (1): 1-17. 1992.Thought-experiments in which one person divides into two have been important in the literature on personal identity. I consider three influential arguments which aim to undermine the force of these thought-experiments – arguments from David Wiggins, Patricia Kitcher and Kathleen Wilkes. I argue that all three fail, leaving us to face the consequences of splitting, whatever those may be.
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643Let's exist again (like we did last summer)South African Journal of Philosophy 20 (2): 159-170. 2001.This paper is a defence of a psychological view of personal identity against the attack Peter Unger launches against it in his Identity, Consciousness and Value. Unger attempts to undermine the traditional support which a psychological criterion of identity has drawn from thought-experiments, and to show that such a criterion has totally unacceptable implications -- in particular, that it allows that persons can go out of and come back into existence. I respond to both aspects of this criticism,…Read more
Bellville, Western Cape, South Africa
Areas of Specialization
Metaphysics |
Philosophy of Mind |
Areas of Interest
Metaphilosophy |
Philosophy of Action |
Metaphysics and Epistemology |