Harold Noonan

Van Inwagen has an ingenious argument for the non-existence of human artefacts . But the argument cannot be accepted, since human artefacts are everywhere. However, it cannot be ignored. The proper response to it is to treat it as a refutation of its least plausible premise, i.e., to ‘tollens’ it. I first set out van Inwagen’s argument. I then identify its least plausible premise and explain the consequence of denying it, that is, the acceptance of a plenitudinous, pluralist ontology. I argue that denying it is not so difficult, since its denial is an easy consequence of ordinary beliefs. I finish by explaining why van Inwagen has not persuaded me that it may be that artefacts do not exist and conclude that nothing stands in the way of tollensing van Inwagen and accepting the consequence of doing so

Philosophers debate whether one-boxing or two-boxing is the rational act in a Newcomb situation. I shall argue that one-boxing is the only rational choice. This is so because there is no intelligible aim by reference to which you can justify the choice of two-boxing over one-boxing once you have come to think that you will two-box. The only aim by which the agent in the Newcomb situation can justify his two-boxing is the subjunctively described aim of ‘getting more than I would if I were to one-box’. But such a subjunctively described aim can justify an action only if it can be seen as generating, in conjunction with the agent’s beliefs, an indicatively describable aim which justifies the action. In the case of the Newcomb agent the aim of ’getting more than I would if I were to one-box’ cannot be seen in this way

Standardly, a one-level criterion of identity 1 is given in the form: ∀ x∀ y )where ‘ K’ denotes the kind of thing for which the criterion is being given and ‘ R’ denotes the criterial relation.Thus, we have, for example, the criterion of identity for sets: ∀ x∀ y))and for composites: ∀ x∀ y))and for events: ∀ x∀ y)). is equivalent to the conjunction of: ∀ x and ∀ x )),which just give two necessary 2 conditions for application of the predicate ‘ K’. 3Consider now the reading of ‘ Kx’ as ‘ x is a member of the Theology Department’ and ‘ Rxy’ as ‘ x admires y and y admires x’. On this reading says that every theologian admires himself and admires no other member of the department. In other words it tells us that the theologians are a bunch of narcissists bound together only by mutual contempt or indifference . Suppose that this is 4 true of the theologians. It might also be …

Eric Olson argues that the dynamic view of time must be false. It requires that the question ‘How fast does time pass?’ has an answer. But its only possible answer, one second per second, is not an answer. I argue that Olson has failed to identify what is wrong with talk of time’s passage. Then I argue that, nonetheless, he is right to reject it. To say that time passes is analogous to saying that space is dense, and to ask about the rate of time’s passage is analogous to asking how dense space is. Since the questions are on a par the dynamic view of time, which requires that they are not, is mistaken.

I respond to criticisms by David Mackie of my previous paper on animalism and Lockeanism. I argue that the ‘transplant intuition’, that a person goes where his brain (or cerebrum) goes, is compatible both with animalism and Lockeanism. I give three arguments for this conclusion, two of them developing lines of thought in Parfit's work. However, I accept that animalism and Lockeanism are incompatible, and I go on to consider the difficulties for Lockeanism that this raises. The principal difficulty, concerning the reference of ‘I’, can be met by distinguishing the thinker of an ‘I’‐thought from the reference of an ‘I’‐thought. The reference is always the person thinking the thought, but when the thought is simultaneously that of an animal coincident but non‐identical with that person, there is not a unique thinker. Mackie's criticisms of this view are ineffective.

How is the debate between presentism and eternalism to be characterized? It is usual to suggest that this debate about time is analogous to the debate between the actualist and the possibilist about modality. I think that this suggestion is right. In what follows I pursue the analogy more strictly than is usual and offer a characterization of what is at the core of the dispute between presentists and eternalists that may be immune to worries often raised about the substantiality of the debate. I suggest that the debate be characterized in Lewisean terms and define positions I call *Lewisean* eternalism and anti-*Lewisean*' presentism (analogous to Lewisean possibilism and anti-Lewisean actualism). I explain some advantages of the proposal and discuss some objections. I conclude that pursuing the analogy strictly offers the prospect of giving clear sense to a controversy which otherwise seems to many deeply obscure

In this book, Eli Hirsch focuses on identity through time, first with respect to ordinary bodies, then underlying matter, and eventually persons. These are linked at various points with other aspects of identity, such as the spatial unity of things, the unity of kinds, and the unity of groups. He investigates how our identity concept ordinarily operates in these respects. He also asks why this concept is so cental to our thinking and whether we can justify seeing the world in terms of such a concept. This is the revised and updated edition of a hardback published in 1982.

This is an elegant and clear tour through many of the issues in philosophy of mind that have occupied philosophers of this century. The topics covered include the problem of other minds, arguments for and against the existence of the soul, a discussion of the bundle theory of the mind, behaviorism, functionalism, mind/brain identity, the argument against the possibility of private language, personal identity and the possibility of after-life, and the question of whether animals and computers can have minds. Carruthers emphasizes arguments for and against the various theories considered, and encourages readers to actively evaluate these approaches as well. Written with clarity and directness, Introducing Persons will prove a useful text for the beginner while simultaneously providing original material of interest to the advanced student and professional philosopher.

Saul Kripke is one of the most important philosophers of the twentieth century. His most celebrated work, Naming and Necessity , makes arguably the most important contribution to the philosophy of language and metaphysics in recent years. Asking fundamental questions – how do names refer to things in the world? Do objects have essential properties? What are natural kind terms and to what do they refer? – he challenges prevailing theories of language and conceptions of metaphysics, especially the descriptivist account of reference, which Kripke argues is found in Frege, Wittgenstein and Russell, and the anti-essentialist metaphysics of Quine. In this invaluable guidebook to Kripke's classic work, Harold Noonan introduces and assesses: Kripke's life and the background to his philosophy the ideas and text of Naming and Necessity the continuing importance of Kripke's work to the philosophy of language and metaphysics. The Routledge Philosophy GuideBook to Kripke and Naming and Necessity is an ideal starting point for anyone coming Kripke's work for the first time. It is essential reading for philosophy students studying philosophy of language, metaphysics, logic, or the history of analytic philosophy

In his Ted Sider takes care to define the notion of a temporal part and his doctrine of perdurantism using only the temporally indexed notion of parthood – ‘ x is part of y at t’ – rather than the atemporal notion of classical mereology – ‘ x is a part of y’ – in order to forestall accusations of unintelligibility from his opponents. However, as he notes, endurantists do not necessarily reject the classical mereological notion as unintelligible. They allow that it makes sense and applies to atemporal subject matters and to temporal subject matters when the entities under discussion are not continuants. Thus, they allow that it makes sense to say that metaphysics is a part of philosophy, or that football is a game of two halves. What endurantists deny is only that the classical mereological notion is applicable to continuants: continuants , they say, have no proper parts simpliciter , either because it is false to say that they have or because it is unintelligible.Thus perdurantists do not have to embrace Sider's excessive caution in defining their position. 1 They can safely allow themselves classical mereological notions as long as it is a consequence of their definitions that continuants are perdurers/have temporal proper parts only if they have atemporal proper parts. 2In his Josh Parsons illuminatingly takes on the task he describes as ‘get[tting] the allegedly technical concepts of temporal part, perdurance and so on by ratcheting up from mereological relations, subregion relations among times and the concept of exact temporal location ’. He continues, ‘My definitions provide a good answer to those endurantists who claim …

The response to Kripke’s modal argument I wish to propose appeals to the distinction between indicative descriptions, i.e., descriptions formed using indicative verb forms, and what I shall call subjunctive descriptions, descriptions formed using non-indicative verb forms used in subjunctive conditionals. The contrast is between ‘the person who is richer than anyone else in the world’ and ‘the person who would have been richer than anyone else in the world’. The response to Kripke’s modal argument is that indicative descriptions are always rigid designators and so do not contrast with proper names