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A defence of anti-criterialism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

Simon Langford
Simon Langford*
Affiliation:
UAE University, Al Ain, UAE
*
Emails: [email protected]
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Abstract

According to philosophical orthodoxy, there are informative criteria of identity over time. Anti-criterialism rejects this orthodoxy and claims that there are no such criteria. This paper examines anti-criterialism in the light of recent attacks on the thesis by Matt Duncan, Sydney Shoemaker and Dean Zimmerman. It is argued that those attacks are not successful. Along the way, a novel strategy to defend anti-criterialism against the critics’ most challenging objection is developed. Under-appreciated difficulties for criterialism are also raised which, I claim, there is no obvious way to solve. It is concluded that anti-criterialism may be a much stronger rival to criterialism than is often supposed.

Keywords

Criteria of identityTrenton Merrickspersonal identity
Type
Articles
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 47 , Issue 5 , 2017 , pp. 613 - 630
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Journal of Philosophy 2017

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