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Sidgwick's Distinction Passage

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 June 2020

Robert Shaver*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, University of Manitoba
*
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]

Abstract

I suggest that Sidgwick, in his controversial “distinction passage,” has Schopenhauer in mind as someone who denies egoism on the ground that there are no separate individuals. I then reconstruct Sidgwick's argument in the passage. I take him to be defending a presupposition of the case for choosing egoism over utilitarianism. He is claiming that there are separate individuals. I close by rejecting alternative interpretations, on which Sidgwick is arguing directly for egoism.

Type
Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press

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