JOHN PERRY Stanford University

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JOHN PERRYStanford University
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PHILOSOPHY TALK

• John Perrys NPR show
• Website for show (including downloads)
• http//www.stanford.edu/philosophytalk/

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The Issue in Perrys Dialogue

• Is personal survival of death possible?
• Possible need not be probable but only logically
  conceivable (non-contradictory) (2-3)
• Personal what survives is someone who is
  identical with me. (3-4)

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Millers First Approach (5-6)

• Miller The possibility of survival is obvious.
• Weirob The Kleenex box example
• Miller We could make a box totally identical
  with one that had been destroyed
• Weirob Exact similarity is not identity

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Millers Second Approach

• Survival can be the survival of a soul (6-7)
• Weirobs basic objection (7-12) a person is not
  a soul because we cant make judgments of
  personal identity about souls.

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Weirobs argument (11-12)

• 1. If a person is a soul, then judgments of
  personal identity are judgments about the
  identity of souls.
• 2. Any judgments about the identity of souls are
  groundless since we cannot observe a soul.
• 3. But judgments about personal identity are not
  groundless.
• 4. Therefore, judgments of personal identity are
  not about the identity of souls.
• 5. Therefore, a person is not a soul.

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Argument over Premise 2 I

• Miller We can infer the presence of a soul from
  its correlation with the body (same body, same
  soul) (8)
• Weirob The needed correlation could be
  established only by directly observing the soul
  (chocolates example) (10-11)

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Argument over Premise 2 II

• Miller Judgment about the identity of souls are
  based on judgments about the similarity of
  psychological characteristics (same
  characteristics, same soul) (12)
• Weirob Theres no reason to think a succession
  of psychological characteristics belongs to the
  same soul (river example) (13-14)

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Argument over Premise 2 III

• Miller I know I have a single soul, so its
  plausible that everyone does (15).
• Weirob Your experience doesnt show that you
  have a single soul, since you cant observe your
  soul (16-18).

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Second Night a New Strategy

• A person is neither a soul nor a body
• Not a soul proved in First Night
• Not a body two arguments (19-22)
• New idea memory as the criterion of personal
  identity

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Identity and Person-stages (22-26)

• Concept of a person-stage
• New statement of problem of personal identity
  what makes a group of person-stages part of the
  same person
• Answer they are related via memory

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Memory and Survival (27-30)

• Miller its obvious that there can be a person
  existing after my death who has all my memories.
• Weirob Distinction of real memories and apparent
  memories--which already depends on personal
  identity (hypnotism example)

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Memories and Causes (30-32)

• Cohen we can distinguish real from apparent
  memories by how they are caused
• Miller Right--and that allows us to use the
  memory criterion of personal identity to prove
  the possibility of survival.

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The Reduplication Argument (32-3)

• 1. If God can make one heavenly person with my
  memories, then he can make two.
• 2. If either of these persons were me, both would
  be.
• 3. Two different persons cannot both be me.
• 4. Therefore, neither heavenly person could be
  me.

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Identity and Transplants

• The Julia North case(38)
• The question who survives--the brain-donor or
  the body-donor? (39-40)
• Cohen who survives is a matter of convention
  (40-41)
• Weirobs critique (41-42)

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The Memory Theory of Identity

• Millers defense of the memory theory
• 1. Explains how we can make judgments of identity
  with our eyes closed
• 2. Explains the importance of personal identity

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Critique of the Memory Theory

• The memory theory requires an identical (not just
  exactly similar) brain
• Given this, it loses its alleged advantages