Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
An Anthology of Philosophical Studies , Patricia Hanna, Editör, Athens Institute for Education and Research , Athens, ss.29-36, 2015
According to reductionism, personal identity consists in the continuity and connectedness between psychological and/or bodily states and not in a further fact. It’s been argued that when reductionism is endorsed, one’s concern for one’s future, called the special concern, cannot be justified. Parfit (1984) calls this the extreme claim. The extreme claim is typically based on the view that continuity and connectedness are irrelevant to the special concern. My purpose is to undermine the extreme claim. I first argue against the stronger claim that the special concern is not compatible with reductionism. Also I argue against the view that phenomenal consciousness cannot be made sense of when reductionism is endorsed. Secondly I argue that the continuity and connectedness between psychological and/or bodily states figure in the determination of a mental state as a mental state of a particular kind, e.g. as a state of concern rather than a belief or a desire. Therefore continuity and connectedness can be seen as relevant to the special concern. Thirdly I argue that some examples used in favor of the extreme claim assume psychological criterion of identity and that those examples fail to support the extreme claim when bodily criterion is endorsed.