Oxford University Press Indeterminate Identity: Metaphysics and Semantics

Terence Parsons presents a lively and controversial study of philosophical questions about identity. Is a person identical with that person's body? If a ship has all its parts replaced, is the resulting ship identical with the original ship? If the discarded parts are reassembled, is the newly assembled ship identical with the original ship? Because these puzzles remain unsolved, some people believe that they are questions that have no answers, perhaps because the questions are improperly formulated; they believe that there is a problem with the language used to formulate them. Parsons explores a different possibility: that such puzzles lack answers because of the way the world is (or because of the way the world is not); there is genuine indeterminacy of identity in the world. He articulates such a view in detail and defends it from a host of criticisms that have been levelled against the very possibility of indeterminacy in identity. Review It is not only those already involved in those debates that should read this book: in particular, it has much to offer for people working in the two disciplines cited in the subtitle - metaphysics and semantics ― Mind This monograph provides by far the most detailed defence of worldly indeterminacy of identity available in the literature. The discussion ranges over a broad array of issues, adopting inventive as well as rigorous techniques and strategies ― Mind About the Author Terence Parsons is Professor of Philosophy at the University of California, Irvine.