Alexander Pruss's Blog

Suppose an amoeba biologically symmetrically splits into two cells, A and B . Here are the main options for what happens metaphysically: ...

That there is an entity that is 25 inches long in 1973 and 72 inches long in 1993 is not even partly grounded in facts about anybody’s memo...

Suppose that you are an immortal who lived for an infinite amount of time, and each year, your body replaces all its cells with new cells co...

One way of posing the question of diachronic identity is to ask for an explanation of facts like The x s compose the very same object at ...

Some philosophers think identity over time is brute: diachronic identity facts are not further explained. Markosian proposed (though later r...

The doctrines of the Trinity, the Incarnation and transubstantiation initially seem contradictory. Elaborate theological/philosophical accou...

I find very persuasive arguments like this: If theory T is true, then whether I exist now depends on some future events. Facts about wha...

Suppose Canada is dissolved, and a country is created, with the same people, in the same place, with the same name, symbols, and political s...

Take a classic case of relative-identity. At time 1, we have a lump of clay, Lumpy1, that is formed into a statue of a horse, a statue I wil...

Advocates of relative identity say that identity is always relative to a kind. This seems to have an interesting and underappreciated conseq...

I've been thinking through my intuitions about vagueness and mental states, especially conscious ones. It certainly seems natural to say...

Let's suppose that personal identity over time is secured by continuation of psychological states. Now imagine Jim and Sally are robots ...

Animalists hold that we are animals. It is widely accepted by animalists that if a brain were removed from a body, and the body kept ali...

Here is an interesting line of thought. Consider these two questions: What is it for x and y to be identical? What necessary and...