Theo Todman's Web Page - Notes Pages
Status Reports
Status: Personal Identity (2022 - June)
(Text as at 03/07/2022 01:29:17)
*** THIS IS NOT THE LATEST VERSION OF THIS NOTE ***
(For the live version and other versions of this Note, see the tables at the end)
Rationale for this Project
- I am researching the subject of Personal Identity primarily because of its intrinsic interest and importance. It is really a sub-topic in my Philosophy of Religion1 project, with its penultimate chapter considering the metaphysical possibility of resurrection.
- While I’m interested in the topic of my research in its own right, I think when I’ve sorted it out a bit, and have something to say, I’ll want to engage with other philosophers active in this field – and re-starting a PhD at Birkbeck or elsewhere might be the only effective way to do this.
- While a PhD is not an end in itself, and certainly not the ultimate aim of my doing philosophy, it’s still true that a PhD would teach me research techniques, provide focus and direction, and furnish a professional qualification should I want to publish any results in this or any other area of philosophy.
- The best place to get an overview of my current views is here2.
- The jumping-off point for my thesis is here3, though follow the links from the Chapter Abstracts for the real work, and a progress dashboard is here4.
Summary of Progress during April - June 2022
- I spent 295.75 hours in 22Q2 on this Project, or related work (776.25 hours YTD, where for "YTD" - Year to Date - I mean the (academic) year that commenced in October 2021). That's 128.4% of the planned effort (90.7% YTD). Overall, 43.3% of my Project effort in the Quarter was directed towards this project (making 37.4% YTD) - as against 30% planned (35.7% YTD).
- I was 30% over my time budget – which is good, but largely a result of the reduced budget this quarter.
- A triumph for the quarter was completing incorporating the ‘text snippets’ from my Notes into the Main text for each Thesis Chapter.
- I’ve made a start on pruning the reading lists for each Note and have set up the process for ‘missed the cut’ works on the lists. My main task for the coming Quarter will be to make further progress on this.
- To control the various links, I’ve created and maintained a PID Note Usage5 Page.
- I started making a detailed analysis of "Baker (Lynne Rudder) - Persons and Bodies: A Constitution View".
- I’ve got yet further behind on reading Aeon, despite spending a fair amount of time reading and on write-ups. It’s never possible to do it justice when a dozen or so interesting papers turn up every week. I did, however, tidy up the prioritisation and restricted top priority to 10 items.
- As a major background task, I completed "Jansen (Marius B.) - The Making of Modern Japan".
- Progress between reports can be obtained from the relevant section of my Summary Task List6.
- A full list of items worked on in the quarter appears below:-
Thesis (Total Hours = 233.5)
- Thesis - Reading / Writing (Total Hours = 222.25)
- "Aeon - Video - A is for autism" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Aeon - Video - Abductees" (Read / Write, 1 hour)
- "Aeon - Video - Composite" (Read / Write, 1.25 hours)
- "Aeon - Video - Peter and Ben" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Aeon - Video - Stray in Kars" (Read / Write, 1.25 hours)
- "Aeon - Video - The AI historian" (Read / Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Aeon - Video - The great malaise" (Read / Write, 1 hour)
- "Aeon - Video - The great silence" (Read / Write, 2 hours)
- "Aeon - Video - The incredible life of Maria Sibylla Merian" (Read / Write, 1.25 hours)
- "Aeon - Video - What does dying really feel like?" (Read / Write, 1.75 hours)
- "Aeon - Video - You've never been completely honest" (Read / Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Baggini (Julian) - How to think about free will" (Read / Write, 1.75 hours)
- "Baker (Lynne Rudder) - In Favour Of the Constitution View" (Write, 1 hour)
- "Baker (Lynne Rudder) - Personal Identity Over Time" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Baker (Lynne Rudder) - Persons in the Material World" (Write, 23.5 hours)
- "Baker (Lynne Rudder) - The Coherence Of the Constitution View of Human Persons" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Baker (Lynne Rudder) - The Coherence Of the Idea of Material Constitution" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Baker (Lynne Rudder) - The Constitution View of Human Persons" (Write, 1.75 hours)
- "Baker (Lynne Rudder) - The First-Person Perspective" (Write, 2.5 hours)
- "Baker (Lynne Rudder) - The Importance Of Being a Person" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Baker (Lynne Rudder) - The Very Idea of Constitution" (Write, 5.75 hours)
- "Calarco (Matthew) - Thinking Through Animals: Identity, Difference, Indistinction" (Read / Write, 6 hours)
- "Carroll (Sean M.) - The Big Picture: On the Origins of Life, Meaning, and the Universe Itself" (Read, 0.25 hours)
- "Clark (Andy) - Language of Thought" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Cohen (S. Mark) & Reeve (C.D.C.) - Aristotle’s Metaphysics" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "DeGrazia (David) - A Short Primer on Animal Ethics" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Dennett (Daniel) - Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking" (Read, 3.5 hours)
- "Derbew (Sarah) - Blackness in antiquity" (Write, 3 hours)
- "Goff (Philip) - Galileo's Error: Foundations for a New Science of Consciousness" (Read, 0.5 hours)
- "Harden (Kathryn Paige) - The Genetic Lottery: Why DNA Matters for Social Equality" (Read / Write, 4.25 hours)
- "Marino (Lori) - Eating someone" (Read / Write, 1.25 hours)
- Michael Moseley Podcast on Napping (Read, 0.25 hours)
→ See "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Sleep" (0.25 hours)
- "Monso (Susana) - How to Tell If Animals Can Understand Death" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Monso (Susana) - What animals think of death" (Read / Write, 2 hours)
- "Monso (Susana) & Osuna-Mascaro (Antonio J.) - Death is common, so is understanding it: the concept of death in other species" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Moynihan (Thomas) - Thanks for all the fish" (Read / Write, 1.75 hours)
- "Nail (Thomas) - Video - What is movement" (Read / Write, 1.75 hours)
- "Pereboom (Derek) & Kornblith (Hilary) - The Metaphysics of Irreducibility" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Pierce (Jessica) - The posthuman dog" (Read / Write, 2 hours)
- "Rescorla (Michael) - The Language of Thought Hypothesis" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Sebo (Jeff) - All we owe to animals" (Read / Write, 3 hours)
- "Shushan (Gregory) - Near-death experiences have long inspired afterlife beliefs" (Read / Write, 1 hour)
- "Stump (Eleonore) - Non-Cartesian Substance Dualism and Materialism Without Reduction" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Telengut (Alisi) - Video - Tengri" (Read / Write, 1 hour)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Abortion" (Write, 1.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Androids" (Write, 1 hour)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Animal Rights" (Write, 1.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Animalism" (Write, 2.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Animalism - Arguments For" (Write, 3 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Animalism - Objections" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Animalists" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Animals" (Write, 4.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Animation" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Artifacts" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Baker" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Biological Criterion" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Biological View" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Body" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Body Criterion" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Brain Criterion" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Brain State Transfer" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Brain Transplants" (Write, 1 hour)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Brains in Vats" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Buddhism" (Write, 1 hour)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Bundle Theories" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Cartesian Ego" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Causality" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Cerebrum" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Change" (Write, 2.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Chapter 01 (Introduction)" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Chapter 02 (What Are We?)" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Chapter 03 (What is a Person?)" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Chapter 04 (Basic Metaphysical Issues)" (Write, 1.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Chapter 05 (Persistence and Time)" (Write, 1 hour)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Chapter 06 (Animalism and Arguments for It)" (Write, 1.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Chapter 07 (The Constitution View and Arguments for It)" (Write, 1.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Chapter 08 (Arguments against Animalism)" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Chapter 09 (Arguments against the Constitution View)" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Chapter 10 (Thought Experiments)" (Write, 1.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Chapter 11 (Resurrection)" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Chimera" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Christian Materialism" (Write, 1.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Clinical Observations" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Clones" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Closest Continuer" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Coincidence" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Commissurotomy" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Computers" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Concepts" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Connectedness vs Continuity" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Consciousness" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Constitution" (Write, 1.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Constitution View" (Write, 1 hour)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Constitution View - Objections" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Contingent Identity" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Continuity" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Convention" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Corpses" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Counting Persons" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Criteria of Identity" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Cyborgs" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Death" (Write, 1.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Degrees of Personhood" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Dicephalus" (Write, 1.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Dion and Theon" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Disembodied Existence" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Duplication" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Embryo" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Endurantism" (Write, 1.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Essentialism" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Evolution" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Exdurantism" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Existence" (Write, 1.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Explanation" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Fetuses" (Write, 1 hour)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Fiction" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - First-Person Perspective" (Write, 1 hour)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Fission" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Free Will" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Functionalism" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Fusion" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Future Great Pain Test" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Genetics" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Holes & Smiles" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Homo Sapiens" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Human Animals" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Human Persons" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Hume" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Hybrid Theories" (Write, 1.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Hylomorphism" (Write, 1 hour)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Immortality" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Indeterminate Identity" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Individual" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Information" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Intelligence" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Intermittent Objects" (Write, 1 hour)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Interregnum" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Intuition" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Ivan Ilych" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Kinds" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Language of Thought" (Write, 2 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Leibniz" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Life" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Life After Death" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Logic of Identity" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Makropulos Case" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Matter" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Mereology" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Metamorphosis" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Metaphysics" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Mind" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Modality" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Multiple Personality Disorder" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Multiple Personality Disorder - Discussion with Sylvia (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Narrative Identity" (Write, 1.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Natural Kinds" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Naturalism" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Near Death Experiences" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Nihilism" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Non-Human Persons" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Numerical Idenity" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Occasional Identity" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Olson" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Only 'X' and 'Y' Principle" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Ontology" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Origins" (Write, 1.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Out of Body Experiences" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Partial Identity" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Perdurantism" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Persistence" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Persistence Criteria" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Persistent Vegetative State" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Person" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Personality" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Personite" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Phase Sortals" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Physical Continuity" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Physicalism" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Plants" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Pregnancy" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Probability" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Problem of the Many" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Process Metaphysics" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Properties" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Psychological Continuity - Forward" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Psychology" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Psychopathology" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Quantum Mechanics" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Quasi-Memory" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Race" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Reductionism" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Reduplication Objections" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - References" (Write, 2.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Reincarnation" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Relative Identity" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Religion" (Write, 1 hour)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Replication" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Resurrection" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Scattered Objects" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Self-Consciousness" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Semantics" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Ship of Theseus" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Siliconisation" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Similarity" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Simple View" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Society" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Sorites" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Sortals" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Statue and the Clay" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Substance" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Supervenience" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Survival" (Write, 1 hour)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Taking Persons Seriously" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Teletransportation" (Write, 1 hour)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Temporary Intrinsics" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Thinking Animal Argument" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Thisness (Haecceity)" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Thought Experiments" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Tibbles the Cat" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Time" (Write, 1.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Time Travel" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Transhumanism" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Transplants" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Twinning" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Unity of the Person" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Universals" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Uploading" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Vague Identity" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Vagueness" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Wantons" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - What Matters" (Write, 0.75 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Wiggins" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Wittgenstein" (Write, 0.25 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Zombies" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Todman (Theo) - Thesis - Zygote" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Wheatley (Thalia) - Video - Thalia Wheatley: social neuroscience" (Read, 0.25 hours)
- "Wong (David) - Relativism" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Zangwill (Nick) - Our Moral Duty to Eat Meat" (Write, 0.5 hours)
- "Zangwill (Nick) - Why you should eat meat" (Read / Write, 3.5 hours)
- Thesis - Discussions
- Thesis - Research Repositioning (Total Hours = 10.75)
Thesis Background (Total Hours = 34.75)
- Thesis Background - Reading / Writing (Total Hours = 32)
- Thesis Background - Books Admin
- Thesis Background - Status
Thesis (Aeon) (Total Hours = 27.5)
- Aeon: Chayes - The Midas Disease (Comments; Read, 0.5 hours)
- Aeon: Francione - We must not own animals (Comments; Read, 0.5 hours)
- Aeon: Keil - How to revive your sense of wonder (Comments; Read / Write, 1.25 hours)
- Aeon: Video - Mobilize (Comments; Read / Write, 0.75 hours)
- Aeon: Video - Nuttag - Homeland (Comments; Read / Write, 0.75 hours)
- Aeon: Video - Phenomena: magnetism (Comments; Read, 0.25 hours)
- Aeon: Video - Sister (Comments; Read / Write, 0.5 hours)
- Aeon: Video - The beauty of gefilte fish (Comments; Read / Write, 0.75 hours)
- Aeon: Video - The first Tuesday in November (Comments; Write, 0.25 hours)
- Aeon: Video - The Japanese sword as the soul of the samurai (Comments; Write, 0.25 hours)
- Aeon: Video - The spiritual exercises (Comments; Read / Write, 0.5 hours)
- Aeon: Video - Who decides what art means? (Comments; Read, 0.75 hours)
- Aeon: Willingham - Help! Brain overload (Comments; Read, 0.5 hours)
- "Hains (Brigid) & Hains (Paul) - Aeon: 2019+" (Comments; Write, 20 hours)
Plans for the Near Future – Top Priority Tasks
- One thing that repeatedly occurs to me is that I’ve got into the habit of collecting stuff – masses of it – and loosely engaging with it, but not doing so seriously enough because of a scatter-gun approach. Also, I very seldom write anything of my own without close reference to what others have written. In a sense this is a good thing, but is destructive of creativity.
- So, I intend to spend at least an hour each and every day writing my own stuff. This isn’t really enough, but we’ll see how things go. Sadly, it hasn’t gone anywhere much in the last academic year.
- So, I have set myself a challenge: write a full-length paper on what I consider to be the critical issue in the philosophy of personal identity: the difference between forward and backward psychological continuity7. Sadly, this hasn’t got far yet.
- I now seem to have a skeleton thesis8 in place. This now needs to be filled out.
- First of all, continually review the Note describing my Current Beliefs9 on the topic of Personal Identity, and ensure the associated Notes have some text. Let Sophie have a look at it, and consider submission to Aeon.
- An “ideal” next step (and one previously suggested) is to ensure that everything of relevance that I have actually read is written up and incorporated in my Notes database and only later – and secondly – consider anything that I have not yet read. This would require discipline, in that interesting new stuff is always turning up, and would be an iterative process. Further, given I’m not getting any younger, it could also be wasting time which should be focussed on using the most relevant materials.
- So, if what I’ve read and written on – in the form of particular papers on a particular topic – is most relevant, I’ll “process” that, but otherwise will start anew.
- As far as effort is concerned, I’ve re-instated the plan to 24 hours / week10.
- Most of what I’m working on appears in the reading lists for the Thesis chapters. Items below are either those that don’t, or a few which require particular focus:-
- Continue with my Thesis11; in particular
- Spend at least an hour a day writing something original.
- Fill out those sections that I can write something on without further research, using books / papers already analysed.
- Continually review the Note describing my Current Beliefs12 on the topic of Personal Identity.
- Regularly review and update of the Notes I’ve created on Personal Identity, focusing on those directly referenced by my Current Beliefs13.
- Make progress on specific Chapters of my Thesis, using the tasks outlined in my Thesis Dashboard14, using the materials listed15 in the Chapters and underlying Notes.
- Ensure the following foundational Books16 required for my Thesis are fully annotated. In particular:-
- "Baker (Lynne Rudder) - Persons and Bodies: A Constitution View",
- "Olson (Eric) - The Human Animal - Personal Identity Without Psychology", and
- "Olson (Eric) - What are We? A Study of Personal Ontology".
- Read and comment on17 the following PhD Theses relevant to my own Thesis:-
- "Atkinson (Thomas) - Human organisms and the survival of death: a systematic evaluation of the possibility of life after death given animalism",
- "Baggini (Julian) - Psychological Reductionism About Persons: A Critical Development",
- "Eddebo (Johan) - Death and the Self: A Metaphysical Investigation of the Rationality of Afterlife Beliefs in the Contemporary Intellectual Climate",
- "Ferner (Adam) - Metaphysics and biology: a critique of David Wiggins’ account of personal identity",
- "Gendler (Tamar Szabo) - Imaginary Exceptions: On the Powers and Limits of Thought Experiment",
- "Hodson (Sommer) - A Hybrid View of Personal Identity",
- "Keles (Serap) - Personal identity and persistence over time : the hybrid view with regard to hylomorphism",
- "Lechthaler (Manuel) - Composition and Identities",
- "Lybaert (Fauve) - Personal Identity and the Formal Self",
- "Paez (Eze) - Abortion: What We Ought to Believe - An Ontological and Normative Analysis",
- "Parsons (Josh) - Theories of Persistence",
- "Rau (Philipp) - The Author, Not the Tale: Memory, Narrative, and the Self",
- "Skow (Bradford) - Once Upon a Spacetime",
- "Southgate (Susan Jane) - Personal Identity: The Simple View",
- "Trakas (Marina) - Personal Memories", and
- "Woods (Evan Thomas) - The Problems of the Many".
- "Kotak (Aakash) - The Hybrid Theory of Personal Identity" (MPhil Thesis; Read and comment on)
- Follow up on Keith Augustine's comments on my review of "Hershenov (David) - Review of Nancey Murphy's 'Bodies and Souls, or Spirited Bodies?'".
- As background tasks:-
- Ensure all items in:-
→ "Various - Papers on Desktop", and
→ "Various - Papers in Desk Drawer"
are either addressed or re-filed.
- Maintain "Various - Papers & Books Yet To Be Logged", and log papers therein if they become important.
- Convert old PDFs to Notes:-
- Review the two reports:-
→ PDF-précis,
→ PDF-essays18.
- Determine how the first is produced, and why the pdfs aren't highlighted, and compare with Write-ups Notes Jump Table
- Convert outstanding Essays & Précises.
- Complete cataloguing the books downloaded from Springer,
- Continue / complete reading various books that have landed in my in-tray:-
- "Ball (Philip) - How to Grow a Human: Reprogramming Cells and Redesigning Life",
- "Barash (David P.) - Through a Glass Brightly: Using Science to See Our Species as We Really Are",
- "Carroll (Sean M.) - The Big Picture: On the Origins of Life, Meaning, and the Universe Itself",
- "Chomsky (Noam) - What Kind of Creatures Are We?",
- "Calarco (Matthew) - Thinking Through Animals: Identity, Difference, Indistinction",
- "Dennett (Daniel) - Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking",
- "Foroohar (Rana) - Don't Be Evil: How Big Tech Betrayed Its Founding Principles - And All of Us",
- "Goff (Philip) - Galileo's Error: Foundations for a New Science of Consciousness",
- "Korsgaard (Christine) - Fellow Creatures: Our Obligations to the Other Animals",
- "Levitin (Daniel) - The Changing Mind: A Neuroscientist's Guide to Ageing Well",
- "Marshall (Richard) - Philosophy at 3:AM: Questions and Answers with 25 Top Philosophers",
- "Ord (Toby) - The Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity",
- "Seung (Sebastian) - Connectome: How the Brain's Wiring Makes Us Who We Are",
- "Wooldridge (Adrian) - The Aristocracy of Talent: How Meritocracy Made the Modern World"
- "Wright (Craig) - The Hidden Habits of Genius: Beyond Talent, IQ, and Grit - Unlocking the Secrets of Greatness",
- Complete reading (or make notes on):-
- "Borges (Jorge Luis) - Labyrinths: Selected Stories and Other Writings",
- "Bregman (Rutger) - Why Garbagemen Should Earn More Than Bankers",
- "Dennett (Daniel) - The Mind's I - Fantasies and Reflections on Self and Soul: Introduction",
- "Erber (Joan T.) & Szuchman (Lenore T.) - Great Myths of Aging",
- Complete my Note on "Smith (Martin) - Why Throwing 92 Heads in a Row Is Not Surprising" and discuss with Pete & Mike.
- Economics:-
- "Bregman (Rutger) - Utopia for Realists: And How We Can Get There"
- "Bregman (Rutger) - Why Garbagemen Should Earn More Than Bankers"
- "Reiss (Julian) - Philosophy of Economics: A Contemporary Introduction"
- "Susskind (Daniel) - A World Without Work: Technology, Automation and How We Should Respond"
- Continue reading and reviewing papers issued by Aeon19,
- Keep up with the Journals via JSTOR & Cambridge Core.
- Update my Journals Note20: Review the journals I have access to; more are available as a Cambridge Alumnus.
- Keep up with the philosophical world by regular reviews of "Interaction - Philos-List", but only seriously pursue items relevant to my research.
Summary of Progress to Date
This was hived off to a separate Note21 back in 2010, and hasn’t changed much since. It needs rewriting.
In-Page Footnotes
Footnote 10:
- This is still ludicrously inadequate for what I want to achieve, but is approximately what would be expected of a part-time research student.
Footnote 15:
- I used to itemise in this Note an ever-growing list of items accummulated over time, broken down by Chapter and Note.
- However, now both Chapters and Notes are getting into shape, there is no need to list these items again here, so they have been cut after checking they are covered in their place elsewhere.
Footnote 16:
- This list could get very long, so restrict it to 3 books!
- I'll replace these with new ones when completed.
Footnote 17:
- There are rather a lot of these, so some will have to be skimmed.
- There were a few more on less central topics.
Live Version of this Archived Note
Table of 12 Earlier Versions of this Note (of 84)
Table of 12 Later Versions of this Note (of 15)
| This version updated |
Reference for this Topic |
Parent Topic |
| 03/07/2022 01:29:17 |
518 (Status: Personal Identity (2022 - June)) |
Status: Summary (2026 - March) |
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