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Time and Identity

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Original essays on the metaphysics of time, identity, and the self, written by distinguished scholars and important rising philosophers. The concepts of time and identity seem at once unproblematic and frustratingly difficult. Time is an intricate part of our experience--it would seem that the passage of time is a prerequisite for having any experience at all--and yet recalcitrant questions about time remain. Is time real? Does time flow? Do past and future moments exist? Philosophers face similarly stubborn questions about identity, particularly about the persistence of identical entities through change. Indeed, questions about the metaphysics of persistence take on many of the complexities inherent in philosophical considerations of time. This volume of original essays brings together these two essentially related concepts in a way not reflected in the available literature, making it required reading for philosophers working in metaphysics and students interested in these topics.

The contributors, distinguished authors and rising scholars, first consider the nature of time and then turn to the relation of identity, focusing on the metaphysical connections between the two, with a special emphasis on personal identity. The volume concludes with essays on the metaphysics of death, issues in which time and identity play a significant role. This groundbreaking collection offers both cutting-edge epistemological analysis and historical perspectives on contemporary topics.

Contributors
Harriet Baber, Lynne Rudder Baker, Ben Bradley, John W. Carroll, Reinaldo Elugardo, Geoffrey Gorham, Mark Hinchliff, Jenann Ismael, Barbara Levenbook, Andrew Light, Lawrence B. Lombard, Ned Markosian, Harold Noonan, John Perry, Harry S. Silverstein, Matthew H. Slater, Robert J. Stainton, Neil A. Tognazzini

338 pages, Paperback

First published July 30, 2010

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80 reviews
November 24, 2019
Very bright people that stumble over the finery of language. The book begins with the assumption that the present time is not real, then wrestles to overcome this statement, wrangling through page after page about verb tense, and even throwing some obscure variables at us.

Honestly, I did not grasp all the material, but I'm hopeful that philosophers like those who contributed to this book can overcome the problems addressed and advance what we call "truth".
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