Time and Identity (Topics in Contemporary Philosophy)

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

Joseph Keim Campbell is Professor in the Department of Philosophy at Washington State University.

Michael O'Rourke is Professor in the Department of Philosophy at Michigan State University.

Harry S. Silverstein is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Philosophy at Washington State University, and coeditor of three previous volumes in the Topics in Contemporary Philosophy series, Causation and Explanation (2007), Knowledge and Skepticism (2010), and Time and Identity (2010), all published by the MIT Press.

Matthew H. Slater is Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy at Bucknell University.

Robert J. Stainton is Professor of Philosophy and Associate Dean (Research), Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Western Ontario.

John Perry is the H. W. Stuart Professor of Philosophy at Stanford University.

Harry S. Silverstein is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Philosophy at Washington State University, and coeditor of three previous volumes in the Topics in Contemporary Philosophy series, Causation and Explanation (2007), Knowledge and Skepticism (2010), and Time and Identity (2010), all published by the MIT Press.

Andrew Light is Director of the Center for Global Ethics at George Mason University and Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress.