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Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities
Persimals, Steven Luper
Persimals, Steven Luper
Steven Luper
What sort of thing, fundamentally, are you and I? For convenience, I use the term persimal to refer to the kind of thing we are, whatever that kind turns out to be. Accordingly, the question is, what are persimals? One possible answer is that persimalhood consists in being a human animal, but many theorists, including Derek Parfit and Jeff McMahan, not to mention John Locke, reject this idea in favor of a radically different view, according to which persimalhood consists in having certain sorts of mental or psychological features. In this essay, I try to show that the animalist approach …
Past Desires And The Dead, Steven Luper
Past Desires And The Dead, Steven Luper
Steven Luper
I examine an argument that appears to take us from Parfit’s [Reasons and Persons, Oxford: Clarendon Press (1984)] thesis that we have no reason to fulfil desires we no longer care about to the conclusion that the effect of posthumous events on our desires is a matter of indifference (the post-mortem thesis). I suspect that many of Parfit’s readers, including Vorobej [Philosophical Studies 90 (1998) 305], think that he is committed to (something like) this reasoning, and that Parfit must therefore give up the post-mortem thesis. However, as it turns out, the argument is subtly equivocal and does not commit …
The Absurdity Of Life, Steven Luper
Retroactive Harms And Wrongs, Steven Luper
Retroactive Harms And Wrongs, Steven Luper
Steven Luper
According to t he immunity thesis, nothing that happens after we a re dead harms or benefits us . It seems defensible on the following basis : 1. If harmed (benefitted) by something , we incur the harm (benefit) at some time. 2. So if harmed (benefitted) by a postmortem event, we incur the harm (benefit) while alive or at some other time . 3. But if we incur the harm (benefit) while alive , backwards causation occurs. 4. And if we incur the harm (benefit) at any other time, we incur it at a time when we do not …
The Anatomy Of Aggression, Steven Luper
Competing For The Good Life, Steven Luper
Annihilation, Steven Luper
Death, Steven Luper
Adaptation, Steven Luper
Exhausting Life, Steven Luper
Exhausting Life, Steven Luper
Steven Luper
Can we render death harmless to us by perfecting life, as the ancient Epicureans and Stoics seemed to think? It might seem so, for after we perfect life—assuming we can—persisting would not make life any better. Dying earlier rather than later would shorten life, but a longer perfect life is no better than a shorter perfect life, so dying would take nothing of value from us. However, after sketching what perfecting life might entail, I will argue that it is not a desirable approach to invulnerability after all.
Mortal Harm, Steven Luper
Mortal Harm, Steven Luper
Steven Luper
The harm thesis says that death may harm the individual who dies. The posthumous harm thesis says that posthumous events may harm those who die. Epicurus rejects both theses, claiming that there is no subject who is harmed, no clear harm which is received, and no clear time when any harm is received. Feldman rescues the harm thesis with solutions to Epicurus' three puzzles based on his own version of the deprivation account of harm. But many critics, among them Lamont, Grey, Feit and Bradley, have rejected Feldman's solution to the timing puzzle, offering their own solutions in its place. …
Posthumous Harm, Steven Luper
"Life's Meaning", Steven Luper
"Life's Meaning", Steven Luper
Steven Luper
Your life has meaning just if, and to the extent that, you achieve the aims that you devote it to freely and competently. You adopt your goals and achieve them more or less through your own efforts, so meaning is something you bestow upon your own life. These achievements are the meaning of your life. In this essay I develop this view, discuss how life’s meaning is related to its purpose and to an individual’s welfare and identity, and examine reasoning that suggests that life is absurd and show how it can be resisted.