Abstract

This dissertation offers and defends a phenomenological account of personal identity. It does so critically in conversation with Anglo-analytical traditions and varieties of other philosophical traditions from around the world, especially Zen Buddhism. Chapter One brings together three areas of philosophy: the multiple realizability thesis from philosophy of science, the logical pluralist position from philosophical logic, and the various conceptions of personhood from metaphysics. I argue that even though the divide in the literature on the metaphysics of personal identity is unresolved, there is a core notion, “person,” that is understood to be the target of explanation in each of the traditions. The multiple-realizability of personhood entails the multiple realizability of identity. Because "person" is an unsettled term, "personal identity" is also unsettled. Chapter Two examines those metaphysics traditions in more detail. After outlining the claims of body continuity theorists, psychological continuity theorists, and narrative continuity theorists, I raise objections to each of the theories. In Chapter Three, I propose that all three categories of metaphysics approaches to identity face a unified objection: they presume a level of objectivity that belies the negotiation of our identities. This chapter examines the limits of methodological naturalism and examines the work of two Indigenous scholars from North and South America who present theories of identity that embrace contradictory beliefs and goals. Chapter Four proposes that phenomenology offers a new and more promising approach to studying personal identity. In this chapter, I point out that there is a disciplinary divide over whether identity is a thing (something of substance) or a way of understanding. By shifting the approach to identity from metaphysics to epistemology, I demonstrate that phenomenology avoids the objections that the metaphysics theories face. In this chapter, I also raise objections that arise in Buddhist traditions. The chapter concludes with close readings of Keiji Nishitani's critique of Western philosophy from Religion and Nothingness and Jean-Paul Sartre's defense of phenomenology, which appears in Being and Nothingness. Chapter Five defends the phenomenological analysis of identity against Nishitani’s critique. I show that the phenomenological approach to identity entails that identities are distributed within contexts. I adopt a deflationary account of identity grounded in the term existence—all that can be said about one's identity is that it is whatever makes them stand out against a background. No amount of precision that is added to the various accounts will settle whether the metaphysics or epistemic approach to identity is better. Therefore, the deflationary understanding of identity allows us to continue talking about the core notion even if the term remains unsettled. In the end, I offer an account of personal identity that suggests that identity is a distributed phenomenon. If one’s identity is intelligible only in the context of the world, then my circumstances are part of my identity.