Abstract

Derek Parfit's Reductionist view of persons is a combination of reductionism about personal identity and the impersonal description thesis. This chapter argues against the impersonal description thesis, the thesis that it is possible to give a complete description of reality without claiming that persons exist. It considers whether reductionism can accommodate the epistemological primacy of memory and the fact that it is not possible to give a full specification of the content of an I‐thought without ascribing it to a particular person.