Expectancy and rational action prior to personal fission

Philosophical Studies 153 (2):299-306 (2011)
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Abstract

According to Sider’s stage theory a subject about to undergo personal fission should expect to experience each outcome simultaneously as distinct persons. How is the subject to make sense of this ? I argue that their most paradigmatically self-interested future-directed behaviour, betting for personal gain, ought to be exactly the same as in equivalent games of chance where the possible outcomes correspond to the fission output branches. So this novel form of expectancy, albeit strange, can be a reliable guide to action.

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Paul P Tappenden
King's College London (PhD)

Citations of this work

Divided we fall.Jacob Ross - 2014 - Philosophical Perspectives 28 (1):222-262.
A Metaphysics for Semantic Internalism.Paul Tappenden - 2011 - Metaphysica 12 (2):125-136.

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References found in this work

How to define theoretical terms.David Lewis - 1970 - Journal of Philosophy 67 (13):427-446.
All the World’s a Stage.Theodore Sider - 1996 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 74 (3):433 – 453.
Can the Self Divide?John Perry - 1972 - Journal of Philosophy 69 (16):463.
Fission and personal identity over time.Trenton Merricks - 1997 - Philosophical Studies 88 (2):163-186.

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