On hylemorphism and personal identity

Abstract

There is no such thing as 'the' hylemorphic account of personal identity. There are several views that count as hylemorphic, and these views can be grouped into two main families - the corruptionist view, and the survivalist view. The differentiating factor is that the corruptionist view holds that the persistence of the soul is not sufficient for the persistence of the person, while the survivalist view holds that the persistence of the soul is sufficient for the persistence of the person. In this paper, I argue that hylemorphists should prefer the corruptionist view. This project ought to be of interest to anyone working on issues of personal identity, not only because hylemorphic views are historically important, but also because they are currently receiving significant attention in the personal identity literature. © 2009 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.