Personal Identity, the Temporality of Agency and Moral Responsibility

Abstract

In this article, I argue against Derek Parfit's thesis that the Reductionist View of personal identity renders the Extreme Claim more defensible. The Extreme Claim supposedly rejects the idea of personal moral responsibility for one's past acts. I argue that in using the Reductionist View to defend the Extreme Claim, we need to construct out of some psychological connections a temporally extended agent who lasts long enough to commit an act, but not long enough to be responsible for the act after it has been completed. The arbitrariness of this kind of construct is explained.