An interview with Derek Parfit

Abstract

Metaphysical facts regarding time, free will, and personal identity directly constrain practical reason and moral attitudes. The common assumption that desires and values are independent of reality is rejected in favor of the view that reasons for acting are grounded in objective facts. Regarding time, the “bias toward the future” and the “bias toward the near” are arguably irrational; if time’s passage is an illusion, experiences in the past and future warrant equal concern. In the domain of free will, the truth of determinism would invalidate the concept of desert and the reactive attitude of resentment, shifting focus toward second-order evaluations of first-order impulses. Personal identity is best understood through a reductionist framework: it is not a “further fact” beyond physical and psychological continuity. In scenarios involving the division of consciousness, questions of identity become purely conceptual rather than ontological. Consequently, what matters for survival is not the preservation of identity but the persistence of psychological connections. Adopting an impersonal conceptual scheme—comparable to certain Buddhist traditions—can effectively reframe the significance of death and the nature of self-concern, demonstrating that the existence of persisting subjects is not a necessary feature of an adequate description of reality. – AI-generated abstract.