Derek Antony Parfit, FBA (; 11 December 1942
– 1 January 2017) was a British philosopher
who specialised in personal identity, rationality,
and ethics.
He is widely considered one of the most important
and influential moral philosophers of the
late 20th and early 21st centuries.Parfit
rose to prominence in 1971 with the publication
of his first paper, "Personal Identity".
His first book, Reasons and Persons (1984),
has been described as the most significant
work of moral philosophy since the 1800s.
His second book, On What Matters (2011), was
widely circulated and discussed for many years
before its publication.
For his entire academic career, Parfit worked
at Oxford University, where he was an Emeritus
Senior Research Fellow at All Souls College
at the time of his death.
He was also a visiting professor of philosophy
at Harvard University, New York University,
and Rutgers University.
He was awarded 2014 Rolf Schock Prize "for
his groundbreaking contributions concerning
personal identity, regard for future generations,
and analysis of the structure of moral theories."
== Life ==
Parfit was born in 1942 in Chengdu, China,
the son of Jessie (née Browne) and Norman
Parfit, medical doctors who had moved to Western
China to teach preventive medicine in missionary
hospitals.
The family returned to the United Kingdom
about a year after Parfit was born, settling
in Oxford.
Parfit was educated at Eton College.
From an early age, he endeavoured to become
a poet, but he gave up poetry towards the
end of his adolescence.
He later studied Modern History at the University
of Oxford, graduating in 1964.
In 1965–66 he was a Harkness Fellow at Columbia
University and Harvard University.
He abandoned historical studies for philosophy
during the fellowship, returning to Oxford
to become a fellow of All Souls College.
Parfit supported effective altruism.
He was a member of Giving What We Can and
pledged to donate at least ten percent of
his income to effective charities.Parfit was
an avid photographer who regularly traveled
to Venice and St. Petersburg to photograph
architecture.Parfit met Janet Radcliffe Richards
in 1982.
They married in 2010.
== Ethics and rationality ==
=== Reasons and Persons ===
In Reasons and Persons, Parfit suggested that
nonreligious ethics is a young and fertile
field of inquiry.
He asked questions about which actions are
right or wrong and shied away from meta-ethics,
which focuses more on logic and language.
In Part I of Reasons and Persons Parfit discussed
self-defeating moral theories, namely the
self-interest theory of rationality and two
ethical frameworks: common-sense morality
and consequentialism.
He posited that self-interest has been dominant
in Western culture for over two millennia,
often making bedfellows with religious doctrine,
which united self-interest and morality.
Because self-interest demands that we always
make self-interest our supreme rational concern
and instructs us to ensure that our whole
life goes as well as possible, self-interest
makes temporally neutral requirements.
Thus it would be irrational to act in ways
that we know we would prefer later to undo.
As an example, it would be irrational for
a 14-year-old to listen to loud music or get
arrested for vandalism if they knew such actions
would detract significantly from their future
well-being and goals (such as having good
hearing or an academic career in philosophy).
Most notably, the self-interest theory holds
that it is irrational to commit any acts of
self-denial or to act on desires that negatively
affect our well-being.
One may consider an aspiring author whose
strongest desire is to write an award-winning
novel but who, in doing so, suffers from lack
of sleep and depression.
Parfit argues that it is plausible that we
have such desires which conflict with our
own well-being, and that it is not necessarily
irrational to act to fulfill these desires.
Aside from the initial appeal to plausibility
of desires that do not directly contribute
to one's life going well, Parfit contrived
situations where self-interest is indirectly
self-defeating—that is, it makes demands
that it initially posits as irrational.
It does not fail on its own terms, but it
does recommend adoption of an alternative
framework of rationality.
For instance, it might be in my self-interest
to become trustworthy to participate in mutually
beneficial agreements, even though in maintaining
the agreement I will be doing what will, other
things being equal, be worse for me.
In many cases self-interest instructs us precisely
not to follow self-interest (Reasons and Persons,
section 63, chapter 8), thus fitting the definition
of an indirectly self-defeating theory.
Parfit contended that to be indirectly individually
self-defeating and directly collectively self-defeating
is not fatally damaging for.
To further bury self-interest, Parfit exploited
its partial relativity, juxtaposing temporally
neutral demands against agent-centered demands.
The appeal to full relativity raises the question
whether a theory can be consistently neutral
in one sphere of actualisation but entirely
partial in another.
Stripped of its commonly accepted shrouds
of plausibility that can be shown to be inconsistent,
self-interest can be judged on its own merits.
While Parfit did not offer an argument to
dismiss S outright, his exposition lays self-interest
bare and allows its own failings to show through.
It is defensible, but the defender must bite
so many bullets that they might lose their
credibility in the process.
Thus a new theory of rationality is necessary.
Parfit offered the "critical present aim theory",
a broad catch-all that can be formulated to
accommodate any competing theory.
He constructed critical present aim to exclude
self-interest as our overriding rational concern
and to allow the time of action to become
critically important.
But he left open whether it should include
"to avoid acting wrongly" as our highest concern.
Such an inclusion would pave the way for ethics.
Henry Sidgwick longed for the fusion of ethics
and rationality, and while Parfit admitted
that many would avoid acting irrationally
more ardently than acting immorally, he could
not construct an argument that adequately
united the two.
Where self-interest puts too much emphasis
on the separateness of persons, consequentialism
fails to recognise the importance of bonds
and emotional responses that come from allowing
some people privileged positions in one's
life.
If we were all pure do-gooders, perhaps following
Sidgwick, that would not constitute the outcome
that would maximise happiness.
It would be better if a small percentage of
the population were pure do-gooders, but others
acted out of love, etc.
Thus consequentialism too makes demands of
agents that it initially deemed immoral; it
fails not on its own terms, for it still demands
the outcome that maximises total happiness,
but does demand that each agent not always
act as an impartial happiness promoter.
Consequentialism thus needs to be revised
as well.
Self-interest and consequentialism fail indirectly,
while common-sense morality is directly collectively
self-defeating.
(So is self-interest, but self-interest is
an individual theory.)
Parfit showed, using interesting examples
and borrowing from Nashian games, that it
would often be better for us all if we did
not put the welfare of our loved ones before
all else.
For example, we should care not only about
our kids, but everyone's kids.
=== On What Matters ===
In his second book, Parfit argues for moral
realism, insisting that moral questions have
true and false answers.
Further, he suggests that the three most prominent
categories of views in moral philosophy — Kantian
deontology, consequentalism, and contractarianism
(or contractualism) — ultimately converge
on the same answers to moral questions.
In the book he argues that the affluent have
strong moral obligations to the poor:"One
thing that greatly matters is the failure
of we rich people to prevent, as we so easily
could, much of the suffering and many of the
early deaths of the poorest people in the
world.
The money that we spend on an evening’s
entertainment might instead save some poor
person from death, blindness, or chronic and
severe pain.
If we believe that, in our treatment of these
poorest people, we are not acting wrongly,
we are like those who believed that they were
justified in having slaves.
Some of us ask how much of our wealth we rich
people ought to give to these poorest people.
But that question wrongly assumes that our
wealth is ours to give.
This wealth is legally ours.
But these poorest people have much stronger
moral claims to some of this wealth.
We ought to transfer to these people (...) at
least ten per cent of what we earn."
== Personal identity ==
Parfit was singular in his meticulously rigorous
and almost mathematical investigations into
personal identity.
In some cases, he used examples seemingly
inspired by Star Trek and other science fiction,
such as the teletransporter, to explore our
intuitions about our identity.
He was a reductionist, believing that since
there is no adequate criterion of personal
identity, people do not exist apart from their
components.
Parfit argued that reality can be fully described
impersonally: there need not be a determinate
answer to the question "Will I continue to
exist?"
We could know all the facts about a person's
continued existence and not be able to say
whether the person has survived.
He concluded that we are mistaken in assuming
that personal identity is what matters in
survival; what matters is rather Relation
R: psychological connectedness (namely, of
memory and character) and continuity (overlapping
chains of strong connectedness).
On Parfit's account, individuals are nothing
more than brains and bodies, but identity
cannot be reduced to either.
(Parfit concedes that his theories rarely
conflict with rival Reductionist theories
in everyday life, and that the two are only
brought to blows by the introduction of extraordinary
examples, but he defends the use of such examples
on the grounds that they arouse strong intuitions
in many of us.)
Identity is not as determinate as we often
suppose it is, but instead such determinacy
arises mainly from the way we talk.
People exist in the same way that nations
or clubs exist.
A key Parfitian question is: given the choice
between surviving without psychological continuity
and connectedness (Relation R) and dying but
preserving R through someone else's future
existence, which would you choose?
Parfit argues the latter is preferable.
Parfit described his loss of belief in a separate
self as liberating:
My life seemed like a glass tunnel, through
which I was moving faster every year, and
at the end of which there was darkness...
[However] When I changed my view, the walls
of my glass tunnel disappeared.
I now live in the open air.
There is still a difference between my life
and the lives of other people.
But the difference is less.
Other people are closer.
I am less concerned about the rest of my own
life, and more concerned about the lives of
others.
=== Criticism of personal identity view ===
Fellow reductionist Mark Johnston of Princeton
rejects Parfit's constitutive notion of identity
with what he calls an "Argument from Above".
Johnston maintains, "Even if the lower-level
facts [that make up identity] do not in themselves
matter, the higher-level fact may matter.
If it does, the lower-level facts will have
derived significance.
They will matter, not in themselves, but because
they constitute the higher level fact."In
this, Johnston moves to preserve the significance
of personhood.
Parfit's explanation is that it is not personhood
itself that matters, but rather the facts
in which personhood consists that provide
it with significance.
To illustrate this difference between himself
and Johnston, Parfit used an illustration
of a brain-damaged patient who becomes irreversibly
unconscious.
The patient is certainly still alive even
though that fact is separate from the fact
that his heart is still beating and other
organs are still functioning.
But the fact that the patient is alive is
not an independent or separately obtaining
fact.
The patient's being alive, even though irreversibly
unconscious, simply consists in the other
facts.
Parfit explains that from this so-called "Argument
from Below" we can arbitrate the value of
the heart and other organs still working without
having to assign them derived significance,
as Johnston's perspective would dictate.
== The future ==
In Part IV of Reasons and Persons, Parfit
discusses possible futures for the world.
He shows that, in the discussion of possible
futures, both average and total utilitarian
standards lead to unwelcome conclusions.
Applying total utilitarian standards (absolute
total happiness) to possible growth paths
of population and welfare leads to what he
calls the repugnant conclusion.
Parfit illustrated this with a simple thought
experiment.
Imagine a choice between possible futures.
In A, 10 billion people would live during
the next generation, all with extremely happy
lives, lives far happier than anyone's today.
In B, there are 20 billion people all living
lives that, while slightly less happy than
those in A, are still very happy.
Under total utility maximisation we should
prefer B to A, and through a regressive process
of population increases and happiness decreases
(in each pair of cases the happiness decrease
is more than outweighed by the population
increase) we are forced to prefer Z, a world
of hundreds of billions of people all living
lives barely worth living, when compared to
A. Even if we do not hold that coming to exist
can benefit someone, we still must at least
admit that Z is no worse than A.
Parfit made a similar argument against average
utilitarian standards.
If all we care about is average happiness,
we are forced to conclude that an extremely
small population, say ten people, over the
course of human history is the best outcome
if we assume that these ten people (Adam and
Eve et al.) had lives happier than we could
ever imagine.
Then consider the case of American immigration.
Presumably alien welfare is less than American,
but the would-be alien benefits tremendously
from leaving his homeland.
Assume also that Americans benefit from immigration
(at least in small amounts) because they get
cheap labour, etc.
Under immigration both groups are better off,
but if this increase is offset by increase
in the population, then average welfare is
lower.
Thus although everyone is better off, this
is not the preferred outcome.
Parfit asserts that this is simply absurd.
Parfit then moved to discuss the identity
of future generations.
He first posited that one's existence is intimately
related to the time and conditions of conception.
I would not be me if my parents waited two
more years to have a child.
While they would still have had a child, he
would certainly have been someone else; even
if he had still been their first-born son,
he would not have been me.
Study of weather patterns and other physical
phenomena in the 20th century has shown that
very minor changes in conditions at time T
have drastic effects at all times after T.
Compare this to the romantic involvement of
future childbearing partners.
Any actions taken today, at time T, will affect
who exists after only a few generations.
For instance, a significant change in global
environmental policy would shift the conditions
of the conception process so much that after
300 years none of the same people that would
have been born are in fact born.
Different couples meet each other and conceive
at different times, and so different people
come into existence.
This is known as the 'non-identity problem'.
We could thus craft disastrous policies that
would be worse for nobody, because none of
the same people would exist under the different
policies.
If we consider the moral ramifications of
potential policies in person-affecting terms,
we will have no reason to prefer a sound policy
over an unsound one provided that its effects
are not felt for a few generations.
This is the non-identity problem in its purest
form: the identity of future generations is
causally dependent, in a very sensitive way,
on the actions of the present generations.
== Writings (selected) ==
1964: Eton Microcosm; edited by Anthony Cheetham
and Derek Parfit.
London: Sidgwick & Jackson
1971: "Personal Identity", Philosophical Review;
Vol. 80: 3–27, 1971.
JSTOR 2184309
1979: "Is Common-Sense Morality Self-Defeating?";
The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 76, pp. 533–545,
October 1979.
JSTOR 2025548
1984: Reasons and Persons.
Oxford: Clarendon Press ISBN 0-19-824615-3
1997: "Reasons and Motivation", The Aristotelian
Soc.
Supp.'
Vol. 77: 99–130, 1997.
JSTOR 4106956
2003: "Justifiability to each person".
Ratio.
Wiley.
16 (4): 368–390.
doi:10.1046/j.1467-9329.2003.00229.x.
2006: "Normativity", in 
Russ Shafer-Landau (ed.), Oxford Studies in
Metaethics, vol.
I, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
2011: On What Matters (two volumes), Oxford
University Press.
2017: On What Matters (volume three), Oxford
University Press.
== References ==
== Further reading ==
Jussi Suikkanen and John Cottingham (Editors),
Essays on Derek Parfit's On What Matters (Oxford,
Wiley-Blackwell, 2009).
== External links ==
Profile, All Souls College, Oxford
Derek Parfit: a bibliography.
A complete bibliography of writings.
Parfit's Climbing the Mountain reading group
on PEA Soup
