Online research in philosophy

Saul Kripke’s (1971, 1972) modal essentialist argument against materialism remains an obstacle to any prospective Identity Theorist. This paper is an attempt to make room for an Identity Theory without dismissing Kripke’s analytic tools or essentialist intuitions. I propose an explanatory model that can make room for the Identity Theory within the constraints of Kripke’s view; the model is based on ideas from Alan Sidelle’s, “Identity and Identity-like” (1992). My model explains the apparent contingency of some scientific identities by appealing to our epistemic access to the conditions of identity for sensations and brain processes. Pace Kripke, the Identity Theorist can thus explain away the apparent contingency of mind-brain identity claims.

It may be that all that matters for the modalities, possibility and necessity, is the object named by the proper name, not which proper name names it. An influential defender of this view is Saul Kripke. Kripke’s defense is criticized in the paper.