Abstract
This is not a very strong contribution to the Monograph Series. Given the present state of the debate in the philosophy of mind, I think most readers will find this essay anachronistic in its metaphilosophy, incomplete and confused in its presentation of the issues, sloppy in its argumentation, and unimposing in its conclusions. And I think most readers will be right. Ostensibly, it is an essay in descriptive metaphysics, an essay in “conceptual geography”. In the author's words, “… this essay constitutes an attempt to map one particular area of the conceptual countryside… that surrounding the concept person.” The vintage of the metaphors aside, this does remain a worthy undertaking, for certainly the full story on our common-sense conception of persons has yet to be told. Curiously, however, Professor Englebretsen's contributions on this particular score are surprisingly slim, and we find him instead discussing and criticizing at length a variety of substantive theories as to what the things we conceive of as persons really are. This is adventurous behaviour for one whose concerns pretend a limit at the inspection, description, and explication of the current state of common-sense, and one wonders how the author supposes that mere conceptual cartography can serve to settle these apparently substantive issues.
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