課程名稱︰形上學
課程性質︰系必修
課程教師︰鄧敦民
開課學院：文學院
開課系所︰哲學系
考試日期（年月日）︰2015/4/21
考試時限（分鐘）：180
試題 :
Answer THREE questions in a separate answer sheet.
(每題35分)(其實就是每週作業選一題來當考題)
1. Suppose that Brown's brain was split and transplanted into two bodies, such
that both regained consciousness and can remember Brown's experiences. It
appears that there are four possibilities about which one is Brown (i) Brown
didn't survive; (ii) Brown survived as one of them; (iii) Brown survived as
the other; and (iv) Brown survived as both), but any choice amongst the four
seems arbitrary. According to the Simple View, such arbitrariness shows that
personal identity is a primitive fact that we cannot determine by any
criterion. But according to Parfit, such arbitrariness shows that personal
identity is an unimportant matter that we needn’t even determine. Which
view do you think is correct? Give your own reason supporting your answer.
2. The Principle of Alternative Possibilities (PAP) is the thesis that a person
is morally responsible for what he has done only if he could have done
otherwise. Famously, Harry Frankfurt offers the following counterexample to
(PAP). Suppose Jones is deliberating about whether to kill Smith. However,
unbeknownst to Jones, a neurosurgeon Black has implanted a device in Jones's
brain, such that if Jones is just about to decide not to kill Smith, the
device will sense a certain 'prior sign' in Jones’s brain (say, some
neurological pattern) and thus trigger an intervention that will ensure
Jones to decide to kill Smith. Suppose after some reflection Jones decides
to kill Smith and does kill him (and so Black’s device remains inactivated).
Frankfurt thinks in such a case, Jones is responsible for his action,
although he could not have done otherwise. Do you agree with Frankfurt?
Provide your own argument supporting your answer.
3. Some philosophers think that mental events are just brain events, and mental
properties are just physical properties. Do you agree with them? Provide your
own argument supporting your answer.
4. Consider the following argument. ‘Some contingent beings exist. But every
contingent being depends for its existence and explanation on something else,
which, if contingent, should also depend on something else, and so on ad
infinitum. So if there is no necessary being on which the existence of
contingent beings depends, we will get an infinite regress of dependence, in
which case the existence of these contingent beings remains ultimately
unexplainable. Therefore, there must be some necessary being, which we call
"God".’ Do you find this argument convincing? If so, defend it against
possible objections. (You may want to modify or reformulate the argument to
fit your defence.) If not, offer your own objection to the argument.
5. According to Endurantism, objects persist through change by being wholly
present at different times. For example, suppose a candle changes its shape.
On this view, it is one and the same candle which was bent and now is
straight. But there is no contradiction because in predicating bentness and
straightness of the same candle we have to relativize it to different times.
However, Lewis argues that by so relativizing, this account treats shapes as
relations rather than intrinsic properties, and thus is incredible. Do you
find Lewis’s objection convincing? If so, elaborate his objection against
endurantism. If not, provide your response on behalf of endurantism.
6. Could Socrates have been a poached egg? Give your own argument supporting
your answer.
7. What is it for a possible world to be the actual world? According to the
indexical theory, all worlds are equally real and no world is special: every
world is actual at itself and at no other world. According to the actualist,
one world is special: it alone is real and all the others are non-real.
Which view do you think is correct? Provide your own argument showing that
the opponent theory is wrong.