Arnold Zuboff
Arnold Zuboff | |
|---|---|
| Born | Arnold Stuart Zuboff[1] January 2, 1946 |
| Education | |
| Education |
|
| Thesis | Time, Self and Sleeping Beauty (2009) |
| Thomas Nagel | |
| Philosophical work | |
| Era | Contemporary philosophy |
| Region | Western philosophy |
| Analytic philosophy | |
| Institutions | UCL Department of Philosophy |
Main interests | |
Notable ideas |
|
Arnold Stuart Zuboff (born January 2, 1946) is an American philosopher. He lectured at the UCL Department of Philosophy from 1974 until his retirement in 2011. His work has covered personal identity, the philosophy of mind, ethics, metaphysics, epistemology, and the philosophy of probability.
Zuboff is the original formulator of the Sleeping Beauty problem. He has also argued for a view of personal identity that he calls "universalism", according to which the apparent separation between oneself and other conscious beings is an illusion of perspective.
Early life and education
[edit]Zuboff was born on January 2, 1946.[2] He was raised in West Hartford, Connecticut.[3]
Zuboff received a B.A. in philosophy from the University of Connecticut in 1968,[4] and attended Princeton University Graduate School until 1972.[5] In 2009, he defended his thesis, Time, Self, and Sleeping Beauty, under the supervision of Thomas Nagel. His examiners were Gilbert Harman, Adam Elga, John P. Burgess, Alexander Nehamas, and Nagel.[6]
Career
[edit]Zuboff lectured at the UCL Department of Philosophy from 1974 until his retirement in 2011.[7] As of 2020, he was an Honorary Senior Research Associate at UCL.[8]
Philosophy
[edit]Zuboff has worked on personal identity, the philosophy of mind, ethics, metaphysics, epistemology, and the philosophy of probability.[9] He is the original formulator of the Sleeping Beauty problem.[10]
Universalism
[edit]In "One Self: The Logic of Experience" (1990), Zuboff set out a view of personal identity that he calls "universalism".[11] On this view, the apparent boundary between oneself and other conscious beings is an illusion of perspective. Zuboff argues that every conscious experience is experienced as "mine" from within it, and that there is no further objective fact that makes one organism, rather than another, the single subject who is "I".[11]
In "An Introduction to Universalism", Zuboff described the view as the claim that "all the experience in all the separate nervous systems of the world is yours", while each experience appears to be the whole of what is one's own.[12] Elizabeth R. Valentine describes Zuboff as having reached the conclusion, by a non-mystical route, that there is no division between self and others, and that universalism holds that "we are all one person: there is only one".[13]
Personal life
[edit]Zuboff was a close friend of the Canadian philosopher G. A. Cohen, with whom he discussed philosophy.[14]
Selected works
[edit]Articles
[edit]- Solomon, Robert C., ed. (1973). "Nietzsche and Eternal Recurrence" (PDF). Nietzsche: A Collection of Critical Essays. Doubleday Anchor. pp. 343–357.
- "Moment Universals and Personal Identity" (PDF). Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society. 52: 141–155. January 1977. doi:10.1093/aristotelian/78.1.141.
- "One Self: The Logic of Experience" (PDF). Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy. 33 (1): 39–68. March 1990. doi:10.1080/00201749008602210.
- "A Presentation without an Example?" (PDF). Analysis. 52 (3): 190–191. July 1992. doi:10.1093/analys/52.3.190.
- "What Is a Mind?" (PDF). Midwest Studies in Philosophy. 19 (1): 183–205. May 1994. doi:10.1111/j.1475-4975.1994.tb00285.x.
- "Morality as What One Really Desires" (PDF). Midwest Studies in Philosophy. 20 (1): 142–164. September 1995. doi:10.1111/j.1475-4975.1995.tb00309.x.
- "The Perspectival Nature of Probability and Inference" (PDF). Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy. 43 (3): 353–358. September 2000. doi:10.1080/002017400414908. S2CID 54894496.
- "Why Should I Care about Morality?". Philosophy Now. No. 31. March–April 2001. pp. 24–27.
- "An Introduction to Universalism".
- "Thoughts about a solution to the mind-body problem" (PDF). Think. 6 (17–18): 159–171. Spring 2008. doi:10.1017/S1477175600003109. S2CID 145231233.
- "Time, Self and Sleeping Beauty". October 2008.
- My 8 Big Ideas. June 2011.
- "A Justification of Empirical Thinking". Philosophy Now. No. 102. May–June 2014. pp. 22–24.
- "Theories That Refute Themselves". Philosophy Now. No. 106. February–March 2015.
- "A Justification of Empirical Inference" (PDF). Philosophy Now. October 2015.
Books
[edit]- Hofstadter, Douglas R.; Dennett, Daniel C., eds. (1981). "The Story of a Brain" (PDF). The Mind's I. New York: Basic Books. pp. 202–212. ISBN 978-0-553-34584-1.
- The Philosophical High Ground: Our World through the Eyes of Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley, Hume and Kant. 2015. doi:10.13140/RG.2.1.4642.8643.
- Finding Myself: Beyond the False Boundaries of Personal Identity. Special supplement to Midwest Studies in Philosophy. Charlottesville: Philosophy Documentation Center. December 2025. ISBN 978-1-63435-117-1.
Videos
[edit]- What You Really Are: A Talk and Discussion About Personal Identity. November 14, 2015.
- What You Really Are: A Demonstration Using Beads. December 7, 2015.
- Personal Identity and the Sleeping Beauty Problem. December 7, 2015.
- Finding Myself – And Undoing the Fear of Death as Annihilation. August 2, 2016.
See also
[edit]- The Mind's I, a collection of essays on philosophy of mind, edited by Douglas Hofstadter and Daniel Dennett, in which Zuboff's short story "The Story of a Brain" is featured
- Open individualism – Philosophical view that a single subject embodies all individuals
References
[edit]- ↑ "Members: Pre-2007". The Phi Beta Kappa Society - Epsilon of Connecticut. February 16, 2021. Retrieved January 6, 2025.
- ↑ "Zuboff, Arnold S., 1946-". The Library of Congress. Retrieved January 6, 2025.
- ↑ Zuboff, Arnold. "About". Arnold Zuboff Art. Archived from the original on August 5, 2024. Retrieved August 5, 2024.
- ↑ "1968 June 3". Commencement Programs. University of Connecticut: 25. June 3, 1968.
- ↑ "Zuboff, Arnold Stuart, 1972". Finding Aids. Princeton University Library. Retrieved August 5, 2024.
- ↑ "Ph.Ds awarded full list" (PDF). Philosophy. Princeton University. Retrieved August 5, 2024.
- ↑ "Full Programme" (PDF). London School of Philosophy. p. 5. Retrieved June 8, 2020.
- ↑ "People". UCL Department of Philosophy. August 4, 2020. Archived from the original on August 15, 2020. Retrieved October 8, 2021.
- ↑ "Works by Arnold Zuboff". PhilPapers. Retrieved October 15, 2019.
- ↑ Elga, Adam (April 1, 2000). "Self-locating belief and the Sleeping Beauty problem". Analysis. 60 (2): 143–147. doi:10.1093/analys/60.2.143. ISSN 0003-2638.
- 1 2 Zuboff, Arnold (March 1990). "One Self: The Logic of Experience" (PDF). Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy. 33 (1): 39–68. doi:10.1080/00201749008602210.
- ↑ Zuboff, Arnold. "An Introduction to Universalism". Retrieved May 5, 2026.
- ↑ Valentine, Elizabeth R. (2020). "Perception and action in East and West". Philosophy and History of Psychology: Selected Works of Elizabeth Valentine. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 978-1-000-08294-4.
- ↑ Sypnowich, Christine (July 9, 2024). G. A. Cohen: Liberty, Justice and Equality (PDF). John Wiley & Sons. p. 12. ISBN 978-1-5095-2996-4.
External links
[edit]
- Arnold Zuboff at PhilPeople
- Arnold Zuboff at ResearchGate
- Arnold Zuboff at University College London
- Arnold Zuboff's channel on YouTube
- Interview on Universalism on YouTube
- Arnold Zuboff Art
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Academics | |
- 1946 births
- Living people
- 20th-century American philosophers
- 20th-century people from Connecticut
- 21st-century American philosophers
- 21st-century people from Connecticut
- Academics of University College London
- American epistemologists
- American ethicists
- American metaphysicians
- American philosophers of mind
- People from West Hartford, Connecticut
- Philosophers from Connecticut
- Philosophers of identity
- Philosophers of probability
- Princeton University alumni
- University of Connecticut alumni