About

Trenton Merricks is the Commonwealth Professor and Director of Placement at the Corcoran Department of Philosophy at the University of Virginia. He holds a BA from The Ohio State University, an MA from the University of Notre Dame, and a Ph.D. from the University of Notre Dame. His areas of specialization include metaphysics, philosophy of religion, epistemology, philosophy of mind, and philosophy of language. Merricks has authored several books, including 'Self and Identity' (Oxford University Press, 2022), 'Propositions' (Oxford University Press, 2015), 'Truth and Ontology' (Oxford University Press, 2009), and 'Objects and Persons' (Oxford University Press, 2003). His research focuses on fundamental questions about the nature of objects, persons, truth, and identity within metaphysics and related fields.

Research topics

• Sociology
• Psychology
• Philosophy
• Computer Science
• Aesthetics
• Epistemology
• Social psychology

Selected publications

• Arguments and closure

  Philosophical Studies · 2026-02-09

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Suppose that you believe a claim because it is the conclusion of an argument that you are justified in believing is sound. Then I think you are justified in believing that claim. Or suppose that you believe a claim because it is the conclusion of an argument that you know is sound. Then I think you know that that claim is true. I do not think I am alone here. I think that philosophers often assume that they are justified in believing (or know) a claim simply because they believe that claim on the basis of an argument that they are justified in believing (or know) is sound. But this assumption is threatened by familiar objections to epistemic closure. The main goal of this paper is to defend the philosophical practice of both giving and also evaluating arguments that aim to justify (or render known) conclusions. It does so by arguing that this practice turns on a particular closure principle, and then defends that closure principle. This paper also shows how the conclusions it defends about the practice of giving arguments to justify (or render known) conclusions bear on a paradox about knowledge from Kripke, on contextualism, and on the paradox of the preface.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Self and Identity

  Oxford University Press eBooks · 2022 · 13 citations

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Sociology
  • Epistemology
  • Social psychology

  The personal identity literature is fragmented. There is a literature on the normative topic of ‘what matters in survival’. And there is a separate literature on the metaphysics of persons. But in <italic>Self and Identity</italic>, Trenton Merricks shows that some important claims about personal identity cannot even be articulated, much less evaluated, unless these topics are brought together. Merricks says that what matters in survival is constituted by its being appropriate to first-personally anticipate, and have self-interested concern with regard to, a future person’s experiences. So what matters in survival is not constituted by identity with a future person. So identity is not what matters in survival. But Merricks argues that—given a metaphysics of ‘enduring’ persons—identity with a future person explains why it is appropriate to first-personally anticipate, and have self-interested concern with regard to, that person’s experiences. So identity delivers what matters in survival. Some claim that what matters in survival is delivered not by identity, but instead by psychological continuity. Or by having the ‘same self’, that is, the same values, desires, and projects. Or by narrative connectedness. Or by unity of agency. Merricks argues that these claims—unlike the claim that identity delivers what matters in survival—cannot accommodate all the ways in which personal transformations can be good, or bad, for someone. At the end of <italic>Self and Identity</italic>, Merricks puts his conclusions about what matters in survival through their paces by applying them to a new topic: personal immortality.

  PublisherDOI

• What Matters in Survival

  Self and Identity · 2022-01-13

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  Consider: <italic>The What Question</italic>: What is it for a person at a future time to have (at that time) what matters in survival for you? This chapter begins by clarifying the ideas that are invoked in my answer to the What Question. Then I motivate my answer, which is: its being appropriate for you to first-personally anticipate the experiences that that person will have at that future time; and if that person will have good (or bad) experiences at that future time, its being appropriate for you to have future-directed self-interested concern with regard to those experiences. This chapter also distinguishes the What Question from other questions with which it might be conflated.

  PublisherDOI

• On the Necessity of Personal Identity

  Oxford University Press eBooks · 2022

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Epistemology
  • Philosophy
  • Aesthetics

  This chapter defends the claim that every good answer to the following question implies being numerically identical with: <italic>The Why Question</italic>: What way of being related to a (conscious) person at a future time explains why that person will have (at that time) what matters in survival for you? So this chapter defends the claim that personal identity is necessary for what matters in survival. This chapter also shows that Derek Parfit’s famous argument to the contrary fails. But there is no single way in which Parfit’s argument uncontroversially goes wrong. Rather, the way in which that argument fails depends on this or that controversial metaphysics of persistence. So that argument fails in one way given endurance, and it fails in a different way given (for example) stage theory. Most importantly, there is no metaphysics of persistence on which that argument succeeds.

  PublisherDOI

• The Same Self

  Oxford University Press eBooks · 2022

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Sociology
  • Computer Science
  • Psychology

  According to the Selfer view, your first-personally anticipating, or having future-directed self-interested concern with regard to, a person’s experiences at a future time is appropriate only if the way you are now is relevantly psychologically connected to the way that person will be at that time. The relevant sort of psychological connectedness is being substantively alike with regard to values, desires, and projects. So to be Selfer is to be committed to the view that a person will have, at a future time, what matters in survival for you only if that person will have, at that time, (enough of) your current values, desires, and projects. This chapter opposes the Selfer view.

  PublisherDOI

• The Same Self-Narrative

  Self and Identity · 2022-01-13

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  Consider: <italic>The Why Question</italic>: What way of being related to a (conscious) person at a future time explains why that person will have (at that time) what matters in survival for you? Some have answered the Why Question in terms of narrative. Narrative-based answers to the Why Question can be in terms of psychological connectedness, or in terms of psychological continuity (which is a chain of overlapping instances of psychological connectedness). Chapter 6 considers an answer in terms of narrative-based psychological continuity. But this chapter focuses on an answer in terms of narrative-based psychological connectedness. In particular, this chapter focuses on—and raises objections to—an answer in terms of being alike with regard to ‘self-narrative’. As we shall see, this chapter thereby continues the discussion of the Selfer view that began in Chapter 4.

  PublisherDOI

• Introduction

  Self and Identity · 2022-01-13

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  This chapter describes the overall line of argument of <italic>Self and Identity</italic>. It also introduces the two questions around which <italic>Self and Identity</italic> revolves. These are <italic>The What Question</italic>: What is it for a person at a future time to have (at that time) what matters in survival for you? And <italic>The Why Question</italic>: What way of being related to a (conscious) person at a future time explains why that person will have (at that time) what matters in survival for you? This chapter also argues that the What Question is distinct from the Why Question, and that these questions have different answers.

  PublisherDOI

• Agential Continuity and Narrative Continuity

  Self and Identity · 2022-01-13

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  Consider: <italic>The Why Question</italic>: What way of being related to a (conscious) person at a future time explains why that person will have (at that time) what matters in survival for you? Chapter 5 focused on an answer to the Why Question in terms of a specific sort of psychological connectedness, namely, having the same self-narrative. This chapter considers two more answers to the Why Question, one of which—like the answer considered in Chapter 5—involves narrative. But the answers considered in this chapter are in terms of specific sorts of psychological continuity, as opposed to psychological connectedness. This chapter also defends the conclusion that it is false that any good answer to the Why Question must be in terms of some sort of psychological connectedness or psychological continuity.

  PublisherDOI

• On the Sufficiency of Personal Identity

  Self and Identity · 2022-01-13

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  This chapter defends my answer to: <italic>The Why Question</italic>: What way of being related to a (conscious) person at a future time explains why that person will have (at that time) what matters in survival for you? My answer is numerical identity. That is, I say that your being numerically identical with a (conscious) person at a future time explains why that person will have (at that time) what matters in survival for you. This answer is controversial. For this answer implies that your being numerically identical with a person at a future time explains why it is appropriate for you to first-personally anticipate, and have future-directed self-interested concern with regard to, the experiences that that person will have at that time.

  PublisherDOI

• The Hope of Glory

  Self and Identity · 2022-01-13

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  Previous chapters defend a variety of claims about what matters in survival. This chapter puts those claims through their paces by applying them to a new topic: personal immortality. I begin by using the distinction between persistence and survival to clarify the idea of personal immortality. I then show how claims defended in earlier chapters allow us to block familiar objections to the desirability and to the possibility of immortality. Here are two examples. Chapter 4’s conclusion that the Selfer view is false plays an important role in my reply to the Tedium Objection. And my answer to the Why Question in terms of numerical identity provides the resources to argue that what matters in survival will not slowly ‘fade out’ over time and change.

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• St. Augustine

  1 shared

• Mark Hinchliff

  1 shared

• Ulrich Meyer

  Colgate University

  1 shared

• Gary S. Rosenkrantz

  1 shared

• Thomas M. Crisp

  1 shared

• Dean W. Zimmerman

  1 shared

• M. Oreste Fiocco

  University of California, Irvine

  1 shared

• Hilary Putnam

  1 shared