Professor Wiggins's new book was originally intended to be a revision of his book Identity and Spatio-Temporal Continuity, which appeared in 1967 and had been allowed to go out of print. Like the earlier book, it is concerned with questions of identity, and especially with the identity of things which persist through change, and it advances the same theory of individuation. So much, however, has been added, and so earnest an attempt has been made to clarify what the earlier book had left obscure, that this ranks as an independent work. Though it is less arcane than its predecessor, the density of its argument and the author's predilection for symbols still make it difficult reading, but the philosophical interest of its subject, and the thorough honesty of its treatment, more than make up for this deficiency. There is no denying the importance of having a proper theory of identity, and even if not all his arguments carry equal conviction, the attempt which Wiggins has made to supply this need deserves to be treated with very great respect.

LRB 22 January 1981 | PDF Download