Counterpart Theory - Arguments Against Counterpart Theory

Arguments Against Counterpart Theory

The most famous is Kripke's "Humphrey Objection". Because a counterpart is never identical to something in another possible world Kripke raised the following objection against CT:

"Thus if we say "Humphrey might have won the election (if only he had done such-and-such), we are not talking about something that might have happened to Humphrey but to someone else, a "counterpart"." Probably, however, Humphrey could not care less whether someone else, no matter how much resembling him, would have been victorious in another possible world. Thus, Lewis's view seems to me even more bizarre than the usual notions of transworld identification that it replaces. (Kripke 1980:45 note 13.)

One way to spell out the meaning of Kripke's claim is by the following imaginary dialogue: (Based on Sider MS)

Against: Kripke means that Humphrey himself doesn’t have the property of possibly winning the election, because it is only the counterpart that wins.

For: The property of possibly winning the election is the property of the counterpart.

Against: But they can't be the same property because Humphrey has different attitudes to them: he cares about he himself having the property of possibly winning the election. He doesn’t care about the counterpart having the property of possibly winning the election.

For: But properties don't work the same way as objects, our attitudes towards them can be different, because we have different descriptions – they are still the same properties. That lesson is taught by the paradox of analysis.

CT is inadequate if it can't translate all modal sentences or intuitions. Fred Feldman mentioned two sentences (Feldman 1971):

(1) I could have been quite unlike what I in fact am.

(2) I could have been more like what you in fact are than like what I in fact am. At the same time, you could have been more like what I in fact am than what you in fact are.