Mark Siderits argues in 'Personal Identity and Buddhist Philosophy' that Buddhist reductionism about persons entails that moral evaluation must track causal chains, not agent-internal states alone.

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Reasons For

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Reason for

1.If persons are reducible to aggregates without essential identity, moral responsibility cannot attach to an unchanging self-essence.
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2.Causal chains reveal how actions propagate consequences; tracking only mental states ignores actual harm produced in the world.
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3.Buddhist ethics emphasizes dependent origination—moral evaluation must follow causal connections, not isolated internal dispositions.
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Reasons Against

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Reason against

1.Causal chains are vast and indeterminate; moral evaluation requires principled boundaries that internal states naturally provide.
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2.Buddhist philosophy emphasizes intention (cetana) as central to ethics; reducing evaluation to external causation contradicts core texts.
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3.Tracking only causal chains risks dissolving personal agency—if I'm merely a link in chains, why hold me responsible for outputs?
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Key Terms

Agent-internal states(as what the argument says should NOT be the only focus of moral judgment): The thoughts, intentions, desires, and beliefs happening inside a person's mind—basically, what someone is thinking or feeling.
Buddhist philosophy(as the broader philosophical tradition being discussed): A tradition of thought originating from the teachings of Buddha that explores the nature of suffering, reality, and how to achieve peace through understanding how our minds work.
Causal chains(as used in philosophy of causation): A sequence of events where each one is caused by the previous one, like dominoes falling in a line.
Mark Siderits(as the author being referenced): A contemporary philosopher who specializes in Buddhist philosophy and has written extensively about how Buddhist ideas relate to Western philosophical problems, particularly around questions of personal identity.
Moral evaluation(as contrasted with epistemic evaluation): Judging whether something is right or wrong, good or bad, from an ethical standpoint.
Reductionism (about persons)(as the Buddhist view described): The view that a 'person' is not a single unified thing, but rather a collection of constantly changing physical and mental parts—like how a car is really just an arrangement of metal and plastic pieces.
personal identity(Philosophy of personal identity): The relation of sameness holding between a person existing at one time and something existing at another time, analyzed here in terms of psychological continuity

Connections

2 topics

Consequentialism1 linked Moral Responsibility1 linked

Buddhist ethics emphasizes dependent origination—moral evaluation must follow ca...Buddhist ethics prioritizes intention over consequences in moral evaluation

Details

Type: claim
Perspectives: 2 (1 for, 1 against)
Edits: 1 edit