Exploring the Significance of Experimental Philosophy through the Concept of Personal Identity

The article introduces experimental philosophy, critiquing it while at the same time deepening our general understanding of it with concrete examples from practice: experimental research in the field of the issues of personal identity. Through this, the author illustrates the methods, development and possible benefits of experimental philosophy while also discussing the critics who have been drawing attention to deficiencies in its methodology, as well as to its inability to reveal precisely defined lay concepts. In response to the critics, the author is called upon to consider the nature of lay concepts, which by their nature are not precisely defined and often serve a specific social function. Although a well-grasped experimental philosophy cannot decide a given philosophical question, it can help us identify and extract essential elements from the specific and, for a person, deeply characteristic conceptual bedrock, while additionally replenishing philosophical research so that it does not lose contact with the world from which it originally arose.