Laurie Paul, philosophy professor at UC-North Carollina, Chapel Hill;  2014 Guggenheim fellow talks with Jennifer Ouellette about empathy, identity and whether having a child can be considered a rational decision (she’s pro-childless despite having two kids of her own). 

Per her website: "My main research interests are in metaphysics and the philosophy of mind, especially temporal phenomenology, time, perception, the ontology of mental states, the philosophy of cognitive science, mereology, causation, constitution, and essence. I work on related topics in the philosophy of science and the philosophy of language."