Family is a crucial aspect of our identities and narratives, shaping our perspectives, beliefs, and worldviews. It is influenced by various factors such as parents, friends, school, media, and religion. The family unit plays a significant role in shaping individuality, with values and beliefs being the first source of knowledge. A positive family environment can significantly impact a child’s emotional intelligence by creating a safe space for them to express their feelings openly and constructively.
Family dynamics contribute to personal development, from early formation of beliefs to self-discovery. Understanding family stories directly impacts how we see ourselves, our ability to succeed, and even our level of resiliency. Family is the fundamental structure of every society, providing individuals with membership and a sense of belonging from birth until adulthood. However, multigenerational influences between family members are often neglected in our culture, particularly when things start to go wrong.
The influence of the family is evident at conception, with the fetus being conferred personhood by their parents. Family life plays a significant role in shaping one’s personhood, as it is where individuals learn their values, beliefs, and attitudes towards others. The family is a complex experience with intricate dynamics, factors, and influences that not only affect the parent but also those in their environment.
In conclusion, families play a crucial role in shaping our values and identity, helping us become more confident, compassionate, and curious. The concept of ‘family’ is complex and influenced by various factors, including parents, friends, school, media, and religion.
| Article | Description | Site |
|---|---|---|
| How does family life shape or influence one’s personhood? | Answer: A child’s learning and socialization are most influenced by their family since the family is the child’s primary social group. | brainly.ph |
| How does your family influence your behavior, personality, … | Our family values and attitudes does shape our personalities to a certain degree. But beliefs can change with age and as you experience the … | quora.com |
| How Family Relationships Influence Who We Become | These cycles can be affected by trauma, poverty, influence, or privilege and greatly impact who children become. Families that foster healthy … | lyrahealth.com |
📹 Personhood: Crash Course Philosophy #21
Now that we’ve started talking about identity, today Hank tackles the question of personhood. Philosophers have tried to assess …
Is Family History Important In Shaping A Person'S Identity?
Family history significantly influences individual identity, as understanding one’s origins enhances self-awareness. According to Hill, knowledge of family history allows adolescents to integrate the lessons learned from generations past, thereby fostering a healthier sense of identity. The concept of the family unconscious suggests that personal identity is deeply rooted in familial experiences, customs, and rituals established in childhood. Adolescents acquainted with their family narratives tend to exhibit higher emotional well-being and identity achievement.
Notably, research indicates that family history can reshape national memory and cultural belonging, serving as a crucial tool for identity formation. Each family contains a "memory store" that encapsulates its collective experiences and influences the identity of its members. The notion of family legacy encompasses shared practices, beliefs, and psychological traits passed down through generations, all of which contribute to individual identity development.
Moreover, genealogy allows individuals to connect with their cultural heritage, offering a sense of belonging and empowerment. While external factors like genetics and community also shape identity, the role of family history is vital and often overlooked in sociological and psychological discourse. Understanding family history can profoundly affect one’s self-perception and personal growth. Overall, family narratives are integral in shaping individual identity and resilience.
What Is The Role Of Family In Shaping One'S Personality?
Family serves as a cornerstone for confidence and unconditional love, fostering personal development through the transmission of values such as love, respect, and good manners. It is a vital source of cultural socialization, connecting individuals to their heritage and beliefs. Regardless of changing family structures, a nurturing environment remains essential. Parental personalities and children's birth order, along with emotional regulation and attachment bonds, profoundly influence personal development. Relationships in early childhood, particularly with parents and caregivers, shape social and emotional growth, forming the basis of identity and perspective.
The concept of "family legacy" highlights the shared practices and beliefs passed from one generation to another, reinforcing behavior patterns and personality traits that persist into adulthood. While genetics play a role, the family environment profoundly impacts traits such as extraversion and maturity. Cultural values instilled in the family affect individual worldviews, influencing behaviors towards collectivism or individualism. Families also teach discipline, shaping morals and acceptable emotional expressions.
Ultimately, families are fundamental in establishing self-esteem, attitudes, and character traits. They create a foundation for social adjustment and ethical understanding, providing emotional warmth and security essential for well-being and personal growth. Through these dynamics, families significantly shape who we are as individuals.
What Makes A Family Unique?
Families communicate in diverse ways, from yelling to silence, and their enjoyment of spending time together varies. Recognizing what sets your family apart can enhance connections and help create the future family you desire. To begin, compile a list of 5-10 qualities that define your family, display it prominently, and integrate these traits into your daily life. A clear identity aids in prioritizing decisions and values. Celebrating unique family aspects—such as experiences, talents, and values—strengthens bonds.
A family's uniqueness doesn't necessarily stem from quirks; it’s about what makes it special for its members, which could be as simple as caring for each other. Every family, regardless of structure, has distinct personalities and traditions that contribute to its identity. With busy lives, it’s easy to let external culture shape family identity instead of the family influencing the culture. Strong family identities promote healthy self-images, especially in children.
Taking time to reflect on family characteristics and narratives fosters this understanding. Traditions form the backbone of family identity, embodying togetherness and shared values. Each family’s uniqueness offers a rich tapestry of culture, love, and support, highlighting the importance of recognizing and appreciating what makes each family special.
How Family Has The Biggest Influence On One'S Character?
Family is fundamental in shaping an individual’s character, serving as the primary source for values, ethics, and behaviors. During the formative years, parents and siblings significantly influence personality traits, attitudes, and beliefs. The author asserts that family has the most substantial effect on one’s character, where parents act as role models, guiding behavior and social interactions through their actions and expectations. They significantly discipline and shape their children's choices and outlook on life.
However, the assertion that family is the sole influence is debated, as peers and educational environments also play crucial roles. Research indicates that the family environment affects career paths and identity formation; thus, the values and traditions transmitted within the family leave lasting imprints. The concept of "post-modern family" highlights the diversity in family structures, emphasizing that nurturing care is essential for children's development.
Notably, parents’ personalities and emotional bonds impact personality development, showing that close familial relationships can bolster self-worth and behavioral patterns. Ultimately, families not only influence individual identity but also lay the groundwork for how one interacts with the world. Our families shape our narratives, values, and behaviors, contributing significantly to who we become.
How Does Family Shape Your Personality?
Family significantly influences our personalities from birth, providing the first source of love, support, and guidance. Values and beliefs instilled by families shape our worldviews, identity, and behavior. Each family acts as a crucible where narratives and perspectives form, which can lead to various personality traits. A child born into an extroverted family may develop different characteristics compared to one from an introverted background, highlighting the complex interplay of inherited temperament and environmental influences.
Research has shown that parenting practices—derived from parents' own backgrounds—greatly impact children's emotional and social development. Emotional bonds with parents foster traits such as empathy and compassion, while family dynamics can affect self-esteem and behavior. Birth order may also play a role, shaping individual personality aspects.
Furthermore, families impart societal norms, religious beliefs, and expectations, guiding children in discerning right from wrong. The nurturing aspect of family can either build confidence or diminish it, thus affecting overall health and success. As individuals grow, the influence of family continues, shaping not only current behaviors but also future aspirations and relationships, ultimately resonating throughout their lives.
How Does Family Shape Our Values And Beliefs?
Children are significantly influenced by the family culture into which they are born, shaping their beliefs about right and wrong through familial values, traditions, and communication patterns. These elements affect the family's identity, cohesion, and member interactions, providing direction in navigating life's complexities. As children grow, the family continues to mold their personalities through instilled values and behaviors. Love, a profound emotion, reflects how families teach beliefs and actions, equipping individuals with tools for living.
Family dynamics not only establish personal identities but also influence behaviors and development. Parents play a crucial role in fostering empathy and moral understanding, guiding their children toward a strong sense of ethics. Family values, varying between each household, provide a worldview and help members grasp their heritage. They form the foundation that nurtures traits like honesty and responsibility, while also impacting societal navigation.
Ultimately, the family establishes the core principles that dictate decisions and behaviors, shaping a child's morals and identity. Strong family values lay the groundwork for a loving household, helping children develop a sense of right and wrong and encouraging positive behaviors that can guide them throughout life.
How Does Family Influence Development?
The chapter discusses the extensive influence of family on child development, encompassing biological, social, emotional, and cognitive aspects. Parents and caregivers are crucial in establishing attachment, teaching developmental skills, and instilling values, ultimately shaping children’s early learning experiences. The family serves as a foundational environment for personality formation, significantly impacting socioemotional, cognitive, and health outcomes.
Family structure and caregiving environments determine the levels of resources available for child development, emphasizing the importance of parent-child relationship quality. Children learn through observation within the familial context, which impacts their emotional regulation (ER) and overall development. Influences of family, society, and culture are critical in shaping children's self-perception and interactions with the world. Loving families foster security, trust, and confidence, essential for children's growth, while also presenting cultural values through everyday experiences.
Studies show that positive family dynamics promote mental health by providing encouragement and affection, illustrating a strong correlation between family life and developmental success in early childhood.
How Does Family Structure Influence The Behavior Of An Individual?
Family structure significantly impacts child development, particularly in relation to behavior and emotional well-being. Research indicates that children from divorced or blended families experience more behavioral problems than those from intact households. Over time, the decline in marriage rates in America has led to increased family instability, with more children facing single parenthood. Such instability affects caregivers and the resources available to children, shaping their developmental environments. Notably, only 11% of children in studies came from intact families, highlighting the extent of family disruption.
Family dynamics, including emotional interactions and organization, play crucial roles in children's mental health and behavior. Children in single-parent families often encounter unique challenges, leading to adverse effects on academic performance and interpersonal relationships. Additionally, the quality of familial communication and emotional support can foster resilience and promote positive mental health outcomes.
Research also examines how family structure influences the political attitudes and behaviors of young adults, underscoring the long-term impact of early family experiences. Ultimately, the interactions and relationships within a family unit greatly influence children's emotional, social, and cognitive development, shaping their self-image and behavioral patterns as they navigate the world.
What Role Does Family Play In Personality Development?
Developmental psychologists and family scientists emphasize the vital role of nurture, particularly family dynamics, in human development, especially personality formation. John Locke's notion of the tabula rasa illustrates that children begin life as blank slates, shaped significantly by parental influence, birth order, emotion regulation, attachment, and the family context. Despite the evolving family structures in modern society, it is the nurturing aspect of family—rather than its specific form—that is crucial for personality development.
A child's personality begins to form early, informed by interactions with parents and other authority figures. The family is pivotal in shaping character, values, beliefs, and social skills, impacting self-image and overall development throughout childhood and adolescence. This study analyzes how family environments affect self-esteem from late childhood to adolescence, emphasizing that supportive family relationships are vital for positive development.
Conversely, conflictual familial relationships can be countered by positive role models within the community. The interplay of genetic predispositions and nurturing experiences highlights that both nature and nurture significantly influence personality development. The family environment provides emotional support, moral guidance, and cultural transmission, crucial for a child's sense of belonging and well-being, ultimately ingraining values and behaviors that shape adulthood.
📹 Personal Identity: Crash Course Philosophy #19
Today Hank is building on last week’s exploration of identity to focus on personal identity. Does it in reside in your body? Is it in the …
5:20 Child abuse and extreme bullying survivor here. I can confirm this view to be true. When you are not recognized as a person be anyone around you, arguing in favour or you being a person is completely useless. Really, the thing is that when a capable, fully functioning human is denied personhood, the morally correct thing to do is to offer a helping hand by caring about that non-person, restoring their personhood in the process. I am eternally grateful for the person who did that to me
Regarding the gradient theory of personhood, how do you determine where someone falls on that gradient? If we take that theory in conjunction with Singer’s theory (since they don’t appear to be mutually exclusive theories), then a cow may be considered more of a person than a week-old fetus, since the cow at least has the capacity to feel pain and pleasure, whereas the fetus does not. In which case, abortion of a fetus in the early stages of development has no more of a moral implication than slaughtering a cow for meat. On the other hand, it may in fact make the matter of slaughtering animals such as cows for meat even more controversial, since cows have now been promoted to persons and killing them could be considered murder. To go even further, if we believe that persons can forfeit their personhood by committing grievous acts against other persons (like murder), then a lion (which is now technically a person since it can feel pain and pleasure) hunting and killing a gazelle (also now a person) is forfeiting its personhood by killing another person. But since lions are cold-blooded animals and must kill other animals (mostly persons) to survive they can never be persons, since their survival precludes their ability to be persons. Therefore, a person cannot be defined by its ability to feel pain and pleasure if persons are also capable of forfeiting their personhood through seriously immoral acts against other persons. By extension, all carnivores have forfeited their personhood by murdering other people (that is, if they have killed the animal themselves).
This is the kind of class I wish I would have taken in college, but it never would have happened at my conservative Christian university. Thank you very much for saying that this was hard to talk about. That shows me you have empathy for how it feels for those who want to explore what these parts of existence mean.
I wish this episode was longer. These are some extremely fascinating ideas and I feel like you didn’t have enough time to discuss the arguments for and against each idea of personhood. Is there any recommended reading out there that can compare these definitions in greater detail? Great episode! Definitely got me thinking.
I think person-hood is not about if something is sentient or not, but if that sentience is closely human relatable / compatible. Such as a cat may not experience all the emotions we do, and express them in the same way we do, thus we don’t call it a ‘person’. This can easily be applied in a scale manner, such as a scale from Human, to Gorilla, to cat and some alien creature. Looking at personified characters, they may not be considered a person, but they are very close, showing and expressing emotions and thought.
This episode reminded me of a very similar question my philosophy instructor once asked, and that is what makes someone a human. It essentially has the same answers and conundrums as this question in a slightly easier package, at least on the surface. The conundrums being people with some form of disability and newborns. Also animals such as other prime apes, elephants, crows, and dolphins usually through a wrench into the idea.
I have some questions, I’m truly and honestly not implying anything, but I found these questions to be interesting to think about, and would like to know your perspectives too, if you would honor me: About cognitive criteria: 1- Do you need to have all or at least 1(or x)? 2- Is a man sleeping or unconscious a person? 3- Can a table be a person capable of reasoning, but incapable of communication? 4- Can all these criteria be summarized to ability to communicate? Social criteria: 1- Does this allow for multiple levels of person hood? (is a hit singer more of a person than me, as more people care for him.) 2- Is this perspective recognizing the belief of majority as the ultimate truth? 3- Does the person who cares about you also have to be a person?(Can I claim a table cares about me, or the sun?) 4(if 3)- Who is the person whose person hood doesn’t depend on another? Who is The First person?(damn it, god get out of here) The capacity to suffer: 1-Does that mean some one who is unconscious is not a person? 2-What role does the ability to communicate pain play in this?(How to recognize a suffering creature unable to communicate?) 3-Does it mean later moral conclusion would only apply if suffering is involved, and not when harm is evolved? Gradient theory: 1- What is measurement of Personhood?(Damn, this one just expands the question) hear are some possibilities: i- Remaining lifetime: An Embryo is more person than all of us. ii- Power: in which case anyone with ability to end another is more of a person than the other.
The legal definition of a person is helpful to this discussion as well. Whether you agree with the definitions of “person” (in the US or other jurisdictions), they provide critical information about what that society values as personhood. For example, the history of corporations being persons in the US is a fascinating story and one that illuminates both American history and current and future values. I encourage anyone interested to read more about it.
The gradient theory of personhood seems to be the most socially accepted atm. Most people seem to care about the fetus as much as the elderly, left in a nursing home to live out their days. Some take greater considerations to the extreme spectrums of life, but most care mainly about the middle ground where humans are capable of producing something or have the potential to be a producer one day. I, personally, would consider all life to be worthy of personhood, but that doesn’t mean I would value it all equally so I’m probably in-line with the gradient theory myself, although it may simply be imaginative personification. Overall, I’d say personhood is an imaginary construct of humans to help bring order to the chaos of life. An advanced, multidimensional race of beings could one day stumble upon us humans and decide that we fit into the same category as minerals, with our slow movements and perceptions or seemingly aimless and random 3-dimensional existence.
This is what I believe. Someone with Personhood is a being that has Knowledge, Wisdom, and Faith. Knowledge= awareness + understanding (In any amount/degree) Wisdom= The ability to take what knowledge you have and apply it to your faith. Faith= An action performed out of your believe in what knowledge you have.
I consider them all wrong, you are a person when you have the possibility (rather right now or in the future) of being self aware and conscious. Let me put is this way, everyone is not self aware, reasonable, capable of communication self motivated, nor conscious when they sleep, no one can feel (all though we have a nervous system reactions) when he or she sleeps, so then is it okay to kill a entity as long as it is asleep?
A person is a human with a personality, and conciousness (thats my definition anyway). (comment made before 3:30 ) Since a fetus is an incomplete human without personality (maybe developing a basic one), i whouldnt call it a person. Since a newborn is an undeveloped human with a basicly developed personality (way of acting), but with not complete conciousness, i whould debate, but in some cases agree that it is a person. After learning a bit to understand itself, its own needs, movement, enviorment, i whould call a little kid a person.
I think I like the gradual view of personhood more than the other ones. I connect it with the degree of consciousness a sentient creature has. The more a creature (whether we’re talking about AI, humans or other animals) is able to experience, that is to say the more it is able to experience pleasure/pain, the more ethical responsibility everyone has towards this creature. If the concept of ‘person’ is necessary in order to include/exclude said person from our moral community, then I believe we ultimately have to discuss just how much or how little we should include/exclude it. From this, an ant would be on one end of the spectrum, but on the far end of it and as far as we know at this point a human would be on the other end of it. We wouldn’t treat the ant the same way we treat the human because of reasonable assumptions that an ant cannot experience to the same degree a human can. Hence degree of consciousness = degree of personhood = degree of moral responsibility towards it. What do you guys think?
I’m surprised Hank didn’t take this discussion to where I’m about to go, but as somebody who has chosen to professionally care for adults with severe physical and mental disabilities, I’ve had to redefine my own definition of personhood. A lot of the folks I help lack all outward signs of sentience – some are barely able to chew up blended meals and require 100% support simply to stay alive – and yet, as myself, my coworkers, and even the State consider them, they are people. When I come home I have my dog, and compared to a lot of humans that I know, she is a LOT more aware, intelligent, and self-actualizing. Thus, since the humans I assist are people, so is my dog, and therefore at LEAST any other animal that can interact with the world on her level. My current take on personhood is to assume that a being has it when all other signs point against them. It is not my place to assign or unassign personhood to any being. All I can do is extend my empathy and hope that somewhere, however deep inside their mind, they receive my love and return it however they are able. THAT’S how I resolve this question: It isn’t up to me.
This gives me an idea for a worldbuilding project. Okay so imagine a society where you are not considered a person until you can form memories. As a result, your early childhood is considered one of the most important points in your life due it being the time you ought to have formed your first few memories and those memories will have a serious impact on you growing up.
I like the gradient theory in relation to The Peter Singer theory, I also like the idea of morals defining personhood. The only problem I can find is that a variety of cultures have many vastly different moral codes. Does that mean personhood differs between cultures? What if you range high on the personhood scale in one group and low on the other? What are the absolute defining factors?
Great article. On the topic of abortion, I agree more so with the gradient theory. I’m against abortion, but don’t believe I have a right to tell a woman what to do with her body. I agree insofar as, even if a fetus may have a lower level of personhood, that fetus has the high potential to develop personhood in the future if it were not to be aborted. Considering the high likely hood of personhood in the future, it is morally wrong to kill off the potentiality of personhood, even if the being in question, hasn’t fully developed it yet. Just like a person who has a horrible infection in their foot. It would be easy to just cut off the foot and get rid of the infection immediately, however, if there remains a high chance that the foot can recover, then cutting the foot off right away is the wrong choice.
I think the Social Criterion is the one that catches most, but without the second clause, just the first one. “You are a person whenever society recognizes you as a person”, period, no “someone cares about you”. I like it because I think it truly matches what we call a person, since morals are a social construct, then it makes perfect sense for a “being that deserves moral consideration” to be also defined by society. With this criterion, you also remove the issue of the lonely person since, regardless of how lonely you are, if someone sees you, they will consider you a person.
Alright alright; so how do I define person hood? The most appealing theory at first sight is the cognitive one. A problem immediately comes to mind here. If I take a person and put them under general anesthesia (while ventilating them); they lose all five criteria of the cognitive rule of person hood. With these criteria, it would be perfectly acceptable to kill someone if they are under general anesthesia. Clearly, that isn’t very palatable. The sentience theory is very similar to the cognitive one, albeit less strict in its definition of person hood, but encounters a similar problem. There is another problem with sentience; and indeed with the cognitive theory. How do I know that anything has sentience / consciousness. Clearly, I think therefore I am, but do you? I assume you do because we support similar hardware, and you tell me you think therefore you are. What about a Korean person? I don’t speak Korean so he can’t tell me that he thinks, but clearly, it shouldn’t change the outcome. Okay, what about a human that grew up in the jungle and doesn’t actually speak a language. Well. Alright he’s most likely sentient. What about a cat? Or a cow? Or a bunny? Are those sentient? They certainly have emotions, and we’ve already said that language isn’t the cut off criteria… So here is the ultimate test. Assume that there is a box. In that box, there may be a human person, who’s gagged and unable to answer you. Assume that you know for a fact that there is 50% chance that the person in in the box, or 50% chance they are in another safe location.
I can remember a time when I was still in grade school, and the teacher was teaching us about nouns, verbs, adjectives, ect. The teacher said to us that nouns are people, places, and things. Then she wrote a list of words on the board. She then called us off,. and we where told to identify the word that she chose for us and tell why we know the word is what it is. The word she chose for me is cat. I said it’s a noun, because it’s a person. The teacher: Yes it is a noun, because it’s a thing Me: (ಠ ʖ̯ಠ)
Man, Hank seems like the type of “person” I would like to talk to. I like having these philisophocal conversations as well as other types of conversations that work the brain. I think I have answers to some of these questions as well as others. If you would like to converse with me you are welcome 🙂
the cognitive criteria is perfect if you apply by the rule that the fewer criteria that are fulfilled the less moral consideration you should apply to them. I mean a fly is a person but less of a person than a human is. If you do that traintrack scenario where you can kill a human or a fly, obviously you pick the fly. This could apply to small children too, although we are evolutionairly wired to have more sympathy for the 2 month old baby, a 2 month old baby vs a grown moral person, you pick the grown moral person.
Information and awareness in a system; the system as a whole has a complete awareness of itself. Perception creates differentiation, the differentiation divides the awareness, this process is, in a sense, a division of consciousness. The meaning contained in the system is moving from the highest state of application, through nested hierarchies of meaning and association into a realm of imagination where all things are possible but less and less meaningful.
I believe that what defines you as a person depends on your ‘essence’ (as mentioned in you course on Existentialism). I agree with the Gradient theory and believe that it also works with essences, and that they feed onto each other. (Keep in mind this is a mere hypothesis that I haven’t delved very deep into in terms on justifying it) ._.
id say the death penalty shouldnt be considered morally, morality should be irrelevant. justice should be pragmatic. once convicted, the crime should be weighed. if it was minor enough that the convict could be “corrected” and reentered into society, thats one thing. if the crime was severe enough that they are considered a lost cause than life incarceration or death penalty as a deterrent and as a way to permanently remove them as a threat. “personhood” is irrelevant
Humanity requires action and acts of kindness. Sometimes decisions are simple to make when we don’t give them much thought and don’t believe they will negatively impact our personalities. But let’s take a lesson from our poor life choices and use it to motivate us to make the right choice next time. Always choose the right course of action, and always act with humanity. Personality development enables us to win the respect and acceptance of both society and those around us.
My approach to personhood is something I call the duck test. If it acts like a duck, if it quacks like a duck, if it looks like a duck, I am going to treat it like a duck. This seems most similar to Mary Anne Warren’s 5 criteria. I don’t think we can know if a duck is a duck or if a person is a person. We just have to decide when we are going to treat a thing like a duck or person. This decision keeps me moral. Persons kill each other and do lots of horrible things, so none of this revokes your personhood. Revoking personhood is usually just a preparation for treating a person in a way we have agreed not to treat other persons. For me, you don’t have to revoke personhood, you just have to fear a person to no longer want to treat them as a person. The person I fear most is probably one without empathy.
I think this is the most important episode of crash course philosophy so far. I think he is correct to say that our understanding of the personhood of the unborn should inform our views on abortion. I do think that a fetus is a person because I have felt a strong sense of love for my unborn children. It would inconsistent for me to say that my children are people before they are born but unwanted fetuses are not people. It then follows that if a fetus is a person regardless of whether they are wanted, then they are deserving of love and legal protection. My intent is not to condemn anyone who has had an abortion but I think we all should be a lot less ok with abortion on demand. To say that abortion is a right under any circumstances seems indefensible to me if we think that there is even a possibility that a fetus is a person.
Under United States law, organizations are considered “legal persons” and extended personhood for the purposes of Equal Protection under the US constitution. That means that nonprofit and for profit organizations, private and public organizations are all considered “persons” protected under Constitutional law.
It seems to me that the most intuitive answer is that a Person is any being that can make moral judgments, and this can definitely happen on a gradient. As far as I can tell this would include most great apes, many dogs, and most people except very young babies, and very mentally ill or old people. It sort of goes with with the question “Why should I care about you if you CAN’T care about me?”
“..and exclude those who you think should be excluded” Oh boy if i were you i wouldn’t encourage people to do such thing because there are peo- there are humans (?) who think exclusion of certain other humans like certain races or minorities such as the lgbt community is justified. There are humans who think someone doesn’t deserve to live just because they identify as a transgender person. Encouraging people to think is important but to mindlessly shout their opinions to the void can be dangerous. I think we shouldn’t encourage the thought that someone might be less of a person for who they are what they believe in or what they’ve done.
a gradient version of the cognitive theory makes most sense to me–allows for some limited personhood and the rightness of considering the interests of fetuses/the senile/my favorite pet dog while at the same time putting them in perspective. You always value the whole person more. I find it interesting to even think about “surrendering” personhood–although I can grant that if you are particularly cruel you may lose some of your moral say/weight I’d never seen this argued as a reduction in personhood, but always as a justice/morality question itself of a different, secondary order. and having a degree in this stuff, well, I’m surprised. just makes me feel more strongly about the gradient approach.
I tend to combine Warren’s criteria, or another set of criteria outlined by a Thomas I. White, with the gradient theory. We can then say that something’s personhood is relative to the number of criteria that they meet at any given point. You can then look at the issue of conciousness during sleep by saying that sleep is a predictable function, we know it will happen, and we know it will stop, usually, therefore we can ignore that state because it doesn’t define that individual. The conclusion of this is that something’s personhood is defined by its state that meets the greatest number, or greatest value (if you don’t consider all criteria equal), of criteria during a predictable and repeated cycle.
Africa Philosophy holds the same thought that person-hood is achievable but our definition of a person is in reference to being of human descent who have achieved the qualities of personhood as set by the community (Philosophy of Ubuntu). A community in Africa metaphysical reality is not defined in terms of location, groups etc but in terms of the set of relationship that will make an individual a person. We are at any one point in time connected to one another and even at a point where our memory fails to define who we were or we are others might help you (My mum will easily remember what happened when I was born than I do). The gradient theory to a certain degree fit into the African perspective of personhood apart from the fact that foetus, children hold an unexploited degree of personhood (Potential) than adult and might become better persons as time passes this alone account for why foetus and children highly protected in the African community. Anyway, I have really enjoyed this course. A challenge from my supervisor on my Thesis which focus on Africa philosophy pushes me here.
I think personhood is the capacity for higher moral reasoning. In this sense, everyone who is a human is a person, because we all have the root capacity for higher reasoning. However, the degrees to which we are able to execute this reasoning would determine how advanced our personhood is, as well as the level of moral responsibility for our actions.
I believe a human is one that: 1. Eats 2. Thinks ( has a mind that can develop) 3. Grows 4. Breathes 5. Socializes (Interact with society in some form) 6. Contains a soul 7. Moves 8. Emotional awareness (or developing of it) 9. Reproduces ( Or some day can) 10. Dies ( at some point. Superman and big foot has been around forever and may “always be around” plus they don’t socialize in everyday life) 11. Has the ability to abide and comply with laws ( and civilization) 14. Ability to choose
One way of examining Mary Ann Warren’s idea of being “cared about” is a reciprocal person stance. You don’t need people to directly care for you, but people need to regard you as a person. IE – a robot with an idea that it is a person would not count, neither would a bird who has imprinted as a baby and thinks a human is it’s mother.
The cognitive and sentience qualifications are the most reasonable, and only need a small tweak to overcome their deficiencies. Something to indicate an acceptance of impending cognitive or sentience qualification. That way, you can preserve for children the person label, without automatically condemning coma patients.
This is my opinion yet i feel it is also accurate in many ways because this is something i think about often. Of course it is by no means perfect, there is always room to learn and adjust your beliefs – shutting yourself down to new developments takes the science out of your argument. Let me also say that i feel this is a very important conversation to have as our species advances through the levels of civilization. To start there is of course many levels of person hood just as there is a spectrum for sexuality rather than just straight-bi-gay or for gender Male-female. On this scale, say 1-10, the moment a human child enters the world it is a 5, where 5 would be the base line for basic human rights such as the right to Food, water, safety, shelter, love, and of course life. Below 5 is mainly reserved for intelligent biological creatures that lack the important marks of higher consciousness who still maintain the right to life in most cases but the murder of one of these would tip the scale of evil and good less than killing a 5+ these are things such as gorillas, dolphins, even dogs. As a human being you advance into life and by the age of say 2 years you are an equal member in this world on par with any adult, say a 9. From 9.1 to 10 is reserved for intelligent beings that may exist beyond our knowledge such as further advanced aliens and even God. Regardless (and this will no doubt make some people upset) of an adult human beings moral short comings no human falls below a 7 after the age of 2.
Very courageous and good quality article. What about using the cognitive definition, but expanding the state of personhood to any being having the same DNA as any individual who’s been recognised to be a person through the cognitive definition? This would preserve the personhood of the elderly and some mentally ill people, and would avoid slippery-slopes.
In regards to Singers philosophy, a thought experiment If a scientist genetically engineers two sets of humans, one set unable to feel physical pain and other set unable to feel any emotional pain, which ones would be more human? And if a human is created which possesses neither physical nor emotional pain, would it be morally just to do anything to such a human in the name of science?
People have the ability to merge their sense of self in society, and I think this realization could completely remove the necessity for personhood. Instead, we should consider each individual completely morally separate to begin with, but that have attained value-in-and-of-themselves from the perspective of each other as the integrate into a society. In other words, to me, you have value in-so-far as I am able to view you as a part of me.
Ernst Mayr liked to discuss the concept of typological thinking and population thinking. Typological thinking has a strict criteria for inclusion in a group, core features. And this is intuitive. But research in biology has shown that breeding populations have a wide range of genetics and thus features. Anyone born of two human parents is fully human themself regardless of their features. Diversity within a population and norms of reaction come to mind.
Thank you for letting me know the “the gradient theory of personhood” was actually a thing with a name; I’ve subscribed to it for years. However, I disagree that personhood should be the yardstick of moral consideration in the first place. To me, personhood is determined by Warren’s five criteria (or something very similar), whereas qualification for moral consideration is determined in the way Singer described; as Jeremy Bentham put it: “The question is not, Can they reason? nor, Can they talk? but, Can they suffer?” And both are on a gradient. For example, a young (human) child is much less of a person than an adult because they can barely think or communicate, but they are only slightly less morally important because their ability to feel pain is (AFAIK) only slightly diminished compared to that same adult.
What are the fundamental properties that make a Person or define what a person is? Morality seems to be the consistent factor driving the definition of Person. Such a question would overlap into different disciplines (Psychology, Quantum Physics, Biology,) can we understand the succinct dividing nature of classifying a Person.
A few questions: By cognitive criteria, am I a person when asleep? What about in a coma? How many of the criterion are required for personhood? Functionally, aren’t social criteria tautological, i.e., personhood is whatever we define personhood as? They work pretty well as descriptive terms, but seem meaningless as prescriptive terms. Am I missing something?
I don´t know if you see this, but the GENETIC argument is the strongest of the four: It can be tested empirically, and yeah, you cannot include Superman or Daeneris, but probably they dont care. Plus, if you add the factor: Uniqueness of the DNA (a human INDIVIDUAL), you can consider your cells to be part of the same person, which kind of make sense. All other arguments are highly subjective, because they cannot be tested: Where is located the “concience”?, what is “feeling”? (a worm has a central nervouse system (just simpler), and some scientist say plants feel more than us).
A question on Warren’s cognitive criteria for personhood- Suppose there’s a really old woman with Alzheimer’s, Dementia and multiple other brain disorders. She’s just on the brink of death, so as it usually is with really old people, she isn’t conscious (in a way that even if her hand gets burnt, she doesn’t really feel it), isn’t self-aware, can’t communicate, has lost all reasoning and can’t do anything- does she still count as a person?
I think the concept of personhood should revolve around the interactions of the individual with his/her environment, rather than on his/her individual characteristics. So, basically, if a living being (yeah, I know, that’s an individual characteristic, whatever) acts in a beneficial way towards other living beings, then that being is a person. By “beneficial” I mean helping maintain physical and psychological integrity. This, of course, includes animals, who are also capable of helping other living beings maintain their physical and/or psychological integrity. “Beneficial” also needs to be understood as opposite to “detrimental”, i.e. disrupting physical and/or psychological integrity. Beings whose actions are detrimental to other living beings are not persons. Then, of course, you need to judge every single action to determine if a living being is a person or not, which means that we can only be labelled as “person or not person” as long as we are acting. Now, how do you judge an action? You have to think about what it means for the creature (living being) that is performing it, as well as what that creature thinks its action means for other creatures, and then what the natural consequences of that action are. If the answer to at least one of those three questions is “beneficial to other creatures”, then the action is being performed by a person. Now, since humans have a higher intelligence, and therefore a higher level of awareness of their own actions, they are “freer” than animals to choose whether to act like persons or not.
I personally like the sentience theory but have my own spin on it. Anything can be considered a person if it can think and feel on it’s own or eventually think and feel on it’s own without any major interference. This means that a fetus can be considered a person if it is reasonable to conclude that it would survive being born but a robot would not be considered a person until the very moment someone programs it to think and feel.
Won’t the idea of gradient personhood cause one to be superior than the other; just ’cause one has “more” personhood? So, am I less of a person if the other is older since he would have time to become a person, that is part of the moral community? And who or what judges the degree of the gradient? Age? Experience? Another person? I much prefer this theory but still it too puts out alot of questions.
I think personhood extends to anyone you would assign an identity to. For instance, your dog would have an identity but the random cow in a field would not. This allows for personhood to change not only between people but within the individual. Therefore, once you pick a certain cow out of the herd and give it a name, it gains personhood because you recognize it as an individual rather than a random cow. Also, just because you have identified this particular cow as a person, it does not mean that they are a person in my eyes, as they are still a random cow.
This episode reminded me of Robert Persig’s “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance”. In the novel, the protagonist brings up the word “quality”, and asks how we would define it (without resorting to a dictionary for however it is defined there). Quality is something rather intangible and difficult to describe. The answer given in the book was, “I don’t know how to define it exactly, but I definitely know it when I see it”. I think personhood is probably very similar in that regard.
it’s probably relevant to mention the legal/judicial doctrine of “corporate personhood” for business corporations. Lawyers and Lobbyists argued that certain collective groups, or legal charters or contracts defining a collective group, consisting of 4 officers, some capital investment, property rights, legal boundaries and protections, is itself a “Person” and entitled to all legal protections owed to human natural persons. Of course this legal precedent mostly applies to major court cases, so applying to larger corporations with large law departments. See Ted Nace book, Gangs of America.
I feel like personhood is some kind connected to skills of interacting meaningfully with community (of humans), understand as: – to “find” your “place” in social structures and “act” within given restrictions – to build/maintain relations with community and it’s individuals by intended and self-motivated actions – to be able to grasp abstractions of “god” and “evil”; of obligations and assumptions – to use logic for predicting community reactions and it’s perceptions of given actions – to process feedback from actions and react to it “somehow” accordingly Because we understand consequences of improving cognitive skills with growing, learning and healing; we (community) “give” presonhood to children and unconscious persons because we expect them to reach a “fully person” status in near future. Sometimes it won’t happen, but once we gave it in advance, we get used to “leave it that way” and treat other similar exceptions accordingly.
When it comes to animals, the distinction between ‘person’ and ‘not person’ is an ‘in group, out group’ distinction made largely for practical, social, and emotional reasons, and not because there is a fundamental difference between us and animals. For most of our history, we have had to eat them, even though they are capable of similar same pains and fears. We are not trying to min/max pain and pleasure in the universe, but entertaining philosophies that rationalise our intuitive, evolved feelings about the world. In a morally objective world, being conscious and having negative or positive experiences would entitle one to ‘personhood’.
I really enjoy this article, but it also depends on a societies moral spectrum. Hearing the perspectives you referenced I couldn’t help but think of exceptions to this. Taking a look at societal people can be overlooked (minorities via ethnic or skin color differences and the poor) and thus exempt of personhood. On the final perspective I can see where that plays out in society as men are often granted more “personhood” or used as the baseline compared to women, as well as straight to lgbtq, white to virtually any other race, etc. The underlying issue I have with this (which I assume you may address is the ethics article) is that morality on a social level, though historically passed down via a social subset (ie religion, government, or interest groups), dictates norms but often is unaware or unconcerned with whom it excludes. If you will it functions as a type of Borg…assuming it is doing the best and aiming for the right affects on society but often steamrolling any sort of critical thought against it….even if said critical thought is an attempt to improve it.
For me its easy to forget cars on the road contain personhood. I get frustrated because those hunks of metal seem lack human consideration for what is around them. Keeping in mind that those objects hold actual people in them (people who are imperfect but most likely have personhood) helps me to not become so irritated during rush hour.
Hank’s charge, that we need to “be sure to include everyone we want and exclude everyone we don’t want is problematic.” Or at least, a literal interpretation of it. If we are finding a definition of personhood that is based on personal whim rather than fundamental belief, then what is the point of bothering to define personhood. The only real advantage would be that someone external to our self would be able to pronounce someone a person by our own definition. Does he mean something else by his commission? Because if not, then it seems that we are to choose qualifications of personhood arbitrarily rather than by more fundamental philosophical principles. Or was it simply a poetic word of caution
In a previous episode, it was mentioned that David Hume asserted that personal identity was an illusion, a sort of veneer over all the emotions, thoughts, memories, and values which constitute a “person”. Hence, maybe personhood itself is an illusion too, a hamper as well if one attempts to determine what beings are worthy of moral consideration based on their personhood, lack, or degree thereof; an existent such as the environment or a work of art is probably worth being ethically dealt with albeit it does not adhere to any theory of personhood. So, ethics aside, what is the point of the classification “person”?
One aspect of personhood I consider which is missing here is what I would call “potential personhood”. For instance a dog has the intelligence of a 4 to 5 year old human, so does this mean that a dog is more of a person than an infant? I think not, we put more personhood into an infant than we do a dog because that infant has the potential to be more of a person than a dog, but a dog has already reached their maximum potential after maturing from a puppy. There are also others out there which view personhood at beginning even before conception; they recognize personhood at the moment there is the chance of developing a person.
Such a hard topic. Do you all watch the definition of self article previously. I liked the chain mail example of person. I would argue that anything that contains the ability to build a chain of self is a person. Because identify self is part of person hood and this also helps solve the problem of denying personhood to a child that can’t yet build a self but is in the process. Also it doesn’t require DNA so Superman would fit. The biggest question is my computer…if it can identfy a “self” should I protect it? Oye so hard,
I’m glad the episode talks about degrees of personhood because throughout the first half I was thinking about how I feel regarding animal welfare: I care to varying degrees about humans, cattle, spiders and bacteria. While I’d be reluctant to kill a human in all contexts except for self-preservation, I’m okay with the death of a cow for food though I still would want to spare it pain, and I prefer not to kill spiders but will readily do so if they’re inconvenient enough, while I am not bothered at all about the death of bacteria. I can see my moral position towards the life of other organisms along a spectrum of sorts, so that even though I wouldn’t say cows are people, I consider them more person-like (or deserving of moral consideration?) than spiders or bacteria and this is reflected in my moral attitude towards them.
My definition of personhood is neither based on biology nor morality, but POTENTIAL INTELLIGENCE. My definition is: any being who can or can potentially learn to, during its lifespan, form opinions on things AND in some way express those opinions for the consideration of others, is a “person.” However I believe personhood is irrelevant in morality. If humans were the only animals on Earth, some people would be vegetarians, some people would be cannibals.
After perusal that, if I hear the word personhood again I’m going to lose my personality! That said, “What constitutes “personhood?”, is actually a very interesting question. Personally I like the Cognitive Criteria school of thought, however I also think that empathy is a worthy consideration for this list.
I find this topic to be especially difficult from a philosophical standpoint because the establishment of conditions seems to be both retroactive (we are building criteria based on what we are biased to want to fit and not fit) and our criteria, as a consequence of their method of development, tend to be rooted in emotivism rather than reason. I’m not quite sure how to escape from the sheer subjectivity of it all in order to make a justifiable stance that isn’t just a consequence of social development.
I think person is someone who is able to understand moral principles and act accordingly. Animals are not included, but they may look like a person if they are trained to do certain actions on command. But they don’t really understand what they’re doing, so therefore they can’t be a person. The same is true for babies. Superman and others seem to comply to this definition.
I think the concept of “personhood” is only relevant when we’re talking about beings from which self-awareness (an ability to recognize yourself in relation to the world) can be applied. Those beings are persons, even if they’re not currently self-aware like an infant or a comatose patient. They’re no less of a person, nor are they any more.
I think personhood is something every living human is entitled to. From as soon as the human organism comes in being until they cease to exist (conception until death), regardless of their actions. The only criteria for possessing the ‘right’ to personhood should be being human and existing, the rest just determines how good or moral a person we are. I believe they each human deserves to hold the status of ‘person’, and therefore merit our moral consideration. Even the worst of our criminals should still be considered persons, in my opinion. They may be incredibly evil persons but they must still be given moral consideration; of course, they should have to face justice in doing so. But every human, to me, should possess the core and essential rights of personhood and life – the latter only being waivered where they threaten another’s right to life. It should not be up to other persons to determine whether a given human has the right to personhood or not, it should just be every human’s core a basic ‘possession’.
I think that there should be a consideration for potentiality when considering personhood. Fetuses and criminals who have not yet achieved full personhood or who have forgone it due to misconduct (respectively) should therefore have their potential to personhood be considered before making a choice to permanently exclude them from our moral consideration. Can the criminal be rehabilitated? Will the fetus mature into a viable and possibly important part of our human family? If the answers to these questions are yes, or even possibly yes, then we should be careful not to use the power we currently hold over these potential persons and perhaps leave room for forgiveness and growth when drawing out the lines.
There are three qualifications to be a person: 1. Emotion. 2. Cognition. 3. Self awareness People: Functional Humans, some animals, sentient aliens, strong AI, Not People: Fetuses, other animals, weak AI, brain dead humans, psycopaths(maybe) I don’t know nearly enough about mental health to be sure about that last one, but if someone can’t feel emotion or empathy, then it seems like they aren’t a person
I love Crashcourse philosophy. But it has been missing up to now what I contend is the most important point of all; love itself. To exclude love is to deny reality. Love is our reality. If you take love out of the equation then the equation is always going to result in an erroneous conclusion, which itself will lead to loveless behaviour. We are talking about the concept of person, but what is a person without love? The giving and receiving of love is life. The more we allow love to guide us the more alive we are. The reverse is equally true. The more we exclude love, the emptier we become. If we have all knowledge, and the power to move mountains, but do not have love, we are nothing. If we give all we possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship to gain the world but do not have love, we gain nothing.
believe most in gradation and cognitive, though there’s also probably merit in Singer’s theory. I definitely don’t believe in social though, as it’s far too easy to devalue and dehumanise people that way, and some people may spend their whole lives trying to validate themselves in a world where they should have been valued in the first place. I believe in gradation most because I believe in shades of grey, aka nuance. I am also interested in sentience and and cognition, especially as neither one, contrary to your Lex Luther example, seems to honestly disregard evil. But if personhood means admittance into a moral landscape, perhaps gradation is the best theory; after all, evil often comes from pain, as well as the fact that it is no less capable of cognitive function than good, usually.
I absolutely think animals have some degree of personhood and I think it’s mainly due to a combination of possessing a nervous system and possessing a degree of agency. While animals may not be exactly like us when it comes to free will, they do possess enough agency that needs to be taken into consideration. I think the first step we should take as a society is to reduce as much cruelty as possible from the animal products industry, and protect animals and the environments they inhabit from human cruelty and greed.
my theory is based on biology of the being. For example….Human beings have two legs, by their own biology, that means that humans are bipedal being. Now imagine a man who stepped on the landmine and half of his body was blown up. Is he human still bipedal being, even if he has no legs anymore? I would say yes, because that is in his nature/biology. Same follows for the personhood. Embryo might not feel pain, or be self aware, or something else, at that exact moment, but based on its nature/biology, they are beings which feel pain or self aware and others.
I think that part of the discussion should concern “legal” personhood as well. For example, in US law, corporations are recognized as “legal” persons with certain rights and responsibilities (but not the same as a biological person). If Hank is actually an android but but (literally) self-incorporates, is he a “legal” person or just a machine with some person-like properties?
Hank don’t get me wrong I love crash course I enjoy learning about stuff and I’ve learned a lot from you and your brother but I have personally studied this a lot in a legal sense and I encourage you to research it in a legal sense because our legal system is one of the systems that has been around the longest is the most universally used systems in America and also because there are no synonyms in law. also uses older definitions of the words before they got all watered down with slang and texting excetera.
The Warren criteria for personhood would, by default, include a lot of the animal kingdom. However, the social criteria would exclude most animals, since people tend not to consider them as people. It is interesting that this might provide an argument as to why some people are vegetarian and others are not- their idea of personhood defines the way they feel about eating meat
Here’s a question I’d like to throw out here for all of you to ponder: How, if at all, can one deserve something except by earning it? The relevant thing here is moral consideration, but the question applies to the general concept of worthiness. E.g., if a fully mentally competent human adult hasn’t done any more to earn moral consideration than a chipmunk, or for that matter if the deeds that make that individual more worthy of consideration have been counterbalanced by other deeds that make that individual LESS worthy of consideration, then how can that human be more deserving of moral consideration than the chipmunk? If it’s unjust to treat someone better or worse based on something beyond their control, then it must be unjust to treat creatures better or worse based on what cognitive abilities they have… except to the extent that they actually control what their cognitive abilities are. (I.e. one might see fit to punish someone for willful ignorance, which gets back to epistemic responsibility.) And if it’s not unjust to treat someone better or worse based on something beyond their control, then what even is justice?
I would say personally I like the Gradient theory best, I agree that a fetus may have some rights, but those rights do not outweigh the rights of the mother, a full-grown person. If you couldn’t tell already I’m strongly pro-choice. XD I also think we can incorporate parts of the other theories into our definition of personhood as well, such as Cognitive and Social. Genetic, to me, isn’t a good indicator of personhood at all though.
I have read a lot of the comments listed way before mine. The topic of this lesson was and is “Personhood”, is it not? So whenever we start referencing other things such as the environment I think we start to get a bit off topic. Just my opinion. As in regards to “Personhood” I am of the mindset that like many other issues in life, it is not all or nothing. It is a bit of a gradient or spectrum of sorts. I think it does have something to do with cognitive ability and I think that an adult is more of a “person” than a child…HOWEVER….That doesn’t mean that we should minimize the importance of a child’s life in spite of an adult’s life. I agree with others comments that the more “personhood” one holds, the more individual responsibility should be expected for his or her actions. The environment effects people/persons and is affected by persons but the environment in itself is not a person. I think that to be a person of any sort one must be human first. But that’s not to say that other living organisms don’t matter…just not as much as people.
I don’t think that Warren’s theory would necessarily exclude young children. They might not yet be self aware, but they’re able to communicate (albeit, through crying and body language) and they’re conscious. Warren stated that meeting only some of these criterion proves sufficient for personhood, meaning that you’re still a person even if you don’t meet all 5 stipulations.
I favour the gradient theory. Consider this, if I go to a bar and get blind drunk (or my drink is spiked) so that I don’t remember what I did that night, was I still a person in that state? Yes I was but my moral involvement was severely affected. How about how I feel on different days, some days I am very clear thinking and even tempered, other days I may be coming down with a virus and it is hard to think and I am irritable. I feel more like me on the good days, how can that be if personhood is binary?
But who are we to bestow personhood on ANYTHING? I understand why we have to define personhood, for our laws, and practices, and how we treat others. But if we come up with an idea of personhood that we agree with, what happens if we misclassify someone who fits the criteria for personhood, but hasn’t been given a fair trial or other persons are unaware of the subjects actual personifications.
There’s one false dichotomy here that I’d like to point out. The reasoning is that if something is a person, it deserves moral consideration, but if it’s not, we can do with it whatever we please, and that’s justified. But that becomes problematic when it’s applied to the environment. I would view the destruction of the environment to be morally wrong, though the environment itself probably doesn’t qualify as a person. Likewise, just because someone is considered a person doesn’t mean one can’t justifiably kill them for some reason. Not to go all Godwin’s Law, but Adolf Hitler is a pretty good example. I don’t think he was no longer a person because of his crimes, he was just a shitty person who did reprehensible things, thus every act of violence against him and his forces was justified. None of those people have their personhood forfeited. Actually, now that I think about it, it is BECAUSE they are people that violence against them is justified. If they are deserving of our moral consideration, then they are also deserving of our moral condemnation. A dog that kills another dog is not considered a murderer, whereas a person that kills another person is. We hold people to higher moral standards. Really, I think this concept of personhood is problematic to begin with, especially when it’s predicated on whether or not we give them moral consideration. If we must use the term, then I’d agree it’s non-binary, with the caveat that just because someone has more personhood than another doesn’t mean they deserve more moral consideration than another, it means we hold them to a higher moral standard.
Society cannot be the determinate of personhood, as then a country – which may or may not be representative of all people and can make mistakes – gets to influence public opinion of what a person is. Personhood is the collection of the thoughts and beliefs a person can hold. Can the potential/almost certainty of personhood be considered personhood?
Anyone who is an anyone is a person. Being “deserving” of moral consideration (aka having personhood) is a problem when we don’t realize “deserving” is something we made up and we shouldn’t (and honestly can’t) be responsible for deciding/knowing, ever. Since we can’t know who is a person, the most responsible thing to do is consider everyone one. (And I know that sounds kind of contradicting, but it makes sense to me.)
Thought the gradient view of person hood aligns with my thoughts on abortion, giving higher regard to the person with more personhood, This doesn’t work for so many other things I think about or value. Assigning personhood is almost like assigning “value”. What about my life to a child’s life? Though I might have more “personhood”, does that mean I deserved more consideration or value? At what point do I start to loose personhood? What about instances of mental health? Or disability? Or so many other things. How is personhood gained? How do we choose to value more or less “personhood”
When you mentioned Superman I thought there would be a discussion about whether fictional characters can be persons, which I would find fascinating. Like, a character I read about might be more of a person from my perspective than a real, living, conscious, adult human whom I’ve never seen or heard of. And some characters might be so widely recognized that they have more accumulated perceived personhood than any human alive. Is “subjective personhood” or “perceived personhood” a thing in philosophy?