Article What is personhood?

[C C]

https://youtu.be/GxM9BZeRrUI

VIDEO INTRO: To philosophers, ‘personhood’ is a technical term. ‘Person’ doesn’t equal ‘human.’

“Human” is a biological term – you’re human if you have human DNA. That’s it.

But ‘person’ is a moral term.

For a philosopher, persons are beings who are part of our moral community. They deserve moral consideration.

This distinction is really useful, but it kinda complicates things. Because there might be non-humans that we think deserve moral consideration. And there might be some humans who don’t.

But the determination of who’s a person and who’s not, is tricky. And the slipperiness of what constitutes a person is at the core of almost every major social debate issue you can think of. [Like abortion, animal rights, etc]

Philosophers have tried to assess what constitutes personhood with a variety of different criteria, including genetic, cognitive, social, sentience, and the gradient theory....

Personhood: Crash Course Philosophy #21

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/GxM9BZeRrUI

[Magical Realist]

Interesting synopsis! I would say that a person is a conscious being who is also a moral agent. Implied with that definition is a certain freewill that can dictate the actions of said agent and merit it certain rights. Consciousness, freewill, as well as certain moral and mental qualities, all go to make up personhood. Persons can think, reason, will, judge, perceive, love, feel emotions, and act according to their own determination. So aliens would be persons, but fetuses no. Coco was a person to some extent, but your pet dog Rover isn't. An AI robot could be a person, but a comatose patient isn't.

In a more ontological sense, a person isn't an objective thing that can be located in space and time. It is the subject behind the physical body. It is not a what but a who. It can't be perceived but it can be empathized with. It is the "I" referred to in the body's moment of mouthing the word "I". When a person is asleep they are still the person they are. Persons can be conscious or unconscious. They can be "normal" or be "not themselves". They are subjects of all the states of being human. They can experience pain and suffering, mental illness, addiction, cosmic meaning, enslavement, sexual desire, love, existential despair, physical sickness, brainwashing, and even death. Personhood is the subjective side of being a self. It is the experient embodied in the flesh and soul of the body.