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A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as
kinship In anthropology, kinship is the web of social relationships that form an important part of the lives of all humans in all societies, although its exact meanings even within this discipline are often debated. Anthropologist Robin Fox says that ...
,
ownership Ownership is the state or fact of legal possession and control over property, which may be any asset, tangible or intangible. Ownership can involve multiple rights, collectively referred to as title, which may be separated and held by different ...
of property, or
legal responsibility Responsibility, in the context of the law, may refer to: * Legal obligation * A measure of mental capacity, used in deciding the extent to which a person can be held accountable for a crime; see diminished responsibility. * Specific duties imposed ...
. The defining features of personhood and, consequently, what makes a person count as a person, differ widely among cultures and contexts. In addition to the question of personhood, of what makes a being count as a person to begin with, there are further questions about personal identity and self: both about what makes any particular person that particular person instead of another, and about what makes a person at one time the same person as they were or will be at another time despite any intervening changes. The plural form " people" is often used to refer to an entire nation or
ethnic group An ethnic group or an ethnicity is a grouping of people who identify with each other on the basis of shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups. Those attributes can include common sets of traditions, ancestry, language, history, ...
(as in "a people"), and this was the original meaning of the word; it subsequently acquired its use as a plural form of person. The plural form "persons" is often used in philosophical and legal writing.


Personhood

Personhood is the status of being a person. Defining personhood is a controversial topic in
philosophy Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some ...
and law, and is closely tied to legal and political concepts of citizenship, equality, and liberty. According to common worldwide general legal practice, only a natural person or legal personality has rights, protections,
privileges Privilege may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Privilege'' (film), a 1967 film directed by Peter Watkins * ''Privilege'' (Ivor Cutler album), 1983 * ''Privilege'' (Television Personalities album), 1990 * ''Privilege (Abridged)'', an alb ...
, responsibilities, and legal liability. Personhood continues to be a topic of international debate, and has been questioned during the abolition of slavery and the fight for women's rights, in debates about abortion, fetal rights, and in animal rights advocacy. Various debates have focused on questions about the personhood of different classes of entities. Historically, the personhood of women, and slaves has been a catalyst of social upheaval. In most societies today, postnatal humans are defined as persons. Likewise, certain legal entities such as
corporations A corporation is an organization—usually a group of people or a company—authorized by the state to act as a single entity (a legal entity recognized by private and public law "born out of statute"; a legal person in legal context) and r ...
,
sovereign states A sovereign state or sovereign country, is a political entity represented by one central government that has supreme legitimate authority over territory. International law defines sovereign states as having a permanent population, defined terri ...
and other polities, or estates in
probate Probate is the judicial process whereby a will is "proved" in a court of law and accepted as a valid public document that is the true last testament of the deceased, or whereby the estate is settled according to the laws of intestacy in the sta ...
are legally defined as persons. However, some people believe that other groups should be included; depending on the theory, the category of "person" may be taken to include or not pre-natal humans or such non-human entities as animals,
artificial intelligences Artificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence—perceiving, synthesizing, and inferring information—demonstrated by machines, as opposed to intelligence displayed by animals and humans. Example tasks in which this is done include speech rec ...
, or
extraterrestrial life Extraterrestrial life, colloquially referred to as alien life, is life that may occur outside Earth and which did not originate on Earth. No extraterrestrial life has yet been conclusively detected, although efforts are underway. Such life might ...
.


Personal identity

Personal identity is the unique identity of persons through time. That is to say, the necessary and sufficient conditions under which a person at one time and a person at another time can be said to be the ''same'' person, persisting through time. In the modern philosophy of mind, this concept of personal identity is sometimes referred to as the '' diachronic'' problem of personal identity. The ''
synchronic Synchronic may refer to: * ''Synchronic'' (film), a 2019 American science fiction film starring Jamie Dornan and Anthony Mackie * Synchronic analysis, the analysis of a language at a specific point of time *Synchronicity Synchronicity (german: ...
'' problem is grounded in the question of what features or traits characterize a given person at one time. Identity is an issue for both
continental philosophy Continental philosophy is a term used to describe some philosophers and philosophical traditions that do not fall under the umbrella of analytic philosophy. However, there is no academic consensus on the definition of continental philosophy. Pri ...
and
analytic philosophy Analytic philosophy is a branch and tradition of philosophy using analysis, popular in the Western world and particularly the Anglosphere, which began around the turn of the 20th century in the contemporary era in the United Kingdom, United Sta ...
. A key question in continental philosophy is in what sense we can maintain the modern conception of identity, while realizing many of our prior assumptions about the world are incorrect. Proposed solutions to the problem of personal identity include continuity of the physical body, continuity of an immaterial
mind The mind is the set of faculties responsible for all mental phenomena. Often the term is also identified with the phenomena themselves. These faculties include thought, imagination, memory, will, and sensation. They are responsible for various m ...
or soul, continuity of consciousness or memory, the
bundle theory Bundle theory, originated by the 18th century Scottish philosopher David Hume, is the ontological theory about objecthood in which an object consists only of a collection (''bundle'') of properties, relations or tropes. According to bundle the ...
of self, continuity of personality after the death of the physical body, and proposals that there are actually no persons or selves who persist over time at all.


Development of the concept

In ancient Rome, the word '' persona'' (Latin) or ''
prosopon Prosopon (, ;"prosopon"
''
The concept of person was further developed during the Trinitarianism, Trinitarian and Christology, Christological debates of the 4th and 5th centuries in contrast to the word nature. During the theological debates, some philosophical tools (concepts) were needed so that the debates could be held on common basis to all theological schools. The purpose of the debate was to establish the relation, similarities and differences between the /''Verbum'' and God. The philosophical concept of person arose, taking the word "
prosopon Prosopon (, ;"prosopon"
''


See also


References


Further reading

* Cornelia Johanna de Vogel , Cornelia J. de Vogel (1963). ''The Concept of Personality in Greek and Christian Thought''. In Studies in Philosophy and the History of Philosophy. Vol. 2. Edited by J. K. Ryan, Washington: Catholic University of America Press. pp. 20– * Patrick Grant (academic), Grant, Patrick. ''Personalism and the Politics of Culture''. New York: St Martin's Press 1996. * Grant, Patrick. ''Spiritual Discourse and the Meaning of Persons''. New York: St Martin's Press 1994. * Grant, Patrick. ''Literature and Personal Values''. London: MacMillan 1992. * * * William O. Stephens, Stephens, William O. (2006). ''iarchive:personreadingsin0000unse, The Person: Readings in Human Nature''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson. . * * Jörg Noller (2019)
Person
In: Thomas Kirchhoff (ed.): Online Encyclopedia Philosophy of Nature / Online Lexikon Naturphilosophie. Heidelberg, Universitätsbibliothek Heidelberg: https://doi.org/10.11588/oepn.2019.0.66403. * Eric T. Olson (2019)
"Personal Identity"
In: Edward N. Zalta (ed.): The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2019 Edition).


External links


Rights of Non-Human Persons Program
(Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies) {{Authority control Personhood, * People, Aesthetics Concepts in aesthetics Concepts in epistemology Concepts in ethics Concepts in metaphilosophy Concepts in metaphysics Concepts in the philosophy of mind Concepts in the philosophy of science Ethics Humans Main topic articles Metaphysical theories Metaphysics of mind