Downs Syndrome Man Threatened with DNR

[The Dharma Bum]

[The Dharma Bum]

I think the best way to look at the concept of personhood is as a legal construct. Human beings, animals, and even a business can be said to be people if they are awarded this status by some "authority".

Given this reality a fetus can be declared a person legally. It simply a matter of which outcome is chosen by this authority. So it can go either way.

Thus this is a subjective quality, not an objective one. (the criteria for consciousness are objective features but the conclusion that this adds up to something called personhood is completely subjective).

[Boris Johnson]

[The Dharma Bum]

[JDHURF]

Boris:

Rationality and consciousness are by no means the only two attributes nor, for that matter, are they both necessarily requisite. I was simply illustrating some of the actual objective criteria, which certainly do exist.

1) You are correct in that rationality can be defined differently, given more or less backbone and that, however defined, it certainly isn't present in the neonate. We can get further into this if you wish, but as I explained to Dharma, the ethical equations are modified after the event of birth.

2) Conscious awareness is one of the key ethically important characteristics for reasons we can get into further if you wish. It appears that we would find a lot of agreement here. It's not so much nebulous in the way I presented it as it is simply a rough sketch to illustrate to someone where my position would begin to lead if pursued in more detail. I certainly accept and, in fact, demand upon the differences in the quality of consciousness between, say, a bonobo and either you or me. I don't believe that it would be in any way accurate to even discuss the self-consciousness of a frog, however.

I am pretty well read when it comes to Singer's positions. The "sleeping man problem" simply doesn't apply to his elaboration of preference utilitarianism for various reasons. I would be more than happy to get into them if you want. It will require a good deal of detail. I suppose I could begin by observing that a sleeping person, assuming normal development and so on, has acquired person-hood while the prenate has not. The sleeping person likely also has social relations and obligations that would be harmed were he/she to be killed (the effects would harm not just the sleeping person but all of the sleeping person's relations). There is also the fact that if it were permissible to kill sleeping people it would cause general society great stress and fear, it would greatly diminish the quality of life for everyone were everyone to have the knowledge that every time they went to sleep they might very well be murdered. There's plenty more to say about this, but that should be enough for now.

[The Dharma Bum]

[JDHURF]

[JDHURF]

[The Dharma Bum]

[JDHURF]