Personhood: Crash Course Philosophy #21
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- Опубликовано: 29 сен 2024
- Now that we’ve started talking about identity, today Hank tackles the question of personhood. Philosophers have tried to assess what constitutes personhood with a variety of different criteria, including genetic, cognitive, social, sentience, and the gradient theory. As with many of philosophy’s great questions, this has much broader implications than simple conjecture. The way we answer this question informs all sorts of things about the way we move about the world, including our views on some of our greatest social debates.
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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
Crashcourse philosophy has been truly masterful at handling difficult topics in a very rational way. Keep up the good work.
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Thanks to Crash Course Philosophy, is now my favorite subject.
Thanks to Crash Course, Philosophy is now my favorite subject.
Thanks to Philosophy, Crash Course is now my subject favorite.
I knew that would attract the grammar Nazi's!
Like fish ya took the bait!
***** Bait you took fish like!
Thank you Crash Course Philosophy. This is now my favourite subject.
he had glasses in his mother's womb
aye
@@obitavora7478 foxy the pirates animatronic?! Is that you????!!!!!
My problem with Personhood is we only have one real example, Us.
A sample size of one is difficult to examine. That's why I've always been fascinated by Neanderthals. In many ways they were very different than us but we would seem to give them personhood.
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Animals are people, they meet all the right criteria. Consciousness, self aware and can potentially adapt to it's surroundings.
Who's to say bacteria don't have all those things?
It's certainly possible Adrian but difficult to prove.
"I'm sure no one in the comments will be shouting their opinion at all" - LOL thanks Hank, I just spat my porridge all over my phone at that line! 😂
Everyone should watch "Unplanned". It answers so much!
As a pro-lifer, it’s so unrealistic and flawed lmao
@@mopolitics8158 This movie mirrors all the research that I have done including the testimonies from 3 girls who I have known personally since grade school, plus all the testimonies from past abortion doctors, past abortion workers, abortion survivors, to the mothers and fathers themselves. There are literally thousands upon thousands of similar testimonies from all over the U.S., let alone the world. Why do you not believe all these people? Why do you think that they are all lying?
I challenge you to prove scientifically what is unrealistic and flawed about this movie, not some generalization, insults, or opinions, but real peer reviewed scientific evidence. I wonder if you even watched this movie or not. If you haven't watched it, you can watch it for free on Amazon Prime Videos.
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.
Nicely Done Hank. Not an easy subject to do well but you and the teams have given us food for thought.
They really are super considerate about sensitive issues. I love how great they do at really staying neutral
As an abortion abolitionist and somewhat of an amateur philosopher, I really enjoyed your fair, unbiased presentation of this issue. I have genuinely never heard a truly unbiased laying out of these positions until now. Well done. Love your science videos as well.
Austin Henning may I ask why you want abortion abolished?
Rude
Sydney Freeman "To their bodies", something I always here from you feminists, nothing but selfish women and men who conform to the feminist ideology. You can do what you want to "your" body, but you definitely shouldn't have the right to someone else's life, being an unborn child. Though not considered a person in terms of this video, a human is a human, no matter how small. No reason can justify the murder of unborn babies.
Sydney Freeman I suggest you look up information on abortions from both perspectives in terms of abortion and what really happens during one.
Sydney Freeman In your opinion, how exactly is "bodily autonomy" a determing factor in terms of abortion? How does it justify the ending of a HUMAN life, without regards as to whether a human fetus is a person or not?
i really like the gradiant theory. it allows for all animal and things to have some degree of personhood, aliens, apes, robots, dogs trees, stones(?). I also like the idea of humans growing in personhood. what i personally don't agree with is the idea of loosing personhood other then through death.
Please consider "Crash Course Theology". I would love that!
It would have to be pretty good. Misrepresentation is just too easy.
Oh man, I can't even WAIT for Ethics. one of my favorite subjects.
I'm flashing back to my time watching Smallville after this week's Flash Philosophy. Awesome episode guys, love this series.
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.
Alberta's "Famous 5" were petitioners in the groundbreaking Persons Case. Led by judge Emily Murphy, the group included Henrietta Muir Edwards, Nellie McClung, Louise Crummy McKinney and Irene Parlby.
".. Some Beings have more Personhood then Others." Reminds me of "All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others."
Watching this all I can think is that I would consider myself a people person
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?"
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.
who else have played The Talos principle ?
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sublime game
Me 😍
Yes! I also felt like SOMA raised a lot of similar questions, although in a different way. Both games really left me thinking...
Jón Aron Lundberg I'll have to check SOMA! seams like I should not play this game before going to sleep tho
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).
No matter what it generally considered the definition of a person, I will continue to treat every human as a person, with respect, kindness, and consideration.
I think self awareness is enough to consider something a person.
Aaaaand the ability to feel pain. There. I think I'm done.
MY personhood is HUGE!
Will there ever be a crash course mathematic ?
Good topic. How math and the understanding of numbers have evolved and appeared in Multiple civilizations and cultures throughout the world. "0" , Geometry to Algebra. Also, Different counting systems (calendars etc)
Probably because eventually they'll run out of ideas!
There's quite a bit of math in Crash Course Physics.
Mathematic is not as interesting as other subjects so i guess not. Also mathematic is all about practicing.. if you need to study math check out Khan academy.. they are the best in my opinion.
***** it's common opinion...
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'.
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.
3:21 “I’m sure no one in the comments will be shouting their opinions on the matter at all”
Looking at you
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.
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.
quality is how well something does it's intended purpose (i didn't look it up). if food is quality it does it's intended purpose well, it tastes good. if a chair is quality is is comfortable to sit in if a vehicle is quality it goes fast or it looks good or it rides smooth or whatever else that particular vehicle is meant to do well.
+Gaming Trees -- A Taco Bell burrito tastes good (but I would never say it was of high quality). I've sat in many ratty chairs that were comfortable but nowhere near good quality.
well as i said- intended use. if i make a chair that i want to be comfortable and i don't care how it looks, then if it doesn't look good it doesn't affect the quality of the item. that burrito was meant to taste like a good burrito and if it does that it's a quality burrito. the comfortable but ratty chair wasn't a quality chair out of all chairs but it was a quality compfy chair. that burrito was not a quality food but it was a quality burrito.
No... it's not a quality comfy chair, it's simply a comfy chair; neither is it a quality burrito among burritos, it's merely a good tasting burrito. You seem to be getting hung up on the fact that everything has qualities (which they do); but, there is an enormous difference between having the qualities for which something was designed and having that "je ne sais quoi" of being a "quality object". Again, it's something that's difficult to describe but most people seem to agree that they know it when they see it. And people may not even agree as to what it is that gives it quality (is it the craftsmanship?.. the finest materials or ingredients?.. the fact that it's handmade vs manufactured?) It's often hard to say... What is it about the craftsmanship that makes it of higher quality? Why is one material better than others? How does assembling it by hand make it better than having it assembled by an automated manufacturing process; or, further, what makes one automated manufacturing process better than another?
The Bonesaw .. well i'll say it again, quality is how well something performs the thing it is designed for. To be a quality burrito it needs to be a very good tasting burrito, and quality comes in degrees. give me an example an item and ill tell you what it needs to be quality
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.
It is great how it addresses all the topics especially I believe the 8th admentment in Ireland is brilliant
The pain thing is flawed if we are only talking about physical pain, because it instantly excludes people who suffer from congenital insensitivity to pain. So it would have to be expanded to include emotional pain as well. And how can we tell if someone is emotionally suffering? Sometimes you can't see if someone is under emotional pain or not and if that person also happens to be unable to communicate because they are deaf and mute, then you can't say "well they told me that they are under emotional pain". This means you have to presume that the person is in fact capable of feeling some kind of pain.
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.
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.
Great video. 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 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
I like Boethius' definition: an individual substance of a rational nature. That's why superman and I are both persons, why the persona batman is not (the batman is assumed by a person), why individual human cells are not persons, but why *all* humans are, in fact, persons. That is, all humans are persons. All persons are not human. That's also, btw, why the SCOTUS and Romney were wrong in arguing that corporations are people. They're not. They're associations of persons, but not persons themselves.
This is one of my favorite episodes so far.
I am a strong believer in gradient personhood, all things animate or not are worth some, and only those whom you care about are worth all of it. However, my moral ethics are quite a bit different than most current cultures.
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
Fishbiene So theoretically if I can make a machine that can kill emotions or if I destroy a part of the brain that manages emotion and use it unto you does that still make you a person?
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.
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?
Also, the gradient proposal can be found in very ancient sacred texts such as the vedas
Usually for philosophers being part of the moral community and deserving moral consideration do not mean the same thing. For a utilitarian, for example, nonhuman animals that can experience pain and pleasure (like dogs, say) deserve moral consideration, but they're typically not considered persons.
I follow my own rule of If it can feel, try not to make it feel bad.
The social definition of person hood reminded me of an old Star Trek original series episode where they meet the last of a race of gods - Apollo I think. They were all disappearing because no one thought of them any more. Social God-hood?
Bit of those last 3 episodes: Imagine a murderer who got into car accident. For few weeks was in a coma and after he awakes he has amnesia. How should he be treated by the law / justice system? After that severe brain damage is he still the same person and should be punished for "his" crimes? When in coma is he still a person? What about people with mental issues: split personality, bipolar syndrome, schizophrenia... ?
Personhood should be culmative, the essential actions and experiences as well as the personal opinion of said actions.Character makes a person but not every person is a character.
I would modify the cognitive definition, such that you need SOME of the criteria, but not nessesarily all, a whole lot of trouble though as you would need to define it via a lot of complicated terms.
I like cognitive personhood but it leaves out a lot of people who I would consider people, like newborns and people in comas. I personally think the gradient is the best way to think about it because everything deserves some amount of moral consideration but some more than others.
5:04 I like this definition if you cut out everything after the comma. Personhood rly is a societal construct bcs it does not exist anywhere in the natural world- only in our minds. The stuff after the comma messes everything up and is just kinda stupid.
I think a person is some one that affects society and has an affect on humans with the intention to have the effect.
I don't think one can surrender his personhood deliberately and immediately. Rather, personhood is something that is given to you the moment you were born and if one does have the intention of ruining it, it would take a very long process. Thus, with this theory, criminals are unable to justify themselves in killing a person (which is only one action) just because they "deliberately surrendered" their personhood.
Yeah.
Great work. It would be nice to see more women scholars included. This clip has one!
If personhood is a moral characteristic then Lex Luther (or a rapist) doesn't become "less of a person" by being evil. Being evil is still a moral characteristic. I think this video conflates "moral ability" with "goodness" several times. Still an interesting and worthwhile video.
I love this series so much.
I use most of your video to my philosophy class. Thanks CCP
I feel that intelligence/consciousness is what personhood truly is. For instance, a man is more of a person than say a dog or a young fetus, for his intelligence is much greater than that of the dog and the fetus. Someone like Lex Luthor is less of a person than Superman, for living a life fueled by hatred and pain is not intelligent. This goes for people who are rapists, murderers, pedophiles, etc., and also I believe consciousness is key to this, for someone is something like a cryonic stasis doesn't have much cognitive ability, making him less of a person than someone well alive with a brain that is fully functioning. I would love to hear your ideas on this, so please comment with your opinion on this idea.
Time, please do a philosophy of time!
my point would be if you are a being that has the ability to care about another and suffer then you are human because evil and good humans can can suffer but evil ones can not care about another
"or whenever someone cares about you."
I've always knew I'm not a person....
@@jayjung5234 wtf
i agree with the gradient theory.
So if consciousness is a criterion for being a person, does that mean you're not a person when you're sleeping? Or am I missing something?
I think the idea is someone who is usually conscious except for when they are temporarily unconscious. Someone in a permanent vegetative state can be considered a non-person and therefore euthanized.
Yea, the whole Cognitive criterion, while I agree with it in concept, just hides behind a bunch of other words it can't really define or measure either. I think the point of consciousness being on the list is that even if you are definitely a person by everything else, you need to able to observe and interact with the world for you to be a person.
That is, a person locked in black box I cannot look into might as well not be in a person. Or maybe not, like I said, hiding behind other hard to define or measure words.
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That whole gradient personhood theory starts to sound a bit like Animalism at the end of the video... "All humans are persons, but some humans have more personhood than others."
In my opinion a person is someone who has the moral faculties to ask to be considered one, any objections?
The idea that personhood can be nullified by actions considered inhumane kinda classes a large portion of all humanity over history outside of being people. committing or being complicit in prolific violence and actions considered very immoral by modern standards have been common for the majority of known history. this leads to the idea that the we have only become "people" fairly recently and even that there are places in the world where large sections of society are not "people" yet. This is horrifying.
It can be argued that personhood is a complete abstraction and that no such thing actually exists.
The real question is, if there are non human persons then should you treat a possible threat from them the same as a possible threat from humans?
You matter...
... until you multiply yourself by the speed of light squared
Then you Energy
Can someone please give me the source of Peter Singers theory of personhood? I've been trying to find where they got that quote from and can't seem to source it.
When he talked about Lex in 2:18 I thought he was talking about Donald Drumpf
I think you're grossly misunderstood Peter Singer's words; at least as long as I haven't: I think he's talking about SENTIMENT, NOT SENSATION. The vegetable stuff/paralysis doesn't apply, does it have emotion is what matters.
I think the first theory refers to humanS not just "human". HumanS refers to human beings. That is living organisms with human DNA. Your cheek cells may be living and may be human, but they are not organisms. A dead body may be human and may have once met the criteria of an organism, but they are no longer living.
The gradient theory of personhood and Warren's criteria both contain similar problems in terms of young children not being considered persons or being less of persons. Additionally, this could lead to even more nuanced (and problematically racist) ideas of gradient personhood. For example, it was not too long ago when there was a specified gradient of personhood in regards to race which still haunts our sociological system today. You may counter with biological evidence that this cannot be; however, we must remember we are building conceptual frameworks of humanity. Therefore, that evidence is no more convincing that a fetus has personhood even though it/he/she is, without a doubt, human. Comments to fill in my potential gaps in knowledge are welcome.
Superman!
OK, so... I am a person... And...
Noone else is. I think I've done a good job!
I was invited to shout my views in such a brilliant sarcastic way that I thought... why not ? I have a huge problem with philosophy when I'm asked to give my opinion. So I'll start by saying this : I will define a person as "some being that we should give moral consideration to". Now, that means you're gonna have...eh, about 7 billion views on what or who it should include/exclude. I for one, couldn't tell you what these moral considerations should be, let alone who to grant them to, but still, I'll go through what I thought on the criteria.
Genetic criterion isn't my favorite by one bit thought. There is observable differences in the each human's DNA, someone could therefore find a genetic marquer to deny moral consideration to a group or individual. I disagree with the "Corpse" argument CrashCourse made against it thought ! We treat corpses with moral consideration I think. We build monuments, we bury and respect them, isn't that part of the whole shebang ?
In the Cognitive Criteria, you used the sentence " *or* isn't conscious [...] that's not a being we can call a person", implying you need all five to be a person. Problem is that you could loose one (ability to communicate for instance) while achieving both four of the other criteria (I'm thinking about the Locked-In Syndrome). Disregarding Personhood in this case is therefore morally wrong. If you meant to say "and isn't conscious", then I agree, we should probably give some moral consideration to any being capable of one of those things. Again, what these considerations should be could vary.
Social Criterion is good as well, although it mentioned society, which isn't exactly a one way thing. You could f.i. have some part of the world regarding another as "not persons", just because. You also have individuals that give moral considerations to things that aren't persons. I think however that the notion of individuality might become important in the euthanasia debate, which I'm not gonna enter now.
The sentience argument is nice, not much to say about it. If you focus on fact that "unnecessary pain" is morally wrong, but necessary pain isn't, it may help advance the animal rights debate in a proper way.
The loss of personhood through misbehavior... hard one. I really don't know. I tend to be against death sentence, mainly because I couldn't be the judge. Yet, I still believe some people deserve to die, probably even to suffer.
The Gradient Theory could be great if defined reasonably. I think it could help people with impossible choices like choosing which person to save in a medical situation for instance. But, I also think that the subjectivity of this makes it impossible to apply, because these are situations without a right answer. Choosing someone with "rationally" less personhood isn't morally wrong, it's a choice that you'll have to live with, just like the other choice is.
Conclusion ? I believe it's important to talk about what moral considerations we give to what or who. It opens a whole range of debates into which I can't wait to dive. I believe individual reason and case-by-case approach are often best for the moral questions we are about to face, which is why I can't really give a definitive opinion. Thanks for reading this, if you care to loose even more time, feel free to answer in any way you like.
Confirmed! Hank was born with glasses!
Simple definition of personhood: something has personhood if I say it does. If I say it doesn't, then it doesn't. Easy! :)
someone who is aware of what will happen to them when they die (depending on what their belief is)
the problem with including only certain species like human or even all animals with nerous systems as people is that we all gradually evolved from beings that didn't and that means there's some in the middle. Therefore personhood must be a gradient. The problem is that you have to specifically assign what moral freedoms the "Semi-person" has ad different stages. For example a toddler clearly has the right to life, unlike a 3-week old fetus because the fetus can not feel pain of death. However the toddler would not have the right to make it's own decisions and is subject to the whims of a fully developed and able parent or other guardian. If this was applied to someone with a fully developed personhood, it would be considered slavery.
Perfect.
does cognitive person hood make you not a person when your sleeping or knocked out?
I feel like there is alot of weight cast on this one word "Personhood" i mean your opinion on the entire episode is different depending on your understanding of the words definition. So if you for think personhood can only be had by humans you can still think for example that animals deserve moral consideration as living beings that can feel pain.
what about if you have enough money? can you buy personhood? can you get a bargain, 2 for the price of 1 ?
and that last comment reminded me of Animal Farm...
some animals are more equal than others!
some beings have more personhood than others??
thumbs up anyway, an interesting thing to think about.
MY OPINIONS ON THE MATTER!
ANGRY UNINFORMED REPLY
I REFUTE YOUR OPINION AND POSIT ONE WITH NO EVIDENCE
OMG! I NEVER THOUGHT ABOUT IT THAT WAY! YOU'VE CHANGED MY LIFE!
OFF TOPIC QUESTION
*RAGES ABOUT YOUR STUPID OPINION AND GIVES HIS*
Crash Course Whatever: Hank poses a question, Hank guides us through reasoning to get the answer
Crash Course Philosophy: Hank poses a question, Hank guides us to more questions which are even more frustrating and a little bit mind blowing, then you eat gelato and weep silently
L
O
to me this is not frustrating but very much mind blowing
Philosophy should be mandatory in school.
no just no
Obscene Vegetable Matter
High school maybe, would be a bit much for children.
How to reason should be, but not philosophy like these topics.
well
first of all I think you should change the school system
think about how many people hate math
philosophy is very similar to math by its methods and sometimes its abstractness
so right now a bad idea
probably good in hypothetical good system
I'm teaching Philosophy here in High school.. Mandatory now in our country... I'm corrupting the minds of the youth.
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).
Tough to talk about but worth it
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"if all you need are human DNA, then my mouth cells are persons" 3:54
Then shows red blood cells, which do not have DNA when they mature =.=
really? I learned every cell (except for mutations) carry the same DNA as other cells, including the cell which divided into it. (getting into biology in a philosophical discussion? might be somewhat relevant but it's not the focus here lol)
@@Obi-Wen Red cells are an exception, since all they do is carry carbon dioxide and oxygen. They aren't technically a true cell with DNA in maturity, and mostly function as a protein.
I don't think it is necessary to take away one's personhood in order to punish them for their actions. ...It is by their being people that they can be punished for what they have done.
If you take away their personhood, it is like you are trying to punish a rock for not being a tree.
Yeah. We are mad at Hitler for example because he was a person and he did what he did.
Agreed! As explained in the past episodes, "personhood" changes from time to time. I don't think that murderers and rapists HAVE to be that way forever. And if you're a theist of some sort, taking someone's "personhood" shouldn't be an ability anyway.
Agree, with some exception. When we find fault with a human we find a way to demonize and they become a bad person or an evil person. When we find fault with other fauna we tend to forget they have personalities and become to us mindless beasts. Certain "primitive" cultures still refer to what we think of animals as a monkey person or an elephant person for example. This, to me, suggests a combination of instinctive self preservation coupled with a trained response to a such a "person".
I thought of philosophy as a rubbish subject but you showed me what philosophy really is. I find it very interesting now. Thank you!
Warren's criteria also excludes about a third of humanity at any given point... you know, the part that's -asleep-, as in, not conscious, not able to communicate and definitely not self-aware.
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Being asleep isn't the same thing as being unconscious. I'd also wager that the thought process only excludes you from personhood if you permanently lack one of the criteria, which would not be the case for people who are simply asleep.
FamAD 123 I thought of this, the problem with the "permanently" argument is that, by that logic, fetuses SHOULD be people, since after a few months, they will be conscious and all that. And what about coma patients? In that case, you just don't KNOW if they'll ever wake up for sure, so are they people or not?
When can you say somebody looses their personhood, when can you say they permanently lack one of these? I mean we're not time travelers so we don't know if the person who got hit by a bat and has been out cold for a few hours will wake up. So are they not a person? Maybe they loose it after a week of not waking up? Such a thing does not stand until such an important factor is included.
It is extremely brave of you to make this episode.
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how is it brave to make this episode?
In order for Crash Course to be brave to produce this video they would need to have fear. This particular series has covered a wide range of controversial topic already that could be more dangerous in the current period of history. The fact that it is a complicated subject does not make one brave to discuss it... especially in a video format on a public domain. The video could be described as brave if they would have taken a firm stance on exactly what defines personhood and argued for that sake at the risk of repercussion. Since there is no possible repercussion from this video there was nothing that required bravery. It is an extremely well thought out video and a great discussion starter...but not brave.
+Brian Griffin My guess would be that because this is a hot button issue it's kinda risky to bring it up. But I think that bravery comes from taking a stance on a subject rather than discussing something that should and is constantly being debated and considered. Not to say that somebody somewhere didn't get their knickers in a twist and add the bookshelves to their hit list because a group of people decided to actually present something for consideration and *gasp* allow people to draw their own conclusions.
+Will Plume So yeah, I guess it is kinda brave. Mayhaps I need not be such a muscle brained purist.
I find that the gradient approach is serving me quite well on a moral basis now. Thanks so much for this video!
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+Nick Christensen that is on point
Personhood wasn't the primary criterion on the Titanic.
The gradient view doesn't work as an independent idea of personhood, you have to mix it with one of the other views. So for example, if you say that a man on the Titanic has more personhood than a child (or vice-versa,) you have to explain why. Is it because the man has more cells containing DNA? Because he is more cognitive? More important socially? Or more sentient?
The problem I have with the gradient approach is that it could be used to justify discrimination. For example, people with IQ less than 100 could be considered inferior to those with IQ's of 150 because they have a greater capacity to reason.
[Unsolicited opinions on Israel]
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