9 Persons: natural, functional, or ethical kind?

American Journal of Economics and Sociology, The,  Jan, 2007  by John P. Lizza

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Indeed, little thought seems to have been given to the moral implications of identifying ourselves with human organisms, dead or alive. For example, David Mackie (1999) observes that the formulation of animalism that identifies the person with the human organism in Feldman's "dead or alive" sense invites the question, "Who are 'we'?" Mackie then states: "To this question, the answer must be that 'we' means you, me, and those persons who are of the same substantial kind as us." (16) Since Mackie and Feldman identify persons with members of the biological kind Homo sapiens, and since they believe that human corpses are still members of that biological kind, they count human corpses among the "we." One wonders what company Feldman and Mackie keep! They appear not to have the "discomfort,' that Wiggins says most of us feel about any straightforward identification of ourselves with our bodies. They also ignore the relevance of subjectivity and reciprocity that Wiggins, Gill, Harre, and others identify as central to personhood.

This resistance to identifying ourselves with our bodies can be extended to other cases. For example, although many believe that we accept the loss of all brain functions as death because it entails the irreversible loss of organic integration, this is mistaken. Likewise, cases of postmortem pregnancy and the extraordinary case of a whole-brain-dead body sustained for over 13 years challenge the idea that brain function is necessary for organic integration. Instead, the real reason we accept the loss of all brain functions as death is that it entails the irreversible loss of consciousness and every other mental function. Most of us would not identify ourselves with our whole-brain-dead bodies even though those bodies may be artificially sustained because those bodies lack the potential for any mental functions. The same could be said about many people's intuitions about anencephalics and individuals in PermVS, although I suspect that there may be more uncertainty about these cases. However, this uncertainty may have to do mostly with an uncertainty about whether individuals in PermVS or anencephalics have any potential for consciousness.

When we come to human organisms who have the potential for consciousness and other mental functions or who demonstrate minimal awareness and sentience, I think there is much greater disagreement about whether to include them among the "we." Consideration of the moral significance of sentience and potentiality complicates matters. While few moral theories accord any moral standing to beings that utterly lack the potential for consciousness, awareness, and sentience (Warren 2000), some moral theories, such as utilitarianism, assign moral value to beings with consciousness and sentience. Whether such value is sufficient for the high moral standing that is usually accorded to persons, however, is an open question.

Thus, the initial intuitions that we have about whether we should count individuals in PermVS and the artificially sustained whole-brain dead as among the "we" may receive support from more reflective moral considerations. While Feldman is right that consideration of the biological structure of dead specimens of the human species, that is, dead persons, may lead us to consider them to be human beings or persons (compare butterflies carefully preserved and mounted), biological structure is only one aspect of human beings and persons. Unless we think that our ontology is completely independent of having a perspective on the world, values, and interests, there is no reason why these biological aspects should take precedence over the psychological and moral aspects of persons.