FUNCTIONAL PERSON
(MEMORY THEORY)
?
MATERIAL PERSON
(MATERIALIST VIEW)
MENTAL PERSON
(CARTESIAN VIEW)
WHAT'S A PERSON?
BEING A PERSON
REQUIRES ...
?
?
SELF
CONSCIOUSNESS
CREATIVITY
REQUIRES
REQUIRES
REQUIRES
REQUIRES
REQUIRES
REQUIRES
REQUIRES
MEMORIES
FREE WILL
REQUIRES
REQUIRES
RESPONSIBILITY
REQUIRE
CONSCIOUSNESS
REQUIRE
REQUIRES
REQUIRE
RAW FEELS
REQUIRE
INTENTIONAL STATES
REQUIRE
REQUIRE
PERCEPTUAL STATES
PERSISTENCE
("LASTING
THROUGH
TIME")
Locke on Persons
• [T]o find wherein personal Identity consists, we
must consider what Person stands for; which, I
think, is a thinking intelligent Being. That has
reason and reflection and can consider it self as it
self, the same thinking thing in different times and
places; which it does only by that consciousness,
which is inseparable from thinking, and as it
seems to me essential to it: It being impossible for
any one to perceive, without perceiving, that he
does perceive. Essay, II.xxvii.9
Locke on Persons
• Locke also says:
• Person, as I take it, is the name for this self.
Where-ever a Man finds, what he calls himself,
there I think another may say is the same Person.
It is a Forensick Term appropriating Actions and
their Merit; and so belongs only to intelligent
Agents capable of a Law, and Happiness and
Misery. Essay, II.xxvii.26
BEING A PERSON
REQUIRES ...
SELF
CONSCIOUSNESS
REQUIRES
REQUIRES
A
HOPED FOR
FUTURE
HOPED FOR
FUTURE
REQUIRES
MEMORIES
A Common Assumption and a Question
• Assumption: All (or most all) humans are
persons and persons have a Right to Life
(have a right to continue to persist).
• Question: Are there animals other than
humans that are persons and thus have a
Right to Life [that is (obviously) violated
if/when we EAT them?]
‘Burgers “R” Us: On an
Apologetics For Carnivores
Jim Fahey
Rensselaer
Department of Cognitive Science (retired)
10/18/2012
A Note on ‘Apologetics’
• APOLOGY
-
a formal justification or
defense
• So, what I plan to discuss is:
• a certain justification for the (admittedly
unnecessary) killing of an animal for food
by humans that holds that such killing
does not violate any intrinsic rights that
the animal might possess.
Some Assumptions:
• In What follows I will assume a number of things
each of which is controversial:
• 1. Moral Principles are REAL (objective);
• 2. RIGHTS are REAL since they derive from
Real Moral Principles;
• 3. Rights Imply Obligations Principle = def. If
s has right R, then all who are capable are morally
obligated (ceterus paribus) to refrain from
violating that right.
Interest Theory of Rights
• If s has right R, then s is capable of
having an interest I in that to which R
pertains.
• In short:
R I
• Note: it is NOT the case that I  R,
however, if s has an interest I, then s is a
candidate for having a corresponding right
R.
Note:
Minimally, my version of this theory requires that if an
entity has a right, it must be capable of being aware of
the presence or absence of that to which the right
pertains. So, for example, if s has the right to “be free
from bodily harm,” s must be capable of being aware
of the presence/absence of bodily harm.
We have little or no reason to believe that such things as
stones or chairs have any awareness at all. Thus,
according to ITR (interest theory of rights) neither
stones nor chairs are candidates for having rights.
Note (cont.)
• More formally:
• If stones have rights, then stones have
interests.
• Stones have no interests.
• --------------------------------------------• Stones have no rights.
Requirements for the Having of
Interests?
I believe that a strong case can be made for
the following:
If something s has (is capable of having) an
interest, I,
then s is (is capable of being)
CONSCIOUS, C.
That is: I
C
Rights: the Consciousness
Requirement
•RI
•IC
• ~C
• -------• ~R
Rights of Plants?
• If plants have rights, then plants have
interests.
• If plants have interests, then plants are
conscious.
• Plants are not conscious.
• --------------------------------------------• Plants have no rights.
Persons and the Right to Persist
• If we accept ITR and that
All persons have the right to life
(right to persist), that is,
• 1. s is a person  s has a right to life
then it follows from ITR that
• 2. s is a person  s has an interest in life
(s is capable of having an interest in life).
Self Consciousness and
Personhood
• What are the requirements for having an
INTEREST IN LIFE?
• In accord with certain traditional accounts of
“persons,” a strong case can be made for the view
that in order for one to have (be capable of having)
an interest in life in the sense at issue, one must be
capable of thinking about oneself as an ongoing
entity– as a something that has both a past and an
anticipated future. If this is the case, then in order
for one to have an interest in life it is NOT enough
for one to be merely CONSCIOUS – one has to be
SELF CONSCIOUS as well.
What is Consciousness?
• What is consciousness? I think it is fair to say that
there is no generally accepted answer. Typically,
however, we say that consciousness includes such
things as:
• RAW FEELS: feelings such as pain or love;
• PERCEPTUAL STATES: for example, my
"seeing" of a "blue patch of color" when I look out
at the Lake;
• INTENTIONAL STATES: my having of such
things as beliefs about things - for example my
belief about the Lake that it is cold.
What is Self Consciousness?
• What is self consciousness? One philosopher (D.
Hume) attempts to shed light on this as follows:
• Consciousness is analogous to being in the
audience and being aware of what happens on
stage. Self consciousness is being aware of
yourself-being-in-the-audience-and-being-awareof-what-happens-on-stage.
• If you are a self conscious entity, then typically
you have the ability to reflect back on your history
and see yourself as a something that has a past, a
present, as well as a hoped-for-future.
Self Consciousness and
Personhood (cont.)
• (3) s has an interest in life  s is self
conscious.
•
(s is capable of having an interest in life
 s is capable of being self conscious.)
• It would thus follow that if some entity s is NOT
self conscious, then s has no right to life and thus
is not a person.
•
•
We thus arrive at:
SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS
CRITERION OF
PERSONHOOD:
• (4) s is a person  s is self conscious
(That is, s is capable (in a relevant sense of
capable) of being robustly self conscious.)
The Argument thus far:
• For some entity s,
• (1) s is a Person  sRLife
• (2) sRLife  sILife
• (3) sILife  s is Self Conscious
• ----------------------------
• (4) s is a Person  sRLife  s is Self
Conscious
Locke on Persons
• [T]o find wherein personal Identity consists, we
must consider what Person stands for; which, I
think, is a thinking intelligent Being. That has
reason and reflection and can consider it self as it
self, the same thinking thing in different times and
places; which it does only by that consciousness,
which is inseparable from thinking, and as it
seems to me essential to it: It being impossible for
any one to perceive, without perceiving, that he
does perceive.
Consciousness without Self Consciousness?
• Locke (and likely Descartes) thought it
impossible to have consciousness without
also having self consciousness. That is they
believed that
C  SC
and because of this they believed it likely
that
No animals are Conscious!
Consciousness without Self Consciousness?
Today it is more common among animal
psychologists to believe that many animals
are CONSCIOUS but they are not SELF
CONSCIOUS.
So while
SC  C
it is FALSE that
C  SC
Self Consciousness
and
(non-Human) ANIMALS
•
Psychologists attempt to devise
experiments that provide empirical evidence
that an entity is or is not self conscious.
One such test is the "mirror test“ (Gordon
Gallup). Only a few animals pass the
"mirror test."
Monkey in the Mirror
• (NOVA video)
Passing the Mirror Test
• Should we allow that “passing the mirror test”
shows that an animal possesses a variety of self
consciousness that makes it a candidate for
personhood?
• If so, should we allow further that all entities who
pass the mirror test are persons?
• We should be careful here …(Watson)
• Mere Self Recognition may not require
Self Consciousness of a sufficiently robust
sort to be indicative of personhood.
Self Consciousness
and the
Right to Life
• Nevertheless, I am willing to defend the
claim that:
• If an entity s is capable (in a relevant sense
of capable) of sufficiently robust Self
Consciousness, then s has the Right to Life
• s is Self Conscious  sRLife
• And thus
Some Non-Humans
Have the Right to Life!
• … since I think there is little doubt that the selfrecognition-behavior exhibited by chimps and
orangoutangs provides good evidence that they
are in a relevant sense capable of sufficiently
robust self consciousness …
CHIMPS AND ORANGOUTANGS
HAVE A RIGHT TO LIFE.
The Bottom Line:
The ‘Burger
• We have little or no evidence that animals such as
dogs, cats, cows, chickens, … are self conscious
and thus we have little or no evidence that they
have a robust interest in life. So while these
animals may have some INTERESTS and
corresponding RIGHTS
(Note that we hold that these animals have the
RIGHT to be free from CRUELTY)
they DO NOT HAVE THE RIGHT TO LIFE.
The Bottom Line:
The ‘Burger
• Thus, the painless killing of
dogs, cats, cows, chickens and
the like does not violate their
rights and so your ‘burger and
nuggets can be enjoyed in
“good conscience.”
OR CAN IT?
NOW,
THE STING
BEING A PERSON
REQUIRES ...
SELF
CONSCIOUSNESS
REQUIRES
REQUIRES
A
HOPED FOR
FUTURE
HOPED FOR
FUTURE
REQUIRES
MEMORIES
The Relevance of a
Less Robust Self Consciousness?
• Remember my claim …
• If an entity s is capable (in a relevant sense
of capable) of sufficiently robust Self
Consciousness, then s has the Right to
Life.
• s is Self Conscious  sRLife
• What if having an appropriate capability
of self consciousness requires merely that
• s has HOPES & DREAMS!
The Relevance of a
Less Robust Self Consciousness?
• As Darwin remarked,
“can we feel sure that an old dog with an excellent
memory and some power of imagination, as shewn
by his dreams, never reflects on his past pleasures
in the chase? And this would be a form of selfconsciousness.”
Darwin, C. (1871) The Descent of Man and
Selection in Relation to Sex, p. 62.
The Final
Bottom Line
• So perhaps we should worry about our
indiscriminate using of cows and chickens, pigs
and lambs.
• With apologies to Yeats …
• But I, being poor, have only my hopes & dreams,
I have spread my hopes & dreams under your feet;
Tread softly, because you tread on my
hopes & dreams.
He Wishes For the Cloths of Heaven
(W. B. Yeats)
• HAD I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
A Look Ahead: Androids and the
Interest Theory of Rights
•
•
•
•
•
•
Searle’s Chinese Room and ITR:
(1) s is a Person  sRLife
(2) sRLife  sILife
(3) sILife  s is Self Conscious (SC)
(4) s is SC  s has Intentional States
(5) ~ s has Intentional States (Searle’s
Arg. applied to “mere” Turing Machines)
• ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
• (6) ~ s is Self Conscious & ~ sILife & sRLife
& ~ s is a person