Personhood: Crash Course Philosophy #21

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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[no_torrs]

Crashcourse philosophy has been truly masterful at handling difficult topics in a very rational way. Keep up the good work.

[botigamer]

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

[nolanhanna]

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

[harrycurtis]

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).

[brianhack]

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.

[flyingspacemasterchief]

Thanks to Crash Course Philosophy, is now my favorite subject.

[XregularC_Casual]

I thought of philosophy as a rubbish subject but you showed me what philosophy really is. I find it very interesting now. Thank you!

[timothythejedi]

"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 =.=

[NourAhmed-gojo]

he had glasses in his mother's womb

[TwentySeventhLetter]

I find that the gradient approach is serving me quite well on a moral basis now. Thanks so much for this video!

[jonleandersn]

i think hank does a great job of talking about these kinds of things in a neutral, objective way, which is important when educating. good job, hank!

[KCSaxe]

Can I just say how much I appreciate that the ads were at the end of the episode. Thanks squarespace !

[willplume]

Great episode. My philosophy teacher back in college took two classes to discuss this and didn't do the awesome job you guys did. Two thumbs up.

[sammjust]

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.

[eddie]

I'm grateful for this season of crashcourse, it's a helpful introduction.

[sportmanatg]

Great series! Keep it up! To the description or to the videos themselves you should add a suggested readings section or additional information area about the video, so people with interest in that topic can find out more about it.

[VCheesey]

>3. Self-motivated activity
>4. Capacity to communicate
or
>Social Criterion

Dang guess I'm not a person

[Sluggernaut]

It is extremely brave of you to make this episode.

[HannahNewberry-ny]

Thanks to Crash Course for helping me through philosophy class this semester in an engaging way. I can imagine I'll continue to use this channel throughout college and beyond :)

[karimayoubi]

"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! 😂