Is Every Single Human Being a Person? A Dispute Between Robert Spaemann and Peter Singer

One of the central issues of contemporary philosophy concerns the definition of the person. Many philosophers and bioethicists have sought to determine the basis for ascribing personhood, and to resolve the associated question of whether only human beings may be properly granted this status. Two co...

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Autor principal:	Jakub Bugajski
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN PL
Publicado:	Ksiegarnia Akademicka Publishing 2017
Materias:	personalism utilitarianism personhood preferences dignity Ethnology. Social and cultural anthropology GN301-674
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/bdb9cf0886f54e26b586ea81f448383d
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spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:bdb9cf0886f54e26b586ea81f448383d2021-11-27T12:55:42ZIs Every Single Human Being a Person? A Dispute Between Robert Spaemann and Peter Singer10.12797/RM.01.2017.02.032544-21392544-2546https://doaj.org/article/bdb9cf0886f54e26b586ea81f448383d2017-11-01T00:00:00Zhttps://journals.akademicka.pl/relacje/article/view/519https://doaj.org/toc/2544-2139https://doaj.org/toc/2544-2546 One of the central issues of contemporary philosophy concerns the definition of the person. Many philosophers and bioethicists have sought to determine the basis for ascribing personhood, and to resolve the associated question of whether only human beings may be properly granted this status. Two contemporary thinkers have played a leading role in this debate, namely Robert Spaemann and Peter Singer. The former, coming from the tradition of Christian thought, seeks to demonstrate that the personality of a human being begins when he or she is conceived and ends with his or her death. In his opinion, only God, as the source of all life, has a right to exercise authority over human destiny. The opposite position is defended by the Australian philosopher Peter Singer. His philosophical views have emerged from the tradition of empiricist thought initiated by Democritus and expanded on later, above all, by John Locke. Singer postulates a descriptive theoretical account of persons, claiming that personhood results from the possession of a set of qualitative features, namely: to become a person, a human being ought to have certain properties, such as self-awareness, rationality of thought, or the possession of preferences – without these, he would say, one cannot even talk about persons. This paper seeks to confront the tenets of personalist ethics (as in Spaemann) with those of preference-based utilitarianism (Peter Singer), presenting the metaphysical, ontological and cognitive commitments that make up these two positions, but also asking whether there is any shared set of underlying concerns that could furnish a basis for dialogue between them. Jakub BugajskiKsiegarnia Akademicka PublishingarticlepersonalismutilitarianismpersonhoodpreferencesdignityEthnology. Social and cultural anthropologyGN301-674ENPLRelacje Międzykulturowe, Vol 1, Iss 2(2) (2017)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN PL
topic	personalism utilitarianism personhood preferences dignity Ethnology. Social and cultural anthropology GN301-674
spellingShingle	personalism utilitarianism personhood preferences dignity Ethnology. Social and cultural anthropology GN301-674 Jakub Bugajski Is Every Single Human Being a Person? A Dispute Between Robert Spaemann and Peter Singer
description	One of the central issues of contemporary philosophy concerns the definition of the person. Many philosophers and bioethicists have sought to determine the basis for ascribing personhood, and to resolve the associated question of whether only human beings may be properly granted this status. Two contemporary thinkers have played a leading role in this debate, namely Robert Spaemann and Peter Singer. The former, coming from the tradition of Christian thought, seeks to demonstrate that the personality of a human being begins when he or she is conceived and ends with his or her death. In his opinion, only God, as the source of all life, has a right to exercise authority over human destiny. The opposite position is defended by the Australian philosopher Peter Singer. His philosophical views have emerged from the tradition of empiricist thought initiated by Democritus and expanded on later, above all, by John Locke. Singer postulates a descriptive theoretical account of persons, claiming that personhood results from the possession of a set of qualitative features, namely: to become a person, a human being ought to have certain properties, such as self-awareness, rationality of thought, or the possession of preferences – without these, he would say, one cannot even talk about persons. This paper seeks to confront the tenets of personalist ethics (as in Spaemann) with those of preference-based utilitarianism (Peter Singer), presenting the metaphysical, ontological and cognitive commitments that make up these two positions, but also asking whether there is any shared set of underlying concerns that could furnish a basis for dialogue between them.
format	article
author	Jakub Bugajski
author_facet	Jakub Bugajski
author_sort	Jakub Bugajski
title	Is Every Single Human Being a Person? A Dispute Between Robert Spaemann and Peter Singer
title_short	Is Every Single Human Being a Person? A Dispute Between Robert Spaemann and Peter Singer
title_full	Is Every Single Human Being a Person? A Dispute Between Robert Spaemann and Peter Singer
title_fullStr	Is Every Single Human Being a Person? A Dispute Between Robert Spaemann and Peter Singer
title_full_unstemmed	Is Every Single Human Being a Person? A Dispute Between Robert Spaemann and Peter Singer
title_sort	is every single human being a person? a dispute between robert spaemann and peter singer
publisher	Ksiegarnia Akademicka Publishing
publishDate	2017
url	https://doaj.org/article/bdb9cf0886f54e26b586ea81f448383d
work_keys_str_mv	AT jakubbugajski iseverysinglehumanbeingapersonadisputebetweenrobertspaemannandpetersinger
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Is Every Single Human Being a Person? A Dispute Between Robert Spaemann and Peter Singer

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