Table Of ContentP
OSTHUMAN
P
ERSONHOOD
______________________
Daryl J. Wennemann
®
University Press of America, Inc.
Lanham · Boulder · New York · Toronto · Plymouth, UK
Copyright © 2013 by
University Press of America,® Inc.
4501 Forbes Boulevard
Suite 200
Lanham, Maryland 20706
UPA Acquisitions Department (301) 459-3366
10 Thornbury Road
Plymouth PL6 7PP
United Kingdom
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
British Library Cataloging in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Control Number: 2013933551
ISBN: 978-0-7618-6103-4 (clothbound : alk. paper)
eISBN: 978-0-7618-6104-1
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum
requirements of American National Standard for Information
Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials,
ANSI Z39.48-1992
For my teachers
Preface
“God is no respecter of persons.” This text from Acts 10:34 is a
rather shocking New Testament teaching. But the meaning of the
Greek term “προσωπολήμπτης” (“προσωπολήπτης” in one
manuscript) in this passage has the sense that God does not show
favoritism. Here the term translated as “respecter of persons” might
be better understood as having the sense of “respecter of
personages”. The religious attitude expressed in this passage is that
salvation is open to all persons. It is not restricted to the Jews or the
wealthy or those having a high social status. Of course, according to
the New Testament teaching, salvation is open to these persons as
well. This religious insight is easily related to the root meaning of the
term “person”. The Latin root of the term, “persona,” is traceable to
the ancient Greek use of masks (πρόσωπα) in plays. The meaning
of the term “persona” is literally “to sound through”. The character of
an individual was indicated by the outward mask of the actor. The
revelation of the New Testament is directed to all individuals of faith
regardless of their social standing. It is not impressed with the
outward status of personages whose social roles give them
preeminence of place.
Likewise, in the Western philosophical tradition, the moral law
applies to all persons. The class of persons makes up the moral
community, those to whom we are obligated to recognize as having
a status making them direct objects of moral concern. But who and
or what is a person? That is the focus of this study. We will be
concerned with defining the moral community so as to determine
who and or what should be accepted as a person in the moral sense.
The moral concept of personhood can be distinguished from the
legal concept. From a legal perspective, a person is any being that is
recognized as having legal standing. A person’s legal rights and
responsibilities must be recognized over against other objects that
may be treated as property. It is a peculiarity of American law that
corporations are recognized as having the status of a person. Of
course, this is a legal fiction.
In the moral realm, certain beings are recognized as having the
standing of persons within a moral community. But the constitution of
the moral community is subject to controversy. Today, there are
some who would restrict the moral community to those human
beings that are able to exercise the capacities of persons. Only
those human beings that can reason and make responsible
decisions would be recognized as having the standing of a person.
To be a person, from this perspective, is to be able to perform as a
person. Such a performance-based model of personhood would
exclude those human beings that are seriously disabled or
developmentally immature. As we shall see, others would extend the
moral community to all human beings. Membership in the human
species is taken to be constitutive of membership in the moral
community. This is a traditional approach to personhood that finds
expression in the concept of universal human rights.
In recent times, theories of the moral community have been
developed that would extend direct moral concern to non-human
animals. Others would extend it to the entire natural environment. In
what some refer to as a “Posthuman Age” the moral community is
conceived as potentially including genetically altered human beings,
robots, computers, and aliens (should they exist). Such a conception
of the moral community seems to break the bounds of our traditional
ethical concepts. What could it mean to consider a computer a
person? What kinds of moral obligations would we have toward
robots? I believe that this remarkable and shocking situation opens
the possibility for us to engage in a fresh reflection on the
constitution of the moral community. I will argue that the traditional
concept of personhood may apply to this new situation and provide
some moral orientation as we enter the posthuman age. The
traditional conception of a moral community would include any and
all persons. And so, if there should exist persons that are not
biologically human, they should be treated with the respect that
applies to persons as such.
The context of a posthuman age also focuses our attention
more sharply on the moral standing of human beings that suffer from
some disability or those that are developmentally immature. Do they
have a moral claim on us regarding their care and treatment? To
genetically alter a human fetus to eliminate some genetic defect, if it
were possible, seems clearly within the realm of moral permissibility.
But to genetically alter a human being so as to enhance the
individual’s performance seems to be quite another thing from a
moral point of view. That is the kind of moral predicament we face in
a posthuman age. Perhaps this can be seen as a new kind of
personage. It would be easy to slip into a moral attitude that gives
precedence to those with genetically enhanced abilities. The
problem of doping in sports will be a minor issue by comparison.
It will be obvious to the discerning reader that my approach to
the issue of posthuman personhood has deep philosophical roots in
the tradition of personalism. But my argument will be that the
development of various technologies that may alter human beings in
significant ways requires that we reflect on the possibility of persons
that are not biologically human, or that are biologically human but
that have been genetically altered or enhanced pharmacologically.
The existence of cyborgs presents yet another topic for ethical
reflection. Human beings are increasingly being enhanced with
technological devices such as brain implants and exoskeletons, etc.
This seems to introduce into the world a new set of beings that have
not previously existed. As a result, we must reflect on the categories
we apply to objects in the world. To which should the term “person”
be applied? The personalist philosophical tradition has focused on
the uniqueness of human beings, understood as a biological kind. It
has also been concerned in some of its strains to reflect on the
divine persons. Now we are confronted with new categories of
beings that may be included in the moral category of persons. As
such, they should be included in our conception of the moral
community. If we do not develop our moral concepts in light of the
new technologies in the offing, we are likely to experience a terrible
moral anomie. My hope is that the development of a posthuman age
will provide the occasion for a moral reflection that will improve our
understanding of the uniqueness of human beings and help to clarify
our traditional moral concepts as they apply to a new social and
moral context. If we should be able to get out ahead of the
technological developments we can see on the horizon, then we may
be able to exercise the kind of moral responsibility the new
technologies demand of us. Then our technological endeavors may
contribute to the maintenance of a personal existence that reflects
the creativity and freedom that ground our attempt at the
technological mastery of the world. If we should fail to carry out such
an ethical reflection, then we may unwittingly destroy the very basis
for personal existence that gives meaning to our technological
endeavors. The stakes could not be any higher.
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Fontbonne University for granting me a sabbatical
leave in the Fall of 2011 during which I was able to write most of the
text. Laura Espinoza at University Press of America was most helpful
in guiding me through the process of formatting the text. I would like
to acknowledge the work of Cynthia and Robert Swanson on the
index. My thanks go to my wife, Cheryl Wennemann, for applying her
computer expertise to the formatting of the text. There are two texts
that I have translated from the German in epigraphs. One is at the
beginning of chapter 4 and the other at the beginning of chapter 7.
Chapter 1
Welcome to the Posthuman Age
Verum esse ipsum factum
Giambattista Vico
Men are sustained, in faith and work, not by what
they find in the universe, but by what man has
built there.
Lewis Mumford
Everything is good as it leaves the hands of the
Author of things; everything degenerates in the
hand of man;…[Man] disfigures everything; he
loves deformity, monsters. He wants nothing as
nature made it; not even man;
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
