I do ethics at school and am exploring what personhood means; whether it be human genetic make-up, rational thought or

Question: I do ethics at school and am exploring what personhood means; whether it be human genetic make-up, rational thought or independant survival. What do you feel makes a person a person and whether interferance in science (prolonging people\'s lives further and further from the natural) is right or will the long term consequences have to terrible a result (such a over-population the earth). Just a thought, is prolonging a persons\' life with increasing medical knowledge a form of genetic engineering? It is, of course, interfering with nature!

Asked by 06offtho to Antonia, Douglas, Hugh, Matt, Tom on 17 Jun 2010 in Categories: General.
- Douglas Blane answered on 16 Jun 2010:
  
  You say “of course it’s interfering with nature”, but is that obvious? Humans are part of nature too, so you could say anything humans do is part of nature.
  
  The whole idea of natural and artificial is a bit ….artificial. The natural world is a cold and violent place and it’s only feeliings like sympathy and compassion, which humans and a number of other animals have, that makes it less so.
  
  In terms of individuals and right and wrong, the fundamental ethical value is that persons should be treated as ends and never as means to an end. So persons have a right to life and some kind of happiness. If that means using medical means to prolong their lives that’s fine.
  
  I also beleve the idea of personhood belongs not just to individual humans but also to a lot of animals. Elephants for instance show grief when they lose a family member. So elephants are persons. So are dolphins, apes, dogs etc.
  
  It’s a big queston. Good luck with it. 🙂
- Antonia Hamilton answered on 16 Jun 2010:
  
  personhood is hard to define and there probably isn’t an absolute definition. Is a 6 week old fetus (too small to have a brain) a person? Is someone in an irreversable coma a person? I don’t think genetics defines personhood (is a rational, emotional computer a person) nor does rational thought (most people aren’t very rational). Independence is a tough criteria too – none of us would survive long in the wilderness and completely independent of other people. I don’t think prolonging life with medicine is genetic engineering because it doesn’t change the person’s genes, but it is interfering with the ‘natural order’. Of course, the natural order is often very cruel.
- Hugh Roderick answered on 16 Jun 2010:
  
  A complex question! My opinion is that what makes a person, and indeed any animal or plant, is a synthesis of genes and environment, the genes produce the framework upon which environment acts.
  
  It’s certainly true to say that we have changed the world we live in and that interfering with nature is what we have been doing since we evolved and more so since we developed farming 10,000 years ago. But that is also true of any animal or plant, they manipulate the environment around them to make it easier for them to survive, we are just a species that have managed to do it on a global scale. I think interference with science as you put it is right, because although science can cause problems it has also been very effective in solving problems. Hope that makes sense! Please ask me to explain more if there is anything I didn’t explain well.
- Matthew Hurley answered on 17 Jun 2010:
  
  Wow! This could be a title of a dissertation (or a book!)!
  I think if we can treat disease we should – to relieve suffering and improve quality of life. I don’t think that things just to increase who long humans can live though is worthwhile.
  Keeping people alive though who otherwise would die does of course over populated the world – that means we need to adapt the environment around us, or can we go back and throw all the medicine away?