Core Self-Awareness and Personhood

Abstract

<p>All beings who possess the capacity for core self-awareness are moral persons and ought to be legal persons. More specifically, I argue that core self-aware beings ought not to be used merely as a means. This moral prohibition ought to be legally enforced and such enforcement can only be effectively accomplished with legal personhood status. Moreover, the moral prohibition that core self-aware beings ought not to be used merely as a means constitutes the essence of moral personhood. This prohibition is defended with four mutually supportive justifications: Kantian ethics, utilitarianism, ethical empathism and a principle of equal consideration of interests. The moral frameworks appealed to either support the thesis directly or do so after philosophically questionable elements have been removed form them. These frameworks are ultimately justified by an appeal to Aristotelian ethics. Although Aristotle concludes that only those who are capable of abstract rational contemplation can embody the good that is the proper subject of moral philosophy, it is briefly claimed within this thesis that Aristotle's undefended premises assume this conclusion. This claim regarding Aristotle's conclusion about rational beings is not defended herein and is left for a future work. The thesis that all beings who possess the capacity for core self-awareness are persons, or ought not to be used merely as a means, is relatively rare in philosophical discourse. The present work is original because its essential claim is defended with a synergy of seemingly disparate traditional moral theories, a new moral theory and a principle of equal consideration of interests. It is a significant contribution to III philosophical knowledge because the question of who counts in ethics, or who is the proper subject of moral discourse, is fundamental to moral philosophy. An important political implication of this thesis is that non-human animals are persons.</p>