In class we defined a person as the conscious subject of a life (SOAL). We listed the necessary and sufficient conditions for a person as cognitive, affective, conscious and purposeful. Although cognitive and affective seem to be reasonable distinctions (I have my reservations about the use of purposeful, but that seems to be a matter of vagueness to be settled at a later date) the issue of consciousness I find to be a contentious one.
There are several aspects of the consciousness problem we need to consider. First, that all of the necessary and sufficient conditions for life are to be considered as active states, not capacities, for an organism to be a person. Thus, a human being in a coma would no longer be considered a person, given that they do not possess, at the moment the power of consciousness. What then of a human being who is asleep? Unless we redefine consciousness in some way as to claim that human beings are conscious while they sleep, which we typically consider to be an unconscious state, then sleeping humans should not be considered persons either. This conclusion has what I consider to be disturbing implications. If the primary purpose of the designation of "person" status to certain organisms is to garner the respect and consideration such a designation deserves, then a sleeping human being would, in that sense, not be worthy of such consideration.
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