person

Dictionary: per·son (pûr'sən) pronunciation

A living human. Often used in combination: chairperson; spokesperson; salesperson.
An individual of specified character: a person of importance.
The composite of characteristics that make up an individual personality; the self.
The living body of a human: searched the prisoner's person.
Physique and general appearance.
Law. A human or organization with legal rights and duties.
Christianity. Any of the three separate individualities of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, as distinguished from the essence of the Godhead that unites them.
Grammar.
1. Any of three groups of pronoun forms with corresponding verb inflections that distinguish the speaker (first person), the individual addressed (second person), and the individual or thing spoken of (third person).
2. Any of the different forms or inflections expressing these distinctions.
A character or role, as in a play; a guise: “Well, in her person, I say I will not have you” (Shakespeare).

idiom:

in person

In one's physical presence; personally: applied for the job in person.

[Middle English, from Old French persone, from Latin persōna, mask, role, person, probably from Etruscan phersu, mask.]

USAGE NOTE The word person has found widespread use in recent decades as a gender-neutral alternative to man in the names of occupational and social roles, such as businessperson, chairperson, spokesperson, and layperson. In addition, a variety of entirely new, more inclusive phrases have arisen to compete with or supplant –man compounds. Now we often hear first-year student instead of freshman and letter carrier instead of mailman. In other cases, a clipped form, such as chair for chairman, or a phrase, such as member of the clergy for clergyman, has found widespread use as a neutral alternative. Reflecting this trend, new standards of official usage for occupational titles have been established by the U.S. Department of Labor and other government agencies; for instance, in official contexts, terms such as firefighter and police officer are now generally used in place of fireman and policeman. See Usage Notes at man.

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Business Dictionary: Person

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An individual, trust, estate, partnership, association, company, or corporation having certain legal rights and responsibilities.

Real Estate Dictionary: Person

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In law, an Entity having legal responsibility. Legally, a natural person is a human being who has reached Majority. (Compare with Minor.) An artificial person may be a Corporation in some instances Partnerships governments, and certain other bodies are considered persons.
Example: negotiating a contract, it is important to deal with a person; otherwise the contract may be unenforceable.

Thesaurus: person

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noun

See

Idioms: person

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Idioms beginning with person:
person of color

In addition to the idiom beginning with person, also see feel like oneself (a new person); in person; own person, one's.

Antonyms: person

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Definition: human being
Antonyms: animal, plant

Architecture: person

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According to most codes: an individual, partnership, corporation, or other legal entity.

Philosophy Dictionary: person

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One of the central problems of metaphysics is what it is to be a person. The answer ought to account for central phenomena of personhood; rationality, command of language, self-consciousness, control or agency, and moral worth or title to respect, are amongst the salient characteristics that have been thought to distinguish persons from other forms of life. In Locke, ‘person’ is a forensic term, applying for moral reasons (‘to agents capable of a law, and happiness and misery’, Essay, ii. 27). A dualistic approach regards a person as an amalgam of an essentially separate mind and body, with the resulting problem of reinventing their unity in the living person (see mind-body problem, occasionalism). Monistic theories, such as that of Strawson's Individuals (1959), work with a primitive concept of a person, as some one thing logically capable of being described in bodily or mental terms. A popular modern analogy is with the compatible software and hardware descriptions of a computer (see functionalism).

Law Encyclopedia: Person

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This entry contains information applicable to United States law only.

In general usage, a human being; by statute, however, the term can include firms, labor organizations, partnerships, associations, corporations, legal representatives, trustees, trustees in bankruptcy, or receivers.

A corporation is a "person" for purposes of the constitutional guarantees of equal protection of laws and due process of law.

Foreign governments otherwise eligible to sue in United States courts are "persons" entitled to institute a suit for treble damages for alleged antitrust violations under the Clayton Act (15 U.S.C.A. § 12 et seq.).

Illegitimate children are "persons" within the meaning of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

The phrase interested person refers to heirs, devisees, children, spouses, creditors, beneficiaries, and any others having a property right in, or a claim against, a trust estate or the estate of a decedent, ward, or protected person. It also refers to personal representatives and to fiduciaries.

Grammar Dictionary: person

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An inflectional form (see inflection) of pronouns and verbs that distinguishes between the person who speaks (first person), the person who is spoken to (second person), and the person who is spoken about (third person). The pronoun or verb may be singular or plural. For example:

first person singular: I walk.
second person singular: you walk.
third person singular: he/she/it walks.
first person plural: we walk.
second person plural: you walk.
third person plural: they walk.

Word Tutor: person

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IN BRIEF: A human being; man, woman, or child.

The average dog is a nicer person than the average person. — Andy Rooney

Wikipedia: Person

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For other uses, see Person (disambiguation).

The term person in common usage means an individual human being. In the fields of law, philosophy, medicine, and others, the term also has specialised context-specific meanings.

In many jurisdictions, for example, a corporation is considered a legal person with standing to sue or be sued in court. In philosophy and medicine, person may mean only humans who are capable of certain kinds of thought.^[1]^[2] This could also extend to late fetuses and neonates, dependent on what level of thought is required.

1 Personhood in theology
2 Scientific approach
3 Individual rights and responsibility
4 Who is a person?
- 4.1 Implications of the person/non-person debate
- 4.2 Nonhuman sentient beings as persons
5 See also
6 References
7 Bibliography
8 External links

Personhood in theology

Person and personhood were used in concepts in the early Christian theological tradition, during the first centuries A.D. by the Church Fathers. The very concept of person (prosopon in Greek) was the result of a theological dispute, how God, according to the Christian (Orthodox) teaching, can be One and three at the same time. Further explication of the problem led to the formulation that there is one substance (or being) and three subsistences (hypostases): God Father, God Son and God Holy Spirit, but still just one God, not three. This theological concept of the person as something that has a specific identity and holds the fullness of being, was applied to the human being as well. The Church Fathers interpreted the "icon of God" in man as human ability to exist as a person, having his/her own unique identity in communion with other persons. Later in the West the concept was translated into Latin as persona and was explained by Boethius and St. Augustine as something characterized by rational capacities.^[3]

Scientific approach

As an application of Social Psychology. and other disciplines, phenomena such as the perception and attribution of personhood have been scientifically studied.^[4]^[5] Typical questions addressed in Social Psychology are the accuracy of attribution, processes of perception and the formation of bias. Various other scientific/medical disciplines address the myriad of issues in the development of personality.

Individual rights and responsibility

Closely related to the debate on the definition of personhood is the relationship between persons', individual rights, and ethical responsibility. Many philosophers would agree that all and only people are expected to be ethically responsible, and that all people deserve a varying degree of individual rights^{[citation needed]}. There is less consensus on whether only people deserve individual rights and whether people deserve greater individual rights than non-people^{[citation needed]}. The rights of animals are an example of contention on this issue.

Who is a person?

Human beings - In contemporary global thought, once human beings are born, personhood is considered automatic.
- Exceptions: - Exceptions to this are often emotive and controversial. Some people have given opinions that fetuses, the disabled, the profoundly and long term brain damaged, those in coma or other persistent vegetative states, may be dubious as regards personhood. Such views are strongly debated from both sides. Historically, personhood has been denied to women, perceived other races, the mentally disabled, and in many tribal societies, all people not from the tribe.
Animals - Some philosophers and those involved in animal welfare, ethology, animal rights and related subjects, consider that certain animals should also be granted personhood. Commonly named species in this context include the Great Apes and possibly cetaceans or elephants, due to the acknowledged intelligence and intricate societies of such species. In animistic religion, animals, plants, and other entities may be persons or deities.
Certain societal constructs - certain social entities, are considered legally as persons, for example some corporations and other legal entities. This is known as legal, or corporate, personhood.

In addition speculatively, there are several other likely categories of beings where personhood might be at issue:

Unknown intelligent life-forms - for example, should alien life be found to exist, under what circumstances would they be counted as 'persons'?
Artificial life - at what point might human-created biological life be considered to have achieved personhood?
Artificial intelligence - assuming the eventual creation of an intelligent and self-aware system of hardware and software, what criteria would be used to confer or withhold the status of person?
Modified living beings, cyborgs - for example, how much of a human being can be replaced by artificial parts before personhood is lost?
- Further, if the brain is the reason people are considered persons, then if the human brain and all its thought patterns, memories and other attributes could also in future be transposed faithfully into some form of artificial device (for example to avoid illness such as brain cancer) would the patient still be considered a 'person' after the operation?
- If the person (or "individual") could go back in time and relate to his/her earlier self. Would it then be two persons yet the same being. Or one person in two bodies?
- Are the surgical separations of Siamese twins cases more complicated, challenging and controversial than abortion?
Do we have to consider whatever "willing and communicative (capable to register its own will) autonomous body" in the universe, no matter about races, an individual (a person)? Do they deserve equal rights with the human race?

Such questions are used by philosophers to clarify thinking concerning what it means to be human, or living, or a person, or an individual.

Implications of the person/non-person debate

This section may contain original research or unverified claims. Please improve the article by adding references. See the talk page for details. (September 2007)

The personhood theory has become a pivotal issue in the interdisciplinary field of bioethics. While historically most humans did not enjoy full legal protection as persons (women, children, non-landowners, minorities, slaves, etc.), from the late 18th through the late 20th century, being born as a member of the human species gradually became secular grounds for the basic rights of liberty, freedom from persecution, and humanitarian care.

Since modern movements emerged to oppose animal cruelty (and advocate vegan philosophy) and theorists like Turing have recognized the possibility of artificial minds with human-level competence, the identification of personhood protections exclusively with human species membership has been challenged. On the other hand, some proponents of human exceptionalism (also referred to by its critics as speciesism) have countered that we must institute a strict demarcation of personhood based on species membership in order to avoid the horrors of genocide (based on propaganda dehumanizing one or more ethnicities) or the injustices of forced sterilization (as occurred in many countries to people with low I.Q. scores and prisoners).

While the former advocates tend to be comfortable constraining personhood status within the human species based on basic capacities (e.g. excluding human stem cells, fetuses, and bodies that cannot recover awareness), the latter often wish to include all these forms of human bodies even if they have never had awareness (which some would call pre-people) or had awareness, but could never have awareness again due to massive and irrecoverable brain damage (some would call these post-people). The Vatican has recently been advancing a human exceptionalist understanding of personhood theory, while other communities, such as Christian Evangelicals in the U.S. have sometimes rejected the personhood theory as biased against human exceptionalism. Of course, many religious communities (of many traditions) view the other versions of the personhood theory perfectly compatible with their faith, as do the majority of modern Humanists.

The theoretical landscape of the personhood theory has been altered recently by controversy in the bioethics community concerning an emerging community of scholars, researchers, and activists identifying with an explicitly Transhumanist position, which supports morphological freedom, even if a person changed so much as to no longer be considered a member of the human species (by whatever standard is used to determine that).

Nonhuman sentient beings as persons

The idea of extending personhood to all animals has the support of legal scholars such as Alan Dershowitz^[6] and Laurence Tribe of Harvard Law School,^[7] and animal law courses are now taught in 92 out of 180 law schools in the United States.^[8] On May 9, 2008, Columbia University Press published Animals as Persons: Essays on the Abolition of Animal Exploitation by Professor Gary L. Francione of Rutgers University School of Law, a collection of writings that summarizes his work to date and makes the case for non-human animals as persons.

There are also hypothetical persons, sentient non-human persons such as sentient extraterrestrial life and self aware machines. The novel and animated series Ghost in the Shell touch on the potential of inorganic sentience, while classical works of fiction and fantasy regarding extraterrestrials have challenged people to reconsider long held traditional definitions.

References

^ Strawson, P.F. 1959. Individuals. London: Methuen: 104.
^ Locke, John. 1961. Essay Concerning Human Understanding. London:Dent: 280.
^ Being as Communion: Studies in Personhood and the Church (Crestwood, NY: St Vladimirs Seminary Press, 1997). ISBN 978-0881410297
^ Person Perception. Second Edition. Schneider, Hastdorf, and Ellsworth. 1979, Addison Wesley ISBN 0-201-06768-4
^ Second-Language Fluency and Person Perception in China and the United States
^ Dershowitz, Alan. Rights from Wrongs: A Secular Theory of the Origins of Rights, 2004, pp. 198–99, and "Darwin, Meet Dershowitz," The Animals' Advocate, Winter 2002, volume 21.
^ "'Personhood' Redefined: Animal Rights Strategy Gets at the Essence of Being Human", Association of American Medical Colleges, retrieved July 12, 2006.
^ "Animal law courses", Animal Legal Defense Fund.

Bibliography

The category of the person. Anthropology, philosophy, history Edited by M. Carruthers, S. Collins, and L. Steven. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1985
Cornelia J.de Vogel The concept of personality in Greek and Christian thought. In Studies in philosophy and the history of philosophy. Vol. 2. Edited by J. K. Ryan, Washington: Catholic University of America Press 1963. pp. 20-60

External links

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Carsten Korfmacher, 'Personal Identity', in the IEP
"Person". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. 1913. http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Catholic_Encyclopedia_(1913)/Person.

Articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

General principles

Article 1: Freedom, Egalitarianism, Dignity and Brotherhood Article 2: Universality of rights

International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights

Article 1 and 2: Right to freedom from discrimination · Article 3: Right to life, liberty and security of person · Article 4: Freedom from slavery · Article 5: Freedom from torture and cruel and unusual punishment · Article 6: Right to personhood · Article 7: Equality before the law · Article 8: Right to effective remedy from the law · Article 9: Freedom from arbitrary arrest, detention and exile · Article 10: Right to a fair trial · Article 11.1: Presumption of innocence · Article 11.2: Prohibition of retrospective law · Article 12: Right to privacy · Article 13: Freedom of movement · Article 14: Right of asylum · Article 15: Right to a nationality · Article 16: Right to marriage and family life · Article 17: Right to property · Article 18: Freedom of thought, conscience and religion · Article 19: Freedom of opinion and expression · Article 20.1: Freedom of assembly · Article 20.2: Freedom of association · Article 21.1: Right to participation in government · Article 21.2: Right of equal access to public office · Article 21.3: Right to universal suffrage

International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights

Article 1 and 2: Right to freedom from discrimination · Article 22: Right to social security · Article 23.1: Right to work · Article 23.2: Right to equal pay for equal work · Article 23.3: Right to just remuneration · Article 23.4: Right to join a trade union · Article 24: Right to rest and leisure · Article 25.1: Right to an adequate standard of living · Article 25.2: Right to special care and assistance for mothers and children · Article 26.1: Right to education · Article 26.2: Human rights education · Article 26.3: Right to choice of education · Article 27.1: Right to participate in culture · Article 27.2: Right to intellectual property

Context, limitations and duties

Article 28: Social order · Article 29.1: Social responsibility · Article 29.2: Limitations of human rights · Article 29.3: The supremacy of the purposes and principles of the United Nations
Article 30: Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.

Category:Human rights · Human rights portal

v • d • e Particular human rights

Civil and political	Freedom from discrimination · Right to life · Right to die · Security of person · Liberty · Freedom of movement · Freedom from slavery · Personhood · Right to bear arms · Equality before the law · Adequate remedy · Freedom from arbitrary arrest and detention · Freedom from torture · Freedom from cruel and unusual punishment · Right to a fair trial · Presumption of innocence · Right of asylum · Nationality · Freedom from exile · Privacy · Freedom of thought and conscience · Freedom of religion · Freedom of expression (freedom of information) · Freedom of assembly · Freedom of association · Right to protest · Universal suffrage · Marriage · Family life

Economic, social and cultural	Labor rights · Fair remuneration · Equal pay for equal work · Trade union membership · Right to social security · Leisure and rest · Right to work · Right to property (and intellectual) · Right to culture · Right to public participation · Right to education · Right to adequate standard of living · Right to housing · Right to development · Right to health · Right to healthcare · Right to water · Right to food · Right of return

Reproductive	Family planning · Reproductive health · Abortion · Freedom from involuntary female genital cutting

War and conflict	Civilian · Combatant · Freedom from genocide · Prisoner of war

Note: What is considered a human right is controversial and not all the topics listed are universally accepted as human rights.

This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)

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Translations: Person

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Dansk (Danish)
n. - person

idioms:

in person personlig, selv
in the person of i den person, som er
take a person out of himself få en person til at være ude af sig selv
take a person up on holde nogen fast på

Nederlands (Dutch)
persoon, lichaam, rechtspersoon, personage, de geslachtsdelen

Français (French)
n. - personne, passionné de, amateur, (Jur) personne, (Ling) personne

idioms:

in person en personne
in the person of en la personne de
take a person out of himself faire tenir (qn) à son offre ou sa promesse
take a person up on relaxer (qn), apaiser (qn)

Deutsch (German)
n. - Person, Körper

idioms:

in person persönlich
in the person of in jmds. Person
take a person out of himself jmdn. seine Sorgen vergessen lassen
take a person up on jds. Herausforderungen annehmen

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - πρόσωπο, άτομο, άνθρωπος, (γραμμ., νομ.) πρόσωπο

idioms:

in person αυτοπροσώπως
in the person of στο πρόσωπο
take a person out of himself βοηθώ κάποιον να ξεχαστεί, να ξεχάσει τις έγνοιες του
take a person up on δέχομαι προσφορά

Italiano (Italian)
persona

idioms:

in person in persona
in the person of nella persona di

Português (Portuguese)
n. - pessoa (f)

idioms:

in person em pessoa
in the person of na pessoa de
take a person out of himself tirar uma pessoa do sério
take a person up on cobrar de uma pessoa

Русский (Russian)
человек

idioms:

in person личный, лично
in the person of в лице
take a person out of himself вывести (кого-л.) из себя, помочь забыться
take a person up on испытать (кого-л. в чем-л.), принять (вызов, приглашение и т.п.)

Español (Spanish)
n. - persona

idioms:

in person en persona
in the person of en la persona de, personificando a
take a person out of himself hacer que alguien se olvide de sus problemas, apoyar a alguien en algo que le han prometido u ofertado
take a person up on aceptar, poner en duda, hacer que alguien se sienta relajado

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - person, människa, gestalt, yttre

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
人, 容貌, 身体

idioms:

in person 亲自
in the person of 代表, 体现
take a person out of himself 让某人沮丧
take a person up on 接受某人的意见或计划

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 人, 容貌, 身體

idioms:

in person 親自
in the person of 代表, 體現
take a person out of himself 讓某人沮喪
take a person up on 接受某人的意見或計劃

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 사람, 법인, 인칭

idioms:

in person 자기 스스로, 본인이
in the person of ...라는 사람[인물]이 되어
take a person out of himself 정신을 빼다
take a person up on 남의 요청에 따라 인수하다

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 人, 者, 人物, 人格, 重要人物, 容姿, 身体, 性器, ペルソナ

idioms:

displaced person 流民, 強制追放者
do a person a mischief 人に危険を与える
do a person an injustice 人の権利を侵害する
have a person on toast 人を意のままに扱う
have a person taped 人を評価判断する, 人の弱点を見抜く
in person 自分で
in the person of …役で, 代わりに
put a person through their paces 足踏みを倒す, 力量を試す
put a person wise 人に知らせてやる
take a person at his/her word 真に受ける
take a person down a peg or two やり込める
take a person out of himself 気晴らしさせる
take a person up on 人の申し出を受けて～をする

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) شخص, أنسان, نفس, ذات, مظهر الإنسان الخارجي‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮בן-אדם, איש, גוף, אברי-המין‬

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person

Contents

Personhood in theology

Scientific approach

Individual rights and responsibility

Who is a person?

Implications of the person/non-person debate

Nonhuman sentient beings as persons

See also

References

Bibliography

External links