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Jim_Baur
Guest
What is the human person?
How is consciousness, intellect, will, sense appetite and the like involved?
Thanks!
How is consciousness, intellect, will, sense appetite and the like involved?
Thanks!
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levinas12
Guest
Consciousness, intellect, etc are activities of the human person … what makes these activities possible is human nature (something we all share) … the reasoning here is Aristotelian … activity requires a principle of operation (or a potentiality) … so the specific human activities (e.g., talking about things) require, as a condition of possibility, human nature … in Greek philosophy, human nature = soul as psyche, as the form which all human beings participate in … subsequently, in Christian thought, “soul” became identified with the human person … this led to some misunderstandings … because human nature is not equivalent to human person …
The person is not a “what” (in the sense of a “nature”) but a “who” - a unique “someone” - a singularity that is not “shareable” … the philosophical way of saying this is that “person” is not a sortal noun (not a class, not defined by species and genus) … there is no “species” for the person …
“Person” complicates our epistemology … usually, knowledge is in terms of the universal (and the particular is known simply as an instantiation of the universal) … so how is it that we know a person “who is a singularity” … this is a queston that contemporary Catholic philosophy is struggling with today … according to the late Jewish philosopher, Levinas, we discover “persons” through an encounter with the “face” which puts a demand upon us … this primordial experience is foundational for everything else … the irony is that it transcends traditional philosophical categories …
What Levinas seems to be saying is that, when Adam knew Eve, it was not a matter of metaphysics … Aristotle cannot explain the I-Thou experience …
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Jim_Baur
Guest
Thanks!!!
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JDaniel
Guest
Jim:
Philosophically, the human person is: the knower. “Consciousness, intellect, will, [and] sense appetite,” derive from and are correlatives of being the knower.
God bless,
jd
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levinas12
Guest
There may be a problem in equating “person” with “knower” … the person is “there” at the moment of conception … “knowing” comes later … and there are other activities of the person which are not necessarily conscious … e.g., metabolic activities, activities of the autonomic nervous system, etc. … that’s why someone who is not conscious remains a person …
Identifying “person” with “knower” is a bit too Cartesian …
The “person” and the “living human body” are one and the same … “knowing”, “willing”, “desiring” are “bodily” activities … this is not to deny their “intentionality” (their “aboutness”) …,
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levinas12
Guest
rephrased:
"the person is not a sortal noun … is not a member of a class … is not defined by species or genus … that’s why the person is a singularity … "
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empther
Guest
“Person” means active agent, “who” is doing it.
Jesus has a human body and soul but is a divine person, not a human person.
Which brings up the question, at least to me, of what the soul is.
The answer lies in what is doing all the things a man does.
The atheist will say the brain is a material recording device like a camera taking pictures or a tape recorder recording sounds.
We must answer that the camera cannot recognize the pictures it takes.
The atheist will answer a computer can be programmed to recognize the contents of a photograph.
We must answer that only human intelligence can program a computer to do this. Asking nature to do this is like asking a man to lift himself up by his bootstraps. Can’t happen.
Jesus has a human body and soul but is a divine person, not a human person.
Which brings up the question, at least to me, of what the soul is.
The answer lies in what is doing all the things a man does.
The atheist will say the brain is a material recording device like a camera taking pictures or a tape recorder recording sounds.
We must answer that the camera cannot recognize the pictures it takes.
The atheist will answer a computer can be programmed to recognize the contents of a photograph.
We must answer that only human intelligence can program a computer to do this. Asking nature to do this is like asking a man to lift himself up by his bootstraps. Can’t happen.
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slywakka250
Guest
An individual substance with a rational nature.
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Jim_Baur
Guest
I am trying to discern whether consciousness is more primary than the intellect.
I seems to me that when I sit down and pray, think, or relax it then that I become aware that there is a difference between my consciousness and all of the rest.
I can turn my consciousness to the sense appetite (passions).
I can turn my intellect to philosophy, theology, math, biology and the like.
I can turn my will make a decision.
I can turn my memory to 1993, June 12.
My consciousness seems to be primary; intellect, will, passions, imagination, and memory are ruled by my consciousness.
That seems to be my actual existence.
Does this ring true in others?
I seems to me that when I sit down and pray, think, or relax it then that I become aware that there is a difference between my consciousness and all of the rest.
I can turn my consciousness to the sense appetite (passions).
I can turn my intellect to philosophy, theology, math, biology and the like.
I can turn my will make a decision.
I can turn my memory to 1993, June 12.
My consciousness seems to be primary; intellect, will, passions, imagination, and memory are ruled by my consciousness.
That seems to be my actual existence.
Does this ring true in others?
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levinas12
Guest
The “person” is more than consciousness (more than what Descartes calls “res cogitans”).
All bodily activities (whether involving “intentionality” or not) belong to the “person”.
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Jim_Baur
Guest
I agree that the person is more than consciousness.
I, as I said, experience my consciousness in charge of intellect, will, passions, imagination, and so forth. Or in other words, I experience my consciousness directing or “observing” all the other parts of me.
Do others experience the same?
I, as I said, experience my consciousness in charge of intellect, will, passions, imagination, and so forth. Or in other words, I experience my consciousness directing or “observing” all the other parts of me.
Do others experience the same?
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empther
Guest
The soul has two powers: intellect and will.
It is the will that directs our passions, imaginations and all the rest.
Consciousness is the action of the intellect and will interacting. As Aristotle pointed out the consciousness disappears when we sleep, but the intellect, or knowledge, is still there.
Conscience is also an interaction of the intellect and will. If we choose evil we can kill the conscience, and it no longer acts in a way that can be called conscience.
It is the will that directs our passions, imaginations and all the rest.
Consciousness is the action of the intellect and will interacting. As Aristotle pointed out the consciousness disappears when we sleep, but the intellect, or knowledge, is still there.
Conscience is also an interaction of the intellect and will. If we choose evil we can kill the conscience, and it no longer acts in a way that can be called conscience.
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levinas12
Guest
Could you expand on this …
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Jim_Baur
Guest
That I can explain.
We are more than just consciousness. We have intellect, will, passions, and a body, just to mention a few.
There was nothing esoteric intended.
We are more than just consciousness. We have intellect, will, passions, and a body, just to mention a few.
There was nothing esoteric intended.
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JDaniel
Guest
Levinas:
Essentially we are defined as “rational animals.” All of the other animals are defined as “animals.” What differentiates us from the other animals? Nothing much more than our soul and its ability to know, in the fullest sense of that word.
At the moment of conception everything about us is potential, with the singular exception of the possession of the soul. Nothing else about a zygote will differentiate it as a human being for a couple of weeks at least (without removing it and/or poking it with needles, and so forth). At that point we are literally the “act of the potential precisely as potential.” More-so because we are at the very inception of act of the potential as potential. No kinds of activities inure to us until each of us has undergone fairly extensive training. And, what do we receive from such training? Things to know.
The animal senses the other in a primitive way, viewing it as food, foe, or friend. The knower, on the other hand, finds the “other” as a-mirror-of-me. The animal requires increased sense awareness. We do not. The animal’s reduced knowingness of others, reduces its activities to: fleeing, chasing, and eating (biting and chewing). The human’s heightened knowingness increases his activities to fleeing, chasing, eating, communicating, sharing ideas and POV’s, loving, working with or against, and a host of other things that animals can’t do.
Above all else, it seems to me that the act of knowing is philosophically what we are. All of the rest are capabilities that are directly attributable to that act. Oh, and, finally, the human can even know that he knows.
God bless,
jd
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shoe
Guest
Human beings seem to have many parts to them. They are obviously physical beings with typical physical needs and wants, which they basically can realize in the physical world. Human beings are also intelligent beings who have the ability to understand things gained by either study or experience; and human beings are also able to use their intelligence, along with their natural curiosity, to ask, and sometimes answer, such questions as “how, what, when, where, and why?” And humans are also spiritual and moral beings with the ability to raise questions about right and wrong and to feel joy when doing right and to feel troubled when doing wrong. And this feeling probably can be described with the word conscience, the self-knowledge of right and wrong, and good and bad, the still small voice that humans can either make their way to or refuse to notice.
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empther
Guest
But the “knowing” is potentially there because the fertilitzed human egg has a soul, and so it is a person.
*I don’t see your point. Metabolics, nervous reflexes, etc we have in common with the animals. They have little to do with the soul’s intellect and will, except that we direct the body to some activites, basketball, binge drinking etc *
*Unless Rene Descartes was right. Actually, he should have said “I know and will, therefore here I am everybody…” *
… *
*No. Man is a composite of soul and body, and the person is this composite. *
… *
*While the soul depends on the body for knowlege in part, memory is stored in brain cells, full understanding of what is remembered requires the soul’s intellect. Likewise, the body “wills” so to speak food and sex and things like that, nevertheless the soul wills things the body is unaware of. *
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levinas12
Guest
What is the difference between two “rational animals”? It’s not simply the matter that differentiates them (although the matter is involved). It’s the “person”. I was going to say that the “person” is the tertium quid (in addition to the form and matter), but the “person” is not a quid … the “person” is a “quis”, a “who”.
“Person” is not “essence” as traditionally understood in Aristotelian metaphysics. “Person” is a singularity outside the framework of the categories.
“Knowledge” is of the universal, or the form, or the essence. So how can we know “persons”? You say, we can know particulars as well as universals. But remember, a “person” is not a “particular” if the latter is understood simply as an instantiation of a nature or form. “Particulars” belong to the Same because they share the same Form. But “person” as a singularity is “radically other” than other “persons”… so how can we break out of ourselves and encounter the “radically other” singularity …
Sometimes, “person” is equated with “soul”. But this can be confusing. In Greek philosophy, “soul” is psyche, the form, the nature that human beings have in common. As psyche, “soul” is not “person” because “person” is “incommunicable”.
In later Christian thought, “soul” becomes identified with the “person”. But the “person” is not different from the body. This is what JP II’s theology of the body stresses. “Person” is the disclosure of the body, the truth of the body. So “person” permeates all the body’s activities. So, for example, my “metabolism” is personal; a dog’s metabolism is not.
Because of this identity between “person” and “body”, the expression “body and soul” can be very misleading.
[For more on the “radically other”, see the writings of the Jewish philosopher, Levinas, who died in 1995 … he was a favorite of JP II].
“Person” is not “essence” as traditionally understood in Aristotelian metaphysics. “Person” is a singularity outside the framework of the categories.
“Knowledge” is of the universal, or the form, or the essence. So how can we know “persons”? You say, we can know particulars as well as universals. But remember, a “person” is not a “particular” if the latter is understood simply as an instantiation of a nature or form. “Particulars” belong to the Same because they share the same Form. But “person” as a singularity is “radically other” than other “persons”… so how can we break out of ourselves and encounter the “radically other” singularity …
Sometimes, “person” is equated with “soul”. But this can be confusing. In Greek philosophy, “soul” is psyche, the form, the nature that human beings have in common. As psyche, “soul” is not “person” because “person” is “incommunicable”.
In later Christian thought, “soul” becomes identified with the “person”. But the “person” is not different from the body. This is what JP II’s theology of the body stresses. “Person” is the disclosure of the body, the truth of the body. So “person” permeates all the body’s activities. So, for example, my “metabolism” is personal; a dog’s metabolism is not.
Because of this identity between “person” and “body”, the expression “body and soul” can be very misleading.
[For more on the “radically other”, see the writings of the Jewish philosopher, Levinas, who died in 1995 … he was a favorite of JP II].
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levinas12
Guest
When I know “JD” as “JD”, “JD” as a person, as a singularity, I do not know just another “rational animal” … another of the “Same” … I don’t say, well, here’s another rational animal … no, I say, here’s JD, and I address “JD” by his unique name … the “other person” is not a “mirror of me” … not a repetition of the Same … the “other person” is not reducible to a metaphysical concept common to many particulars …the “other person” is “radically other”, absolutely “exterior” to me (in a way that objects are not) …
See my previous posting #18 above …
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JDaniel
Guest
Levinas:
Agreed. If it were that simple, God could have made us cookie-cutter, then minutely tweaked our spiritual part to differentiate us. Or, He could have allowed matter alone be the differentiator. Instead, He uses both.
I’m not so sure about this. I see the person as differentiated commonality. As a pneumatikon soma, we will be spiritual bodies. More precisely, we will be soma pneumatikon. But, for now, I do not see us as “outside of the framework of the categories.” After death, when we are our own genus, then we are a singularity.
Not so. Knowledge is first the recognition of particulars, specifically, “mobile being,” then we look for commonalities. (I know there are people who look for comparatives among rocks, but I don’t, unless it has a MOHS hardness of 10!)
By recognizing us in them.
Of course.
I understand him to be the instantiation of a particular rational animal. As such, we are still in the realm of the categories. As such we are speciated.
Not so. They share a comparably similar form. That’s all. But, not the “same” form. If that were so, we would all be the self-same. Moreover, we would be like “points,” without any identity. It is precisely the commonality of our natures that allows us to universalize, to abstract.
I’m not into that too much. He is, as a human being, merely an “other.” Like one cow to another cow, but more complicated.
Breaking out of ourselves is not what’s required. Breaking into ourselves is what’s required. Until death, we are really inseparable.
Which is fine. This means that we can never “know” the other as intimately as we know ourselves. No, not even our wives.
Yes, because that expresses an almost dis-unified dualism. We are not dis-unified in any way at all. Rather, we are intimately unified. But, we can consider each part of the duality separately. But then, you are correct in saying that that tends to make their unification much harder.
I will do my best. Thank you for that.
God bless,
jd
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