what makes a living being human

Mary Anne Warren Versus John Noonan

Mary Anne Warren argued that a human being is one who is a full-fledged member of the moral community ' and not just any member of the Homo sapiens species . She continued her argument by claiming that for one to be a member of the moral community , one should first be a person . According to her , a living being should first satisfy any several , or all of five characteristics before it could be considered a person . First , it should be conscious of incidents or objects which exist

either within or outside of its being . Specifically , she insisted that said living being should be able to feel pain . Second , it should have a reasoning power and should possess a developed capacity ' to decipher and /or explain somewhat complex or new problems . Third , its actions should not be solely dependent on the control of its genetic make-up or by external stimuli . In other words , the living being should be able to motivate itself or do something without being compelled or influenced by any external factor . Fourth , it should have the ability to communicate about different subjects , not just involving several contents about one . Finally , racial or individual concept of the self should be present in the living being . In other words , the living being should be aware of what it is - may it be a Caucasian , an Asian or just a member of the species of man (Warren

For Warren , these traits are what make up a person . Any living being therefore , that does not have at least any one of these five traits could not be considered a member of the community of people . She maintained that since her five characteristics determine personhood it is no longer necessary to take into consideration genetic qualities before establishing whether a living being is a person or not . Simply put , one could be a person without first becoming a human being in the genetic sense (Warren

She defended her argument by citing the fact that there are human beings who could not be considered persons or people and there are in fact people who could not qualify as human beings . For instance , she explained that a man who has permanently lost his consciousness is still a human being but is not a person anymore . In the same vein , a woman who has no mental capacity could not be considered a person , and neither is a fetus who does not yet possess any of the five traits that she had laid down . In the debate about abortion , she argued that since a fetus does not possess any of the five traits of personhood , it is therefore not a person who is entitled to any moral right in the community of people . She hinted at the possibility of having persons who are not human beings by referring to the likelihood that the day will come when robots and computers who are already self-aware ' would be invented When the day finally...