by Kolbitar » March 18th, 2007, 3:32 am
Hi again.
::I want to think about your argument for a while. You seem to be using the concept of I, whether conscious or not, to be definitive of...humanhood (wants to avoid the connotations of the word "humanity" at this point). An interesting philosophical construct, and a big one. I may need to sleep on it...for a few nights...
I actually wanted to avoid delving too deeply into philosophy (though not for my sake), but I'll gladly indulge for a post or two :-)
I'm using the concept "I" to signify the enduring element of my being which undergoes change (I'm speaking of more than Kant's transcendental unity of consciousness, I'm speaking of substantial unity which every thing, animate or inanimate, has as it's principle of being -- in my case this also includes Kant's unity of consciousness, at least, in so far as it exists potentially--as it does when I sleep). That enduring element is known philosophically as my substance. I am a rational animal (I have intellectual and sense knowledge, and all that entails) -- that is my substance, my nature. Since the use of "I" designates my enduring nature, and since rights are integral to my enduring nature, then I have inalianable rights at the moment my nature comes into being...
Regarding the philosophical term "substance," the following quote, I think, puts it rather well:
"There cannot be any doubt…that the ordinary man makes a distinction between things and their modifications. We have only to examine what we are accustomed to say about the changing size of a tree or the changing colour of its leaves to see that this is the case... A substance is that of which we say primarily that it exists and which is not predicated of something else in the way in which we predicate pallor of John or redness of a rose, while an accident is that which exists only as a modification of a substance or a thing and which is predicated of a substance." --Copleston
Jesse
The man who lives in contact with what he believes to be a living Church is a man always expecting to meet Plato and Shakespeare tomorrow at breakfast. He is always expecting to see some truth that he has never seen before. --Chesterton
Sober Inebriation:
http://soberinebriationblog.blogspot.com/