Personhood

Larry Solum's "legal theory lexicon" series turns its attention to the meaning of "personhood."  An excerpt:

And person is sometimes defined as a "human" or "individual". But "person" has another meaning, one that distinguishes the concept of person from the concept of human. Suppose, for example, an intelligent alien species were to arrive on Earth (or humans were to encounter them elsewhere). If the members of the aliens displayed evidence of human-like intelligence and could communicate with us (e.g. were able to master a human natural language, such as English), then we might be tempted to treat members of this species as morally and/or legally entitled to the same rights as humans.

Consider, for example, the aliens Chewbacca or Yoda in the Star Wars movies. Neither Chewbacca nor Yoda is a member of the species homo sapiens, yet both are treated as the moral and legal equivalents of humans in the Star Wars universe.

Let us stipulate then, that term "human" is a biological term, which refers to all the members of the species homo sapiens and that the term "person" is a normative term, which refers to a moral and/or legal status that creatures or other bearers of human-like capacities can share with normal adult humans.

Is everyone comfortable with the terms of that stipulation?

UPDATE: As evidence of the long-term corrosive impact of blogging on brain function, my February 2006 post about Solum's "personhood" definition has apparently receded from my memory.