Naming the Source of Human Dignity: A Fourth Response

One student remarked that so many students are responding to the blog today because ANYTHING is better than studying for finals.  Here is another student's take on the human dignity question:

"The real problem is, indeed, a modern philosophical shift, but not necessarily the one people are talking about. Modern philosophy begins with the outlying case: can there be human dignity for the human person that doesn't act, look, or smell like a person? Classical philosophers began with the norm, and then accounted for outlying variations. They established principles that were generally true of a type, while dealing in individual cases with the failure of some to have certain traits that otherwise seem characteristic of the type.

 As such, Aristotle was able to say that duties were owed to all other persons in so far as they were people, without tying the dignity that creates the duties to any particular trait. (I am being a bit anachronistic here, since Aristotle didn't really deal with "dignity" per se). He does acknolwedge that the thing that makes the genus human different is reason (like Kant) but says that we owe the duty to all others in the genus, regardless of whether they share the particular trait.

The difference is a belief that things have essences. Unfortunately, for this to make sense, we have to consider the age-old (really many ages old) debate over nominalism. That is, the debate is about whether the distinctions that separate categories of things are a recognition of real phenomena or merely nominal distinctions drawn by humans in recognition of certain common traits. If distinctions are recognitions of real differences in kind, then things of a kind share a common essence. And those things within the group ought to be treated alike. Thus, in the present case, human beings ought to be treated with dignity because they have the same essence, even if they lack certain characteristics that are definitive of human beings. But if distinctions are merely nominal, then when we say that we treat alikes alike, we have to look to certain characteristics that might grant (or not grant) the status of being alike.

An illustration that may or may not be helpful: a layman's definition of a dog is a creature with four-legs, a tail, and fur that barks. If a dog were to lose a leg, its tail, its fur, and its vocal chord in some terrible accident the classical philosopher would have no problem recognizing the creature as a (rather sad) dog that has lost certain characteristics, and would treat it as she would treat any other dog. But the nominalist would have to make a very real inquiry into whether the traits lost somehow made it so the dog no longer meets the definition of being a dog, and this could have a very real impact on how he treats the dog."