INTRODUCTION TO THE UNIT

Welcome to CPP 416: Philosophy of the Human Person. In this unit, you will learn about the
philosophy of the human person. You will learn about the discussions that philosophers have
undertaken since the ancient times regarding the meaning of the personhood of humans. You will
learn about the concepts and the theories they developed, together with the questions which so
perplexed them.

In the most general manner, the value of the philosophy of the human person lies in the fact that
the philosophy of the human person is a way of thinking which makes understanding the concept
of the human person key to the understanding of all, if not many, philosophical problems such as
in religion, ethics, law, epistemology and metaphysics. For example, the question whether there
are non-human persons relates to the religious moral issue of how animals should be treated.