This thesis approaches the question of what kind of being a person is through an
investigation of the question of how a being becomes a person. The "what"
question typically addresses certain necessary and sufficient conditions of
personhood such as rationality and self-consciousness, which are then linked to
what personhood implies in the practical domain, such as a moral standing or
certain rights and responsibilities. The "how" question addresses, on the other
hand, its genetic conditions; that is, those that essentially characterize the origin
and mode of formation of that kind of being we designate a person. In philosophy
this latter question is rarely put, arguably because it is deemed largely irrelevant
to the former, analytic question, with the notable exception of medieval theories
of creation or communication of a soul to a body. In various other fields several
aspects of the genesis of persons attract more attention, but these are not
investigated through particularly philosophical questions: how the human species
came to possess its present form, how the human infant develops cognitively and
socially, how the moral and legal status of persons differ from culture to culture
or across historical periods, or how normatively structured social systems
emerged would be some representative examples. I argue that the genetic and the
analytic questions are intimately related to one another, to the effect that we need
an understanding of the origins of personhood in order to reach an adequate
understanding what personhood consists in. By an adequate understanding I mean
a holistic exposition of the metaphysical, intersubjective and practical dimensions
of personhood in their integrity.
