When you read something on a book or internet, you might find something that says “all humans are persons but not all persons are humans”. When reading about it, you might be wondering about the meaning of it. So, what does “all humans are persons but not all persons are humans” mean?
According to a user on Brainly called arem21, the “all humans are persons but not all persons are humans” means the other persons are doing bad things or inhuman or they just do not care about humans, animals or the other living things. The only thing that they care about is themselves. All human beings are potential moral agents. This is a status that cannot be accorded by a colt because even a horse cannot become a moral agent.
From that, it can be concluded that everyone is unique and has their own personality. Some people are good while some others are bad. Some people care about others while some others are selfish and only care about themselves. For them, life revolves only around them and the other ones just basically do not exist and do not matter.
“All humans are persons but not all persons are humans” is known as Akan philosophy of the person. What is Akan philosophy? If it is the first time you hear such philosophy and you have zero idea about it, you can check out the following information.
Akan philosophy is known as a tradition from West Africa. It is a centuries old tradition. This philosophy discusses a lot of kinds of big topics, such as the meaning of freedom. Apart from that, the other things discussed by this include the most ethical way to love and what it means to be a person.
Just like any other discussions, sometimes, Akan philosophers are involved in tight debates. Showing disagreements is normal for them. However, when it comes to being a person, there are a few common themes.
In the Akan tradition, being a person means contributing to your family as well as the community. Not only that, it also means taking part in local rituals, doing important work, and getting married and making babies. For some people, it can be shocking because can you think why should anyone have to get married and have kids just to be considered as a person? Don’t you think singles also deserve their own right?
However, the thing about is far finer compared to a conception of personhood that arose in a certain West African cultural context. It will be needed for you to think about the meaning of family and community if you want to translate Akan values for contemporary America. In the cultural context, there are a ton of ways to contribute to a community even without being a parent. Some of these ways include taking nephews and nieces to watch a movie, doing community service in a soup kitchen on weekends, and teaching the next generation about the things that you can do.
The next thing that a lot of people disagree with the Akan conception of personhood is the concepts of family and community themselves. Is it really needed for us to define ourselves in terms of others? For those who live in harmony with the people around you, it might be a good idea. However, if you try to disagree or criticize them, the story will be different.
The philosophers named Kwasi Wiredu and Kwame Gyekye think that a person that does not agree can still count as a full person on the Akan conception. This kind of person is still in dialogue with the values of their community. Besides, the person still also has value. There is a belief that it would be worse if the community did morally things that are questionable without thinking about themselves.
It is possible for you to still be worried about Akan philosophy about contributing to the community even taking the worries about critics and dissenters aside. You might be wondering about those who are unlikely to contribute, either because they are disabled, or maybe they never got a proper education and whether they are counted as less worthy personhood.
While philosophers disagree about the answer, the approach done by Kwasi Wiredu is actually not bad. All that you need to do is to adjust for the level of opportunity of the people. An individual who can get through the obstacles and can make a contribution to the society, even though it is just a small contribution, could count as more of a person compared to another who makes a big contribution but uses privilege to start everything.
If you are wondering about what Akan philosophers think about people’s inner lives, in his book on African philosophical thought, Kwame Gyekye addresses this thing. According to him, in the traditional Akan view, every human being is composed of three parts. The first one is the okra. It means the soul. The second one is the sunsum. The meaning of the sunsum is spirit. As for the third, it is the honam. For those who have no idea about it, it means the body. Furthermore, the okra is the same essence that every human has. Just like the okra, the sunsum exists in everyone. What makes them different is that the okra is the same while the sensum is different in people. It is the reason why everyone has their own unique personalities.
It is clearly not easy to map this picture onto any certain western philosophical scheme. It is hard to know if it is like the views of Plato and Fred that say that human beings have three parts or it is more similar to Descartes’s theory that says that people are composed of a body and a mind and need some explanation of how they interact. You might also want to know if some of the different Akan words are just ways of picking out the same thing.
A bookworm and researcher especially related to law and citizenship education. I spend time every day in front of the internet and the campus library.
