A person in a Permanent Vegetative State (PVS) has suffered trauma to the parts of the brain that govern higher brain functions but not to those parts of the brain and nervous system that govern basic biological functions. The person cannot think, is not conscious and is not aware of her surroundings. However, the person still breathes, circulates blood and digests food and will continue to live as long as they are fed and hydrated with a feeding tube. That state is considered permanent because it is virtually impossible for the person to regain the higher brain functioning. The person, however, is not considered “brain dead.”
Suppose that a famous professional athlete Dora has had severe brain trauma as a result of a car accident and is in a permanent vegetative state.
Is the athlete Dora who won several National Championships in her sport that same person as the PVS patent Dora?
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ReplyDeleteMy group argued that the PVS (permanent vegetative state) patient is not the same person as the athlete who won several National Championships in her sport. Even though this case satisfies the body view, which claims personal identity is preserved through having the same physical body over time, it does not satisfy the memory view. Memory view is when a person’s identity depends on their ability to remember, recognize themselves, and be conscious of their experiences. If a person cannot speak, make decisions, express memories, or recognize sensory input, then they are no longer the same person they were previously. A person must be able to think of themselves as themselves. Otherwise, how can they recognize their own existence? If Dora is unable to think or be conscious of her surroundings, it raises the question of whether she is truly alive and still the person she once was. Although she can survive without machines, her body functions almost mechanically, sustaining someone who lacks awareness or control over their own life. She cannot consciously evaluate her quality of life or exercise control over herself. If someone is unknowingly alive, what makes them who they are? Without the ability to feel, think, process, vocalize, or acknowledge their own existence, they are no longer themselves. While this case may also satisfy the soul view, which holds that a person remains the same as long as their soul is intact, it fails to meet the criteria of the memory view, as Dora cannot recall, recognize, or connect with her past experiences. Therefore, she is not the person she was before she was in a permanent vegetative state.
ReplyDeleteI believe that Dora isn’t the same person she once was. To start, what is the point of being alive if you don’t know you are? When Dora’s friends come and see her and are like “hi Dora, how are you feeling?” is she going to be like “oh, I’m not conscious.” It takes consciousness to know you’re conscious, so her having no thoughts means she's basically just a body keeping itself alive. She can’t go and respond to her friends, saying, "Oh, I feel soooo much better now," because she doesn’t even know she’s alive. Being brain dead means there is no brain activity, and the person is in a vegetative state,e meaning they can’t eat, drink, or do anything. Dora can eat and drink, but not think. I believe the last part outweighs everything else because, without a thinking brain, we’re not human at all. She can’t regain higher function or begin to think for herself again, so she’s effectively like an organism eating, drinking, and sitting for the rest of her life, not doing anything else or making choices outside of keeping the body alive. Is that truly quality of life?
ReplyDeletePeople would say, “Oh, she’s alive, so it’s clearly Dora” or “I mean, being brain dead means you can’t eat or anything, so obviously Dora is still alive, like you idiot.” Well, you should ask Dora if she knows she’s alive and how she feels. She is breathing, circulating that blood, then using the oxygen gained to eat through a tube. Those are her daily activities for the rest of her life. How is that enjoyable? The answer is neither yes nor no since the person doing it doesn’t know if it’s pleasant or not because they’re not conscious of telling the difference between the two. Dora can be compared to an aliterla plant. It keeps itself alive, and that’s it.
Despite not being considered "brain dead" Dora is no longer the same person or athlete she had been before the accident. While Dora's body can still function enough to keep her alive she's lost her consciousness and therefore is no longer herself. It's not enough for the body to simply continue to eat and breathe, it has to have some sort of autonomy and consciousness to be considered a person. In order to be a person, you have to be able to acknowledge the world around you, and think and feel things. Without those kinds of experiences or feelings, a person would be more of a vessel, just like Dora is now, than a conscious human being. To say that in Dora's current state she was a person, would be the same as saying a computer is alive. A computer can do things it was programmed to do, however, it cant think or feel for itself because it has no consciousness, therefore it isn't alive. Dora’s consciousness has been severed, and she can no longer think or remember anything. According to the memory view, this means Dora's previous experiences and memories are no longer tied to the body Dora has now. This discontinuation of the stream of memory means that according to the memory view, she is gone. In the case that Dora could recover from this state, and regain consciousness, it would be true that Dora was the same person she had been before the accident. If that were the case, there would have been another section of consciousness that could be tied to Dora's previous memories, reconnecting the continuous stream which makes Dora, Dora.
ReplyDeleteDora in a Permanent Vegetative State is not the same person as the athlete Dora who won championships. The psychological view says that what makes someone the same person over time is things like consciousness, memories, personality, beliefs, goals, and the ability to think and be aware. Before the accident Dora had a really good psychological life. She could think, feel emotions, had memories, recognize people, make decisions, and care about her career and achievements. These mental traits are what made her Dora. After the accident, Dora has permanently lost all of these brain functions. She is not conscious, has no awareness of herself or her surroundings, and cannot think, remember, or feel. Because these psychological features are gone forever, there is no psychological connection between the athlete Dora and the person now in PVS. Even though Dora’s body is still alive and functioning, the person she once was no longer exists. Her living body still exists, but the mind that defined her identity does not. Since personal identity depends on psychological connections, and those connections are completely broken, Dora after the accident is not the same person as Dora before it.
ReplyDeleteDora, being in a Permanent Vegetative State, is a really hard case because it forces you to think about how you define a person. According to the soul view, the answer is basically “yes” to her being the same person. If Dora has an immaterial soul and that soul is still present in her living body, then she’s still Dora even if she can’t think or be aware. There is a continuous string of consciousness, despite her not being in the same psychological state. Her personality and future goals don’t matter as much as the fact that the same soul is still attached to the same human being. This view makes identity stable, but it’s also hard to prove, because we can’t really test whether the soul is there, as it is invisible. On the memory view, it looks more like a “no” situation. The athlete Dora was Dora because of her memories of training, relationships, competitiveness, ability to recognize people, and make choices. In PVS, Dora has no awareness and can’t access any memories or form new ones. If personal identity is basically psychological continuity, then that chain is broken. The body might be alive, but the “person” who won championships isn’t psychologically present in the way that matters. On the body view, the answer is “yes,” because Dora is essentially the same living human organism. Her body is still doing biological functions and is continuous from before and after the accident. Even if her mind is gone, the organism hasn’t died, so Dora hasn’t ceased to exist.
ReplyDeleteDora is the same person on the soul and body view, but if we’re talking about what we care about when we talk about Dora as a person, the memory view explains why people feel like she’s not the same person. This case shows that Dora is biologically and metaphysically the same individual, but no longer the same person in terms of identity. The accident did not end her life, but it ended the psychological self that once made Dora who she was.
Dora being in a permanent vegetative state makes you question, how do you define what makes someone someone? According to the psychological continuity view, she is not the smae person. This is because according to this view, Athlete Dora had thoughts, memories, and things she was working towards in life, she even had characteristics unique to only her. Now PVS Dora has none of those things and never will again making her not the same person according to this view. When looking at this case from the soul view, it makes this an even more complicated question. This view says that the person is always the same perons if the soul is present, but we dont know if Dora’s soul is still attached to her body. We also don’t know if the soul adds anything to her as a person which is why this view is very complex and might depend on personal beliefs. In conclusion, biologically Dora is the same person as she was when she won the championship. But psychologically and even morally, PVS Dora might be a completely different person compared to who she was when she won the championship. The addition of the soul view in this case adds another layer of complexity because it makes you look deeper into what makes a person a person. Technically, if PVS Dora still has the same soul as championship Dora, she is the same person no matter her psychological condition or her physical condition. But like I said, this view could largely depend your personal and even religious views.
ReplyDeleteWhen a person loses all autonomy and the ability to think, personal identity is called into question. Dora, a famous professional athlete enters a Permanent Vegetative State after severe brain trauma. Dora loses all higher brain functioning and consciousness, yet she is not brain dead. She can still respirate, circulate blood, and digest food on her own. She will never regain awareness, but her biological organism continues to function. Dora in PVS is the same person as the athlete Dora because personal identity depends on physical continuity.
ReplyDeletePhilosophers argue that identity is grounded in the continuity of the soul, the body, or the mind. The soul view claims an intangible soul persists over time, but the very nature of the immaterial soul makes it impossible to prove. Additionally, if the soul exists, it provides no measurable way to track personal identity. Psychological continuity ties identity to an ongoing consciousness, but this fails as well. People lose consciousness every time they sleep, and this view struggles to differentiate between something like dementia and general forgetfulness in a non-arbitrary way.
Physical continuity, however, provides a clear and measurable standard. As long as the body’s overall structure and biological functions are the same, the person stays the same. Amputations or injuries do not create a new person, because the biological entity remains intact. Dora’s body continues to function as the same living organism as the on that once competed professionally. Therefore, despite her loss of consciousness, she remains the same person over time.