On the Human in Human Dignity

DOI

10.3390/philosophies9050157

Document Type

Journal Article

Publication Date

10-1-2024

Publication Title

Philosophies

Volume

9

Issue

5

Keywords

animal studies, human, medical model, naturalistic reductionism, post-humanism, psychiatry, semiotic phenomenology

Abstract

Only the incurious and philosophically challenged doubt the significance of dignity as a central issue in human interactions. Human dignity is much debated in religion, law, moral philosophy, anthropology, psychiatry, bioethics, sociology, philosophical anthropology, psychology, communication studies, and elsewhere. It is subject to competing discourses of ontology, epistemology, axiology, and logic. It appears in intercultural and international discussions of rights, autonomy, race, ethnicity, economics, war, and peace. It is contrasted with guilt, shame, and humiliation, both ordinary and extreme. However, the dynamic roots of dignity are usually presupposed or ignored in favor of reductionist typologies and antinomies. Returning us to lived experience and with post-humanist animal studies and the medical model of psychiatry as exemplary cases of reductionism, I interpret H. Plessner’s semiotic phenomenology as a communicative philosophy of the humane in dignity.

Open Access

Gold

Link to Full Text

Share

COinS