Thus, it was not a soul that made an individual, but these five “aggregates.” Instead, early scholars argued, individual beings were comprised of five mental and physical functions, or skandha: form, sensation, recognition, mental forces/formations, and self- consciousness. Yet, regardless of the foundation from which discussions of bioethics might be derived, the fact remains that neither religion nor philosophy provides any easy answers.īuddhist thought has historically eschewed the Hindu belief in an eternal soul, one that remained unchanged through the never-ending process of life, death, and rebirth in the realm of samsara. What makes a person? Can people be created through artificial means? What exactly constitutes “artificial means” anyway?Īnd although such issues are consistently approached through the lenses of various Western systems of thought, ranging from the “objectively” scientific to the “subjectively” religious, it is only recently that non-Western (i.e., Buddhist, Hindu, Jain, etc.) philosophies have begun to find a place in these dialogues. To be fair, these questions aren’t any different than those that have been applied to the contemporary fields of artificial intelligence and robotics. The existence of these beings within the mythos of the series raises philosophical questions: Can we consider them to be persons? If so, should we consider Wrath and/or Greed to have a greater degree of personhood than the others? And how do we even evaluate their personhood over against that of Gluttony or Lust or Sloth? Both were similarly injected with a Philosopher’s Stone, and consequently became the embodiment of a particular emotion once belonging to Father. Wrath and the second Greed (inhabiting the body of a prince named Ling), however, were originally fully human. Pride, Sloth, Envy, Gluttony, Lust, and the original Greed were each artificial vessels formed by Father and imbued with the power of a Philosopher’s Stone. While all were created by another older homunculus, known as Father, the circumstances of their “births” vary. Over the course of their travels, they encounter a group of beings known as homunculi, each of whom is named after one of the Seven Deadly Sins. When the dust settles, they begin to seek a way to restore themselves to normal, and in the process uncover a conspiracy that threatens the existence of the entire nation. As payment for their folly, Ed loses his left leg, and Alphonse his entire body. After an aborted attempt to resurrect their mother through an illegal form of alchemy, the pair finds themselves on the brink of death. Personhood in Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood By Darian Shumpįullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood follows the adventures of Edward Elric, a State Alchemist employed by the military of Amestris, and Alphonse, his younger brother.
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