On Mon, 2008-09-22 at 14:39 -0700, Kerim Aydin wrote:
> On Mon, 22 Sep 2008, ais523 wrote:
> > I call for judgement on the statement "The Monster is a person".
> >
> > Evidence:
> > Rule 2150:
> > {{{
> > A person is an entity that has the general capacity to be the
> > subject of rights and obligations under the rules.
> > }}}
>
> Ooh, a classic faulty syllogism:
> 1. A person is an entity that is the subject of rights and
> obligations under the rules.
> 2. The monster is an entity that is the subject of rights
> (nb. not really) and obligations under the rules.
> 3. Therefore the monster is a person.
>
> -Goethe
>
> p.s. Extra credit: comment on the significance of "a person is an entity"
> versus "a person is any entity".
>
> pps. This *does* imply that the monster is either a march hare or a walrus.
>
I don't treat the syllogism as faulty; I read the sentence as "A person
is hereby defined to be an entity that has the general capacity to be
the subject of rights and obligations under the rules." For the other
possible meaning there's no obvious reason why entities would be
mentioned at all; "People have the general capacity to be the subject of
rights and obligations under the rules" would make more sense in that
case.
--
ais523
