Reductio

            In Jtg1's conceptual analysis on "character," he defines and explains the word as "moral excellence and firmness." For someone to have character means that person will do what is good or virtuous, and will not deter from this. He also explains the apparent discrepancy in definitions of "character" from culture to culture because cultures tend to define morality - whether by this, they mean what is good or evil, or what is virtue and what is vice - in different ways. By understanding what is meant by "character," he says others will be able to understand whether or not to trust someone, who is said to lack character, with something important. Yet within his analysis there exists both room for contradiction and room for absurdity.

            For example, suppose Calypso and Didymus are students at a famous college. The two of them must work on a group assignment, which is an important part of their grade. The two of them have a choice of either dividing the work between them, with each taking one part, or working jointly on the entire assignment. The latter choice will take more time, which is undesirable, but the former choice requires the two to trust each other to fulfill their part of the work. According to Jtg1’s analysis, Calypso will know whether or not she can trust Didymus to do his part of the assignment by understanding what “character” is, and whether or not Didymus has it or not.

If Calypso and Didymus both were members of the same culture, with the same sense of morality – goods and evils, or virtues and vices – then there would be no problem with this analysis. Here is where contradiction arises: Calypso and Didymus are students at a famous college. The college environment is well known for being a multi-cultural environment, with those in charge of college admissions purposefully selecting students from a wide range of cultures and ethnicities. In all likelihood, with the great number of overlapping cultures within the college environment, Calypso and Didymus are probably members of different cultures.

Being of different cultures means that they will have different ideas of what the goods and evils or the virtues and vices are. For example, suppose that in Calypso’s culture, it is a virtue to take things easy in life. For people to have character in Calypso’s culture means, among other things, that they in turn will “take things easy,” that is, they will not work as hard or as strenuously as they might be able to, but rather stay calm and relaxed throughout.

In contrast, suppose that in Didymus’ culture, it is a virtue to work to the very best of his ability. For people to have character in Didymus’ culture means that they will work to the very best of their ability, that is, they will work as hard or as strenuously as they might be able to, likely becoming stressed in the process. Each of these two concepts has its benefits and downfalls. The only difference is which one their culture has established as virtue and which one was not.

Yet these two concepts of virtue are mutually exclusive. One cannot simultaneously “take things easy” – to not work as hard or as strenuously as one might be able to, but rather stay calm and relaxed throughout – and work to the best of one’s ability – to work as hard or as strenuously as one might be able to, likely becoming stressed in the process. Because one cannot display “moral excellence” while failing to meet one of the standards of morality in the first place, Didymus and Calypso cannot fail to meet their respective virtue. Thus, for Didymus or Calypso to have character in one of their cultures is to not have character in the other culture.

If Didymus asked members of his cultural community if Calypso had character, they would likely judge her by their own standards. In which case, if she holds to her own community’s standards of morality, they would tell Didymus that she lacks character. Yet if Didymus then asked members of Calypso’s cultural community instead, they would judge her by their own standards. In which case, because she holds to her own community’s standards of morality, they would indeed tell Didymus that she does have character.

This is a contradiction. Calypso is simultaneously being said to both possess character, and to lack character. One cannot have both A and not A at the same time. Both cultures are within their bounds to make this statement about her. It is not a mistake for them to say either thing. Yet there must be some mistake for this contradiction to arise in the first place. Either the idea of character or Jtg1’s analysis of character must be wrong, if it can lead to contradiction like this.

Where contradiction leads to absurdity comes through a process called enculturation. Enculturation is when a person, being thoroughly exposed and engrained in another culture, picks up the cultural norms and habits of that culture. This process usually, but not always, results in the loss of attachment to the person’s original culture, and the cultural norms and habits associated with it. In short, enculturation is when one person becomes part of another culture, and that culture supplants their original one.

For example, suppose that after spending time with Didymus, Calypso decides to join his culture. The simplest way this would happen is if Calypso and Didymus started a relationship, and while being exposed to his family, friends and culture, became fully enculturated. Among other things, this would include the virtues that his culture holds to be true, including the virtue of working to the very best of one’s ability.

Soon enough, as Calypso takes on more and more traits of Didymus’ culture, the people of Didymus’ culture will begin to say that she now has character. This is because, as previously mentioned, they will judge her on the basis of their own cultural standards. Yet there is a problem here. By becoming enculturated in Didymus’ culture, Calypso would have had to give up the virtues her own culture followed, such as the virtue of taking things easy.

This would put her at odds with her original culture, which would also judge her on the basis of their own cultural standards. As previously mentioned, these two virtues – takings things easy, or working to the very best of one’s ability – are mutually exclusive. For Calypso to have character in Didymus’ culture now is to not have character in her original culture anymore. Instead of going from “A and not A” to “A and A,” Calypso only managed to reverse her initial position to “not A and A.”

Indeed, because of the mutual exclusivity generated by these divergent virtues, there is no possible way for Calypso to have character in both cultures. She will always be said to both to have and not have character. Indeed, even if Didymus’ culture did not exist, there would still be others like it due to the cultural overlap that exists on a planetary level. It is utterly impossible for Calypso to fully have character, because there will always be a cultural group, if not multiple cultural groups, that have an opposing conception of what cultural norms make up the goods and evils or virtues and vices that comprise the moral excellence innate to character. This is absurd.

Without a universal understanding of what are the goods and evils or the virtues and vices, there is no universal understanding of what moral excellence is. Without a universal understanding of what moral excellence is, there is no universal understanding of what makes up character. Without a universal understanding of what makes up character, people will disagree on what makes up character, leading to these situations where people can simultaneously be said to have character and to not have character.

Jtg1 says that by understanding character as “moral excellence and firmness,” one would be able to know whether to trust someone who is said to lack character. Yet lacking character is not only a matter of cultural perspective, it is arguable that everyone could be said to lack character if one only looked at them from the right – or rather, the wrong – perspective. Not only that, but there is no way for a person to satisfy every culture’s expectations of what constitutes character, which traps them in an unending “have character and not have character” spiral paradox. For these reasons, character alone should never be the basis of trust, unless a person is working in a single culture environment. In this time frame, that is exceedingly rare to find. Character is a linguistic concept that, without a universal definition of morality, only leads to contradiction in an increasingly multicultural world.

Dilemma

            In Jtg1's conceptual analysis on "character," he defines and explains the word as "moral excellence and firmness." For someone to have character means that person will do what is good or virtuous, and will not deter from this. He also explains the apparent discrepancy in definitions of "character" from culture to culture because cultures tend to define morality - whether by this, they mean what is good or evil, or what is virtue and what is vice - in different ways. By understanding what is meant by "character," he says others will be able to understand whether or not to trust someone, who is said to lack character, with something important.

            For example, suppose Archibald and Billy-jean are students and must work on a group assignment, which is an important part of their grade. The two of them have a choice of either dividing the work between them, with each taking one part, or working jointly on the entire assignment. The latter choice will take more time, which is undesirable, but the former choice requires the two to trust each other to fulfill their part of the work. Billy-jean does not know much about Archibald, but he is said to have character. If Billy-jean understands what is meant by "character," then she will be able to understand whether or not to trust him to fulfill his part of the work.

            Yet there is one very large problem with this understanding of “character” and using it to measure a person’s trustworthiness. Defining character solely by “moral excellence and firmness” adequately works in a single culture society, where understanding what is meant by “character” is a universal understanding. When there is more than one culture in a single society, however, there is also no single universal understanding. Indeed, where multiple cultures overlap in the same society, multiple concepts of “character” can develop, even within this precise definition of “character.” In the following example, I will show how a person can be said to have character, and yet still be untrustworthy.

            Suppose Archibald and Billy-jean are students in a college – an environment well known for the number of diverse cultures converging on a single locale. Both of them come from a different culture, with each culture possessing its own sense of morality and cultural norms. Within his own culture, Archibald is said to have character; that is, he displays moral excellence and firmness in regards to his own culture’s morality and cultural norms. Yet because Archibald’s culture is different from Billy-jean’s culture, Archibald would not be considered to have character in Billy-jean’s culture.

            If Billy-jean is trying to measure Archibald’s trustworthiness, then there are primarily two groups of people she could speak to about if Archibald has character or not.  She could ask her friends, who might know Archibald better than her. She could also ask Archibald’s friends, who would of course know Archibald better than herself. In each situation, the culture that they come from has a large impact on what they might say about Archibald and how they view him, which in turn affects what they would say about Archibald.

            If Billy-jean asks her own friends, then what they might say about Archibald is likely representative of what Billy-jean’s culture in general would say about Archibald. This is because people usually befriend people with like-minded beliefs or people who belong to similar cultures. In this case, because Archibald’s culture is different from that of Billy-jean and her friends, her friends will tell her that Archibald does not have character. They will judge him by the standards of their own culture.

            If Billy-jean asks Archibald’s friends if he has character, the result is likely to be very different. In the same way that Billy-jean’s friends are likely to be of the same culture as herself, Archibald’s friends are likely to be of the same culture as himself. Unlike in Billy-jean’s culture, within Archibald’s own culture, Archibald is said to have character after all. If Billy-jean asks Archibald’s friends if he has character, they will likely say he does. They, like Billy-jean’s friends, will judge him by the standards of their own culture.

            For example: in Archibald’s culture, it is a virtue to take things easy in life. For people to have character in Archibald’s culture means, among other things, that they in turn will “take things easy”, that is, they will not work as hard or as strenuously as they might be able to, but rather stay calm and relaxed throughout. When such a person is part of a group assignment, that person will not work as hard, and this in turn will be reflected in that person’s grade. That person is much more likely to have a bad grade, because that person did not work as hard as someone else.

In Billy-jean’s culture, however, it is a virtue to work to the very best of her ability. For people to have character in Billy-jean’s culture means that they will work to the very best of their ability, that is, they will work as hard or as strenuously as they might be able to, likely becoming stressed in the process. When such a person is part of a group assignment, that person will work very hard, and this in turn will be reflected in that person’s grade. That person is much more likely to have a good grade because that person worked harder than someone else.

These two concepts of character are mutually exclusive. One cannot simultaneously “take things easy” – to not work as hard or as strenuously as one might be able to, but rather stay calm and relaxed throughout – and work to the best of one’s ability – to work as hard or as strenuously as one might be able to, likely becoming stressed in the process. For Archibald to have character in one of their cultures is to not have character in the other culture.

By this understanding of their culture’s representative notions of “character,” if Billy-jean wants to know if she can trust Archibald on the basis of character to do his part of their assignment, then who she asks will have a very large impact on whether she believes she can or not.  If Billy-jean asks her friends if Archibald has character, they will say no, because as it was earlier mentioned, they will judge Archibald by the standards of their own culture.

Because of Archibald’s proclaimed lack of character, Billy-jean will come to the conclusion that Archibald is untrustworthy and she cannot trust him with his part of the assignment. She will thus opt for the more unfavorable option of the two working together on the whole assignment. Because Archibald will take things easy and Billy-jean wants a good grade, her mistrustfulness is merited.

Yet if she instead asks Archibald’s friends if he has character, she will come across a real dilemma: Archibald’s friends will tell her that he does indeed have character. According to Jtg1’s analysis, by being said to have character and understanding what is meant by character, Archibald would thus become a trustworthy figure. Billy-jean will thus opt for the more favoriable option of the two each working on their own parts of the assignment. This is a mistake.

In Archibald’s culture, it is a virtue to take things easy. He will not work as hard, and he will likely have a lower grade because of it. Because this is a group assignment, Billy-jean will also have a lower grade because of it. Billy-jean wanted a good grade, and trusted Archibald to do his part of their work well. She trusted him because he was said to have character, but she really should not have trusted him at all.

Thus in this example, one can see how Archibald simultaneously was said to have character but was also untrustworthy with something important to Billy-jean, that is, their grade on that assignment. Jtg1’s analysis of “character” focused on the two key components of “moral excellence and firmness” and how understanding that would allow a person to know whether or not they could trust someone. Yet in the face of this example, one can see there is a problem with Jtg1’s analysis: either the definition of what “character” is must be wrong, or at least insufficient, or character is simply not as good of a means of establishing trustworthiness as he believes.

If the definition he provides is wrong, this would account for why there can be a misunderstanding about character that led to Billy-jean trusting Archibald when she should not have. If it is simply insufficient, then the definition he provides must be amended to take into account such situations as this. If “character” in general is simply a bad means of establishing trustworthiness, then his definition may not be the wrong one. It may be that because of cultural connotations, the word itself simply does not ensure trustworthiness. If that is the case, then as long as one lives within a multicultural society, when it comes to trusting people, one may as well disregard the concept of character and seek out other alternatives to base trust on.

Counterexample, New

In Jtg1’s Conceptual Analysis on “character,” he defines and explains the word as “moral excellence and firmness. He also explains the apparent discrepancy in definitions of character from culture to culture because cultures tend to define morality – whether by this, they mean what is good or evil, or what is virtue and what is vice – in different ways. By understanding what is meant by character, he says others will be able to understand whether to trust someone who is said to lack character or not with something important.

Yet there are exceptions to this. The “melting pot” society is most likely to experience such an exception, where multiple cultures overlap in the same area of living, or even blend cultures together. Each culture likely has its own definition of morality – the goods or evil, or the virtues and vices – and so each is rightfully within their own bounds to say whether a person has character or not. The one who is said to have character in one culture may have a different morality, or possibly even oppose the morality of one who is said to have character in another culture.

For example, in one culture, if it is a virtue to let a person stand on their own, or even face hardship so they can grow from said hardship, then going to him or her for help with something important may prove disastrous. If that person is true to his or her virtues, as the person must be because of the “firmness” of character, then the person may act in some negative manner: inhibiting, obstructing, or perhaps even destroying what the something important that he or she was trusted with.

In a melting pot society, however, the person who did the trusting may have based their trust in the person, who is said to have character, on his or her own culture’s concept of character, in which it could be a virtue to help those who ask for help. The definition of character does not change between them; it is still “moral excellence and firmness.” The one who is said to have character does indeed have character, but he cannot be trusted with something important.

Conceptual Analysis, New

As follows is a brand new conceptual analysis, which overlaps the same concept as my previous versions but is written from a different perspective:

Character is a very important linguistic concept. Functionally, character is used in language to assess a person in some way, especially to make decisions or judgements. For example, if someone is said to be lacking in character, then by understanding what character is, one will know it is unsafe to trust that person with something important. Yet the word “character” has several definitions and is sometimes used in a general way in the vernacular. In this analysis, I will look at the individual components that are used to define the word character and why the above statement is true.

The study and analysis of character is an ancient tradition. Indeed, even as far back as 300 to 400 BC, philosophers like Aristotle were writing entire volumes on the subject. Aristotle, a renowned Greek philosopher who lived in that period, wrote a book on the subject that is still being read today. This book, entitled Nicomachean Ethics, provided a literary foundation for this subject and others that people would, and have used, for the millennia that followed.

There are many definitions of the word “character,” so it is important for us to identify explicitly what we mean by this word so that there is no confusion. I shall focus on only two of them here. First, character is defined as “attributes or features that make up or distinguish an individual.” It is important to note this definition, because this is expressly not the definition that the use of “character” in this analysis will refer to. That definition primarily refers to “character” in a way synonymous to descriptive characteristics in general.

This second definition of character is “moral excellence and firmness.” The use of character here refers to something distinct, not general. It is this definition of character that we must keep in mind in the continuing analysis. Looking specifically at this definition, however, we can see how this definition is comprised of two main components: “moral excellence” being one of them, and “firmness” being the other. Both of these components of the definition are key to understanding what character is, thus we shall look at each in turn.

The first component to character, “moral excellence,” is not a singular word on its own. Rather, it is a phrase, a pair of words that constitute their own unique definition to be understood in conjunction. In this case, that phrase refers to a state of morality. Morality thus is a fundamental component of what character is as well. Indeed, it is the moral component that most people readily associate with the idea of character. Yet what is morality?

At its root, morality is a system of two contrasting elements: either good and evil, or virtues and vices. In simplistic terms, this is a contrast between positive and negative elements. What is good and what are virtues are the positive, with what is evil and what are vices as the negative. These two elements, though both possible roots of morality, are distinct in that “good” and “evil” are general qualities applicable to a broad host, and “virtues” and “vices” specifically refer to habits and actions, or the lack there of.

The second part of the phrase, “moral excellence,” is much easier to understand. “Excellence” is simply the quality of being of the highest level. After all, to excel means to exceed beyond other things – in this case, the levels of how moral a person is. Because we have established morality as a system of goods and evils, or virtues and vices, moral excellence thus refers to that state of being that follows the goods or virtues most perfectly.

The second component to character, “firmness,” is similarly easier to understand. The definition of firmness has two aspects: a positive aspect, and a negative aspect. The positive aspect says what “firmness” is: it is securely and solidly fixed in place. The negative aspect says what “firmness” is not: it is not subject to change or revision. Thus the second component to character can be summarized in one sentence: it is stable and unchanging.

Character is thus made up of those two components: “moral excellence” and “firmness.” They are tied together in this definition and cannot be taken apart. That they are tied together incidentally has other implications on both. Because “firmness” is tied to “moral excellence,” the definition of the former also applies to the later. This means that a person with character will not change their state of morality depending on the circumstances, and is similarly stable in their state of morality.

More importantly though, these two components must also exist in balance with one another. If a person has “firmness” but is lacking “moral excellence,” he or she is merely stubborn and closed-minded. This kind of person does not have character because they do not reach the appropriate level of goodness or follow the appropriate virtues. What he or she holds firmly is not necessarily what are the goods and virtues, and so lacks character in this regard.

On the other hand, it is a contradiction to say that a person can have “moral excellence” but lack in “firmness.” As previously stated, for a person to be morally excellent, they must follow the good or virtues most perfectly. This requires action on his or her part. It is not enough to simply know and accept the goods or virtues. Yet if a person is lacking in firmness, he or she will be unable to reach that level of morality in the first place. This is because lacking in stability allows a person to waver in their morality, and a person that constantly wavers between good and evil, or virtue and vices, can hardly be said to follow the goods or virtues most perfectly.

Yet in these two components used to define character, even if the two exist in balance, there is still a very large discrepancy: character is not universally equitable. That is, the actions or traits of a person said to possess character in one place may not equal the actions or traits of a person said to possess character in another place. This is because within the definition for character there is still room for variation in that first component: morality. This was already hinted on earlier when morality was defined as a system of goods and evils, or virtues and vices.

Goods and evils or virtues and vices are two separate groupings. While there may be some overlap, it is more important to realize that there is a distinction between these two groupings. This leads to the important question of “why is there a distinction in the first place?” This distinction develops largely because of the way that morality itself develops in each culture, along cultural lines.

In this regard, morality tends to be affected by two aspects of culture: first, the religious or spiritual aspect of the culture, and the mundane or philosophical aspect of the culture. Religions have an exceptionally profound impact on the conception of morality in a culture. Many religions, such as those in the Abrahamic tradition, have explicit concepts of what is good and what is evil – concepts which may not overlap with other traditions, or worse, outright oppose those of other traditions.  In a culture that follows such a tradition, morality is defined from these concepts.

As far as the mundane or philosophical aspect of a culture goes, it can be summed up in a single phrase: cultural norms. A cultural norm is a concept, usually unconsciously decided upon by the culture in question, that is the standard to which they hold themselves. These, more than religious concepts, tend to be rather place specific and more representative of the culture that created them. Because of these two aspects – the religious or spiritual and the mundane or philosophical aspects of culture – character ends up being directly dependant upon how the home culture defines morality in the first place.

This then is what is really meant by character: that the people possessing character display and maintain a high, if not the highest, level of morality. In the opening paragraph, it was stated that understanding the meaning of character would allow one to see why it is unsafe to trust someone who lacks character with something important. For someone to have character means that they will do what is good or virtuous, and will not deter from this. In short, they are dependable - but someone who lacks character does not share this same dependability. They may do what is wrong, fall to vice, or change their mind all together. They, in short, are not dependable. Character is an assessment of a person’s moral dependability.

Conceptual Analysis, Revised

            Do human beings have a true self? Before we can answer this question, we must also ask, what is a “true self”? Many people instinctively believe they have one – saying such things as ‘the true self is how one really is’ – but actually explaining what it is, or why they believe they have it, is a more difficult task. For the sake of this analysis, I shall assume two main points as true: first, that all human beings do have a true self, and that the true self is functionally defined as being moral, stable and unchanging. I assume these things, because while trying to answer the question, “Do human beings have a true self?” I have no way to physically test the presence of the true self within human beings. I can only rely on a logical examination of the fundamental attributes of the true self to ascertain the validity of these claims.

            If we take the true self to be moral, however, than one has the issue with understanding what “moral” is as well. Here there is the first of several issues that arises from this definition of the true self: people do not intrinsically know what is “moral.” There is no circuit board in the mind, a clear yes-no answer automatically generated in all situations that allows a human being to instinctively and readily infer a morally right action from a morally wrong action. To determine what is moral requires judgement, active use of the mind’s faculties, and judgement is subject to individual perspective. Perspectives, however, can and do tend to conflict.

Thus what is moral is the subject of constant debate, and has been for millennia, if not since the dawn of rational human thought, and the current human populace is no closer to ending the debate than it has ever been before. Since people cannot decide what moral is or is not, then moral must be left as an unknown in the equation. One cannot define something otherwise unknown with another unknown in the hopes of proving the existence of the first. As an unknown, the truth could just as easily undermine, instead of support, the definition. What is moral must then be disregarded from the assumptions on that ground.

            Some may consider a conscience, as an emotional response to an event or line of thought, to be an indication of the true self’s moral guidance, but then what of the psychopath who knows nothing of guilt? Is one to presume that the psychopath’s true self is somehow deficient? A deficient true self can hardly qualify as a true self, for by its very nature, one’s true self cannot be deficient. Deficiency implies that something has been taken away or is lacking, but the true self is said – and assumed here – to be stable and unchanging. You cannot take away from something that is stable and unchanging, and for something to be lacking implies that it can lose or grow in the first place – actions that also cannot be true because of the basic assumptions. The only way to disqualify the psychopath from the assumptions is to say that the psychopath is not a human being. Since psychopaths are indeed human beings, then what is moral must be disregarded from the equation on that ground as well.

            The true self is also said to be stable, a solid foundation for a person’s character. Yet the problem with this is that there is a lack of empirical evidence to suggest that a person’s character has any stability. Indeed, studies over the last century record evidence quite contrary to this idea. There is a laundry list of factors, even insubstantial ones, that have shown to have a profound effect on human behavior: personal mood (Isen and Levin experiment, 1972), haste (Darley and Batson experiment, 1973), cultural inclinations, perspective, the presence or absence of peers (Latane and Darley experiments, 1970) or superiors (Milgram experiments, 1974), etc. Humans are capable of great atrocity, or surprising kindness, even with a shift of small variables. Yet in regards to the assumptions at hand, it does not even matter what those factors are. What does matter is the sheer fact that one realizes the lack of evidence for stability.

If there is little to no evidence for stability in a person’s character, then it is likely – although not assuredly – that stability does not exist. Because this is an argument attempting to prove the existence of the true self, one must veer away from blind faith in the stability of character and instead take it for what it most likely is: an arbitrary linguistic attribution. No matter the authority assigning them, one cannot put stock in arbitrary attributions without an appropriate level of evidence, and then accept those attributions as evidence for something else. In other words, “stable” as a quality of the true self is not stable enough to depend on. If one cannot depend on it, then it has no force and cannot be used for anything.

Indeed, even without the empirical evidence displaying the lack of stability, one can still see this lack of stability in normal human life. Rather, it is self-evident that the events a person experiences, whether singular and drastic, or frequent and minimal, can affect a lasting change on that person. In the former case, it is obvious how traumatic events can cause harm, sometimes irreparably, to a person’s character. For example, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is unfortunately a common and highly visible issue, especially in wartime and in victims of violent crime, that can display stark contrasts in the effected person’s initial behavior and their later behavior. This, however, is an extreme case, and something as simple as bullying or the death of a family member can also cause behavioral shifts in an individual.

In the latter case, it can be summed up in a single word: habituation. By doing something over and over again, a person can make that thing a habit, eventually reaching a point where repeating said activity can be done without even needing to be fully conscious of it. Yet a habit, though long lasting and hard to break, can also be unmade, through an opposing process of not doing that thing which contributed to the formation of the habit in the first place, and possibly through forming another habit instead. The person who has a started a habit of biting their nails when stressed has several ways in which said habit can be broken, and thus become a reformed nail biter.

Indeed, rather than displaying the stability of character that is expected of the true self, it is much clearer to see how human beings display an adaptability of character. This goes hand in hand with the earlier argument against the true self’s moral qualities. If people did not possess this ability to adapt, to learn and grow from their experiences, then there would also be no concept of moral growth and its opposite, moral stagnation, and trying to teach children anything of morality would just be a waste of time. Children do need to be taught, however, in the same way that a parent or guardian must teach them so many other things. Does this lack of innate morality mean that children do not have a true self? Yet children are human beings, and if we take human beings as having a true self, then that can only be true if children are not considered human beings.

That, then, is the central issue. If one believes that all human beings have a true self, and that the true self is moral, stable and unchanging, then one must either exclude some people, like psychopaths and children, from being considered “human beings,” or drop the defining attributes of “moral, stable and unchanging” from its description. Yet historically, if one excludes the title of “human being” from such people, then those who are still considered human beings may use that as a justification for treating them inhumanely, as has been done in the past, and as such, I am unwilling to make that concession. However, if one takes away those key attributes, then there is little else to define a true self by, and without a proper definition, the “true self” becomes a meaningless concept that would be better to disavow then accept on faith as so many already do.