What is rationality? Internal Dialogue.

What is rationality? One answer is that it is the use of reason. But there are at least two rebutting

defeaters to this: (1) a comatose person does not use reason and (2) a person sleeping does not

use reason.

Clearly a comatose person or a person sleeping are in fact a person, it does not

matter if they use reason. One other answer is that it is the capacity to use reason.

So, a sleeping person or a comatose person has the capacity to use reason. One undercutting

defeater to this answer is that we really does not know if a sleeping person or a comatose person

has the capacity to use reason. Why not say that the sleeping person or the comatose person does

not have the capacity to use reason? The proponent answers that the sleeping person or the

comatose person has the capacity to use reason in virtue of their nature, namely, being a human.

In answer, the conclusion is begging the question. At most it seems like there could be an

unidentifiable moment in a person's life whereby they receive reason. It may be that some

humans do not have the capacity for reason at all.



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