HPP/DLC 2015: Ferenc Hörcher, "The Concept of the Person: A Catholic-Aristotelian, Practical Ph

Ferenc Hörcher - 'The Concept of the Person: A Catholic-Aristotelian, Practical Philosophical Account'. Delivered at the 2015 HPP/DLC Persons and Community colloquium.

The Concept of the Person: A Catholic-Aristotelian, Practical Philosophical Account' Realising the deadlock in the connection between the individual and the community as a result of the birth of an unencumbered self in modern liberal thought, this paper suggests we return once again to philosophical anthropology, and see what answers the Western—mainly Aristotelian and Christian, theoretical and practical—tradition has provided to the problem of the person. In this enquiry I will a look at the conceptual framework of the person and at actual practices in the early modern period of cultivating different personae, as well as the Enlightenments' concept of practical philosophy. Through this investigation the paper aims to suggest ways to reconstruct—meaning to revive and to renew at the same time—a richer concept of the connections between the person and her political community, more in harmony with the antique and Christian European tradition.