Ethics

Is my body my property? Or is it not property at all?

Comments

If I am my body, then my body can't be my property because then there will be no distinction between owner and owned. But even if I am a different sort of thing than my body yet can't exist apart from my body, then some usual notions of property as that which I have a right to sell or exchange cannot apply in this case.

I can exist without certain parts of my body, however, and it recognizing a right to sell or exchange such parts is not incoherent. Still, the commercialization of bodily parts is a dangerous trend, and there are good reasons to prohibit the sale of bodily parts in order to protect those who are economically vulnerable.

There are good reasons to insist that one has important rights over one's body -- rights to make decisions about how it is used, rights to decide how it is altered, rights to decide how it is shared -- but none of these rights depend on viewing one's body as one's property.

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