October 11, 2026
SIG-PRG 2026-10-11
Participants: misha 🪨, Sam Mandel (GMT -4), Sarah Friend | utc +2, Simon Hudson | utc-5
The session explored how personhood extends beyond the body into property, objects, and spaces, using Radin's distinction between fungible property and property bound up with the self. Discussion moved from homes, homelessness, and sentimental attachment to objects, through the fungibility of body parts and digital property (phones, social-media accounts), and ultimately to an extended conversation—prompted by Simon—about whether AI agents can or should have personhood, ownership, and sovereignty. The group closed with housekeeping about November readings and a book-writing initiative.
- Misha: The house is essential to being; one can "lose oneself" without a home. He cited a newspaper piece (around World Homeless Day) about a woman who felt she lost her personhood as she lost possessions while homeless.
- Sam: In the US, homeless people are often treated as "partial persons" and stigmatized beyond mere poverty—partly because success/failure framing attaches to not having a house or address.
- Misha connected this to Roman etymology: domus/dominus—only the lord of the house was fully a persona, while slaves, children, and women within the household were not; this links back to earlier sessions.
- Sam was skeptical of the cultural assumption that long-held possessions (e.g., items lost in natural disasters) carry special personal value—questioning whether this is a valid insight or a sentimental justification. He later qualified this, noting that elderly people forced to downsize into care facilities genuinely experience a loss of identity.
- Misha: Attachment to objects varies by person (e.g., a friend who abandons all belongings when moving, as a "reset").
- Sarah raised "Swedish death cleaning" as a meme suggesting that ruthlessly discarding belongings is itself a kind of death (and possibly rebirth, per Sam). Dimensions of property and the moral argument
Session Recording Summary · 59m 32s · Full notes ↗
Reading: The reading is an essay on property and personhood by Margaret Jane Radin (referred to in the transcript as "Radin" / "Ratin" / "Radden"). Participants mention reading either excerpts or a longer version (a quote is cited from page 973). The essay draws on Hegel's theory of property and freedom and engages with the law-and-economics tradition (notably a famous article by Guido Calabresi and a coauthor, Melamed). This is part of an ongoing series of readings on personhood.
The session explored how personhood extends beyond the body into property, objects, and spaces, using Radin's distinction between fungible property and property bound up with the self. Discussion moved from homes, homelessness, and sentimental attachment to objects, through the fungibility of body parts and digital property (phones, social-media accounts), and ultimately to an extended conversation—prompted by Simon—about whether AI agents can or should have personhood, ownership, and sovereignty. The group closed with housekeeping about November readings and a book-writing initiative.
- Misha: The house is essential to being; one can "lose oneself" without a home. He cited a newspaper piece (around World Homeless Day) about a woman who felt she lost her personhood as she lost possessions while homeless.
- Sam: In the US, homeless people are often treated as "partial persons" and stigmatized beyond mere poverty—partly because success/failure framing attaches to not having a house or address.
- Misha connected this to Roman etymology: domus/dominus—only the lord of the house was fully a persona, while slaves, children, and women within the household were not; this links back to earlier sessions.
- Sam was skeptical of the cultural assumption that long-held possessions (e.g., items lost in natural disasters) carry special personal value—questioning whether this is a valid insight or a sentimental justification. He later qualified this, noting that elderly people forced to downsize into care facilities genuinely experience a loss of identity.
- Misha: Attachment to objects varies by person (e.g., a friend who abandons all belongings when moving, as a "reset").
- Sarah raised "Swedish death cleaning" as a meme suggesting that ruthlessly discarding belongings is itself a kind of death (and possibly rebirth, per Sam). Dimensions of property and the moral argument
Questions & Disagreements: - Is sentimental attachment to property genuine or a rationalization? Sam was initially skeptical, later tempered by observing elderly downsizing. - Moral vs. efficiency grounding of property rights: Sam questioned how convincing Radin's moral dimension is versus the law-and-economics (Calabresi) efficiency framing. …
Participants: misha 🪨, Sam Mandel (GMT -4), Sarah Friend | utc +2, Simon Hudson | utc-5