An individual is that which exists as a distinct
entity.
Individuality (or self-hood) is the state
or quality of being an individual; particularly
of being a person separate from other people
and possessing their own needs or goals, rights
and responsibilities.
The exact definition of an individual is important
in the fields of biology, law, and philosophy.
From the 15th century and earlier (and also
today within the fields of statistics and
metaphysics) individual meant "indivisible",
typically describing any numerically singular
thing, but sometimes meaning "a person".
From the 17th century on, individual indicates
separateness, as in individualism.Although
individuality and individualism are commonly
considered to mature with age/time and experience/wealth,
a sane adult human being is usually considered
by the state as an "individual person" in
law, even if the person denies individual
culpability ("I followed instructions").
An individual person is accountable for their
actions/decisions/instructions, subject to
prosecution in both national and international
law, from the time that they have reached
age of majority, often though not always more
or less coinciding with the granting of voting
rights, tax and military duties/ individual
right to bear arms (protected only under certain
constitutions).
In line with hierarchy, ultimate individual
human reward for success and responsibility
for failure is nonetheless found at the top
of human society
== Law ==
in International law:
All human beings are born free and equal in
dignity and rights.
They are endowed with reason and conscience
and should act towards one another in a spirit
of brotherhood.in American law:
A natural person is a human being.
A legal person is an entity such as a company,
which is regarded in law as having its own
'legal personality'.The Merriam-Webster's
Dictionary of Law states: A "natural person"
is "A human being as distinguished from person
(as a corporation) created by operation of
law.
A 1910 legal dictionary states: "Individual:
As a noun, this term denotes a single person
as distinguished from a group or class, and
also, very commonly, a private or natural
person as distinguished from a partnership,
corporation, or association."
== 
Philosophy ==
=== Buddhism ===
In Buddhism, the concept of the individual
lies in anatman, or "no-self."
According to anatman, the individual is really
a series of interconnected processes that,
working together, give the appearance of being
a single, separated whole.
In this way, anatman, together with anicca,
resembles a kind of bundle theory.
Instead of an atomic, indivisible self distinct
from reality, the individual in Buddhism is
understood as an interrelated part of an ever-changing,
impermanent universe (see Interdependence,
Nondualism, Reciprocity).
=== Empiricism ===
Early empiricists such as Ibn Tufail in early
12th century Islamic Spain, and John Locke
in late 17th century England, introduced the
idea of the individual as a tabula rasa ("blank
slate"), shaped from birth by experience and
education.
This ties into the idea of the liberty and
rights of the individual, society as a social
contract between rational individuals, and
the beginnings of individualism as a doctrine.
=== Hegel ===
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel regarded history
as the gradual evolution of Mind as it tests
its own concepts against the external world.
Each time the mind applies its concepts to
the world, the concept is revealed to be only
partly true, within a certain context; thus
the mind continually revises these incomplete
concepts so as to reflect a fuller reality
(commonly known as the process of thesis,
antithesis, and synthesis).
The individual comes to rise above their own
particular viewpoint, and grasps that they
are a part of a greater whole insofar as they
are bound to family, a social context, and/or
a political order.
=== Existentialism ===
With the rise of existentialism, Søren Kierkegaard
rejected Hegel's notion of the individual
as subordinated to the forces of history.
Instead, he elevated the individual's subjectivity
and capacity to choose their own fate.
Later Existentialists built upon this notion.
Friedrich Nietzsche, for example, examines
the individual's need to define his/her own
self and circumstances in his concept of the
will to power and the heroic ideal of the
Übermensch.
The individual is also central to Sartre's
philosophy, which emphasizes individual authenticity,
responsibility, and free will.
In both Sartre and Nietzsche (and in Nikolai
Berdyaev), the individual is called upon to
create their own values, rather than rely
on external, socially imposed codes of morality.
=== Objectivism ===
Ayn Rand's Objectivism regards every human
as an independent, sovereign entity who possesses
an inalienable right to their own life, a
right derived from their nature as a rational
being.
Individualism and Objectivism hold that a
civilized society, or any form of association,
cooperation or peaceful coexistence among
humans, can be achieved only on the basis
of the recognition of individual rights — and
that a group, as such, has no rights other
than the individual rights of its members.
The principle of individual rights is the
only moral base of all groups or associations.
Since only an individual man or woman can
possess rights, the expression "individual
rights" is a redundancy (which one has to
use for purposes of clarification in today's
intellectual chaos), but the expression "collective
rights" is a contradiction in terms.
Individual rights are not subject to a public
vote; a majority has no right to vote away
the rights of a minority; the political function
of rights is precisely to protect minorities
from oppression by majorities (and the smallest
minority on earth is the individual).
== Biology ==
In biology, the question of the individual
is related to the definition of an organism,
which is an important question in biology
and philosophy of biology, despite there having
been little work devoted explicitly to this
question.
An individual organism is not the only kind
of individual that is considered as a "unit
of selection".
Genes, genomes, or groups may function as
individual units.Asexual reproduction occurs
in some colonial organisms so that the individuals
are genetically identical.
Such a colony is called a genet, and an individual
in such a population is referred to as a ramet.
The colony, rather than the individual, functions
as a unit of selection.
In other colonial organisms the individuals
may be closely related to one another but
differ as a result of sexual reproduction.
== See also
