 From an animalist perspective, the most significant aspect of Locke’s famous discussion is the sharp distinction he draws between the human animal (“man”) and the person. Unlike a mass of matter—which consists merely in “the Cohesion of Particles … any how united” (II.xxvii.4)—a living organism (e.g., oak tree, horse, human animal) is a structurally complex material object whose functional organization is conducive to continued life. A person, by contrast, is a  “thinking intelligent Being, that has reason and reflection, and  can consider it self as it self, the same thinking thing in different times and places; which it does by that consciousness, which is inseparable from thinking” (II.xxvii.9).