What is the Meaning & Definition of physical person

In law the concept of person is understood as subject and object of the law. It is the subject because the legal system is focused on it and is the object because human behavior is what determines the laws to act in a certain way. The majority of civil codes usually define the physical person as that person or entity which may acquire rights and contract obligations or commitments.

Natural person and legal entity

The individual should be understood as opposed to the legal or moral person. Thus, the individual has a visible existence and traits of humanity. In this sense, the natural person has from the moment he is born until it dies a series of rights and inalienable duties. On the other hand, the legal person is the set of various individuals who act as if they were an individual. The legal person is is through a public deed which express standards that define it and the obligations and rights that has that person (for example, a company that performs a certain activity, a trade union or a professional association). In other words, the individual has an individual character, but the legal person is a group of individuals (the law refers to the legal person as a set of individual wills common purposes).
This distinction is relevant in different areas, especially in the economic. When a company has to register legally you must decide treatment law that suit you most. And for this you must either be a natural person or a legal person, because in every case there are a number of conditions and specific obligations (especially those relating to taxes).

Some requirements for physical personality

The majority of civil codes establish birth determines the physical personality, i.e., the legal capacity as an individual. This does not mean that legally the unborn / unborn child is unprotected legally (for example, if a woman is pregnant and her husband dies law has the hereditary rights of which has still not born).
The concept of physical personality provides for equality between the sexes, something that historically has not always been so. On the other hand, some legislation incorporates rights that affect the transgender people as a physical person.
As for the extinction of the physical personality, this ends with the death of an individual. In normal situations, the death is easily creditable but in some cases is not (for example, when someone is missing for a few years can be requested his death before the law).