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Are Rights Natural?

Are Rights Natural?

  • Total voters
    50
Ikari said:
Government is an organization created by people, but the government itself is not people. Government also does not possess rights, groups cannot possess rights. Rights are held by the individual alone. I don't believe the concepts of rights are useless, in fact they are rather powerful. Is it all subjective in the end? Well it's not a hard science like physics and there is much political philosophy involved. But I do believe that rights are an important concept and that we can understand natural rights by considering the natural state which is free from outside forces.

In the end, I think what you have here in this post is basically the zero solution. It satisfies the equations, yes; but no real information is given about the system.
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I personally don't think any group really possesses rights (socially defined), just people. So we agree, but for completely different reasons.

They are useful in that they help guide us to achieve what we want to achieve and they are powerful. I agree with that.

Yes it is all subjective in the end. Personally, I believe even God's desires are largely subjective. He created people because he wants to be loved. That sounds subjective to me. So yeah, I think the concept is all-encompassing.

Anyway. I don't think these things can be made measurable unless we build a computer in which to perfectly simulate society and try different things and see what works. But even then, the desirability of various outcomes would still be subjective.

The beauty and horror of it is that the system can be anything we imagine as long as we expend the energy and resources to build it. I did not seek to create a system, people will do that on their own because instinct and comfort compels them to and a lot of times they end up pretty unique solutions with (from my perspective) good and bad things about each and everyone one of them, including ours.

Anyway. I think we are going to have to end it. I need to do chores around town for the sake of my kids. See ya.
 
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Ethereal said:
It's my body and my life, therefore, I affirm my sovereignty over them. You can deny my sovereignty but you will do so at the peril of civilized humanity.
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The world worked quite well with slavery for more than 90% of human existence.

I disagree with slavery but civilization and humanity has shown that it flourishes with or without personal soveriegnty.
 
scourge99 said:
The world worked quite well with slavery for more than 90% of human existence.
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It worked well for a select few; the rest (the slaves especially) were living under tyranny and in abject poverty. So, while a few lived like humans, the rest lived as beasts. I wouldn't call that "civilization", just the mere appearance of it.

I disagree with slavery but civilization and humanity has shown that it flourishes with or without personal soveriegnty.
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How can humanity be flourishing when a sizable portion of humanity is enslaved or impoverished?
 
Ethereal said:
Of course. To assume otherwise is to destroy peace and humanity. We might as well be beasts, bashing one another's skulls in for scraps of meat in the gutter.
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Unless you consider all of history prior to the 1700's as nothing but a bunch of beasts, bashing one another's skulls in for scraps of meat in the gutter, then you are absolutely wrong.
 
Ikari said:
A right is not a guarantee. This seems to be your stumbling block. You seem to envision rights as a magical cure all. If we have the right to property, then we all somehow magically have property. If we have the right to food, we somehow magically have food appear in front of us. But that's not a right, a right is a limitation upon the authority. We have the right to property, thus government should not be allowed to merely come and take our land at their own leisure. We have the right to life, thus the government cannot kill us at their whim. We have the right to liberty, thus government cannot deprive us of it rightfully by their own wishes and rules.

Maybe if you stop living in fantasy land where magic and alchemy apparently exist, and come to the real world we can have a proper discussion. But if you want to think of rights as magic, then we're going to disagree fundamentally on what a right actually is.
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Riiiiiight...I'M the one living in a fantasy land. You have this inane notion that somehow rights just 'exist'...but I'M the one thats living in a fantasy...
:doh
 
Ikari said:
A right is not a guarantee. This seems to be your stumbling block. You seem to envision rights as a magical cure all. If we have the right to property, then we all somehow magically have property. If we have the right to food, we somehow magically have food appear in front of us. But that's not a right, a right is a limitation upon the authority. We have the right to property, thus government should not be allowed to merely come and take our land at their own leisure. We have the right to life, thus the government cannot kill us at their whim. We have the right to liberty, thus government cannot deprive us of it rightfully by their own wishes and rules.

Maybe if you stop living in fantasy land where magic and alchemy apparently exist, and come to the real world we can have a proper discussion. But if you want to think of rights as magic, then we're going to disagree fundamentally on what a right actually is.
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You remind me of the characters in "Life of Brian".

We shall fight for his RIGHT to have babies, even if he cant actually HAVE babies, which is no ones fault...not even the Romans.
 
scourge99 said:
Unless you consider all of history prior to the 1700's as nothing but a bunch of beasts, bashing one another's skulls in for scraps of meat in the gutter, then you are absolutely wrong.
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Okay, allow me to rephrase, we might as well be that or slaves. Either way, it's beast-like and uncivilized.
 
VanceMack said:
You remind me of the characters in "Life of Brian".

We shall fight for his RIGHT to have babies, even if he cant actually HAVE babies, which is no ones fault...not even the Romans.
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So you've degraded to nothing but insults. Noted.
 
starving_man.jpg
Ikari said:
So you've degraded to nothing but insults. Noted.
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Someone should tell this guy he has the right to not be hungry
 
Ethereal said:
It worked well for a select few; the rest (the slaves especially) were living under tyranny and in abject poverty. So, while a few lived like humans, the rest lived as beasts. I wouldn't call that "civilization", just the mere appearance of it.
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so there were no civilizations prior to 1800's? Except for the one's without slaves?

Ethereal said:
How can humanity be flourishing when a sizable portion of humanity is enslaved or impoverished?
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[/quote] you look at history from your the pinnacle you enjoy without regard to the ever increasing strides and acoomplishments present throughout.

Likely, 1000 years from now people will look back at us with similiar disgust for things we can only imagine.

JM roberts has an excellant world history book that will enlighten you to such things.
 
Ikari said:
So you've degraded to nothing but insults. Noted.
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starvation.jpg


and these people are having the HELL violated out of their rights....
 
Done yet? Or are you still in "rights are magical" mode. Are there oppressed people in the world? Yes of course. Are there hungry people in the world? Yes, of course. Does that mean rights don't exist at all? No, it doesn't. It's an absurd notion and can only be put forth by someone who defines rights as magical devices which will satiate all our needs though some form of magic or alchemy.
 
Ikari said:
So you've degraded to nothing but insults. Noted.
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starvation.jpg


It seems like all around the globe, people are not getting the memo that they have the right to liberty, freedom, food, clean water, shelter.

As an IDEA...its a wonderful notion. In reality? Its a notion that the priveleged few share...and only they because others have fought, bled and died to provide it.

You want to call that insulting...fine. Not meant to be an insult...maybe a reality check...but not an insult.
 
As I'm lazy, I didn't feel like reading the whole thread, so...

I agree and disagree with the OP.

Problem is, how do you define "natural rights"?

If you were alone in a blank, empty space, you would die due to lack of air in short order.
If air were added, you would die due to lack of water in a somewhat longer period.
If water were added as well, you would die due to lack of food in a yet longer period.
If air, water, and food were provided, you would eventually die due to your body wearing out. Or suicide, as you had gone insane. If you could find a way to suicide in a blank, empty space...

Basically, I look at human requirements for living a reasonably comfortable life as:
  1. Air.
  2. Water.
  3. Food.
  4. Companions.
  5. And, depending on the length of time you want to live, protection from the various natural elements which can kill/damage you, such as:
    • Weather.
    • Disease.
    • Animals who want to kill/damage you.
    • Falling objects (trees, rocks, etc.)
    • Humans who want to kill/damage you.
Now, many of those issues can be avoided by an alert, reasonably intelligent human:
  • Weather can be protected against (buildings).
  • Disease can be cured/prevented (although not by any means all).
  • Animals who want to kill/damage you can be protected against or killed if the protection fails.
  • Falling objects can be dodged or protected against.
  • Humans who want to kill/damage you can be protected against or killed if the protection fails.
However, most of those solutions involve work on the part of the human.

----------------------------------------
I suppose the ability to produce work is one of the natural rights we possess.
IF you define the right to life as a natural right.
----------------------------------------

Creating a society of multiple humans allows that work to be saved for future generations (although an individual could do the same, on a smaller scale).

To an extent, a society (if set up to allow such), allows an individuals unneeded past or present work (wealth) to be traded for other past or present work (through trade or money, or some exchange of wealth).

But all of it hinges on whether you consider the right to live a "natural right". If you don't, then no other rights matter, really...because to do anything, you must be alive.

Blather over.
 
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Ikari said:
Done yet? Or are you still in "rights are magical" mode. Are there oppressed people in the world? Yes of course. Are there hungry people in the world? Yes, of course. Does that mean rights don't exist at all? No, it doesn't. It's an absurd notion and can only be put forth by someone who defines rights as magical devices which will satiate all our needs though some form of magic or alchemy.
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The only absurd notion is your dogged insistence that 'humans' have 'rights' when the PROOF is pretty GLARINGLY OBVIOUS that outside of our happy little realm...thats so very OBVIOUSLY not the case. Or again...someone TOTALLY missed the meeting...didnt get the memo...whatever...
 
VanceMack said:
It seems like all around the globe, people are not getting the memo that they have the right to liberty, freedom, food, clean water, shelter.

As an IDEA...its a wonderful notion. In reality? Its a notion that the priveleged few share...and only they because others have fought, bled and died to provide it.

You want to call that insulting...fine. Not meant to be an insult...maybe a reality check...but not an insult.
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Well you haven't actually proven anything, but I guess whatever floats your boat.
 
Ikari said:
Well you haven't actually proven anything, but I guess whatever floats your boat.
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PROOF? What do you offer as 'proof'???

I much prefer when my boat floats...otherwise its not very useful...sort of like when the word 'rights' has no meaning.
 
VanceMack said:
The only absurd notion is your dogged insistence that 'humans' have 'rights' when the PROOF is pretty GLARINGLY OBVIOUS that outside of our happy little realm...thats so very OBVIOUSLY not the case. Or again...someone TOTALLY missed the meeting...didnt get the memo...whatever...
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No, the absurd notion is that you are saying that because the exercise of rights can be infringed upon, because people can suffer, that rights don't exist in the least. It's an absurd notion that doesn't recognize what a right is. Instead you dogmatically avoid all argument and post little pictures thinking you're proving a point; but you've done nothing but show that there is suffering. Welcome to reality I guess. But the existence of suffering does not negate the existence of rights.
 
Ikari said:
No, the absurd notion is that you are saying that because the exercise of rights can be infringed upon, because people can suffer, that rights don't exist in the least. It's an absurd notion that doesn't recognize what a right is. Instead you dogmatically avoid all argument and post little pictures thinking you're proving a point; but you've done nothing but show that there is suffering. Welcome to reality I guess. But the existence of suffering does not negate the existence of rights.
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Holy batcrap...
 
VanceMack said:
Holy batcrap...
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It has been what you've posted. And you've never countered anything. You show suffering and say "oh look, rights don't exist". But that argument can only be true if you assert rights to be some magical device which can instantaneously satiate all desires at that moment. That's not what a right is, a right is something the people wield as restriction upon government. A right states what a person rightfully can have or can fight for if missing. It's not magic, magic doesn't exist.
 
VanceMack said:
starving_man.jpg


Someone should tell this guy he has the right to not be hungry
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I don't know what you think this proves. A "right" is just a philosophical construct that is based upon human nature. It cannot protect you from anything, which is why they are said to be "violated" when someone's individual liberty is infringed upon.

People come up with some strange arguments when they're talking about "natural rights".
 
Ethereal said:
I don't know what you think this proves. A "right" is just a philosophical construct that is based upon human nature. It cannot protect you from anything, which is why they are said to be "violated" when someone's individual liberty is infringed upon.

People come up with some strange arguments when they're talking about "natural rights".
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Well you'll see a lot of people use weird arguments to try to get out of debates on rights. I don't know when abstract ideas became bad, but I think there is a lot of validity to abstract ideals and philosophy.
 
scourge99 said:
so there were no civilizations prior to 1800's?
Except for the one's without slaves?
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There were certainly civilizations, but I wouldn't call many of them "civilized".

Obviously, some will have civilized aspects, but those are overshadowed by the barbarity.

you look at history from your the pinnacle you enjoy without regard to the ever increasing strides and acoomplishments present throughout.

Likely, 1000 years from now people will look back at us with similiar disgust for things we can only imagine.

JM roberts has an excellant world history book that will enlighten you to such things.
Click to expand...

Whoa. I'm not trying to throw history away or anything. I'm probably one of the most "old-fashioned" thinkers on the forum. I wouldn't throw away the Constitution because it was signed by some slave-owners, but that does not mean I overlook the unjust and barbaric nature of slavery. They were flawed, like all humans.
 
Ikari said:
Well you'll see a lot of people use weird arguments to try to get out of debates on rights. I don't know when abstract ideas became bad, but I think there is a lot of validity to abstract ideals and philosophy.
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I would recommend they actually sit down and read the Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers, instead of just trying to encapsulate the Founders' entire political philosophy in two sentences.

There! I've refuted all of them! The Founders are but ants before my intellectual prowess! I am an internet God, slaying arcane philosophies at my leisure!!!

:rofl

In your dreams internet warrior...
 
Allow me to put forward an odd proposition, for those who do not believe in natural rights:

You might want to consider "faking it"... that is, pretending to believe in natural rights, even if you don't.

Do you like having rights? I expect you do.

Are your rights more secure if the vast majority of the population believes them to be abstract constructs of society, or privileges granted by government... or natural and inherent?

If nobody thought the Constitution was important, it wouldn't be. But, in point of fact lots of people believe it is... indeed it is held as all but sacrosanct by many, and so it still has power.

Rights are sorta like that. If most people believe you absodamnlutely have an inborn, inherent, natural right to free speech, then the government will have to tread lightly in infringing on same.

If most people view the right to free speech as an arbitrary social construct granted by government, I think they would be less inclined to see infringements of speech with the same level of outrage and fury.

Give it a moment's thought. Words and concepts have power. Critical thinking is all very well, but if you kick ALL the underpinnings out of a society, what will hold it up?
 
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