Rights: Natural, Equal, Universal

[Diuretic]

If something is good for humans shouldn't it be universal for humans?

Humans are too stupid to work together for mutual benefit. Have you not realized this?

Well you do have a point! But in defence of humans, especially those of us who are living in industrially and technologically developed, capitalistic societies, the con job has been successful to date. But we're fast approaching the point where competition as an economic and social model will not be useful and it will have to be replaced by an updated version of the natural human tendency to cooperation.

 

[Diuretic]

I don't know if food has a moral quality but it's certainly necessary for our survival.

Cannibalism is a reasonable response where people live in an area where there isn't much protein. It's probably more polite to eat your enemies than your friends though.

Becuse they are you enemies? Do you declare them to be so because you are hungry, then?

Of course not. If you eat your mates who's going to help you hunt or defend? And besides, you'd be frightened to go to sleep, you could end up as bbq!

No, you could eat your enemies because that didn't threaten the group you lived in.

 

[Diuretic]

It does sound a bit ridiculous doesn't it? But what if the Declaration has actually identified what it means to be a human being (stripped of all the cultural baggage we all carry with us)? Do you think it's possible to do that?

I think its a work in progress.

My problem with the Declaration is really only semanic: There cannot possibly have been Universal Agreement on the issue.

I think I'd have been happier had there been a "Flexible, Morally Relativistic Declaration of Human Rights That Have Worked Particularly Well at Princeton University."

Of course, I agree, that's quite a mouthful.

probably more accurate though!

Points taken. No doubt at the time it caused a warm inner glow among the delegates assembled.

 

[☭proletarian☭]

I don't know if food has a moral quality but it's certainly necessary for our survival.

Cannibalism is a reasonable response where people live in an area where there isn't much protein. It's probably more polite to eat your enemies than your friends though.

Becuse they are you enemies? Do you declare them to be so because you are hungry, then?

Of course not. If you eat your mates who's going to help you hunt or defend? And besides, you'd be frightened to go to sleep, you could end up as bbq!

No, you could eat your enemies because that didn't threaten the group you lived in.

If you're eating eachother, apparently you live pretty close. Just how many blocks away before my buddy becomes food?

 

[Diuretic]

Becuse they are you enemies? Do you declare them to be so because you are hungry, then?

Of course not. If you eat your mates who's going to help you hunt or defend? And besides, you'd be frightened to go to sleep, you could end up as bbq!

No, you could eat your enemies because that didn't threaten the group you lived in.

If you're eating eachother, apparently you live pretty close. Just how many blocks away before my buddy becomes food?

Do they deliver?

 

[midcan5]

Individual liberty isn't an absolute, in fact I'm going to take the pugnacious position of declaring that there are no moral absolutes to see where it might lead.

You don't manage humans, do you? If you do, then I'd be fascinated to determine how you manage their activity without any moral absolutes.

"nothing is predetermined in terms of its morality." And this, my dear fellow, is why Moral Relativism will never be useful; Because No One Knows The Rules to the Game.

Interesting that the discussion continues. On a certain level I disagree with both of you which places me on a fence somewhere. Having managed 'humans' for a long time I have no clue where 'moral absolutes' enter? But this is where these type of discussions get lost. The people I manage are all managers so the worst case doesn't exist but still... As for no moral absolutes, I think life must be one, for without it there would be no consciousness and without consciousness, no introspection, and without mind, no empathy. The question should be, not what is, it but what does it do? Weird how the nuns come back to haunt us fallen Catholics with omission and commission. I think if humans at core had no central values we would not be where we are today, natural selection does not support the careless or immoral to bring us back that point. (no time now have to read more of above discussion)

 

[midcan5]

Only following the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, which “crystallized 150 years of struggle,” did rights once again come to dominate the conscience of much of the world. Human rights, Hunt concludes, have now become “our only commonly shared bulwark” against the brutalities and cruelties that still afflict much of humanity."

He's a fool. 'Rights' are no common ground beyond the extent to which they serve as the rhetoric to justify common interests. It is our common goals and desires which unite (and divide) us, as has always been the case.

Fool?

Interestingly prior to the 16th-17th centuries morality was about duties and not individual rights. Duties to king, church, the feudal lord, or god. This gave way to birthright and eventually to the state being the protector of rights or to law which can only exist in a stable, just state or possibly in a small community. The American and French bills of rights established the power of government, but as is so obvious from history, it took much longer to realize.

Wittgenstein once said all philosophical problems are problems of language, I think that is true of relativism which I consider a useless term in a moral or rights discussion. Even Einstein didn't completely counter the Newtonian world, but that is another area of exploration. Relativism assumes there may be case where A is right one place, and wrong another, on a simple level that may be true, but when it comes to critical questions of life and liberty it doesn't hold water. Murder is never right in spite of the fact there are many times we would kill or be killed. Same with slavery, while it existed in the past and still today in Wal-Mart, it is still not morally right. So throw relativism out, it doesn't help.

See Bernard Williams' "In the beginning was the Deed" for an interesting discussion of these items.

 

[☭proletarian☭]

Interestingly prior to the 16th-17th centuries morality was about duties and not individual rights. Duties to king, church, the feudal lord, or god.

Obedience =/= morality

. Murder is never right

define 'murder'

If one of the assassination attempts on Hitler had succeeded, would you have condemned the culprit or praised him?

 

[Diuretic]

I feel bound to defend relativism. Yes, terminology is difficult, we have to agree on what a word represents and what a concept is, but if we can do that we can toddle along nicely.

I'm looking at relativism compared to absolutism. Both are ideals. But I still maintain relativism is valid.

If I may take up your example of "murder" mid. "Murder" is a technical term which describes a situation where a human has killed another human. "Killing" is less technical. The term "to kill" can apply to just about any sentient actor who is carrying out an action and the subject of the action (eg a plant) can be non-sentient as well as sentient.

"Murder" is wrong, it's inherent in its meaning, the word assigned to the act of a human killing a human encompasses a range of circumstances and events that must exist for "murder" to be a fact.

"Killing" is not of itself wrong. If I kill a weed with weedkiller it's not a wrong act.

So even the act of killing isn't an absolute. "Murder" might be an absolute but it's tightly defined so it loses any claim to being an absolute.

Situational ethics is an alternative to me banging on about absolutes I suppose.

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

"Inventing Human Rights?"

When we talk about "Our only COMMONLY shared bulwork," aside from being redundent (if its "Ours" then it must be "commonly shared"), who is Hunt talking about? Me and Hunt? Humanity?

Maybe you've had a bad day? Using 'our' in the context above is NOT redundent. Try substituting this 'Our independantly held views... ' and I think you will find the flaw in your reading and comprehension.

 

[Samson]

"Inventing Human Rights?"

When we talk about "Our only COMMONLY shared bulwork," aside from being redundent (if its "Ours" then it must be "commonly shared"), who is Hunt talking about? Me and Hunt? Humanity?

Maybe you've had a bad day? Using 'our' in the context above is NOT redundent. Try substituting this 'Our independantly held views... ' and I think you will find the flaw in your reading and comprehension.

Ok, then "Commonly shared" is redundent.

Now, either get a life or argue with a stump, Professor Einstein.

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

"Inventing Human Rights?"

When we talk about "Our only COMMONLY shared bulwork," aside from being redundent (if its "Ours" then it must be "commonly shared"), who is Hunt talking about? Me and Hunt? Humanity?

Maybe you've had a bad day? Using 'our' in the context above is NOT redundent. Try substituting this 'Our independantly held views... ' and I think you will find the flaw in your reading and comprehension.

Ok, then "Commonly shared" is redundent.

Now, either get a life or argue with a stump, Professor Einstein.

your inferiority complex(s) are showing. you really should open your mind more and your mouth less.

btw, 'commonly shared' is an appropriate term. One can individually share an automobile. Think. Two people drive the same car at different times.

now, STFU and learn how and when to throw your little temper tantrums with the most effect.

gawd, who let the dawgs in?

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

"Inventing Human Rights?"

When we talk about "Our only COMMONLY shared bulwork," aside from being redundent (if its "Ours" then it must be "commonly shared"), who is Hunt talking about? Me and Hunt? Humanity?

Maybe you've had a bad day? Using 'our' in the context above is NOT redundent. Try substituting this 'Our independantly held views... ' and I think you will find the flaw in your reading and comprehension.

Ok, then "Commonly shared" is redundent.

Now, either get a life or argue with a stump, Professor Einstein.

your inferiority complex(s) are showing. you really should open your mind more and your mouth less.

btw, 'commonly shared' is an appropriate term. One can individually share an automobile. Think. Two people drive the same car at different times.

now, STFU and learn how and when to throw your little temper tantrums with the most effect.

gawd, who let the dawgs in?

 

[LuckyDan]

I like the Jeffersonian model. (Yes, I am aware he owned slaves. Like Wal-Mart, whose employees I take it are not free to quit and apply at Target.)

If we are endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights, then only those born into godless societies will have to struggle for them. We on the other hand have to be careful that we don't voluntarily give them up, which we may easily do by confusing rights with obligations and responsibilites, which are the price of liberty.

Healthcare is a good example. We have decided that an individual is not obligated to himself or his family to acquire something as basic as health insurance. We have now deemed it a right.

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

I like the Jeffersonian model. (Yes, I am aware he owned slaves. Like Wal-Mart, whose employees I take it are not free to quit and apply at Target.)

If we are endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights, then only those born into godless societies will have to struggle for them. We on the other hand have to be careful that we don't voluntarily give them up, which we may easily do by confusing rights with obligations and responsibilites, which are the price of liberty.

Healthcare is a good example. We have decided that an individual is not obligated to himself or his family to acquire something as basic as health insurance. We have now deemed it a right.

Modern societies grant rights all the time. It is what seperates today's humans from our genetic cousins and biological ancesters.

The US Constitution is a man made document never to be confused with prophecy and other religious nonsense. We can amend, revamp and even do away with it if we so choose.

 

[LuckyDan]

...or call it nonsense. It remains a standard that has served us pretty well so far, especially the Civil War amendments.

As you say, we can do away with it if we so choose, and that seems to be the direction we are heading when we devalue individual liberty - and the responsibilities that go with it, and delegate more powers to the state. We are doing this more and more it seems in seeking to enforce equalities of outcomes.

PS - I was thinking more the Declaration of Independence in my first post, but yes, the Constitution applies as well.

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

...or call it nonsense. It remains a standard that has served us pretty well so far, especially the Civil War amendments.

As you say, we can do away with it if we so choose, and that seems to be the direction we are heading when we devalue individual liberty - and the responsibilities that go with it, and delegate more powers to the state. We are doing this more and more it seems in seeking to enforce equalities of outcomes.

I had no idea we were devaluing individual liberty and the responsibilities that go with it.

how are we ceding things to the states?

 

[☭proletarian☭]

Maybe it's the vodka and Poma, but I'm lost. I don't recognize this thread title but I think I got here through my usercp. Was this split from another thread? Have I posted here before?

 

[LuckyDan]

I had no idea we were devaluing individual liberty and the responsibilities that go with it.

how are we ceding things to the states?

There's a pretty good example of it taking place tomorrow evening in DC.

When government pays for your healthcare, shouldn't it then have a right, if not an obligation, to demand that you make healthful choices to keep the cost of maintaining your health to a minimum?

AGW/Climate Change (whatever the hell they're calling themselves this year) alarmists would regulate the way we earn our living and go about our daily lives. Many among us think this is all just fine, but our choices will be more limited.

PS - I'll check back tomorrow. Late for bed. Night all.

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

Maybe it's the vodka and Poma, but I'm lost. I don't recognize this thread title but I think I got here through my usercp. Was this split from another thread? Have I posted here before?

sure. are you saying you do not remember losing that 100 dollar bet with me? pay up you fuckin' dead beat! or get to a 12 step meeting.

*smirk