Say yes to rights...

@Fido,

what rights do you have?
inalienable rights derived from natural or god given law?
those rights given to you by your society or government?
or those rights you have the power to take?
What is the source of your rights?

@Fido,

Fido;114496 wrote:

Say yes to rights...

Out of all our rights our happiness grows...If you want people to have children give them a world of happiness to bear children in...For this they must have rights, so that they are empowered against injustice, for with justice they will have enough of power and wealth, and if they are then miserable it is in their nature...

I agree. I think the Bill of Rights is a good example for the foundation of a decent society. Perhaps it could even be improved. Our fiat currency seems to be a weak spot. Our wealth is not safe, not protected from manipulation.
In any case, legal rights. If only we could get the majority to respect the rights of the minority. I wish more persons understood that the rights are necessary especially for the minority.

@Fido,

Fido;114496 wrote:

Say yes to rights...

Out of all our rights our happiness grows...If you want people to have children give them a world of happiness to bear children in...For this they must have rights, so that they are empowered against injustice, for with justice they will have enough of power and wealth, and if they are then miserable it is in their nature...

What about situations where violating rights can increase the general level of happiness? For example, lynching a suspected paedophile/serial killer/rapist to satisfy public outrage.

Even if you accept that 'happiness grows from rights', what about situations in which you can minimize the total number of rights violations by violating one person's rights? E.g. Let's say a crime has been committed, and a violent mob is on its way to a certain part of town to take revenge. The mob will inevitably violate the rights of lots of people, but the authorities could placate the mob by punishing an innocent man of the crime. Should they do it? If we want to produce happiness, the answer must be 'yes' (fewer rights violated, more happiness), similarly there will be less injustice if the mob is stopped by allowing a single injustice.

I'm not arguing against rights, just the notion that rights can be founded on producing happiness, or justice. Rights express the inviolability of the individual; the Kantian notion that people may not be used or sacrificed for the achieving of other ends without their consent. People live their own lives with their own goals, desires and projects; it's their only life, and that has to be respected. Rights are constraints upon action that prevent us from using people (in ways relevant to political philosophy), not mysterious things that people are imbued with that ought to be maximised to further some other end.

@mickalos,

mickalos;114595 wrote:

I'm not arguing against rights, just the notion that rights can be founded on producing happiness, or justice. Rights express the inviolability of the individual; the Kantian notion that people may not be used or sacrificed for the achieving of other ends without their consent. People live their own lives with their own goals, desires and projects; it's their only life, and that has to be respected. Rights are constraints upon action that prevent us from using people (in ways relevant to political philosophy), not mysterious things that people are imbued with that ought to be maximised to further some other end.

The individual is inviolable? Why is this so? Kant (if read) is not exactly mysterious, but one cannot help but be impressed at how his ethical theory was constructed. Kant's ethical theory may not be mysterious but its not exactly common sense either.

@Deckard,

Deckard;114611 wrote:

The individual is inviolable? Why is this so? Kant (if read) is not exactly mysterious, but one cannot help but be impressed at how his ethical theory was constructed. Kant's ethical theory may not be mysterious but its not exactly common sense either.

Really? I find Kant incredibly convoluted and difficult to follow, sometimes even impenetrable. Paton's translation of The Groundwork is good, but it's hardly clear, though it's nowhere near his most difficult work.

For Kant, humans have an intrinsic value because of their rational faculties, they have the ability decide what to do for themselves, and we must treat that as an end in itself. Thus, we must never allow ourselves to subvert a persons autonomy by merely using them without appropriate respect for their own wishes and desires. In political philosophy this means we aren't allowed to coerce people into doing something against their will.

I agree, it's not exactly common sense, but the Kantian notion that humans are valuable, and that there are certain ways in which we are not allowed to treat people, is. It is at least intuitive, and the correct way of characterising rights (as constraints on action).

@mickalos,

mickalos;114648 wrote:

Thus, we must never allow ourselves to subvert a persons autonomy by merely using them without appropriate respect for their own wishes and desires. In political philosophy this means we aren't allowed to coerce people into doing something against their will.

.

That is really too bad, since these precepts are more honored in the breach than in the observance. And especially, most lately, in Washington D.C. . In fact, I would be happy to hear of a place where a government honors them.

@prothero,

prothero;114545 wrote:

what rights do you have?
inalienable rights derived from natural or god given law?
those rights given to you by your society or government?
or those rights you have the power to take?
What is the source of your rights?

I have every right that supports my life, natural only in the sense that soiciety cannot well deny what it needs itself for existence...It can deny immorality its power, but it cannot deny life to the people because the life of the infividual, and the life of the society are the same...People have every right...If they find some necessity to defend their rights as they see them to the death against those who would deny them, then I will not be a target, or an innocent by stander...Who am I to tell another what rights he needs for his life -which is his happiness, to sleep secure, and dream in peace that all of life is not in vain, to know the future with every certainty , and not to fear that tomorrow may find us regretting every happiness that did not secure our rights... With rights goes wealth, and happiness, security and health... All the goods as virtue that a man may know grow out of his power, that is his right in society....

---------- Post added 12-27-2009 at 02:14 PM ----------

kennethamy;114657 wrote:

That is really too bad, since these precepts are more honored in the breach than in the observance. And especially, most lately, in Washington D.C. . In fact, I would be happy to hear of a place where a government honors them.

It is true of every virtue that we know it more by its want than by its evidence, and why should rights as freedom means, be any different???Do you ken that the task before us is no mean feat...We cannot go a bag at a time into the better future, but must look at all, and leave all we do not need to be buried like everything else in the dust of time...If the word revolution as complete and final change we heard; what would it mean to you??? Is it something to dread, or would you look as Lot into the future with never a glance back???

If you want to be a man; help me to write a better constitution no better than it has to be to trash the old one... Then let the future trash that if so inclined... I am too old to give the dead meaning...I want my own meaning before death cools me...

---------- Post added 12-27-2009 at 02:22 PM ----------

mickalos;114648 wrote:

Really? I find Kant incredibly convoluted and difficult to follow, sometimes even impenetrable. Paton's translation of The Groundwork is good, but it's hardly clear, though it's nowhere near his most difficult work.

For Kant, humans have an intrinsic value because of their rational faculties, they have the ability decide what to do for themselves, and we must treat that as an end in itself. Thus, we must never allow ourselves to subvert a persons autonomy by merely using them without appropriate respect for their own wishes and desires. In political philosophy this means we aren't allowed to coerce people into doing something against their will.

I agree, it's not exactly common sense, but the Kantian notion that humans are valuable, and that there are certain ways in which we are not allowed to treat people, is. It is at least intuitive, and the correct way of characterising rights (as constraints on action).

No different from others, Kant was looking for an ethical form...That is the work of philosophy as it has been, to cure the immorality common to societies as they fail, -with reason...People are not reasonable, and they are not moral by choice, reasoned or unreasoned... They know who they are, and moral is what they are as a result of who they are...It is in part instinct, to bond, subjected to constant conditioning to be good, or socaible...It is the highest morality to see others as you would see yourself, and it is the denial of individualism...It is not rational, and it never will be...Morality is anti rational...

---------- Post added 12-27-2009 at 02:37 PM ----------

Deckard;114611 wrote:

The individual is inviolable? Why is this so? Kant (if read) is not exactly mysterious, but one cannot help but be impressed at how his ethical theory was constructed. Kant's ethical theory may not be mysterious but its not exactly common sense either.

Ethics is built upon a certain relationship between the individual and his community...So it can be considered in the abstract, as a form...What it cannot be considered to do is be rational, or as you say, according to: common sense...Marriage as a form seems all nice and rational too; but it would seem like the rational veneer over the exterior of irrationality to who ever has been married...Where is the marriage that follows the rules???Each is individual because it is made of the individuals...

Rights considered as form, or construct is bent toward the individual who need them, and experiience them...But they are really a dynamic between the individual and his community...The individual demands what he needs for himself from them, for his life, which is there life; And to gether the individual defends what no person can easily defend themselves, which is their rights, and their freedom... Rights are enjoyed individually, but it is society which defends them communally...There is a give and take to the process... The individual should seek every power, and the society should tell what powers it will accept and defend...When it becomes relationship becomes static, as every state seeks, then the people look to the state as the giver of rights, to plead their case for what they need...It is the other way around, that the people give to their communities, and to their governments and to all their social forms only the power necessary to do good for them... And no people can give more of rights than they possess...If people have the right to kill in defense, so do governments...If they cannot kill for any other reason, the government has no more right than they...

---------- Post added 12-27-2009 at 02:56 PM ----------

Reconstructo;114579 wrote:

I agree. I think the Bill of Rights is a good example for the foundation of a decent society. Perhaps it could even be improved. Our fiat currency seems to be a weak spot. Our wealth is not safe, not protected from manipulation.
In any case, legal rights. If only we could get the majority to respect the rights of the minority. I wish more persons understood that the rights are necessary especially for the minority.

Right protect every body from every body...AS conceived now, with civil rights one thing, and property rights another; some people have unequal protection of the law, and as a result all wealth, which was once the common wealth is becoming private property which is associated with, and has been associated with the right of goverment since the Feudal Age...Law is like a coccoon holding all its former selves...We see only ourselves against this monolith with a hard and smooth exterior and cannot see that deep within it is nature with bloody teeth and hands defending all it has taken from the unwarry...

I would like to keep things the same, so they would never change, or be like Plato and change the window treatments so that natural morality would always suffer a social form incapable of adaptation, like the medieval church...That is what people do with law: They try to protect their spoils and they try to keep free of morality, which demands equality...Society might persist for a long time on the Ten Commandments if it would follow them, but law made to protect spoils also protects spoilers until the whole wealth of every place becomes the property of a few...We do not have a multitude of laws, but a plethora...We have law by the yard, and by the rod... No one can know it all... The law of the Muslims and the Qu'ran might be memorized by a few; but it takes nime people usually deeply divided to even tell us what our laws mean... Every community, village, and four corners has its laws, on top of federal and state, and every one is an infringment of free activity, usually more for worse than bad...There is a point reached by every social form when it supports itself on the labors of the people and belabors them with rules serving only the form, and not the life of the people...

@Fido,

What I most want from government is RIGHTS. I like government functioning as a referee. The problem is that accumulated wealth buys the government. I would like rights to be absolute, inviolable. incontrovertible. But even if they were, it's enforcement that matters. If the government itself violates your rights or fails to punish other citizens who do, these same rights are the poetry of what should have been.

Ethics and law are too different things. When we get into law and enforcement, we get our hands dirty. Politics is the real deal. No more academic abstractions but tough choices.

@Reconstructo,

[QUOTE=Reconstructo;114707]What I most want from government is RIGHTS. I like government functioning as a referee. The problem is that accumulated wealth buys the government. I would like rights to be absolute, inviolable. incontrovertible. But even if they were, it's enforcement that matters. If the government itself violates your rights or fails to punish other citizens who do, these same rights are the poetry of what should have been. [/QUOTE]"We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness"
This is one of the best known phrases in all of the English language. The rights that are referred to there are held to be "inalienable" and "endowed by their creator". Lacking a concept of god or of transcendent values where can "inalienable rights" possibly come from? Where does the concept of "human rights" and "human dignity" come from if not from religious traditions? Secular humanism seeks to secure these rights without the original concept that gave rise to them. Rights based on god and transcendent value seem vacuous when belief in god and transcendent value dies.

The bill of rights seeks to secure certain rights to individuals and to states and to protect them from encroachment by the central government. The rights in the "bill of rights" are secured by one branch of the government (judiciary) against the other branches of government (executive and legislative). The original fear was of an over expansive over powerful federal government. The federal government was supposed to be of limited size, scope and powers. One concern about the bill of rights was that by listing certain rights, any rights not listed might be forfeited. The ninth amendment was placed to secure these unspecified rights to individuals and the tenth to secure them to states. The problem is there are no true conservatives on the Supreme Court and there has been a relentless expansion of the size, scope, and power of the federal government since the nation's inception. Rights based on government can be taken away by government.

When Scut Farkus and his toadies decide to beat you up on your way home from school; where were your rights then? As a practical matter do you have any rights that you can not defend for yourself or that your government is not willing to defend for you?

So, these rights, everyone seems so anxious to claim, on what basis do you think you have any inherent or inalienable rights at all?

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;114707 wrote:

What I most want from government is RIGHTS. I like government functioning as a referee. The problem is that accumulated wealth buys the government. I would like rights to be absolute, inviolable. incontrovertible. But even if they were, it's enforcement that matters. If the government itself violates your rights or fails to punish other citizens who do, these same rights are the poetry of what should have been.

There is another purpose of rights even when they are not enforced. They give the victim something to stand on. When the victim is all demoralized and humiliated by some violation of his or her rights he or she may stop believing that those rights ever existed in the first place. An important step in the healing process is realizing "It was not the victims fault" and "The perpetrator had no right to do what was done."

Thus I must take issue with saying rights are only the "poetry of what should have been" nor even "what ought to be. In the case of rights, they are the poetry of what is even when not enforced. (Noble lie? No, its the Truth.)

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;114707 wrote:

What I most want from government is RIGHTS. I like government functioning as a referee. The problem is that accumulated wealth buys the government. I would like rights to be absolute, inviolable. incontrovertible. But even if they were, it's enforcement that matters. If the government itself violates your rights or fails to punish other citizens who do, these same rights are the poetry of what should have been.

Ethics and law are too different things. When we get into law and enforcement, we get our hands dirty. Politics is the real deal. No more academic abstractions but tough choices.

That is the object of governments...It is the object of all communities...Look at the Gay Community, or the Black Community, or the Christian Community... Why do people organize in small units or large when the experiences is usually ineffective and uninspiring??? It is because to have individual rights people must organize a collective defense of them...It seem outrageous on its face that anyone should be required to pay union dues to a union when they pay taxes to a society that was founded to achieve justice, general welfare, and unity... What chance has any union to do what the government was formed to do if the government once formed does not do it???

I might point out, that the birth place of our law, as we have it, which is the Frankish Conquests of Europe, calls law, Right, and that is law's name in French and German respectively... It is right that law should enforce, so it is right which we should examine if we will have law as it should be, out of justice...

@prothero,

prothero;114724 wrote:

So, these rights, everyone seems so anxious to claim, on what basis do you think you have any inherent or inalienable rights at all?

Rights are, for me, a legal concept. They are an invention just like light-bulbs. Sure, I'm well aware that rights are "fictions." So is the self. I like both my self and my rights. I hold these fictions to be most pleasant. That individual humans are dignified and beautiful --- potentially!

We are talking of legal rights. At some point skepticism has to put away its scribbles are secure some food, dodge the arrows of enemies. Laws are necessary because humans are predatory. Hobbes was no slobbe.

Athens was founded as a hide-out for thieves. So "they" say.

@Deckard,

Deckard;114726 wrote:

There is another purpose of rights even when they are not enforced. They give the victim something to stand on. When the victim is all demoralized and humiliated by some violation of his or her rights he or she may stop believing that those rights ever existed in the first place. An important step in the healing process is realizing "It was not the victims fault" and "The perpetrator had no right to do what was done."

Thus I must take issue with saying rights are only the "poetry of what should have been" nor even "what ought to be. In the case of rights, they are the poetry of what is even when not enforced. (Noble lie? No, its the Truth.)

With all respect Deckard; this is non sense... With law, the whole community takes up the violation of rights, and takes on the injury of the injured upon itself... But the object of law is not punishment, and it is not even to make the injured whole... The object of law is rehabilitation, and the term is an old one with the significance of being restored to honor, for in the past, no one would by choice live with, or near others having no honor... We are shocked at honor killings among Muslims which very often occur in the poorer places in Islam, in Afghanistan, or Pakistan...For people living in honor societies, honor is also their economy... No one could leave home, nor claim to have anything not in their immediate possession if they could not trust the honor of those they live with...We think money is a fair equivalent of honor... It is not...Where money is dear, honor is cheap...The presumption of honor still attaches to money, but we see how far that goes...

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;114770 wrote:

Rights are, for me, a legal concept. They are an invention just like light-bulbs. Sure, I'm well aware that rights are "fictions." So is the self. I like both my self and my rights. I hold these fictions to be most pleasant. That individual humans are dignified and beautiful --- potentially!

We are talking of legal rights. At some point skepticism has to put away its scribbles are secure some food, dodge the arrows of enemies. Laws are necessary because humans are predatory. Hobbes was no slobbe.

Athens was founded as a hide-out for thieves. So "they" say.

So for you, rights are derived from law and government? You have only those rights that your government decides to provide to you or allows you to have?

The are no natural or inherent or inalienable or god given rights at all?

I prefer my rights to have a more secure philosophical basis than just government so did Jefferson.

@prothero,

prothero;114784 wrote:

So for you, rights are derived from law and government? You have only those rights that your government decides to provide to you or allows you to have?

The are no natural or inherent or inalienable or god given rights at all?

I prefer my rights to have a more secure philosophical basis than just government so did Jefferson.

I prefer to dwell on legal rights. Yes, these legal rights are founded upon ideology, but what of that? There's a murderer buried in everyone. I want it on paper, not just in the air (breath). I feel like this thread is especially about legal rights. I like Jefferson. Of course. His slaves liked him too, perhaps.

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;114788 wrote:

I prefer to dwell on legal rights. Yes, these legal rights are founded upon ideology, but what of that? There's a murderer buried in everyone. I want it on paper, not just in the air (breath). I feel like this thread is especially about legal rights. I like Jefferson. Of course. His slaves liked him too, perhaps.

Seems like a rather shallow, pragmatic, and utilitarian approach for a philosopher. :bigsmile:
What we write down on paper, and into our laws is generally reflective of some deeper ideological or philosophical notion about "rights".
The "divine right of kings" gave way to the "social contract".
The "race goes to the swift and the strong" gave way to "individual rights".
Ultimately our notions of "human rights' and "human dignity" had their basis in reflections about man being made in the "image of the divine". There is little basis in raw nature for thinking that man has any "inalienable or inherent rights" at all.

@Fido,

Well, I just don't trust cops to be philosophical. I suppose I would endorse the ideology of individualism. But too much individualism brings the house down, as wealth becomes concentrated and the government is auctioned. Also,when all the frontier is claimed, new citizens are born into a country where everything is owned.

It's dangerous to make property rights absolute, and dangerous not to. I'm sure that I want citizens to be protected from violence and confinement. It's smart to provide basic necessities for the desperate. A lot of the work is in the details. How much? Who pays? Capitalism has serious flaws. But it's created so much wealth, so much innovation.

@Reconstructo,

Fido;114773 wrote:

With all respect Deckard; this is non sense... With law, the whole community takes up the violation of rights, and takes on the injury of the injured upon itself... But the object of law is not punishment, and it is not even to make the injured whole... The object of law is rehabilitation, and the term is an old one with the significance of being restored to honor, for in the past, no one would by choice live with, or near others having no honor...

I think the object of law is to make the victim whole. I call this healing. You call it restoring to honor. Actually, I think I like your words for it a little better but they still have the same general meaning. Ideally the law would also provide the steps that must be taken to restore the honor of the perpetrator though this may require ritual suicide in quite a few cases.

I'm a big fan of bringing back the concepts of honor and virtue especially if we can be smart about it. Let the head rule but let the heart have its place. The head being the seat of intellect and the heart being the seat of honor (also love, courage, in a word virtue). Also, I'm a big fan of Don Quixote. I'm not so sure about Cervantes though.

So I don't know why you called it non-sense. And I take issue with this, My honor is offended and I demand satisfaction. Pistols at dawn!!!

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;114707 wrote:

What I most want from government is RIGHTS. I like government functioning as a referee. The problem is that accumulated wealth buys the government. I would like rights to be absolute, inviolable. incontrovertible. But even if they were, it's enforcement that matters. If the government itself violates your rights or fails to punish other citizens who do, these same rights are the poetry of what should have been.

Ethics and law are too different things. When we get into law and enforcement, we get our hands dirty. Politics is the real deal. No more academic abstractions but tough choices.

I'm not sure why you think enforcement of rights is at all important. Rights are about what it is permissible to do to one another. This has absolutely nothing to do with what people actually do to one another; just because people kill people does not mean that they ought not kill people. 'Government' is just an answer to the question, 'how do we get people to act morally?' It's a practical question for practical people (dullards), it's completely distinct from whether or not we have rights, and what they are, which are normative questions.

Quote:

Rights are, for me, a legal concept. They are an invention just like light-bulbs. Sure, I'm well aware that rights are "fictions." So is the self. I like both my self and my rights. I hold these fictions to be most pleasant. That individual humans are dignified and beautiful --- potentially!

We are talking of legal rights. At some point skepticism has to put away its scribbles are secure some food, dodge the arrows of enemies. Laws are necessary because humans are predatory. Hobbes was no slobbe.

Athens was founded as a hide-out for thieves. So "they" say.

...
I prefer to dwell on legal rights. Yes, these legal rights are founded upon ideology, but what of that? There's a murderer buried in everyone. I want it on paper, not just in the air (breath). I feel like this thread is especially about legal rights. I like Jefferson. Of course. His slaves liked him too, perhaps.

Legal concepts are for lawyers. They are boring. Moral philosophy is not concerned with legal matters, the moral philosopher cares not whether rights are enshrined in law, nor even if they are respected. Take a normative position, it will make things more interesting. Do you not think there are certain things (a class of actions) that one human is never allowed to do to another, or certain ways in which we ought not treat others? (You say rights are fictions, but I wasn't sure whether or not that was a meta-ethical position about truth in ethics, or a normative view).

fido wrote:

With all respect Deckard; this is non sense... With law, the whole community takes up the violation of rights, and takes on the injury of the injured upon itself... But the object of law is not punishment, and it is not even to make the injured whole... The object of law is rehabilitation, and the term is an old one with the significance of being restored to honor, for in the past, no one would by choice live with, or near others having no honor... We are shocked at honor killings among Muslims which very often occur in the poorer places in Islam, in Afghanistan, or Pakistan...For people living in honor societies, honor is also their economy... No one could leave home, nor claim to have anything not in their immediate possession if they could not trust the honor of those they live with...We think money is a fair equivalent of honor... It is not...Where money is dear, honor is cheap...The presumption of honor still attaches to money, but we see how far that goes...

Why do you think the object of law should be rehabilitation? Utilitarianism would partly disagree with you, because punishing crimes prevents more crimes, and because people are generally happier when they see justice being done (i.e. people getting their just desert). Of course, the utilitarian thinks that happiness can be further maximised by adding a rehabilitative element to the justice system. Going back to Kant, he thought rehabilitating criminals was downright immoral. As autonomous beings people have the right to decide what kind of person they want to be, if they want to be a bad person who does bad things then that's their decision to make. Trying to manipulate the criminal's personality violates their integrity, and we have no right to do this. However, if the criminal is a rational agent, we do have the right to hold them accountable for their actions, we can allow the criminal's conduct to determine, at least in part, how we respond to them. If somebody does a bad thing, we should treat them badly in return; indeed, when somebody commits a crime they would expect such a response, punishing them merely complies with their own decision. I fail to see where honour comes into it.

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