Where do rights come from?

[GePap]

To say "I have a moral right to X" is, essentially, to say "it is morally impermissible for other people to prevent me from X".
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No, it is not the same. In this country it is legally impermissible for the State to stop you from watching videos of bestiality inside your home. The vast majority of people would say it is immoral to watch bestiality, and any private citizen can stop you from doing such in their own house. Legality and morality ARE NOT THE SAME THING!!! What is legal might be considered as immoral by most people (just aks most of the population regarding the behavior of Wall Street, or take the very obvious example of human slavery). As I have said again and again, rights are a legal formulation.

To return to the issue of "God", you have no rights under that system,only obligations. God may tell people they can't kill each other, but It gets to kill anyone it wants, making the notion that a prohibition to murder for the underlings is equal to anything resembling a right false.

"Rights" have meaning only if there is a legal construction to enforce them. Rights are NOT enforced by the general population. On the other hand, moral codes of conduct are meant to regulate behavior between people. Another simple example: you have the right to call any other individual, including a cop, a mother****er ******* to his face if you just walked up to him. That is "freedom of speech." Most people though would say it is immoral to do so, and would probably side with the person insulted if they happened to hit you and go to trial for assault.

[flash9286]

Absolutely not true, especially since murder is a prohibition only on illegal killing - there are other categories of killing (executions being the most obvious one) that are allowed.

Let me give an example - banning the drinking of alcohol as illegal is not just another way of saying that you have the right to be free from drunken people, even if you start arguing that "the consequences are the same."

I never said absolute right to live. Saying it is wrong to murder people=right to live with certain defined expectations.

[GePap]

I never said absolute right to live. Saying it is wrong to murder people=right to live with certain defined expectations.

Jesus, NO.

The prohibition of murder does not exist to save any one individual from murder. It exists to prevent the collapse of the group from cycles of revenge or from a destruction of trusts between the individual members. As such, there are times when the group may chose to allow a murder to happen - for example, say a parent were to shoot a known pederast and pedophile who was their neighbor but was not in any way threatening a child at the time. It would be plausible to say that a jury of peers would allow the person to get off with minimal punishment if any, if only because the group thought that that was an individual whom it was worth killing to make everyone else's lives better. They have made a moral judgement that ending the life of a "bad man" is a good thing. On the other hand, it is never a "good thing" to violate a right, and the assumption is that the system would punish violators of rights all the time, because if punishment became conditional, the whole foundation of the right is undermined.

[Kuciwalker]

No, it is not the same. In this country it is legally impermissible for the State to stop you from watching videos of bestiality inside your home. The vast majority of people would say it is immoral to watch bestiality, and any private citizen can stop you from doing such in their own house.

You're still on the "can't read" streak, aren't you? Remember this?

I'm aware. The fact that the rights are situational isn't terribly important - rights under almost any framework are typically a bit situational, e.g. "it's okay to kill in self-defense".

And so in this case "you have a right to watch bestiality in your own home" is equivalent to "people may not morally prevent you from watching bestiality in your own home". The people who think bestiality porn is wrong generally don't think that it would be okay for them to go into YOUR home and destroy your computer.

What is legal might be considered as immoral by most people (just aks most of the population regarding the behavior of Wall Street, or take the very obvious example of human slavery). As I have said again and again, rights are a legal formulation.

GePap, were you dropped on your head as a child? Did you miss one of the dozen times I've pointed out the very obvious fallacy in confounding "rights as a legal formulation" and "rights as a moral formulation"? The fact that the word has one meaning doesn't preclude it from having another. And we know FOR A FACT that there are moral theories which contain the notion of RIGHTS AS MORAL ENTITIES THAT ARE DISTINCT FROM RIGHTS AS LEGAL ENTITIES.

"Rights" have meaning only if there is a legal construction to enforce them.

Of course, this is ANOTHER fallacy of equivocation. By "have meaning" you just mean "are enforced", i.e. "rights are only enforced if people enforce them" NO **** SHERLOCK.

Moral systems that explicitly propose natural rights do not, generally, suggest that these natural rights are PHYSICALLY ENFORCED BY THE UNIVERSE. (Otherwise NO ONE WOULD CARE.) They suggest that we are morally obligated to respect and, in some cases, defend these rights.

[Kuciwalker]

You have yet to articulate a case where "I have a right to do X [with certain conditions, blah blah]" produces different results from "it is immoral for people to prevent me from doing X [with same conditions]". e.g. X = "watch bestiality porn in my own house", to use your example.

[GePap]

You have yet to articulate a case where "I have a right to do X [with certain conditions, blah blah]" produces different results from "it is immoral for people to prevent me from doing X [with same conditions]". e.g. X = "watch bestiality porn in my own house", to use your example.

Illegal and immoral are NOT THE SAME GOD DAMMED THING! It is your right to kiss a man if you wanted, but many people in some parts of the country do NOT think that it would be immoral to stop you from kissing a man, and thus if you started kissing a man in certain places, you would get beat. I think there is a very obvious difference in results from expecting the ability to kiss a man free of consequence and getting assaulted or killed if you actually did it.

The issue here is what drives ACTIONS. In theory, people do not actively engage in what they hold to be immoral behavior. That is the power of morality, that is forms an internalized constraint on the behavior of people. This is not the same as someone not acting because they fear punishment. That is a constraint formed by an expectation of someone else's actions, and that is the realm in which rights exist. I know that you will invariably claim now that fear of punishment by others is itself an internalized beliefs, so "they are the same." Except that they are not, because if you truly have internalized a constraint, that rules your behavior even in the total absence of others and the utter impossibility of punishement. A good example is people who might play a video game but refrain from committing acts they consider immoral in the game, even thought the issue of outside punishment is irrelevant as they are in full control, and this includes divine punishment, as I do not think any religion would claim that killing hookers in GTA would mean a trip to hell, like killing real hookers would.

[Kuciwalker]

Illegal and immoral are NOT THE SAME GOD DAMMED THING!

thank you for noticing something we established on the first page

It is your right to kiss a man if you wanted, but many people in some parts of the country do NOT think that it would be immoral to stop you from kissing a man, and thus if you started kissing a man in certain places, you would get beat.

i.e. they don't think you have a moral right to kiss a man

You've been wonderfully successful at illustrating the difference between moral rights and legal rights. It's not clear to me why you decided to do so, since I articulated that distinction first in post #26 and then many times thereafter, but thanks for reinforcing my thesis.

[GePap]

Illegal and immoral are NOT THE SAME GOD DAMMED THING!

thank you for noticing something we established on the first page

It is your right to kiss a man if you wanted, but many people in some parts of the country do NOT think that it would be immoral to stop you from kissing a man, and thus if you started kissing a man in certain places, you would get beat.

i.e. they don't think you have a moral right to kiss a man

You've been wonderfully successful at illustrating the difference between moral rights and legal rights. It's not clear to me why you decided to do so, since I articulated that distinction first in post #26 and then many times thereafter, but thanks for reinforcing my thesis.

Sorry Kuci, but just restating something doesn't make it true.

OP cares about the question "what privileges cannot morally be denied me through coercion" or "to what privileges am I morally entitled", in particular as a universal question, and he really wants to know "by what metaphysical mechanism was I endowed with these rights?". Common answers are "God", "the Constitution" (in the American civic religion), "um hey look over there!", "just because".

Your mistake is thinking that morals bestow privileges. They instead enforce constraints upon individuals. There is a difference, particularly when it comes to morality based on notions of an omnipotent, omniscient intelligence. A person has no privileges vis a vi God - God can do anything and everything to a person, and by just the fact that God did it, the action is moral and right. To think otherwise is no negate the idea that God is the source of morality, as you would be claiming that God had to be constrained somehow, which is impossible for the omnipotent.

Your most basic mistake is seeming to believe that morality is arrived at through rational discourse. I don't think there is any historical basis for such a belief. I think it much more plausible and supported by the evidence that morality is a slowly evolving thing based on the moral sentiments that humans have inherited as they evolved (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/20/sc...oral.html?_r=1). You continue the mistake you made in the old thread about animals having feelings (I recall you saying they were basically automatons) by failing to perhaps think that the world is no arrived at based on some logical first principles that can be modeled mathematically.

[Kuciwalker]

Your mistake is thinking that morals bestow privileges. They instead enforce constraints upon individuals. There is a difference

No. We have Alice and Bob, who subscribe to a moral theory that states everyone has a right to pee in the shower. For Alice, there are only two moral claims that follow from this theory: first, that it would be wrong for her to interfere with Bob peeing in the shower, and two, that it would be wrong for Bob to interfere with her peeing in the shower.

This is exactly the same as them instead subscribing to a moral theory that states "no one may interfere with another person peeing in the shower".

There is a difference, particularly when it comes to morality based on notions of an omnipotent, omniscient intelligence. A person has no privileges vis a vi God - God can do anything and everything to a person, and by just the fact that God did it, the action is moral and right.

Neither Alice nor Bob in that example would consider it "immoral" if a hurricane destroyed their shower, preventing them from peeing in it. The existence of hurricanes or other objects not subject to moral rules is not relevant to those rules.

Your most basic mistake is seeming to believe that morality is arrived at through rational discourse.

No, but your most basic mistake is a consistent inability to read. I explicitly disavowed that I was making claims about the historical origin of the current prevailing moral opinion.

[Kuciwalker]

dp

[Aeson]

No. We have Alice and Bob, who subscribe to a moral theory that states everyone has a right to pee in the shower. For Alice, there are only two moral claims that follow from this theory: first, that it would be wrong for her to interfere with Bob peeing in the shower, and two, that it would be wrong for Bob to interfere with her peeing in the shower.

This is exactly the same as them instead subscribing to a moral theory that states "no one may interfere with another person peeing in the shower".

To keep with the "shower" theme... the right to take a shower does not mean that no one may interfere with another person taking a shower. The very act of taking a shower, which is the right of the actor involved, may interfere with another person taking a shower when there is not enough showers to go around. (It's easy to see how you don't understand this though... )

I don't really care about this argument... but felt the need to make the joke... carry on

[Aeson]

No. We have Alice and Bob, who subscribe to a moral theory that states everyone has a right to pee in the shower. For Alice, there are only two moral claims that follow from this theory: first, that it would be wrong for her to interfere with Bob peeing in the shower, and two, that it would be wrong for Bob to interfere with her peeing in the shower.

This is exactly the same as them instead subscribing to a moral theory that states "no one may interfere with another person peeing in the shower".

To keep with the "shower" theme... the right to take a shower does not mean that no one may interfere with another person taking a shower. The very act of taking a shower, which is the right of the actor involved, may interfere with another person taking a shower when there is not enough showers to go around. (It's easy to see how you don't understand this though... )

I don't really care about this argument... but felt the need to make the joke... carry on

[Kuciwalker]

To keep with the "shower" theme... the right to take a shower does not mean that no one may interfere with another person taking a shower. The very act of taking a shower, which is the right of the actor involved, may interfere with another person taking a shower when there is not enough showers to go around. (It's easy to see how you don't understand this though... )

I don't really care about this argument... but felt the need to make the joke... carry on

I'll address this just so none of the lesser minds reading the thread get confused: even though in practice Alice's right to pee in the shower is circumscribed, in the dual form of the morality (where the moral axioms take the form "Bob may not interfere with..." rather than "Alice has the right to...") Bob's proscriptions are identically circumscribed. The duality is not affect by the introduction of realistic situations, etc.

[Zevico]

Where do rights come from?

They need to do way to instain framers>who kill their rights. How come rights can't frigth back?

[Aeson]

I'll address this just so none of the lesser minds reading the thread get confused: even though in practice Alice's right to pee in the shower is circumscribed, in the dual form of the morality (where the moral axioms take the form "Bob may not interfere with..." rather than "Alice has the right to...") Bob's proscriptions are identically circumscribed. The duality is not affect by the introduction of realistic situations, etc.

I'll address this just so none of the lesser minds reading the thread get confused: When Bob is circumcised it doesn't hamper his ability to pee in the shower, thus the doctor hasn't infringed upon his rights by chopping up his private parts. And just because Alice is a girl (supposedly, though only Bob can be sure since he's peed with her in the shower) she still has the right to be circumcised too. At least as long as she's an American, or Jew. (Just be grateful you're not a Jewish American and have to have it done twice!)

And if you're still confused, by "pee in the shower" we simply are referring to "golden showers"... you're welcome!