wombat@nmtsun.nmt.edu (Christopher M. Conway) (01/20/90)
On the subject of "rights" that is being so hotly argued all over
this group, I would like to make a few comments.
"Rights" are a SOCIAL CONVENTION. They do not exist anywhere in the
so-called Real World. There is no empirical, scientific evidence that
any human has any rights or responsibilities w/r/t any other human.
However, most humans prefer to live in company with other humans.
For such communities to function, certain social conventions must be
established. These conventions are always in flux. For example:
Point 1. MURDER IS WRONG.
Argument 1. What about a man who murders small children? Is it okay
to murder that man?
Point 1, Rev. 1. MURDER IS WRONG, EXCEPT TO PREVENT FURTHER MURDER.
Argument 2. What if you can prevent further murders without committing
murder yourself?
Point 1, Rev. 2. MURDER IS WRONG, UNLESS IT IS THE ONLY WAY TO PREVENT
FURTHER MURDER.
And so forth. This process goes on for individuals and for societies, all
the time. Rights and other social conventions are *always* in flux.
For those reasons (and no others) it is worth discussing various exceptions,
variations, and revisions to the bases of the current social conventions.
One of the possible sources of those exceptions, variations, and revisions
is Objectivist philosophy.
Incidentally, all philosophy becomes indistinct from religion once it
is examined closely enough. Objectivism is one of thousands of examples.
I am not exactly an O'ist because I disagree with Ayn Rand on several
points, and we've all heard how fatal that is! ;-) However, I currently
believe that a lot of her definitions of "rights" are good starting points
for this kind of ongoing revision.
Her concept of property rights is an extension of older concepts of
personal liberty, some of them dating back to the Magna Charta. The
MC was designed to protect the barons (the feudal "middle class") from
the King. Later, the MC was applied to the serfs and other classes
and, as it traveled, affected the writings of democratic writers all
over the world. An earlier source is the scraps of information we
have about Greece. The "rights" granted in the MC were not carved in
stone. They were not fixed. Instead, they have been extended and
applied to all persons,
**** Because there was something there that worked!! *****
On the other hand, I think that communism and the principle of
reward based on need is currently proving itself bankrupt, based on
the current news from Eastern Europe. That principle does not work
well as a social convention.
The mass slaughter of 12 million people by Nazi Germany horrified
the world (and, I have no doubt, a great many Germans). Genocide of
the people who disagree with you does not work! If it worked,
Nazi Germany would not have been a deplorable aberration; it would
have been normal.
The ongoing debate needs to continue. We cannot define that anyone's
concept of property rights (whether it's Phil "TAXES=THEFT" Ronzone or Roger
"PHIL IS FULL OF SH*T" Lustig or whoever) is wrong. If we try
libertarianism and it works well for a large number of people, fine and
good. If it doesn't, we throw it out. Since no-one has tried that
set of social conventions in recent memory for any length of time
(enough time has to elapse to determine if the system is self-
replicating, i.e., do our children still want to be libertarians?), we
can't throw it out yet.
Actually, I don't think anyone has any inalienable rights of any kind
whatsoever. However, I want to assume some inalienable rights for
myself. In order to be "entitled" to those "rights", I MUST grant them to
other people. If I do not, then I am making myself supra-human,
and I am justifying mass murder, theft, and other amoral behaviour in
myself, and I am not so stupid as to think that I can get away with
any of that in this society! (Which, incidentally, is one argument
in favor of inalienable rights!)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
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this is Lily-Rose using his login. | Theology is worse.
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