Humans have more right to live than baiji dolphins [part 2]

Great Debates
21

LHoD, if I understand your objection, it’s that even unenforced rights are useful because people may voluntarily choose to follow them even if there’s no actual punishment in play. People may just choose to follow them anyway.

To an extent, I agree. The problem as I see it is that someone isn’t acknowledging those rights because it’s a guideline and they like guidelines, they follow them because they match up with their inner sense of rights. As you say, even if it were not a recognised right, you would not harangue me on my walk. But it isn’t because that’s a right written down somewhere; it’s because you think it’s a good idea. Yes, it provides a guideline, but it’s not one people will be motivated to follow at the expense of their own guidelines in the absence of enforcement. IOW, you aren’t following that guideline, you’re following your own one - and the two just happen to coincide in this particlar case. It existing as an unenforced right has no effect on whether you choose to follow it, and thus it means nothing.

22

[QUOTE=Left Hand of Dorkness]
I don’t.
[/quote]

Whatever.

I guess I didn’t think you were the religious type.

Well, mainly because murder is at the extreme end of the scale. But we can keep looking at you if you want. From an evolutionary standpoint, a moral code comes about to benefit our species, not any given individual. The benefit of having murder be immoral and illegal is that the murderer is (or can be) then removed from society to prevent him from repeating his crime.

23

[QUOTE=pravnik]
Odd bump. Did a Baiji dolphin rights case just get handed down from the Supreme Court, thus renewing the debate? :smiley:
[/QUOTE]

No, unfortunately, the baiji dolphin was just declared extinct, primarily because of reckless, insanely blinkered, selfish human actions.

24

[QUOTE=John Mace]
Whatever.
[/quote]

If you’re not interested in understanding my position, I guess that’s your prerogative.

This is something I struggle with, believe me. It is part of the reason I say that people cannot choose their beliefs. Even though I can’t really formulate my reasons for believing in an objective morality, even though I recognize that my belief in one may be a product of my brain’s hard-wiring, I still believe in it.

Okay, that’s fine. I’d rephrase the third sentence as, “From an evolutionary standpoint, a recognition of a moral code comes about to benefit our species, not any given individual.” That is, I see our recognition of objective morality as a tool of reasoning. Things are right or wrong regardless of whether we evolved to believe them.

Daniel

25

[QUOTE=Revenant Threshold]
It existing as an unenforced right has no effect on whether you choose to follow it, and thus it means nothing.
[/QUOTE]

I disagree. The fact that I believe in the right protects you. If I can persuade others to believe in the right, you’re protected from more folks. Yes, it’s my belief in the right that protects you, not the right itself–but that’s precisely equivalent to how your legal right not to be murdered protects you.

Daniel

26

I think the problem is one of levels of rights. You don’t believe in the legal right, other than that it exists. Your motivation for following that rule isn’t because it’s a legal right, but because your own idea of moral rights coincide with it. When such rights are enforced, we have plenty of motivation other than (and as well as) our own inner sense of rights to follow them; that they are enforced, for one; social stigmatization, which is itself a form of enforcement; and so on. When rights are unenforced, though, you are left only with your inner sense.

Go back to the raving loony example. You see a person walking along, and are struck by the urge to shout abuse. In one scenario, there is a legal right that protects the person from your abuse, but it is not enforced. In another, there is no such right at all.

Will you behave differently in those two scenarios?

27

[QUOTE=Left Hand of Dorkness]
If you’re not interested in understanding my position, I guess that’s your prerogative.
[/quote]
.
OK. I just thought if you were interesting in presenting a position you’d’ve posted more than “I don’t”. :wink:

I can accept that you believe that, but I can’t see why anyone else would. Basically, it sounds like you’re saying: Just take my word for it. I don’t mean that to be snarky, it’s just exactly what it sounds like to me.

That’s what I can’t get my mind around. Was this objective morality in existence before the earth came into being? If we had evolved differently, and that’s entirely possible, then the morality we would have would be different. For example, If social insects were to evolve into a sentient species, their morality would be quite different from ours.

28

[ Moderating ]

amrussell, we would really prefer that old threads (known as zombies) not be re-opened. There is a good likelihood that posters who participated in the thread when it first was posted are no longer members and arguments directed against them are going to be wasted. There is also the possibility that posters who once had feuds and resolved them are liable to encounter language rekindling the feud, not realizing that the language predates the truce.

The more appropriate way to address old topics is to initiate a new threa with a link to the old one, as I have done for you, here.
Original thread: Humans have more right to live than baiji dolphins

[ /Moderating ]

29

Wait hold up, how exactly were the baiji dolphins threatening humanity?

Some evil scheme involving a giant laser?

Seriously it wasn’t us vs them. It was us vs us deciding their fate. Looks like the wrong side won, now they’re gone.

30

[QUOTE=Bricker]
Your argument seems to rest on the idea that if “a great wrong” was done to them, it must have been done in violation of their “rights.”

While I know it’s tempting to say that right and wrong are opposite concepts, and that this proves the point, that’s an example of equivocation. In this context, “rights” does not mean “that which is not wrong.” Yes, a great wrong was done to those women. Nonetheless, in their circumstances, assuming you’re representing Taliban-ish law correctly, they had no legal remedy, and it’s not correct to say they had a “right” not to be stoned to death. They didn’t.

If they did, one presumes they would have exercised it.
[/QUOTE]

What a goofy concept…

31

Pardon the hijack, but this thread immediately brought to mind last week’s story on NPR’s “This I Believe”: A reverence for all life.

Even though the author has passed, it’s good to know there are still people who feel this way.
Sorry to interrupt the debate.

32

[QUOTE=John Mace]
.I can accept that you believe that, but I can’t see why anyone else would. Basically, it sounds like you’re saying: Just take my word for it. I don’t mean that to be snarky, it’s just exactly what it sounds like to me.
[/quote]

I certainly don’t expect you to take my word for it. At this point, I’m talking about my own position, not trying to convince you of it.

In the same way that, before aything existed in the universe, 1+1=2 was a true statement, yes. Morality is descriptive of what is right and wrong to do. It does not, I believe, depend upon evolution.

Daniel

33

Hey whatr happened to the old threaed?

34

[QUOTE=Bricker]
Your argument seems to rest on the idea that if “a great wrong” was done to them, it must have been done in violation of their “rights.”

While I know it’s tempting to say that right and wrong are opposite concepts, and that this proves the point, that’s an example of equivocation. In this context, “rights” does not mean “that which is not wrong.” Yes, a great wrong was done to those women. Nonetheless, in their circumstances, assuming you’re representing Taliban-ish law correctly, they had no legal remedy, and it’s not correct to say they had a “right” not to be stoned to death. They didn’t.

If they did, one presumes they would have exercised it.
[/QUOTE]

Sorry to re-post the obvious, but:

[QUOTE=the aforesaid collection of old dudes]
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
[/QUOTE]

Any reading of that must conclude that unalienable rights are self-evidently inherent in creation, not derived from government. Life (the right not to be stoned to death) is listed. From this, it would seem that your best argument is that the women involved did not have rights because they were not men, but let’s not get sidetracked.

For those among us who might be lawyers, and thus may require additional help understanding straightforward concepts,* I present the following:

[QUOTE=that same founding document of American law]
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
[/QUOTE]

So the rights, which clearly exist regardless of government/law, are merely secured by government (yes, I recognize that’s a hell of a “merely”). Furthermore, when any form of government (presumably including the Taliban) is destructive of these ends, another right comes into play.

I’d say it’s abundantly clear to an American that the women did indeed have an actual right not to be stoned to death…even if it was not one they themselves could effectively assert.

Sailboat
*I kid.

35

[QUOTE=Sir Oinksalot]
Hey whatr happened to the old threaed?
[/QUOTE]

See post number twenty eight here. The moderator took the newest posts and split them from that topic to make a new (non-zombie) topic in which we could continue the discussion. The post I mentioned explains this, and gives a link to the previous thread.

36

[QUOTE=Sailboat]
Sorry to re-post the obvious, but:

Any reading of that must conclude that unalienable rights are self-evidently inherent in creation, not derived from government. Life (the right not to be stoned to death) is listed. From this, it would seem that your best argument is that the women involved did not have rights because they were not men, but let’s not get sidetracked.

For those among us who might be lawyers, and thus may require additional help understanding straightforward concepts,* I present the following:

So the rights, which clearly exist regardless of government/law, are merely secured by government (yes, I recognize that’s a hell of a “merely”). Furthermore, when any form of government (presumably including the Taliban) is destructive of these ends, another right comes into play.

I’d say it’s abundantly clear to an American that the women did indeed have an actual right not to be stoned to death…even if it was not one they themselves could effectively assert.

Sailboat
*I kid.
[/QUOTE]

Why is the Declaration of Independence considered an authoritative document? It’s interesting, of course, but has no legal standing in the sense that the Constitution does. In fact, if a US state decided to do same, the federal government would not look too kindly on it (witness the Confederacy).

Beyond that, though, 18th century thinkers were locked into a religious, or at least a theistic, view of the world. I don’t accept that there even is a “Creator”. So where do we go from there?

37

[QUOTE=Sailboat]
So the rights, which clearly exist regardless of government/law, are merely secured by government (yes, I recognize that’s a hell of a “merely”). Furthermore, when any form of government (presumably including the Taliban) is destructive of these ends, another right comes into play.

[/QUOTE]

  1. The Declaration of Independence has no standing in law at all, and is not the “founding document of American law” by any means. Where did you get that idea?

  2. The Declaration makes certain claims, yes, but those claims were unpersuasive to George III. You may recall that there was actually a war for independence; we didn’t deliver the Declaration of Independence to George and hear, “Right, well, good show, Yankees. Off you go to be free, then!” What persuaded his royal self was the guys with muskets hiding behind trees and shooting the guys with red coats. They asserted a right, and enforced their own remedy.

  3. If you assert a right, you need to be able to assert a remedy. The legal system is not the only remedy. Guys with guns ready to impose their own legal system if they win is ALSO a remedy. In fact, at heart our legal system IS guys with guns ready to enforce the rules upon you.

  4. Mere words, no matter how eloquent, are alone never enough. They have to convince large numbers of people to make sacrifices to establish the remedy you want.

  5. Therefore: there is no right without a remedy.

ADDENDUM A: Are you seriously premising your claim for rights on those granted by a Creator?

38

[QUOTE=Bricker]
ADDENDUM A: Are you seriously premising your claim for rights on those granted by a Creator?
[/QUOTE]

I guess we better forget about that whole Separation of Church and State thingy, then. Perhaps we should teach something about this “Creator” in our public schools, too, so our kids don’t grow up ignorant about what the source of their rights are.

39

In legal theory terms, we have people in this thread taking:

(1) the “Positive Law” position: there is no universal law–law is only what a society decides law will be; and

(2) the “Natural Law” posistion: there is a basic set of rules written in the hearts of men that is always law no matter what society decides or enforces.

The problem with (1) is that Hitler made laws that everyone outside Germany thought were bad–but these laws still should have the name “laws” because they functioned as such. The laws of the Taliban are wrong but still should be called laws.

The problem with (2) is that no one agrees on exactly what laws are written in men’s hearts.

Number (3) is an uneasy compromise where laws are laws only if they are based on a generally acceptable “moral code,” which may not be written in all men’s hearts everywhere at all times but is generally accepted by a particular society. This position suffers the faults of both (1) and (2) in an intermediate way.

40

[QUOTE=John Mace]
I guess we better forget about that whole Separation of Church and State thingy, then. Perhaps we should teach something about this “Creator” in our public schools, too, so our kids don’t grow up ignorant about what the source of their rights are.
[/QUOTE]

We certainly should give some thought to public mention of the Creator at governmental functions and events, given his role in the very underpinnings of our government.