Guns As A " God-given Right"

[4588686]

It sort of feels like you want to argue, but you aren't actually addressing anything I've said - or rather you are arguing against things I never said.  Still, I'm happy for you that you got to use some college words.

 

 

I addressed exactly what you said.  That without God rights are arbitrary.  

[4588686]

And once the tsar fell, his replacements threw away the God card and set up the most miserable, murderous society the world had ever known.  That God-less society gave birth to many more and all devolved into miserable, murderous totalitarian pits. 

 

 

Yep.  And a Godly society slaughtered every man, woman, and child of Canaan society.  

 

As Popper pointed out a number of decades ago, what the official Communist state had in common with the many inhumane and opressive societies that were predicated on Jesus is that there were closed societies.  

 

Leszek Kolakowski made this point about Stalinism in much greater detail.  It's well worth reading.  When you have a set of special and select individuals who get to pull out unquestionable truths from a source that only they get to access/interpret you have awful results.  

[Winchester]

As both socrates and I have already said, in our view*, without God rights are arbitrary...

 

...or to quote Dostoevsky: everything is permissible.

 

...or to paraphrase anamoly's last post: might makes right.

 

(*better men than I would argue the opposite point of view, but this is how I feel.)

Even with God, functionally, rights are still arbitrary. Unless He starts barking order directly from Heaven for all to hear. He's been rather quiet, though.

[Anomaly]

As both socrates and I have already said, in our view*, without God rights are arbitrary...

...or to quote Dostoevsky: everything is permissible.

...or to paraphrase anamoly's last post: might makes right.

(*better men than I would argue the opposite point of view, but this is how I feel.)

That's a horrible and misleading paraphrase that is patently inaccurate.

Basically, where has your God communicated specifically what are human or natural rights?
(As an aside, both terms are essentially interchangeable for most people. Look it up. If we devolve into arguing semantics, there is no communication)

It's the idea or principle of a God, a supreme being and creator, that is the foundation for some humans to logically and rationally discern these human rights. This is not done completely outside the context and understanding of society. Hence questions, debates, and development of ideas concerning slavery, abortion, etc.

I totally disagree with the philosophy that a supreme authority is required. For example, the Golden Rule to treat others as you would want to be treated is known in other cultures as well, with different names, and within or outside of religion. It's a human nature thing that is recognized by most sane humans.

As a Catholic, you can say that is God speaking in our hearts and souls. As an atheist humanist, you can say that is simply recognizing human behavior and group psychology.

Either way, it's self destructive for either perspective to argue and attack the other because that discordance violates the first idea of shared identity, living within a community, and human nature. We may as well be chickens pecking to death the odd ball while the raccoon is stealing eggs and chicks. Edited May 13, 2014 by Anomaly

[4588686]

That's a horrible and misleading paraphrase that is patently inaccurate.

 

 

 

Yeah.  It's weird how the fairly obviously and uncontroversial observation that the social power (which need not necessarily be physical violence) to assert and hold onto rights is a necessary precondition to having substantive access to those rights gets misconstrued into a normative claims that MIGHT MAKES RIGHT!!!!

[Winchester]

Yeah.  It's weird how the fairly obviously and uncontroversial observation that the social power (which need not necessarily be physical violence) to assert and hold onto rights is a necessary precondition to having substantive access to those rights gets misconstrued into a normative claims that MIGHT MAKES RIGHT!!!!

This need not be the person who 'possesses' the rights, though. 

 

All it really takes is a commitment of others to not be assholes.

[4588686]

This need not be the person who 'possesses' the rights, though. 

 

All it really takes is a commitment of others to not be arse portals.

 

 

Sure.  And I think that Posner has written some interesting things about this.  Expanding circles of rights coming from empathy via 'moral entrepreneurs.'  

[NotreDame]

I would opine that a developed concept of human rights grew outside of religion. Religions recognize a God as the only source of human rights(if any), and thus subject to whomever speaks convincingly as God's spokesperson.

Ultimately, human rights are what can be reasonably expressed and enforced within society.

 

That's a horrible and misleading paraphrase that is patently inaccurate.

 

I read the sentence above as "rights are what can be enforced", which is consistent with "might makes right."  If you meant something different then I apologize.

[Winchester]

I read the sentence above as "rights are what can be enforced", which is consistent with "might makes right."  If you meant something different then I apologize.

Wimp.

[PhuturePriest]

Wimp.

 

 

[Anomaly]

I read the sentence above as "rights are what can be enforced", which is consistent with "might makes right." If you meant something different then I apologize.

With gracious humility, I accept your apology.

[Winchester]

Oh, barf.

[Era Might]

As both socrates and I have already said, in our view*, without God rights are arbitrary...

 

...or to quote Dostoevsky: everything is permissible.

 

...or to paraphrase anamoly's last post: might makes right.

 

(*better men than I would argue the opposite point of view, but this is how I feel.)

 

"God" is basically a social symbol around which everyone orders themselves. A man's own mind can serve the same role that "God" does in society. The problem with that is society is full of ignorant and wandering people, so God is a useful social mechanism, but that has always been something against which more independent minded people rebelled and challenged. Modern "rights" are the result of a long process of secularization, against which the church resisted mightily because it was trying to hang on to an older view of society. The Protestant Reformation was a huge event, and after everyone was done slaughtering each other over their religion, they slowly started to live and let live (Treaty of Westphalia). It's ironic, but "rights" as we know them are precisely what enables everything to be permissible, as long as order is maintained. Usually when we think of rights we think of physical rights, but mental rights are still a sore point for Christians (some of them anyway...the official church has more or less accommodated itself). Before, physical and mental rights were both knotted together, which is why you could burn someone for an idea. Of course, we still have political prisoners, and in a sense, all law is political, a way for us to work out our prejudices and failures and phobias (drug sentencing, etc).

Edited May 14, 2014 by Era Might

[Socrates]

He's not saying they are.  Neither is he saying that being an atheist makes one a moral nihilist.  He's saying (correctly, I believe) that without God ethical concepts, including political rights, are arbitrary. 

 

Exactly.

[Anomaly]

Oh, barf.

Weves.

That made me look better than a sincere:

" your abject grovelling at your realization of predestined and shameful defeat does not merit my notice, not even enough to urinate on the smoldering corpse of your pitifull ego".

Magnanimity in victory is one of my traits.

[Winchester]

Weves.

That made me look better than a sincere:

" your abject grovelling at your realization of predestined and shameful defeat does not merit my notice, not even enough to urinate on the smoldering corpse of your pitifull ego".

Magnanimity in victory is one of my traits.

 

pfft

[4588686]

Is it getting hot in here or is it just me?

[PhuturePriest]

Un-following this thread was one of the best decisions I made this week.

[Socrates]

You're confusing atheism with a reductionist subset of beliefs within the Anglo-American materialist tradition.  

 

While it's conceivable that someone can claim atheism and still deny materialism, or believe in some sort of spiritual reality (and am aware that some hold such beliefs, though I'm not particularly familiar with them), I don't find this view very intellectually coherent, and the cast majority of atheists, at least in the Western world, are materialist; they deny the existence of the spiritual or immaterial.

 

I was under the impression that both you and Anomaly were materialists, though I'm open to correction if mistaken.

[Socrates]

Even with God, functionally, rights are still arbitrary. Unless He starts barking order directly from Heaven for all to hear. He's been rather quiet, though.

 

He's not so quiet if you happen to believe in Divine Revelation.

Rights are a useful legislative concept, which can be deduced rationally from certain basic moral precepts.  For example, from "Thou Shalt Not Kill" and "Thou Shalt Not Steal," you can draw the positive corollaries of a right to life and a right to property.

(I've read some Catholic thinkers who don't like the idea of "rights" and think it preferable to think in terms of responsibilities.  "Rights" can too easily become an endless, arbitrary, and contradictory list of wants.)

 

However, I never claimed a concept of rights was dependent on Divine Revelation.  

Atheists and liberals often cite "rights" as a basis for law without morality, yet the whole idea that people have rights that others must respect and not violate is itself a moral claim.

 

The big issue here is whether there are objective standards of ethics and morality above and outside of man, which man is morally obligated to follow (what Russell Kirk called an "enduring moral order"), or whether man himself is the ultimate arbitrator of morality, and makes his own rules.

If there is no objective moral order, there can be no basis for rights beyond personal preference, government power, or majority opinion.

 

This has practical consequences.  For example, without an enduring moral order to appeal to, we have such absurdities as courts denying persons the right to life on the basis of a "right to privacy" and other such nonsense.