From: Lee Corbin (lcorbin@tsoft.com)
Date: Wed Jan 15 2003 - 03:39:58 MST
Mike Lorrey, ever on the prowl for a few good men, writes
> > It is patently false that humans are born free or with a
> > right to his or her own person.
>
> Well, then, Sheeeeaaat! Lee, why don't you mosey on over here so's I
> kin clap you in some chains. I 'bin in need of a good slave for a while
> now, seein' as how buying power has eroded so much of late. I shorely
> could use an extra set of hands workin' on my behalf.
No doubt you could. Doesn't sound like too much fun,
though, and besides, I'm booked through April.
> > > Our Natural Rights evolve specifically out of our evolution, via
> > > natural selection, as individualistic social primates with an
> > > inclination toward tool invention and use and exploration of new
> > > habitat.
> >
> > It really surprises me that a number of distinguished
> > thinkers can believe in such a thing given the modern
> > discoveries in so many branches of science, but especially
> > anthropology. You're quite clear and correct about
> > "individualistic social primates with an inclination
> > toward tool invention", but what has this to do with
> > rights?
>
> Natural Rights are those legal liberties which the evolutionary history
> of human culture has demonstrated provide superior selection, survival,
> of both the individual and the society in which the individual resides.
There has no doubt been a trend towards such during the last three
hundred years or so; and adumbrations stretch back to the successful
policies of Greece and Rome. But these are extreme exceptions in
the vast panoply of history. In most eras and for most tribes and
nations, it couldn't work; some critical elements of culture were
lacking. Even if you'd gone up to the Great King as he was finding
the Athenians and some of the others a bit troublesome, and had
completely talked him and all his immediate subordinates and
satraps into all these ideas, it would not have flown.
This is, in fact, the error so common among those who believe that
all Africa needed in 1960 was freedom and democracy. Sorry, (we
should have told them had we only known then), takes centuries of
preparation and development. Try to learn from your Western
superiors the arts of self-government, and plan on at least a
century.
> ...all the way back to Aristotle a scientific recognition
> that societies which recognized this right had greater
> survivability (as did the individuals who exercised these
> rights).
Even if he said this, he would be accurate only about his
society, that is, cultures on a par with Greece or Rome.
By the way, do you have a reference for this?
> Similarly, technology in general is the natural right of those primates
> to create, own, and use, free of interference. These include cloning,
> stem cells, cryonics, AI, space technology, nanotech, etc.
Sounds like you all mean "default" or "manifest" or something
when you write "natural". I agree that these are good things.
I agree that explanations exist for why advanced civilizations
are better off with those things than without those things
readily exist.
I have to translate the above as "Mike Lorrey approves of
primates like us being free of interference to own and to
create, and believes that great benefits will accrue to
our nations when we adopt and promote these things."
> > In my book, what the Enlightenment philosophers achieved
> > is they described the ideas (notions) that were being
> > developed in their times, consciously or unconsciously,
> > and expressed two important other things: One, that they
> > highly approved of these new views, and that two, such
> > assumptions embodied into habit and legal precedent *worked*,
> > i.e., made societies more prosperous and resourceful.
>
> But WHY did they make societies more prosperous and resourceful if it
> were not a matter of them being in greater agreement with the Objective
> Truth embedded into the warp and weave of the universe?
Luckily, we know why, or at least think we do. Sometimes, we
only know that things seem to be a certain way. For sure,
however, saying that the answer is "because it's a natural
law" gets one nowhere---might as well talk of essences.
And yes, I will readily admit that one way to sum up
the success of capitalism, say, and the failures of
socialism are that the self-interest taken advantage
of by the former is a part of human nature. The
attempted suppression of what some would call "greed"
by communist regimes didn't succeed. But all this can
easily be addressed by very down-to-earth vocabulary
and concepts as is done in scores of books.
Here are six I just grabbed off the shelf:
Knowledge and Decisions, by Thomas Sowell
The Origins of Virtue, by Matt Ridley
The Fatal Conceit, by F.A. Hayek
Power and Prosperity, by Mancur Olsen
The Mystery of Capital, by Hernando De Soto
Carnage and Culture, by Victor Davis Hanson
Not a one has "natural rights" or "natural law"
in the index. And if any did, you'd think either
Sowell, in his huge book, or Victor Davis Hanson
(who explains so extremely well the advantages
the Greeks and the West in general has in armed
conflicts against those who have no feeling for
individualism and legal rights of citizens)
would have.
So what is going on? Must one look back into
dusty books written by 19th century historians,
or highly theoretical works by way-out libertarians?
None of the most modern and pressing expositions
appear to give any credence to this concept.
> The Enlightenment philosophers saw themselves first as scientists, for
> they saw no delineation between scientists and philosophy, and both
> existed to serve and demonstrate the validity of the deist God and his
> wisdom in constructing such a universe. Our place in that universe is
> to discover the Objective Truth of Natural Law through the use of
> science and technology, and in the end to use that knowledge to reach
> the Omega Point.
Fine, if you're switching over to mean the real laws of nature,
not these highly dubious IMO "natural rights".
Well, hmm, maybe not so fine. I've always felt our place in
the universe was primarily to have a good time! Boffo!
Lee
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