Cuts to UK Science Research and Student Grants:

[mistermack]

Well why not? It's my right to choose life, liberty and property as my fundamental, natural and unalienable rights.

You certainly haven't come up with any sort of rational justification for anything else, particularly socialism.

I don't have to. I don't claim any inalienable rights exist. I deny that they do.

Take off your clothes, leave everything here, it will be cleaned and disinfected and returned to you. The shower is that way...

You're free not to claim any rights at all, but you're not free to deny my claim.

Of course I am. It's my right to impinge on your freedom as much as I like. It happens in nature, so it's my inalienable right.

And I notice you didn't answer about the car. Chicken.

[pErvinalia]

I don't ignore them at all. Ants and bees have exactly the same basic biological imperatives as any other creature.

Why don't you aspire to similar rights as they enjoyed then?

I do. I aspire to the right to life, liberty and property.

Because it doesn't fit with your own vision, that's why. You're just cherry picking what suits you.

Well why not? It's my right to choose life, liberty and property as my fundamental, natural and unalienable rights.

You can choose whatever you like. But the problem begins when you try and extrapolate that to everyone else with some bogus philosophical arguments.

[Seth]

I don't ignore them at all. Ants and bees have exactly the same basic biological imperatives as any other creature.

Why don't you aspire to similar rights as they enjoyed then?

I do. I aspire to the right to life, liberty and property.

Because it doesn't fit with your own vision, that's why. You're just cherry picking what suits you.

Well why not? It's my right to choose life, liberty and property as my fundamental, natural and unalienable rights.

You can choose whatever you like. But the problem begins when you try and extrapolate that to everyone else with some bogus philosophical arguments.

I don't care what you want, I only care that you don't infringe on my rights, individually or collectively. Your life is your own, and mine is mine.

[Seth]

Well why not? It's my right to choose life, liberty and property as my fundamental, natural and unalienable rights.

You certainly haven't come up with any sort of rational justification for anything else, particularly socialism.

I don't have to. I don't claim any inalienable rights exist. I deny that they do.

Take off your clothes, leave everything here, it will be cleaned and disinfected and returned to you. The shower is that way...

You're free not to claim any rights at all, but you're not free to deny my claim.

Of course I am. It's my right to impinge on your freedom as much as I like. It happens in nature, so it's my inalienable right.

And have a right to defend my freedoms against your interference using force, up to and including deadly force. You want some, come get some.

[mistermack]

And have a right to defend my freedoms against your interference using force, up to and including deadly force. You want some, come get some.

You've got nothing I want.
But the US government has the right and the power to take your property, and lock you up, if you don't follow their rules. As you well know.

I haven't seen any reports of you fighting off the taxman with your home arsenal.

[Seth]

And have a right to defend my freedoms against your interference using force, up to and including deadly force. You want some, come get some.

You've got nothing I want.
But the US government has the right and the power to take your property, and lock you up, if you don't follow their rules. As you well know.

I haven't seen any reports of you fighting off the taxman with your home arsenal.

Actually it has the authority and the power, which was delegated to it by the People, who can revoke that authority at will.

And my dealings with the tax man are far more subtle than that. I pay every tax that I owe. Of course I also arrange my life so that I owe little tax, primarily sales taxes and some small ownership/use taxes on the vehicles i have that are registered here.

Anyway, we weren't talking about the government, we were talking about you. You exercise your rights and I'll exercise mine and we'll see who walks away. Clue: It won't be you.

And that's why my rights are natural and fundamental...because I can defend them against intrusion by others.

[piscator]

Rights are a function of the power to enforce them. This is more generalized than, "Rights are a function of the authority to enforce them" or, "Rights are a function of my ability to defend them."

So, if all you knuckleheads can agree with me, we'll at least have a word we can all speak in the same language.

[Seth]

Rights are a function of the power to enforce them. This is more generalized than, "Rights are a function of the authority to enforce them" or, "Rights are a function of my ability to defend them."

So, if all you knuckleheads can agree with me, we'll at least have a word we can all speak in the same language.

"power to enforce them," or "ability to defend them" seem to me to be a distinction without a difference.

I don't think one "enforces" rights as much as one defends ones exercise of rights.

Rights are by their nature freedoms of action that may be interfered with by others. What rights are not are positive obligations imposed on others. One does not have a "right" to medical care (free or otherwise) because to say so is to presume that someone competent to give you medical care is under a moral or ethical obligation to provide it to you on demand. You don't have a right to be supplied with food because that assumes an obligation on the part of another to provide it to you that you may defend against his failure or refusal to do so.

Rights are aspects of the individual's freedoms to take actions; to speak, to breathe, to move about, to seek the resources necessary for survival, to procreate. All of these are actions that the individual engages in which may be interfered with by others, and against which interference the individual has the right to defend.

The problem with your construction "the power to enforce" is that it makes the existence of the right dependent upon the actual ability (power) to defend (enforce) them. Thus, in your construction, if the individual does not have the power to enforce his right to move about freely, then the individual does not have the right at all. This means that so long as government has the power to overcome the individual's exercise of a right, that right does not exist in the individual, it exists only in the government. But rights cannot exist in government because government is an abstract concept, not an individual. Government cannot have more of anything than what the individuals that make up the government have to begin with. Banding together to form a "government" does not imbue the participants with some mystically-derived authority that is superior to what the individuals in that band enjoy, at best it creates a situation where the collective has the ability to exercise force to overcome or infringe upon an exercise of rights by the individual, but that's nothing more than a "might makes right" argument which disparages the entire concept of rights to begin with. Rights must originate in the individual, otherwise they are not rights, they are nothing more than permissions to take actions granted by the collective. The notion of rights implicitly demands that the right enjoyed by the individual is a right because it is superior to, or at least equal to the exercise of the same right by others.


Nice try at turning the whole thing around though.

[piscator]

>The problem with your construction "the power to enforce" is that it makes the existence of the right dependent upon the actual ability (power) to defend (enforce) them.<

They are. "Power to do X" generalizes ability, means, enforceability, authority, etc.
To use your example: If you don't have legs, you don't have the means to walk, so some implied Right to Walk is something you'll not exercise like most of the rest of us, because you lack the power (means). If you don't have the power to get yourself to someplace where guns are legal, you'll not exercise your right to self defense with a firearm, or if you do, you'll likely answer to a power you don't have the power to resist, and be at the disposal of that power, and your power to enforce your other rights will be at its discretion as well.

Hatchet Jack used his .50 Hawken and kilt the bar that broke his legs. But he no longer could enforce his previous right to walk, so he wrote a note and died up under that tree. Now he has no rights, having executed his last will and testament, save those that others have the powers to effectuate and enforce. The bar took his rights away. The Hawken denied the bar any rights he may have had the power to assert and enforce. A negative sum, to be sure.

[mistermack]

Anyway, we weren't talking about the government, we were talking about you. You exercise your rights and I'll exercise mine and we'll see who walks away. Clue: It won't be you.

Yes, you would rather talk about something that will never happen, than admit what happens every day.
Your property is taken from you, and your freedom is curtailed every day by the US government.
You don't seem very keen to stick up for your ''inalienable rights''.
You're all talk.

Except when it comes to questions that you would rather not answer.
Once again,

''If you cut yourself, and are bleeding to death, do you have a right to take my car, if I object? Even if there is no possible alternative for you to get help?''

[Seth]

Anyway, we weren't talking about the government, we were talking about you. You exercise your rights and I'll exercise mine and we'll see who walks away. Clue: It won't be you.

Yes, you would rather talk about something that will never happen, than admit what happens every day.
Your property is taken from you, and your freedom is curtailed every day by the US government.
You don't seem very keen to stick up for your ''inalienable rights''.
You're all talk.

And yet I'm the guy who walks around wearing a pistol or two every day and you are not.

''If you cut yourself, and are bleeding to death, do you have a right to take my car, if I object? Even if there is no possible alternative for you to get help?''

You have the right to try, and I have the right to prevent you from doing so as an exercise of my right to the exclusive use of my property. In today's legal climate I cannot be prosecuted for preventing you from taking my car, and you cannot be prosecuted if you succeed for the reasons you mention. It's called a "choice of evils" defense.

[mistermack]

And yet I'm the guy who walks around wearing a pistol or two every day and you are not.

Yes, and you meekly pay your taxes and obey the laws that other people say you have to.

''If you cut yourself, and are bleeding to death, do you have a right to take my car, if I object? Even if there is no possible alternative for you to get help?''

You have the right to try, and I have the right to prevent you from doing so as an exercise of my right to the exclusive use of my property. In today's legal climate I cannot be prosecuted for preventing you from taking my car, and you cannot be prosecuted if you succeed for the reasons you mention. It's called a "choice of evils" defense.

So what the fuck is unalienable, about your or my inalienable rights?

The right to try to get what you want, nobody is disputing. I've made that clear, and anyway, it's bleeding obvious.
What the fuck is unalienable about any of it?

[Seth]

And yet I'm the guy who walks around wearing a pistol or two every day and you are not.

Yes, and you meekly pay your taxes and obey the laws that other people say you have to.

Of course I do. Most laws are reasonable and logical and there's no reason not to.

''If you cut yourself, and are bleeding to death, do you have a right to take my car, if I object? Even if there is no possible alternative for you to get help?''

You have the right to try, and I have the right to prevent you from doing so as an exercise of my right to the exclusive use of my property. In today's legal climate I cannot be prosecuted for preventing you from taking my car, and you cannot be prosecuted if you succeed for the reasons you mention. It's called a "choice of evils" defense.

So what the fuck is unalienable, about your or my inalienable rights?

You don't understand the meaning of the word "unalienable."

The right to try to get what you want, nobody is disputing. I've made that clear, and anyway, it's bleeding obvious.
What the fuck is unalienable about any of it?

Go look up the definition of "unalienable."

[mistermack]

[
Go look up the definition of "unalienable."

I know perfectly well what it means, but you don't seem to. You need to explain how property is an unalienable right, and yet you regularly give up that right.
And if property is an unalienable right, how come you can take stuff off your kids?
At what age does the property right go from being alienable to unalienable? When unalienable doesn't have an age limit, it's supposed to apply as soon as you're born?

How can freedom be an unalienable right, when you are not free as a child? What age does it start?

[Seth]

[
Go look up the definition of "unalienable."

I know perfectly well what it means, but you don't seem to. You need to explain how property is an unalienable right, and yet you regularly give up that right.

No, you give up the property, not the right.

And if property is an unalienable right, how come you can take stuff off your kids?

It's not the property, it's the right to own property that cannot be taken away or given up.

At what age does the property right go from being alienable to unalienable?

It's always unalienable, but minors are under the supervision and control of their parents until they reach majority, but they still have the right to own property, albeit not some specific piece or item of property at some specific time.

When unalienable doesn't have an age limit, it's supposed to apply as soon as you're born?

Indeed.

How can freedom be an unalienable right, when you are not free as a child? What age does it start?

Because the right exists and cannot be given up or taken away. It can, however, like all rights, be regulated as a part of maintaining a society of ordered freedom.

The term "unalienable" in the context of rights means that no person or government has the authority to declare one's fundamental unalienable rights out of existence. Hitler declared the Jews to be animals and therefore they had no rights and therefore they could be exterminated like rats, but his declaration that Jews did not have a right to life did not alienate the Jews right to life. He merely had the present ability to infringe on their rights, and the world went to war to stop him and vindicate the right to life enjoyed by every human being on the planet, which is universally recognized by all civilized people.

No politician or elected official or national leader or despot or tyrant can simply say, "there is no right to life, and therefore I declare that I can kill anyone I want without violating their human rights." No person can (justly) say "I hereby declare that all property is the property of the state, and any property formerly belonging to individuals no longer belongs to them, but to the state." No leader can say "No person has the right to procreate and I will dole out permission to procreate as I see fit."

Now we all know that despots and tyrants do say such things and do such things (North Korea comes to mind), but that is what makes them despots and tyrants, and that is what justifies any and all necessary force to destroy such persons and regimes by everyone else on the planet.

The ability (power) to deny the exercise of one's rights is not the same thing as the rights not existing in the first place, it's merely an infringement on an unalienable right that is a moral and ethical wrong which may be resisted (defended against intrusion by others) without infringing on some right claimed by the tyrant to so infringe.