From: Richard Steven Hack (richardhack@pcmagic.net)
Date: Sun Feb 24 2002 - 15:35:56 MST
Samantha:
At 04:22 AM 2/24/02 -0800, you wrote:
>Damien R. Sullivan wrote:
>
>>On Thu, Feb 21, 2002 at 11:01:07AM -0500, Mike Lorrey wrote:
>
>>"Codified physical law"? I'd like to see some support for that.
>
>
>Agreed. It is a strange turn of phrase. To me the argument that natural
>rights grow out of the fact that humans, by virtue of their specific
>nature, require certain conditions in order to live and thrive most
>optimally and a subset of those are basically rights to their own person,
>property and pursuits - the so-called "negative rights" - comes closest to
>a justification for natural rights.
>
I have yet to see someone explain to me how the human need to breathe, eat,
sleep, and excrete and reproduce translates into a "right" which is somehow
a physical law. This is nothing but hand-waving.
"Codified physical law" is hand-waving. There is the physical universe
which includes biology and evolution. There are human concepts of
same. The map is not the territory. A human concept is not a physical law
(in fact, "physical law" is a merely a human concept - and there are
scientists who are not so sure that there ARE "physical laws" operative
throughout the Universe).
>Give the above notion of natural rights the natural rights exist
>regardless of whether they are honored by any particular ruler or
>mob. Judging the actions of the rulers or mobs is done relative to
>supporting or denying these "natural rights", these requirements for human
>well-being. This seems much more reasonable than attempting the reverse,
>judging the concept of natural rights on the basis of whether this or that
>leader or group would honor and uphold them. Saying they are a social
>contract, in my opinion, makes a similar mistake. It puts the emphasis on
>upholding these rights rather than on whether certain "rights" naturally
>are required by dint of the nature of human beings.
This still begs the question: why is the concept "rights" needed? You
have basic human physical needs. Why elevate them to "rights" unless you
are trying to score points in a moral debate? A principle of Objectivist
epistemology, I recall, is that concepts should not be multiplied beyond need.
>What your nature requires relative to the actions of others or their
>refraining from certain actions for your optimal functioning does not
>change based on how they do in fact act toward you. Natural rights
>therefore are not a matter of social contract. Social contracts, if they
>are rational, grow out of these "natural rights" - not the reverse.
Human behavior as individuals and groups is based on human "nature", i.e.,
the structure of our bodies and brains and our physical and cultural
evolution - and to an enormous degree on our primate evolutionary
heritage. This behavior considered as a whole can be modeled by various
sciences and by economic theory a la Von Mises praexology [or is that
praxeology - I can never remember the spelling :-} ] Such an economic
analysis leads to the conclusion that coercion on a large scale or as a
general principle of behavior is not productive for a group of sentient
conceptually processing entities as a whole. No "natural rights" are
needed - it is simply not productive and therefore not conducive to
survival and therefore not in the best interests of such entities to engage
in coercion as a behavioral principle.
The reality, however, is that humans as part of their basic nature as
biological entities fear death. This translates into the same basic two
reactions as any other animal: fight or flight. In humans, with
imagination and conceptual processing capability, this is expressed in two
ways for each reaction. Fight: 1) self-development or controlling one's
personal being (examples might be bodybuilders, martial artists, whatever).
2) Concern with understanding and controlling external reality (examples
might be scientists, technologists, etc.) Flight Response: 1) Stand up and
wave your arms and try to attract the attention of the "gods" who might
give you more life if you stand out from the herd (examples: anyone in the
public eye and anyone who tries to establish themselves as morally superior
to everyone else, e.g., priests and philosophers and moralists of every
stripe); 2) Tear down everyone above you and stamp on everyone below you
(examples: virtually everyone, especially politicians).
Instead of recognizing the universe has plenty of resources and the way to
survive is to use our conceptually processing capability to take advantage
of those resources, i.e., fight response, - defy and defeat death by using
our mental and physical resources - the vast bulk of the human race (at
least 98-99%) engage in flight response, producing a Darwinian competition
"war of all against all" which leads to the world you see around you.
See Alan Harrington's work "The Immortalist" - probably the most important
book ever written on the impact of death on human society.
Without relieving the species' fear of death, there is no way you are going
to override that fear and its flight response with talk of "rights", when
those "rights" are merely concepts that will be accepted or rejected based
on the individual's fear reactions.
The only rational argument for non-coercion is based on economic
self-interest which in turn is based on the economic interest of the
species as a whole. This argument, however, cannot override genetically
inbred fear, either.
The issue of "rights" is IRRELEVANT to the issue of personal survival which
is the only valid human purpose. Personal survival demands dealing with
the world as it is, not as you wish it to be. One can certainly proceed on
the basic of a principle of non-coercion, but trying to convince any
significant portion of the species of the validity of this is a waste of
time and therefore counterproductive.
Mike's notion that because human nature derives from evolution and the
physical universe that this translates a concept into a "natural law" is an
irrational and mystical concept. See Robert Anton Wilson''s "The Myth of
Natural Rights".
Richard Steven Hack
richardhack@pcmagic.net
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