Should Dolphins be granted human style rights?

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
If you're a non cognitivist, you'll see the problem with a statement like 'murder is wrong'.

Why make claims that natural rights have some sort of independent existence when they clearly don't? You produce the red herring and then propose that I should discuss it with John Locke ... Natural rights theory is simply wrong -- human rights are a contes ...[text shortened]... cussion is out of place in a science forum; I'll set Popper's ghost on you if you do.

Very well said! 🙂

I am not dismissing the posts of those who have responded since my last post. I simply want to offer a relevant reference for those who want to study this topic:

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/rights-human/#GenIdeHumRig

I'll try to get back to those posts.

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
If you're a non cognitivist, you'll see the problem with a statement like 'murder is wrong'.

Why make claims that natural rights have some sort of independent existence when they clearly don't? You produce the red herring and then propose that I should discuss it with John Locke ... Natural rights theory is simply wrong -- human rights are a contes cussion is out of place in a science forum; I'll set Popper's ghost on you if you do.

I did not say 'murder is objectively wrong'. I said it's my opinion that murder is wrong. I did not claim natural rights have some sort of independent existence. I told you this was all subjective a long time ago. I thought that cleared up this point of confusion before.

"Granting rights" puts the moral authority on the granter, and makes the person who has the rights morally subordinate to the granter. It leads toward "divine right", top down morality sort of thinking, where what is moral is what the government decides is moral. With this notion of "granting" rights, one could end up with some sort of absurd situation such as a country where torturing innocent Christians is considered perfectly moral because the Muslim government didn't "grant" the Christians rights. It doesn't make sense.

The point of rights is that the rulers are NOT morally superordinate to the people; rights trump government when they come into conflict; not the other way around - government doesn't grant rights. Government cannot grant or ungrant them. If they try the people are justified in violent rebellion against the evil government that refuses to protect their rights.

All of this is of course the subjective opinion which my nation and the international community officially use to inform their legal systems, and all of this is implied when we refer to entities having "human style" rights.

Originally posted by AThousandYoung

"Granting rights" puts the moral authority on the granter, and makes the person who has the rights morally subordinate to the granter. It leads toward "divine right", top down morality sort of thinking, where what is moral is what the government decides is moral. With this notion of "granting" rights, one could end up with some sort of absurd situ , and all of this is implied when we refer to entities having "human style" rights.

Thanks for acknowledging the subjectivity of the whole business.

Regimes resort to fiction when they seek to justify their oppression. The divine right of kings was one such fiction; the fiction of natural rights was invented to eliminate it (a frame for the grand narrative of Revolution). Now we have all sorts of other fictions invoked to justify practices like 'extraordinary rendition', torture and devastating war -- although some still use the the 'natural right to rebel' as an excuse to justify murder, such as occurred in the RIRA attack last year.

What if you wanted to extend some sort of legal protection to dolphins? How would you go about it?

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
Thanks for acknowledging the subjectivity of the whole business.

Regimes resort to fiction when they seek to justify their oppression. The divine right of kings was one such fiction; the fiction of natural rights was invented to eliminate it (a frame for the grand narrative of Revolution). Now we have all sorts of other fictions invoked to justify f you wanted to extend some sort of legal protection to dolphins? How would you go about it?

Thanks for acknowledging the subjectivity of the whole business.

I did that on page 3 😕 That's why I have been so confused by the last four pages.

I'll think about your question.

Originally posted by AThousandYoung
[b]Thanks for acknowledging the subjectivity of the whole business.

I did that on page 3 😕 That's why I have been so confused by the last four pages.

I'll think about your question.[/b]

Let's talk about it in the other, shorter thread.