I am not sure what you are trying to prove. Different people have different beliefs, we both understand that. Are you saying the guy with the biggest gun who thinks that he has the right to take the land is correct? Or it makes no sense to talk about the belief being “correct”?
Rights are not agreements between people. That’s a weird way to put things.
If someone says: “I have a right to life”, does that mean that they agreed with everyone that the others shouldn’t attempt on their life?
I can see that. Because you told me earlier that the guy with the biggest guns getting what he wants would not mean that it was what ought to happen. But now you’re almost saying that.
Humans have opinions on what ought to be just like humans have opinions about what is. But there is a what is and they might or might not be a what ought to be.
I think you don’t think there is a what ought to be but please, if that is the case, say: “there is no ‘ought to be’ although some people might think there is”. Otherwise I would imagine you do think there is a what ought to be (like there is a what is) and that it’s defined by humans.
Sure, but do you see that it’s not relevant? You are not talking about rights, which is what the discussion is about, and instead bringing up irrelevant matter to the question of rights.
I’m trying to investigate the nature of human rights. I can’t think of anything I’m trying to prove.
I’m saying that rights depend on point of view, that’s all.
It is a difficult truth for us humans to face sometimes, but I can find no way around it other than asserting that God is in my corner.
I’m sure you mean that in your personal opinion, my way of putting it seems weird to you.
I can’t track that. It seems to me a weird way to put it. Claiming your right to life is expressing your opinion. You might work quite hard to convince the others of it, but a court might declare that since you did X crime, you are wrong about your right to life. (And it’s got a bigger noose.)
You are welcome to ask me any question you like, and I will give you an honest and straightforward answer. Tell me exactly what part of that you don’t understand.
I’m sorry. That’s just incoherent to me. Could you say it without the ‘ought’ and ‘what is’ language?
As I say, that language seems so strange to me. I don’t know what you mean by an ‘ought’ or an ‘is’… therefore I cannot make any statement of my beliefs using that particular language. I don’t speak it.
Is that some kind of technical vocabulary you learned among academic philosophers or something?
No. It seems perfectly relevant. The OP wanted to talk about property rights. That’s what we’re talking about, although we’ve expanded it to human rights in general.
I do not consider you the judge of ought. I’m sorry. I just don’t.
Rights are agreements. They are agreements about the duties and obligations that benefit everyone. I will not steal from you and you do not steal from me. Together they form a social contract.
BestGuessYet is right that they are invented and to be effective someone needs to be capable of enforcing them.
However, we can also ask about agreements whether they are fair. Would a reasonable person agree to be bound by them.
Thats the purpose of the OP. To consider that in relation to Lockes property rights.
There seems little doubt—at least to me—that property rights are not absolute. We see that with eminent domain and adverse possession laws and squatters’ rights and such.
Agreements between who? When did the agreement happen?
Take the example, an individual saying: “I have a right to life”. I don’t think this is something weird or incoherent so what does the individual mean by that in terms of agreements?
I am also pretty sure John Locke didn’t think of rights as “agreements”.
Well, I told you about the aliens. From their point of view, they are operating within the rights conveyed to them by the Galactic Council. But from the human point of view, they are violating our rights.
Vikings vs. English churchmen. Each has a point of view about rights.
The British Crown vs. American revolutionaries.
I’m not sure I can be clearer.
As I’ve written directly to you: “I don’t think there is a God who stamps it.”
But many others disagree. Most every army marches on God’s side, you know.
You gave me examples where different people had different points of view. People have different beliefs about rights. No one disagrees. Is that all you are saying? I asked, in situations where two people have different contradictory beliefs about rights, is one of them right? Can one of them be right?
Just like two people could have different points of view about the Earth being flat. That doesn’t mean that the flatness of the earth depends on the point of view; it just means that one of those people is wrong and the other is right.
Well, I can explain that claim (but not in terms of agreements). So we both agree that it’s not weird nor incoherent. So what does the sentence mean in terms of agreements?
Say it’s true, the individual does have a right to life. Does that imply he had to agree with someone about that? Who?
A right to life generally means that others ought not to kill you under most circumstances.
That doesn’t answer my questions. Sorry, I am not knowledgeable about the 13th Amendment. Could you spell it out? Who agreed? When? For whom (who has the right to be unenslaved)?
Social contract theories explain how rights might have arisen through agreement ( rather than divine command). They don’t claim that there is or was a literal comtract.
Alright. Maybe it has a sense on a certain reading I can’t quite get. As long as we agree that rights constitute moral statements, I say it doesn’t matter.
If a churchman has a right and a Viking has a right, which one owns the right which is congruent with some Cosmic Right?
It’s inconsequential to claim there is a Cosmic Right unless we can find it, isn’t it? It’s like claiming there is Truth out there, but no human can tell us what it is exactly.
If you don’t mind—to avoid confusion—let’s use “correct” here, rather than the word ‘right’. So your question becomes:
Two people claim to have rights. Can one of them be correct?
My answer is Yes, one of them could be correct. One of them could align with God’s Opinion of Rightness, but we have no way to tell which one. We only have strong personal opinions. Sometimes we have strong cultural opinions.
I have told you that I don’t believe in God. And even if I did, God is not here to tell us which opinion is correct and which isn’t. I mean, there are plenty of His prophets who will make a claim one way or the other, but I don’t find prophets convincing.
So when you ask if there is a right and a wrong, you seem to be asking me if I believe in a God’s Perspective somewhere out there, and my answer is, “Nah.” But even if I did, what use is it? We can’t locate it.
But this is still not even the question I am asking.
Great. So, you don’t believe in rights, yes or no?
You call that a “God’s Perspective” but I am not sure why you’re so inclined to talk about God. I mean there are mathematical facts, doesn’t mean there is a “math God”.
Is there? Is the Earth real? You can be skeptic about what is just like you can be skeptic about what ought to be.