What Does Diversity Have to Do with Science?

[Peter1469]

$#@!ing pope pleaser^^

@Mister D is a defender of the faith.

[MisterVeritis]

Even the Declaration and the Constitution speaks of rights as belonging to the people.

There are many individual rights. Some rights must accrue to the people. For example, the right to peaceably assemble requires more than one individual.

[MisterVeritis]

What use or value do rights have to as an individual? Robinson Crusoe yourself on an island, alone, individual, what rights? Individual rights are abstractions. Rights accrue from the society your in, your place in it.

"Permit me then to continue our conversation, and to tell you what the freedom is that I love, and that to which I think all men entitled. This is the more necessary, because, of all the loose terms in the world, liberty is the most indefinite. It is not solitary, unconnected, individual, selfish liberty, as if every man was to regulate the whole of his conduct by his own will. The liberty I mean is social freedom. It is that state of things in which liberty is secured by the equality of restraint. A constitution of things in which the liberty of no one man, and no body of men, and no number of men, can find means to trespass on the liberty of any person, or any description of persons, in the society. This kind of liberty is, indeed, but another name for justice; ascertained by wise laws, and secured by well-constructed institutions." -- Edmund Burke,

I have an individual right to life, liberty, and property. You have wandered down a wrong path.

[Helena]

I have an individual right to life, liberty, and property. You have wandered down a wrong path.

and property?

[Chris]

There are many individual rights. Some rights must accrue to the people. For example, the right to peaceably assemble requires more than one individual.

I have an individual right to life, liberty, and property. You have wandered down a wrong path.

You're not responding at all to my argument.

Let's do this again. Let's look at the Declaration where life, liberty and porperty (happiness) are found:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

You have rights as a member of the people.

Disagree? Then show us where in that passage individual rights are mentioned?

[Chris]

and property?

IIRC, Jefferson, cribbing Locke, originally wrote property and it was edited committee to happiness. Not sure why, see James Madison on Property and what it meant back then.

[MisterVeritis]

I have an individual right to life, liberty, and property.

and property?

Yes. The State can not take your property without due process.

[Helena]

I have an individual right to life, liberty, and property.

Yes. The State can not take your property without due process.

Sure they can!

Should they, especially as outlined by our laws? NO, but that doesn't mean they can't. It means they shouldn't.

[MisterVeritis]

You're not responding at all to my argument.

Let's do this again. Let's look at the Declaration where life, liberty and porperty (happiness) are found:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

You have rights as a member of the people.

Disagree? Then show us where in that passage individual rights are mentioned?

I have no need to look to other authorities. We have rights as individuals because we exist as individuals. We are equal before the law. Our equality before the law accrues to each of us as individuals. Some rights, for example, the right to create a government requires more than one individual. It makes no sense to think of an individual forming a government.

[Helena]

You're not responding at all to my argument.

Let's do this again. Let's look at the Declaration where life, liberty and porperty (happiness) are found:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

You have rights as a member of the people.

Disagree? Then show us where in that passage individual rights are mentioned?

That seems to me to be a really dangerous and treacherous interpretation of a people forming an independent government, breaking off from tyranny; translating it to a collective in all areas where an individual does not have rights and autonomy in some respects.