Derivative natural rights theory

Unrepentant_Elitist
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Derivative natural rights theory

 Having just re-read John Adams' Dissertation on the Canon and the Feudal Law No. I, a problematic aspect returned to the forefront: Adams' well-reasoned thought proceeds from an assertion that individuals possess "natural rights" because of the will of a creator. As an atheist, I obviously find this to be overly anthropic/teleological. My question is: Can the concept of natural rights be treated in an axiomatic manner (necessarily immune from foundational challenge), arguing "divine will" as a non-intrinsic property?


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Blimey

Atheistextremist wrote:

She arrives after 5 years of IVF, 3 losses and much torment.

Thank you, medical science. 

Hope that his new distraction doesn't cause you to cut down your posting here too much.

We can probably assume that she'll be raised as a critical thinker, though there must be a mild concern that she'll rebel in her teenage years and don the burqa.

Good luck.


Beyond Saving
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 Atheistextremist wrote:She

 

Atheistextremist wrote:

She arrives after 5 years of IVF, 3 losses and much torment.

Thank you, medical science. 

Congrats AE! +1 for science. Cheers. 

If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X


Atheistextremist
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Thanks lads

 

 

My head is revolving. She's a good wee midget so far. Very quiet. Still can't quite accept she's here.

Last night I caught her watching The Wonder of Life with Professor Brian Cox, which bodes well. 

Keep checking to make sure she is breathing, which I understand is normal...

 

 

 

"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck


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No sleep and living on the

No sleep and living on the edge of panic. That is your future. But the rewards are endless!

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cj
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Atheistextremist wrote:My

Atheistextremist wrote:

My head is revolving. She's a good wee midget so far. Very quiet. Still can't quite accept she's here.

Last night I caught her watching The Wonder of Life with Professor Brian Cox, which bodes well. 

Keep checking to make sure she is breathing, which I understand is normal...

 

Yeah, I spent a lot of time checking that the first one was breathing. Gave it up for the second and third. You learn. She will fall and skin her knees, lose a pet and cry for days, catch some bug and scare you to death, come home late from a date and really scare you to death. And you will always love her and worry about her. I still worry about my ~40 year old sons. Love them still. Hugs from afar, Dad.

 

-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.

"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken

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Beyond Saving

Beyond Saving wrote:
Fortunately, many of our founders were not fundamentalist Christians. While some of the philosophers who contemplated the idea of natural laws were Christians (such as Locke and Grotius), the idea was not spread rapidly among fundamentalist Christians. It was deists and those who spent little time focusing on religion that really spread the popularity of the concept. Franklin, Jefferson, Paine and company were hardly fundamentalists and did far more to get the concept included in the political system. 

I think it is quite a stretch for anyone to claim that the concept of god given rights comes from the bible. I certainly don't remember reading about god mentioning that we have any of these rights. The ten commandments was a list of rules humans were being ordered to follow, not a list of rights or freedoms we have from others. I'll take the Bill of Rights over the 10 commandments any day. As usual, we can come up with much better ideas than those made up by the barbarians who wrote the bible. 

 

Eh...

http://www.adherents.com/gov/Founding_Fathers_Religion.html

For better or worse, your understanding of "fundamentalist Christian" should be revised.

The deism debate is overvalued too.  The real reason the founding fathers wanted to avoid integrating religion is because they understood the influence of the Wars of Religion in Europe for the past couple centuries, and their goal was friendship with all, alliances with none.

Even Great Britain itself had the Glorious Revolution 100 years before, and that was even after the 30 Years' War established religious self-determination.

It really didn't have to do with ideals.  It was a practical policy.