What are our "Human Rights"?

reply to post by Jean Paul Zodeaux


You're post saddened me. But alas, I must not waiver.

It is a difficult thing to be raised with the notion that laws (not rights) are self-evident. Perhaps in the physical universe we can say that what we observe leads us to be comfortable with the perspective. But laws and morals are pliant, and evolve with society (even when the society insists it doesn't.) If anything, it makes me assume that rights occupy a separate dimension from the logic of laws, and the emotional appeal of morals.

In order to comprehend truly what an ideal like rights means, we have to accept that it cannot be based on what we think "ought to be" as opposed to being more... normative.

One problem with rights, the linguistics evade me. It is too easy to confuse rights, with what is right and what is wrong. The two are separate concepts. As we specify what we believe our rights must be, we mangle the notion of what is right and wrong into the mix.

I suppose it cannot be denied that a right which cannot be expressed does not exist. If it can't be framed, it cannot be applied.

One says; We have a right to life.

Well, just because it is a right, does not mean it will protect you from death.

So it must also follow that a right - in order to exist - must be actively protected and made into a restraint against the rights of others. Were you and I standing beneath an apple tree with one edible apple on it, all courtesy aside, which has a 'right' to it? Both? That would lead to conflict. A necessarily avoidable situation with no mutual benefits. So if neither of us wants the conflict, we will negotiate. If both of us will not accept anything less than the apple, unpredictability may disappoint one, if not both of us. The best approach is negotiation which at least assures us both of some predictable input into the dilemma.

So our rights, don't seem to mean much without some effort to manifest them. Which implies to me that rights are in fact an element of human nature; and perhaps may have led us to develop speech... which would assuredly make negotiation much more effective, reinforcing the notion of the right to speak.

That's another linguistically misplaced term. It should really be right to communicate; the idea of speech having been born of people who frequently assumed deaf mutes were "dumb". Sorry, drifting now.....

Thus perhaps the right of speech is natural, and explainable. But what of the fruits of our labor? The right to lay claim to a thing you created, cultivated, or caught was the original context.... now we have added make believe 'money' into the mix so "thing I paid for" rightly belongs in the list too.

OT (sort of)

Earlier, there was a comment about a man who could save his son's life if he stole money from his neighbor. Guess what, he has a right to try. The consequences are dire and the outcome is negative in most 'moral' senses. But no one can forever stand tensed and ever-poised to protect their rights, that would not be a life. Someone may steal from you, someone may try to kill you,, someone may defraud you... no one has a right to negate these possibilities. It is our civic duty to avoid the situation and where inescapable, to act as the society expects us to. That is the price of belonging. We can, and often do, struggle to make any such act as undesirable as humanly possible. That is a social response, not contingent on rights - unless there is bias at play.

reply to post by Maxmars

You're post saddened me. But alas, I must not waiver.

And your reply saddens me, nor can I waiver.

At least you are willing to accept that the "linguistics evade" you. Martin Heidegger once asserted that language speaks us, we do not speak language. While we can look around and find plenty of evidence to support this contention, it remains merely a truism and is not the truth. We can be guilty of allowing language to speak us, or we can endeavor to take control of language and speak it as language should be used.

Fortunately, for every Martin Heidegger there is a Alfred Korzybski. Korzybski developed what he calls "general semantics", I believe in a large part, to correct the problem of people allowing language to speak them. I rely upon one of his more famous quotes quite often:

"The map is not the territory, the word is not the thing defined."

We cannot, no matter how idealistic we may be, grow a crop of corn on a map. At best, that map can only point us to land where corn can be grown. We cannot, no matter how willful we may be, travel by using the word automobile. A legislative act cannot in itself be law, it can only, at best, describe an existing law.

What tends to confuse so many is that revered documents such as the Constitution for the United States of America make reference to Congress "making law". On top of this, all legislation does not necessarily have to be law. The Bill of Rights describe law. Articles I, II, and III do not. They merely establish the artifice of government. A statute describing murder in the first degree is describing law. A statute establishing a tax is not law. Both acts of legislation are valid. What becomes invalid in terms of legislation is when statutes are enacted that violate law. These are those "positive acts" mentioned earlier.

Congress can, without acting unconstitutionally, enact a statute declaring Pi and even 3.0. This will certainly make doing the math in regards to Pi much easier, but god save those who cross a bridge built upon this new pliable act of legislation.

I suppose it cannot be denied that a right which cannot be expressed does not exist. If it can't be framed, it cannot be applied.

This supposition is in direct conflict with the Ninth Amendment that prohibits the federal government from denying or disparaging any rights that are not enumerated, and makes clear these unexpressed, unframed rights not only exist, but are retained by the people. This Amendment - not the law itself, merely evidence of the law - is perhaps one of the greatest protections the people have from capricious and arbitrary legislative acts. So self evident is this law that just recently the Supreme Court in a unanimous (9-0) decision relied heavily upon the Ninth Amendment to explain their ruling in Bond v United States.

By denying any one government com­ plete jurisdiction over all the concerns of public life, feder­ alism protects the liberty of the individual from arbitrary power. When government acts in excess of its lawful powers, that liberty is at stake

Continuing, Justice Kennedy holds:

An individual has a direct interest in objecting to laws that upset the constitutional balance between the National Government and the States when the enforcement of those laws causes injury that is con­crete, particular, and redressable

A right need not be expressed or framed in order for us to recognize the "concrete, particular, and redressable" harm a legislative act has caused. What is required is careful consideration and not surrendering to emotional reactions. For some the use of drugs is a foul and disdainful behavior, but as foul and disdainful as it may be, the use of the thing itself causes no harm, yet the legislative acts passed in an attempt to prohibit its use have caused clear and undeniable harm. Indeed, the United States currently imprisons more people per capita than any other industrialized nation in the world. More so than China, and more so than the Soviet Union at the height of their tyranny.

Because the "positive acts" of legislation prohibiting illicit drug use are passed by Congress, signed into "law" by the President, and even upheld as Constitutional by the courts, many presume that this is law. The harm these acts of legislation have caused, and the individual rights they violate demand more critical thought than mere acceptance of procedure acting under color of law.

One says; We have a right to life. Well, just because it is a right, does not mean it will protect you from death.

You may as well point to the mute to show how the right to speech is just an idea. You may as well point to all of us who have no printing press to point out how freedom of the press is just an idea. You may as well point to the atheist to show us how the right to worship is just an idea.

The right to life is not a guarantee of immortality, nor is it an extended warranty. The right to life, just as any right, does not work in the positive sense, it works in the negative sense. If you come at me with a knife and your clear intent is to kill me, don't be surprised if I defend myself. I am not defending myself because some benign government allows me to, I am doing so by right.

The newborn infant who wails and cries did not obtain permission to this freedom of expression, and arguably has no idea that there is any First Amendment protecting this right. That newborn wails by right.

If I fail to defend myself, and you succeed in killing me, this does not prove there was no right to life, it proves your criminality. If I as a parent suppress my newborn's crying, this does not prove the right to freedom of expression does not exist, it proves I am a dubious parent.

So it must also follow that a right - in order to exist - must be actively protected and made into a restraint against the rights of others. Were you and I standing beneath an apple tree with one edible apple on it, all courtesy aside, which has a 'right' to it? Both? That would lead to conflict. A necessarily avoidable situation with no mutual benefits. So if neither of us wants the conflict, we will negotiate. If both of us will not accept anything less than the apple, unpredictability may disappoint one, if not both of us. The best approach is negotiation which at least assures us both of some predictable input into the dilemma.

The problem with hypothetical situations is that invariably much data is omitted. Whose apple tree is that you and I are standing under? If it is my apple tree, that I planted years ago, and I worked tirelessly to make sure it bore fruit, and am standing under it prepared to pick the last apple of the season, and you happen upon me and this apple tree without any express permission to do so, this is trespass. Were you to complicate matters further by insisting that you had as much right to that last apple as I do, this is theft.

Conversely, if you and I as friends are walking in a field not owned by anyone and happen upon an apple tree with just one apple, isn't it fairly assumed you and I are walking in this field together out of mutual agreement, and why not assume we are friends? As your friend, do you find it so hard to believe I would offer you the apple, declining any for myself? Would it be so hard to believe that - even if you were incredibly hungry - that you would either insist I take the apple, or at the very least, offer to share it?

Where is the actual dilemma? Why is it that hypothetical situations must be designed in order to demonstrate why I don't have any real rights? Do you not see the absurdity of such a thing? You invent some imaginary dilemma in order to show me how my self evident rights are not real.

Thus perhaps the right of speech is natural, and explainable. But what of the fruits of our labor? The right to lay claim to a thing you created, cultivated, or caught was the original context.... now we have added make believe 'money' into the mix so "thing I paid for" rightly belongs in the list too.

Money should not be as confusing as people hope to make it. Money is symbolic nothing more. It is an invention of convenience to better facilitate exchange. By inventing this symbolic money, this does not in anyway diminish a persons right to enjoy the fruits their own labor.

Earlier, there was a comment about a man who could save his son's life if he stole money from his neighbor. Guess what, he has a right to try.

Guess what, he has the right to earn money to save his son's life, he does not have the right to violate the rights of others because his son his dying. He doesn't even have the right to try to violate the rights of others. He has the absolute and undeniable right to earn money as quickly and easily as possible and where one solution would be to enter the black market and sell goods declared "illegal" that are dubiously legislated such, but no one offered up this hypothetical solution, instead arguing that theft was moral under the condition presented.

This is the arbitrary and capricious nature of "man made law", where rights are given no respect and treated derisively as imaginary ideas, and to support the argument rely upon imaginary scenarios while failing to utilize that imagination to the fullest of their capability. It is as if people who are adamantly against respecting rights as natural law are full on intent on stultifying their own imagination in order to keep believing that their view is the correct one. It doesn't even occur to them when offering up hypothetical's such as the dying son and desperate father, that there are a multitude of solutions beyond theft. No, in order to "prove" that rights are not real, all their imagination will allow is that theft can be moral sometimes, and immoral at other times, it just depends on...well, on whimsical ideology.

Edit to Add: I would like to add another assertion to this dying son and desperate father hypothetical. If this desperate father steals money from me in order to save his son, and upon hearing his tale, I have the right to decline to press charges against him. This would be my right, just as much as it would be my right to seek remedy for the theft. Perhaps both you and I would take pity upon this poor father, and decline to press charges, and maybe the only difference between us is that in my compassion, I would not hesitate to make clear this desperate father had other options available to him besides criminality, where you would instead, in your compassion, tell him he had a right to steal from you.

Some argue that desperate times require desperate measures. I would suggest that desperate times require measured response.

reply to post by Jean Paul Zodeaux


You have fallen for the popsci language in the article. The 2ns law of thermodynamics is a statistical law, of course it has limits in the microscopic world. That is included in it, so it does not break it.
We live in a probabilistic universe afterall, there is a tiny but nonzero probability that you fly off the Earth now. To imply from it that "physical laws are broken all the time" is ridiculous. If the law is broken, it means only on thing - that our knowledge of the physical law in question was simply incomplete or mistaken, and the law governing reality is merely different. Not that you can somehow break the physics of the universe.

This does not diminish physics in any way, but illustrates the problem with dogma.

Oh the irony. Yes, dogmatic belief that there are universal rights derivable only from the nature, and that they are the "natural rights" as specified by Locke. You have not provided any proof, only said that its "self-evident". Well, saying something does not make it so.

In the same way you use the existence of murder to "prove" that people do not have the right to life

People do not have universal natural right to live. As much as it is not nice, this is the reality of our universe. There is noone and nothing enforcing this right, as we can see from the millenia of murdering. They have merely ability to live. You are confusing right with ability. People have both ability to own property, and to steal. What in the natural world holds one of these abilities higher than the other? Even to the point that stealing should be not a right under any circumstances (required to fulfill the Lockian natural rights)? Nothing.

Right:

Rights are legal, social, or ethical principles of freedom or entitlement; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people, according to some legal system, social convention, or ethical theory.

Legal systems, social conventions, ethical theories - these are the sources of rights. Not nature. Evolved human morality is the source of rights. And it does not support Lockian natural rights IMHO, at least not without further clarifications.

I have used this same logic to show that the act of murder is breaking the law in the same way that people who jump off cliffs believing they can fly is breaking the law, or that failing to follow through in an action is breaking the law in the same way that murder is.

Failed attempt to break the law of gravity vs. actual breaking of the right to live. Incorrect analogy.

Of course, I have made no such claim at all, and it is not I pretending that what is self evident is not evident at all, this is you.

You have made a claim that natural universal rights objectively exist, and then proceeded to enumerate them, based on one light source (ethical theory), in effect claiming all others are false (dont objectively exist), since universal rights set can be only one, otherwise its not universal at all.

Rights are derived from morality. Not the other way around. So what is the moral theory you derive the rights from? And how do you justify its objectiveness?

reply to post by Maxmars

Rights, unlike laws, cannot be immoral. How you choose to exercise the right is subject to morality.

Then right = ability ?

For instance, Jonathan Wallace has asserted that there is no basis on which to claim that some rights are natural, and he argued that Hobbes' account of natural rights confuses right with ability (human beings have the ability to seek only their own good and follow their nature in the same way as animals, but this does not imply that they have a right to do so).[43]

en.wikipedia.org...

reply to post by Jean Paul Zodeaux

Because the "positive acts" of legislation prohibiting illicit drug use are passed by Congress, signed into "law" by the President, and even upheld as Constitutional by the courts, many presume that this is law.

The law prohibiting illicit drug use is a negative.

You may as well point to the mute to show how the right to speech is just an idea. You may as well point to all of us who have no printing press to point out how freedom of the press is just an idea. You may as well point to the atheist to show us how the right to worship is just an idea.

The right to life is not a guarantee of immortality, nor is it an extended warranty. The right to life, just as any right, does not work in the positive sense, it works in the negative sense. If you come at me with a knife and your clear intent is to kill me, don't be surprised if I defend myself. I am not defending myself because some benign government allows me to, I am doing so by right.

The newborn infant who wails and cries did not obtain permission to this freedom of expression, and arguably has no idea that there is any First Amendment protecting this right. That newborn wails by right.

right = ability?

He has the absolute and undeniable right to earn money as quickly and easily as possible and where one solution would be to enter the black market and sell goods declared "illegal" that are dubiously legislated such, but no one offered up this hypothetical solution, instead arguing that theft was moral under the condition presented.

The whole example is based on the presumption that he has not a chance to earn the needed money in time. Even on black market, if such thing exists in his society. So this is not a real solution, only kind of a strawman.

If this desperate father steals money from me in order to save his son, and upon hearing his tale, I have the right to decline to press charges against him.

Also in the hypothetical the rich man knows about the situation (father asked him for money first), but he refused in his selfishness.

No, in order to "prove" that rights are not real, all their imagination will allow is that theft can be moral sometimes, and immoral at other times, it just depends on...well, on whimsical ideology.

It depends on your moral system you adhere to. According to my moral system (consequentialism - utilitarianism) the morality of an act is determined by its consequences. If the alternative of not doing theft in some situation leads to more evil and suffering than doing the theft, then it is not a more moral choice.

Acts alone are not universaly moral or immoral in themselves. Consequences in a given context determine the morality or immorality of an act.

reply to post by Maslo

The law prohibiting illicit drug use is a negative.

In regards to law is is a positive act of legislation, both in its codification and that it is "man made law" prohibiting a specific behavior that in and of itself can show no victim.

Positive law (lat. ius positum) is the term generally used to describe man-made laws which bestow or remove specific privileges upon an individual or group. Contrast this with natural law which are inherent rights, not conferred by act of legislation.

It is also described as the law that applies at a certain time (present or past) at a certain place, consisting of statutory law, and case law as far as it is binding. More specifically, positive law may be characterized as "[l]aw actually and specifically enacted or adopted by proper authority for the government of an organized jural society"

en.wikipedia.org...

right = ability?

Are you being purposely obtuse? The mute has a right to speech, the crippled has the right to walk, the infirm have the right to health, and the murdered had a right to life.

The whole example is based on the presumption that he has not a chance to earn the needed money in time. Even on black market, if such thing exists in his society. So this is not a real solution, only kind of a strawman.

"Kind of a strawman?" Are you just naturally obtuse? Let's get something straight about your silly little hypothetical that you keep amending in a hopeless attempt to some how make this fiction valid; You have to keep inventing scenarios, instead of pointing to reality -in an absurd attempt to declare what is self evident not real - because in the real world your presumptions will run you into trouble every time. You heap foolish presumption upon presumption in order to "prove" theft can be moral. The most insidious thing about your game is that theft is the negative outcome of a violation of a right. That which was stolen was some other persons property, and as property that person had a right to it, and the morality of this fact is irrelevant.

Also in the hypothetical the rich man knows about the situation (father asked him for money first), but he refused in his selfishness.

More amendments to your silly little parable? For every new qualification you add to your hypothetical only more questions come up. What kind of father brings a son into the world and does nothing to prepare for the unexpected? What kind of man heartlessly goes through life not even bothering to set money aside for those moments, such as your fiction, where life takes us by surprise, at his sons expense. What kind of social outcast decides to have a son, remain clearly a social outcast, (for surely if I offer up more solutions to your little fiction you will only insist that these solutions are not in the equation and the "only" option is theft), obviously showing no regard to how this will affect his son? Isn't it any wonder his son is perilously sick?

What kind of social outcast goes to a rich man he doesn't even know...what's that you say? Oh, the rich man and the foolish broke ass father are friends are they? What's that you say? Ohhhh, not friends, but the rich man is his employer, and the father isn't foolish at all, but is "really" just a hard working schlep who is grossly underpaid, and because of this he can't even afford to pay the medical bills incurred, you say? Of course, if you say this, the question then becomes why on earth this father with clear and present responsibilities would agree to work for such a vile employer? What's that you say? In this hypothetical that poor father has no choice but to work for this vile employer, because as vile and "selfish" as this employer is he is better than all the other vile and "selfish" employers out there, and this was just the best our poor hapless hero could do.

This is the realm of hypothetical's, where reality is replaced with the whimsical and twisted world view of the creator, and no possible solutions exist outside of moral dilemmas. This is why you have endeavored so hard to make this about morality, in spite of my steadfast insistence morality has nothing to do with it. You needed to establish law as morality so that you could offer up your fictional moral dilemmas.

In the real world moral dilemmas do not exist, and morals have nothing to do with law.

reply to post by Jean Paul Zodeaux

Are you being purposely obtuse? The mute has a right to speech, the crippled has the right to walk, the infirm have the right to health, and the murdered had a right to life.

Then rights = current abilities + potential abilities when unrestricted by anything, natural or manmade?

In the real world moral dilemmas do not exist, and morals have nothing to do with law.

en.wikipedia.org...

As classically used, natural law refers to the use of reason to analyze human nature and deduce binding rules of moral behavior.

It has everything to do with moral behaviour. Law is based on morality. Natural law is based on natural universal (evolved) morality. Its in the definition. Thus any law system which gives immoral answer in even one theoretically possible instance, is by definition invalid as universal natural law. Your "property extremist" definition of NL is such a system. My updated NL 2.0 is not suffering from it.

You have to keep inventing scenarios, instead of pointing to reality.. More amendments to your silly little parable?

All conditions, even those you asked for, were specified the first time I posted the hypotetical. I am not inventing anything additional. Scroll back and prove yourself wrong.

Reality:
news.yahoo.com...
www.irishcentral.com...

Reality is often very close, even now. And I am sure something like my hypothetical happened many times for example in Dickensian 19th century world, if its not happening somewhere today. Anyway, even theoretical example is enough to prove it wrong. Any law system which gives immoral answer in even one theoretically possible instance, is by definition invalid as universal natural law.

What kind of father brings a son into the world and does nothing to prepare for the unexpected?

What % of parents have tens of thousands of dollars set aside for advanced cancer treatments? And even if he was unprepared by his own fault, how it changes the scenario? Are you trying to imply that he has a right to decide immoraly (let his child die instead of steal the treatment) just because he was immoral (having child when unable to take care of it is immoral, thus it is not a right) in the past? Isnt it the other way around? He caused the situation by his own neglect, so now he has even more of a moral duty to help the child.

Of course, if you say this, the question then becomes why on earth this father with clear and present responsibilities would agree to work for such a vile employer? What's that you say? In this hypothetical that poor father has no choice but to work for this vile employer, because as vile and "selfish" as this employer is he is better than all the other vile and "selfish" employers out there, and this was just the best our poor hapless hero could do.

Contrary to libertarian theoretical fantasies, sometimes you dont have a choice, especially in conditions when time is an issue (such as dying child). Recession, rising unemployment, or Dickensian Britain for reality examples (not that they are needed, as I have said, even theoretical but in our universe possible example which gives incorrect answer is enough to prove the moral system / law system wrong).

reply to post by Maslo

Then rights = current abilities + potential abilities when unrestricted by anything, natural or manmade?

The obtuse = obtuse x obtuse = obtuse to the nth degree? Outside of defense, if it causes no harm then it is done by right. Why not put down that stick and let the water settle. Clearly by stirring up the pond you are not making things any clear for yourself.

It has everything to do with moral behaviour. Law is based on morality.

Law is law. Nothing more, nothing less. I earlier made the assertion that if your intention was to equate morality with law I had no problem with this, but let me be clear here. If you are framing morality as pro survival behavior, and immoral behavior as anti-survival behavior then you and I can finally find something to agree on. But you are not doing this, are you?

You appear stubbornly intent on using morality to dismiss law as being nothing more than cultural zeitgeist. You
backpedal and disingenuously equivocate all the way:

All conditions, even those you asked for, were specified the first time I posted the hypotetical. I am not inventing anything additional. Scroll back and prove yourself wrong.

This is the equivocation I am talking about. Here is exactly what you said:

"A poor mans child is ill, and will soon die without a cure, but he cant afford to buy one. Somehow, no charity wants / is able to help him. Then he founds out that a very rich man living nearby has enough money that he wont even notice the amount he needs is missing. He asks him for donation, but he refuses."

"Somehow"? Really? It doesn't matter how this somehow came about, does it? Only that "somehow" conditions are such? Who knows how this imaginary poorly constructed tale came to this, just trust you, it did come to this. Also, just trust you, the "poor man" is noble, right? Surely, in your imagination it is implicit this "poor man" cannot afford to "buy" a "cure" only because "somehow" life has dealt this noble "poor man" a really, really, really, really, crappy hand. None of his problems are self manifested - in your twisted imagination - all his problems are the creation of "somehow". Of course later you add this qualification:

Also in the hypothetical the rich man knows about the situation (father asked him for money first), but he refused in his selfishness.

Ahhhhh! In his "selfishness" was it? I suppose that - in your imagination - I and others should have just naturally assumed that the "rich man" refused to donate the money out of "selfishness". This, as far as you are concerned was a given in your original little imaginary tale. People should have just assumed the "rich man" who has "enough money that he won't even notice the amount (the "poor man" needs) is missing, refused out of sheer disregard for the "poor man". What else should we have assumed on behalf of your poorly constructed fiction?

Should we assume, on your behalf, that the "poor man" found out that the "rich man" had "enough money" from the "rich man" himself? Should we assume the "rich man" was bragging to the "poor man" about all the liquid assets he had at his disposal? Hell, why not just assume the "rich man" told the "poor man" he had more money than he knew what to do with, and since we are doing all this assuming on your behalf, why not make it clear why the "rich man" was bragging to the "poor man" who lives "nearby"?

How about this, then? The "poor man" lives nearby the "rich man" because the "rich man" - in spite of his wealth - lives in the ghettos. Hell, let's just assume the "rich man" is a slum lord. Hey! How about this? The "rich" slum lord is actually the "poor mans" land lord and the "poor man" in a large part cannot afford to "buy" a "cure" for his son's ills because the slum lord is raping the "poor man" with rent.

This poor "poor man" is paying over three quarters of his income just to pay the rent, leaving only a quarter of his paltry income to put food on the table for he and his son....wait! Why just assume it is he and his son alone? This poor "poor man" is of course married, and he and his wife have twelve children! One of those children - and why not make him the youngest and most adorable of the twelve children...Tiny Tim adorable - is the child who becomes ill with this curable disease. Is the "cure" expensive? What difference does it make?

Even if it is, by normal standards, affordable, this poor "poor man" is desperately trying to figure out each day how to make a quarter of his income stretch out enough to feed, clothe and purchase incidentals for he, his wife and twelve children. Even if the "cure" is affordable under normal conditions, this poor "poor man" can barely feed his family because three quarters of his income is going to the evil "rich man" slum lord, and while we're at it, why not clarify that the domicile this "poor man" is renting from this "rich" slum lord is a single room apartment with a tiny kitchenette and one bathroom? This poor "poor man" is spending most of his income on this single room apartment for he and his wife and twelve children because...well, "somehow" this is how it is.

"Somehow" life has so cruelly impeded this noble "poor man" at every step to the point of entropy. Each hurdle placed in front of the noble "poor man" slowed down his own effort to the point that now all he can do is show up to work at a job that demands twelve hours a day of his time, seven days a week, and by the time he is done with work it is all he can do to muster enough energy to smile at this own children. Hard to imagine? Less and less so in this United States where more than 600,000 acts of legislation are on the federal books, the vast majority of these acts of legislation being "positive" acts that do nothing to protect the rights of individuals but instead are intended to regulate individuals to the point that it is easy to imagine a "poor man" with a wife and twelve children working seven days a week, twelve hours a day, and at the end of the month three quarters of his income is spent on rent for a slum dwelling that is only one room with one bathroom and a tiny kitchenette.

These intrusive acts of legislation that deign authority to regulate individuals are real, not imaginary. The licensing schemes imposed upon virtually every professional field, coupled with the plethora of administrative agencies that use the licensing schemes as a grant of authority to demand of the professionals that they acquiesce to thousands upon thousands of demands, not to mention taxes, have made it so difficult for individuals to go into business for themselves, and certainly so with little to no investment capital, that less and less people are going into business for themselves, necessarily creating a situation where more and more people are vying for jobs. As employees, their employers insist that the employee, before ever receiving a pay check, sign government contracts that authorize the employer to act as a fiat tax collector on their behalf, collecting "at the source" a percentage of their pay to pay for the "income tax" they are "liable" for.

Before employees even see a dime from their labor, their employers have coerced - believing they have some legal and lawful authority to do so - these employees to sign a contract admitting to a "liability" they may or may not actually have, so that the government gets theirs before the employees get theirs. These "employees" sign government contracts that make the subject to federal, state, and local legislative acts that claim authority to regulate their lives. By agreeing to be "employees" they have admitted to being an "employee" as statutorily defined by the federal and state governments, and why? Why have our legislatures found it necessary to define "employee"? Why, so they can regulate the employee and make demands of that employee. Demands that are so intrusive that before that employee even gets paid, a portion of that hard earned money is "withheld" from their paychecks on the governments behalf.

None of this has anything at all to do with natural rights, and much of it is grossly and unlawfully violating natural rights.

You can be the funny little man hiding behind the curtain with all your gee gaws and levers controlling the holographic Great and Powerful Oz if you like. The curtain you hide behind is the curtain of morality, and the holographic Oz is all the "positive acts" of legislation you so love. You can, once the curtain is pulled back to reveal the truth, demand we all pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, it will not matter.

Those who seek the truth will find it. Those who revile the truth will do all they can to hide it, but the truth has ways of revealing itself and really doesn't need a cute little dog pulling back curtains in order for those seeking the truth to find it.

For all your parlor tricks and poorly constructed Oz, it is clear what you are advocating, and that is more of the same. You recognize what an understanding of natural law will do to your precious system, and this "somehow" agitates you. You want to defend and protect your beloved system, but your system, the system is broken. Throwing money at the system won't help, and attempting to convince people that they are hopeless slaves to the system won't do anything to save this system either.

This vaunted "positive" law you advocate can only work for tyranny. The "negative" natural laws cannot serve tyranny in any way. You have chosen your side, and I have chosen mine.

reply to post by amaster


Looking at the ‘rights’ question from a European point of view, these are the Articles of the European Convention on Human Rights which the UK included in its Human Rights Act. It’s worth pointing out that all the countries that have signed to the Convention provide at least a basic social security and healthcare system which, mostly, manages to ensure that people don’t die avoidably, don’t starve, and don’t have to be homeless.
There’s a European Court to enforce these Articles when the individual countries fail. It’s not perfect, but it’s not bad, and few people think that a right to own guns is important or is really any help at all!

“ARTICLE 2 RIGHT TO LIFE
1Everyone’s right to life shall be protected by law. No one shall be deprived of his life intentionally save in the execution of a sentence of a court following his conviction of a crime for which this penalty is provided by law.
2Deprivation of life shall not be regarded as inflicted in contravention of this Article when it results from the use of force which is no more than absolutely necessary:
(a)in defence of any person from unlawful violence;
(b)in order to effect a lawful arrest or to prevent the escape of a person lawfully detained;
(c)in action lawfully taken for the purpose of quelling a riot or insurrection.
ARTICLE 3 PROHIBITION OF TORTURE
No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
ARTICLE 4 PROHIBITION OF SLAVERY AND FORCED LABOUR
1No one shall be held in slavery or servitude.
2No one shall be required to perform forced or compulsory labour.
3For the purpose of this Article the term “forced or compulsory labour” shall not include:
(a)any work required to be done in the ordinary course of detention imposed according to the provisions of Article 5 of this Convention or during conditional release from such detention;
(b)any service of a military character or, in case of conscientious objectors in countries where they are recognised, service exacted instead of compulsory military service;
(c)any service exacted in case of an emergency or calamity threatening the life or well-being of the community;
(d)any work or service which forms part of normal civic obligations.
ARTICLE 5 RIGHT TO LIBERTY AND SECURITY
1Everyone has the right to liberty and security of person. No one shall be deprived of his liberty save in the following cases and in accordance with a procedure prescribed by law:
(a)the lawful detention of a person after conviction by a competent court;
(b)the lawful arrest or detention of a person for non-compliance with the lawful order of a court or in order to secure the fulfilment of any obligation prescribed by law;
(c)the lawful arrest or detention of a person effected for the purpose of bringing him before the competent legal authority on reasonable suspicion of having committed an offence or when it is reasonably considered necessary to prevent his committing an offence or fleeing after having done so;
(d)the detention of a minor by lawful order for the purpose of educational supervision or his lawful detention for the purpose of bringing him before the competent legal authority;
(e)the lawful detention of persons for the prevention of the spreading of infectious diseases, of persons of unsound mind, alcoholics or drug addicts or vagrants;
(f)the lawful arrest or detention of a person to prevent his effecting an unauthorised entry into the country or of a person against whom action is being taken with a view to deportation or extradition.
2Everyone who is arrested shall be informed promptly, in a language which he understands, of the reasons for his arrest and of any charge against him.
3Everyone arrested or detained in accordance with the provisions of paragraph 1(c) of this Article shall be brought promptly before a judge or other officer authorised by law to exercise judicial power and shall be entitled to trial within a reasonable time or to release pending trial. Release may be conditioned by guarantees to appear for trial.
4Everyone who is deprived of his liberty by arrest or detention shall be entitled to take proceedings by which the lawfulness of his detention shall be decided speedily by a court and his release ordered if the detention is not lawful.
5Everyone who has been the victim of arrest or detention in contravention of the provisions of this Article shall have an enforceable right to compensation.
ARTICLE 6 RIGHT TO A FAIR TRIAL
1In the determination of his civil rights and obligations or of any criminal charge against him, everyone is entitled to a fair and public hearing within a reasonable time by an independent and impartial tribunal established by law. Judgment shall be pronounced publicly but the press and public may be excluded from all or part of the trial in the interest of morals, public order or national security in a democratic society, where the interests of juveniles or the protection of the private life of the parties so require, or to the extent strictly necessary in the opinion of the court in special circumstances where publicity would prejudice the interests of justice.
2Everyone charged with a criminal offence shall be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law.
3Everyone charged with a criminal offence has the following minimum rights:
(a)to be informed promptly, in a language which he understands and in detail, of the nature and cause of the accusation against him;
(b)to have adequate time and facilities for the preparation of his defence;
(c)to defend himself in person or through legal assistance of his own choosing or, if he has not sufficient means to pay for legal assistance, to be given it free when the interests of justice so require;
(d)to examine or have examined witnesses against him and to obtain the attendance and examination of witnesses on his behalf under the same conditions as witnesses against him;
(e)to have the free assistance of an interpreter if he cannot understand or speak the language used in court.
ARTICLE 7 NO PUNISHMENT WITHOUT LAW
1No one shall be held guilty of any criminal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a criminal offence under national or international law at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that was applicable at the time the criminal offence was committed.
2This Article shall not prejudice the trial and punishment of any person for any act or omission which, at the time when it was committed, was criminal according to the general principles of law recognised by civilised nations.
ARTICLE 8 RIGHT TO RESPECT FOR PRIVATE AND FAMILY LIFE
1Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence.
2There shall be no interference by a public authority with the exercise of this right except such as is in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.
ARTICLE 9 FREEDOM OF THOUGHT, CONSCIENCE AND RELIGION
1Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief, in worship, teaching, practice and observance.
2Freedom to manifest one’s religion or beliefs shall be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of public safety, for the protection of public order, health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.
ARTICLE 10 FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION
1Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. This Article shall not prevent States from requiring the licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema enterprises.
2The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.
ARTICLE 11 FREEDOM OF ASSEMBLY AND ASSOCIATION
1Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and to freedom of association with others, including the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.
2No restrictions shall be placed on the exercise of these rights other than such as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others. This Article shall not prevent the imposition of lawful restrictions on the exercise of these rights by members of the armed forces, of the police or of the administration of the State.
ARTICLE 12 RIGHT TO MARRY
Men and women of marriageable age have the right to marry and to found a family, according to the national laws governing the exercise of this right.
ARTICLE 14 PROHIBITION OF DISCRIMINATION
The enjoyment of the rights and freedoms set forth in this Convention shall be secured without discrimination on any ground such as sex, race, colour, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, association with a national minority, property, birth or other status.
ARTICLE 16 RESTRICTIONS ON POLITICAL ACTIVITY OF ALIENS
Nothing in Articles 10, 11 and 14 shall be regarded as preventing the High Contracting Parties from imposing restrictions on the political activity of aliens.
ARTICLE 17 PROHIBITION OF ABUSE OF RIGHTS
Nothing in this Convention may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein or at their limitation to a greater extent than is provided for in the Convention.
ARTICLE 18 LIMITATION ON USE OF RESTRICTIONS ON RIGHTS
The restrictions permitted under this Convention to the said rights and freedoms shall not be applied for any purpose other than those for which they have been prescribed.
PART II THE FIRST PROTOCOL
ARTICLE 1 PROTECTION OF PROPERTY
Every natural or legal person is entitled to the peaceful enjoyment of his possessions. No one shall be deprived of his possessions except in the public interest and subject to the conditions provided for by law and by the general principles of international law.
The preceding provisions shall not, however, in any way impair the right of a State to enforce such laws as it deems necessary to control the use of property in accordance with the general interest or to secure the payment of taxes or other contributions or penalties.
ARTICLE 2 RIGHT TO EDUCATION
No person shall be denied the right to education. In the exercise of any functions which it assumes in relation to education and to teaching, the State shall respect the right of parents to ensure such education and teaching in conformity with their own religious and philosophical convictions.
ARTICLE 3 RIGHT TO FREE ELECTIONS
The High Contracting Parties undertake to hold free elections at reasonable intervals by secret ballot, under conditions which will ensure the free expression of the opinion of the people in the choice of the legislature.
ARTICLE 1 OF THE THIRTEENTH PROTOCOL
ABOLITION OF THE DEATH PENALTY”

reply to post by Jean Paul Zodeaux


Your entire post is a strawman (again), and also false dilemma logical fallacy (how frequent among anarchists, who equate everything except their beloved utopia with socialist dictatorship, inaware of the plethora of possibilities and shades of gray inbetween, inaware that the complex function of the wellbeing of people (which defines objective utilitarian morality) may not have maximum at either extremes of the liberty-totalitarianism axis).

You assume that when I support some stealing, under condition that more important right that right to property (such as right to live or health) must require it for not being breached (basic welfare and public healthcare payed from taxes), I must automaticaly support hundreds of others pointless and harmful laws, overgrown and pointless bureacracy, or even tyranny. Well, nope.

The obtuse = obtuse x obtuse = obtuse to the nth degree? Outside of defense, if it causes no harm then it is done by right.

Stealing of a cure is a defense of life. Witholding a cure is murder (its moraly equivalent to it - lets try not to suffer from omission bias). You do not have a right to murder. Ergo you do not have a right to withold a cure when its needed and you are able to provide it.

If you are framing morality as pro survival behavior, and immoral behavior as anti-survival behavior then you and I can finally find something to agree on. But you are not doing this, are you?

What do you mean by "pro-survival behaviour"? Behaviour which defends life or health? I gues you can aproximately define morality as such, altrough there is a better definition IMHO - utilitarianism (consequentialism), which encompases it, and more. Defense of life and health is protected because this leads to great increase in wellbeing (or decrease or preventing of suffering) among sentient beings. This is based on objectively existing properties of our brains, so its universal.

A system of rights which does not acknowledge this huge naturally evolved distinction between pleasure of owning a lot of property vs. pleasure of having life saved, or suffering of having some (non-critical for survival or health) part of property stolen vs. suffering of someone dying (and the feelings of others who know him) is not reflecting this natural evolved morality, and thus is by definition invalid as universal law or universal right system. Protection of life and health is deeply ingrained in humans by billions of years of evolution, it is a right more basic than right to property.

Originally posted by ErtaiNaGia
That's a very warming list of platitudes you have posted there, it's just a shame that it is absolutely wrong in every conceivable way.

You have the RIGHT to not be deprived of your life, because you were born.

You have the RIGHT to think your own thoughts, because you have a brain.

You have the RIGHT to express your opinions, because you have a mouth.

You have the RIGHT to be free from unlawful incarceration, detention, etcetera.

You have the RIGHT to labor for yourself, and to keep the fruits of your labors, because you have arms.

You do not have the right to Food... you actually have to work for it.

You do not have the RIGHT to clean water, you have to clean it, or find it.

You do not have the RIGHT to shelter, you actually have to build it, or buy it.

You do not have the RIGHT to health-care, you actually have to compensate the doctors.

You *DO* have the right to education... but not FORMAL education... Life provides the *ONLY* education that you can even remotely claim to have a RIGHT to.


The things that you claim are RIGHTS, are actually services, or products that people have to work HARD to make, or provide.

What you are arguing for, is slavery.



You want the Doctor to be your slave.

You want the teacher to be your slave.

You want the farmer to be your slave.

You want the lumberjack, and construction worker to be your slave.

And that violates THEIR rights, of working for themselves, and keeping the fruits of their labor.

As I said before... your platitudes SOUND pretty good, until you start thinking about it....

And then it all just falls apart.

Nothing in the OP is a Right.

Unless you think that Enslaving Doctors, Teachers, and Farmers... Or taking my money in taxes to provide for YOU is a right.

edit on 22-6-2011 by ErtaiNaGia because: spelling

One interesting thought I had reading the above -
Slaves were fed and sheltered, if memory serves in Rome many of them were educated because their tasks required it (scribes for instance). I suspect they got whatever was available in medical care to - I mean they were an investment for their 'owners'.
All of a sudden this 'right' to a lot of stuff begins to sound like people are asking to be slaves. I for one figure since we are so close to it anyway might be better to go ahead and use the word - at least that way we all know where we stand and we can stop with all the play pretend that we are free.

reply to post by Maslo

Your entire post is a strawman (again), and also false dilemma logical fallacy (how frequent among anarchists, who equate everything except their beloved utopia with socialist dictatorship, inaware of the plethora of possibilities and shades of gray inbetween, inaware that the complex function of the wellbeing of people (which defines objective utilitarian morality) may not have maximum at either extremes of the liberty-totalitarianism axis).

Let's get something clear, here. A strawman argument is when an opponent misrepresents the opposing argument. Ironically, you accuse me of this and then turn around and declare me an anarchist. Nice.

So, now we are not only forced to define strawman:

A straw man is a component of an argument and is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position. To "attack a straw man" is to create the illusion of having refuted a proposition by replacing it with a superficially similar yet unequivalent proposition (the "straw man"), and refuting it, without ever having actually refuted the original position.

But define anarchy as well:

Anarchy (from Greek: ἀναρχίᾱ anarchíā, "without ruler") may refer to any of several political states, and has been variously defined by sources. Most often, the term "anarchy" describes the simple absence of publicly recognized government or enforced political authority. When used in this sense, anarchy may or may not imply political disorder or lawlessness within a society. In another sense, anarchy may not refer to a complete lack of authority or political organization, but instead refer to a social state characterized by absolute direct democracy or libertarianism.

Clearly defining a strawman argument is much easier done than defining anarchy, which is yet another irony given you began your debate with me by asserting I was being too vague on what rights are. You cannot, of course, find anything in any of my posts to support any contention that I advocate an absence of publicly recognized government - unless, of course, you intend to engage in more strawman arguments only to turn around and accuse me of your fallaciousness - nor can you reasonably show where I advocate a lack of enforced political authority, and since I am adamant that it is the people who hold the inherent political power, then reasonable people will understand I am indeed advocating enforced political authority.

Further, I have remained adamant about acting lawfully as opposed to presume legality is lawful, and at best all you can do is claim that by anarchy you meant to label me a libertarian. Of course, if you did, you did not say what you mean, and I do not know any people who self identify as a libertarian who advocate anarchy. Anarchy is a pejorative that has been thrown at libertarians by their political opponents, which again, would be a strawman argument.

You assume that when I support some stealing, under condition that more important right that right to property (such as right to live or health) must require it for not being breached (basic welfare and public healthcare payed from taxes), I must automaticaly support hundreds of others pointless and harmful laws, overgrown and pointless bureacracy, or even tyranny. Well, nope.

At best, with this lazy bit of rhetoric, you can claim sloppy use of language, and at worst stubbornly adhere to Orwellian doublespeak and insist you are speaking correctly and it is I who needs rehabilitation. When you begin by stating:

"You assume that when I support some stealing...", and what should be clear by this phrasing is that my assumptions that you support stealing are correct. It is no longer an assumption but is a fact...unless you intend to back away from your own language and insist that this is not what you meant. Hell, I suppose you could argue that I am using a strawman by pointing out that you support stealing, and let's be clear here, the qualification of "some" does not diminish the fact that you do indeed support stealing.

You then follow this phrasing with:

"...under condition that more important right that right to property (such as right to live or health) must require it for not being breached (basic welfare and public healthcare payed from taxes), I must automaticaly support hundreds of others pointless and harmful laws, overgrown and pointless bureacracy, or even tyranny."

Presumably you are listing "public healthcare" as some sort of right more important than the right to property, and offering this up as it is some sort of accepted given. It is a heavily bombarded propaganda these days, but not by any stretch of the imagination is this "public healthcare" a right. Healthcare is a right, but what you mean by "public healthcare" and what is meant by actual healthcare are two completely different things.

Health care, by definition, is the care for ones health. Such care can only be handled on an individual basis, and any credence given to "public healthcare" can only come from pandemics, epidemics, and other such communicable diseases, and even then, when it comes to actual health care, no panacea can be given to the "public" to handle the "public" ills, and can only be handled on an individual basis.

The pointless and overgrown bureaucracy you hope to distance yourself from can only find validity under yours and Maxmar's philosophy where "law" is pliable and man made. Under the rigid conditions of law that I argue, pointless and overgrown bureaucracies would be unlawful. In your philosophy they are not unlawful and perfectly legal, even if you offer the caveat that you don't support them. Philosophically you do.

A leg to a table can claim it doesn't support tables all they want. They can even be philosophically opposed to tables, but their insistence they don't support tables is demonstrably false. When you argue as passionately as you have, not just for political ideologies that can only serve tyranny, but passionately against natural rights being given any respect at all, you are most assuredly supporting tyranny in the same way a table leg in denial still supports that table.

Stealing of a cure is a defense of life.

Of course, in your hypothetical you claim I am using strawman arguments against, it was not the "stealing of a cure" that you presented, but rather the theft of another man's property in order to purchase the cure. Regardless, theft remains theft, no matter the thing that is stolen, or the motive behind stealing it. Perhaps one of the greatest literary presentations of theft that curries sympathy is the story of the iconic Jean val Jean in Les Miserables.

In Victor Hugo's remarkable book, a young Jean val Jean, in a moment of despair, borne as much from his resentment of the nieces and nephews he feels obligated to feed, as it was his own hunger, steals a loaf of bread from a bakery. For this crime Jean val Jean winds up doing something like 20 years of hard labor. While Hugo, unlike you and your ridiculous explanation of "somehow", takes great pains to describe the wretched situation young Jean is in when he steals the bread, but this is merely the set up for his tome, not the plot of it. Arguably, Hugo is not making any argument asserting that the poor should be able to steal without impunity, nor is he arguing that the poor have a right to steal, (and surely a loaf of bread would qualify as the "cure" to hunger), but is more concerned with addressing the horrible circumstances of sentencing for such a petty crime.

Much like yourself, Flaubert is the gendarme who fully embraces the validity of legislation as law, and in doing so he becomes the books chief antagonist. Flaubert, for all his rigid adherence to rules, is clearly the bad guy. Yet, Flaubert is not written without sympathy, and inside this rigid mans heart beats a human. Hugo is not so intent on laying blame on any single human for the outrageous suffering Jean val Jean went through for such a petty crime, but is much more concerned with addressing the absurdity of thoughtless punishment.

Disturbingly, the conditions in which Jean val Jean suffered are becoming perilously real in modern America with its impossibly unreasonable "three strikes" legislative acts. The prison nation that has risen in the United States is a condition created by the belief that legislation is equal to law, and that a simple stroke of a pen is all that is required...well, the passing of, signing into, and ultimately approval of by legislatures, executive and judicial branches...to "make" law that has helped lay a foundation for this overgrown and pointless bureaucracy you hope to distance yourself from.

Since, in your "somehow" hypothetical we are not privy to what the illness actually is, nor are we privy to what the cure is, let's continue to embrace Hugo's hypothetical instead. Surely Hugo put far more effort in his hypothetical than you have in yours. Let us equate your hypothetical illness to Jean val Jean's hunger, and let us equate the "cure" to a loaf of bread. Let us even tinker with Hugo's hypothetical a bit so that we can fully equate it to yours and suggest that Jean was starving and the loaf of bread would save his life, for here is your argument now, that this sort of theft is self defense.

However, in your hypothetical the equation of cure to self defense does not provide a demonstrable attacker outside of the victims own body. Whether it be some nameless illness with some nameless disease, or starvation cured by a loaf of bread, if theft be self defense, then that which the victim is defending themselves from is their own body! I suppose that in your hypothetical you could quibble and clarify the illness is some virus or other external bug that has created this illness, and that it would not be their own body then that they are defending against but the virus or bug. But, even under these conditions the equation of theft to self defense stretches the definition of self defense.

If you attack me with a knife, and I struggle with you in an attempt to relieve you of this weapon but it becomes painfully clear that my only hope is to kill you before you kill me, this is self defense. Even if I am able to disarm you without killing you, and all that is required is a strong enough assault to convince you to reconsider your actions, the ordinary crime of assault is not appropriate because I did not assault you without justification. I did so out of self defense. If I steal a loaf of bread from you in order to save my starving body from perishing this is not self defense at all, as the theft I engaged in was not a reaction to your assaults. If there is any validity in excusing the theft it would have to instead lie in the law of necessity

In U.S. criminal law, necessity may be either a possible justification or an exculpation for breaking the law. Defendants seeking to rely on this defense argue that they should not be held liable for their actions as a crime because their conduct was necessary to prevent some greater harm and when that conduct is not excused under some other more specific provision of law such as self defense. Except for a few statutory exemptions and in some medical cases there is no corresponding defense in English law

Had you taken the time - and certainly you would not have had to put as much effort in your hypothetical as Hugo put in his in order to make an implausible plausible - to explain what the illness was, and for the sake of argument now let us assume this illness was a toxic snake bite, and the cure was an anti-venom solution, which was being denied the child because of an inability to pay for it - and in the United States such a scenario would be on its surface implausible - then the father stealing the anti-venom would be arguably justifiable under the law of necessity, not self defense.

The death of the child in this circumstance is a greater harm than the theft of the cure. However, the more removed you become from that implausibility towards greater implausibility the harder it becomes to even argue for the law of necessity. Even so, let us say that instead of stealing the cure, the father did as you presented and asked the rich guy who lives nearby for the money to buy the cure and in response to the rich guys refusal the father steals the money from him, such a scenario could fit under the law of necessity, where still the greater harm was the death of the child.

I took the time earlier in this post to bring up Les Miserables because this book has similarities to our debate here, but also because Hugo was clearly concerned with the harsh sentencing structures of petty crimes, and finally because I firmly believe after reading Hugo's book three times now that Hugo is not at all making your argument and does not wish to suggest that theft under some circumstances should come with impunity.

Theft of property is a harm caused to the owner of that property and this person has the right to a redress of grievance to seek remedy. It is insane to suggest a prison sentence would suffice as remedy. In the instance of a stolen loaf of bread restitution for the lost bread should be enough. Jean val Jean should not have been sentenced to hard labor in a prison camp and instead should have been expected to repay the baker for the stolen bread. In the instance of your hypothetical, the father should not be imprisoned for his harm to the "rich" guy, but should be expected to offer restitution to the party harmed. This is lawful and just. The system you advocate but not, is loathe to reach this same conclusion.

Witholding a cure is murder

Oh please! Under your own hypothetical this assertion goes way beyond hyperbolic and into the realm of histrionics. If a doctor viciously and malevolently withholds a cure from a patient this is murder. A "rich" guy refusing to donate to money for the cause of a cure for a "poor" guys son is not murder, nor is there any crime. The "rich" guy has caused no harm by refusing to donate money. The harm came from the illness of which it is fairly presumed the "rich" guy was not the source of the illness. It is also fairly presumed the "rich" guy did not have in his possession any cure. Just money.

Your willingness to embrace vagueness in order to justify theft is disturbing. It was fairly easy to predict, after you began by accusing me of vagueness that you would then rely upon it as heavily as you have. Every court case, during the trial, is all about fact finding. Each case is narrow in its scope and involves only the facts of that case. As an advocate for your case, your eschewing of facts does not help you at all.

On a side note, it is more than amusing that the link you provided for omission bias was a Wikipedia article that qualified that article as being disputed for its lack of neutrality. Rich indeed.

You do not have a right to murder. Ergo you do not have a right to withold a cure when its needed and you are able to provide it.

This is nothing more than bifurcation. Your assumption relies heavily upon an excluded middle. Under the scenario I presented of a malevolent doctor your "ergo" would work. Under your "somehow" scenario this assertion is just fallacious.

What do you mean by "pro-survival behaviour"? Behaviour which defends life or health? I gues you can aproximately define morality as such, altrough there is a better definition IMHO

What do you mean by IMHO? If you mean by that in my humble opinion, this becomes suspect when we follow your link presented as an authority only to discover it is a thread in this site created by you! Humble indeed.

Yes, behavior which defends life or health, in its simplest terms could work, and in my not so humble opinion, works better than your pretense at humble opinions.

A system of rights which does not acknowledge this huge naturally evolved distinction between pleasure of owning a lot of property vs. pleasure of having life saved, or suffering of having some (non-critical for survival or health) part of property stolen vs. suffering of someone dying (and the feelings of others who know him) is not reflecting this natural evolved morality, and thus is by definition invalid as universal law or universal right system.

"naturally evolved distinction between pleasure of owning a lot of property vs. pleasure of having life saved"? Are you serious? Do you some how believe this assertion has cleared up your perceptions of vague rights?

Ultimately you continue to insist that - as if we are in agreement, or worse that it is settled - morality equates to law. Not your morality pal. Not by any stretch of the imagination.