--- Justin Schwartz <jkschw at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> >
> >Short of a theocracy, does it EVER make sense to
> talk
> >of rights?
> >
>
> What does theocracy have to do with anything
>
> Nothing necessarily metaphysical about rights talk.
> I have a right to X if
> you can't take it waay from me without my say so.
> The basis of that "can't"
> may be moral or legal or conventional or indeed
> theological, But what is
> wrong with saying that there are things tht can;t
> betaken away without my
> say so?
ED:> "Nothing necessarily metaphysical about rights talk." Says you. That begs the question. There are a lot of people that think rights are a very particular type of metaphysical construct. Those folk reject a pragmatic view of rights. For a traditional conception of Natural Law, rights are immutable truths that govern all human behavior consistently across time and space. That is not so for a pragmatic conception. Thus, when someone says that there is a right to food, that can carry a number of meanings: (1) such a right actually exists; (2) such a right is recognized as existing; (3) such a right is recongnized as the controlling consensus as to how we are to interact.
The difference between (1) and (3) is metaphysical. Thus, any justification for a pragmatic conception of rights must include a refutation of a more robust ontological conception of rights, or even a less robust ontological conception (e.g., libertarian conception).
To say that a "rights regime" is a pragmatic rights regime is to dictate the proper conception of a "right," which is the precise subject of debate -- a theocracy of pragmatism as it were.
>
>
> >Surely, rights are defined in terms of particular
> >ontologies and epistemologies, such that if there
> >exists different ontologies (there does [do]) and
> different
> >epistempologies (there does [do]), then one should
> expect
> >there to be different conceptions of "rights"
> (there
> >are). The debate over rights is a debate over
> >ontologies, which, last time I checked, is a debate
> >without definitive and and universal resolution.
>
> Unlike all the other debates . . . .
>
>
> >Thus, talk of rights -- for and against -- is
> >political on all sides, and ultimately
> theoretically
> >irresolvable. We may come to a consensus about
> >whether such "rights" ought to recognized, but
> those
> >decisions are going to based on political
> expediency
> >and not on the correctness of a particular
> conception
> >of "rights."
> >
>
> An idea that as a pragmatist I am happy to embrace.
> Did you see my piece
> posted here the other day on why democracy doesn't
> need justification?
>
> Still, it is interesting and useful to talk about
> rights and their basis, as
> you just have been doing.
>
> Btw, nothing we were saying depending on rights
> having any partifcular
> controversial basis at all. We were discussing which
> rights it made sense to
> say we have, whatever their basis is. So your point
> is here beside the
> issue.
>
> jks
>
>
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