The best comment you've made so far! (Still blank at 1:45 pm)

Happy Easter everyone.

Too bad Obama felt it necessary to tell the world that America is not a Christian nation during his Dixie Chick America Sucks Euro-Tour, right after he bowed and curtsied to the Saudi King and told the French that the US has been stuck-up meanies to their jealous and ungrateful Euro-socialist cousins.

This country was founded on Judeo-Christian principles.

John Adams: “The general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were the general principles of Christianity. I will avow that I then believed, and now believe, that those general principles of Christianity are as eternal and immutable as the existence and attributes of God.”

Doug Giles

The United States of America
July 4, 1776 - Jan 20, 2009
Rest in Peace

from being founded on Christian principles and being designated as a Christian nation. If we can't define THAT distinction then we are doomed to continue to be a nation of narrow-minded bigots. Keep the faith

Even a dead fish can go with the flow.

The Giles thing is one horribly written piece. He is more a smart ass than anything else. It is a part of the problem as we witness the decline of civil debate and dialog.

But as for the question of whether America is a "Christian nation," I do, in fact, maintain that the fundamental appeal to the inalienable rights and dignity of persons appeals to a transcendent Source assumed by theists and deists alike. Without such an appeal, Bentham was correct in observing that the notion of rights is "nonsense on stilts." More recently, Daniel Dennett, after laying out a Darwinian explanation for why people believe in such things as rights, reiterates Bentham's famous quip and suggests that the importance of "rights language" is that it serves as a "conversation stopper." That is, if people continually thought that everything morally relevant was up for grabs, there could be no social cohesion. So we are programmed for "rule worship," and, once someone plausibly invokes "rights," all controversy ceases. But, he thinks, clearly there are no such things.

Even Kai Nielsen, an atheist and author of Ethics Without God, admits that the actual historical context in which the notion of human dignity emerged was the theistic notion that humans are created in the image of God. (And then Nielsen does a miserable--even laughable--job of attempting to derive a robust notion of rights from the resources of his atheism/naturalism.)

Here's a bit on Bentham's rejection of the notion of rights.

Jeremy Bentham, that imperishable proponent of utilitarianism, famously said that the notion of natural rights is “nonsense on stilts.” In fact, the broader context of that quote is useful for our present purpose.

Bentham’s subject was the “Declaration of Rights” published by the French National Assembly in 1791. That declaration included a number of articles that Bentham thought demonstrably false. Article II, in particular, asserted, “The end in view of every political association is the preservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man. These rights are liberty, property, security, and resistance to oppression.” On analysis, Bentham suggests that the article manifests confusion and that what it asserts is not only nonsense but also, “dangerous nonsense (2001, p. 500).” In particular, Bentham challenges the notion of natural and imprescriptable rights, thought to exist, “anterior to the establishment of government.” The notion is as fantastic as it is mischievous.

"How stands the truth of things? That there are no such things as natural rights—no such things as rights anterior to the establishment of government—no such things as natural rights opposed to, in contradistinction to, legal: that the expression is merely figurative; that when used, in the moment you attempt to give it a literal meaning it leads to error, and to that sort of error that leads to mischief—to the extremity of mischief" (2001, p. 500).

Where that French document maintains that “the ignorance, neglect, or contempt of the rights of man are the sole cause of public calamities and of the corruption of governments,” Bentham notes that this is little more than wishful thinking. “Reasons for wishing there were such things as rights, are not rights;—a reason for wishing that a certain right were established, is not that right—want is not supply—hunger is not bread” (2001, p. 501).

And whereas the document is motivated by a concern to preserve the natural rights of people, Bentham reasons that things that do not exist are in no danger of being destroyed and, therefore, cannot call for preservation. One might as well add unicorns and griffins to the list of endangered species. This sets the context for Bentham’s well-known “nonsense” quip: “Natural rights is simple nonsense: natural and imprescriptible rights, rhetorical nonsense,—nonsense upon stilts” (2001, p. 501).

Bentham’s argument, then, is with the notion of rights that are inherent and imprescriptable (i.e., “inalienable”). Both features of such rights are rejected by means of one parsimonious explanation: whatever rights exist are contingent upon the circumstances of society. And those “circumstances” are determined by the question of what is “advantageous to society,” that is to say, the notion of utility.

"In proportion as it is right or proper, i.e., advantageous to the society in question, that this or that right—a right to this or that effect—should be established and maintained, in that same proportion it is wrong that it should be abrogated: but that as there is no right, which ought not to be maintained so long as it is upon the whole advantageous to the society that it should be maintained, so there is no right which, when the abolition of it is advantageous to society, should not be abolished" (2001, p. 501).

Bentham’s view does clearly entail that there are no natural or moral rights that are anterior to and independent of the civil rights that are accorded by society, and so the former are unavailable as the grounds for the latter. But it is worth highlighting here what may be obvious: this does not leave him in a position of saying that there are no anterior moral grounds for the granting of civil rights. Though there are no anterior and inherent rights, it may still be the case that individuals within a society ought to be accorded certain rights—perhaps even that list of rights delineated in the Declaration. And, of course, the court of appeal will be found in the Principle of Utility. But whether rights are extended or abrogated will be determined by the circumstances of utility, and this is always with a view to the advantage of society.

There cannot be “imprescriptable” rights precisely because a concern for social utility may call for their abrogation. If there were such rights, then there would be occasions on which it is morally inappropriate to calculate consequences. But if the principle of utility is true, then it is always appropriate so to calculate. Whether ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the benefit of society.

____________________

"Puddleglum" by Weatherwax (one of the Muddlings).

Jeeves to the Rescue

It's interesting reading and re-reading the philosophical meaning of 'life' and 'rights'. Kai's declaration: that the actual historical context in which the notion of human dignity emerged was the theistic notion that humans are created in the image of God - has always been the basis of my thought. (Spiritual - not material). It's been my life-experience that by trying to treat others as I would want them to treat me and mine defines the limits and/or possibilities of 'rights'. I also have found that all is not 'black' or 'white' - there are a lot of 'gray' areas in the human society.