Which humans?
I believe there are things which should be human rights. Not everyone agrees. I’m not sure what you think has gone wrong.
There is an animal welfare Act in the UK and other countries.
And rights are not invented by man. They stem from the immense value of life which cannot be explained if we think we exist by chance.
And does this act extend human rights to animals, or does it offer a smaller set of rights animals?
Even if you base your rights on the “immense value of life,” we humans are the ones doing the valuing. Therefore, we did invent the rights, we just did so indirectly through our decision on how much value to place on human lives.
All sentient animals have the right to life and not to be killed or made to suffer unnecessarily.
Only Fundamentalists interpret every sentence in the Old Testament literally.
This doesn’t need to be interpreted literally. In fact, I don’t believe the entire Exodus story actually happened. The question I’ve always asked while reading bible stories is “what is the take home message or overarching theme here?” There are numerous instances in the old testament where the message seems to me to be: God doesn’t recognize any human rights.
If you substitute “perfection” for whims you are correct! Evil incurs its own punishment is the teaching of the Old Testament even though it is often expressed in primitive terms. Human rights stem from the value of life created by God. They cannot exist independently. If we were freaks of nature our lives would be valueless, purposeless and meaningless. It is only because we are God’s children that the principles of liberty, equality and fraternity exist. They wouldn’t make sense if we existed by chance for no reason whatsoever and were doomed to total extinction when we die. A few brief years on this incredibly minute planet in such an unbelievably immense universe are of no significance whatsoever by themselves. Absurdity would be the name of the game. It is a choice between all or nothing. There are no half-measures when it comes to interpreting the significance of existence. We have to take it or leave it… It is up to us to decide and no one else can do it for us. That is why we exist…
Conventionally, we think of “human rights” as something we have simply by virtue of being human. However, you are saying this is not the case, you are saying that the rights we have are determined by the value given to us by God. Your position that all of God’s smitings are consistent with human rights because they are punishments ignores the realities of the smitings. For example, God infected Davids young son with a lethal disease because David had sinned. It seems to me that this is not consistent with the idea that all humans have some intrinsic value by virtue of being human. Indeed, it actually seems that God is perfectly capable of giving some people less value than others, and therefore fewer rights. So even given your religious position, how do you know that you are a “David” whose life God values instead of a “David’s son” whose life is expendable?If you substitute “perfection” for whims you are correct! Evil incurs its own punishment is the teaching of the Old Testament even though it is often expressed in primitive terms. Human rights stem from the value of life created by God. They cannot exist independently. If we were freaks of nature our lives would be valueless, purposeless and meaningless. It is only because we are God’s children that the principles of liberty, equality and fraternity exist. They wouldn’t make sense if we existed by chance for no reason whatsoever and were doomed to total extinction when we die. A few brief years on this incredibly minute planet in such an unbelievably immense universe are of no significance whatsoever by themselves. Absurdity would be the name of the game. It is a choice between all or nothing. There are no half-measures when it comes to interpreting the significance of existence. We have to take it or leave it… It is up to us to decide and no one else can do it for us. That is why we exist…
Mostly because
But you’re basically splitting hairs here. Sure, we could make reasonable arguments that the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky deserve some basic fish-rights and bird-rights. But we were talking about human rights, not bird-rights or fish-rights.
Which is a fine sentiment, but why doesn’t God act like that is the case?
If that is the case, then I challenge you to go back and read the bible from the point of view of the “least of these” people God smited. What did everyone other than Noah learn about God while drowning? What did the slave-mothers of Egypt learn about God during the Exodus? What did Job’s family think about being handed over to the devil? What did the children of Amalek learn about the God who had ordered their destruction? If you’re right, and God loves all of us, especially the least ones, then we should see that love no matter whose perspective we take. Or perhaps you believe that in the entire country of Egypt, there was not a single firstborn son who loved others enough to be worth sparing.
I am curious what you think of Rousseau’s argument for human rights. I’ll summarize it. Rousseau noticed that René Descartes had stumbled upon a massive find his study of human language. Descartes essentially proposed that human language held the capacity of infinite creativity through finite means. This sounds contradictory, but it was proven mathematically in either the late 19th or early 20th Century. Now Descartes therefore proposed that this is what separates human beings from other animals (which he viewed as we would computers-- machines). For now let’s set aside the issue of animals and their creative potential. Rousseau therefore argued that the fundamental aspect of human nature is its creativity. And as such, any infringement upon a human being’s creativity by any authority must be overwhelmingly justified (such as in the case when a parent grabs and yanks their child away from walking into traffic, which can be justified). If it cannot be justified, then human rights have been violated and thus tyranny has been imposed.
Sure, and I’m bet we could also come up with something based on Rawls’ Veil of Ignorance too, if we wanted. But at the end of the day, it is humanity alone that chooses to recognize human rights (e.g. by valuing creativity or by willingly putting on the veil of ignorance.) They are not a law of the universe. The previous comments pointed out that terrorist groups abuse people and violate human rights and asked how I would tell them they were wrong. I would use arguments like these ones to try to persuade them to consider human rights, because they are fundamentally a persuasive activity. No one would try to persuade terrorists to obey the laws of gravity, because they don’t have a choice. With human rights, there is always a choice.
Specifically: the stories he left us to teach us about himself involve him violating human rights.
You are very adept at avoiding the point. Suppose a politician was caught on tape making a raunchy joke about doing something inappropriate with one of his aides. He then turns around and claims that he is the family values candidate. It doesn’t matter if he actually did that inappropriate thing in the joke, he has already shown that he doesn’t really believe in family values, and people would rightfully be upset with him.
For example, in addition to the ones I’ve already cited, 2 Samuel 15, where God randomly inflicts civilians with disease. Today we consider the use of chemical or biological weapons to be a war crime, and their use against civilians is certainly a human rights violation.
So you’re telling me that I would have a better understanding of God if I read less of his divinely inspired works.
Look, I am well aware of the good parts of the bible too. The problem isn’t that they don’t exist, its that the very religious often act like the bad parts don’t exist or somehow don’t count. When I look at the bible-as-a-whole I simply see a collection of ancient mythologies, allegories, propagandizing, political justifications, cults of personality, poetry and philosophizing. I see evolving concepts of morality, politics and religious ideas. In short, its a big mess of literature that is academically fascinating, but utterly underwhelming as a basis for human rights. The mental gymnastics required to make the bible into a coherent and self-consistent treatice on God are dramatically more demanding than simply treating it as a compilation of snapshots from different time periods in the history of a primitive ethnic group. The god of the old testament is so radically different from the god of the new testament that I still find it incredible people think they are the same.
Oops, that should be 2 Samuel 24:15
