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Corporations, and the government for that matter, are made up of people. Lakes, rivers, and forests are not. So there is that difference. The article itself is

Corporations, and the government for that matter, are made up of people. Lakes, rivers, and forests are not. So there is that difference. The article itself is an editorial piece with scant details. Who is sued? One example is given of a lawsuit on behalf of a river in Ecuador, in which "companies" were sued. Who represents the river? The government? Who is paid the damages? The government? Are trial lawyers involved? What is their fee? Surely no potential for shenanigans there </sarcasm>.

jerf 8y ago
"Corporations, and the government for that matter, are made up of people." And I'd emphasize, made of people who can have responsibilities. We can regulate a corporation, and the result is real people have to do real work or make real changes somewhere, or the regulation is meaningless. Treating a corporation like a big person makes sense in at least some ways. You may legislate all you like, but the river is not going to fill out an environmental impact statement in advance of its next flood. It's not a person. It can't have responsibilities.
- munk-a 8y ago
  A river is made up of those who live along it, a farmer that dumps manure into it is effecting it - similarly the community downstream has certain rights when it comes to their waterway, they may be farmers that purchased access to the waterway with their lands, or residents that purchased their property with an expectation of being able to swim or even a home owner who is pursuing damages against the flood of a river where an insurance company needs to determine if an upstream private party was responsible or the river itself. Basically, I agree with your statement that a river doesn't have personal rights or responsibilities but those people effected by mal-treatment of the river (including, if no one else advocates, a state/local government) should have the right to protect against unrestricted mistreatment. Nothing that isn't a natural person should be treated like a person, everything outside of an individual should have separately delineated rights afforded to it depending on the type of object it is. We can sanely fix this problem (and citizen's united) by just agreeing to shift some definitions.
  - kortilla 8y ago
    Ugh, those aren’t rights though. There are also already protections for rivers enforced by governments (who have the rights to do so).
wolco 8y ago
Corporations are people. People work for corporations and hold roles. Lakes, rivers support people. Lakes can't sue but people could.
- ucaetano 8y ago
  > Lakes can't sue but people could. People can sue, for damages to the people, not to the lake.
- HeWhoLurksLate 8y ago
  > Corporations are people. Corporations are entities made up of people that have incorporated. Corporations are therefore supported by people. If the people aren't there, a corporation will fall. Forests don't need people, people need forests. To me, that would make them more important to protect than a corporation. For this reason, suing on behalf of a river seems quite reasonable to me if a corporation can, too.
  - dragonwriter 8y ago
    > Corporations are entities made up of people that have incorporated. No, corporations are legal persons created by law, with regard to which which other people (natural, non-natural legal, or a mix) are granted certain rights and privileges, by law. They aren't made up of people they are made up of laws.
  - Nasrudith 8y ago
    The problem isn't the importance but the practicalities - it is abundantly clear who has standing to sue on behalf of corporations and they have common interests. Who can claim to speak for a forrest and not be mere sophists? A hunter, hiker, and a lumberjack all have different interests in a forest. Unless it is privately owned in entirety there is nobody who can claim standing unless the standards are anarchic enough that literally anyone can sock-puppet the entity.
  - roenxi 8y ago
    > Forests don't need people, people need forests. Citation needed, your orders of magnitude are probably off. If we literally burned every tree that probably would be catastrophic, but most large corporate entities have created more net good than a given forest or lake. We rely on corporations for food and comfort, we rely on forests for ... maybe oxygen? But from a rationalist perspective, the ideal would be to identify how much forest cover is required and then convert the rest of the land to productive use. People don't choose to live in forests and visit cities. They choose to live in cities and visit forests. Cities are literally 100% corporate supported, from the infrastructure under the ground to to the tops of the skyscrapers. As far as I'm concerned, people who don't live in cities are disadvantaged by their lack of access to corporate support.

jerf 8y ago

"Corporations, and the government for that matter, are made up of people." And I'd emphasize, made of people who can have responsibilities. We can regulate a corporation, and the result is real people have to do real work or make real changes somewhere, or the regulation is meaningless. Treating a corporation like a big person makes sense in at least some ways. You may legislate all you like, but the river is not going to fill out an environmental impact statement in advance of its next flood. It's not a person. It can't have responsibilities.

munk-a 8y ago
A river is made up of those who live along it, a farmer that dumps manure into it is effecting it - similarly the community downstream has certain rights when it comes to their waterway, they may be farmers that purchased access to the waterway with their lands, or residents that purchased their property with an expectation of being able to swim or even a home owner who is pursuing damages against the flood of a river where an insurance company needs to determine if an upstream private party was responsible or the river itself. Basically, I agree with your statement that a river doesn't have personal rights or responsibilities but those people effected by mal-treatment of the river (including, if no one else advocates, a state/local government) should have the right to protect against unrestricted mistreatment. Nothing that isn't a natural person should be treated like a person, everything outside of an individual should have separately delineated rights afforded to it depending on the type of object it is. We can sanely fix this problem (and citizen's united) by just agreeing to shift some definitions.
- kortilla 8y ago
  Ugh, those aren’t rights though. There are also already protections for rivers enforced by governments (who have the rights to do so).

wolco 8y ago

Corporations are people. People work for corporations and hold roles. Lakes, rivers support people. Lakes can't sue but people could.

ucaetano 8y ago
> Lakes can't sue but people could. People can sue, for damages to the people, not to the lake.
HeWhoLurksLate 8y ago
> Corporations are people. Corporations are entities made up of people that have incorporated. Corporations are therefore supported by people. If the people aren't there, a corporation will fall. Forests don't need people, people need forests. To me, that would make them more important to protect than a corporation. For this reason, suing on behalf of a river seems quite reasonable to me if a corporation can, too.
- dragonwriter 8y ago
  > Corporations are entities made up of people that have incorporated. No, corporations are legal persons created by law, with regard to which which other people (natural, non-natural legal, or a mix) are granted certain rights and privileges, by law. They aren't made up of people they are made up of laws.
- Nasrudith 8y ago
  The problem isn't the importance but the practicalities - it is abundantly clear who has standing to sue on behalf of corporations and they have common interests. Who can claim to speak for a forrest and not be mere sophists? A hunter, hiker, and a lumberjack all have different interests in a forest. Unless it is privately owned in entirety there is nobody who can claim standing unless the standards are anarchic enough that literally anyone can sock-puppet the entity.
- roenxi 8y ago
  > Forests don't need people, people need forests. Citation needed, your orders of magnitude are probably off. If we literally burned every tree that probably would be catastrophic, but most large corporate entities have created more net good than a given forest or lake. We rely on corporations for food and comfort, we rely on forests for ... maybe oxygen? But from a rationalist perspective, the ideal would be to identify how much forest cover is required and then convert the rest of the land to productive use. People don't choose to live in forests and visit cities. They choose to live in cities and visit forests. Cities are literally 100% corporate supported, from the infrastructure under the ground to to the tops of the skyscrapers. As far as I'm concerned, people who don't live in cities are disadvantaged by their lack of access to corporate support.