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There’s no distinction in the UNDHR between negative and positive rights [1]. Many people (especially, but not only libertarians) don’t regard positive rights a

There’s no distinction in the UNDHR between negative and positive rights [1]. Many people (especially, but not only libertarians) don’t regard positive rights as true human rights. They may be human 'goods' but they are not human 'rights'. They would agree with Articles 1 to 21, but disagree with Articles 22 to 30. Personally I think human rights are largely a legal fiction anyway — they are invented, not natural. “inalienable rights” and “born free and equal in dignity and rights” are a pretty fantasy. (Also by the way, Article 26.1 “Elementary education shall be compulsory” directly contradicts Article 3 “Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.”) 1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_and_positive_rights https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_and_positive_rights

mindslight 3y ago
Positive/negative rights is a useful distinction when talking about concrete implementation details, but its utility fades when talking about what ought to be where it tends to get put forth axiomatically. Layered complexity creates logical contradictions, whereby even though a right might not be specifically infringed in the negative sense, it still has been effectively nullified constructively. This list is not meant as a basic legal implementation, but rather is useful as a list of metrics for evaluating societal outcomes. Thus it's less important whether its ideals have been arrived at by explicit government guarantee, or through free association and general prosperity.
rayiner 3y ago
If you don’t believe in a higher power, “rights” are a pure social construct. Both positive rights and negative rights are nothing more than what people with guns are willing to do for you.
- skissane 3y ago
  I disagree that the issue is actually about a "higher power" (theism). It is really about naturalism. I'm sceptical of claims that anyone can convincingly ground objective ethics in naturalism. But, there are also non-naturalist atheisms (e.g. some versions of Buddhism, the British idealist philosopher John McTaggart) – and whether non-naturalist atheism can successfully ground objective ethics is a very different, and largely independent, question.
  - rayiner 3y ago
    I don’t know if I understand the difference you’re trying to articulate. The enlightenment concept of individual “natural rights” arose in the context of Christianity. The existence of a supernatural order provides a logical basis for the concept of rights. I think you need some notion of a supernatural order—maybe it looks quite different from Christianity or Islam—for the concept of rights to make sense. If you really believe that we’re meatbags and experiencing various chemical interactions as consciousness, what’s the basis for saying that bag of meat has “rights?”
    - skissane 3y ago
      > The enlightenment concept of individual “natural rights” arose in the context of Christianity "Natural rights" arose out of the natural law tradition, which is often said to have first been clearly expressed by Aquinas. But Aquinas drew heavily on pagan ancient Greek thinkers (especially Aristotle), and also Islamic and Jewish philosophy. Even though it arose in a Christian context, it was never essentially Christian, I think it is better viewed as part of the classical Western philosophical tradition which transcends the boundaries between ancient Paganism, Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Indeed, Aquinas' views on this have a lot of overlap with those of the Māturīdī school of Sunni theology. And even though Aquinas was a Christian (indeed, a Catholic monk and priest), his theories about "natural law" are not inherently theistic. He claims that every natural being (all animals and plants, even inanimate natural objects such as rocks or stars) has an essence, a nature – and that, in the case of human beings, our essence/nature implies the existence of certain objective moral rights and duties. Of course, Aquinas believes that God created that essence/nature, and that it is somehow a limited reflection of God's essence/nature – but those further theistic claims are not essential to his natural law theory as such. A person could rationally believe in a human essence/nature, and that ethics can be objectively grounded in it, without believing in God. Hence, the real problem with contemporary naturalist atheism, is not its atheism as such, it is its anti-essentialism, the rejection of the Platonic/Aristotelian idea of a really existent human nature. > I think you need some notion of a supernatural order—maybe it looks quite different from Christianity or Islam—for the concept of rights to make sense Buddhists traditionally ground ethics in the Buddhist dharma, which is asserted to be timeless, eternal. The natural-vs-supernatural distinction is a Western concept which is alien to traditional Buddhism, but traditional Buddhist accounts of "dharma" are very hard to square with modern naturalism. Of course, there are some contemporary Buddhists who will try, but they end up producing something which has significant differences from Buddhism as it was traditionally understood. But, Buddhists also reject any concept of any ultimate God – Buddhism traditionally accepts the polytheistic gods of Hinduism as real, but views them as finite, limited, mortal entities – and hence they are atheists with respect to the ultimate God of the Abrahamic religions. > If you really believe that we’re meatbags and experiencing various chemical interactions as consciousness, what’s the basis for saying that bag of meat has “rights?” I agree. But my point is, the ethical difficulties of that viewpoint are due to its naturalism/materialism/physicalism, rather than its atheism per se.
himinlomax 3y ago
> Personally I think human rights are largely a legal fiction anyway — they are invented, not natural Whatever you mean, that applies to anything that could be called a right, not just "human" rights.
skissane 3y ago
> Many people (especially, but not only libertarians) don’t regard positive rights as true human rights. They may be human 'goods' but they are not human 'rights' People can "regard" anything as anything, but why should anyone else care what they "regard"? > Personally I think human rights are largely a legal fiction anyway — they are invented, not natural Some schools of jurisprudence – e.g. legal positivism, legal realism – view law as fundamentally disconnected from ethics: either ethics is subjective, or even if it is somehow objective, it is a separate sphere with no inherent legal relevance. That seems to align with your claim that human rights law is "invented, not natural"–but, what then makes it a "legal fiction"? We speak of corporate personhood as a "legal fiction" because we are taking a term "person" and stretching it far beyond its non-legal meaning; I don't think "human rights", even under a positivist/realist reading, involves any such stretching. Conversely, other schools – e.g. natural law theory – presuppose the existence of objective ethics, and view law's fundamental purpose as to serve ethics (even if inevitably imperfectly). From that perspective, humans have ethical rights and duties, natural law rights and duties; and human rights law, as a field of positive law, should be judged on the basis of how well it conforms to natural law. > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_and_positive_rights https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_and_positive_rights That is an example of a terribly written Wikipedia article. It speaks of "positive rights" being "initially proposed in 1979 by the Czech jurist Karel Vašák", but then goes on to quote 19th century philosopher Frédéric Bastiat discussing them. As usual, Stanford has a much better article – https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberty-positive-negative/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberty-positive-negative... – which says that the "The idea of distinguishing between a negative and a positive sense of the term ‘liberty’ goes back at least to Kant..." – although leaving open the question of whether "positive vs negative liberty" and "positive vs negative rights" are synonymous or distinct.
- perilunar 3y ago
  > People can "regard" anything as anything, but why should anyone else care what they "regard”? Why indeed? Why, for example, did you write several paragraphs about it and link to a long article about philosophers’ opinions? Why should anyone care what you or they think? Clearly people do care, not least because the UDHR comes from the UN, and if it is not as universal as it purports to be, then why would we expect countries to respect it?

mindslight 3y ago

Positive/negative rights is a useful distinction when talking about concrete implementation details, but its utility fades when talking about what ought to be where it tends to get put forth axiomatically. Layered complexity creates logical contradictions, whereby even though a right might not be specifically infringed in the negative sense, it still has been effectively nullified constructively. This list is not meant as a basic legal implementation, but rather is useful as a list of metrics for evaluating societal outcomes. Thus it's less important whether its ideals have been arrived at by explicit government guarantee, or through free association and general prosperity.

rayiner 3y ago

If you don’t believe in a higher power, “rights” are a pure social construct. Both positive rights and negative rights are nothing more than what people with guns are willing to do for you.

skissane 3y ago
I disagree that the issue is actually about a "higher power" (theism). It is really about naturalism. I'm sceptical of claims that anyone can convincingly ground objective ethics in naturalism. But, there are also non-naturalist atheisms (e.g. some versions of Buddhism, the British idealist philosopher John McTaggart) – and whether non-naturalist atheism can successfully ground objective ethics is a very different, and largely independent, question.
- rayiner 3y ago
  I don’t know if I understand the difference you’re trying to articulate. The enlightenment concept of individual “natural rights” arose in the context of Christianity. The existence of a supernatural order provides a logical basis for the concept of rights. I think you need some notion of a supernatural order—maybe it looks quite different from Christianity or Islam—for the concept of rights to make sense. If you really believe that we’re meatbags and experiencing various chemical interactions as consciousness, what’s the basis for saying that bag of meat has “rights?”
  - skissane 3y ago
    > The enlightenment concept of individual “natural rights” arose in the context of Christianity "Natural rights" arose out of the natural law tradition, which is often said to have first been clearly expressed by Aquinas. But Aquinas drew heavily on pagan ancient Greek thinkers (especially Aristotle), and also Islamic and Jewish philosophy. Even though it arose in a Christian context, it was never essentially Christian, I think it is better viewed as part of the classical Western philosophical tradition which transcends the boundaries between ancient Paganism, Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Indeed, Aquinas' views on this have a lot of overlap with those of the Māturīdī school of Sunni theology. And even though Aquinas was a Christian (indeed, a Catholic monk and priest), his theories about "natural law" are not inherently theistic. He claims that every natural being (all animals and plants, even inanimate natural objects such as rocks or stars) has an essence, a nature – and that, in the case of human beings, our essence/nature implies the existence of certain objective moral rights and duties. Of course, Aquinas believes that God created that essence/nature, and that it is somehow a limited reflection of God's essence/nature – but those further theistic claims are not essential to his natural law theory as such. A person could rationally believe in a human essence/nature, and that ethics can be objectively grounded in it, without believing in God. Hence, the real problem with contemporary naturalist atheism, is not its atheism as such, it is its anti-essentialism, the rejection of the Platonic/Aristotelian idea of a really existent human nature. > I think you need some notion of a supernatural order—maybe it looks quite different from Christianity or Islam—for the concept of rights to make sense Buddhists traditionally ground ethics in the Buddhist dharma, which is asserted to be timeless, eternal. The natural-vs-supernatural distinction is a Western concept which is alien to traditional Buddhism, but traditional Buddhist accounts of "dharma" are very hard to square with modern naturalism. Of course, there are some contemporary Buddhists who will try, but they end up producing something which has significant differences from Buddhism as it was traditionally understood. But, Buddhists also reject any concept of any ultimate God – Buddhism traditionally accepts the polytheistic gods of Hinduism as real, but views them as finite, limited, mortal entities – and hence they are atheists with respect to the ultimate God of the Abrahamic religions. > If you really believe that we’re meatbags and experiencing various chemical interactions as consciousness, what’s the basis for saying that bag of meat has “rights?” I agree. But my point is, the ethical difficulties of that viewpoint are due to its naturalism/materialism/physicalism, rather than its atheism per se.

himinlomax 3y ago

> Personally I think human rights are largely a legal fiction anyway — they are invented, not natural Whatever you mean, that applies to anything that could be called a right, not just "human" rights.

skissane 3y ago

> Many people (especially, but not only libertarians) don’t regard positive rights as true human rights. They may be human 'goods' but they are not human 'rights' People can "regard" anything as anything, but why should anyone else care what they "regard"? > Personally I think human rights are largely a legal fiction anyway — they are invented, not natural Some schools of jurisprudence – e.g. legal positivism, legal realism – view law as fundamentally disconnected from ethics: either ethics is subjective, or even if it is somehow objective, it is a separate sphere with no inherent legal relevance. That seems to align with your claim that human rights law is "invented, not natural"–but, what then makes it a "legal fiction"? We speak of corporate personhood as a "legal fiction" because we are taking a term "person" and stretching it far beyond its non-legal meaning; I don't think "human rights", even under a positivist/realist reading, involves any such stretching. Conversely, other schools – e.g. natural law theory – presuppose the existence of objective ethics, and view law's fundamental purpose as to serve ethics (even if inevitably imperfectly). From that perspective, humans have ethical rights and duties, natural law rights and duties; and human rights law, as a field of positive law, should be judged on the basis of how well it conforms to natural law. > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_and_positive_rights https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_and_positive_rights That is an example of a terribly written Wikipedia article. It speaks of "positive rights" being "initially proposed in 1979 by the Czech jurist Karel Vašák", but then goes on to quote 19th century philosopher Frédéric Bastiat discussing them. As usual, Stanford has a much better article – https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberty-positive-negative/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberty-positive-negative... – which says that the "The idea of distinguishing between a negative and a positive sense of the term ‘liberty’ goes back at least to Kant..." – although leaving open the question of whether "positive vs negative liberty" and "positive vs negative rights" are synonymous or distinct.

perilunar 3y ago
> People can "regard" anything as anything, but why should anyone else care what they "regard”? Why indeed? Why, for example, did you write several paragraphs about it and link to a long article about philosophers’ opinions? Why should anyone care what you or they think? Clearly people do care, not least because the UDHR comes from the UN, and if it is not as universal as it purports to be, then why would we expect countries to respect it?