ARE WE ENDOWED WITH CERTAIN UNALIENABLE RIGHTS?

Why not? Cause they are 'alienable'.

I would say we "ARE WE ENDOWED WITH CERTAIN INALIENABLE RIGHTS?" I have no idea what UNALIENABLE IS.

Yeah.

Not to be trite about it or anything, but among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

I think we came endowed with no rights at all, really.

We tend to create them in societies to some extent - presumably, I think, in an act of enlightened social self-interest - and it is possible that some altruistic behaviour is "hard-wired" in - at least in our behaviour towards our families and "pack" - since it appears to be evolutionarily a reasonable strategy.

"The Declaration of Independence
(Adopted in Congress 4 July 1776)

"The Unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen United States of America
When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.

...

"We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levey war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor."
============

BUT [ beatsthehell out of me whether God, or "Nature's God", or "our Creator", or "the Supreme Judge of the World", or "devine Providence" exists or not! ]

CONSEQUENTLY, I WOULD HAVE WRITTEN THE ABOVE PARTS OF THE DECLARATION DIFFERENTLY

The Unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen United States of America
When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which <their mutual enlightened self interests> entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold <it to be self-evident that it is in our enlightened mutual self-interest to equally endow all innocent mankind> certain unalienable rights. <Among these rights> are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among <mankind>, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.

...

We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, assembled, appealing to <our own sense of our self-evident mutual enlightened self-interests> for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levey war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on our mutual self-protection, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.

NOW LET US DEBATE!

Merriam Webster
www.m-w.com

Main Entry: un·alien·able
Pronunciation: "&n-'Al-y&-n&-b&l, -'A-lE-&-
Function: adjective
Date: 1611
: INALIENABLE

Main Entry: in·alien·able
Pronunciation: (")i-'nAl-y&-n&-b&l, -'nA-lE-&-n&-
Function: adjective
Etymology: probably from French inaliénable, from in- + aliénable alienable
Date: circa 1645
: incapable of being alienated, surrendered, or transferred <inalienable rights>
- in·alien·abil·i·ty /-"nAl-y&-n&-'bi-l&-tE, -"nA-lE-&-n&-/ noun
- in·alien·ably /-'nAl-y&-n&-blE, -'nA-lE-&-n&-/ adverb

Er, so? Not sure what you are saying by quoting that.

Does a declaration forming and reflecting some of the bases of a particular culture at a particular point in history say anything other than this is what those people believed was important? Or, at least what the wanted to declare they thought was important - not that I am knocking it - just remember the slaves and women and Native Americans etc had pretty alienated "rights", even as those lovely words were being spoken.

oh, sorry, didn't read your post fully Ican, thought you just quoted the original.

Who its said by or what their motivations in saying it were, is less important than the truth of what was said!




I disagree! These rights themselves were not alienated. The government of the United States did not at that time secure or adequately secure these unalienable/inalienable rights for all people.

The Declaration as I view it was a theory of an ideal way for people to relate to one another. Our Constitution as amended over time gradually corrected those failures of our government to live up to that ideal. See the 13th, 14th, 19th, 24th, and 26th amendments for confirmation of my claim. Time is always required for people to move closer to their ideal convictions. How are you doing?

According to this Webster definition, I'd say about the only unalienable right we are born with is the right to die, and even that is governed by societal laws so I'd amend that to say the only unalienable right we are born with is the right to die a natural death. And...that right is not even afforded to all humans.... so I guess the answer is, no, we do not have any unalienable rights obtained outside societal custom and agreement.

This of course assumes the "we" in your question does not exclude anyone who is not a US citizen.

1) We have no "unalienable rights." All of our rights are alienable -- no matter how nice that phrase may sound in the Declaration.

2) There is absolutely no reason to suppose any of the rights we have are the result of endowment -- most particularly, endowment by a "Creator."

3) It is my opinion that the framers of the Declaration of Independence used that term as a counterfoil to George III's supposed "divine right" to rule his subjects.

It was a rhetorical trick phrase, in my opinion, that said: If you assert a "divine right to rule us" -- we can assert a "divine right of unalienable rights."

4) It is my opinion that all of the "rights" we have -- we have gotten by demanding them for ourselves -- or by having other people demand them for us.

I think that in terms of the constitution, they were saying that these rights SHOULD be unalienable, not that they ARE. We don't have these rights under the evil Brits, but by golly, we WILL. That kinda thing.

I don't know....

...I understand you are trying to put the best possible face on it, Sozobe, but the wording is pretty clear -- and damn forceful.

They insist that we not only have unalienable rights -- but that we were endowed with those rights by "our Creator" -- and all of this is "self-evident."

Pretty strong stuff.

Right, but did they have all of those rights under the British? If they didn't, how are they unalienable? If they did, why the fuss?

first i suggest that u burn all the webster dictionaries u can find; & spend Bush's tax rebate on a nice new Oxford for every1 in the country!
then there will b no such nonsense as 'unalienable' 2 worry about.

what r rights?
they r what is earned by taking on responsibilities.

if 1 takes on the responsibility of being a member of a community; supporting, guarding, and improving that community to the best of 1's abilities, then that person should b able 2 count on certain rights from the members of that community;
2b allowed their personal freedom, to manage their affairs as they see fit so long as this does not put in jeopardy the freedoms of other members of the community. and these freedoms must b imune 2 any heirarchy of individual worth which might arise from variances in origin, sex, disposition, education, or heritage.
this is simply a fair and just agreement between members of a civilized community that believes that sharing the resources of this planet is the only wise long term manner of living together.

Ican - if you are stating a belief that in a reasonable civilisation those are reasonable rights for the state and citizenry to agree to attempt to uphold, well and good, they are ideals worth striving for - and we have no disagreement.

If you are stating that, by some strange process, we have those rights, in the world, naturally, then I think that what you are suggesting is simply wrong. (Although there was a popular philosophy at the time that held that we DID have "natural rights" - which is where a lot of the thought behind the Declaration came from, and a very important philosophy it was, too, in the west.)

Life? What is the attrition rate at birth and shortly after for human beings through most of prehistoric and recorded time. What was the early death rate through disease, starvation, childbirth, predation, war etc. What are those rates still, in more than half the world.

Liberty? How many serfs, villeins, slaves etc have there been? How many are still in those conditions? What right to liberty did women have (or do we now have) in many earlier times, or in some other countries?

The pursuit of happiness? Hmm - if you have time, leisure etc. Otherwise the pursuit of survival took up most of human time, and I suppose we found some happiness in being able to achieve that, and in moments of relaxation and fulness and such.

What do you mean by inalienable? Clearly something different than I, or Craven for that matter, mean - since Craven's simple, logical statement that they cannot be inalienable, since they are constantly alienated would have been sufficient to convince you that they are not inalienable at all!

I certainly agree that they should, in general, be TREATED as though they are inalienable - with exceptions like depriving extremely dangerous, un-rehabilitable, people of liberty, in order to try to assist the "rights" of the rest of us from being alienated more often than we can help.

ARE WE ENDOWED WITH CERTAIN UNALIENABLE RIGHTS?
NO.

Dlowan wrote:

I think we came endowed with no rights at all, really.

We tend to create them in societies to some extent - presumably, I think, in an act of enlightened social self-interest - and it is possible that some altruistic behaviour is "hard-wired" in - at least in our behaviour towards our families and "pack" - since it appears to be evolutionarily a reasonable strategy.

Quite right Bunny---we have only those rights which the society in which we live wants us to have and ---AND the one thing that all you good people have carefully avoided----- what the ENFORCERS of that society are capable of providing.

Altruism means nothing without the means to enforce it.

good point; perception!