What is a Right?

Well I'm going to bed.After I've been to the pub I mean.

o.k , be a good boy and dont drink too much then.

What about this thought: An immoral action is the act of violating someone's rights. So rights are the things that are trampled when an immoral act takes place.

In this sense, I don't think it is immoral to keep hens caged, since the hen is not a sentient being. I admit that they feel stimulus, but I do not think that it is a defensible position to say that they suffer. If the hen were sentient (sentient = capacity for suffering) then it would be immoral to use them like we do. As it stands, chickens do not have the mental capacity to know what suffering is. I contend that we have domesticated them to the point that they have the same rights as insects, which almost no one defends in these kinds of debates. (sorry, a little tangent there). If you can prove that chickens suffer more than insects, then I may change my mind.

Fred, I think your first paragraph is a perfect example of circular reasoning.

Right is all the matter of each individuals opinion on it.

Now, do we enjoy the rights of our freedoms today? Most do. However, do we think it was right for Christopher Columbus or other past adventurers(killers) to massacre the indians to help lead the way to how we colonized the usa?? If you were an indian back then, you wouldn't think it was "right."

Is it right for a tiger to attack a baby doe and tear it apart and eat it? You'll say that's nature. When America attacks Iraq, and 100,000's innocent men, women, and children, who had done absolutely nothing bad to america, the innocent people die in bombs, is that our nature?

So as long as it's considered "nature," it's right? If you were one of those innocent Iraqi men, women and children, do you think it was right?

Right has a lot to do on which side your on. I think our "egos" tend to project things in our own perspective on how our own lives have gone and how we handle them and how it turned out.

Who knows?

Roger: I wasn't using the second sentence to back up the first, I was merely restating. I couldn't figure out a way to word the sentence without saying it twice. Besides, if you make a definition it doesn't matter what order you say it.

Violation of rights = immoral action.
Immoral action = violation of rights.

I still don't know if this makes any sense, but I disagree that it is circular. (Whew) I feel better.

The Pentacle Queen

I think that we all, human beings, have the same rights. The fact that they are not respected - in Africa, in your example - doesn't mean africans have no rights. It does mean that their rights are not respected and they must fight for them, against corrupt governments.

Perhaps it is impossible a perfect world to exist. The same as a perfect knowledge. But that is different from saying: "if we can't reach a situation were all human rights are respect, then let's forget those rights". You must fight for them, as many human beings have done along History.

But, the simple fact that most people today accept that all human beings have the same basic rights is already an improvement. Two hundred years ago that would be impossible, regarding women, blacks, yellows, indians.

good points.

fred, although battery hens may not understand what suffering is, they still feel pain do they not?

Queenie:-

I don't know how you can be bothered arguing with somebody who thinks battery hens can be defended on moral grounds.Or any grounds.They are a disgusting outcrop of greed and selfishness.I have been in a few units of that type and if they don't suffer you need a different definition of suffer than the one I am used to.

Doesn't the concept of right indicate something about fairness? It is subjective, but it's easier to agree about some concepts of fairness than others.

I'm not sure what you're saying here. I can't tell if you are against the current treatment of battery hens or not. I disagree with you that the battery hens are a disgusting outcrop of greed and selfishness though.

The second yes. As for the first, I'm not attracted to five year olds... perhaps if I were.

Hi can I just ask:
has there actually been any points of view put forward by logical positivist philosophers about this? any definitions?

if you do know please post here.

Queenie-

You could try A.J.Ayer's Truth and Logic or

Readings in the Philosophy of Science by Feigl and Brodbeck or

Jorgensen's The Development of Logical Positivism.

For a quick go Prof Fotion's entry in The Oxford Companion To Philosophy.

That should keep you quiet for a bit.

When AJ was alive it was a bit risky for young ladies to approach him with philosophy questions as he usually began acting like a missionary.

My two pennies:

Moral 'rights', as many before have said, are a made up concept. Further, I don't think they are a very useful concept. Anyone can claim a right to anything. Worse, when 'rights' are used in a moral system, there seems to be a tendency to conjure up arbitrary qualities one must possess in order to be said to have rights - like 'maleness', 'whiteness' or 'human-ness'. Ughh.

Instead, I prefer to think in terms of interests. For example, I have an interest in being alive, in not feeling pain, etc. Interests can be weighed against one another, for example, my interest in getting rid of someone who irritates me is clearly less than their interest in being alive. If you are very bored and are interested in my moral position, see the utilitarianism thread.

Just have to comment on this, though:

What do you mean 'do not have the mental capacity to know what suffering is'? If you mean 'do not feel pain', then I think you are just wrong. To my knowledge, scientific research on the subject has turned up fairly conclusive evidence that animals such as chickens, fish, etc. do feel pain. Would such research change your mind?

I don't know if insects feel pain, perhaps research is being done on it. By the way, can you prove that you suffer more than insects? Your 'rights' may depend on it...

I fully agree.