Things I Have Learned:
Given our different natures and environment, what I have learned is not likely what someone else has learned. Still, the question begs an answer: What is life really about? Early in life it is about learning how to stay alive and communication. In youth and our productive years life is mostly about excitement. We are attracted to excitement, we thrive on it. Finally, in our terminational years we seek contentment, not excitement.
When all is said and done, what is life really about, what do we really seek? Perhaps it boils down to contentment. Early on we think contentment will come via learning, then excitement, love, power and wealth. I don't know if there is any kind of genuine test that can measure personal contentment. But contentment is the goal all of us seek to achieve, while maybe what brings contentment varies. It starts with the realization that human intelligence has limitations, that our comprehension of life is limited.
At any rate, the goal of life is contentment. So it boils down to what factors generate contentment? Good health is necessary for contentment. Those who understand the importance of good health early in life are more likely to be content in later life because they protected their health. Ethics may not be as obvious, but I put ethics right up there if one is to be contented. An appreciation of nature I put here also because we are all a part of nature, and if we cannot appreciate this aspect of our life, we cannot be content wallowing in ignorance about our earth's environment. Tolerance of diversity, or rather the appreciation of diversity, is a key factor affecting our level of contentment. A more complicated factor is the extent to which one becomes dependent on others for contentment.
Finally, one needs to reach some objective understanding of one's self. Self evaluation is crucial. You can make mistakes about others, but failure to understand yourself is fatal to contentment.
Personally, I have never been as contented as at the present time. The puzzle, for me, is basically complete. Of course time is running out, but I don't really fear the end, however far off it may be. If I can manage to control my own dying process I am home free. But let's look at the individual factors which determine the level of contentment a person achieves.
The health aspect is obvious and needs little enlightenment. I always am amazed at how many intelligent people run outrageous risks with their health. But discipline seems a real wild card in our genetic makeup. To complicate things further some people are real disciplined with certain aspects of their life and loose with other aspects. I suppose we can always blame it on someone's lack of willpower, but that implies we all start on a level field with 'willpower'. There is no evidence this is true. As is so often with our strengths and weaknesses, a good amount of luck is involved----good or bad.
Ethics is a more interesting factor of contentedness. I have, over time, rejected the notion that we learn ethics from our inherited religious scripture. Rather, it now seems obvious to me that inherited religious scripture can be used in a positive or negative way to bolster our inherent understanding of right and wrong. Organized religious sects can be used to strengthen our resolve to do right instead of wrong, or they can be used to justify wrong. It is always too easy to justify wrong actions and beliefs if we can convince ourselves it is "God's will". Every crime and unethical practice imaginable has been committed under the umbrella of God's will.
There are two basic tenets to my understanding of ethics. First, the inherent human understanding of right and wrong is the Golden Rule: "do unto others as you would have them do unto you." All people everywhere understand this unless they are psychopaths and just lack this capability. This simple universal concept is the basis for almost all ethics. Any deviation from this is simply wrong. My second adopted tenet over time is that when you skirt the Golden Rule by using scripture or rituals or prayer or sectarian dogmas and traditions to do wrong---when you do this, you cannot be a contented person. How many of those on the religious right of any religion---the so called purists---are happy campers in life? Whenever they express themselves about issues you can feel the heat of their anger towards their targets. What radiates most from these religious purists is their deep sense of intolerance to human diversity. I don't think it is possible to be a contented person when diversity is not seen in a positive light. If there is anything that stands out most from God's created evolutionary process it is diversity. When one opposes this diversity, and disrespects this diversity, one is out of alignment with the very process which generated our own existence.
Thus, to my way of thinking, contentment can only come from two aspects of diversity. First, one needs to genuinely appreciate and welcome diversity. Second, one needs to defend and protect those victims who are persecuted or given second class treatment or subjected to character assassination by those with little tolerance of diversity. To accept and defend diversity is to be content. To do otherwise---to reject and attack---is to be discontented.
Appreciating diversity does not give anyone the right to break the Golden Rule. All diverse races, cultures, religious groups, political groups, social groups, etc. are all still bound by the Golden Rule. After that they are free, free as all should be to have diverse personalities, diverse beliefs, diverse political notions, diverse cultural dress, customs, etc. When Barack talks about our commonality I interpret this to really mean the Golden Rule. That is the human commonality when it comes to ethics. And ethics is one of the kingpins for contentment.
All of us exist in earth's environment. We can, and often do, try to elevate ourselves to some sort of special place in the evolutionary process, creating an image of God which gives us dominion over other species, license to abuse natural resources, and direct personal connections to God. This, to my way of thinking, is a big mistake. You are just setting yourself up for endless frustration when God 'betrays' your trust and things don't go your way. Of course then we invent all kinds of explanations for this betrayal: God is testing us, God works in mysterious ways, all will be for the best in the end---and the end, if necessary, will be Heaven as a reward for any torment you may suffer during your life. Of course each person is entitled to beliefs which at least conform to the Golden Rule. But believing in an image of God described above does not very often generate contentment. Rather, it is very frustrating. And certainly if God was personally on anyone's side, good things would happen to good people and bad things to bad people. If reality tells us anything, it certainly debunks that notion.
I don't know how often, if ever, God tampers with evolutionary laws, the laws which have driven the process for millions of years. I don't know how many times, if ever, God answers any prayers for Him to interfere. We certainly know that many times he certainly does not entertain the best of prayers or protect the best of people from the laws of evolution. The evolutionary process is brilliant and good in the big picture. The more we understand the nature of this process, including the randomness involved, the better we can accept any 'bad luck' in our lives. Humans, at this stage in the process, have the ability to create a certain amount of good luck and avoid some bad luck. Size once dominated the earth. Now 'brains' dominates the earth but alarm bells are going off from all directions that our brains might be our downfall. The notion that God likes or favors us over other species is at best an assumption. I happen to have liked all my pets over the years. I liked them a lot. I am not too receptive to any notions that my pets can be mistreated in any way because they are not as elevated in the evolutionary scale. When humans mistreat other species I find it hard to believe God is amused any more than I would be amused if my pets were being mistreated. I mean, go ahead and chop the head off of any pet I have had and see if I shoot you. For me, spending time alone in nature, or at the very least in nature with someone you are really close to, helps me bond with the evolutionary process, and keep a lot of things in perspective. All the gadgets and creations by humans pale in comparison to the complexities, beauty, and wonder of nature. Mother Nature is our reality of existence. For me, separation from nature is a disaster for my state of contentment. Imbedded in nature your thoughts and feelings are the purest and clearest and it is then that contentment settles in the most. I love nature and am saddened to see what humans are doing to it. If what we are doing to nature is not wrong, nothing is wrong. If overpopulation and the subsequent abuse to nature is not wrong, nothing is wrong.
Successful relationships with others contributes to contentment. But too much dependency on others is seldom a good thing. When a person becomes dependent on others for contentment----literally dependent on others to the extent others gain control over his/her contentment---this is most often a mistake. It is a mistake because relationships are rarely etched in stone. People change with time, people relocate, people die, get divorced, or friendships end. When this normal pattern of life occurs and bonds are broken, the basis for contentment should not be lost, and if it is lost, the relationship in the long run failed. No matter the depth of the relationship, it should not be the end all sort of relationship, or future contentment becomes endangered. When you depend on others for contentment you have lost control over contentment. This is not to say others do not contribute to contentment for they certainly do. The trick is to not let too much of your own contentment depend on others.
To me, we all die a little bit when relationships end---whether the relationship be human or a pet. Kids are going to leave the nest, adults often get divorced, friendships end, pets die, people die. Those who build everything around such relationships have nothing left to sustain contentment if they end. "What am I going to do now?" is not a dumb question. But the question should have been asked from the start. These kind of relationships are bonuses, the icing on the cake, but never the substance upon which lasting contentment endures. All the death do we part nonsense is ignorance of human nature. Of course 'till death' may happen, but even then, at some point, one is left alone when the other dies. Each person becomes independent of personal relationships their own way. Often the best marriages are those in which this independence is evident. The choking kind of relationships are unhealthy from a mental standpoint, and they are quite risky. Someone or both are going to pay dearly at some point in time. The end of relationships does not have to be catastrophic in nature, nor do they have to be seeped in blame. This has nothing to do with the depth of sadness at the parting. It is idiotic not to understand the magnitude of the loss, or value the good it brought to your own contentment for the time it lasted. Genuine relationships are good, whether short or long. Genuine relationships contribute to contentment. These genuine relationships can occupy brief periods of your day or long periods of your day. They may only occur in spurts or on planned occasions. Let's put it this way, one should not put all their eggs in one basket. If he/she has no identity outside of the identity others give to him/her, he/she can never be consistently contented. The smaller one's world the least likely any kind of real contentment for any length of time.
Buddhist philosophy states: "Listen, if you accept something it never becomes a load; the wound is not carried. Remember one thing: Anything incomplete is carried by the mind forever. Anything complete is dropped. Mind has a tendency to carry the incomplete things in the hope that some day there may be an opportunity to complete them. You are still waiting for the wife to come back or for the days that have gone." It is hard to be content if you cannot let contentious relationships drop and move on. Tippy-toeing around each other in any kind of relationship ensures endless annoyance and frustration for both. Again Buddhist philosophy states: "If you expect permanency in a world where everything is impermanent, you will create worry. Anything that is born is going to die. Birth implies death, so it is okay, nothing can be done about it."
The God created process of evolution moves on, not as we dictate (especially in our own personal lives), but as the evolutionary laws dictate. Humans have the ability to affect some aspects of our personal lives, this is our gift of 'freedom', and some of us use this 'freedom' better than others. Life is an opportunity wrapped in a good deal of luck (chance) and the goal is to maximize contentment under our individual circumstances. All of the above is just my own interpretation of how contentment is reached.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
TOO LATE FOR 'YES WE CAN?'
Too Late For 'Yes We Can'?
I was an early supporter of Mr. 'Yes We Can" and I don't know whether I like the first, middle or last name the best. He is, most came to realize, among the best of us in intellect, personality, patience, and judgment. The comparisons with Abraham LIncoln are not without merit. One day in his shoes, with his schedule, and with his responsibilities would require, for me, a week of rest. And of course, even at my best, my interrelationships with others would be more like the subtleties of a Terrell Owens.
One characteristic of God's evolutionary process is the slowness of it. Eons of time pass and there is no reason to believe eons more time will not pass as the process lumbers on, not in any straight line, but with spurts and plateaus, species eliminations, regressive lines, sudden catastrophes, and yet---when all is said and done---this process is the work of a creative genius, which in whatever form we imagine Him or Her or Whatever---is God.
The tragedy, as I see it, is that Obama may have arrived on the scene too late. He should have have arrived 20 years ago---instead we got Reagan. Not that I was any brighter back then than others, he was a likable chap, pleasant, folksy, and had this sing song manner about him which made all of us proud about the wrong things, indifferent to important matters, and could make mobs of people believe in fairy tales, like the trickle down theory and that people most inclined, with the most ability to make money, could be trusted to police themselves. The scam worked, with little dips here and there, for like 20 years with deft uses of smoke and mirrors.
The problem is, as we all danced to Reagan's folksy oral fiddle, all the problems now facing us slowly progressed, as evolutionary laws always do, and while the band played on, the seeds of catastrophe for more and more of humanity were spread. It became, by any measure, the best of times for some and the worst of times for more and more. There was a time in evolution when size mattered. It mattered a lot. The dinosaurs reigned and it seemed they would reign for ever. How could dinosaurs disappear? Well, they did. Today brains matter more than size. Humans have spread over the earth like locusts, devouring everything in sight, including natural resources and species in our way. In our wake we have left depleted natural resources, eliminated thousands of species, polluted our waters, our sky, our soil, and in the process tampered with our climate, species diversity, and generated human population levels which exceed the ability of our planet to enable all people to live a lifestyle now reserved for the few. The game is up. We know it now, at least some of us---not the Rush Limbaugh types---the troughs from which they voraciously feed have never been fuller and their oinking never so loud. They have this illusion that God has personally blessed them (for what is hard to imagine) and feeling possessed by God's spirit and understanding, they become pompous self serving pigs at the trough, feeling more than assured than ever that they have earned their blessings.
I can no more predict the future with any more exactness than anyone else, but I have written about all this coming down the pike for more than 20 years now. Not that I was alone with predicting this, and in fact, none of my thoughts were original. If I have shown any foresight at all it came through the eyes of those far more knowledgeable than I. Some people are original thinkers, I just steal from the insights of others via a lot of reading. To think a lot about life and 'big pictures' probably requires one to be a loner, to enjoy solitude, and nature, and observing things without the noisy clatter of company. I often remark that I never feel less alone than when alone in nature or tilted back in my recliner looking out from the 11th floor. So much of everything in life seems mysterious and beyond comprehension while maybe too much of life seems, upon labored reflection, too real. There is certainly more sadness than merry contentment, and increasingly more people living lives of quiet desperation.
When Obama say 'Yes We Can', I feel hope but down inside I fear it might be a stupid hope. I say this because it may be too late. We could stop the pollution of the atmosphere right now, today, on a dime, and the climate would still change. It took centuries for us to get to this point and it will take centuries to correct it. In the mean time climate will change and people will suffer. It took centuries for the world to become overpopulated with humans, and we could implement mandatory responsible reproductive practices today, and the world would remain overpopulated for a century or more. And therein lies the catch 22. All the human behavior traits which accompany overpopulation, including wars, genocides, terrorism, refugee camps, etc. will increasingly prey upon all of us until chaos prevails---and more and more people begin to live like those on the West Bank, in the hills of Afghanistan, the streets of Baghdad, the communities of our own urban and rural ghettoes, most of Africa, South American, the Middle East, the Near East, etc. We may finally know what we need to do, but where is the TIME to do this going to come from? Man is the first species with the theoretical ability to avert evolutionary disasters, but in reality, this ability may be too limited, too late, too little.
We may have played with fate too long and Mother Nature is now at bat. On the other hand the neatest thing about human preedictive intelligence is how limited it really is. So maybe, all these reasoned out fears I expound on can still be averted, at least for a remnant of the human species. Whatever, WE go---TIME stays. Say good-night Gracie.
I was an early supporter of Mr. 'Yes We Can" and I don't know whether I like the first, middle or last name the best. He is, most came to realize, among the best of us in intellect, personality, patience, and judgment. The comparisons with Abraham LIncoln are not without merit. One day in his shoes, with his schedule, and with his responsibilities would require, for me, a week of rest. And of course, even at my best, my interrelationships with others would be more like the subtleties of a Terrell Owens.
One characteristic of God's evolutionary process is the slowness of it. Eons of time pass and there is no reason to believe eons more time will not pass as the process lumbers on, not in any straight line, but with spurts and plateaus, species eliminations, regressive lines, sudden catastrophes, and yet---when all is said and done---this process is the work of a creative genius, which in whatever form we imagine Him or Her or Whatever---is God.
The tragedy, as I see it, is that Obama may have arrived on the scene too late. He should have have arrived 20 years ago---instead we got Reagan. Not that I was any brighter back then than others, he was a likable chap, pleasant, folksy, and had this sing song manner about him which made all of us proud about the wrong things, indifferent to important matters, and could make mobs of people believe in fairy tales, like the trickle down theory and that people most inclined, with the most ability to make money, could be trusted to police themselves. The scam worked, with little dips here and there, for like 20 years with deft uses of smoke and mirrors.
The problem is, as we all danced to Reagan's folksy oral fiddle, all the problems now facing us slowly progressed, as evolutionary laws always do, and while the band played on, the seeds of catastrophe for more and more of humanity were spread. It became, by any measure, the best of times for some and the worst of times for more and more. There was a time in evolution when size mattered. It mattered a lot. The dinosaurs reigned and it seemed they would reign for ever. How could dinosaurs disappear? Well, they did. Today brains matter more than size. Humans have spread over the earth like locusts, devouring everything in sight, including natural resources and species in our way. In our wake we have left depleted natural resources, eliminated thousands of species, polluted our waters, our sky, our soil, and in the process tampered with our climate, species diversity, and generated human population levels which exceed the ability of our planet to enable all people to live a lifestyle now reserved for the few. The game is up. We know it now, at least some of us---not the Rush Limbaugh types---the troughs from which they voraciously feed have never been fuller and their oinking never so loud. They have this illusion that God has personally blessed them (for what is hard to imagine) and feeling possessed by God's spirit and understanding, they become pompous self serving pigs at the trough, feeling more than assured than ever that they have earned their blessings.
I can no more predict the future with any more exactness than anyone else, but I have written about all this coming down the pike for more than 20 years now. Not that I was alone with predicting this, and in fact, none of my thoughts were original. If I have shown any foresight at all it came through the eyes of those far more knowledgeable than I. Some people are original thinkers, I just steal from the insights of others via a lot of reading. To think a lot about life and 'big pictures' probably requires one to be a loner, to enjoy solitude, and nature, and observing things without the noisy clatter of company. I often remark that I never feel less alone than when alone in nature or tilted back in my recliner looking out from the 11th floor. So much of everything in life seems mysterious and beyond comprehension while maybe too much of life seems, upon labored reflection, too real. There is certainly more sadness than merry contentment, and increasingly more people living lives of quiet desperation.
When Obama say 'Yes We Can', I feel hope but down inside I fear it might be a stupid hope. I say this because it may be too late. We could stop the pollution of the atmosphere right now, today, on a dime, and the climate would still change. It took centuries for us to get to this point and it will take centuries to correct it. In the mean time climate will change and people will suffer. It took centuries for the world to become overpopulated with humans, and we could implement mandatory responsible reproductive practices today, and the world would remain overpopulated for a century or more. And therein lies the catch 22. All the human behavior traits which accompany overpopulation, including wars, genocides, terrorism, refugee camps, etc. will increasingly prey upon all of us until chaos prevails---and more and more people begin to live like those on the West Bank, in the hills of Afghanistan, the streets of Baghdad, the communities of our own urban and rural ghettoes, most of Africa, South American, the Middle East, the Near East, etc. We may finally know what we need to do, but where is the TIME to do this going to come from? Man is the first species with the theoretical ability to avert evolutionary disasters, but in reality, this ability may be too limited, too late, too little.
We may have played with fate too long and Mother Nature is now at bat. On the other hand the neatest thing about human preedictive intelligence is how limited it really is. So maybe, all these reasoned out fears I expound on can still be averted, at least for a remnant of the human species. Whatever, WE go---TIME stays. Say good-night Gracie.
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Human Rights
Human Rights
The most famous statement on human rights is the 'right' to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness". I guess one starts with what exactly does the word 'right' mean? For example, who exactly establishes a 'right'? I suppose one could answer God but this is a meaningless copout. That answer can, and often is, used as a convenient answer to justify just about anything: "God wills it". I guess that settles it----but it rarely ever does, and the killing fields abound.
For me, reasoning and logic are the tools God's evolutionary process have given humans as the basis for implementing 'rights' to people. Believing as I do that ethics is an innate quality of human reasoning, it is then ethics which deciphers out our 'rights'. I have long since given up on any inherited dogmatic human dogmas written out by those who lived decades after some prophet died, and all of these prophets clustered centuries ago in the same part of the globe. If any of these scriptures were truly the Word of God, literally, there would not be so much antiquated nonsense throughout these scriptures.
When all the dust has settled it is always the Golden Rule which is the common and universal ethical guideline: Do unto to others as you would have them do unto you---fair is fair. This simple guideline is not based on religious affiliation, race, sex, nationality, genetic proximity, personality, financial status, social status, looks, or any other such diversity. I call this reasoned ethics. It fits any age, any culture, and any circumstance where human life exists. You don't need any college degree to understand it, no priests of any sort to pile on rituals or additions, or build elaborate cathedrals to impress either God or worshipers---it is simply a universal and logical statement of 'human rights'.
This simple and inherent ethics enables us to easily figure out human rights in most every instance. You have a 'right' not to be robbed since no one else wants to be robbed either. I guess that is exactly why stealing is wrong, not right. Everyone has the 'right' to vote because this would not fit the Golden Rule were it otherwise. Can individuals do things for which they lose their rights? This gets a bit tricky. How can you logically lose a 'right'? If you murder some one, others need protection from you, and you lose the 'right' to be free in order to protect this right of others. Thus, if you go around depriving others of any 'right' then reason dictates others need be protected from you. A 'right' doesn't exist if it is not protected. Punishment for those who interfere with the logical 'rights' of others is required for 'rights' to exist and flourish.
Not all 'rights' are bestowed at birth. Children do not have a right to drive a car. At what age a young person should be allowed this 'right' is a gray area. But these are minor glitches whether it be 16, 18, whatever. Same with marriage---there is a right here, but at what age it becomes effective is a bit gray. Of course by the Golden Rule any adult should be allowed to marry another adult of their choosing---period. Are there ever any exceptions? I suppose if there are established and accepted genetic reasons why two should not be married, this could be a legitimate restriction on a 'right' which would otherwise be universal.
Does a child have a 'right' to have as much money spent by society on his/her education as other children? Of course: do unto others as you would have them do unto you. That our society is willing to spend 2 or 3 times as much to educate some children compared to other children is simply an obvious breach of the Golden Rule. It is not fair and never will be fair by any logical and moral application of human reasoning. Medical care: is there a right to proper medical care? Of course there is. The poorest workers, at the lowest levels of employment, are entitled to good health care. The argument that those who earn enough to pay for good health care are entitled to better health care is superfluous and self centered. It doesn't fit the Golden Rule at all. We are talking ethics here not capitalism vs socialism. It is not surprising when recently a study was done to find out which countries have the most contented people, that these countries were those in which common 'rights' were protected and where necessary, financially supported by their government. My own health care is practically endless. There is nothing I have done with my life which entitles me to receive better health care than others who, for whatever reason, cannot afford good health care. Exactly for what are we punishing those who can't afford health insurance? I understand you lock up a person who kills because if you don't, they could kill others.
Unfortunately, rights are not inherent, but bestowed by society. Slaves were not free by fact of being born human, but were free only when society deemed them free. Women did not have the right to vote at birth, but got this right only when society bestowed this right to them. Some 'rights' are a bit complicated. According to some everyone has a right to own and carry firearms. Of course no one is born with any such right and like every other right, such a right has to be bestowed on them by the society in which they live. So how does ethics, arrived at by reason, come down here? I may want to own and carry a gun for protection of my life and property. That certainly may be something I want to do---hard to question that. But others, just as adamant, do not want to carry a gun and feel less safe if others have guns. Thus, do unto others as you would have them do unto you is stymied here. Some want the right to carry a gun and others don't want any such right, and, in fact, feel unsafe if others have such a right. There is more here than safety. Some people like guns and others hate them. There is a young security guard I know who makes like $10/hr and has an array of assault weapons. He thinks it is cool and some others think he is missing a few marbles. Owning and carrying guns is certainly not any universal right in the sense that other rights mentioned above are universal rights. There is no 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you' which is applicable. We do know that in those countries with the most guns, with the exception of Canada, there are by far more homicides. Those countries with few guns do not go around killing others with baseball bats etc. and end up with the same number of homicides per 1000 population. Thus, by any reasonable analysis, guns usually, if not always, end up with more people dead. Since everybody wishes not to be killed, we then have a universal 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you' and there is therefore no 'right' to own and carry guns around.
Now let's examine the 'right' to drink alcohol and the 'right' to smoke and the 'right' to smoke pot. All recreational drugs are used to alter one's mental state. There is no other reason to use them. I suppose one can insist he/she loves the taste of beer or wine, etc but one just wonders---if it did not produce a mental effect, whether anyone would pay the cost for that taste. But let us not squabble over minor points. I think most everyone wants the 'right' to ingest anything they want as long as this is not harmful to others---"it is my body, I'll do what I want with it". BUT: what you put into your body can sometimes be harmful to others---drunk drivers, drunks who lose their job and can't support their family, abusers of alcohol and all smokers who run up large medical bills from associated medical conditions caused by their abuse of these recreational drugs. The medical costs of cigarette smoking have already been established, and these costs could be recovered by sufficient taxation on the purchase of cigarettes, so this would give them a 'right' which could then be universal: "I smoke and I also pay the cost of the medical consequences". Fair is fair. Alcohol use is far more complicated. Reasonable amounts do not carry with it a lot of medical consequences, larger amounts do. And there is no way to monitor when someone crosses that line. The best one can do here is to tax the sale and use the collected taxes to cover the medical costs of the medical abusers. Still, some will argue that the 'right' to drink alcohol ends up killing or physically hurting a good number of people through car accidents, homicides, drunken assaults, battered spouses, abuse of kids, etc. None of these are a pretty picture. We all know that. One might reason: "well then, let's not make drinking alcohol a 'right'. BUT: we tried that during prohibition and it didn't reduce drinking, facilitated huge underground criminal gangs, deprived the government of huge amounts of tax revenues, and increased the homicide rate. Then there is the 'right' to smoke marijuana. No medical consequences to speak of (no one knows anyone dying of pot smoking), no huge safety problem (animated conversations on a cell phone are more dangerous on the road than pot smokers), reduced assaults, and reduced homicides. Thus, the one recreational drug with the least social consequences is illegal. Not particularly logical, but a political reality. Just think how much better swimmer Phelps would have been if he didn't smoke pot. Yeah, sure.
HOWEVER, and this applies to all abuse of recreational drugs, no matter which one: everyone has the 'right' to get medical treatment for mental stresses of various sorts. Clearly if this is a universal right for physical ailments, this must then be a universal right for mental ailments. With precious few exceptions, all abusers of recreational drugs have mental feelings which they try to alleviate through the use of a recreational drug which will alter their mental state to produce a desired effect. They are not criminals, they are medically in need of help. And until the mental state is altered via treatment, the abuse will continue and continue and continue. The more severe the mental need, the more severe the abuse. THUS, drug abuse is really a medical problem and should never be treated as a criminal problem. Of course criminal acts committed under recreational drug abuse have to be treated as criminal problems.
Currently, at last, society is starting to come to grips with the 'right' to die. Everyone wishes to have control over their dying process. The process is riddled with religious dogmas and different people would control their dying process in their own personal way. Just as one person doesn't want anyone else or the government to say 'it is time and you must die', another person doesn't want anyone else or the government to tell them, 'no matter what you wish, you cannot die". If dying is not personal, what the hell is? Clearly the right to die meets the criteria: 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you'. To attempt to control someone else's dying process is an ethical abomination. There are states and countries which currently allow people to control their own dying process and the charge that this results in the elderly being murdered has not proven a problem at all. Of course you don't say no one can drive because a few people drive in such a way as to kill someone. "Rights' don't come with no risks. They exist because it is unethical for certain 'rights' not to exist.
Do we have an inherent right to have as many children as we want? This one is not complicated. Again, via the Golden Rule, everyone would like to have enough to eat, a home, some land, good health care, and enough resources to live an affluent life. Right now there are no longer enough resources on this earth for everyone to live the affluent life many of us now do. For this to happen there must be a reduction in the world population. World reduction in population can only happen two ways: Either humans accept restrictions on the number of children permitted, or the laws of evolution will reduce human populations in the harshest and cruelest of fashions. Mother Nature always bats last. And for some people in certain parts of the world, Mother Nature is already at bat.
The discussion of rights, so it seems to me, comes down to ethics over selfishness. When the Golden Rule rules, people end up with 'rights'. The powerful forces of greed and power are often the forces which deprive others of 'rights'. Patriotism, religious intransigence, political fervor, racism, social status, economic status, scarce natural resources (including water, land, food, energy), and sexual nuances all contribute pressures to deprive others of 'rights', which otherwise people would have.
Human rights prosper when society is geared in the direction Davis (have forgotten the first name) urges us: "There is a way of life, a way of thinking, of behaving towards other men and your fellow creatures, towards all living things, towards the whole earth and the sky and the sun that is based on love, on compassion, on respect, on cherishing everything there is around you because it is wonderful, unique, it's natural and good and it evolved that way (via God's evolutionary process), it's got to be cherished and if we think like that and live that kind of life, we can all have our freedom, we can all have our happiness, (we can all have our rights), we can all feel the sun and smell the grass and smell the flowers and look upon each other with appreciation."
The most famous statement on human rights is the 'right' to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness". I guess one starts with what exactly does the word 'right' mean? For example, who exactly establishes a 'right'? I suppose one could answer God but this is a meaningless copout. That answer can, and often is, used as a convenient answer to justify just about anything: "God wills it". I guess that settles it----but it rarely ever does, and the killing fields abound.
For me, reasoning and logic are the tools God's evolutionary process have given humans as the basis for implementing 'rights' to people. Believing as I do that ethics is an innate quality of human reasoning, it is then ethics which deciphers out our 'rights'. I have long since given up on any inherited dogmatic human dogmas written out by those who lived decades after some prophet died, and all of these prophets clustered centuries ago in the same part of the globe. If any of these scriptures were truly the Word of God, literally, there would not be so much antiquated nonsense throughout these scriptures.
When all the dust has settled it is always the Golden Rule which is the common and universal ethical guideline: Do unto to others as you would have them do unto you---fair is fair. This simple guideline is not based on religious affiliation, race, sex, nationality, genetic proximity, personality, financial status, social status, looks, or any other such diversity. I call this reasoned ethics. It fits any age, any culture, and any circumstance where human life exists. You don't need any college degree to understand it, no priests of any sort to pile on rituals or additions, or build elaborate cathedrals to impress either God or worshipers---it is simply a universal and logical statement of 'human rights'.
This simple and inherent ethics enables us to easily figure out human rights in most every instance. You have a 'right' not to be robbed since no one else wants to be robbed either. I guess that is exactly why stealing is wrong, not right. Everyone has the 'right' to vote because this would not fit the Golden Rule were it otherwise. Can individuals do things for which they lose their rights? This gets a bit tricky. How can you logically lose a 'right'? If you murder some one, others need protection from you, and you lose the 'right' to be free in order to protect this right of others. Thus, if you go around depriving others of any 'right' then reason dictates others need be protected from you. A 'right' doesn't exist if it is not protected. Punishment for those who interfere with the logical 'rights' of others is required for 'rights' to exist and flourish.
Not all 'rights' are bestowed at birth. Children do not have a right to drive a car. At what age a young person should be allowed this 'right' is a gray area. But these are minor glitches whether it be 16, 18, whatever. Same with marriage---there is a right here, but at what age it becomes effective is a bit gray. Of course by the Golden Rule any adult should be allowed to marry another adult of their choosing---period. Are there ever any exceptions? I suppose if there are established and accepted genetic reasons why two should not be married, this could be a legitimate restriction on a 'right' which would otherwise be universal.
Does a child have a 'right' to have as much money spent by society on his/her education as other children? Of course: do unto others as you would have them do unto you. That our society is willing to spend 2 or 3 times as much to educate some children compared to other children is simply an obvious breach of the Golden Rule. It is not fair and never will be fair by any logical and moral application of human reasoning. Medical care: is there a right to proper medical care? Of course there is. The poorest workers, at the lowest levels of employment, are entitled to good health care. The argument that those who earn enough to pay for good health care are entitled to better health care is superfluous and self centered. It doesn't fit the Golden Rule at all. We are talking ethics here not capitalism vs socialism. It is not surprising when recently a study was done to find out which countries have the most contented people, that these countries were those in which common 'rights' were protected and where necessary, financially supported by their government. My own health care is practically endless. There is nothing I have done with my life which entitles me to receive better health care than others who, for whatever reason, cannot afford good health care. Exactly for what are we punishing those who can't afford health insurance? I understand you lock up a person who kills because if you don't, they could kill others.
Unfortunately, rights are not inherent, but bestowed by society. Slaves were not free by fact of being born human, but were free only when society deemed them free. Women did not have the right to vote at birth, but got this right only when society bestowed this right to them. Some 'rights' are a bit complicated. According to some everyone has a right to own and carry firearms. Of course no one is born with any such right and like every other right, such a right has to be bestowed on them by the society in which they live. So how does ethics, arrived at by reason, come down here? I may want to own and carry a gun for protection of my life and property. That certainly may be something I want to do---hard to question that. But others, just as adamant, do not want to carry a gun and feel less safe if others have guns. Thus, do unto others as you would have them do unto you is stymied here. Some want the right to carry a gun and others don't want any such right, and, in fact, feel unsafe if others have such a right. There is more here than safety. Some people like guns and others hate them. There is a young security guard I know who makes like $10/hr and has an array of assault weapons. He thinks it is cool and some others think he is missing a few marbles. Owning and carrying guns is certainly not any universal right in the sense that other rights mentioned above are universal rights. There is no 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you' which is applicable. We do know that in those countries with the most guns, with the exception of Canada, there are by far more homicides. Those countries with few guns do not go around killing others with baseball bats etc. and end up with the same number of homicides per 1000 population. Thus, by any reasonable analysis, guns usually, if not always, end up with more people dead. Since everybody wishes not to be killed, we then have a universal 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you' and there is therefore no 'right' to own and carry guns around.
Now let's examine the 'right' to drink alcohol and the 'right' to smoke and the 'right' to smoke pot. All recreational drugs are used to alter one's mental state. There is no other reason to use them. I suppose one can insist he/she loves the taste of beer or wine, etc but one just wonders---if it did not produce a mental effect, whether anyone would pay the cost for that taste. But let us not squabble over minor points. I think most everyone wants the 'right' to ingest anything they want as long as this is not harmful to others---"it is my body, I'll do what I want with it". BUT: what you put into your body can sometimes be harmful to others---drunk drivers, drunks who lose their job and can't support their family, abusers of alcohol and all smokers who run up large medical bills from associated medical conditions caused by their abuse of these recreational drugs. The medical costs of cigarette smoking have already been established, and these costs could be recovered by sufficient taxation on the purchase of cigarettes, so this would give them a 'right' which could then be universal: "I smoke and I also pay the cost of the medical consequences". Fair is fair. Alcohol use is far more complicated. Reasonable amounts do not carry with it a lot of medical consequences, larger amounts do. And there is no way to monitor when someone crosses that line. The best one can do here is to tax the sale and use the collected taxes to cover the medical costs of the medical abusers. Still, some will argue that the 'right' to drink alcohol ends up killing or physically hurting a good number of people through car accidents, homicides, drunken assaults, battered spouses, abuse of kids, etc. None of these are a pretty picture. We all know that. One might reason: "well then, let's not make drinking alcohol a 'right'. BUT: we tried that during prohibition and it didn't reduce drinking, facilitated huge underground criminal gangs, deprived the government of huge amounts of tax revenues, and increased the homicide rate. Then there is the 'right' to smoke marijuana. No medical consequences to speak of (no one knows anyone dying of pot smoking), no huge safety problem (animated conversations on a cell phone are more dangerous on the road than pot smokers), reduced assaults, and reduced homicides. Thus, the one recreational drug with the least social consequences is illegal. Not particularly logical, but a political reality. Just think how much better swimmer Phelps would have been if he didn't smoke pot. Yeah, sure.
HOWEVER, and this applies to all abuse of recreational drugs, no matter which one: everyone has the 'right' to get medical treatment for mental stresses of various sorts. Clearly if this is a universal right for physical ailments, this must then be a universal right for mental ailments. With precious few exceptions, all abusers of recreational drugs have mental feelings which they try to alleviate through the use of a recreational drug which will alter their mental state to produce a desired effect. They are not criminals, they are medically in need of help. And until the mental state is altered via treatment, the abuse will continue and continue and continue. The more severe the mental need, the more severe the abuse. THUS, drug abuse is really a medical problem and should never be treated as a criminal problem. Of course criminal acts committed under recreational drug abuse have to be treated as criminal problems.
Currently, at last, society is starting to come to grips with the 'right' to die. Everyone wishes to have control over their dying process. The process is riddled with religious dogmas and different people would control their dying process in their own personal way. Just as one person doesn't want anyone else or the government to say 'it is time and you must die', another person doesn't want anyone else or the government to tell them, 'no matter what you wish, you cannot die". If dying is not personal, what the hell is? Clearly the right to die meets the criteria: 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you'. To attempt to control someone else's dying process is an ethical abomination. There are states and countries which currently allow people to control their own dying process and the charge that this results in the elderly being murdered has not proven a problem at all. Of course you don't say no one can drive because a few people drive in such a way as to kill someone. "Rights' don't come with no risks. They exist because it is unethical for certain 'rights' not to exist.
Do we have an inherent right to have as many children as we want? This one is not complicated. Again, via the Golden Rule, everyone would like to have enough to eat, a home, some land, good health care, and enough resources to live an affluent life. Right now there are no longer enough resources on this earth for everyone to live the affluent life many of us now do. For this to happen there must be a reduction in the world population. World reduction in population can only happen two ways: Either humans accept restrictions on the number of children permitted, or the laws of evolution will reduce human populations in the harshest and cruelest of fashions. Mother Nature always bats last. And for some people in certain parts of the world, Mother Nature is already at bat.
The discussion of rights, so it seems to me, comes down to ethics over selfishness. When the Golden Rule rules, people end up with 'rights'. The powerful forces of greed and power are often the forces which deprive others of 'rights'. Patriotism, religious intransigence, political fervor, racism, social status, economic status, scarce natural resources (including water, land, food, energy), and sexual nuances all contribute pressures to deprive others of 'rights', which otherwise people would have.
Human rights prosper when society is geared in the direction Davis (have forgotten the first name) urges us: "There is a way of life, a way of thinking, of behaving towards other men and your fellow creatures, towards all living things, towards the whole earth and the sky and the sun that is based on love, on compassion, on respect, on cherishing everything there is around you because it is wonderful, unique, it's natural and good and it evolved that way (via God's evolutionary process), it's got to be cherished and if we think like that and live that kind of life, we can all have our freedom, we can all have our happiness, (we can all have our rights), we can all feel the sun and smell the grass and smell the flowers and look upon each other with appreciation."
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