Sunday, April 29, 2018

Self-Ownership is not Self-Evident

Me: Self-ownership is not self-evident to wide swathes of humanity.
Them: Yes, it is. Watch. I'll light this joint up in front of this police station.
Me: Uh-oh.
(A swarm of cops descends on the Rights theist.)
Them: What the fuck are you trying to do, you pigs?! I bought this joint! I own my lungs!
Me: Your self-ownership rights lack operational import. I tried to warn you. Wide swathes of humanity don't recognize self-ownership rights.
Them: My (possessive pronoun) joint! My (possessive pronoun) lungs! I have the right to smoke the plant product of my (possessive pronoun) choice!
Me: A helluva lot of good your rights do you now. Never mind your possessive pronouns.
Them: Everybody knows right from wrong!
Me: The Royal Oak police don't. And they're a subset of those wide swathes of humanity I tried to warn you about.
Them: (Kicking, screaming, invoking their deep faith in Sky Wizardry.)

Monday, April 16, 2018

Euler's Theorem and Natural Rights

My daughter's a college senior majoring in math. She proved Euler's Theorem in her Analysis class last week:
e^i*pi + 1 = 0.
She texted the proof to me. I told her I thought Euler had made his Theorem up.
"It comes from defining e^ix = cos x + i sin x," she said. "When x = pi, it's e^i*pi = -1, so e^i*pi +1 = 0."
"So there's a definition in there? The whole thing's pretty much arbitrary? Like 'natural' rights?"
"Yeah, like natural rights," she conceded. She graduates *summa cum laude* next month.

Tuesday, April 10, 2018

The Great Bang Big God

It's like this: the Big Bang created everything. Everything consists of matter and of that which is not matter nothing consists. Reflective consciousness--knowing about knowing--is an illusion. As are truth, beauty, art, ethics, rights, justice, free will, and the infield fly rule. Man's quest for transcendence is sound and fury, signifying nothing. Well, maybe it signifies NATO, but that's worse than nothing.

There is no immaterial individuating principle. Everything we think, say, or do is the product of chemical reactions, which is to say, ultimately, physics.

I punch you in the nose? You can't hold me responsible. The Great Bang Big God did it.

Monday, April 02, 2018

Rights Theism

I was raised Rights-Theist, but I'm OK now.
When I was a kid, I was told by adults, whom I trusted, that there existed a higher power. That power transcended time and space. Ordinary men quaked in its presence.
I was told this higher power was everywhere, and everyone knew it, and if I violated its "natural, objective, discoverable" precepts, I would be committing the crime of irrationality. 
I was told stories about Rights and given books to read about them. There were internet memes trumpeting Rights and Deep Thinkers who knew we would all come to enjoy Rights once the "last king was strangled with the entrails of the last priest." 
There were conflicting versions of Rights, even full length academic tomes presuming to defend one version of Rights or another. There were people who claimed to speak directly on behalf of Rights and represent them.
I was told everyone agreed on Rights if you left them alone to figure things out. It was those damned kings and priests who kept getting in the way. Never mind that Rights themselves were used as a control mechanism.
Even though no one had ever seen Rights, and even though they took different forms at different times and places, everybody seemed to know about this "natural, objective, discoverable" order. So, as a child, I had no reason to doubt it.
Then I grew up and developed the ability to reason. I used logic and common sense and I realized that Santa Claus doesn't exist. Just looking for a little consistency.