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The original doc. at http://freeassemblage.blogspot.com/2009/03/mans-rights-without-gods-existence.html contains hyperlinks to references.Man's Rights Without God's Existence If God does not exist, then where do the "rights of man" come from? Glenn Beck, agood man with good intentions, said that without God man's rights would not existbecause God gave them to us.But the American Founders believed in something called "individual sovereignty"and that concept has as much validity with or without God. Natural rights arethose said to belong to every human being by virtue of his rationality. This isbecause no man can have the right to decide another man's use of his will, and itis free will that is always at the center of the concept of "individualism".It was Aristotle who termed man "the rational animal." Reason was a naturalvirtue, given by nature to every man and woman of normal mental capacity. Somepeople have better than normal, some people have less than normal and must becared for. But virtues came in two varieties, according to Aristotle: mental, suchas perception, abstraction, analytics, conceptualization, etc.The second kind of virtue he termed "habitualized." This is virtue of character.This virtue is habitualized because only by acting on one's moral beliefs andpracticing the principles in all our affairs can we gain what we call our"character" and our "integrity.""Character" is the specific manner in which we practice the principles of ourvirtues, which by the way, is the practice of morals. Practicing principles ofvirtues is the practice of morality."Integrity" is the virtue itself of being consistent in the practice of one'smorals. If we are seen to be relativists, doing one thing this time, another thinganother time, and we cannot be counted on to be the same person each and everytime, if we cannot be counted on for consistency in our means and objectives, ifwe cannot be predictible in the sense that our character can be known, then wehave no integrity.The life of habitualized virtues as the "central issue for Aristotle is thequestion of character or personality — what does it take for an individual humanbeing to be a good person?" Character and integrity "must essentially involve theentire proper function of human life." Britannica"One leading commentator says you could easily think of Aristotle as asupercilious prig. Aristotle purports to set out for us how we should live. Isuppose this is consistent with his being a prig. But it is also what a lot ofpeople think philosophy should be providing. Not logic chopping, not playing withbizarre ideas which bear very little relation to the world we have to live in, butoffering wisdom, serious, considered, guidance on what life is all about and howwe should deal with it." Aristotle's EthicsHow does this correspond with "natural rights" as "sovereignty" which pertains towhat the law can and ought to guarantee, when the proposition is made that God didnot provide us with these rights?Let me reverse the question and ask: Why are natural rights with the attendentsovereignty of the individual only possible when given by God?These two questions can be reconciled with the premise that "rights from God" and
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