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THE ONTOLOGICAL BASIS 0}' HUMAN RIGHTS T HE FOCUS OF this essay is not the topic of human rights itself but instead what is preliminary to it: whether there is a real, i. e., ontological, basis in man for the claim that he is the subject of inalienable rights; whether rights are due him in virtue of his very nature rather than because society or the state chooses to confer them upon him? Looked at from another angle, the focus can be formulated thus: whether man ultimately exists totally for society or exists in some significant sense for himself? What prompts the formulation of this problematic is the contemporary concern for what is called " the quality of life." This concern has become the occasion for the most recent and, perhaps , serious challenge yet to the doctrine of natural right. For example, the wealthy nations fear that the present growth of world population, especially in the poor nations, threatens the future of the human species,1 while progress in the field of genetics enlivens the hope of eradicating hereditary defects through " genetic engineering " and, hence, of halting the " pollution of the gene pool." 2 These two visions lead, in the minds of some,3 to the inescapable conclusion that the doctrine of inviolable , i.e., natural, rights is incompatible with the good of society as a whole and is, therefore, to be repudiated as erroneous 1 Sir Julian Huxley, "The Impending Crisis," The Population Crisis.. Edited by Larry K. Y. Ng. Bloomington & London: Indiana University Press, 1970; p. 27. For response to this view of the world problem, see my article, " The Social Encyclicals and the ' Population Problem '," Social Justiae Review, Oct., 1972. 2 For a perceptive discussion of the moral problems involved in genetic engineering, cf. Paul Ramsey, Fabricated Man; The Ethics of Genetic Control. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1970. 3 " A New Ethic For Medicine and Society," California Medicine, Vol. 118 # 3, September, 1970; pp. 67-68. 484 ONTOLOGICAL BASIS OF HUMAN RIGHTS 435 or at least made subservient to the exigencies of social survival. The latter seems to be the position taken by B. F. Skinner: "Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are basic rights. But they are the rights of the individual and were listed as such at a time when the literatures of freedom and dignity were concerned with the aggrandizement of the individual. They have only a minor bearing on the survival of a culture." 4 This position derives its force from an appeal to the principle, ' the good of society (in some sense of the word ' good ') has precedence over the good of the individual (in some sense of the word ' good ') ,' which appeal seems to carry with it the implicit rider that all human rights are social rather than natural in origin. If this position is accepted, then the inference is automatic that, since even the right to life is conferred by .society, it too may be rescinded in order to preserve the greater good of the community . What is at stake here is not simply the question of society's authority to execute convicted murderers and the like but the innocent as well; e.g., those who are deformed, retarded, carriers of hereditary diseases, or whose existence is adjudged " meaningless " or " devoid of value." One cannot help asking, for example, whether Professor Garrett Hardin, in his proposal that the freedom to procreate he rescinded,5 grasps the full import of his plea that we deny the validity of the United Nations' Declaration of Rights. Specifically, one wonders why, if, in the name of social .survival, we can properly deny the freedom to procreate, can we not also deny, in the name of social survival, the freedom to exist. To be sure, the defensibility of the doctrine of natural right presupposes the doctrine's compatibility with the good of the social body. But the requirements of compatibility are, in this case, reciprocal, for the question of what constitutes the good of .society is inextricably bound up with the fundamental ques- • B. F. Skinner., Beyond Freedom and Dignity. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 197Q; p. 180. 5 Garrett Hardin, " The Tragedy of...

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