According to the Temporal Rights Axiom, every capability has a corresponding right to exercise that capability, otherwise the universe would be absolutely frozen and nothing would or could change anywhere: complete stagnation.
The changes occurring in the universe are the result of the exercise of the capabilities (or powers) and simultaneously and intrinsically the exercise of their corresponding rights. One may focus on any particular object and notice that there are other objects whose capacities and rights are superior and still others whose rights are inferior. This is the law of the jungle in operation: one thing violating the rights of another. This universal law literally makes the world go around.
If we choose to ascribe rights to capabilities, as the Temporal Rights paradigm does, then we also have to deal with the reality of violation. And the idea of violation leads immediately and inherently to the notion of responsibility: “The 100 year storm was responsible for the greatest destruction of the ancient monument” and “The gun-wielding convict was responsible for the death of three victims.”
The Origin of Morality
Responsibility and morality and ethics are but different facets of the rights of things. In human society, the exercise of rights by one person that violates the rights of another is wrong or evil. Whatever honors, protects or celebrates rights is good. The abstract paradigm of Temporal Rights is thus the conceptual foundation of the abstraction we call ethics.
Everything in the Universe is About Rights
Is it possible to identify anything in the universe that is not either some type of matter (We have knowledge of a few of these already.) or a social/political construct based upon rights? Can you think of an organization, corporation, political party, or any other social construct that does not have rights bound up tightly in its reason for existence?
If you can find one such, then maybe everything isn’t about rights after all.
Maybe love is self-existent and doesn’t fit into either category of matter or social construct. But if it is self-existent, it has rights.
The Key to Peace
Recognizing that everything is about rights is also an understanding of how the universe and all life in it operates. That, in turn, is essential to seeing that human freedom is our most fundamental political right and the basis of our responsibility for one another’s freedom. Systems that operate solely on the law of the jungle are chaotic unless there is an opposing principle that brings order and peace. In human society, for example, equal rights (your rights end where mine begin) provides that balance.
Comprehending this intrinsic connection between the rights of all things, gives us a key to understanding what is happening around us, and that understanding (taking the mysteries out of our present tumultuous world) leads us to know how to act and can bring the peace that comes from knowing what’s happening and what, if anything, to do about it.
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- Face it! It’s a Storm! - April 22, 2024
- An Open Letter to Tucker, Glenn, Laura, et al. - December 15, 2023
