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I'm an atheist, there is no God for me.


There's no God for me either, but isn't that a pedantic point? I think it could just as easily read as

> Your rights come from our nature, not government.


Reading it that way doesn't make it make any more sense.


That's irrelevant. (And I disagree.)


I think he meant more of a metaphorical god in the "We hold these truths to be self-evident" sense.


It is just a figure of speech, don't be pedantic about this.


Your rights come from God is not a figure of speech; it's a statement of belief in God and it's not pedantic to point this out.


No, it is a figure of speech and it is pedantic to claim that it is about belief in any deity. It is similarly used in this context: "God gave you legs, now move your ass out of my way!" It is nothing more than a way to express the idea that rights are something people are born with, regardless of who is in power or what sort of government rules over them. That is how the founding fathers (another figure of speech, nobody is claiming that any of those men are any living person's father) used the term.


You're absurd.


It's not pedantic. One of the most notable aspects of the US constitution is that its power is explicitly derived from the masses - "We the people..." - and not from some divine power, unlike the British monarchy.


Power is derived from the people, not rights. An early argument was over the very need for an explicit bill of rights. Even the text of the bill of rights suggests that the founders believed that certain rights are inherent:

Congress shall make no law...abridging the freedom of speech...

That wording seems to just assume that people have the right to speak freely, that no law is needed to give people that right, and that laws can only restrict that right (and such laws are explicitly forbidden). The phrase "God-given rights" is not meant to assert that God exists, it is meant to assert that certain rights transcend legal codes and exist regardless of what government happens to be in power (or even if there is a government in power).


So you agree with all of the other words of my comment? :-)


I don't know whether I'll agree to any of it. I'm not that wise.

Humans are able to raise kids, leave knowledge to them, and as long as they don't believe so hard in rebirth, treat history with importance. As such many different laws were left - it's for us to decide which make sense.

If we are left to nature, then we are left with whatever the animals have. It won't be anymore our human "nature".

We were not born to speak, record, etc. - over the long period of evolution it developed around us - along with raising kids. This is where we recognize the nature as important force, but not really for guiding us what to do - it's our environment, and we should care about it, but there is hardly any guidance what to do.




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