The Concept of Society and the Individual

[YourFutureDentist]

I'm writing a paper (that's due Monday!) in an ethics course at the University of Illinois.

My paper is an assessment of Einstein's essay "Why Socialism". I'm going to try to show that bestowing upon society rights beyond those of the individuals that comprise it is making a grave mistake. I'm having a hard time with my professor's objection to this. I'll just paste a part of his argument below:

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"Why are the rights and goals that Einstein describes for society "pseudo-rights"? Why can't there be rights and obligations for a society as a whole? What, conversely, is the source for "individual" rights - and how are these intelligible without appeal to the social? It will be interesting to see what you do with your paper, but if you try to argue for this by insisting that there are individuals first and foremost, and that these end up comprising the 'parts' of society (which is a typical way to attempt to argue this), then consider the following kind of claim:

BOTH the idea of an individual, as well as the idea of a society, are value-laden concepts and descriptions of relationships and identity (the self related to the self, the self related to other selves, the self related to society, etc) that we etch onto the world and its natural phenomena: they are not natural categories. In other words, they are not an immutable fact of how things are, but rather ways of description that we arrive at. The world in its raw form just has bundles of cells, organic matter, drives, and so forth. On this view, the idea of "individual" is not more primary or more of a building block than the concept of "society": they are both quite abstract and conceptual ways of carving up the natural world. No matter how much we may, through habit, want to dig in our heels and insist on ourselves as "individuals" this may not be any natural category at all, but some way we have become habituated to describe phenomena."

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So what do you guys think? I understand that describing a man as being made up of cells or even atoms doesn't negate the fact that he is still a man, but how can this not be applied to describing society as being made up of individuals?

[aequalsa]

I'm writing a paper (that's due Monday!) in an ethics course at the University of Illinois.

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So what do you guys think? I understand that describing a man as being made up of cells or even atoms doesn't negate the fact that he is still a man, but how can this not be applied to describing society as being made up of individuals?

Oh man, what a mind-f&%$. The whole doesn't count because it is made up of smaller pieces? Atoms, then also dont matter since they are made up of sub-atominc particles. His primary mistake seems to be that he is either forgetting about or denying freewill, in which case youre in for some trouble.

Basically rights are required for man's existence. Man being, a being of volitional conciousness. If you deny volition, rights cannot be supported. There are differences between the nature of men and inanimate matter. He disagrees with this somewhere...I would bet he's a determinist/behaviourist.

I am not sure what level he disagrees on, but I bet this will be an uncomfortable experience for you wherever it is. Good luck.

[YourFutureDentist]

Oh man, what a mind-f&%$. The whole doesn't count because it is made up of smaller pieces? Atoms, then also dont matter since they are made up of sub-atominc particles. His primary mistake seems to be that he is either forgetting about or denying freewill, in which case youre in for some trouble.

Basically rights are required for man's existence. Man being, a being of volitional conciousness. If you deny volition, rights cannot be supported. There are differences between the nature of men and inanimate matter. He disagrees with this somewhere...I would bet he's a determinist/behaviourist.

I don't know what free will has to do with distinguishing the individual from society.

I just want to know how I can say that, "a society cannot have more rights than the individuals that comprise it" without having this refuted by someone else saying that, "an individual cannot have more rights than the cells or atoms that comprise it." Meaning that men have no rights, just like atoms don't.

Can someone please help?

[DavidOdden]

We can't help much, because we don't know exactly what hole you may have dug yourself into. The question is, have you sufficiently laid out the foundation for rights at all, that is, what are "rights", and where do they come from? If you start by simly asserting "Only individuals have right, that is axiomatic" then your professor will rightly throw your axiom back in your face and say "Yeah? Only society has rights, that is axiomatic". Almost certainly, the solution to your problem lied in grasping what rights are, i.e. what thing in the real world does the concept mean? Some people simply deny that there is such a thing as "rights"; there's no reasoning with a gainsayer. Some people think that rights derive authoritatively from a "higher power", e.g. man has "god-given rights". I would not give that a moment of consideration.

Since "rights" is not a philosophical primary, you need to reduce rights to what is primary. If you can explain why an individual has rights, you should be able to apply that to the question of so-called social rights. Note his hint: "What, conversely, is the source for 'individual' rights - and how are these intelligible without appeal to the social?". These are answerable, especially if you focus on the right primary, namely the choice to exist, man's nature (a being who survives by reason rather than brute strength or innate knowledge of how to find food and shelter, and a being with free will).

Consider, briefly, the nature of the concept "choice". What is a "choice", how is one made; what can make a choice (can a rock make a choice? If not why not). Can a society make a choice? If not, why not? I think that if you don't understand how free will and the mind is relevant for distinguishing the individual from society, then you've missed some basics of philosophical reasoning.

[~Sophia~]

I just want to know how I can say that, "a society cannot have more rights than the individuals that comprise it" without having this refuted by someone else saying that, "an individual cannot have more rights than the cells or atoms that comprise it." Meaning that men have no rights, just like atoms don't.

What are rights? What is the purpose of rights? What are the criteria for possessing rights?

The existance of inanimate matter is unconditional whereas the existance of life is not - it depends on specific course of action. It is only the concept of life, its conditional nature, that makes concept value possible so only for a living entity things can be good or bad.

Simple organisms, such as plants, survive by means of their automatic physical actions. A plant has no choice of action. The range of actons required for the survial of the higher organisms is wider, it being proportional to the range of their consciousness. Animals which do not have free will, use instincts to determine their course of action. Animals are not be capable of choosing one course of action over another aside from what their instinct determines. Same as for plants, their code of values is automatic.

Man's life is equally conditional yet he has no automatic code of survival. Rights are conditions of existence required by man's nature for his proper survival. Rights are principles of human coexistance based on man's nature meaning the nature and requirements of a conceptual consciousness.

Rights are derived from 1)conditional nature of life 2) man's capacity to reason and 3) man's free will, and thus only humans have rights.

Since, the mind is an attribute of the individual; there is no such thing as a collective brain; no such thing as a collective throught. The process of reason is performed by each man alone. Thinking and rational action are properties of the individual. Thus only individuals have rights; there is no such thing as a 'collective right' or "society right'. Any group is only a number of individuals. A group can have no rights other than the rights of its individual members. A group as such, has no rights at all because an individual can neither acquire new rights by joining a group nor lose any rights he already holds.

Edited December 1, 2006 by ~Sophia~

[softwareNerd]

Dentist, I feel for you! Your professor isn't simply challenging the idea of rights, but the entire notion that things, men, society exist in any meaningful sense. On that basis, I assume that he does not support socialism either, or does he? If he does, then do you know on what basis he does so?

It is odd that one arrangement of atoms (Prof) wants another arrangement of atoms (Dentist) to critique some particular arrangement of atoms (Essay copy) that is a close approximation of an arrangement of atoms (original essay) as arranged by another arrangement of atoms (Einstein).

[KendallJ]

I don't know what free will has to do with distinguishing the individual from society.

I just want to know how I can say that, "a society cannot have more rights than the individuals that comprise it" without having this refuted by someone else saying that, "an individual cannot have more rights than the cells or atoms that comprise it." Meaning that men have no rights, just like atoms don't.

If the basis of rights depends on the definition of man as "a member of a class of things", well then your professor woudl be right; however, this is an example of an analogy gone to far. The analogy compares things on inessentials.

Atoms make up your body. Atoms have no rights.

Individuals make up society. Individuals have no rights.

puh-lease...

As sophia says, if the fundamental basis behind rights is thown out of the analogy, then it is useless as an explanation.

Reverse it. Start from the fundamentals of rights.

Man is a conceptual, volitional being with his life as his purpose. Man has rights.

Atoms are conceptual, volitional beings with their life as their purpose. NOOOT! Atoms don't have rights.

Society is a conceputal, volitional being with it's life as its purpose. NOOT! Society cannot have rights over the individuals that make it up.

[YourFutureDentist]

I think I may have it. Maybe it is not as epistemological as I thought--obviously the professor's objection is, but I don't think that my answer has to be.

Rights are concepts "that preserve and protect individual morality in a social context" (OPAR, 351)

We need morality because we have *choices* to make.

If rights only apply to moral (meaning morality-utilizing) entities, and morality only applies to entities that have to make choices (volitional ones), then only volitional entities can possess rights.

We can't think for each other just as much as we can't eat for each other. It's only the people in a society that make the choices. So regardless of how much we "depend" on (benefit from) each other, society is not a primary to be considered for ethics or rights.

Right?

[aequalsa]

I think I may have it. Maybe it is not as epistemological as I thought--obviously the professor's objection is, but I don't think that my answer has to be.

Rights are concepts "that preserve and protect individual morality in a social context" (OPAR, 351)

We need morality because we have *choices* to make.

If rights only apply to moral (meaning morality-utilizing) entities, and morality only applies to entities that have to make choices (volitional ones), then only volitional entities can possess rights.

We can't think for each other just as much as we can't eat for each other. It's only the people in a society that make the choices. So regardless of how much we "depend" on (benefit from) each other, society is not a primary to be considered for ethics or rights.

Right?

BINGO! You got it.

[KendallJ]

I think I may have it. Maybe it is not as epistemological as I thought--obviously the professor's objection is, but I don't think that my answer has to be.

Rights are concepts "that preserve and protect individual morality in a social context" (OPAR, 351)

We need morality because we have *choices* to make.

If rights only apply to moral (meaning morality-utilizing) entities, and morality only applies to entities that have to make choices (volitional ones), then only volitional entities can possess rights.

We can't think for each other just as much as we can't eat for each other. It's only the people in a society that make the choices. So regardless of how much we "depend" on (benefit from) each other, society is not a primary to be considered for ethics or rights.

Right?

I would say you've got the basics. Your last sentence made me grit my teeth a bit, only because it sort of conceeds a point that is not phrased appropriately. I would maybe phrase it, "no matter how much we stand to gain from our interactions with one another, that should not be considered an ethical claim on one another." Or maybe leave it out all together.

[YourFutureDentist]

I would say you've got the basics. Your last sentence made me grit my teeth a bit, only because it sort of conceeds a point that is not phrased appropriately. I would maybe phrase it, "no matter how much we stand to gain from our interactions with one another, that should not be considered an ethical claim on one another." Or maybe leave it out all together.

The reason I phrased it that way is because I'm writing an assessment of Einstein's essay. He says that (my synopsis) from food and shelter to language and the content of his thoughts, society provisions the individual in all aspects of his existence. One can no longer think of man “outside the framework of society” (p. 3). I disagree with it of course, and that's why I put "depend" in quotations. The fact that we benefit from interacting with one another doesn't make society the starting point for ethics and rights. Right?

[KendallJ]

Ok, I see the context. Yup. The objectivist stance is that "interdependancy" is manifested as the "trading" principle, which is a value for value exchange, so it is not dependance at all. But that is probably a more complex issue to deal with, so what you have does it.

Edited December 2, 2006 by KendallJ