It is true or it is false. You have repeatedly said you think it false. That leads to an absurdity as I have twice illustrated. Your hang-up is thinking that this obvious fact, which you and everyone else observes regularly, somehow contradicts your deeply held values. It doesn't, or if it does, then your deeply held values need to be rethought.
Rights for an individual are those individual's values for which another individual is willing to alter his behavior in order to avoid conflict.
Your definition is not an absolute statement, thus by your definition human rights are not absolute.
Wrong. My whole point is that these are FACTS of nature. As such, they are the universal absolute aspects of the universe that we are privy to through observation. They are a necessary product of the traits human beings possess. If creatures in another era on another planet possess these natural traits, then rights would develop for them as well. The facts are independent of any human opinion, emotional decision, or stipulated dogma. They are unchangeable as gravity and time.
There are certain people (I needn't go back over the history) who will not alter their behavior
Then they are as commonplace as the trees, the wind, or the wild animals. At any rate, it has no bearing on anything I've said. If they can never or will never change their behavior upon request to avoid conflict, then they are not a part of a relationship relevant to rights.
So if in a given culture the government will not alter it's behavior to avoid conflict over human life, do these people not have a right to life?
There you go again. If you haven't read my past posts, I refer to them now.
YOU: I believe that without God the case for human rights collpases completely. Why? Because if human rights are truly "rights" then they must be based on a set of universal values that are always true, in all places and at all times.
ME: Like 2+2=4 is always true in all places and at all times?
That's right!
So you believe that without god the case for 2+2=4 "collapses completely"?
No, I mean that without the validation of a higher law your judgments mean nothing more than his. So you cannot tell whether someone else is right or wrong without calling on a higher law.
This is easily demonstrated to be false. If someone else tells me, "I am Fred and I am not Fred", then I can tell that he is wrong without calling on an elevated law. The absurdity that my judgements mean nothing more than his ought to be obvious. If his judgement is that I must die, then I gaurantee you my judgement that I should live means a heck of lot more to me than his judgement. I need no higher law for that. I know that I want to live, even without anyone's help.
Sure, you could settle the dispute yourselves, but you would appeal to a higher law than just your opinion - to whit, the property boundary. You could just fight it out, but in that case the person who wins is the strongest, not the most just. Or you could bring in a third party to mediate and agree to go by his judgement - i.e. a higher law.
The property boundary is a higher law? The third party is a higher law? How do you know they are not lower laws? Or laws that are kind of at the same elevation? So you are saying that it is your opinion that the third party is a higher law than my opinion. Well excuse me if I value more of my opinion than your opinion.
Funny that no matter how emotional you get about something, your utterances remain your opinion. Unless you can convey to me through a common observation, something that, for my eyes, I cannot deny, your claim of absolute truth is nothing more to me than "just your opinion".
Sure you can - but you can't be consistent without a law higher than yourself.
I'm glad you used the word "consistent". Maybe you can show me the syllogism that proves that a moral judgement "without a law higher" than the judger is necessarily inconsistent. It is by no means obvious.
I'm sorry, it's not that simple. Sometimes people are able to be peacefully persuaded. Often they are not. I explained my exceptions. I believe they are consistent. I've presented very compelling evidence that people sometimes allow themselves to be peacefully persuaded, and sometimes they require raw force to conform them.
If his judgement is that I must die, then I gaurantee you my judgement that I should live means a heck of lot more to me than his judgement.
Of course you do, and I'm glad to hear it. But your opinion in that instance really means no more than your attackers unless you can call on a higher law to claim that his acts are wrong.
Maybe you can show me the syllogism that proves that a moral judgement "without a law higher" than the judger is necessarily inconsistent.
When a case to trial and a judge renders a judgement, he does so (hopefully) in accordance with a law. He does not offer his "observations" disconnected from a higher law - he follows the law and renders justice accordingly. The judge must call upon the law for his judgments to have any moral meaning at all. Otherwise he is just exercising raw force without any moral judgment to back him up. And that is inconsistent.