-- proved that a "social contract" cannot possibly be a "contract." --here:
Briefly, the proof is to observe that a "contract" is "a voluntary agreement among two or more parties," and noting that a "social contract" is not entered into on a voluntary basis.
Fact -- Our Constitution was, and is, a contract among all the citizens of the USA, and is entered voluntarily upon adulthood. -- Anyone is free to renounce their citizenship and/or leave this country to avoid honoring Constitutional law.
This leaves only the possibility that a "social contract" is a "contract of adhesion"--i.e., a "shrinkwrap license"--where being born is interpreted as consent to the terms of the contract. An unborn child cannot consent to anything, and did not choose to be born; therefore a "social contract" is also not a valid contract of adhesion.
Pointless argument. The fact is you are free to leave the USA as an adult, as pointed out above.
--- humans never existed in a "state of nature" in which all struggled against all, from which they emerged by devising a "social contract."
Rather, we know that all mammals, and in fact all chordata, have a social structure of the sort Hobbes considers a "social contract."
You admit social contracts exist in mammals. -- Thank you.
Therefore such structures predate sentience, and could not possibly have been devised purposely by rational beings.
Your conclusion that rational human beings "could not possibly" devise a Constitutional social contract, --- because "such structures predate sentience" is akin to your "magic words of power" argument.
How droll.
So far, you haven't actually said what a social contract is, so it's hard to attack your definition.
Here's a pretty good preamble to & definition of a social contract:
We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
There you go making assertions again. The fact is that only naturalized citizens and members of the military can truly be said to have "entered voluntarily" into the contract. At no point in my life have I sworn an oath or signed a contract. I am certainly not a signatory.
Your answer is, "then leave". That's what a "contract of adhesion" says: "by opening this package you agree to sacrifice your children to Moloch, serve as Bill Gates's cabaña boy, etc., etc..." You are saying that I accept the terms and conditions by remaining inside the country's borders. The reality is that no such contract exists. I already answered the case that it inheres upon birth, by pointing out that birth was not a choice.
You introduced a new definition: namely, that citizenship is a contract of adhesion that one enters upon turning 18. That's false too, but I haven't addressed it before. There are three arguments against this theory:
First, if such a contract of adhesion existed, there must exist an adhesing party. You (or someone in this thread) denied that the government is the "other party" to the "social contract," which leaves no adhesing party at all.
Second, the adhesing party must assert his/her/its rights per the contract. So if we say, for the sake of argument, that the government is a party, just to ensure that the contract actually has two parties, then we observe the government has not ever asserted its rights per the contract: namely, it has never deported anyone for breach of the social contract. The government has never attempted to enforce the terms, "abide by the contract, or else leave the country."
Third, constitutional rights are applied to minors as well as adults. Therefore, the privileges of alleged the "social contract" accrue to minors; but this is only possible if the obligations of the contract also accrue to minors. Therefore, it is not possible that the contract comes into force at age 18.
You admit social contracts exist in mammals. -- Thank you.
Very much the opposite, unless you're making the absurd claim that mongooses can make contracts. Mongooses have a complex social order, based on a mating pair, their offspring, and various old adults and batchelor hangers-on. You're claiming these mongooses have a "social contract," which utterly beggars the meaning of the word "contract."
Which is exactly my point. If you actually read Hobbes, he claims that man in his natural state is involved in perpetual conflict, and that certain smarter-than-average individuals discovered "civilization" when they made a contract, and then began enforcing it on the people around them. I prove him wrong by pointing out that long before man had language, or even sentience, he had a social structure. Centuries passed, and a human named "Hobbes" invented a completely ahistorical explanation for the development of that social structure. Among other things, the complete ahistoricity of Hobbes's theory utterly beggars the meaning of the term "natural state".