Conversations with History - Jeremy Waldron

"Dignity, Human Rights, and Torture"

Jeremy Waldron
University Professor, New York University School of Law

Conversations host Harry Kreisler welcomes legal philosopher Jeremy Waldron for a discussion of the legal concept of dignity, it origins in law and morality and its emergence as a foundation for human rights. In the conversation, Professor Waldron also talks about the importance of preserving liberal values in the fight against terrorism, and, in this context, he criticizes the torture memos for their assault on human dignity.

http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/iis/Kreisler.html
http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/conversations/

Category:

Education

Tags:

• UC
• Berkeley
• ucberkeley
• event
• Harry
• Kreisler
• conversations
• with
• history
• Jeremy
• Waldron
• International
• Law

[dingdongpingpong69]

@at4550 haha

[at4550]

My hunch is that the music theme for the introduction of these videos has not been changed since 1982.

[xternalist]

@dingdongpingpong69 the wellspring of ethics is not belief in god or what people believe about god. the foundation of ethics is not belief but facts about humans and their well-being. that we are created in the image of god is NOT a fact. its a lie. we're better off without that belief because its a waste of our energy and time.

[dingdongpingpong69]

@Setzer Interesting point, but I'm not sure I see it the way you do.

I think he's saying loss of religion has hurt our morality, but not necessarily our moral intuition.

[dingdongpingpong69]

@redman265 Jeremy Waldron, youtube.

[dingdongpingpong69]

@xternalist I see your point, but I wonder, to what extent is the "supervenient" character of equality and dignity a problem, if the moral foundation to which it is attached (all men are created in god's image, or all men are equal because god created them so, etc.) is the wellspring of a humanist ethics?

[dingdongpingpong69]

dis shit were good

[xternalist]

Waldron is a christian legal philosopher. He wants to build international law on the gibberish doctrine of the imago dei. Equality or dignity to him is supervenient on the image of god, a property which every human being has. I think that the theological doctrine that we are all created in the image of god is not a fact but a noble lie. But it seems to work to most people. But its still a lie though. We (normal people) know that a lie like this is disgusting.

[redman265]

If one wanted to use comments made in this interview , how should one reference it as a footnote / bibliography???



[Setzer]

I agree with a lot of the things Prof. Waldron, but I did take issue with his view that a loss of religion in some way hurts our moral intuition. I think that the inspiration of the law, dignity, and justice is derived from reason, logic and even science (Sam Harris gives a good account of how science informs our ethics). Religion has been used to support slavery and murder, and this is explicit in the holy books. We can select the good passages because our ethics come from a secular source.