Old Fashioned: Albert Smith's Mystery Thrillers Book 3

First published in 1980, Natural Law and Natural Rights is widely heralded as a seminal contribution to the philosophy of law, and an authoritative restatement of natural law doctrine. It has offered generations of students and other readers a thorough grounding in the central issues of legal, moral, and political philosophy from Finnis's distinctive perspective. This new edition includes a substantial postscript by the author, in which he responds to thirty years of discussion, criticism and further work in the field to develop and refine the original theory. The book closely integrates the philosophy of law with ethics, social theory and political philosophy. The author develops a sustained and substantive argument; it is not a review of other people's arguments but makes frequent illustrative and critical reference to classical, modern, and contemporary writers in ethics, social and political theory, and jurisprudence. The preliminary First Part reviews a century of analytical jurisprudence to illustrate the dependence of every descriptive social science upon evaluations by the theorist. A fully critical basis for such evaluations is a theory of natural law. Standard contemporary objections to natural law theory are reviewed and shown to rest on serious misunderstandings. The Second Part develops in ten carefully structured chapters an account of: basic human goods and basic requirements of practical reasonableness, community and 'the common good'; justice; the logical structure of rights-talk; the bases of human rights, their specification and their limits; authority, and the formation of authoritative rules by non-authoritative persons and procedures; law, the Rule of Law, and the derivation of laws from the principles of practical reasonableness; the complex relation between legal and moral obligation; and the practical and theoretical problems created by unjust laws. A final Part develops a vigorous argument about the relation between 'natural law', 'natural theology' and 'revelation' - between moral concern and other ultimate questions. Cover......Page 1 Contents......Page 12 Abbreviations......Page 16 Part One......Page 18 I.1. The Formation of Concepts for Descriptive Social Science......Page 20 I.2. Attention to Practical Point......Page 23 I.3. Selection of Central Case and Focal Meaning......Page 26 I.4. Selection of Viewpoint......Page 28 I.5. The Theory of Natural Law......Page 35 Notes......Page 36 II.1. Natural Law and Theories of Natural Law......Page 40 II.2. Legal Validity and Morality......Page 42 II.3. The Variety of Human Opinions and Practices......Page 46 II.4. The Illicit Inference from Facts to Norms......Page 50 II.5. Hume and Clarke on ‘Is’ and ‘Ought’......Page 53 II.6. Clarke’s Antecedents......Page 59 II.8. Natural Law and the Existence and Will of God......Page 65 Notes......Page 67 Part Two......Page 74 III.1. An Example......Page 76 III.2. From Inclination to Grasp of Value......Page 77 III.3. Practical Principle and Participation in Value......Page 80 III.4. The Self-evidence of the Good of Knowledge......Page 81 III.5. ‘Object of Desire’ and Objectivity......Page 86 III.6. Scepticism about this Basic Value is Indefensible......Page 90 Notes......Page 92 IV.1. Theoretical Studies of ‘Universal’ Values......Page 98 IV.2. The Basic Forms of Human Good: A Practical Reflection......Page 102 IV.3. An Exhaustive List?......Page 107 IV.4. All Equally Fundamental......Page 109 IV.5. Is Pleasure the Point of It All?......Page 112 Notes......Page 114 V.1. The Good of Practical Reasonableness Structures Our Pursuit of Goods......Page 117 V.2. A Coherent Plan of Life......Page 120 V.3. No Arbitrary Preferences Amongst Values......Page 122 V.4. No Arbitrary Preferences Amongst Persons......Page 123 V.5. Detachment and Commitment......Page 126 V.6. The (Limited) Relevance of Consequences: Efficiency, Within Reason......Page 128 V.7. Respect for Every Basic Value in Every Act......Page 135 V.9. Following One’s Conscience......Page 142 V.10. The Product of these Requirements: Morality......Page 143 Notes......Page 144 VI.1. Reasonableness and Self-interest......Page 151 VI.2. Types of Unifying Relationship......Page 152 VI.3. ‘Business’ Community and ‘Play’ Community......Page 156 VI.4. Friendship......Page 158 VI.5. ‘Communism’ and ‘Subsidiarity’......Page 161 VI.6. Complete Community......Page 164 VI.7. The Existence of a Community......Page 167 VI.8. The Common Good......Page 171 Notes......Page 173 VII.1. Elements of Justice......Page 178 VII.2. General Justice......Page 181 VII.3. Distributive Justice......Page 182 VII.4. Criteria of Distributive Justice......Page 190 VII.5. Commutative Justice......Page 194 VII.6. Justice and the State......Page 201 VII.7. An Example of Justice: Bankruptcy......Page 205 Notes......Page 210 VIII.1. ‘Natural’, ‘Human’, or ‘Moral’ Rights......Page 215 VIII.2. An Analysis of Rights-talk......Page 216 VIII.3. Are Duties ‘Prior to’ Rights?......Page 222 VIII.4. Rights and the Common Good......Page 227 VIII.5. The Specification of Rights......Page 235 VIII.6. Rights and Equality of Concern and Respect......Page 238 VIII.7. Absolute Human Rights......Page 240 Notes......Page 243 IX.1. The Need for Authority......Page 248 IX.2. The Meanings of ‘Authority’......Page 250 IX.3. Formation of Conventions or Customary Rules......Page 255 IX.4. The Authority of Rulers......Page 262 IX.5. ‘Bound By Their Own Rules’?......Page 269 Notes......Page 271 X.1. Law and Coercion......Page 277 X.2. Unjust Punishment......Page 282 X.3. The Main Features of Legal Order......Page 283 X.4. The Rule of Law......Page 287 X.5. Limits of the Rule of Law......Page 290 X.6. A Definition of Law......Page 293 X.7. Derivation of ‘Positive’ from ‘Natural’ Law......Page 298 Notes......Page 308 XI.1. ‘Obligation’, ‘Ought’, and Rational Necessity......Page 314 XI.2. Promissory Obligation......Page 315 XI.3. Variable and Invariant Obligatory Force......Page 325 XI.4. ‘Legally Obligatory’: the Legal Sense and the Moral Sense......Page 331 XI.5. Contractual Obligation in Law: Performance or Compensation?......Page 337 XI.6. Legal Obligation in the Moral Sense: Performance or Submission to Penalty?......Page 342 XI.7. Obligation and Legislative Will......Page 347 XI.8. ‘Reason’ and ‘Will’ in Decision, Legislation, and Compliance with Law......Page 354 XI.9. Moral Obligation and God’s Will......Page 359 Notes......Page 360 XII.1. A Subordinate Concern of Natural Law Theory......Page 368 XII.2. Types of Injustice in Law......Page 369 XII.3. Effects of Injustice on Obligation......Page 371 XII.4. ‘Lex Injusta Non Est Lex’......Page 380 Notes......Page 384 Part Three......Page 386 XIII.1. Further Questions about the Point of Human Existence......Page 388 XIII.2. Orders, Disorders, and the Explanation of Existence......Page 395 XIII.3. Divine Nature and ‘Eternal Law’: Speculation and Revelation......Page 405 XIII.4. Natural Law as ‘Participation of Eternal Law’......Page 415 XIII.5. Concluding Reflections on the Point and Force of Practical Reasonableness......Page 420 Notes......Page 428 Postscript......Page 431 Bibliography......Page 497 A......Page 502 C......Page 503 D......Page 504 G......Page 505 J......Page 506 M......Page 507 P......Page 508 S......Page 509 V......Page 510 Z......Page 511 This book firmly integrates the philosophy of law with ethics, social theory and political philosophy. The author develops a sustained and substantive argument; it is not a review of other people's arguments but makes frequent illustrative and critical reference to classical, medieval, modern, and contemporary writers in ethics, social and political theory, and jurisprudence. Natural Law and Natural Rights is widely recognised as a seminal contribution to the philosophy of law, and an essential reference point for all students of the subject. This new edition includes a substantial postscript by the author responding to thirty years of comment, criticism, and further work in the field.