[MD] Biological Quality & Social Conservatism

[craigerb at comcast.net]

[Arlo]
> From whose intellect do we derive the right of "free speech"...Well, I
> suppose the "literal" answer would be, in this case, a "consensus of
> learned individuals appealing to philosophy and reason".

[Craig, previously]
> Or did the right of free speech come first & some "consensus of learned
> individuals appealing to philosophy and reason" start to limit it.

[Arlo]
> If the right to "free speech" preceded reason, where did it exist? Was it just
> floating around the universe, waiting for man to discover it? I'd say the right
> to free speech is a construction of intellect (or more precisely, an
> intellectual pattern that emerged from social-collective participation), not
> some pre-existent discovered by it.

Suppose you came across a tribe where anyone could talk to anyone else about whatever they wanted, they could criticize the tribe's chief, etc.  You might say in this tribe they had (de facto) "free speech".  What additional would it take for you to say they had the (de jure) "right to free speech"?
1) A law "guaranteeing" saying free speech
2) Laws prohibiting abridgement of free speech
3) A lack of power to abridge free speech
Option 3) is the one I was suggesting as possible.
Craig