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__NOTOC__===Introduction===Most of us are familiar with the notion of “human rights.” We use this concept to explain what sorts of privileges or entitlements should be afforded to us merely for being born human. Typically we attach the word “inalienable” to these rights, meaning that they are unable to be given or taken away by other human beings. Some of them include the right to life, the right to an education, the right to pursue happiness, etc. In the name of human rights we decry the outrage of genocide and condemn countries that deny women the opportunity to receive an education, and rightfully so! For, we all seem to be in consensus, in the West at least, that these rights are, indeed, universal and inalienable. Was it always this way though? When did the Western world start consenting to this notion? What are the ideological roots for claiming human lives are innately valuable and dignified, thus should be protected via this commitment to “human rights’?

For starters, no, there was not always a notion of human rights that entitled every individual to be valued and respected (and entitled to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness) by virtue of their humanity. The earliest ethical thinkers would have scoffed at such a notion! Aristotle famously remarks in the <i>Politics </i> that some men are born natural slaves and thus, it is not only proper , but just , that they are enslaved: “It is thus clear that just as some are by nature free, so others are by nature slaves, and for these latter the condition of slavery is both beneficial and just.”<ref> Aristotle, <i>Politics</i>, trans. Ernest Barker. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1962), I.v.§ 10,1255a</ref> For Aristotle, at least, there is no apparent or inherent value and dignity to human life that should be applied universally to all persons. The value of a human life is proportionate to his or her intellectual capacities and contributions to the <i>polis</i>. In other words, no one has the “right-to” liberty because they are born human. As Alsadair McIntyre famously argues, there is absolutely no concept of human rights in ancient ethics.<ref>McIntyre, Alasdair. <i>After Virtue</i>. (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 1984), pg. 69</ref>Ultimately, humans were not always sold by the idea that their fellow humans were worth protecting and advocating for---so if the ancient Greeks didn’t conceive of the notion-who did?

[[File:John Locke Crop.png|left|270px|thumbnail|John Locke]]Clearly, this sounds quite different, still, from our contemporary understanding of human rights. As was already noted, the medieval conception of human value and dignity is specifically and unavoidably connected to God. There is another major shift from an Imageo Dei understanding of value and dignity to a natural rights understanding of value and dignity that occurs during the enlightenment, as is typical for many paradigm shifts in Western History. This is but one more evolutionary development that will eventually lead us to the modern conception of human rights we observe in the West. For this development we have, mainly, John Locke to thank.

From Locke we gain the theory of “natural rights.” For John Locke natural rights were heavily predicated on the conception of the natural law, inherited from the medieval period. It is the natural law which purported that individuals were made in the Imageo Dei and thus should be valued as dignified individualssuch, as discussed earlier. Locke argued that due to the “law of nature,” or the natural law, all men were obliged to observe what are described as natural rights to life, liberty, health, possessions, etc. He argues this explicitly in <i>The Two Treatises on Civil Government</i>: “no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions… (and) when his own preservation comes not in competition, ought he, as much as he can, to preserve the rest of mankind, and may not, unless it be to do justice on an offender, take away, or impair the life, or what tends to the preservation of the life, the liberty, health, limb, or goods of another.”<ref>John Locke, <i>Two Treatises of Government</i>, ed. Thomas Hollis (London: A. Millar et al., 1764).</ref>