@mockingbird...
Nope. Maybe spock doesn't like me.

@Goat...
Here we go...
Why should the legal use of the word "person" be at all surprising? Making sense of your post would mean figuring out what you mean by "you" - and you've given no clue as to what that might be. The most I can make out is that you're saying that there's a difference between me qua member of a political community and me not-qua member of a political community - but that's just tautology.

You're right to say that legal personhood begins at birth - that's why you can't murder a foetus, for example. But I'm mystified as to how that amounts to giving the government control over anything. Just baffled.

Your claim that humans have certain inalienable rights is something that it's been fashionable to believe since the late 18^th century, but exactly what they are, how they're established and what they mean is not something you elaborate on. And it's not clear that the belief is true, anyway. More supporting argument, please.

Your claim that "my person" rather than "I" pays taxes presupposes a serious metaphysical distinction between the two - but, again, you don't offer any account of what that is. I'm not immediately inclined to believe that there is such an account to be had. Ditto votes (allowing that I vote, of course - I don't), parking tickets and all the rest of it.

Where does it say that you have to have a person? Well, if you mean person in the legal sense, it's implicit in there being law. A person is simply that entity which enjoys the protection of the law. Boom. That's it.

You ask "Why have they gone to such trouble to hide from us the fact that they act upon our persons?" Who are "they"? What's your evidence that anything has been hidden, let alone that any effort was made? (Your (mis)understanding of the law is not indicative of THEM hiding anything.)

"Statutory law is concerned with persons (artificial) and their privileges, duties, and obligations within and subordinate to collective public/government welfare..." Not really. It's just a matter of regulating and formalising transactions between people. It's really nothing all that interesting.

"It does not, and cannot, deal with sovereign human beings..." Um... yes it does. Unless by "sovereign human beings" you simply mean "that entity which is not the domain of the law" - in which case, you're tautologising again.

Your "common laws" are somewhat perplexing too. Are they really common? How're they established? What do you mean by harm? (Would requested euthanasia be a harm, for example?) What's the difference between a harm and a wrong? Why do you grant property the same importance as other people? Why is it only others that interest you? What about duties to self... and so on.

So - I did what you suggested, and thought about it. And your claims came out somewhat the worse...
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Wed 21 May 2008, 12:02, Reply)