I believe that the life and property of the individual are inviolable. A benevolent society cannot be built on harming people or seizing what they have honestly earned without just cause.

Confidence

High

Current support

• Without security in person and property, cooperation gives way to fear and predation.
• Every durable social contract assumes that innocent people are not legitimate targets of violence or theft.
• Sample: Fraser Institute Area 2 scores show countries with stronger legal systems and property rights consistently rank higher on economic freedom and income.

What could disprove it

Show that a stable, benevolent society can be sustained while routinely violating innocent life or property.

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I believe that consent is the moral basis of legitimate interaction. Unity built on force is domination, not cooperation.

Confidence

High

Current support

• Voluntary agreements align incentives and reduce resentment.
• Coerced participation corrupts both the coerced and the coercer.
• Sample: Nobel laureate Elinor Ostrom documented hundreds of cases where communities self-govern resources through agreed rules rather than top-down force.

What could disprove it

Show that widespread coercion produces more trust, prosperity, and moral integrity than widespread consent.

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I believe that the right to speak, question, and dissent is essential to social health. A society that punishes honest challenge cannot stay truthful or unified for long.

Confidence

High

Current support

• Error is corrected only when it can be named aloud.
• Suppressed speech does not disappear; it festers and returns as extremism.
• Sample: Freedom House Freedom in the World index ties expression rights to broader political rights scores across 210 countries.

What could disprove it

Show that suppressing dissent produces more accurate institutions and stronger long-term unity than protecting it.

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I believe that no person should be treated as a means to another's end. Benevolence requires seeing each person as an end in themselves.

Confidence

High

Current support

• Using people as tools dehumanizes both victim and user.
• Kant's categorical imperative remains a practical guardrail against political cruelty.
• Sample: Kant's Formula of Humanity (1785) remains a standard reference in medical ethics and human-subjects research rules.

What could disprove it

Show that routinely instrumentalizing people for collective goals produces better moral outcomes than respecting individual ends.

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I believe that equal dignity does not require equal outcomes. A benevolent society protects equal standing under the rules, not sameness of result.

Confidence

High

Current support

• People differ in talent, effort, luck, and choice; equal outcomes require unequal treatment.
• Justice concerns fair process; envy concerns comparison.
• Sample: OECD income inequality data shows equal formal rights coexist with wide outcome gaps — enforcing equal outcomes requires unequal treatment.

What could disprove it

Show that enforced equal outcomes increase freedom, trust, and prosperity more than equal rules applied to all.

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