How Is Equality Possible? An Analysis of the Idea of Intrinsic Equality

How Is Equality Possible? An Analysis of the Idea of Intrinsic Equality The present study focuses on a particularly important meaning of the term equality, namely, the one that inspires the general principle that all human beings, as human beings, are equally important, or do count equally, and deserve equal respect. While the idea that people are fundamentally equal is nowadays almost taken for granted, the meaning of the concept of 'equality' is still under dispute, and the clarification of the idea that 'fundamentally, humans are equal' is far from being complete. This stems from certain confusions that are being made in this context between concepts like 'empirical' and 'typological' empirical and 'normative,' 'natural' and 'empirical,' and between 'intrinsic equality' and 'equality as an intrinsic value.' The author then goes on to examine the unavoidably relative nature of the value judgments applied to human beings, in its multiple facets.