[sachdevap]

> "self-evident" is inappropriate because it presumes perspective of the reader

I don't think that is the reason for it being inappropriate. In my opinion, such phrases are a result intellectual laziness, of which I am also guilty at times.

[Empact]

“We hold these truths to be self-evident” - intellectually lazy, or a claim whose verification or refutation is left to the reader?

[sachdevap]

Actually my reading says that the context there is stating the assumptions on the basis of which the rest of the document is based.

And I don't think "accelerating inequality we’re witnessing is not the natural inequality of competition and the power law, easily explained by simple arithmetic" as an axiom compares to "that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness".

As an aside, I believe the founders of the US did some great work, but let's not put their use of certain phrases on a pedestal. For example, I for one do not believe in a creator at all.

[rhacker]

Well, maybe not lazy in the case of the declaration of independence, but it's definitely filler words.