So where, other than the mind of man, do inalienable rights come from?
Well, from the point of view of Rousseau, Hobbes and Bentham, they derive from a continuous social contract; I believe a couple of people have argued that in this thread. If you argue specifically from Hobbes, then you argue that historically we have made an irrevocable trust wherein we have for all time transferred our original rights to the state in exchange for its efforts, no matter how arbitrary, to spare us from a life that was considered short, nasty and brutish.
If you are a Marxist, then I believe that you argue that your rights - or the lack thereof - derive from your membership in an economic group.
If you argue from the Jeffersonian point of view, then our rights are endowments from the Creator - in whatever form(s) one chooses to conceive of [him | her | it].
If you argue from the strictly materialistic point of view - a Darwinian view - then you might have to appeal to the existence of and the phenotypic expression of what Richard Dawkins has called the "selfish gene" or possibly follow Sam Hariis on his quest for a neurological basis of faith.
If you want to consider it as a trivial matter, then all basis for our rights come from our minds, but from different causes.
