I will not die it's the world that will end

[moralist]

All right, but not incompatible with my point.

Yes, I see less and less actual disagreement the more our views are clarified.

A boy sailing from 5yo could well be an expert yachtsman by his adulthood on nothing but doing it often and thinking about it constantly. What you did comes under "self-discovered" theory I mentioned. You had to still conceptualize your experience into knowledge, books or no books.

Yes...

...except I would term that as "knowing" rather than "knowledge" as it is born of the awareness of a visceral experience in real time. And sure, I could always remember the experience and think about it later, and formulate it into concepts and words if I wished.

To differentiate... I'd term "knowledge" as reading books about sailing without ever actually getting into a boat.

Greg

[Brant Gaede]

Charlie Munger: Warren and I read constantly.

Warren Buffett: I've wasted 10% of my time for not being a faster reader.

[moralist]

I also enjoy reading... it's just a lower priority than working, creating, and building.

Greg

[william.scherk]

Here are the returns from the search for Moralist's mentions of 'reason' since his beginnings here, in order of appearance.

 

In the overwhelming majority of mentions, reason is a plain noun, A Reason, One Reason, Many Reasons. A few mentions are adjectives, Reasonable, or adverb, Reasonably. The only times he uses Reason as a functional noun, as a faculty, a process, an ideal or tool -- the mentions are usually accompanied by a sneer. In a few places he refers to Reason neutrally. Each mention of the word is hyperlinked to its containing OL comment.
 
 
These findings suggest to me that Moralist has no actual point of contact with Reason as most OLers understand it: rational, logical cognition. If he were asked to define Reason, I believe he would be stumped. He has never written "My Reasoning," and chances are he never will.
 
I don't know how to make the following list more readable, so you are forwarned. My faves are 41, 51. 84, 89, 96 and 97. My all-time favourite is a to-the-death tossup between 89, "When a feminine ideology resides within a male it causes them to (un)reason," and 96, "Jonathan holds the leftist definition of "logic and reason"... while I do not."

 

Some of this is gold, ladies and gentlemen.

 

VI.V.MMXV The Tablets of Reason as told by The Moralist

• Everything that happens does serve a reason and a purpose
• everything happens for a reason
•  politics had overruled reason.
•  Although in AS, Ayn Rand's reason prevailed when she demonstrated how a gun was used as a necessary tool
• This is one reason I don't watch television
•  By any measure of human reason, just DNA itself is a highly sophisticated infinitely intelligent physical design.
• (for some reason, the posting and editing function on this forum is running bare bones, so I spell out the smilies.)
• "George is a Spanish speaking minority with many black family members and friends. He would be the last to discriminate for any reason whatsoever.
• you are doing business at the wrong time, in the wrong place, with the wrong people, and for the wrong reason.
• There's a reason why he's so adamant in doing that, but it doesn't matter what it is.
•  But objective moral law is not created by that process. How it works can only be discovered by calm centered reasonable observation.
•  It is us who need to observe and use reason in dealing with it [electricity], so that we don't destroy ourselves.
•  I knew a guy in the Dispensary who completely filled in my shot record for the rest of my tour so that I never had to get another shot. As long as I wasn't behaving like almost everyone else, there was no reason for me to get sick
•  I'd add a smiley, except I've devolved back into Neanderthal basic posting mode for some odd reason.
• There would have to be a real world reason to cause your imaginary situation.
• Tourism is the second-largest reason people go to D.C.; No. 1 is to beg for a government handout.
• You just offered an excellent reason for why I avoid any direct contact with the financially TOXIC debt economy, so as not to become contaminated by its contagion.
• I don't care why people do what's right.  The why is irrelevant because the results are the same regardless of the reason.
• One reason for its [gold's] relatively stable value is that it takes the objective reality of real world labor to mine, refine, and mint.
• There's always a reason when a myth could be so durable as to be able to persist in so many widely varied forms for thousands of years..
• That's one reason why insurance premiums have been steadily rising way faster than inflation.
• Another reason for rising costs is that there is no competition as long as the person receiving healthcare services is not the one directly paying for them. 
• Another reason costs keep going up is that each participant in the pyramid is supporting a huge parasitic bureaucracy with thousands and thousands of employees who produce absolutely nothing except to process insurance billing, keep records, and transfer wealth from one person to another.
• There's no reason for the insurance pyramid not to crumble. 
• I stated my preference for rural living away from urban mobs, as well as offering a reason why.
• But that's not as dire [a choice] as it might sound, for you're certain that you had already made the right choice so there is no reason why you wouldn't be perfectly content to live and die by it.
• And that's one reason why the pharmaceutical sector is so huge.
• Sorry... for some reason I'm stuck in default primitive edit mode.
• Everything happens for a reason, and just because we don't comprehend the reason does not mean that there isn't a reason.
• Well, that was the obvious point Helen [Ellen Stuttle] had refused to even acknowledge... and there is a reason for that.
• The reason these archetypes endure over time is because there are gems of truth within them. 
• There was a specific reason I chose this trade. 
• For some reason I've lost the quote function.
• Thanks Bob... you've just offered yet another reason why not to become a slave to debt.
• And for an irrefutably valid reason. 
• There's a specific reason for taking this topic to the personal level.
• This is one reason I positively HATED school.
• That's one reason why I softened my question to "do what's morally wrong".
• And the reason is that I already understand that you (as well as many of the other folks here) have already chosen your path and will follow it straight to your grave
• There is no reason it would, because it was a New Testament event relevant to Christianity. 
•  And what of your own unfounded religious faith (unsupported idea) in the validity of the bitcoin pyramid scam which has no basis in observation and reason?
•  My answer is that you already know, and if you don't already know for yourself, there would be no way of knowing the veracity of my answer which is based on my own observation and reason.
•  Dean had made a comment about faith and reason. 
• There is a reason you chose one chart over the other. 
•  It'll only drive you crazy because there's no reason to be found in the feminized liberal lunacy over firearms.
• The reason there are so many different sects of Christianity is because of all the different interpretations of the Scriptures.
• That would all depend on the reason why it is "seized".
• In my opinion, the reason she had a bone to pick with religion because she could see the brass underneath the gold plating of so many who were acting under the color of religious authority. 
• And the only reason it is not working as it was designed by the Founders is because of catastrophic personal moral failure on a massive scale.
• The reason you're trying to engage me in an argument is that you disagree with my view.
•  Those two are not antithetical, for not all faith is unreasonable, just as not all "reason" is reasonable.
• Your side is only to do what's right even if you do it for the wrong reason. 
• Right reasons always come later as you learn.
• That's an even better reason why you'll never be free.
• This is the reason you handle reality so poorly, and can only end up complaining about how you are a slave... 
• This is the reason I went into business for myself. 
• If you're scared to be in a good mood for no good reason, that's not actually a good mood in the first place. It's a bad one.
•  It is not something people "have" to do, as if it required an effort of their will, or that they are forced to abandon their reason or their rationality.
• There's a reason that behavior made it into the TopTen.
• There is another reason pleasure is sought out, and that is to temporarily escape from pain. 
• But the effect on the world of doing what's morally right for what you subjectively believe is a "wrong" reason, is nevertheless exactly the same.
• You just assume that it is, and that's one reason why you're confused.
• And that's another reason.
• People don't always begin doing what's right for all the right reasons, but it still makes them better people as they discover that it is in their own best interests to do it, even if for any reason.
• ...regardless of the reason, right or wrong.
• The real reason is loyalty..
• ...all the more reason to build your own Gulch.
• You don't agree with my opinions, so it logically follows that my reason is useless to you.
• You would be far better served by looking for your own reason instead of trying to find it in others.
• There is something beneficial about calm centered self awareness that creates a positive feedback loop inside which can rob symptoms of their reasons to exist...
• Sometimes the reason for a symptom to exist is simply being bothered by it. But if it can no longer upset us, there is no emotional energy on which to feed, so it gives up and leaves.
• For you there is absolutely no reason that you would ever regard moral accountability for your own choices in life as a rational thought. 
• There is a reason the Palestinians have better lives in the 15% than in the 85%: It's the Jews. 
• One reason (of many others) the government exists exactly as it is today is because people need something to hate and to blame for their failure to properly order their own lives.
•  It's not even necessary to try to supply a reason.
• There is a specific reason I purposefully do not make that case. 
• For these reasons I resigned as President, and left the group.
• ...and there is a reason for that
• For the same reason this explains the rise to dominance of the Islamic fascists. 
• This is one reason you see so much economic inequality for which the moochers, being true to Marx, blame (unjustly accuse) the producers for their own failure.
• The graph won't show up because for some reason it's not permitted so I made a representation of the two axes.
• That's bound to happen when you believe that the only reason anyone could disagree with your view is because they don't understand it.
•  Within their evil ideology they functioned reasonably and logically...
•   Consider the Islamic fascists, it was their reason and logic and efficiency that successfully flew planes through the buildings.
• Ludwig just offered a good reason not to put money in a bank, or spend money on insurance policies, or be insolvent and dependent on a pension.
• This is why you are so ill equipped to deal with the here and now, and is the reason you blame (unjustly accuse) the government for your own failure to live in the present.
• Which is the reason why you are so poorly equipped to deal with the present with a mind so stuck up in the dead past.
• But that's the will of the majority, and exists for no other reason than it is what most people have demanded.
•  When a feminine ideology resides within a male it causes them to (un)reason. 
• There's no reason for me to get angry at you, Brant... because I don't get the consequences of your view. 
• There's obviously a reason you're being so evasive about not disclosing the composer or posting an artist actually performing the song. 
• Escaping moral accountability is every liberal's wet dream, and it is the reason why they're failures in life.
• If it's true, that means that if there is no God there is no reason to do what's morally right.
•  Certainly not the amoral "logic and reason" of the feminized left. 
•  That all depends by what standard you reason, Brant...
•  Jonathan holds the leftist definition of "logic and reason"... while I do not.
•  So naturally what he worships as "reason and logic" in modern abstract art, I regard as random baby drool
• Look, there is no reason for you to change your view of being nothing more than your physical brain. 
• The reason our two views differ is because you believe the lie that the government creates people in its own image... 
• Exceptional men like Washington are the reason why America has lasted this long despite the millions of termites chewing away at its foundation.
• For exactly the same reason that people debate everything else... 
• Israel is also exceptional for the same reason.
•  Unreasonably responsible... you nailed it, Brant.
• It's one reason Satan is also referred to as the Accuser... 
• That's a likely reason why Newberry didn't bother me.
• There's a reason that dung slinging is associated with leftism.
• ...and the only reason those rights are eroding for others is that they are not living lives deserving of them.
•  Wright effectively communicated reason with his design... 
•  It effectively communicates reason to me... 
•  Jonathan naturally reasons differently from me as we each live by completely different values.
•  And only your own life can convince you of the quality of your reason

Edited June 6, 2015 by william.scherk

[moralist]

Another drama queen soliloquy from the poster child of the bloated sedentary do-nothing unproductive liberal bureaucracy.

Greg

[william.scherk]

Some of this is gold, ladies and gentlemen.

Another drama queen soliloquy from the poster child of the bloated sedentary do-nothing unproductive liberal bureaucracy.

QED

[RobinReborn]

Greg, I think this is your philosophy (based on your claim that people don't change their views from arguments):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism

[moralist]

Greg, I think this is your philosophy (based on your claim that people don't change their views from arguments):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism

(shrug...) You're free to live with the fantasy that you have an imaginary super power to convince others to change their view. Only the objective reality of the consequences of your own actions could ever convince you otherwise...

...and certainly not me. That's why you'll never see me try.

Greg

[Selene]

Greg, I think this is your philosophy (based on your claim that people don't change their views from arguments):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism

Have you considered how poorly you arrive at your improper judgments?

Greg a philosophy of Solipsism?

Really?

[moralist]

What an odd conclusion, Robin... Solipsism is a product of secular leftist government university intellectualism. I know there's Something greater than me to which I am morally accountable for my actions.

That's hardly only me alone!

Greg

[Brant Gaede]

Greg, I think this is your philosophy (based on your claim that people don't change their views from arguments):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism

(shrug...) You're free to live with the fantasy that you have an imaginary super power to convince others to change their view. Only the objective reality of the consequences of your own actions could ever convince you otherwise...

...and certainly not me. That's why you'll never see me try.

Greg

Try? All you do is try to convince us of the futility of reason. Wisely, you do not use reason, just asseveration and constant repetition.

--Brant

[moralist]

Greg, I think this is your philosophy (based on your claim that people don't change their views from arguments):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism

(shrug...) You're free to live with the fantasy that you have an imaginary super power to convince others to change their view. Only the objective reality of the consequences of your own actions could ever convince you otherwise...

...and certainly not me. That's why you'll never see me try.

Greg

Try? All you do is try to convince us of the futility of reason. Wisely, you do not use reason, just asseveration and constant repetition.

--Brant

I only thing I can convince others of is that I remain unconvinced by others.

And only your own life can convince you of the quality of your reason... just as it does in mine... and everyone elses' too.

That's where the real answer is found.

Greg

[Brant Gaede]

Greg, I think this is your philosophy (based on your claim that people don't change their views from arguments):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism

(shrug...) You're free to live with the fantasy that you have an imaginary super power to convince others to change their view. Only the objective reality of the consequences of your own actions could ever convince you otherwise...

...and certainly not me. That's why you'll never see me try.

Greg

Try? All you do is try to convince us of the futility of reason. Wisely, you do not use reason, just asseveration and constant repetition.

--Brant

I only thing I can convince others of is that I remain unconvinced by others.

And only your own life can convince you of the quality of your reason... just as it does in mine... and everyone elses' too.

That's where the real answer is found.

Greg

You're a button pusher. It took a long time for me to disconnect from that. Someone I read a lot--not here--keeps saying there is no teaching, only learning. This means it's you arguing with yourself to a conclusion, not someone else doing that for you. Essentially you two are on the same boat. As for you, another layer of sophistication is needed, for taken as such your approach is literally incorrect. It's all about the thinking, not the arguing. In this context there are two types of arguing from--from facts and from the fact of one's critical thinking or the critical thinking disguised as arguments, if you will, from someone else. Facts are just raw material. Arguments are facts partially cooked, sometimes wrongly. Conclusions are the result. They can be described as rational or irrational, true or false. The overall question is the sovereignty of one's mind, whether you as an individual maintain that or not, whether you just let someone's half baked conclusions in as if the other fellow were given effective permission to control you by you, or not.

--Brant

[moralist]

You're a button pusher. It took a long time for me to disconnect from that.

Then you learned something useful, Brant.

Someone I read a lot--not here--keeps saying there is no teaching, only learning.

That's absolutely brilliant.

Now take that same idea.

There is no convincing... only conviction.

See?

Greg

[william.scherk]

Here below are some helpful passages from the mind of Ayn Rand, courtesy of The Lexicon. She was 'big on reason,' as they say. She lived as if her life depended on it, and she believed it was the most important faculty of the human being. I think she would likely chortle at this quotation.

Greg, I have updated your Tablets of Reason -- the record of every time you have mentioned the word 'reason' in your Objectivist Living commentaries. Your latest brief mention says, "only your own life can convince you of the quality of your reason." I want you to know that after you are dead, the Tablets of Reason will remain. Your church will have scripture. It may not grow, but it will not die, even if you do. You will be digitally immortal. Celebrated, given homage, memorials, festschrift. I am one of the scribes who preserve your wisdom in collections for sharing with future conveners. You're welcome. Signed, holy scripture bureaucracy ladyboys.


Yours is an interesting phrase, "the quality of your reason," embedded in an interesting claim; it begs for further discussion or at least understanding. The phrase suggests that there are specific acts one can perform to test the quality of one's own reasoning, yet also that each specific act one can perform to test the quality of one's reasoning must be but one of a class -- "one's own life."

The phrase further suggests that there may be no other universal means to test reasoning. Every man is on his own. That suggestion is why your philosophy of reason can seem based on solopsism.** It allows, as stated, extra-personal warrants in one's life, but only from direct personal experience by implication, as another person's proofs are disregarded. Only your own life.

It's a fine point, and I am sure you miss it, but solipsism is a kind of 'refuge' philosophy, it's for the suspicious and pathologically skeptical. There are only gatherings of one in the solipsistic community. All knowledge is personal. You see where that road leads. Only your own life. Only me. Only my knowledge. Final exit, Solipsism.


So, questions ...

What value does reason have in your estimation, Greg, as explained by Ayn Rand? Are there points of agreement and points of understanding you can expand upon, or is it all just confusing, alien, feminized, faggoty fluff and dander?

What I wonder is at the scope of understanding. I wonder if you can understand that most people here actively adhere to Rand's position on the supreme value of reason.


I know you consider the tabulation of your own thoughts on 'reason' to be tainted. The words you used were bloated, sedentary, do-nothing, unproductive, with a hint of faggotry and clerkism (I wonder if you are that hostile to your local librarian), I tend to think your appreciation of reason is stymied by emotion and prejudice, but I could be wrong. It could be that you just don't see the value of the processes limned by Rand, after due consideration.

I expect that wild horses couldn't get you to address the meaning and importance of reason in your own life on his forum. It wouldn't be fun or entertaining, perhaps. The reason underlying my expectation is the fact that you have had little intelligible to say about reason since you first dropped in. So, sweep away those questions, and dismiss them from your work here. Simply read Rand for comprehension, read for reflection, read for background and context.

And after you do that, you might better understand this position: if you cannot describe the processes of reason, reasoning, rational inquiry, then you quite probably have no idea what other folks are talking about when they insist upon reason. And that is sad. It should be easy, not hard for you.


So, here's Rand. Read or not. Think or not. Be mindful of your own understanding or not. Further queries at bottom.

Reason is the faculty that identifies and integrates the material provided by man’s senses.

“The Objectivist Ethics,”

The Virtue of Selfishness, 20

Reason integrates man’s perceptions by means of forming abstractions or conceptions, thus raising man’s knowledge from the perceptual level, which he shares with animals, to the conceptual level, which he alone can reach. The method which reason employs in this process is logic—and logic is the art of non-contradictory identification.

“Faith and Force: The Destroyers of the Modern World,”
Philosophy: Who Needs It, 62

Reason is man’s only means of grasping reality and of acquiring knowledge—and, therefore, the rejection of reason means that men should act regardless of and/or in contradiction to the facts of reality.

“The Left: Old and New,”

Return of the Primitive: The Anti-Industrial Revolution, 162

Reason is the only objective means of communication and of understanding among men; when men deal with one another by means of reason, reality is their objective standard and frame of reference. But when men claim to possess supernatural means of knowledge, no persuasion, communication or understanding are possible. Why do we kill wild animals in the jungle? Because no other way of dealing with them is open to us. And that is the state to which mysticism reduces mankind—a state where, in case of disagreement, men have no recourse except to physical violence.

“Faith and Force: The Destroyers of the Modern World,”
Philosophy: Who Needs It, 70

I am not primarily an advocate of capitalism, but of egoism; and I am not primarily an advocate of egoism, but of reason. If one recognizes the supremacy of reason and applies it consistently, all the rest follows.

This—the supremacy of reason—was, is and will be the primary concern of my work, and the essence of Objectivism. Reason in epistemology leads to egoism in ethics, which leads to capitalism in politics.

“Brief Summary,”

The Objectivist, Sept. 1971, 1

Do you think, Greg, that there is a fundamental mismatch between Ayn Rand's values and your own? Do you think that there is a fundamental mismatch between your values and values imagined when someone disagrees with you? Picture in your mind, if you can, a rigorous comparison between Ayn Rand's concept of reason and your own concept of reason.

Do they match? Do they differ? Are you able to intelligently describe the differences, if asked?


(The funny thing is, in the normal give and take of a conversation, questions are difficult to slide past and to evade.

Put in your mind, Greg, a conversation on the patio between yourself, Peter Reidy, Stephen Boydstun and Michael our host. Friendly, sunny, fresh lemonade from your tree, spouses in the kitchen. Conversation rambles over topics of your household and property and its marvelous efficiencies and beauty. At some point the conversation hones in on Reason. The question in the air is "what is your beef with reason / what is the difference between your concept of reason and Ayn Rand's?"


At first, you evade the question by generalities and aphorism, but your friendly guests are persistent. They want to get to the nub, the issue revealed, the differences made apparent. They continue to press you to express your own views on reason.

In a conversation it would be weird and telling if you evaded a full, honest, open response to the questions of your guests. On a forum evading a question is easy-breezy, as there is no actual real-time to and fro [as there would be in instant-messaging, telephone calls, interviews and so on].

So, is it possible, Greg? Is it even possible that you would give an honest, open response to the question at hand in a personal encounter?

I say it is quite likely. It's only friendly, casual conversation. Expressing yourself, expressing your understanding, that's a breeze. And in the second round of lemonade you could expand upon your views of Reason, and respond to clarifying questions.

And yet ... whatever honesty you would possess in that kind of human-to-human encounter is likely to be missing in your response to this comment. Yes, I think you will respond dishonestly, evasively, even abusively, because otherwise you might look like a crank. 111 one-liners on 'reason' and not a single full, open, honest discussion to be found, so far. Nobody, I bet, expects anything else but one-liners on 'reason' from here on in.

I think you would rather appear dishonest, evasive, craven, confused, irrational, or even hateful -- rather than be shown a fool. Show me wrong, Greg, show me wrong.)

A bit more Rand never hurts:

Logic is man’s method of reaching conclusions objectively by deriving them without contradiction from the facts of reality—ultimately, from the evidence provided by man’s senses. If men reject logic, then the tie between their mental processes and reality is severed; all cognitive standards are repudiated, and anything goes; any contradiction, on any subject, may be endorsed (and simultaneously rejected) by anyone, as and when he feels like it.

“Nazism and Subjectivism,”

The Objectivist, Feb. 1971, 12

___________________________

** Adam pursed his lips at Robin, proclaimed it improper judgment to scribe solipsism as Greg's baseline philosophy -- even if Robin's judgment was "based on the claim that people don't change their views from arguments."

It's a fine point, but I think Robin is right, and it is telling. Consider this bit from Robin's link:

Solipsist's investigation may not be proper science, however, since it would not include the co-operative and communitarian aspects of scientific inquiry that normally serve to diminish bias.

Just for fun ...

Fun ...

[Selene]

Fun...

William, great stuff. Really clever.

Could I see the one you did on Allah and Mohammed?

A...

[william.scherk]

Adam, hold that thought, and look at the incredible graphic image at the link. You are a fast reader-responder, but this will tax you:

World Religions Tree

Re Allah, Mohammed and Ali, you can probably imagine how I would treat a Mohammed-o-phile, were he to impress us repeatedly with anything like The Tablets. The Christophile is here in our faces. The M-phile is absent. Plus I communicate with intelligent M-philes every day. They aren't Reason-Busters as is, in my estimation, Moralist. They aren't playing here tonight.

In a pinch, I would go on at boring length about the Alawites and the Alevis, and hope to push back some gloom.

Anyway, here is a fragment of the Religions Tree. It is refreshing to think how few of us here are in thrall to anything found in the tree.

-- there are 177 iterations of "reason" on this page at last count. If Google wants to rank it at the top of OL searches for "reason," do I get brickbats or bouquets?

Edited June 6, 2015 by william.scherk

[Brant Gaede]

Fulmination is in the air.

[william.scherk]

Two one-liners away from a fresh page, Brant. I'll hang up and wait out the storm.

[Brant Gaede]

Say what?

[Brant Gaede]

Oh, I get it.

[moralist]

Fun...

William, great stuff. Really clever.

Could I see the one you did on Allah and Mohammed?

A...

Leftists won't touch Islam.

Greg

[moralist]

World Religions Tree

The tree appears to be comprehensive, however your secular political religion of leftism isn't represented, even though presently, it's the most dynamic fastest growing religion in the world.

Greg

[Selene]

Say what?

[RobinReborn]

Greg...the solipsism comment was partly in jest.

As for being able to convince people, I don't claim any magical ability to do so but I have had some successes (more failures though). There's no use in trying to undermine the foundations of someone's philosophy, but if you grow to understand them and their values well enough, you should be able to change their mind about issues they don't have strong opinions on.

Believe it or not you've changed my mind on some things. Not sure if it's worth telling you exactly what they are.