JARS V15 N2 - December 2015


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Oops!

We managed to have some discussion of the content of JARS V15N2, Roger's contribution in particular, for about two pages of this thread, and now, for the last ten posts or so, we wandered off into the usual junk. When a visitor to the site now clicks on the most recent post to this thread there on the OL front page, what they get is this junk (and my talk of junk, which more junk-talk), a full page of it. For reasons unknown to me, this sort of personal nastiness does not increase number of reads at these sites the way it did ten years ago. Perhaps Facebook is part of the change. (I didn't see Ellen's remark or effort as nasty, rather, something positive and in good faith, given the opacity there had been on the editorial capabilities of co-leaders of various Corners [and for that matter, opacity on the editorial capabilities anywhere on the site of persons designated VIP].)

I agree! Roger should not have introduced his snarky nastiness to this thread!

I don't think that Wolf Alan von Altendorf DeVoon is very bright, but I think that his questions and critcisms were offered in good faith. There was no reason for Roger's hyper thin-skinned personal nastiness in response.

On Roger's little tantrum thread titled "Go Moderate Yourself! (You Know Who You Are!)," he whined that he thinks he deserves the "same respect and treatment as the Brandens, Chris Sciabarra, David Kelley, and others."

The thing is, I don't remember the Brandens, Sciabarra or Kelley ever personally attacking others in the way that Roger does, or evading mounds of substantive arguments. I don't remember them resorting to abuse when they couldn't answer others' criticisms of their ideas. I don't remember them dishing out snark and ridicule and then crying like wusses when they got a little taste of their own medicine.

Sciabarra in particular is treated with great respect because he doesn't behave as Roger does. And here Roger is pissing all over Sciabarra's corner!

J

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Michael has encouraged me to discuss the things important to me in my Corner, rather than elsewhere (like here). And since I really would like to encourage a discussion with Stephen on this material, and if I had the nefarious super-powers with which I cannot be trusted, I would simply move this thread to my Corner and prune (an editorial function granted to the privileged few) the garbage from it.

But by using ordinary mortal powers of Copy and Paste, I will do the next best thing and start a new thread in my own Corner - sort of a mega quote (which function does not work for me, nor do most of the emoticons). (Even to do the C&P, I first have to shunt the material into a text file, then again shunt it into an OL text window. Design flaw of some sort going on here.)

Not to fear, though - all the material, including the trash, will remain right here in Chris Sciabarra's Corner. (As always, my "initiating" of nastiness against anyone here on OL will be confined to retaliating against those who do it to me first.)

Uh, okay.

--Brant

the line forms to the right?

(I miss the indefatigable Ellen Moore [but not Jason Alexander] from the old Atlantis: [George H. Smith:] "Why did the turkey attack Ellen Moore?" [Me:] "It was next in line." I won second place. First place was, "She criticized his [Jason Alexander's] 'Cypress Lectures.'")

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Michael has encouraged me to discuss the things important to me in my Corner, rather than elsewhere (like here).

That's probably a good idea, given how upset you get over potent criticism. Since you can't handle substantive debate from informed opponents, but prefer to be coddled and protected and surrounded by like-minded yes-men, you should definitely stay within the boundaries of your safe space. Keep your fragile little boat in the harbor where it will be sheltered from the elements.

And since I really would like to encourage a discussion with Stephen on this material...

If you want a discussion with Stephen, then why not have a private discussion with him? What's the deal? Is the discussion so important, since it's between the two biggest intellectual giants in the whole world, that it needs to be shared with the rabble on a read-only basis?

But by using ordinary mortal powers of Copy and Paste, I will do the next best thing and start a new thread in my own Corner - sort of a mega quote (which function does not work for me, nor do most of the emoticons). (Even to do the C&P, I first have to shunt the material into a text file, then again shunt it into an OL text window. Design flaw of some sort going on here.)

Yeah, it couldn't possibly be pilot error! After all, we're taking about His Royal Published Highness, Roger Bissell! It just cannot be -- must not be -- that he doesn't grasp how to handle simple code. Heh.

Not to fear, though - all the material, including the trash, will remain right here in Chris Sciabarra's Corner. (As always, my "initiating" of nastiness against anyone here on OL will be confined to retaliating against those who do it to me first.)

Clearly the problem is that you think that people are being personally nasty and viciously attacking you simply by being critical of your ideas. Roger takes everything as a personal attack, and therefore believes that he has the right to be personally nasty in "retaliation" to any and every criticism of his ideas.

J

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(I miss the indefatigable Ellen Moore [but not Jason Alexander] from the old Atlantis: [George H. Smith:] "Why did the turkey attack Ellen Moore?" [Me:] "It was next in line." I won second place. First place was, "She criticized his [Jason Alexander's] 'Cypress Lectures.'")

That was mine (as Keyser Soze)! I forgot about some of those old ATL contests. Heh.

J

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It's good to know that Ellen Stuttle is on the ball, taking precautions in case I act like a sort of surrogate chickenshit. Together, she and Jonathan and Wolf make an unbeatable team against the queers and dick-lickers and wimpy pussies and frauds.

God, what a freaking crybaby!!!

Roger, do you seriously think that the Brandens, Sciabarra or Kelley would behave so unfairly and childishly as you did in the above post? You've taken three different people's disparate views on a variety of subjects and lumped them all together as if they were the same person with the same beliefs in a lame attempt to lash out at them. You're trying to smear Ellen and me as holding Wolf Alan von Altendork DeVoon's views when we don't. What an asshole!

You really need to work on earning some of the respect that you're always demanding. Try to focus on the difference between your behavior and Sciabarra's. Sciabarra has always been quite a gentleman, and never came close to trying to pull the type of collectivist smear job that you just tried to pull.

J

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Duplicate. Glitch.

Edited by william.scherk
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Sciabarra in particular is treated with great respect because he doesn't behave as Roger does. And here Roger is pissing all over Sciabarra's corner!

Re, um, Wolf's good faith spirit noted above, I bring to this court's attention the matter of Von Altendorf V Sciabarra ...

If anyone has an emotional problem, Mr. Scherk, I'd say it's you, hysterically quoting me out of context. The line in question started with men, women, and children before I referenced with disdain the 2% of US population that are neither male nor female in the ordinary (and Randian) sense of those terms. Few have done more damage to Objectivism than queers claiming to be latter day savants of Ayn Rand "studies" -- principally Sciabarra and his admirers and enablers.

Wolf has a queer fixation on the Dicklickers. Here [here] he reproduces a list from the nutterzone, wherein every bad Dicklicker and Dyke is named. Some highlights from Wolf's reproduction: Woody Harrelson, Barack Obama, John Travolta, Hillary Swank, Tom Cruise, Bradley Cooper. Who knew?

I bring this up from irrelevant elsewhere to demonstrate that Wolf has nothing to say but ugly on JARS issues, and neither do I.

I shall vacate the thread, having nothing good to say. Wolf should maybe vacate the thread, too. I mean, he has expressed his contempt for The Corners, Roger, JARS founder and leading light Chris Sciabarra, George H Smith the wittering fool, Jonathan McSnide, and all the queer enablers who belong also in a jar. Or a piss-pot.

That said, my final ugly comment tends to support Wolf and Jonathan in re Roger V The Mob ... in that Chris Sciabarra does not descend to forums anymore. His work is done in his corpus, in his journal articles, in his stewardship of the intellectual project of studying Ayn Rand.

Chris does not descend to the gutter. Not since Dr Former Mrs Doctor Diana did her big number.

Roger, you kinda get down in the mud of the piggery sometimes, whereas most scholars kinda don't. The wallow is deeper here than in most opinion farms, like in the quasi-scholarly middle-ground of philosophy forums. It gets as dirty and as stupid as it gets (except at Perigo's Half-Acre of Hate, of course).

The least time you spend mudding with the other Mud River hogs on holiday from civility, the better to your scholarly game. Getting into the swamp with the snapping turtles and catfish and assorted reptile species ... like I say, not promising.

It is a Season of Good Will. A Season of Reason. Somewhere.

What was it Newberry called, me -- a snake, a viper?

Sploosh!

Edited by william.scherk
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Sciabarra in particular is treated with great respect because he doesn't behave as Roger does. And here Roger is pissing all over Sciabarra's corner!

Re, um, Wolf's good faith spirit noted above, I bring to this court's attention the matter of Von Altendorf V Sciabarra ...

If anyone has an emotional problem, Mr. Scherk, I'd say it's you, hysterically quoting me out of context. The line in question started with men, women, and children before I referenced with disdain the 2% of US population that are neither male nor female in the ordinary (and Randian) sense of those terms. Few have done more damage to Objectivism than queers claiming to be latter day savants of Ayn Rand "studies" -- principally Sciabarra and his admirers and enablers.

Wolf has a queer fixation on the Dicklickers. Here he reproduces a list from the nutterzone

That link goes to a post I wrote, but there's no list of any kind. Try again.

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(I miss the indefatigable Ellen Moore [but not Jason Alexander] from the old Atlantis: [George H. Smith:] "Why did the turkey attack Ellen Moore?" [Me:] "It was next in line." I won second place. First place was, "She criticized his [Jason Alexander's] 'Cypress Lectures.'")

That was mine (as Keyser Soze)! I forgot about some of those old ATL contests. Heh.

J

The contest was on the new (Yahoo) AtlantisII*. It was a commentary on the death throws of the old Atlantis on which Ellen was still posting (about being attacked by a turkey). She went down with that ship. Both she and Jason are deceased. There are people who are stupid because they don't use their brains right. Ellen seemingly had no brains to betray and was a thorough hard head. Reminded me of my paternal step-grandmother that way. Anyone with an IQ of 100, even a little lower, can be intelligent for intelligence is the natural human default. Or stupid. I've done stupid things in my life. Fortunately, I'm not chronically stupid.

--Brant

*late spring or early summer 2003

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Sciabarra in particular is treated with great respect because he doesn't behave as Roger does. And here Roger is pissing all over Sciabarra's corner!

Re, um, Wolf's good faith spirit noted above, I bring to this court's attention the matter of Von Altendorf V Sciabarra ...

If anyone has an emotional problem, Mr. Scherk, I'd say it's you, hysterically quoting me out of context. The line in question started with men, women, and children before I referenced with disdain the 2% of US population that are neither male nor female in the ordinary (and Randian) sense of those terms. Few have done more damage to Objectivism than queers claiming to be latter day savants of Ayn Rand "studies" -- principally Sciabarra and his admirers and enablers.

Wolf has a queer fixation on the Dicklickers...

Right. I simply meant that on this thread, WolfAlan Von AltenDeVoonDork has been, in my opinion, acting in good faith. That's not to say that he acts in good faith on all other threads.

J

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Interjecting a couple physics details:

We, the sunburned organisms certainly do interact with the sun - both in being sunburned by it, and in being aware of its heat and light. Do you deny this? Of course not. And as Selene pointed out, we sunburned, perceiving organisms, in so interacting, are indeed doing something (remote control) to the sun: we are blocking a certain stream of its rays (i.e., a certain portion of its action) - just as the car at the front of the chain reaction pileup does something to the car in the rear who caused it, namely, blocks/absorbs/etc. some of that rear car's action (transmitted through the other cars). They enter into a *system* of interacting entities - the cars, the sun, rays, and organisms.

The analogy isn't accurate. Photons coming to earth from the sun are going through mainly near-vacuum where there isn't enough "stuff" to produce the sort of chain-reaction backward effect produced by the front car in a pileup on the rear car.

Also, few if any of the photons striking one's body are the same photons as those which entered the outer fringe of the earth's atmosphere. In between, there's absorption and re-emission of photons.

And:

[...] when you begin to explain Newtonian mechanics to the novice saying A body continues at rest or in uniform motion unless acted upon by a force. And the novice sensibly asks, Well if thats the way it works, how come a picture on the wall falls to the floor even though it was subject to the same force of gravity while at rest on the wall and while moving to the floor? Newtons scheme will be gotten for it with some further explanation.

Make that "acted upon by a net force," and the novice will have less reason for being confused. :smile:

Ellen

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Daffy Definitions #362

"collectivist smear job" - referring to three individuals as working together as a team (you know, like Galt, Francisco, and Ragnar)

:laugh:

Roger, come on. Working as a team? Me and Jonathan and Wolf? That is a loony idea.

I hadn't even been reading the thread, and still haven't read more than a small fraction of the long posts - and didn't want those posts disappearing, with your being in a snit, before I have a chance to read them.

Ellen

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I went back to post #1 to remind myself what the topic was (Roger's self-promotion). It ran off the rails in post #5, when he said mind and physical reality "interact" and quoted Peikoff and Kelley in support of the notion. Later claimed that sunburned skin alters the Sun. Also made peculiar remarks about Atlas Shrugged. I think it's frowned upon to disagree with him, because he's a VIP who helped MSK launch OL, and Bissell is therefore entitled to hurl incomprehensible abuse. I'm sure he'll correct my version of events.

RussiaTeaser.png

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A retina is part of the brain. The "interaction" surely can only be of light photons acting upon the rods and cones of a retina, which in turn are stimulated to send specific signals to the brain's vision center. It's not the subject which is 'acted upon' by one's sight, NOT reality affected by the senses, it's the ~reflected light~ off the subject which the retina (the brain) interacts with, and which momentarily and accordingly changes its structure( I surmize).

(Or direct light from a light source, regarding the Sun).

So I'd think that Wolf's provoking metaphor of a thermometer - a passive measuring instrument - can be refuted.

The senses are re-active and 'interactive' with stimuli from the subject.

(E.g. Resistance on our skin and nerve endings of a ball in hand, etc.)

Isn't this then, a biological, neurological -chemical -mechanical (as with touch and hearing) issue, rather than philosophical?

Still, the singular, over-riding concern at stake for philosophy is, of course:

Do our senses and mind ~directly~ perceive reality -- or a 'reflection', 'shadow' or simulacrum of it?

(Those early philosophers hadn't the advantage of what is known now but had to rely only on their introspection, therefore, a rationalism. I wonder if Plato would reconsider his Forms, today...)

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I went back to post #1 to remind myself what the topic was (Roger's self-promotion). It ran off the rails in post #5, when he said mind and physical reality "interact" and quoted Peikoff and Kelley in support of the notion. Later claimed that sunburned skin alters the Sun. Also made peculiar remarks about Atlas Shrugged. I think it's frowned upon to disagree with him, because he's a VIP who helped MSK launch OL, and Bissell is therefore entitled to hurl incomprehensible abuse. I'm sure he'll correct my version of events.

RussiaTeaser.png

Oh. I went back to AtlantisII Yahoo Group April 2003 and was reminded of how no one worried about "abuse."

AtlantisII was created when the old Atlantis was taken over by "Jimbo" Wales and he told everybody to be "civil." Nobody of any import wanted any of that Big Momma crap and decamped and Jimmy's Atlantis died on the vine. It wasn't quite the same for structural reasons, but George H. Smith and such loved to slash away and it was fun to watch because he didn't really have a vicious bone in his body as long as no one presumed to stand over him--like Jimmy. It was anarchy and I think it worked as anarchy because so many there were libertarian anarchists anyway and it was when brains collided. When brains collided meant colliding content and absolutely no room for presumption. This place here is about 70% of that x all the people gone to other things never coming back to such Internet redoubts. But OL is more amendable to longer, more substantive postings, especially from the Corners.

There is too much PC expectation these days, even in this joint. A lot of posters who want nicey-nice have gone away. Bollocks!

--Brant

the infection is spreading out from college campuses consuming everything in its path, like The Blob

https://youtu.be/4Bn47ke1StE

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1. if two or more people interact, or if one person interacts with another, they communicate with one another and react to one another, often while performing an activity together

2. if two or more things interact, or if one thing interacts with another, they affect or change one another in some way



1. to introduce something such as a new law or new system, and force people to accept it

2. to force someone to have the same opinion, belief, etc. as you

3. to give someone something unpleasant to deal with

4. to cause extra work for someone by asking them to do something that may not be convenient for them


The start of the dispute on this thread is post #4, in which Stephen cites Roger in JARS citing Groarke. Groarke said, "The mind and the world impose on each other." Groarke also used "interact." Stephen called Groarke's claim Kantian. Roger balked. I called it Kantian, too, and cited Rand regarding Kant. Both Groarke's and Rand's use of "impose" was metaphorical, since the common meaning is one person imposing on another person. Regardless, they did use it similarly.


Roger then cites Kelley and Peikoff, who did not use "impose." Roger claimed what they said implied both interacting and imposing and is Kantian. Others jumped on Roger for his use of "interact" in regard to one-way phenomena, which is metaphorical or sloppy. The metaphorical or sloppy usage of two words has sparked a fire (a metaphor), which has grown into a flame war (an interaction, literally).


Merlin playing reporter.

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1. Groarke was not using "impose" in any of the senses listed above. Webster's New World Dictionary (College Edition) includes "place, put, deposit" and (impose on or upon) "to make a strong impression on." Leaving aside the magnitude suggested by "strong," this sense of "impose" clearly gets across that one thing is making an impression on, leaving an impression on, causing a change in, another thing. Granted, mutually impose or impress upon and interact with are not strict synonyms, but they ought to be close enough that we understand what is being said, without resorting to glossary wars and accusations of Kantianism.

2. No Objectivist I have ever read (except maybe here) has ever referred to perception as a one-way phenomenon. Both the quotes I offered previously are good clear statements of the Objectivist position that consciousness is interactive. Peikoff also explains this clearly in lecture 12 of his Thales to Hume history course (1972?). He even uses the analogy of two automobiles colliding to get across the point that sense perception is interactive.

3. None of the phenomena we are talking about are "one way." They are *all* interactions. They may be (1) simple interactions, as when one automobile collides with another, or when an object presses against our skin. In the former case, the automobiles impose or impress their natures upon one another, causing dents, swapping paint, whatever. In the latter case, the object imposes against our skin and its receptors, and our skin and receptors react and impress their nature (only allowing the object to push so far and no further, unless it is overwhelming, channeling and directing the mechanical or heat energy of the object, etc.). This is all two-way and interactive. Mutual imposition of their natures, mutual impressing upon, interaction. Or, interactions may be (2) a chain of such simple interactions, as when (a) a shaft of sunlight bouncing off a tree impresses its nature upon the tree and the tree upon the sunlight, causing (b) the shaft of light thus transformed to collide with our visual mechanism, the shaft of light then impressing its (transformed) nature upon the eye's visual mechanism and that mechanism impressing its nature upon the shaft of light. ADDED: The result of this collision or interaction of sun via shaft of light via tree via shaft of light with our visual mechanism is the *content* of awareness, which is the way in which we are perceptually aware of the tree. The content of awareness is the interactive/causal result of the mutual imposition of their natures on one another by the tree (via the shaft of light) and my visual mechanism.

4. None of this is "Kantian." In fact, a model of perception is *only* Kantian if it's one-way, i.e., if it regards the imposing or impressing upon something as being from the perceiver to the object perceived. And don't confuse the object perceived with the content of perception. The object is what we perceive, and the content is how we perceive it. We perceive that ball on the table as being large and red. When we interact with the ball (via its tactile contact with our skin or via the light waves that flow from it to our eyes), it impresses its nature upon our sense organs, and our sense organs impress their nature upon the bundle of energy extending from the ball to us.

5. Contrary to Kant, however, we do not impose *its* nature on the ball, and Rand was right to point this out. Instead, we impose *our* nature on the ball, and it imposes its nature on us. That is what an interaction *is.* Each thing proximately (like, by touch) or distally (through an intermediary) causes a change in the other thing - and that change is the result of the nature of the thing making the cause in the other thing. Hence, each thing imposes some aspect of its nature on the other. ADDED: And the result is the product of interaction, the conscious experience of perceptual awareness of the ball, tree, whatever. As Peikoff asked: where is the sensation of redness? In the ball? In us? Neither. It's in the interaction between us and the ball (via the light waves it reflects).

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I went back to post #1 to remind myself what the topic was (Roger's self-promotion). It ran off the rails in post #5, when he said mind and physical reality "interact" and quoted Peikoff and Kelley in support of the notion. Later claimed that sunburned skin alters the Sun. Also made peculiar remarks about Atlas Shrugged. I think it's frowned upon to disagree with him, because he's a VIP who helped MSK launch OL, and Bissell is therefore entitled to hurl incomprehensible abuse. I'm sure he'll correct my version of events.

RussiaTeaser.png

I don't think it's an issue of Roger's having helped launch OL, but of Roger's generally thinking of himself as a VIP. I think he would see his involvement with OL as a very tiny feather in his cap. That's not the source of his unmatched highness which should command our reverence and awed silence. Rather, he believes that his majestic intellectual status has been earned by his having been published in his personal friends' Objectivish publications (and nowhere else). Having soared to such heights of published importance, while never having faced informed criticism from experts who are not his friends or who are not sympathetic to him or to Objectivism, he seems to have the false confidence of believing that he's been vetted and challenged by the best of the best.

So he gets very, very upset when he isn't properly "respected," which means that he is not to be treated in the manner that he treats others. He may introduce name calling and ridicule to a discussion, but his opponents are not to respond with the same. Don't they know who he is?!!! The issue of giving him his proper respect really kicks in when an opponent asks questions or issues challenges which Roger can't answer, and which reveal his lack of knowledge, his bluffing, his self-contradictions, and his double standards. That totally pisses him off, sends him in to dodge and evade mode, makes him squeal that he's being disrespected, and makes him threaten -- often several posts in a row -- that he has been so severely and unfairly abused that he will never, ever converse with his critic again. Then he returns to complaining about being abused, while still not addressing the substance of the arguments which revealed his errors and ignorance. Any and all potent criticism is seen as "personal abuse."

It's a pose. It's a mechanism. Its an out, an escape hatch. It's a transparent device for trying to save face.

J

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Groarke was not using "impose" in any of the senses listed above.

I didn't say he was. Indeed, I explicitly said he used it metaphorically.

Both the quotes I offered previously are good clear statements of the Objectivist position that consciousness is interactive.

I disagree with such a blanket statement. If I look at the sun, my doing so has no effect on the sun. If I hear a train whistle, it has no effect on the train. If I smell bread baking, my smelling it has no effect on the bread. Touch and taste are different. So I will address touch.

When we interact with the ball (via its tactile contact with our skin or via the light waves that flow from it to our eyes), it impresses its nature upon our sense organs, and our sense organs impress their nature upon the bundle of energy extending from the ball to us.

There is an interaction here, but the effects are of different kinds. As I've shown, it cannot be extrapolated to all perception.
That's a loose use of "impress" (after the "and"). Suppose it's a rubber ball and I squeeze it. Is it my sensory organs changing the shape of the ball? No, it is my hand, and not the sensory nerves in my hand either.
The main 2 types of nerves are sensory nerves and motor nerves:
1. Sensory nerves also known as afferent nerves, carry impulses from sensory receptors towards the brain.
2. Motor nerves also known as efferent nerves, carry impulses away from the brain to muscles and glands.
Each type is one-way. The first is why I say perception is one-way.
"Perception is necessarily a process of interaction: there is no way to perceive an object that does not somehow impinge on one's body. Sense qualities, therefore, must be effects." (Peikoff, OPAR, page 47)
That is one way. He says nothing about an effect in the opposite direction, which would make it two-way. So I take his "interaction" with a big grain of salt.
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Well, if one considers the excitation of the molecules of the nerves and receptors (etc.) to stimulus, it is two-way.

But the interaction is not one of *kind*, for sure.

Perhaps useful input by Rand:

"Percepts, not sensations, are the given, the self-evident. The knowledge of sensations as components of percepts is not direct, it is acquired by man much later: it is a scientific, *conceptual* discovery."

[Cognition and Measurement]

So, we can't know how sensation works until we learn and conceptualize how it works. Reverse engineering, sort of.

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There is an unbroken causal chain involved in every process in the universe. There is an unbroken causal chain from the sun to our skin to our brains - or from a tree to our retina to our brains - or from a physical object touching us to sensory neurons in our skin to our brains - or from our brains to our motor neurons to our muscles to the objects we touch.

There are transformations from one form of energy to another: radiant or sound, mechanical, chemical, etc., but each transformation takes place at the site of a physical interaction, and each of the entities interacting - whether sun and light wave, light wave and tree, tree and reflected light wave, reflected light wave and retina, retina and optic nerve, optic nerve and brain - is, by its nature, causing a change in the attribute measurements of the other entity it interacts with.

If someone stands in the path of an arrow shot by an archer, he is interacting with the arrow and affecting its nature, just as it affects his. If it were to hit him at one mile an hour, he would stop the arrow with no harm to himself except a small sensation of pressure on his body, but the arrow would not penetrate his body and hurt him as it would if it were going much faster at impact. (Imagine standing on top of a hill and someone fires the arrow upward at you, and it hits you at the apex of its flight, having lost nearly all of its velocity.) There is also a mutually affecting of arrow and body if the arrow is going much faster, but the details of the affects are much different - as again they would be if the person were wearing armour, or the arrow were made of styrofoam, etc.

Now, is the person hit by the arrow interacting with the *archer*? In a sense, yes, just as the front car in a multi-car pileup is interacting with the rear car causing the pileup. It's a causal interaction, two-way, but since it's *transitive,* passing through, it's not a direct interaction, so the causal effects produced are not the same as if the archer hit the person directly, or the rear car hit the front car directly. The same is true for the sound and video of a television program produced in a studio, captured on microphone and camera, sent through cables or through the electromagnetic field produced by the television transmitted, bounced off a satellite or forwarded through cables, captured by an antenna or cable box, ultimately being emitted by the innards of our television sets. The same is true for the tree or television interacting indirectly with our brains via the light waves, sense organs, and sensory nerves. But there is two-way interaction between entities and energy transformation of each others' energy all along these causal chains. There cannot not be.

Perception of a star, say, cannot be one-way any more than the sun's causing sunburn is one-way. Neither process is able to happen except by some thoroughly interactive causal means. I've just illustrated how both of these work. The sun can't burn us without either touching us directly (unless we go to the sun at night)(joke) or sending some bunch of a certain kind of radiation it has emitted, which does the touching and burning. We can't perceive a star without interacting with photons the star has emitted. There is no immaculate (non-two-way-interactive) perception and no immaculate sunburn. The fact that we interact with the star's or sun's proxies, does not make it one-way interaction.

So, Peikoff is entirely correct. Save the salt shaker for some of his more dubious comments, OK?

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