rhartford

Emphasis mine. Speak for yourself. Agreed GS. My children. My house. Mi casa. Mi ninos. Mi escopeta. Adam GS and Adam have told me a fundamental obligation of every poster is to speak for himself or herself. (emphasis mine) I agree. I spoke my best judgment of what every parent ought to do. You may disagree with what I spoke, but I did speak my judgment of truth. You spoke for yourselves in telling me that I ought to "speak for myself" and that is what I did.

A 4 year old child has been taught to speak and evaluate this way - this begins very early in life. This doesn't mean children couldn't be brought up very differently, ie. taught not to be so sure of themselves. I hope no one on this list would try to teach a child that was sure of her knowledge not to be so sure. A fundamental obligation of every parent is to teach a child how to assess his or her own knowledge, to praise children when they are sure they are right and are right, to correct children when they make an error and teach them how to correct errors, to guide them in judging the quality of their own knowledge, helping them to understand when they can be sure. To do otherwise, to "[teach a child] not to be so sure of [his or her self]" when that sureness is warranted, would be a gross immorality and a tragedy.

Why couldn't the formulation of 'structural similarity' serve this purpose just as well as 'truth'? My 4 year old grandchild readily knows the meaning of truth. When she hears something she knows is a falsehood, she emphatically states "that's not true." She has become so sophisticated that when she suspects I'm kidding her about something she will say "For Real!?" I hope that drive to know survives the onslaught those who find truth "problematic" and think "structural similarity" can equally serve the cause of knowing.

I just returned from seeing "Avatar" in IMAX 3D. It reminded me of this thread and, combined with reading Joseph J. Grano, Jr's book "You Can't Predict a Hero," prompted me to think of an opportunity. Grano states, "Successful leaders position themselves as an extension of the solution rather than just an articulation of the problem." Imagine how "Avatar" can be used to solve political problems by use of parody. Imagine a clever "you-tube" parody with the "D.C. Sky people" taking our wealth, car companies, banks, and health while "We the Blue People" - the productive, the thoughtful, the self-responsible - are committing ourselves to the "electoral" fight to save our honor and freedom. I think someone creative could really do something effective that could go viral.

If you are like me, you answer because you are patient and you know that some others will find your comments valuable. Your analysis of "contextual certainty" to start this thread was quite interesting. Your statement that "although we cannot know what is true apart from what we are justified in believing to be true, this does not mean that we can, or should, dispense with the notion of absolute truth. This notion, if it is an abstract ideal, also functions as a concrete reminder of our fallibility" sounds right. The thought that truth is possible also spurs us to greater and more careful effort to use cognitive processes, objective processes, that best reach truth. Truth serves a similar role epistemologically that existence serves metaphysically. Certainly we can be certain of something. In fact I know something about everything. Everything that is exists, and I am certain of the truth of that statement.

In response to my Post #203 George provided the above two references. If you are not familiar with his cultural analysis of "Third Party intervention in [the] quest for restitution," considerations of "restitutive risk," and implications for objective legal procedures, the above articles are well worth reading.

The clarity and depth of knowledge displayed in George Smith's posts make them a pleasure to read. I like the above because it uses the term "value" in its fundamental sense, not the sense used by many on this list. His use of the term is clearer than that found in Rand's essay "The Objectivist Ethics," and is clearer than my own use in the paper "Objectivity and the Proof of Egoism," The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies, Vol. 8, No. 2. In that paper, I "carefully use the term 'value' to denote a single concept valid for all living organisms. . . [and I] limit the concept of value to denote a beneficial condition for its own life that an organism produces through its own action." "In a human context, some authors use the term value to denote any goal sought or anything that a person chooses to value. That is more properly labeled a value principle. This paper will not use the term value to denote a value principle. Also, this paper will not use the term 'ultimate value.' That term confuses the final goal of life with the values that are the means to achieving the goal of life." (p. 296)

About my questions regarding "justice agencies," you say: I don't know the answers, but let me rephrase the problem in a neutral manner, using "political institutions" as surrogate for either "governments" or "justice agencies." Then let's see how far we can get together and where our views might diverge.1. The goal of political institutions should be to aim at the ideal of "unfailingly [protecting] political freedoms and unfailingly [constraining] those who would violate a political freedom." 2. In a political conflict, rational egoism provides the necessary foundation for a political standard to determine which action of a conflict is the political freedom and which action would violate that freedom. 3. The function of the political institutions is to apply adequate force, or its threat, to ensure the identified political freedom in a conflict is protected. 4. The political institutions should make their policies and practices thoroughly open so that others can assess whether the institutions are acting in accord with step 1 or not. 5. If others judge one of the political institutions to be acting in violation of step 1, the others should alter or abolish it. 6. Performing steps 1-5 is more likely to be successful if resolution of each type of political conflict is the responsibility of one among the several political institutions. Each political institution should have a clear appellate procedure, a mechanism for policy alteration by voluntary means, and as a last resort step 5 could be implemented by force. I used the plural, political institutions, throughout because the complexity of potential conflict would require either "governments" or "justice agencies" to assign original responsibility to specialized institutions and appellate responsibility to other institutions. I have a sense that, in the United States, movement forward to achieving the ideal of Step 1 is more likely via action to change governments to accord with the ideal, but I have neither proof nor stronger arguments. I look forward to a response, and will at least monitor this thread, but don't think I have the time and knowledge to pursue these issues much further. I do however look forward to your book dealing with these issues.

Fine, but if an agency attempts to enforce an unjust decision, why would only a monopolistic government have the right to "preclude that option"? If a rogue agency is violating someone's rights, then any justice agency would have the right to stop it, just as any agency would have the right to stop a thug from killing someone. Are you assuming that the "any justice agency" specified, regardless of which justice agency, is correct in assessing that a particular agency is a "rogue agency"? If the "any justice agency" taking action is incorrect in its judgment that an agency is a "rogue agency," then what?

The first scenario would be voluntary, because the final arbiter would be agreed upon by the disputing parties. In the second scenario the government forcibly precludes such options. That's the difference. If the two agencies agreed to binding arbitration by the third agency, that would be voluntary and a legitimate government (if there is such an institution) would not preclude that option.If one of the two agencies did not voluntarily submit the conflict to the third agency, and that third agency tried to enforce an erroneous judgment, a legitimate government (if there is such an institution) would preclude that option.

I have a couple problems with this statement. First, no institution will "unfailingly protect political freedoms," and such perfection is not necessary to render that institution "valid." Honest errors can and invariably will be made from time to time. Second, I don't see the point of the qualification political freedoms. The primary purpose of any justice agency, whether this be a government or not, should be to protect individual rights, and these rights include far more than "political" freedoms, as this term is normally understood in political philosophy. I agree "honest errors" are likely, but holding the ideal as a goal is still necessary.My use of "political freedom" may be unusual and is based on the following: "The need for the concept of a political freedom arises when individuals choose actions that conflict and they cannot voluntarily resolve the conflict. Only one of the actions can take place. If one of the actions is a political freedom, the opposing action would violate that freedom. The proper resolution of the conflict protects the action that is a political freedom." This use considers the facts of a political conflict, encourages resolution of the conflict by applying the ethics of egoism to the solution, enables justifying the use of force to protect the action that is the political freedom, and supports derivation of rights. "Logically, a right is a principle that summarizes and describes political freedoms. Politically, a right is the basis for rule of law that recognizes and protects the political freedoms described by the right." As example of some political freedoms summarized by a right, "the right of freedom of speech captures some actions - with respect to voicing one’s ideas - that are properly free from constraint by others." (The quotations are from my forthcoming article in The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies)

Responding to George’s question with a comment and a question:The goal of a valid institutional political framework is to “unfailingly [protect] political freedoms and unfailingly [constrain] those who would violate a political freedom.” (From my forthcoming article in The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies) If any two agencies differ in practical application of that foundational theoretical principle, how would adjudicating the conflict differ when resolved by a third agency subscribing to the same theoretical principle versus being resolved by a “voluntarily-financed” limited government subscribing to that same theoretical principle?

All we have are reality and the people in it. As in any other area of our interest, cognitive or normative, it is the responsibility of each of us to seek truth to the best of our ability.

It is the anarchist’s validation of anarchism that is of primary interest to me. Validation must explain how the theory of anarchy accords with the requirements of a political theory. I have stated that “The role of political philosophy is to derive the fundamental principles and the required institutions to properly resolve [political] conflict. The fundamental principles enable identifying the political freedom that is placed in danger by a conflict, and the required institutions apply force or the threat of force to protect the political freedom so identified.” (A Political Standard for Absolute Political Freedom, to be published in The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies, Vol. 11, No. 1) In a political conflict, one side wishes to exercise a political freedom and the other wishes to violate that political freedom. The uniquely valid solution to the conflict requires the political institutions to apply force or threat of force against those who would violate a political freedom, and also apply force or threat of force against those who would prevent use of force against that violator. I am curious as to how anarchism conforms to these fundamental conditions for a valid political theory.

. . . But when it comes to deciding which ethical standard or code to actually live by, the justification is offered in the context of a more fundamental issue: how to live as a moral person. The issue of how to live as a moral person isn’t driven by the justification, although many people present the issue that way. Rather, the desire to live as a moral person precedes the justification. Looking back, as a youngster I was interested in "what was right," both in terms of discovering truth and understanding proper action. For me, understanding proper action meant and means knowledge of the actions that can be proved valid. That led to my attempt at a cognitive validation of the foundational principle of ethics in my 2007 paper. As you rightly say, my "desire to live as a moral person precede[d] the justification." But, in my case, and I suspect in most cases, a person's search for "how to live as a moral person" is driven by a search for a justified moral code.

. . . As I said previously, the difficulty with the cognitive, pre-moral choice is that it undercuts the likes of the message of Galt’s speech. In the speech Galt tells his listeners that they have chosen the wrong standard, and that this has resulted in their present circumstances. But Galt also makes clear that his listeners have transgressed morally, and done so grievously. If the choice of the standard is pre-moral, Galt has no basis for these claims. Since his listeners have made poor cognitive choices, at most he can chastise them for cognitive mistakes, not moral transgressions. The issue is more complicated. Proof of the choice to live is cognitive and pre-moral, but implementation of the choice to live is normative and hence a moral issue. A quotation from my 2007 paper may clarify the issues involved. "Objectivity thus has two distinct roles: its descriptive role for logically proving the choice to live, and its normative role for implementation of the choice to live. Choosing life is both logically and morally valid. Therefore, it is not surprising to find commentary that treats the failure to choose life as a logical failure and other commentary that treats the failure to choose life as a moral failure. ". . . Peikoff on one hand 'condemn morally the choice not to live' and . . . Peikoff on the other hand asserts that 'the choice to live precedes morality.' "[because of ] the equivocal use of 'the choice to live' in the above quotations [Peikoff's two statements are not contradictory]. For clarity, 'the choice to live' often needs to be modified by 'to prove,' 'proof of,' 'to implement,' or 'implementation of.' It is not at all contradictory to 'condemn morally the failure to implement the choice to live' and on the other hand to assert that 'proof of the choice to live precedes morality.' "One should not be overly critical of those who sometimes focus on the cognitive failure to prove the choice of life and sometimes focus on the moral failure to implement the choice of life. Only a detailed analysis and a process of introspection can fully determine the relative contribution of logical errors and moral errors in any failure to choose to live."

I share your concern that the Objectivist ethics begins with "the single choice, to live" as its moral foundation and moral standard. That is why I used cognitive standards to prove the foundational principle of ethics as "acceptance and use of the principle of holding one's own life as the motive and goal of one's action." This puts the foundational moral standard of the Objectivist ethics on a sound cognitive foundation. Please see: Hartford, Robert. 2007. Objectivity and the Proof of Egoism. The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies 8, no. 2 (Spring): 291–303.

The above is not the job of the government of a free country, not to mention the personal responsibility of the chief executive of that government. The consequence, if not the intent, is to cause students to wonder why he is not taking enough from the citizens to provide the schools with what they need.

I mentally separate things in reality into those things that are “out there” and those things that are my mental products, such as memories, concepts, propositions, and principles. If my mental products are to be true, they must correspond to the “out there,” they must correspond to reality. The mental processes for producing mental products vary in their effectiveness at achieving correspondence to reality. Basing one’s mental products on processes that are known to be unreliable, e.g. by what “feels” right or by acceptance on faith, is to act subjectively. Basing one’s mental products on processes that are known to be effective at achieving truth, e.g. reasoned analysis, is to act objectively. The former is more likely to result in error than is the latter. In attempting to judge any individual it is not always easy to know which procedure the person is using. The criterion, however, is not "how much error" is made, but the objectivity/subjectivity of the mental processes used. That is why it is often so difficult to judge and why accusations of subjectivity are often subjective. Obviously, there is a great deal more to say, and I welcome others' suggestions of valuable references. The above is my simplistic view of the issue.

Below are some questions I asked and Dragonfly's responses: "Valid" and "correct" are meaningless terms here, it is about my personal choice how I'd like to see society. As I said, "correct" and "valid" are in this regard meaningless terms, we are not talking about the speed of light or the mass of the electron. The above indicates that Objectivism, and subjectivists such as Dragonfly, require a convincing argument to support the view that a true ethical theory can be formulated. I present an approach to that task in my essay “Objectivity and the Proof of Egoism,” The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies, Spring 2007. I extend David Kelley’s argument that: “In dealing with the foundations of knowledge, David Kelley (1998, 17), in ‘Evidence and Justification,’ gives ‘a justification of knowledge that goes all the way down, based upon a set of epistemological standards to which all knowledge is subject.’ He starts 'all the way down' with a person’s very first awareness and provides justification of an entire hierarchy of knowledge. Similarly, a justification of normative judgments must be traced to such foundational roots.” After some complex arguments, I assert: “This analysis provides a criterion for ‘correspondence to reality’ in the realm of normative action. The action, its causes, and its consequences must integrate with the rest of one’s mental contents. For noncontradictory integration, volitional selection of action must be in accord with holding one’s own life as the motive and goal of one’s action.” Valid actions are then those action that are in accord with the derived foundational principle. If the proof holds, or can be made to hold, normative choices can then be properly assessed as valid or invalid, correct or incorrect. If one’s subjectivism is held as a matter of faith, the proof will be found inadequate. Even if committed to reason, the proof may be found inadequate. But, if one thinks a true ethical theory can be found, a proof must be found. Kelley, David. 1998. Evidence and Justification. Poughkeepsie: The Institute for Objectivist Studies. Hartford, Robert. 2007. Objectivity and the Proof of Egoism. The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies 8, no. 2 (Spring): 291-303.

Does this mean you will not try to "rationalize your choice" about being "against murder" as a correct choice. Does this mean that another's "subjective choice" to be "for murder" is equally valid? Is there no way in your mind to decide which of the two choices is a correct choice? If you can choose one of the two choices as correct, by what standard? If you can't choose one as correct, do you hold the two contradictory choices as "equally valid" if you can't rationalize your own choice? What does it mean to you to be a "strong proponent" of something?

So it is always "higher/lower value to whom", establishing the connection to the entity attributing value to this or that, and this is precisely what PREVENTS those values from "floating off unanchored to any facts of reality". Every choice humans make is motivated by the wish to get a higher value in return . . . Note that the "for what" of value has floated away. One can't even wish to get a higher value without a measurement standard for what is a higher value. For her the standard is what is wished for, circular again. For Objectivism the standard is benefit to one's life.

Technically and definitively, that statement was made because the author defines every "trade" to be acquisition of "something of a higher value." In Objectivism, however, “something of a higher value” is something that is of greater benefit to the organism. To declare something “higher” requires a standard of measurement and that standard, in Objectivism, is beneficial contribution to the life of the organism. “Something valued less” is something that a person thinks, rightly or wrongly, is of lesser benefit. The hierarchy of things that actually benefit a person’s life can be quite different than the hierarchy of things a person thinks will benefit life. Different concepts are needed to label choices that match the actual hierarchy of benefit and choices that are made in conflict with actual benefit. There are many reasons for choosing in conflict with actual benefit. Some possibilities are acceptance of the wrong standard for measuring benefit, simple error in applying a proper standard, and allowing feelings to override considered judgment. One must clearly recognize that one can make errors and that what one thinks is of value may not be something of actual value - that acting to achieve what one thinks is of greater benefit may not in fact be of greater benefit. The pursuit of truth requires one to be "on guard" for cases when what is "in one's mind" fails to correspond to reality. I decided to reply to my own post. I thought "going to the facts" in the above post might be helpful. The last paragraph, in particular, I thought would prompt some labeling of cases where what one thinks to be to one's benefit may not actually benefit one's life. For instance, bowing to social pressure might cause one to act in conflict with one's actual benefit. One might label that a "no-backbone" choice. Of course, Xray would claim that bowing to social pressure was actually choosing the "higher value." That's because XRay engages in the logical fallacy of circular definition. She says, in effect, a person 100% of the time chooses the higher value. And the higher value is a goal sought in preference to a lower value. Without an independent standard for measuring value, she is reduced to circularity. The higher value is that which is chosen and that which is chosen is the higher value. In that treatment, "higher" and "value" lose their meaning and float off unanchored to any facts of reality. There may be more to learn from Xray's errors, but I think this thread has probably covered most of them by now.

Technically and definitively, that statement was made because the author defines every "trade" to be acquisition of "something of a higher value." In Objectivism, however, “something of a higher value” is something that is of greater benefit to the organism. To declare something “higher” requires a standard of measurement and that standard, in Objectivism, is beneficial contribution to the life of the organism. “Something valued less” is something that a person thinks, rightly or wrongly, is of lesser benefit. The hierarchy of things that actually benefit a person’s life can be quite different than the hierarchy of things a person thinks will benefit life. Different concepts are needed to label choices that match the actual hierarchy of benefit and choices that are made in conflict with actual benefit. There are many reasons for choosing in conflict with actual benefit. Some possibilities are acceptance of the wrong standard for measuring benefit, simple error in applying a proper standard, and allowing feelings to override considered judgment. One must clearly recognize that one can make errors and that what one thinks is of value may not be something of actual value - that acting to achieve what one thinks is of greater benefit may not in fact be of greater benefit. The pursuit of truth requires one to be "on guard" for cases when what is "in one's mind" fails to correspond to reality.

I disagree. Since I have low expectations (of others) whenever they come through my delight is multiplied and increased. I have no downside, or hardly any downside. Since I expect little or nothing everything I get is a gift. For me disappointment is rare (since I do not expect much) and I do not live with the resentment that disappointment produces. I like to base my expectations on physical realities. Given the second law of thermodynamics and the -fact- that the universe is running down, what basis is there for optimism? I take what is to be had as it can be gotten and expect rather little (except from myself). Ba'al Chatzaf An advantage of optimism is the way that it sets your mind to see the best in people and to latch onto information that may be valuable. It may lead to great benefit and certainly the possibility of disappointment, but it is best not to let disappointment lead to resentment. I am optimistic that sometime in the future someone will find a way to violate the second law of thermodynamics. That optimism sets my mind to become alert whenever new information might bear on that possibility. In a similar way I am optimistic that Objectivism can be validated with greater logical power than found in Ayn Rand's writing. That optimism and alertness has led me to publish in "The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies," and present at "Free Minds '09," analysis that may contribute to placing "the choice to live" and "the right to life" on a firmer logical foundation. I optimistically look forward to others doing even better.