john42t

Just curious, why is ants building an anthill any different than an innate sense of duty in humans?

Xray:

See what I mean?

This kind of talk is what prompted Rand to talk about the issue at all.

Demonic is a great book--at least a good book with a great premise from a solid social philosopher (Gustave Le Bon) and with great research to back it up.

Thanks ever so much for mentioning Gustave Le Bon.

I didn't yet know him, just read the German Wikipedia article. This man appears to be a very important vertex on the map of influential intellectuals.

I just wanted to ask how demonic compares to her other books and whether it's the book you'd recommend on the French Revolution regarding mob mentality... but damn, there's just too much to read.

I thought the article predictable, and laughable too, if it weren't so amoral.

Like all determinists, Baron-Cohen is boring. They all start from the premise that what a man is born with (God-given, instinctive, etc) is his true nobility.

Conversely, rationally choosing a conscious and conscientuous morality to live by, is rather passe - and just too 'easy'.

What article is that? The link "Why a lack of empathy is the root of all evil" doesn't work and it appears not be by Baron-Cohen.

Is it really him you refer to?

He brings up the Rwandan genocide as an example of (I assume) lack of empathy. As if every one of the 100's of thousands of perpetrators of it was a psychopath, or indeed would score low on his empathy scale.

One person in the thread spells it out, thanks for this. Sometimes I feel very lonely.

Because I don't trust any single one of you that "empathy" is going to stop your participation in a mob on a killing frenzy once irrational ideas are taking over.

As always, I'll go straight for the premise to see if it contains an error. Always go for the premises first, for if error is discovered already in the premise, it spares you the effort to go after all the rest based on the false premise. (Which is why checking premises first, aside from being the correct epistemological approach, is also a very economical method).

True.

If you disagree, name one *concept* (not instinct) that you believe is inate.

It is irrelevant in that context what kind of concepts humans form. The point is that they do possess the rational faculty to form them, depending on a certain stage of their cognitive and linguistic development.

With this statement I conclude we're in perfect agreement and also very likely in perfect agreement with Rand. Nothing else was claimed to my knowledge.

If you disagree, name one *concept* (not instinct) that you believe is inate.

Your premise: "Man's rational faculty is tabula rasa".

The premise contains a substantial error: A faculty cannot be tabula rasa.

The faculty has some memory to store concepts. Either you consider that part of that faculty (like I did) or not (like you do).

That memory for concepts is empty, ie tabula rasa.

Rand's concern was only about this memory: If it is assumed not to be empty initially, it could contain concepts that can assist in establishing a moral imperative, such as "God" or "duty". Kant and many others assumed innate knowledge. It's often implied in the statement "There are things human beings just know." I don't think so. In terms of concepts, we learn it all from scratch.

Beck and the Tea Party are not democracy advocates at any level.

They fully understand that this is a limited government Constitutional Republic.

But he and Tea Party folk do often talk as if they draw the legitimacy of governments out of majority will.

As in: "we, the people, must be heard" - if you're not a democrat, how's what "we, the people" want or say of any relevance to legitimacy of governments?

I was thinking on this level.

I'm sure you're right on that he opposes direct democracy. But even Germans oppose direct democracy rather strongly! (This is in harsh contrast to Switzerland, who also speak German to a large extent.) They are still totally democratic in their believe that the only legitimate government can be one that resulted out of general elections.

Democracy will not save us, but the total lack of it is our ruination.

How do you define the total lack of democracy?

For example, would you say that China lacks democracy totally? Or is there some element of democracy in China? If so, where is it?

Or when only landowners can vote, is that lacking democracy totally or is a little bit of democracy in it because *some* can vote?

Anarchy in Somalia

Robert Murphy of the Ludwig von Mises Institute contends that Somalia is a real world demonstration of the practicality of anarchism. In contrast to the endless theoretical debates, he offers Somalia as an actual laboratory experiment on whether a society devoid of government can avoid collapsing into warring factions that prevent the growth of a free market. I do not have enough facts to argue either way, but I am fascinated.

I'm curious to know if other OL members have evidence that either supports or disproves Murphy’s thesis.

Near the end of the article there's an ad depicting H.H.Hoppe, who promotes monarchism as anarcho-capitalism (long theory short: it's not a real state if it's owned privately, intriguing argument). Now if that's anarchism, it can work as everybody knows. Is that the question?

If not, what is the question? The article already admits that certain businessmen (I suppose the successful ones) have to defend themselves.

Everybody knows that Somalia is poor. Once there will be someone who really gets some wealth he will have to have some real army to defend himself against the looters that wealth attracts. If he already has that army, he's naturally going to use it to provide others with security too. He will make agreements with other such armed entrepreneurs about where their respective "jurisdictions" end for practical reasons. If that happens within a failed democratic state, it's called organized crime. But outside it, it's traditionally called a monarchy.

What do "anarchists" want?

Yup, Michael,

I agree as well, I'm even rather anti-democratic. The thing I care about most in terms of government is the rule of law.

It is one thing when a nation has never even experienced 'one man, one vote' (as we saw in Egypt, etc, - and look how it's going there), and another when it comes to old, established democracies as there are in Europe.

Well there was France 1800 which resulted in an irrational mob devastating Europe, but you could argue that it was only the democratic ideology, not the actual voting process that lead to the disaster of the French Revolution.

But then there's German post-WWI where a democracy was put onto Germany and the guy that got elected after a good decade started WWII.

Then there's the UK, which was, like America, never considered a democracy before the advent of collectivism. It was considered a constitutional monarchy, America a constitutional republic. In both systems voting rights were extremely restrictive (in the UK much more than in the US though).

The idea of a mob rule, that means the egalitarian idea that any man's voice should influential as that of any other, crept in later in both cases. (Although maybe George could point to some material for me about when and how that happened in the US?)

Despite his minor side-swipe at Socialism, this guy appears to be another left-leaning Brit intellectual.

I'd say the fundamental premises of the EU are collectivist and authoritarian/bureaucratic, but all he attacks are the latter, the 'leaders'.

The "people" must be heard! Who are ultimately responsible for the mess, but the "people"?

I feel as you do, but he sees himself to the leftists establishment (and in the comparison he's correct of course). In the video I linked above he's raving non-stop against the "leftist pricks" in the BBC and the government.

"We the people" and democracy are values promoted strongly by the Tea Party and Glenn Beck as well. But strictly speaking they are leftists too in that regard.

These leftists are just everywhere!

John:

Nice job. Glad I tweaked you to stick around at OL.

Adam

My pleasure.

Looks like the "spread of Christianity" had nothing to do with marketing!

The Explosion of Early Christianity, Explained

Very interesting article.

Also that it was a feminist ideology back then is an interesting statement, I haven't heard that yet.

No, it it is differentiaton and precision, acknowledging the fact that several philosophies exist which one cannot not simply lump together.

Continued here.

I factored this out from Phil's thread, the last comment being this one.

What I wrote in the above quote is independent of whether or not one defines a philosophy as the philosophy of its founder.

It is about what is stated in the primary primary text sources of a philosophy.

Which are written by its founder I presume? I can't see how that doesn't amount to the same thing.

That would be a definition by non-essentials. I define it as the one, true philosophy.

This is not a definition but a personal value judgement voicing what this philosophy means to you. It's bit like saying "Jane is my one, true love, the most wonderful woman on earth."

Not a bit. The analogy would be "I define the name Jane to refer to whomever is my one, true love." Which is a confusing and impractical definition, but perfectly valid.

When one speaks of "philosophy" without the indefinite article, it is used as a general term, as the general category When philosophy is used with an article or the genitive, it refers to a specific philosophy (like e. g. "The philosophy of Immanuel Kant", "William Occam's philosophy of nominalism").

The implicit assumption being that you do not need a word for the one that is actually true. Because you believe there is no such thing as the true philosophy.

Tell mathmaticians that you come to appreciate "Calculus, the mathematics of Issac Newton", and when they do calculus that go beyond Newton, you scold them that Newton never said such a thing, they are wrong in believing it to be calculus. When they point out to you, like I did with with philosophy, that they really don't give a thing about who invented it, only that it's true, you laugh at them: Do they really believe one is actually true? Oh, those silly absolutists.

> Austrian economics aren't known to Germans either.

Which is ironic since the language of origin was German and since Austria is right next door and in fact was once part of the German world. Many of the greatest Austrian, Ludwig von Mises's works had to be translated from German to English so it's sad that they are not known in their original language.

I believe Mises translated his work into English himself after he emigrated due to Europe's descending into collectivism. I have the English version of "The Theory of Money and Credit" in my shelf. It is is two chapters longer than the older German edition, but much, much less expensive. :-)

Austria was considered as German as anything, that's true. In fact the whole idea of Germany is a collectivist idea. Without collectivism, we still had the Prussian and Austrian monarchies plus many little kingdoms. About when the Zeitgeist changed to collectivism, during the 19th century, Germany's intellectual power wavered. It suffered severly with the unification, imploded totally with the advent of Nazism and has not yet recovered.

[EDIT: And of course the Austrians are not known in modern Austria either! From all I know about Austria, it's a good deal worse than Germany in terms of intellectual climate.]

But I've taken all the Peikoff courses which he gave up through the mid-80's and there is tremendous insight in them - not just about Objectivism but about many other areas of knowledge. I consider them invaluable.

If you have an example lecture you consider a good teaser, I'd be interested.

So far, Rand herself continues to surprise me. Lately I found that Rand wrote on Randroids! This lady just couldn't be more perfect.

Have a look at this speech by Condel. This is the first speech of his I have heard which is purely political. It is about Europe the the E.U. but you can find parallels in the United States.

He sometimes makes such speeches lately.

Pat is great and there is the spirit of the Tea Party in his words.

Here's one that touches religion but is aimed strongly against the secular (!) left:

http://www.youtube.c.../10/D4YMbsEm3ms

Guys, please don't hijack the thread onto the validity of the philosophy -- that will lead to endless back and forth posts and there are many threads on the merits of Objectivism itself.

Sorry about that.

I would -love- to hear from either of you your thoughts on spreading the philosophy, getting more people exposed to Rand, how that might be done in Germany (or elsewhere). For example, this would be fascinating:

A: Are there good German translations of Rand?

B: How did you get exposed to Rand or to Objectivism?

C: Have you had access to the non-fiction, the Peikoff courses, the NBI courses?

A:

There are old ones which are out of print. I don't know how good they are, but that "We, the living" has been translated with "undefeated by life" isn't a good sign.

B:

I was investigating the curious phenomenon of the Tea Party. People demonstrating for more capitalism seemed weird. I don't know for sure, but maybe the name Rand was on a sign or maybe I saw it on a related website. I rember some Randist's ranting in an article about how capitalism must not be justified on pragmatic grounds but only on moral grounds. That was so way out of anything I could categorize in my map of known ideologies that I got very curious. I like to understand how people tick, at least roughly, and being able to categorize them. The world around the Tea Party, the libertarians and especially Rand (who I believe greately contributed to the former) was entirely new to me. Austrian economics aren't known to Germans either.

C:

The first thing I read after quotations on the net was "Philosophy, who needs it." I can't tell you just how much of an impact it had on me. For a short while I was so completely alienated from others, I felt like a tragic hero in a zombie movie - and that was only the first little set of articles. I didn't went on a mission to convince everybody of Objectivism or something like that, in fact I barely mentioned it. But I tested people by asking questions about their premises. Rand turned out to be right - and believe me, I wished she was wrong. Many of them liked me only because, and only in so far, I pretended to be as immoral as them. All I considered good in me they considered evil. Not all of them, but family and many of those I considered my closest friends.

In a way I always knew it, but did not dare to draw conclusions. I didn't really need her ideas so much, I needed her courage and the knowledge that I'm not alone. That is one thing you can use for your quest for how to spread the word.

As to the rest, I'm familiar with some of the Objectivist movement and such by the biography "Goddess of the market" and various internet sources.

I'm not familiar with Peikoff's courses or the NBI courses and I'm very much in the dark about their quality. As of now, I don't see much reason to delve into those (maybe you have one?). There are still some pieces of Rand I haven't read (art of fiction, art of non-fiction and all the articles that are not in book form; also didn't read WTL yet) and of course there's always other stuff to do.

While we're at it, I don't have a very strong opinion about Peikoff, the ARI and related issues closed vs. open either. I read "Fact and Value" and "A Question of Sanction", but I'm not sure what to make of it all. It's very difficult and tedious to analyse these splits and there's little in it for me in doing so. I rather advance my knowledge in other fields.

I should say that the amount of disagreement I have with Rand is tiny and inconsequential, but it took me a long while to arrive there.

There's another tiny point I want to mention: Our disagreement about the American natives. I read Rand's statement relatively early in my discovery and agreed with it instantly. There's two things to this point: 1. The argument itself is non-trivial and the conclusion appears monsterous to the do-gooder (it makes him evil, after all). 2. The author seems to relish in the expected agony of the potential do-gooder. Rand provoked. That appeals to me and the do-gooder reaction made her more visible. If you want to spread the message, don't ally with do-gooders, don't engange in smooth-talking. That approach will only get you ignored.

[...] undu the countless damage he has done (and Bush II and Clinton)..

Wasn't Clinton fiscally conservative?

What damage did he do?

Thus one avoids absolute claims, and the premise doesn't go down as a whole if some errors in the philosophy should be discovered.

I don't define Objectivism as "the philosophy of Ayn Rand".

That would be a definition by non-essentials. I define it as the one, true philosophy.

If I detect and correct errors, I don't leave Objectivism, I approach it.

The fact that this works in terms of communication obviously depends on Rand's excellence as a philosopher. [EDIT: Meaning: the two defintions lead to almost identical concepts - only very rarely (like in the discussion we're having right now) you will have to distinguish the two.]

I'm confident that this is a definition Rand would have approved of more than the former.

In the absence of neomystical corruption, there would be no need for the term "Objectivism": "philosophy" would suffice.

Since a philosophy is composed of many statements, to claim truth fo the whole philosophy would imply truth for all statements made there by the philosopher.

There is no such thing as "a" philosphy, any more than there is "a" mathematics. Maths is an integrated whole, so is philosophy.

Anything else is masturbation.

Rand was in error about several assertions she made, for example that "man is tabula rasa" - the premise "Objectivism is the one, true philosophy" collapses because it has been exposed as false.

Man's *rational faculty* is tabula rasa, I made a

If you disagree, name one *concept* (not instinct) that you believe is inate.

I hope your case is better than the "but I feel pain and I haven't learned that"-strawman, which is really cheap. As if Rand didn't know about that.

Adam

Capitalist Pig

Now, that's the spirit.

Recently I have met several other objectivists at UPItt and they have become instant friends. Discovering a whole forum of people who share my dedication to rationality and familiarity with Ayn Rand's philosophy is sure to lead to many many many interesting discussions and I can't wait!!!!

So that means you

a) call yourself an Objectivist and have

b) meet others who call themselves Objectivists and

c) it turned out that they actually believed the same as you do regarding Objectivism?

That's amazing!

When did you read OPAR?

Precisely my point. It is undefinable...take a look at this "chart" of absolute bullshit...

http://understanding...sciousness.html

Meaningless chart, I agree.

The removal of the state from all interactions in this realm is critical to freedom and the growth of a prosperous and free society.

We're again largely in agreement then.

This will, again in my not humble opinion, take place by revolution, or, an Atlas type collapse.

By revolution you mean a revolution at the ballot box?

I do not share your hope of the turn around that you see. I hope I am wrong. I will still strive to achieve change through peaceful elections and local actions.

As an American I'd probably be more pessimistic myself.

The major aspect in which Atlas Shrugged has turned out not to be prophetic is what happened to countries other than America. Rand was right about middle and south America, but not Europe and the Far East.

It's America that is more and more dependent on importing goods.

My optimism is primarily for the world, not America, even though I think there's change on the horizon for her as well.

You know that Red China is a cauldron of unrest and open revolution...correct?

[...]

And these are just some of the issues that leak out of that communist cesspool.

No, my knowledge about China is very limited.

The reason is that I don't know any source I trust.

In particular, I don't trust sources that consider China to be Communist. I don't know what it is, but it's not Communist.

First, the Wiegers and other Muslim groups are in open revolution in the South West regions.

Complaining Muslims, who would have thought it possible.

[EDIT: I'm *so* glad the Chinese have them too.]

The Northwester provinces are "declaring bankruptcy" and cannot pay the bills.

That is surely a local issue. China is one of the most fiscally conservative countries on the planet.

Tibet is in open revolution.

The "empty cities are decaying."

Large amounts of money are being "moved" out of China.

The Chinese economy is radically contracting.

Pollution is exploding.

Workers organizations are in open revolt in the "factory cities" where suicide is exponential.

You wouldn't get those horror stories back in 1960 when the Chinese were starving in the millions. That's when they were actually still Communist and then the media loved them. Now that they are the world's factory for low-cost production the media don't love them any more, and now each factory suicide is worse than a thousand who starved in 1960.

I'm with Rand to believe that a country's wealth is the barometer of their morals. They are a lot more moral than in 1960. And whether they will out-do America in terms of wealth (and thus, morality) still remains to be seen.

However, I firmly state that the Chinese administrations have done a fairly good job over the last 3 decades and I might add that this is in harsh contrast to the American ones.

If Americans don't want their democracy to fail they really ought to stop whining about China and start voting for less evil presidents.

-- In response to the "social consciousness" link to wikipedia: leftist crap beyond redemption - I wouldn't know how to define it any meaningful way.

Does being rational exclude social consciousness?

I even think having the word "social consciousness" in one's active vocabulary is a bad sign.

I suppose it is meant to imply a duty/responsibility to society (ie people I don't even know)? That would be very irrational, yes.

As to your statements that these ideas mean less to the individual today, one always has to be careful (this caveat applies to my own argumentation too of course) not to thinking of one's own personal preferences as a standard applying to all others.

Mostly I take this from the leftists whining that people only care about money these days (their pessimism and despair is the new thing), together with a lack of political activity especially in the usual suspect groups students and professors.

Most of the young have moved from very leftist, highly political to pragmatic/consumerist. I don't think that it's only me who sees it this way.

Since the term "sustainability" ('Nachhaltigkeit') is being talked about a lot in today's economy, I don't think environmental ideas mean less to the individual. One can invest in solar and wind energy; big companies construct cars that are more and more environment-sparing, etc.

That's true and we will see this to continue for a good while, but I think this is more inertia of past ideologies passing by than the future.

Also, I consider all of those things to be leftist corruption.

This is your personal opininion.

All I say is my personal opinion. What else could it be?

But the die-hard leftist aren't exactly known for being very conscious about sparing the environment, are they?

As for the ecologist party (the Greens), they are quite a motley crew.

I'm not talking about groups that, within Germany, are considered leftists. I'm only talking about ideas that I consider leftist corruption. Many of those ideas are mainstream to an extent that even the majority of conservatives hold them, such as much of environmentalism.

I don't think there's much of a difference between German party lines.

Yes, I showed "contempt" [your word choice] for Sandusky. I would call it moral and legal disapproval and call for punishment since Sandusky used force to take adavantage of those children, allegedly.

Yes, I am showing "contempt" for the Florida woman. I would call her actions immoral, but not illegal. I would also argue for the state not supporting her at all.

I certainly do not perceive her as a victim, any more than the men who did not control their sperm, and left children all over the place.

However, I do not call their behavior illegal.

Then we're in agreement and I was mistaken to sense anything else.

I understand that you object to madatory sterilization.

What is your solution?

Well, strictly speaking I object primarily to the (democratic) state doing it.

I could say two things here.

First, what would a "good society" be like and second what should one personally support or do given the contemporary one.

To the first issue, I've probably become a child of the 19th Zeitgeist in the sense that I believe that some people just can't provide for themselves and that everyone is, and should, ultimately be selfish. People who can't provide for themselves will have to live under the rule of those who provide for them. They should be free, but if they want to eat more than they are worth, they should be humbled first. This is, of course, a violation of human rights, but I consider those to be evil.

So I'm authoritarian in that sense, but I want all authority to be private, not public.

To the second point, I think that striving for a "good society" is utopian. One should work on oneself, not others. One should concentrate on alleviating the danger to oneself that women like this can pose (moving to a better neighborhood, for example), rather than trying to think about how to prevent that from happening.

I sympathize deeply with the old Puritan thought that you cannot save the souls of others.