samr

If life is a ultimate cause, then there are certain scenarios when one should choose to save his life, but act in a contrary way to his values. Think of a person who is threatened that if he does not kill a person he loves, he will be killed himself. And has good reasons to believe the threat will be executed. If life is the ultimate value, then it makes no sense to avoid killing the person you love. That's what ultimate means - the upper value. (Acting to values can be rational _long term_. But not in specific situations, when you know you will die if you will act according to your values). So, I think the only way to redeem it, would be to bring another life into the picture. (Though I am not sure how intellectually honest this is). The basic idea behind the view of "another life" is twofold - one, that Something cannot turn into Nothing. Something is your consciousness in this case. Your life, what you are, in a poetic sense, cannot turn just into nothing. Two, that it is _always_ useful to think long term. If this is true, that implies that there is another life which is the long term of this one.

It is a valid argument, even if existentially it is not true. If there is no life after death, then meaningful actions have no ultimate meaning, no ultimate cause. (They have daily goals of course, but no ultimate one). Ayn Rand thought pursuing one's own destiny is a ultimate cause. (The highest meaning of your self). However, I think that one might argue in the opposite way : a ultimate cause exists. One's own sense of living and creativity is a ultimate cause. When one is engrossed in these, he surpasses the fear of death. If there were no life after death, a ultimate cause could not exist. Therefore, there is life after death.

As a person or a group of people considering whether to take the castle of the king\the land that belongs to him by force. Then redistribute it to the democratic government (the king has only symbolic status at this point of history). Or, if you prefer, redistribute it to private people. In the scenario, people have believed previously in the divine right of kings, so they explicitly gathered 500 years ago, gave the king a charter that declares he and all his future generations will own all of the land in the country, and the royal castle. Forever.

Also fits in the same category of questions the religious argument that if mind ceases after life, then life cannot have a ultimate goal. (Of course, religion posits a third-person goal (god's) for your own life, but this is another issue).

Would you agree that a king that has inherited his castle without the _explicit_ use of force (everybody in the country believe in the divine right of kings), has a right to own it, and no man or group of men might take it from him by force, or from his future generations? Would you agree that the same principle applies to a king actually owning the whole land of the country?

I think that implicit in Objectivist ideas is that complex functions of consciousness are reducible to simpler operations of consciousness. So, it does support strong emergency in that sense. I am not sure what is the basic view of O-ism on the basic faculties of the human mind. The question of whether the simpler operations of consciousness can be reduced in themsleves to physical operations of the brain (and then reduced again to interactions between atoms) is a different question. I do not think it is aa question of reducing a complex structure to its simpler components. I do not think science can "explain" consciousness, since consciousness is ontologically different than matter (I am a substance dualist), and science measures only matter. So, by definition it cannot "explain" what it cannot even measure. This is not to say consciousness is something mystical - we can all perceive it directly (in ourselves) and indirectly (in others, mediated via the physical faculty of sight), we know how it works, in O-ist terms, it has cause and effect.

Ontology. Where did you see sneering in my post?

Fear of death is not a virtue. The question is how can this be justified onthologically - what are the rational premises - if there are, that due to them fear of death is not a value. If mind ceases at death, then it seems a premise for a fear of death. Yet fear of death is not a good attitude to have, and it is an understandable emotion that death is not "the final end", that you always continue, in the form of memories of your friends, your legacy, the ideas you left behind and so on . The important part of you doesn't die, in some sense. But what are the premises (if there are) that can justify this onthologically? Modern day onthology seems to argue for the worst. (Buddhist onthology for example, argues that our mind continues after our death, and part of what continues with us is our character. THAT would be for example an onthological premise from which fear of death would not only be cowardice, but also would be irrational. ). But modern day brave people claim that you should take risks and do not spend your day fearing death, even though their onthology justifies just that.

If Death exists (there is no other life after this one), then survival is the highest value. Since without being alive no other values are possible to actualize. But if surivival is the highest value, then all our values should be subordinated to it. Therefore, we should always choose the _safest_ route. Therefore, if a person has a choice of living a brave life that would involve risk taking (even the risk of dying), or living a safe life - he should always choose the safest. If the latter is a bad way of living, there is no Death. Or there is no logic. Or I am misusing logic.

I do not have a clear concept. But it is obvious to me that new age texts are emotional. I do not have a good grasp of that.

Suppose that an armageddon like scenario would happen, and a meteorite would threaten earth. Do you think it would be moral for the governments to _force_ people to go to space and destroy that astroid? In case no "astroid conscription" would be enforced by the government, I would argue (for the sake of the argument) that a person that doesn't try and go to space to destroy the asteroid acts necessarily imorally since he lives on the account of other people, relies on them to do the work for him. P.S.

I cannot provide a successful positive case that consciousness can be independent of matter. (It is necessary in the time between consciousness moving from one body to another). And I cannot think of a mechanism how the consciousness would "sense" a body to be reincarnated to, having no sensory information. Tibetan Buddhists posit that consciousness has extra-sensory perception at the time between the different lifetimes) But thinking in basic principles - where does our consciousness come from, does seem to suggest it comes from a previous reincarnation. A consciousness would have to be created EX NIHILO (from nothing), or from matter, or reincarnated from another consciousness. I do not see how something can be created from nothing (if something is created FROM something, then there should be a reason why it is this thing that is created and not another. This reason should be interaction between nothing, and the conditions. But since "nothing", cannot interact, something cannot be created from it). And I do not see how could matter be _transformed_ into consciousness. So, I have to assume it came from another. And there is the issue of Mozart, for example. Where did his genius come from? I don't think genius can be "encoded" in genes. It is just not that type of thing that can be created by something physical. It has to be created by a spiritual process (spiritual in the best sense of the word. Like Howard Rork was "spiritual").

Daniel Burnham : I am looking for a source of knowledge to learn from about the differences between the attitude described above, and new-age emotionalism. Between the rational-minded magic, and the emotional-minded magic.

(by "this" I mean the principle that altruism leads to unhapiness). Many altruists would argue that altruism leads to hapiness. Once you surrender your selfish desire, and open your heart to the love of human beings, your life becomes deeper. -- BTW, I I think they define "selfishness" in different ways than Ayn Rand does.For example, Pride is considered a sin in christianity. But I don't think it means the healthy pride of a person knows he has something of value, I think they mean the variety of pride that is based upon vanity. To this type of pride, I think Rand would also object. Only she would add that there is another type of pride, based upon reason, which christians seem to deny.

What is the perceptual data that it is based upon?

Yes, how would you _define_ this method? It is not substantiation by observation, definitely.

How would you define the method of support for the proposition "living according to altruism does not lead to personal happiness"?

There is a principle "Things fall down when dropped" which is true. Then there is principle "Things raise to the ceiling\sky when dropped" which is false. But then there are principles of the sort "Gravity works through invisible undetectable creatures which pull and push particles together". Or "God works through mysterious ways. Ways which we cannot understand. ". Would you agree that the latter belong in a different category than the two above?

Ayn Rand talks about a career about something more than only being an honest career. What do you think is the difference between this and new-age emotionalism?

What about a hypothetical situation in which the US is attacked in the second world war, and no draft is legislated. There is a volunteer army, supported by the taxes of everyone. (I think it is relevant to notice that the people who take a risk of being killed are those who volunteer ). Does a free-rider problem exist in such a case? Is it moral for a person not to volunteer?

Hi, What do you think is the main difference between what Objectivism says about career, and the typical new-age notion of "doing whatever whatever your heart desires"?

I was talking about the social part of the environment. We can change nature to suit our needs, but I think you cannot change people around you (you can take a branch and a string, bend one, tie the other one and create a bow. You cannot change people in such a way). So I would say you cannot adapt the social environment around you. Do you disagree? Do you think there is a third alternative rather than adapting to it?

So, I understand you to say that a person should have the freedom to act immoraly.

When I talk about the non-physicality of mind, I do not adress the question whether it is somehow linked to physical processes or not. I think that in its nature, mind is not physical. The question of what is the nature of mind (does it exist? Is it physical? ) is a different question of the link between it and the physical. For example, one could argue that mind exists, it is not material BUT it has no causal efficacy of its own AND the sufficient cause for it is the brain. It was a clarification. ---------------------------------------------------------- A question to you - how can you be an objectivist given your ideas? If the mind arises from physical actions, do you think there is a space for cognitive choice?

I think there is a strong argument in favor of reincarnation, from the existence and the non-physicality of mind. (Since mind exists, is non physical, and its sufficient cause cannot be matter, then it has to be reincarnated from a previous lifetime, ad infinitum). I would somewhat be skeptical of specific reports of NDE - even if some are valid, obviously some are mere delusions. How do you distinguish the valid ones from the dellusions? If you don't have a valid tool, then how can you asess?