CriticalThinker2000

Hi Kierkegaard,
 
Welcome to the forum.
 
 
There is plenty of room in Objectivism for optional values. For example, the virtue of productivity simply says that man must provide himself with the material values necessary for existence. It doesn't say, you have to create value by being an architect (Roark) or by being an industrialist (Rearden) or by being an artist (Halley). The choice of a career is an optional one based upon your specific, objective, experiences and preferences. I, unlike you, prefer cake to ice cream. I prefer cake for objective reasons- the texture in my mouth is more enjoyable to me- but ultimately it comes down to the context of my own life. Both are desserts and we both have individually acquired tastes for different desserts. The same is true for many many other things, like preferring tennis to soccer. Both are sports. Which one you prefer depends on your individual experiences and value judgements in the context of your specific life (which sport you grew up watching, etc).
 
 
 
This second question is a point of much misunderstanding, especially among people that are new to Rand. When Ms. Rand refers to 'life' she refers to the full meaning of the concept 'life'. She doesn't just refer to a beating heart or open eyes but to the entire meaning of the concept. Thus, the goal of the Objectivist morality is not merely to extend your life for as long as possible. If this were the goal, I agree that you could argue that eating any dessert is immoral. You could probably even argue that leaving your house is immoral because of the probability you get run over crossing the street.
 
But what Rand means by 'life' is a full life specific to man. In other words, man is a certain entity with a specific identity. He is rational, experiences emotions, has two arms, etc. Living, for a human being, means living in accordance with your nature. Which means living a rational, fulfilling life, with deep emotions, relationships, and all of the wonderful values that are distinctly human. Merely existing in a miserable state is not living in the true sense. Yes, you are alive in that you are fulfilling the minimum requirements to continue the process of being alive- but you are not living in the full sense of the concept. Existing as a slave may be the kind of life proper to an animal but you would not be living a flourishing life in accordance with your identity as a man.

Rearrangement of the metaphysically given, the essence of production is.

Rearrangement of the metaphysically given, the essence of production is.

I don't think that it's comparable to proving a negative. It's impossible to prove that something is infinite because an infinite object has no bounds which means it has no identity. Proof itself is premised on the law of identity and so 'proving the existence of infinity' means using the law of identity to show that the law of identity does not exist.
 
With respect to proving a negative, one is never required to disprove a claim to knowledge when there is no evidence for the claim because a lack of evidence means that the 'knowledge' has no known basis in reality.
 
The two things are both wrong to do but it doesn't seem like the reasons why are the same.

In response to Harrison D's remarks about infinity being inferred from unboundedness, I would like to make a fine distinction. One might think of "unboundedness" as being the very definition of "infinity", but one must be careful then not to use "infinity" as a noun. One may also be careful not to collect things like natural numbers into a "set" in order to keep "infinity" from becomming a noun, or from possessing the properties of other sets that are closer to how perceivable concepts are organized. "Infinity" is not perceivable. In the extended real numbers infinity is added as a noun and certain arithmetic operations are defined for it. Perhaps this should be thought of as a convenient fiction that is not directly traceable to perception. People use "infinity" in very flexible ways that often have no particular meaning. Therefore, one must be careful about the use of this term.

I've read all of Ayn Rand's non-fiction and fiction but I'm not too bright, plus I have adhd.  Can someone please explain to me, like you would to a high schooler who knows nothing of Objectivism, why capitalism has a propensity to lead an individual to high self esteem and communism facilitates low self esteem?
 
From what I've read and understand, capitalism leaves you free to act therefore leaves you free to gain confidence in the use of your own mind.  Confidence in the use of your own mind and confidence in your ability to deal with reality is by definition self esteem.  Under communism this isn't possible because you depend on others for things.  You can never gain confidence in your ability to deal with reality because you are dealing with reality through other people.
 
 
I know there is a lot to add to that and the way I put it isn't that eloquent and I doubt it would convince anybody who knows nothing of Objectivism to look into it any further, so can you please answer my question?

Without these clarifications, it wasn't an intelligible question. "the Saudis" doesn't necessarily refer to just the government, acting in an official capacity, and "Islamic totalitarian ideology" is also not one thing. Not all Islamists want a global caliphate. Most just want one in Muslim countries.
Now that you clarified, the answer is no, I'm not aware of any evidence that the Saudi government gives money to any groups actively planning to create a global caliphate. In fact, everything we know about the Saudi government says that they wouldn't do that. They want peace and economic cooperation with non-Muslim countries (controlled cooperation, but cooperation), not war.

It sounds to me like you've got this exactly right. Whether there is intent or not is unknowable but when the words come out of the person's mouth it enters the objective realm. Words have real, objective meanings/interpretations. The reasonable man standard seems to be a good attempt at deciding what constitutes an objective threat.
 
 
 
Yelling fire in a crowded theater (unjustifiably) is a property rights issue, not a free speech issue. It shouldn't be illegal because of consequences but rather because the theater owner prohibits it.

http://news.yahoo.com/u-preparing-sue-ferguson-police-over-charges-racial-022544637.html
According to CNN, the Holden Justice Department wants to sue Ferguson Police for racial discrimination. Two paragraphs in particular made me laugh:
 
Ferguson is 70% black. So, if they stick with this language in the lawsuit, they're gonna have to prove that Ferguson PD has been discriminating against whites, hispanics, and that one Indian family that runs the 7/11.

"There can be no compromise between a property owner and a burglar; offering the burglar a single teaspoon of one’s silverware would not be a compromise, but a total surrender—the recognition of his right to one’s property." -Ayn Rand
 
What would she say about compromise on the issue of speech? If Charlie Hedbo decides not to print something because they are threatened, who has won? The notion that the world is too complex for the simplistic principles illustrated in Ayn Rand's fiction is a thinly veiled excuse to compromise on basic moral principles.

Okay. Ted Turner bought his 2 million acres from people who were poorer than himself.

There's really only one way to assess this: you look at rich people, and you figure out if land got them there. You could try doing a rigorous study, but that's not the place to start.

The place to start is to look at the world around you. You probably know a few people who are fairly rich, even if not super-rich; and, you probably know of a few more. Ask yourself how they got their wealth: to the best of your knowledge.

The next place is to look further afield. Look at something like the Forbes list of richest folk. Did Gates, Walton, Ellison, Carlos Slim, Buffett or Bloomberg build their billions primarily because of an inherited land-holding?
 
if this cursory survey indicates that wealth is not key, and no other evidence is offered to show that it is, then there is zero reason to believe it is. A seemingly logical argument about why land ought to be key is not worth the paper it is written on, if the evidence shows the opposite.
 
Now, doing this type of survey, you will probably find that there are some countries --  still at a "developing country" stage -- where inherited land explains the wealth of a certain segment of the population. However, what you will find -- even in these countries -- is that these people are not the richest, as a group. Rather, the group with the most wealth is the one who had guns and gangs and simply took over other people's land and mineral resources.
 
So, the ball is in your court to offer at least some cursory evidence -- not "pure" argument, but cursory evidence -- that inherited land explains a significant share of current wealth, particularly in a modern country.

Using your logic and reason, probably. But proudly declaring yourself on the side of logic and reason in every single post you make, only to launch into a series of false claims right afterwards, is not really how actual logic and reason works.
Scientific arguments don't start with "using logic and reason", and they most definitely don't include adjectives like "dumdum" or interjections like "hahahahahaha" to refer to an opposing position.

In this case, logic and reason would dictate that you use that "math" you mentioned, to prove your position. That would be the ONLY logical and rational argument to make in this case: math. Oddly enough, there's not a single number in your post. Not a one. Hard to do math without using them numbers.
Simply, huh?
Unfortunately for that theory, potential government tax revenues are finite. After a certain point, raising taxes does not increase revenue. A logical and rational approach to this problem would've probably accounted for that basic fact, instead of stating that raising taxes is a simple, fool proof solution to any insolvent government scheme.

I'll give this one last shot, try to sum up my previous post, since I see no one here got my point:

The phrase "identical situations" is a contradiction. The use of plural suggests a distinctions between two or more things. Distinction is the opposite of identity. The whole point of the law of identity is that one thing is identical to itself, but two or more things are not identical.

Nothing you say, that relies on the assumption that identical situations can exist, makes any sense. Interpreting the law of identity to contradict the existence of free will is ridiculous.

Eiuol, with respect, I was not asking you to restate your argument. I understand your argument. I constructed a very similar argument when I took tenth grade physics. (Which, to clarify, is not intended as a put down; I'm only trying to emphasize that your position is very familiar to me, and has been for a very long time.)

Instead, I was asking you whether you recognize that your argument stands opposed to the quote from Leonard Peikoff I'd provided. And I ask, not for the purpose of accusing or implicating, or anything else, except that one of the features of this longstanding debate which frustrates me is that the proponents of determinism are seemingly very reluctant to recognize that they are arguing for it, or to call it by name. I don't mind that people argue for determinism (though I think they're mistaken), but I'd like to see a spade called a spade. I think that discourse generally requires such honesty.

So really, I'd like to know. Do you understand that your position is contra the position expressed in that quote? Or do you truly believe that there is no conflict between this quote and what you're proposing? I'll provide it here again, for convenience, and then I will sincerely hope for an answer:
 

Personally, I don't plan on ever going silent, here or anywhere. What's the point of that? It's not too difficult to say a couple choice comments, in a whole slew of contexts. If I'm hitting a bunch of proverbial walls with non-Objectivists and it's really bugging me, I'll take a break or find some new people.

In person, the chances of finding enough like-minded or open-minded people to allow yourself to feel good about humanity, is slim. But online, you've got global tech companies providing you with free tools to find those people, and to keep the others away.

And, it's really not so bad as all that. People compartmentalize, and are mostly still civilized. It takes forever to figure out new ideas, even when people really have interest in them. So, cut yourself a break and focus on all the positive stuff. You'll probably be dead before anything catastrophic happens anyway!

Isn't that just pragmatism, with power as it's end?

One would have hoped that after hanging out in an Objectivist forum for years, you'd appreciate that this is a straw-man when it comes to freedom of speech. Do you seriously think any Objectivist would say that Charlie Hebdo has a right to have its cartoons published in any publication of its choosing? 

"There can be no compromise between a property owner and a burglar; offering the burglar a single teaspoon of one’s silverware would not be a compromise, but a total surrender—the recognition of his right to one’s property." -Ayn Rand
 
What would she say about compromise on the issue of speech? If Charlie Hedbo decides not to print something because they are threatened, who has won? The notion that the world is too complex for the simplistic principles illustrated in Ayn Rand's fiction is a thinly veiled excuse to compromise on basic moral principles.

Of course, it's impossible for people to privately coordinate large projects for profit...

One cannot assume that Taggart's commentary is meant to be the author's view. In fact, it is better to assume the opposite. In these quotes, Rand shows that Taggart has no clue why someone like Eddie would love TT so much.
One cannot judge Eddie's whole life based on the last moment of utter depression, when all that he has loved is gone and he sees nothing to live for anymore.
Rollback to the last point where Dagny was still working on the railroad. At that point, what had Eddie done different from Dagny, in terms of showing either loyalty or serfdom to TT?

Serf?  Really?  
 
There is NO economic or political derivative to pull from the end of the story outside of the fact the author used it to show what happens to moral people in an amoral system - They become victims.  
 
In fact the book is the progress of good people being victimized and being replaced by the kind of vermin that benefit from a corrupt system. Rand just brilliantly turns it into a mystery to support the theme (what happens when the people that think stop). Eddie lasted the longest, by author fiat, due to being connected to Dagny and once she was gone he went the sad route of the rest - A good man lost.  
 
That is theme of the book being dramatized - nothing more or less.  

Being long time married and attending a large family gathering my odds seem fowl at breast.

Well of course any statement I make is going to be "just a statement"...
 
My response does answer your question because it shows the link between retaliatory force and the ultimate ethical value, life. You have a new question (why is force anti-life?) but that doesn't mean your original question wasn't answered.
 
 
 
Man's means of survival is his mind. Force is anti-mind and therefore anti-life. Ayn Rand spent quite a lot of time explaining this fact through her philosophic writings and also by concretizing the principle in her novels. If you have read a lot on the topic and have a specific question, I'd be happy to help answer it, but asking people for explanations on a forum for a question as fundamental and broad as this one seems like a terrible way for you to arrive at a correct answer. It's akin to posting "Why is Capitalism good?" in the economics forum.
 
 
 
Because life is the standard of morality.

There is definitely some hocus-pocus going on here in the gnome-nclature.