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KyaryPamyu

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  1. The thread I mentioned above has been restored. This was merely an unusual incident. Old content should be safe.
  2. A heads-up to the members of this forum: make backups of any writings you have posted here and want to preserve. My thread "How To Be Happy", a comparative study of Rand and Schopenhauer's view of suffering and happiness, got deleted/hidden today without prior notice. For an 'official' Objectivist perspective on Schopenhauer (albeit not the most accurate one), you can refer to Leonard Peikoff's lecture on him.
  3. A bit more context on the Will, from Frederick Beiser's Weltschmerz (2016). "When Schopenhauer wrote Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung in the early 1800, Naturphilosophie was in its heyday. Although Schopenhauer was critical of its wild and poetical speculations, he still makes clear in §27 of book II that he endorses some of its fundamental principles; he then proceeds to outline a conception of nature in accord with them. In the early 1800s, it was clear for Schopenhauer, and indeed most of his generation, that the mechanical view of the world had broken down entirely, and that it was no longer possible to explain matter as inert extension. The old Cartesian physics had shown itself to be utterly incapable of explaining the most basic phenomena, viz., magnetism, electricity and action at a distance. To overcome these shortcomings, it was necessary to adopt a dynamic conception of matter, according to which matter consists not in dead extension but in the interrelations of attractive and dynamic force. Even the occupation of space, which seemed primitive to the Cartesians, had to be explained in dynamic terms as the power to resist any body that would occupy the same place. Such was Kant’s argument in his Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Naturwissenschaften, which was crucial for the development of romantic Naturphilosophie. However, the romantics (viz., Schelling, Baader, Oken, Eschenmeyer), went one significant step beyond Kant. They maintained that matter should be understood not only dynamically but also organically. A dynamic conception understands matter in terms of the interrelations of its forces; an organic conception conceives it in terms of an internal nisus, a spontaneous striving to realize an inner force. Only this organic concept of matter would explain—so it was argued—phenomena like electricity and magnetism, and only it could underpin the continuum of nature ruptured by Cartesian dualism. If we place Schopenhauer’s metaphysics in this context, then it ceases to appear like wild speculation. On the contrary, it was based on scientific orthodoxy, the best normal science of its day. Since it was founded on the latest thinking in the natural sciences, Schopenhauer could claim that his metaphysics is based upon the facts of experience after all. There is indeed nothing extravagant in calling the inner nature of inorganic things the will if we use the term in the broad sense that Schopenhauer recommends. The nisus was not simply energy or power, but also a striving, a spontaneous urging and impulse, just as Schopenhauer described it. Schopenhauer’s claim that self-consciousness of my willing is consciousness of the thing-in-itself then amounts to the thesis that the awareness I have of my willing is of the same striving, urging and impulse that is found throughout all of nature. The microcosm inside myself reflects the macrocosm outside myself (I. 238; P 162). This is hardly extravagant at all; it is at least a plausible hypothesis." --- ". . .In his Über den Willen in der Natur, which first appeared in 1836, he provided all kinds of evidence from every field of natural science—physiology, anatomy, botany, astronomy—to show that the will is the ultimate cause of organic and inorganic phenomena. If this were indeed the case, then Schopenhauer could claim that his metaphysics was keeping within his empirical guidelines, and that he was doing nothing more than interpreting and explaining appearances."
  4. Schopenhauer's contribution to eudemonology is the essay called Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life. I liked the second part (Counsels and Maxims) so much that I wrote a summary of the 53 pieces of advice, phrasing things in ways that aid my comprehension, and sometimes adding examples that are evocative for me. The audiobook version, narrated by the legendary David Rintoul, is a favorite listen of mine. --- Counsels and Maxims I. General Rules 1. There is a sneaky trap built into the pursuit of pleasure: we enjoy things only in those moments when our lives are problem-free. For instance, imagine going to an art gallery with a stomach ache—your entire attention will be concentrated on getting relief from pain, and the paintings won't matter to you. However, people are naive: they're taught that it's worth incurring stomach aches (i.e. problems and complications) for the price of visits to the gallery (i.e. pleasure and joy). Those who see through the illusion will focus on escaping life unscathed, rather than on dazzling themselves. 2. When life is free of problems, our mind compensates by turning trifles into big issues. If you are annoyed by trifles, then consider yourself well off (as far as happiness goes). 3. It's a common occurrence to completely lose interest in a goal after you've already put a lot of effort into it. This is because humans are ignorant about what the future actually holds, and they assume that what they want right now is also what they'll want in the future. Therefore, instead of assuming too much, limit your plans to the not-so-distant future. II. Our Relation to Ourselves 4. In spite of the previous advice, you should have a rough plan for your life (youth, adulthood, old age). 5. Although it's wise to tend to your worries about the future, you must discipline yourself to have fun today. The present is all there is, every day is like a whole lifetime. 6. Avoid adding politics, the fate of humanity etc. into your list of preoccupations. Think about your own life instead. 7. If possible, pick intellectual hobbies, because with them, a lot less can go wrong. A side-advice: temporarily halt intellectual stuff if you're busy with practical matters. 8. Help your brain spot patterns in the chaos of life: review how your day went, every night before going to sleep. 9. Learn to be satisfied with your own company, if only to avoid the dangers associated with over-socialization. 10. Envy accomplishes absolutely nothing. Also, avoid envious people. 11. Before you set out to do something, plan well, and make preparations for unfairness and bad luck. But once you start doing, don't stop until you finish. You can't ask more than that of yourself, since you can't know in advance every possible contingency. 12. Awaken to the truth of determinism: none of your misfortunes could have been otherwise, given the knowledge and conditions you had back then. However, you should conscientiously identify your missteps and learn from them. 13. When you're stressed or tired, your brain will scare you with bogus fears. Leave plans for when you feel better. 14. Think about what it would be like to not have what you have. It's all a matter of perspective anyway. (And that's way better than fantasizing about what you don't have.) 15. Compartmentalize: do not think about things outside of the specific time you've allocated to them. 16. Tame your appetites. Don't multiply desires, decrease them. The world offers very little for people with insatiable gullets. 17. Take advantage of boredom: build something useful. 18. Your dreams of future fame and wealth are not real, they're delusions of the brain. The only thing that's real is knowledge and concrete plans. 19. The previous advice is a special case of this general principle: what is immediately present to us (a fantasy, a real-life event) tends to cloud our reason, to hide the forest and make us see only the trees. 20. Take care of your health. And don't over-strain your brain. III. Our Relation to Others 21. Character is innate and unalterable, so learn the art of putting up with people. 22. Men are united by common interests, and that's only natural. 23. Do not deal with fools and blockheads, period. It's not a growth-inducing experience. 24. People that spend their idle time thinking (instead of making noises to entertain themselves) are golden. 25. Admiration is connected with real world value, while love is often connected to bulls*it. 26. Avoid subtleties when you're around people that connect absolutely everything to themselves in some way or another, i.e. the easily offended ones. 27. If some false theory becomes mainstream, be patient—people will be forced to get it right at some point or another. 28. Do not be indulgent and charitable beyond the natural, reasonable range. People will take you for a fool. 29. Beware: people that value fairness naturally believe that others value it as well. Thus, they are highly prone to be deceived by others. And no, an outward appearance of fairness or a positive track record does not necessarily indicate that you can expect fairness. 30. Do not try to be someone you're not. Nature can't be forced. 31. If you see something contemptible in others, you have learned about something to fix in yourself. 32. People value your titles or office, not what's in your head. 33. Friendship is not what you've been taught in fairy tales. Also, appreciate the honesty of your enemies. 34. People feel threatened when they're around people they evaluate as being superior to them, so they will sometimes instinctively look for the company of people they deem to be below them. 35. Trust is hard, so don't expect it cheaply. As for you, don't give it foolishly either. 36. Politeness is the reason social harmony and order exists. 37. Do not try to perfectly replicate successful people's steps. Their circumstances (character, time, place etc.) were different from yours. 38. Getting corrected in public is a potential source of embarrassment for people. Show social intelligence by refraining from casually schooling people. 39. Speaking from facts gets you further than speaking from enthusiastic feelings. 40. Anything beyond modest self-praise can create suspicion. 41. To uncover a lie, play along with it until something incriminating comes up. In the same way, if you suspect that a certain matter is being hidden from you, pretend to have doubts about that matter—it might lead the other person to openly defend (and therefore, expose) it. 42. Information can be an unexpected, unsuspected weapon. Therefore, hide your personal affairs; show intelligence by shutting up. 43. Be glad for swindled money, for it has thought you something. 44. Learn what to expect from people by analyzing their characters. 45. There's a time and place to express your anger, and "in the midst of other people" is not it. 46. When you speak, putting emphasis on certain words can make people suspect that you're implying something about them. IV. Worldly Fortune 47. In spite of appearances, you can expect every life to be plagued by the same perennial problems, regardless of wealth and social position. 48. Adapt. Life is like chess: the way your rival plays will require you to make changes to your original plan until nothing of it remains. Also: Nature might endow you with a natural intuition for something, in contrast to the mechanical manner in which we sometimes approach tasks. 49. In moments of desperation, hold your horses. It's hard, but don't make rash decisions that you'll regret when the dust settles. 50. Don't expect anything to be obvious. If possible misfortunes were self-evident, we'd be taking prevention measures right now. 51. Misery is not a miracle, it's the norm. So, stop being surprised about it. 52. Do not confuse fate with being in a hurry and irresolute. 53. We need courage to slay life's dragons. But courage is an innate trait you might inherit or not. If you have it, use it.
  5. Humans obey the laws of physics as well. But that's a metaphorical obedience, e.g. obeying gravity is different from obeying a decision. If we go with OPAR, humans do have something in common with rocks: they can't choose not to choose, just as they can't choose to be free from the laws of physics. Quote: ". . .the action itself, the fact of choosing as such, in one direction or the other, is unavoidable. Since man is an entity of a certain kind, since his brain and consciousness possess a certain identity, he must act in a certain way." (Ch. 2, Human Actions, Mental and Physical, as Both Caused and Free) "But," someone might reply, "what about the content of my choice - the thing I actually pick? Does that flow inevitably and naturally from my constitution?" To this I would answer: "No, that would be determinism - and determinism is bad!". And I'd hold onto my position. ...unless, of course, someone showed me an alternative: "Freedom and blind lawfulness are two sides of the same coin, they're never actually apart. As a consequence, Nature will look purposeful when it clearly isn't, and human choice will appear deterministic when it clearly isn't."
  6. Schopenhauer was a big influence on Nietzsche, and Rand liked Nietzsche more than just a little. "His 'Thus Spake Zarathustra' is my Bible. I can never commit suicide while I have it.", wrote Rand, answering a questionnaire, circa 1935[1]. By way of spiritual lineage, could it be that some of Schopenhauer's ethos inadvertently found its way into Objectivism? Well, probably not, but I'm getting paranoid! It's time for a trip down philosophical hall of fame. Like many philosophers of his era, Schopenhauer believed that jumping straight into philosophizing about this and that is irresponsible. If we're going to use philosophy to gain insights, we ought to take a look at philosophy first: Philosophy is concerned with explaining things, so explainability is assumed from the get go. Furthermore, if something requires an explanation, it means that it doesn't explain itself - some other thing does. In short, we assume the motion from an explanatory cause to that which it explains, from one state of matter to another.[2] As the above analysis indicates, things like matter, motion, cause and effect, object-for-a-subject are already built into metaphysical inquiry, like your lungs are built into your body. As for logical, mathematical or moral investigations, they each come with their own inbuilt structure as well, according to Schopenhauer. Interestingly, as Kant observed, those structures can mess up metaphysics big time. For instance, consider the claim that the world is One interconnected whole: From one angle, 'Mankind', 'The State' etc. are mere abstractions, because only real individuals exist, like Sally, John, and Suzy. From another angle, everything is just a word or name for something else: 'pillow' is a name for feathers and cotton, 'feather' is a name for alpha-keratin and beta-keratin, ad infinitum. Individuals are illusory, the Whole alone is real. This dilemma is rooted in the nature of the concepts themselves. Parts and wholes are two poles of a perspectival relation, similar to 'left and right', or 'here and there'. They are not something concrete like beef and candy, but ways of relating beef and candy, and all other empirical content. In Book II of The World as Will and Representation, Schopenhauer proposes an alternative: instead of describing what the world is like, we might simply describe what it's like to be it. And what looks from the outside like a hand being raised, from the inside looks like raising a hand. Those are two ways of looking at the exact same thing, i.e. the angle of perception, plus the angle of a drive-for-activity. Quoting Robert Wicks, "as one is a part of the universe as is everything else, the basic energies of the universe flow through oneself as they flow through everything else."[3] Schopenhauer calls this second aspect simply Will. Will is harmless - unless, of course, Will is perceived through human cognitive structures like part-whole relationships, each part requiring others for its being, a veritable fight for existence. And, as Rand observed, the alternative between life and death grounds all values, and therefore all joys and woes as well. Schopenhauer's Guide to Happiness Suppose you're given a choice between two computer operating systems. They are identical in every respect, save for a key difference: one is aesthetically pleasing, the other is a crime against visual design. Which one would you pick? Most people would probably pick the pretty one. Sure, being biased toward beauty makes sense in a sexual context, but come on - we're talking about pixels smeared on a screen! But Schopenhauer would have explained that the value of graphic design lies precisely in its uselessness for things like booting speed, security, software selection and the rest. Beauty is a normative ideal for what something ought to look like. It's not an individual, it's a unified standard that individuals can succeed or fail at embodying. Thus, archetypes are not specifically concerned with you, or your friends, or what has been or will be; they make you think in Absolute terms rather than relative ones. In other words, during aesthetic contemplation, you lacking something doesn't even cognitively register. Perhaps this has something to do with the fact that at the core, we are neither fragments nor wholes, but simply Reality proper. Remembering this can lead us to a more laid-back and friendly attitude to the world. In effect, we see ourselves in others. Universal empathy is, thus, another mark of happy individuals, according to Schopenhauer. And it's just as rare as artistic genius. But those are temporary. If we're honest, the only way to not be disturbed by anything ever is to not care about anything to begin with. Sometimes this attitude comes naturally to individuals who are genuinely fed up with the cycle of distress. They will gladly ignore their leftover habitual clinging - a "dark night of the soul" - for the prize of tranquility. Asceticism, then, is the aesthetic or ethical consciousness made permanent. However, poetic genius, empathy or ascetic inclination are reserved for extraordinary people, and those are one in a million. Everyone else must study the science of happiness, which Schopenhauer calls eudaemonology (Greek εὐδαίμων [happy] + λόγος [treatise]). However, just in case we forget that the world is not a problem-free place, Schopenhauer elaborates that the 'happy' part is an euphemism for "living tolerably."[4] So, what should we do to become cheerful, according to eudaemonology? Well, that's a trick question. We don't do things to become cheerful; we do things because we're cheerful. The "genial flow of good spirits" is like the zoomies your cat or dog has, an energy that flows naturally from your constitution. Once possessed by it, you blow off steam by engaging in activity. "To secure and promote this feeling of cheerfulness should be the supreme aim of all our endeavors after happiness", says Schopenhauer in The Wisdom of Life. He adds that nothing opens the gate to cheerfulness more than your physical condition, since the state of your body is also the state of your mind. However, "a man may be perfectly sound in his physique and still possess a melancholy temperament and be generally given up to sad thoughts. The ultimate cause of this is undoubtedly to be found in innate, and therefore unalterable, physical constitution." Schopenhauer presents us with an indirect route to a bearable (and if fate allows, enjoyable) life. "The first and foremost rule for the wise conduct of life seems to me to be contained in a view to which Aristotle parenthetically refers in the Nichomachean Ethics: [Greek: o phronimoz to alupon dioke e ou to aedu] or, as it may be rendered, not pleasure, but freedom from pain, is what the wise man will aim at."[5] In other words, it's impossible to enjoy ourselves when we are in pain, so we ought to always set the stage for happiness by keeping preventable woes at bay. (What about un-preventable problems, though? They are not the Boogeymen you think they are, according to Schopenhauer. His analysis of that is well worth a read.) Rand and Schopenhauer I did not feel discouragement very often, and when I did, it did not last longer than overnight. But there was one evening, during the writing of The Fountainhead, when I felt so profound an indignation at the state of "things as they are" that it seemed as if I would never regain the energy to move one step farther toward "things as they ought to be." Frank talked to me for hours, that night. He convinced me of why one cannot give up the world to those one despises. By the time he finished, my discouragement was gone; it never came back in so intense a form.[6] It did come back though, even in that less intense a form. Rand was not exactly shy about making it known that the world isn't as it could be and ought to be. But Rand is Rand. It seems to me that Rand treats life the same way she treats a lover. When you love someone, even their flaws become glamorized to some extent. It's as if saying "although I don't necessarily approve of this flaw, even it is marked with my lover's scent." (Other people's flaws can go to hell.) You know that a novel is a drama before you place your order on Amazon. That's what novels are, and novels are what you're into. So with life. I think Nietzsche had this element as well, of romanticizing life itself. And let me tell you: this is not for everyone. If you're not that kind of person, philosophy won't turn you into one. This romantic spirit might be like musical inclination, or introversion, or (as Schopenhauer says) physically-induced melancholy. Corollary: to fully grasp all the nooks and crannies of Objectivism, or Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, your spirit must already be a little bit like theirs. ---------- FOOTNOTES [1] See the first footnote of Lester Hunt's essay, Ayn Rand’s Evolving View of Friedrich Nietzsche. [2] For Schopenhauer, human cognition is built around the principle of sufficient reason, to which he dedicates his PhD thesis, On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason (1813). [3] Wicks, Robert, Arthur Schopenhauer, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2021 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.) [4] Schopenhauer, Arthur, Introduction to Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life. [5] ———. Counsels and Maxims, §1. [6] Rand, Ayn, Introduction to The Fountainhead.
  7. Eddie believed that the oak tree from his childhood was so strong that "if a giant were to seize it by the top, he would not be able to uproot it, but would swing the hill and the whole of the earth with it". However, a lightning strike revealed that the tree's trunk was, in fact, hollow. In a similar way, Eddie subconsciously suspects that New York's trunk is hollow (for example, due to the stores going out of business). Nevertheless, Eddie is unable to identify why he feels a sense of impending doom, or why he connects this feeling to the oak tree. So he shrugs it off, thinking he's just imagining things. No heroism here 😛 According to Jim, a feudal serf works for the prosperity of his employer, without caring if his employer is ethical or helps society etc. Eddie disagrees that there's a dichotomy between making money and being ethical, so he matter-of-factly accepts the moniker.
  8. Every Objectivist interested in the BUP should read and study Ecclesiastes. After listing all the reasons why the world is a horrible place, the author tells the reader: "Go, eat thy bread with pleasure, and drink thy wine with cheer; And white be (all) thy garments, and oil for the head unfailing. Be happy with a woman' thou lovest, through all the days of thy vanity; For this is thy portion in life, in thy toiling under the sun. Whatever thy hand may find to do with thy strength-do it! For work there is none, nor planning, nor knowledge, nor wisdom in Sheol." (translated by Paul Haupt)
  9. Institutes like ARI and TAS follow a specific 'marketing plan', so I think it's worth considering what can and cannot be achieved by those plans. For the rest of us, who didn't choose a career in promoting Objectivism, I wholly agree with you on simply doing our thing and enjoying life. History abounds with philosopher-writers: Schiller, Dostoevsky, Sartre, Camus are prime examples. I noticed that many of them have at least one organization attached to their name. I think the Ayn Rand Institute is exactly that: an organization dedicated to promoting Ayn Rand's work - of which Objectivism is but one strand among many. Such an organization can expect precisely what, for example, the Albert Camus Society can expect: bringing together veteran fans, attracting a few new ones, and encouraging new scholarly research. In this respect, I think the Atlas Society (the open-system advocate) is different from ARI. Imagine that a few intellectuals took it upon themselves to expand the philosophy of Camus. Well, you obviously can't do that, because Camus is Camus. So I think that TAS is, in fact, offering an alternative to Rand's system-as-she-left-it. (Of course, offering such an alternative is compatible with promoting Ayn Rand the philosopher-writer). If, let's say, 10% of the population read Camus, quoted Camus, attended lectures on Camus every summer, adopted his terminology verbatim, imitated his manner of acting, and excommunicated various individuals, what would we call that? A cult, or a fanatical fan base. Human knowledge is a decentralized business. People can accept Camus' ideas without liking his novels or haircut. No one is commiting a folly by choosing to never read Camus himself, and relying instead on accurate presentations by other authors. This is what it means for knowledge to successfully 'infect' the world. Science and philosophy cannot have Jesus-figures. Anyone who is committed to promoting Objectivism should imagine the following scenario: a world where everybody learns Objectivist ideas from K-pop and TV dramas, but barely anyone has heard of Atlas Shrugged and Ayn Rand. If said promoters find no problem with this picture, there's a high chance they're committed to spreading the philosophy, rather than to spreading Ayn Rand's writings.
  10. Welcome to the forum, metacreation. People who hear about Rand for the first time can still dislike her writing style or her 'interview personality' after looking her up. And that's fine; even if you agree with her ideas 100%, you don't have to force yourself to read novels or essays you don't enjoy. Cool idea. I think the 'like' button is disabled on posts made by newly registered users, so I'll just quote you instead.
  11. In short, the 'movement' would benefit from marketing the philosophy to non-fans, i.e., to people who dislike Ayn Rand as a person, or find her writing style to be obnoxious. As a parallel, we all benefit from studying term logic, but only a small portion of the population is interested in Aristotle as a person or writer. Focus more on making a cutural impact, less on Rand as a personality.
  12. Objectivism upholds the 'if/then' model of morality ('if you want X, do Y'). At first glance, this is completely incompatible with the Categorical Imperative, which simply demands you to 'do it', no matter the context or situation. However, in philosophical discussion, the restrictive CI is always connected to concepts such as freedom, autonomy and human dignity, so what gives? Since human freedom is a hot topic for Objectivism as well, perhaps we can extract some nuggets of truth from the CI's two most popular formulations (those of Kant and Fichte). After a brief presentation of both, I'll tackle the issue of human autonomy, as applicable to the Objectivist Ethics. ______ Kant and the CI Kant tackled morality as part of a wider project encompassing the human faculties: reason (theory), conscience (morality) and taste (aesthetics). In the first installment of his project (The Critique of Pure Reason), he argued that in conscious experience, when the world undergoes changes, it still remains the same world, and thus, you also remain the same self throughout. He then shows how certain relations, such as causality, enable this sameness-in-difference. But, although you can prove that such relations are necessay for preserving the sameness of the self, Kant claims that it's an unjustified leap to assume that the exact same relations operate beyond the senses (Prolegomena, § 28). Reason is extremely tempted to do that, but whenever it tries to make claims about what lies beyond experience, it short-circuits and ends up in antinomies, i.e. for a given metaphysical thesis, it can also prove its opposite, the antithesis. However, since we're endowed with certain faculties such as moral conscience, we can show that certain assumptions are justified, albeit not provable. For example, morality presupposes a belief in freedom, i.e., in the ability to cause an action of our own will, without being forced to cause it. This model can be formally expressed as 'just do it' (the Categorical Imperative). The CI's rival is the Hypothetical Imperative, which can be expressed as follows: 'Do X, but only if you want to attain Y'. According to Kant, since the CI is implicit in freedom of action, our concrete actions should be in harmony with that. For example, it's not possible to 'just lie', because lying depends on first building trust; this turns lying into a Hypothetical, rather than Categorical imperative. Kant also thought that human conscience is innately biased toward the CI, and that following the HI takes a toll on our dignity (in the latter, freedom is merely the 'freedom' to dutifully comply with everything nature asks you to do, like a good boy/girl). Since the phenomenal self is rooted in the noumenal self (outside of the senses), it's reasonable to assume that both selves are in harmony somehow, even if it looks as if maintaining the CI is sometimes impractical or useless. Fichte's Formulation Fichte believed that the proposition 'A exists' does not have universal truth, since 'A' could be a unicorn or a talking chinchilla. However, the proposition 'A = A' does have universal validity, and grounds all of logic. He wanted to track the source of this universal validity, and allegedly found it. He explained that, in self-consciousness, the self (as subject) relates itself to its own self (as object). Thus, in the proposition 'I = I', the mind opposes the two terms, then relates them (in ITOE-parlance, ‘differentiates and integrates’ them). While the truth of 'A exists' is conditional upon what 'A' stands for, the truth of 'A = A' is universal, since it points to an actual content, namely, the unity of subject and object. Theoretical Portion Thesis: I am I. Antithesis: However, I (the subject) am also not I (the object). Those two are distinct, opposed. Synthesis: The 'I' and 'Not-I' co-exist, each having some quantity relative to the other. As you can see, rational integration (synthesis) does not succeed in resolving the separation of subject and object, it merely makes them cohabit. To properly achieve the unification that theoretical reason failed at, we'll simply have to incorporate this 'Not-I' into ourselves, through practical reason. In other words, if our bodies can follow our wills, so can the rest of material nature. Needless to say, that's a daunting project (but doable). Science, technology, art etc. will become our tools for this project. Rand and the Choice To Live Nature blackmails us with endless conditions to fulfill, so at first glance, it looks as if we're only 'free' to dutifully obey whatever nature nags us to do. One of the things I find remarkable about Rand's ethics, is that the basic choice underlying the 'if/then' model is unconditional. More specifically, the choice to live is a pre-moral choice, a precondition for the possibility of morality. Unfortunately, I think OPAR kind of ruins this insight by phrasing things like some pious cleric: No thanks. I'm not bowing my head to anything. Contrast this with Rand's own presentation: That’s a big difference of emphasis. A free being does not pursue life because it's forced to do so by natural appetites, but rather: pursues life (with all of its appetites) as an act of freedom. Back to OPAR: After claiming that the choice to live is pre-moral, Peikoff tactlessly brings up the rungs of hell, suggesting moral condemnation for the sin of not 'accepting reality' (choosing life). Kelley made fun of this in one of his lectures. I just want to empathize how truly radical the 'pre-moral' idea is. Obviously, there's a stark difference between the CI and the Objectivist Ethics. The CI does not even allow people to take their own lives, because that would remove from existence an instrument of freedom. But Objectivism roots the fundamental choice in our absolute autonomy. Not in mechanical causality, not in nature's whims or in externally imposed edicts, but in us. When it comes to those philosophies that uphold 'freedom for it's own sake' (e.g. Fichte's system of ethics), it's tempting to retort: 'no, it's freedom for life's sake'. But the dignity of freedom is so important, that its absence can completely absolish a person's desire to live. As always, one needs to go beyond what's 'technically true' and see the living, breathing reality that faces us. Another example: it's perfectly valid to speak of one's body as a tool/machine for one's will. Rand herself does this in Galt's Speech (FTNI, pg. 130) without contradicting her thesis that a person is an indivisible entity. Likewise, for Fichte, the 'Absolute I' is merely the target; the 'real I' is always a mind-body trying to incorporate the rest of nature into its will. I think there's a grain of truth in the idea that the desire for freedom somehow underpins all of our actions. We strive for a perfect state of affairs that will finally satisfy us, yet the moment we find something that fits the bill, we're struck by its ghastly restrictiveness and incompleteness. The spirit revolts against limitation, all limitation. Perhaps, if Objectivist 'activists' focused on presenting reason as a tool for freedom, we'd see a spike in interest for the philosophy. Personally, I'm definitely not in the camp of people that consider that it's not necessary to 'sell' reason to the masses. No human being is interested in something, unless that something bears positively on his freedom. At least, that's what attracted me to The Fountainhead and VoS in the first place: the fact that Rand wrote about the autonomy of the human spirit. To this day, I still don't care about fawning over how cool Ancient Greece was, or about cringey polemics regarding alternative logics. This is another fact to consider: there might be Objectivists out there who don't care about most of the Objectivist memes, and maybe, *gasp*, they don't even enjoy Atlas Shrugged. All the more reason to focus on properly marketing the philosophy (forgive my blasphemous language), rather than struggling to pull in 500-1000 'rational newcomers' per year, of which at least a portion will be dogmatists who don't care to challenge their views, anyway. ______ Further Reading A brief, interesting overview of Kant's work Kant's weird list of 'duties' (notice the Christian influences) Stephen Boydstun's thorough coverage of Kant's moral theory in relation to Rand's A review of Michelle Kosch's book on Fichte's Ethics
  13. Perhaps I'm mixing up who said what? I'll have to think that over.
  14. Regarding 'early development' arguments, I take a more conservative stance. We also start as flat-earthers, but it doesn't follow that we should dismiss the spherical earth just because we had to perform complex calculations to prove it. Berkeley never once denies that we experience ourselves as embodied individuals in a spatio-temporal world subject to causation; he provided a theory about the 'source' of this experience, and realism does the same. Perhaps a lingering confusion is whether idealism is compatible with physiological theories of perception. The answer is a resounding yes. In this thread, I am solely concerned with the status of claims that can't be verified by experience (cosmic intellect, mind-independent realm, Hyperuranion etc.); I have no beef with wholly verifiable claims, such as those of neuroscience.
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