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A few problems I have with Objectivism

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CJM

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There is no confusion. It may be possible for me to choose my values, or it may not, depending on how you choose to define choice.

You don't see your circular logic here?

"Choose to define choice"

When modern philosophers declare that axioms are a matter of arbitrary choice, and proceed to choose complex, derivative concepts as the alleged axioms of their alleged reasoning, one can observe that their statements imply and depend on “existence,” “consciousness,” “identity,” which they profess to negate, but which are smuggled into their arguments in the form of unacknowledged, “stolen” concepts.

Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, 79.

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You don't see your circular logic here?

"Choose to define choice"

When modern philosophers declare that axioms are a matter of arbitrary choice, and proceed to choose complex, derivative concepts as the alleged axioms of their alleged reasoning, one can observe that their statements imply and depend on “existence,” “consciousness,” “identity,” which they profess to negate, but which are smuggled into their arguments in the form of unacknowledged, “stolen” concepts.

Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, 79.

You need to turn on your humour meter.

Also Rockefeller what do you mean "no she would not?" Yes she would and so would you. The person I was replying to was arguing a rational person would not sacrifice their life for someone else.

Edited by CJM
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CJM, although you talk about reality, you have all of these beliefs and suppositions. These are not knowledge. Yet, you are hanging on to them for all your might. I am not suggesting that you replace them with another person's judgment, even Ayn Rand's. I am saying that as long as beliefs not anchored to reality and "logical suppositions" hold sway, you aren't going to learn anything, not from us or reality.

But even deeper, you are in a world of hurt. Your senses don't work and you can't think. Your conclusions are determined by the cosmos, not you. Your statements have causes outside yourself, they aren't yours.

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If you sacrifice your life for a value, you are holding that value as a higher value than your life. This contradicts holding your own life/existence as your highest value.

I think you are misunderstanding what is meant by holding life as the standard of value or as your ultimate value. This is understandable because Objectivism does not use these terms in the way they are commonly understood. To live, to exist, implies to live or exist AS something, to have an identity. Objectivism is talking about a certain KIND of life, not just survival. So before you continue along this line of argument you should understand that in Objectivism life =/= survival. This is why it can be rational to commit suicide in certain instances. For example, I would commit suicide before I would allow myself to exist in a permanently vegetative state. Can you understand why this is rational in an Objectivist value hierarchy and why merely continuing as a shell of marginally functioning biological reactions is not really living in the sense it is meant here?

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And your sense organs may not be accurate aswell? If not, why not?

How do you get from A to B. Something being your standard of value does not entail that it must be your ultimate value.

If volition is possible and controlled by our brain, a casually determined physical object, then how is it free?

CMJ, come on. Slow down and look at this stuff. "Made possible" is not the same as "controlled" (your word). We are trying to make sense of your comments. AR taught us that we have to know what some one is saying exactly, try to understand their meaning, before we can make any kind of evaluation of their position. It is a mental technique worth learning. Of course, since you do not have volition, you can't choose to do that.

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You need to turn on your humour meter.

Trust me, it is on. I laughed out loud at your statement.

However you must see that your "problems" with Objectivism are rooted in your assumption of (and reliance on) concepts you're attempting to negate.

If your position leads to a conclusion that existence does not exist, then... well... pickle butter. :santa:

Edited by freestyle
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CJM, although you talk about reality, you have all of these beliefs and suppositions. These are not knowledge. Yet, you are hanging on to them for all your might. I am not suggesting that you replace them with another person's judgment, even Ayn Rand's. I am saying that as long as beliefs not anchored to reality and "logical suppositions" hold sway, you aren't going to learn anything, not from us or reality.

But even deeper, you are in a world of hurt. Your senses don't work and you can't think. Your conclusions are determined by the cosmos, not you. Your statements have causes outside yourself, they aren't yours.

Strangely enough, I don't base my beliefs based on what makes me feel good. So I won't be adopting the beliefs that my sense organs are infallible super machines or that I somehow hold free will despite being nothing more than a collection of my genetics and past experiences anytime soon(not to mention the insane idea free will entails that the same person in the same circumstances could make two different choices with no changing variables.) just because they seem nice.

The fact that you attempt this appeal to emotion is not a good sign for someone who considers themselves an Objectivist.

I think you are misunderstanding what is meant by holding life as the standard of value or as your ultimate value. This is understandable because Objectivism does not use these terms in the way they are commonly understood. To live, to exist, implies to live or exist AS something, to have an identity. Objectivism is talking about a certain KIND of life, not just survival. So before you continue along this line of argument you should understand that in Objectivism life =/= survival. This is why it can be rational to commit suicide in certain instances. For example, I would commit suicide before I would allow myself to exist in a permanently vegetative state. Can you understand why this is rational in an Objectivist value hierarchy and why merely continuing as a shell of marginally functioning biological reactions is not really living in the sense it is meant here?

Not really. If holding your life as an ultimate value merely means identity or self interest, then ethically it can mean ANYTHING. That identity could be one of a rapist, altruist....literally anything.

Note: this is kind of off point on my part.

But anyway, if living a certain kind of live is to be your highest value, then sacrificing yourself for someoneelses life is still contradictory to it.

Edited by CJM
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CMJ, come on. Slow down and look at this stuff. "Made possible" is not the same as "controlled" (your word). We are trying to make sense of your comments. AR taught us that we have to know what some one is saying exactly, try to understand their meaning, before we can make any kind of evaluation of their position. It is a mental technique worth learning. Of course, since you do not have volition, you can't choose to do that.

Volition is not contradictory to a lack of believe in free will.

Wait, does Objectivism use this word differently too?

Trust me, it is on. I laughed out loud at your statement.

However you must see that your "problems" with Objectivism are rooted in your assumption of (and reliance on) concepts you're attempting to negate.

If your position leads to a conclusion that existence does not exist, then... well... pickle butter.

Woah, my position is definitely not that existence does not exist, where did you get that? I am sorry if I gave that impression.

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And your sense organs may not be accurate aswell? If not, why not?

Do you mean accurate as in "accurate to the 300th decimal place"? Or accurate as in reliable? If you have blurry vision you could say your vision is "less accurate", but what you see is valid.

How do you get from A to B. Something being your standard of value does not entail that it must be your ultimate value.

Can you elaborate on what you mean by ultimate value? Anyway to determine if a particular value is rational or not requires some thought. A value cannot be considered apart from one's life. So you'd need to analyze a particular value in a particular context in order to determine if it is rational. I was probably a little to ambiguous in my last post.

If volition is possible and controlled by our brain, a casually determined physical object, then how is it free?

"Free will", or more accurately, volition, is self-causation. Obviously, though, you're brain needs to be "turned on" before anything is caused. Any decisions made would be a result of a choice that is not caused by anything on the outside. This does not mean the *ability* to make a choice is also self-caused.

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Coleecdting data from objective reality and collecting objective data about reality are two very different things.

So? How does it relate to my response?

Lets not get carried away here, I am not changing my manner of writing to reflect the fact that I believe all knowledge to be subjective. That is unnecessary.

It's not about your writing. It's about your belief. Where did you get that belief? "All knowledge is subjective" is an objective evaluation, which contradicts your statement itself. So, not unnecessary.

Being a standard of value and being an ultimate value are two very different things.

Not so in this context. If a man holds life as his highest value, then it should be the ethical standard for his choice of all other values.

Perfectly would be perceiving objective reality as it is.

What does it mean to perceive reality as it isn't?

Being willing to act against does not necessitate moving towards in the way you used it.

Acting "against" it necessarily implies self-destruction because man's life is not automatic. It requires thinking and acting to gain and keep one's values.

If you sacrifice your life for a value, you are holding that value as a higher value than your life. This contradicts holding your own life/existence as your highest value.

As I mentioned in my previous post, it is man's life qua man, not as a slave or tortured soul, which is the standard of value. You completely ignored that point.

Not perfect. My lawnmower is not perfect. It is reliable.

"Reliability" presumes a standard. And the only standard that man has is his non-contradictory knowledge, which is ultimately derived from perceptual data.

Whether it is different or not is irrelevant to whether we can gain objective knowledge through it.

It is relevant precisely because you made the suggestion that sense-perception could be fallible.

There is no confusion. It may be possible for me to choose my values, or it may not, depending on how you choose to define choice.

I define (making a) choice as a volitional act when faced with an alternative. How do you define choice?

Why infinite, why not absolute?

Because our eyes do give us absolute data, but not infinite.

I believe most peoples conception of free will to be an illusion. It is not different from making an incorrect judgment.

I request you to read my post again, to answer the question I asked. This is what I wrote:

"I understand your confusion here of why you consider it to be an "illusion". All I will ask you is one question, is it possible for you to choose your values? And if your answer is yes, then all you have to do is integrate this knowledge with the fact that actions of our body do not violate causality."

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Woah, my position is definitely not that existence does not exist, where did you get that? I am sorry if I gave that impression.

That is the impression I'm getting. If you can (and apparently do) claim that existence exists, then by what "objective" means have you made this determination? At the very least, I get the impression that you may waiver and argue that it is possible that your senses are imperfectly perceiving and it is possible that existence doesn't exist.

If not, then by what faculty have you established the objective reality of existence?

Edited by freestyle
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Do you mean accurate as in "accurate to the 300th decimal place"? Or accurate as in reliable? If you have blurry vision you could say your vision is "less accurate", but what you see is valid.

How can it be valid AND inaccurate?

Can you elaborate on what you mean by ultimate value? Anyway to determine if a particular value is rational or not requires some thought. A value cannot be considered apart from one's life. So you'd need to analyze a particular value in a particular context in order to determine if it is rational. I was probably a little to ambiguous in my last post.

Highest value is all I mean by ultimate.

"Free will", or more accurately, volition, is self-causation. Obviously, though, you're brain needs to be "turned on" before anything is caused. Any decisions made would be a result of a choice that is not caused by anything on the outside. This does not mean the *ability* to make a choice is also self-caused.

Self-causation implies that it is not caused by outside factors. Otherwise it is not self-causation, merely causation. So it is a causa sui, and comes from nothing?

I mean, it has to be one or the other, there isn't actually a middle ground here, unlike most other areas.

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Strangely enough, I don't base my beliefs based on what makes me feel good. So I won't be adopting the beliefs that my sense organs are infallible super machines or that I somehow hold free will despite being nothing more than a collection of my genetics and past experiences anytime soon(not to mention the insane idea free will entails that the same person in the same circumstances could make two different choices with no changing variables.) just because they seem nice.

The fact that you attempt this appeal to emotion is not a good sign for someone who considers themselves an Objectivist.

I am laughing. You consider that an appeal to emotion? lol. No, it was showing that your position is not tenable. I don't think that I have seen anyone using anything but their best effort to talk to you. But now I do question yours, since no one has suggested that the senses are "supermachines" or that freewill is consistent with "insane idea free will entails that the same person in the same circumstances could make two difference choices with no changing variables". The last part of that is nonsensical. That really is has little to do with AR's view on free will. She says that free will is lodged only in the choice to think. Certainly, if one does not think one feels in the grip of forces outside one's control. One feels determined.

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So? How does it relate to my response?

Because I never claimed we did not do what you responded and told me we did, making your response entirely redundant and off point?

It's not about your writing. It's about your belief. Where did you get that belief? "All knowledge is subjective" is an objective evaluation, which contradicts your statement itself. So, not unnecessary.

Why is it an objective ecaluation, and not subjective?

Not so in this context. If a man holds life as his highest value, then it should be the ethical standard for his choice of all other values.

Yes, but there is no reason to think the opposite should necessarily be true.

What does it mean to perceive reality as it isn't?

It would be to perceive reality in a biased and subjective way.

Acting "against" it necessarily implies self-destruction because man's life is not automatic. It requires thinking and acting to gain and keep one's values.

Acting does, being willing does not, as I already pointed out.

As I mentioned in my previous post, it is man's life qua man, not as a slave or tortured soul, which is the standard of value. You completely ignored that point.

I tackled it in response to someone else, sorry about that.

"But anyway, if living a certain kind of live is to be your highest value, then sacrificing yourself for someoneelses life is still contradictory to it."

"Reliability" presumes a standard. And the only standard that man has is his non-contradictory knowledge, which is ultimately derived from perceptual data.

Okay.

It is relevant precisely because you made the suggestion that sense-perception could be fallible.

How does that make it relevant?

I define (making a) choice as a volitional act when faced with an alternative. How do you define choice?

I would define it in much the same way.

Because our eyes do give us absolute data, but not infinite.

No they do not. How do your eyes give you absolute data? Can you perceive the keyboard in front of you in absolute detail? No you cannot.

"I understand your confusion here of why you consider it to be an "illusion". All I will ask you is one question, is it possible for you to choose your values? And if your answer is yes, then all you have to do is integrate this knowledge with the fact that actions of our body do not violate causality."

Yes I can choose my values. However I could not choose any others.

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Volition is not contradictory to a lack of believe in free will.

No, nolition does not result in rationality. But, thinking, which is volitional, does allow you to think that you are not capable of thinking. This is the root of the stolen concept. You must have the ability to think and reach conclusions on evidence. This is in conflict with determinism. You are saying that your conclusions are caused by outside forces, or your genetics, or something other than your own judgment.

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I am laughing. You consider that an appeal to emotion? lol. No, it was showing that your position is not tenable.

Yes I would. Unless you are suggesting that postions that are difficult to hold are untenable?

But even deeper, you are in a world of hurt. Your senses don't work and you can't think. Your conclusions are determined by the cosmos, not you. Your statements have causes outside yourself, they aren't yours.

I don't think that I have seen anyone using anything but their best effort to talk to you. But now I do question yours, since no one has suggested that the senses are "supermachines"

It is called hyperbole. You should try it.

or that freewill is consistent with "insane idea free will entails that the same person in the same circumstances could make two difference choices with no changing variables". The last part of that is nonsensical. That really is has little to do with AR's view on free will. She says that free will is lodged only in the choice to think. Certainly, if one does not think one feels in the grip of forces outside one's control. One feels determined.

This is the essence of free will, the idea than man has a choice between alternatives, and that he is free to follow either.

If you wish to use words outside of their regular meaning, you should be more careful and give greater advance warning.

No, nolition does not result in rationality. But, thinking, which is volitional, does allow you to think that you are not capable of thinking. This is the root of the stolen concept. You must have the ability to think and reach conclusions on evidence. This is in conflict with determinism. You are saying that your conclusions are caused by outside forces, or your genetics, or something other than your own judgment.

Thinking and coming to conclusions are not contradictory to a lack of belief in free will either. You are trying to pigeon hole me into beliefs I do not hold, which you also seem to not understand very well.

Edited by CJM
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But anyway, if living a certain kind of live is to be your highest value, then sacrificing yourself for someoneelses life is still contradictory to it.

You're missing the point. Yes, sacrificing yourself for someone else's life, literally living for another, is contradictory to it. Dying to save a loved one or defend a deeply held value is NOT A SACRIFICE. Let's take the spouse example again. If you value your spouse so much that you cannot possibly go on living (keep in mind again what exactly we mean by living) without them, risking your life to save them is entirely rational. I'm not sure exactly what love is other than a passionate, reverent valuation of that regard. Assuming your love is deep and genuine why would you even hesitate to give everything you have to give (understanding that some things can and must never be given by a person of self-esteem)? When you act on your love you are acting FOR YOUR VALUES, you are truly living even if it happens to result in your death.

Dying for someone can be rational. Living for someone never is. But in dying for someone else you can be living for yourself.

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Yes I would. Unless you are suggesting that postions that are difficult to hold are untenable?

No, I am saying explicitly that it is wrong, wrong on all points, needs free will to be made at all, and would lead you, CJM, to shutting down of all your facilities if you took it seriously, which you don't.

It is called hyperbole. You should try it.

It is called completely misstating your opponents' argument. It is called setting up a straw man. We are familiar with it. It is what our opponents do all the time. We do not do that.

This is the essence of free will, the idea than man has a choice between alternatives, and that he is free to follow either.

If you wish to use words outside of their regular meaning, you should be more careful and give greater advance warning.

There is only one alternative, since we are discussing AR's philosophy. The only alternative involved in free will is to think or not. We supposed that you were talking about Ayn Rand. If not, then we can stop this discussion.

Thinking and coming to conclusions are not contradictory to a lack of belief in free will either. You are trying to pigeon hole me into beliefs I do not hold, which you also seem to not understand very well.

No, it is not contradictory to the lack of belief in free will, but who cares. It is contradictory to the lack of the existence of free will. You can come to conclusions only because you have free will. Without free will, you are controlled by your bowel movements.

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CJM,

Just so you know, you whole argument is wrong because your senses and ability to perceive reality are not perfect and your argument relies on both to be right. Sadly, you are also doomed to continue to believe your subjective reality because you have no ability to think for yourself (free will) either.

There's nothing anyone here can do for that.

Is no one else catching on to the HUGE concept stealing going on?

Edited by RationalBiker
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You're missing the point. Yes, sacrificing yourself for someone else's life, literally living for another, is contradictory to it. Dying to save a loved one or defend a deeply held value is NOT A SACRIFICE. Let's take the spouse example again. If you value your spouse so much that you cannot possibly go on living (keep in mind again what exactly we mean by living) without them, risking your life to save them is entirely rational. I'm not sure exactly what love is other than a passionate, reverent valuation of that regard. Assuming your love is deep and genuine why would you even hesitate to give everything you have to give (understanding that some things can and must never be given by a person of self-esteem)? When you act on your love you are acting FOR YOUR VALUES, you are truly living even if it happens to result in your death.

Dying for someone can be rational. Living for someone never is. But in dying for someone else you can be living for yourself.

Risking we are not talking about, dying we are. I fyou love someone so much you cannot go on living without them, if it would literally destroy your life in the same way as death, take all your values, you have no more reason to die for them than you do to let them die. The consequences are the same. You would be Buridans ass.

It is called completely misstating your opponents' argument. It is called setting up a straw man. We are familiar with it. It is what our opponents do all the time. We do not do that.

I'm sorry, but would you like to re-tract that before I go quoting mad and show you that is wrong? My position has been misstated numerous times in this very thread.

There is only one alternative, since we are discussing AR's philosophy. The only alternative involved in free will is to think or not. We supposed that you were talking about Ayn Rand. If not, then we can stop this discussion.

If there is only one alternative, there are still alternatives in relation to each other. Two differetnt choices. Tell me where I was wrong again?

No, it is not contradictory to the lack of belief in free will, but who cares. It is contradictory to the lack of the existence of free will. You can come to conclusions only because you have free will. Without free will, you are controlled by your bowel movements.

Of course not. If no alternatives are truly available to you but you don't know it, and you come to a conlcusion, you have still come to a conclusion.

Thinking and coming to conclusions are in no way contradictory to a lcak of existence of free will.

No, I am saying explicitly that it is wrong, wrong on all points, needs free will to be made at all, and would lead you, CJM, to shutting down of all your facilities if you took it seriously, which you don't.

Your arguments are weak. You say I must have free will because I come to conclusions and think, that is ridiculous. One can think of the of consequences of impossible actions.

You say sense perceptions can give us objective knowledge, despite the fact they can never give us absolute knowledge about even the simplest thing. This is ridiculous.

Edited by CJM
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CJM,

Just so you know, you whole argument is wrong because your senses and ability to perceive reality are not perfect and your argument relies on both to be right.

Not perfect now equals wrong. Excellent reasoning.

Sadly, you are also doomed to continue to believe your subjective reality because you have no ability to think for yourself (free will) either.

I see you also do not understand the concepts of free will or determinism.

Eugh.

Just to sort this out for you, free will has nothing to do with "thinking for ourselves" and not having free will has nothing to do with whether or nto your views can change.

Edited by CJM
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On Objectivist Epistemology

The validity of the senses, this is one I can't get my head around. Rand seems to hold that our perception of reality is objective reality. Is this so? This makes no sense to me, as it seems to suggest physiological infallibility on mans part. What we perceive is not objective reality, since our sensory systems act imperfectly.

Objectivism holds that the claim that our sensory systems act "imperfectly" is not tenable. This can be seen by considering the causal connections that give rise to our perception and how our sense organs interact with outside stimuli. Let's (very briefly) examine some common objections to see if they hold up.

Most objections to the reliability of our senses stem from instances in which our perception appears to be faulty. A common example put forth of this is the fact that a stick which is partially submerged in water will appear bent. This occurs because light passing through the water is refracted. Although we know the stick is straight, it clearly appears bent. Thus, our perception is imperfect.

These contentions rest on faulty ideas about how information *should* present itself to us. The change in the stick's appearance is due to real phenomena. The presence of water actually changes what is happening with the light rays. Are we supposed to still see the stick as straight, when the light which is reaching our eyes is different than before? This would be wishing for our knowledge to appear in our minds by magic, independent of causality and reality. In fact, our perceptions are fully and consistently based on reality. This must be true, if causality always holds. The same light stimuli should always produce the same effect. This is ultimately the basis for the reliability of our senses: the axiom of identity. These apparent illusions are still instances of our senses working perfectly; we are simply observing the stick under abnormal conditions. We literally could not continue to perceive the stick as straight, when the light rays coming off of it are bent by water. In fact, the very reason that we can identify this as an "illusion" or as "abnormal" conditions is that we can compare this with our (reliable) perception of the stick when it's not in water.

Other common objections to the reliability of our senses stem from people's concerns about dreams, hallucinations, etc giving false information. While it is certainly possible for someone to incorrectly conclude that these are instances of perception, the fact is, these are not perception. They are different phenomena. The unreliability of information "observed" while dreaming does not invalidate one's waking perceptions.

These issues are discussed extensively in David Kelley's book The Evidence of the Senses, written in 1986 (although it should be noted that this forum generally holds that none of Kelley's work after his break with ARI in 1989 is truly in the Objectivist tradition).

On Objectivist Ethics

Objectivism seems to hold that a persons life should be their highest value. I see no reason why a rational person could not hold something else, e.g. their child's life to be of greater value than their own.

Objectivism holds that the concept of "value" is genetically dependent on the concept of "life." It is only in relation to life that things can have value. Additionally, my own life is the only end which I can *consistently* pursue. Furthermore, every action I take will have some effect on my life, either furthering it or obstructing it (however minutely). Only my own life can provide a consistent standard against which I can produce a consistent set of values to pursue.

Other people's lives can become incorporated into my value system according to the value I see in their character (or in their potential, as is the case with children and strangers). It is indeed possible, according to Objectivism, that another person's happiness and well-being can become so enmeshed within my value structure that it is rational for me to give my life in order to save them (if I truly would prefer this to continuing on without them). Thus, my own life is the basis, the standard for the formation of my values, but those values can be formed in such a way that giving my life is in accordance with pursuing them.

The point is, I cannot use another person's life as the standard in forming my values. By the very nature of a living organism, it must engage in some self-oriented action. Living a life fully and consistently committed to any other end then one's own life leads inexorably to death.

On Objectivist Metaphysics

The problem of free will and causality. This is the biggest stumbling block for me, as one who holds no belief in free will. The arguments I have found against this problem have seemed very weak to me. Free will is held to be self evident in Objectivism, but an argument brought for it seems to be that choice and free will are not contradictory to the law of causality, but a part of it, that volition is causality. Seemingly volition is a causa sui?

The Objectivist notion of causality is quite distinct from the common perception of it. Causality is most commonly conceived as the idea that the occurrence of one event inexorably leads to another event. The collision of two billiard balls causes them to bounce off of each other. However, Objectivism recognizes that it is not events themselves that act. Rather, it is the entities involved which act. It is Billiard Ball A which causes a change in the direction of Billiard Ball B, not the collision itself. Events are completely dependent on the acting entities, and causality is based not on events, but on the *identity* of the entities. The effect with the billiard balls is produced by their identities (their masses, densities, hardness, etc), and what happens when two objects with those identities hit one another.

Free will is not compatible with the first conception of causality. If one event inexorably causes another, there is no room for choice. However, the Objectivist notion of causality leaves room for free will. This is because free will is a fundamental characteristic of the identity of human beings. By our nature, we have free will. Because it is part of our nature to be able to choose, causality and free will go hand in hand. A person's exercise of choice, far from defying causality, is an instance of it. We can observe that free will is part of our natures in the immediate sense only through introspection (reflecting on the workings of your mind easily illustrates that you make choices all the time, and that you could have made different ones). We can infer free will in others through observations of their actions. Once we observe the existence of free will as part of human nature, we know that the exercise of human free will is an instance of a person acting like a person (in accordance with his nature), and thus acting in accordance with causality.

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Excellent reasoning.

That was my point. I'm not the one claiming that we cannot know an objective reality... you are.

I see you also do not understand the concepts of free will or determinism.

No, I'm quite familiar with both. I'm just applying the logical ends of your arguments to your arguments.

You argument consists of concept stealing. In arguing that an objective reality cannot be known, you are in fact asserting the identification of an objective reality that you have concluded.

free will has nothing to do with "thinking for ourselves"

Just to sort it out for you, it has EVERYTHING to do with being able to think for ourselves.

Edited by RationalBiker
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