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No-one Denies that "A is A". Why Is It Such a Huge Theme in Objectivism?

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Here's a very simple example for you Dustin. 

A politician following the principle that contradictions do not exist, or "a is a" would remember that rights are what they are. The practice of integrating that principle into ones thinking would lead them to say something like, "if rights are something that you cannot earn, then one can never have a right to something someone else earned".

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On 3/25/2016 at 9:23 PM, Dustin86 said:

I arrive at those conclusions by looking at what has happened every time socialism has been tried. The horrors of the genocides, famines, and red terrors of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The failure of so-called "democratic socialism" in places like Greece and Venezuela, where now people can't even get toilet paper. Etc.

I think I understand your question now. It sounds like you're asking about the deductive chain of reasoning of how "A is A" leads to the conclusion that, for example, socialism is bad. It also sounds like you object to the idea that you could use deductive reasoning to determine that socialism is bad. The thing is, Objectivism is not built up with deductive chains of reasoning from a principle like "A is A". In fact, looking at and observing reality with plenty of inductive reasoning leads to the conclusion that  socialism is bad. The LOI is more like a recognition of how reality works, and with it we can recognize that anything that exists has an identity. Causality is recognized as a corollary. But neither tells you what the identity is of anything. To grasp the identity of government, you must observe what has happened, to determine what its identity even is.  We also use conclusions about ethics to figure out what sort of governments are bad or good.

If you still have objections, and suspect that Objectivism is a system built by deduction a la Descartes, I suggest investigating more about Objectivist epistemology. It would help to explain Objectivism's claims of how we come to understand the identity of something.

 

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2 hours ago, Eiuol said:

I think I understand your question now. It sounds like you're asking about the deductive chain of reasoning of how "A is A" leads to the conclusion that, for example, socialism is bad.

Yes, from things like "A is A" and the Law of Causality.

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It also sounds like you object to the idea that you could use deductive reasoning to determine that socialism is bad.

No, I honestly don't. It seemed to me that Objectivism somehow did claim to derive the Objectivist form of government from things like "A is A" and the Law of Causality. Otherwise I think it's odd why they would be mentioned over and over again in Atlas Shrugged, which dealt with Objectivism vs "Subjectivism" in government. Now you guys are saying that's not true. Ok, fine.

Look, I think what you guys are asking for is intellectual honesty, like when Craig admonished Senator Reid's intellectual dishonesty in claiming that income tax is "voluntary". Would that be accurate?

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52 minutes ago, Dustin86 said:

It seemed to me that Objectivism somehow did claim to derive the Objectivist form of government from things like "A is A" and the Law of Causality. Otherwise I think it's odd why they would be mentioned over and over again in Atlas Shrugged, which dealt with Objectivism vs "Subjectivism" in government.

I'm not sure about "over and over again", Atlas Shrugged as a novel deals with many ideas aside from capitalism. It isn't meant to only talk about capitalism, or to "prove" capitalism. A lot of it is also about how people approach life. 

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On 3/25/2016 at 8:23 PM, Dustin86 said:

What I'm really wondering is whether Objectivism is a philosophical school of thought or a political movement or both.

It's a philosophy (which includes a political component). However, if we're comparing apples to apples (and A's to A's) then Objectivism is just so different from any other philosophy that it almost deserves its own category.

Ayn Rand once said that she wasn't really an advocate of Capitalism but of Egoism, and not really an advocate of Egoism but of Reason; the rest follows from that. She didn't say that she was pro-Capitalism, anti-Altruism and oh, gee, maybe pro-Choice, because the stars were aligned with her spleen that day (as most people do); she actually thought it all out, from start to finish, and Objectivism is the living embodiment of her conclusions and (more importantly) her methods.

There's a respect for truth that's completely unique to Objectivism, which is what makes it so radically different from anything else in recorded history.

 

On 3/25/2016 at 8:23 PM, Dustin86 said:

I arrive at those conclusions by looking at what has happened every time socialism has been tried. The horrors of the genocides, famines, and red terrors of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The failure of so-called "democratic socialism" in places like Greece and Venezuela, where now people can't even get toilet paper. Etc.

Well, if you would indulge me for a moment, I'd like to run through this step-by-step.

 

Suppose you and I were candidates running for some position (where you could fix some things or I could make them even worse) and you mentioned the horrors of the USSR, during one of our debates, to which I replied:

"Yes, but every country has its problems. The USSR wasn't so bad; what about the greed of America's corporations or all of the unemployment from their rampant, out-of-control industrialization?"

As an advocate of freedom, what would you have to say to that?

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On 3/28/2016 at 3:37 PM, Harrison Danneskjold said:

Well, if you would indulge me for a moment, I'd like to run through this step-by-step.

 

Suppose you and I were candidates running for some position (where you could fix some things or I could make them even worse) and you mentioned the horrors of the USSR, during one of our debates, to which I replied:

"Yes, but every country has its problems. The USSR wasn't so bad; what about the greed of America's corporations or all of the unemployment from their rampant, out-of-control industrialization?"

As an advocate of freedom, what would you have to say to that?

At that point I would say that in the USSR even after Stalin died, although the quantity of horrible abuses went down, the "quality" (so-to-speak) never changed: people were still taken out of their homes in the middle of the night and shipped to Siberia for "political crimes", people were still executed for political dissidence, etc.

I would then say that the 2008 bailout, which provided golden parachutes to all those failed corporations, although it was approved by majorities in both parties, was approved by a far larger majority of democrats than republicans, while the vast majority of the people who voted "no" being "small government" republicans such as Bob Barr and Ron Paul. I would say that every effort to inject more socialism into the economy has brought about an *increase*, not a decrease, of cronyism and golden parachutes for politically connected corporations and their executives.

I would then bring up the failure of "democratic socialism" (which has been touted by socialists as "the better alternative" since the failure of the USSR), in places like Greece and Venezuela, where people now cannot get cooking oil, cannot get toilet paper, etc.

Edited by Dustin86
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[I'm using quotes to indicate my devil's advocacy]

10 hours ago, Dustin86 said:

I would say that every effort to inject more socialism into the economy has brought about an *increase*, not a decrease, of cronyism and golden parachutes for politically connected corporations and their executives.

"Which is precisely why it's so critical for us to get it right, this time!

This is neither Russia nor Venezuela. Let the Russians and the Venezuelans worry about their own problems; this is America.

In America we've seen the free market fail time and time again; costing billions of taxpayer dollars and wreaking havok on our economic security.

It's time for us to learn from our mistakes. It's high time for some transparency and accountability from Wall Street!"

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Notice two things.

 

Firstly, this sort of exchange is absolutely lethal to any Republican candidate. I've seen it happen; they walk into the debate with their head high, knowing that the facts are on their side, and end up crawling away in misery. This is exactly the sort of thing that gives the Left its power.

Secondly...

11 hours ago, Dustin86 said:

I would then bring up the failure of "democratic socialism" (which has been touted by socialists as "the better alternative" since the failure of the USSR), in places like Greece and Venezuela, where people now cannot get cooking oil, cannot get toilet paper, etc.

27 minutes ago, Harrison Danneskjold said:

This is neither Russia nor Venezuela. Let the Russians and the Venezuelans worry about their own problems; this is America.

What did I do, right there?

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On 3/24/2016 at 3:47 AM, Nicky said:

Really? Ignoring the law of identity, which is the basis for all logic, wouldn't impact your life? Now who's being stupid?

He understands the role of knowledge in human life. Questioning what the Law of Identity has to do with it indicates an attempt to probe at what knowledge is and (if successful) to discover the new frontier which is Objectivist epistemology.

The Law of Identity is not easy to grasp. It is more than our mental handle for it (A=A); it is the identification of the nature of identification, itself. It is one of the most abstract and difficult-to-understand concepts we have (the other two being Existence and Consciousness).

 

It is an excellent question, which anyone who wishes to further the Objectivist movement would do well to answer or, in the very least, shut up and pay attention to. Referring to our own epistemological tenets will be of little use, towards that end (although it is better than calling the inquirer stupid).

 

Since this is a website devoted to Ayn Rand, I wonder what she would have to say about your comments thus far?

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23 hours ago, Harrison Danneskjold said:

[I'm using quotes to indicate my devil's advocacy]

"Which is precisely why it's so critical for us to get it right, this time!

This is neither Russia nor Venezuela. Let the Russians and the Venezuelans worry about their own problems; this is America.

At this point in the debate, I would say:

'I am actually one of the few conservatives who does not believe in American Exceptionalism. Too many of us in this country believe that there is something 'magical' about it that somehow negates the laws of economics and mathematics that exist everywhere else in the world. I hate to be the killjoy here, but this 'magic' does not exist. There are at least 20 countries in which "command-economy" socialism has failed and at least 6 in which "democratic socialism" has failed or is failing (most notably Greece and Venezuela). If adopted here, it will fail as well. Democratic socialism's "success stories" have all been located in natural resource states that effectively "live off" natural resource exports such as Norway (oil), Denmark (gas), Canada (oil), and Australia (minerals), and even being a natural resource state is no guarantor of the success of socialism, witness Venezuela. We are too large, populationwise, to live off the sale of natural resources to other countries, and we wouldn't want to anyway, because such an economy breeds all sorts of corruption.'

Edited by Dustin86
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4 hours ago, Dustin86 said:

'There are at least 20 countries in which "command-economy" socialism has failed and at least 6 in which "democratic socialism" has failed or is failing (most notably Greece and Venezuela). If adopted here, it will fail as well.'

"Sure, if I was talking about Democratic Socialism, but I'm not. Nobody here is advocating Socialism. I just think the wealthiest Americans should be a bit more public-spirited about the means of production (and if they simply refuse to grow a conscience then I'd be happy to assist them). That's not Socialism. 

Why use ugly words like that, anyway? We both want to find the proper balance between progress and security. I don't see why we can't be civil about this.

So -to return to the issue at hand- what do you hate so much about security?"

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19 hours ago, Harrison Danneskjold said:

"Sure, if I was talking about Democratic Socialism, but I'm not. Nobody here is advocating Socialism. I just think the wealthiest Americans should be a bit more public-spirited about the means of production (and if they simply refuse to grow a conscience then I'd be happy to assist them). That's not Socialism. 

Why use ugly words like that, anyway? We both want to find the proper balance between progress and security. I don't see why we can't be civil about this.

So -to return to the issue at hand- what do you hate so much about security?"

The next thing I would say in the debate would be:

"The government, at all levels (federal, state, and local), is currently spending about 36% of our nation's GDP, that's over a third of it. Most of that is taken directly out of our nation's productive capacity, some of it is taken out as debt to other nations and added to our national debt which is now more than 100% of GDP. It is not healthy for any government to expend such a large portion the nation's productive capacity for so long because it crowds out the rest of society.

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To which I'd accuse you of deflecting the question about 'why you hate security so much', throw in a few more jabs at Capitalism and wipe the floor with you and your facts (like so many well-meaning Republicans before you). Game over.

 

Do you know why your facts couldn't save you?

 

Skim through our little exchange, again. You were making certain assumptions and I was throwing them back in your face. Rather than defending them, you kept moving on to the next point and making further assumptions.

 

My last post essentially said that seizing the means of production isn't Socialism if I say it's not. You let that stand, unchallenged, which would've given me the leverage to support any number of wild assertions, later on.

 

In order to defend freedom, you must be able to disprove statements like that.

 

How would you go about doing so?

Edited by Harrison Danneskjold
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Well Harrison, I tried to do that. You talked about how the wealthiest Americans should be more public spirited about the means of production, I said that about 36% of the means of production is already in the hands of government, a level eclipsed only during the heights of Total War during World War II. It's like we have a permanent wartime economy that never goes back to a peacetime economy. If we were to raise the percentage higher by any significant level on a permanent basis, we would actually reach World War II spending levels (which usually fluctuated between around 40-50% of GDP at any given time) and we would be there on a permanent basis.

As far as our economy would be concerned, it would be like we were fighting World War II on a permanent, neverending basis.

As far as economic security, government bureaucracies have proven ineffective in alleviating problems such as poverty, because they are like a leaky, hole-riddled pipe connected between the taxpayer and the person who is supposed to receive the benefits. In between the taxpayer and the person who is supposed to receive the benefits, there are the huge internal costs of the bureaucracies themselves, and there are tons of bureaucrats making $200,000 a year or more for doing nothing, and because of the corruption and favor-trading that invariably accompanies such megaburaucracies, the number of bureaucrats hired to do nothing invariably increases year after year. So we as a society are pedaling and pedaling harder and harder year after year just to remain in the same place.

 

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On 4/2/2016 at 7:35 PM, Dustin86 said:

Well Harrison, I tried to do that. 

I know.

 

You mentioned that you induced your conclusions about Communism by looking at its consequences in the real world. There's nothing wrong with that (indeed - it is rational) but when you generalize from "this Communist country" and "that Communist country" to "Communism itself", you do so on the assumption that A is A and that Communism is Communism (regardless of where or when it happens to be attempted). All of your conclusions are based on the Law of Identity.

When someone says "seizing the means of production isn't Socialism" they're saying that Socialism isn't Socialism and that A!=A. When someone says that one country's downfall has nothing to do with any other country, they're denying that A=A and that all A's follow certain universal rules (regardless of what we're using "A" to stand for).

 

That's what we mean when we call it the "basis of all logic" and people deny it all the time. They smuggle their denials in under exactly this sort of hit-and-run attack on reason:

On 3/31/2016 at 6:13 PM, Harrison Danneskjold said:

"Sure, if I was talking about Democratic Socialism, but I'm not. Nobody here is advocating Socialism. I just think the wealthiest Americans should be a bit more public-spirited about the means of production (and if they simply refuse to grow a conscience then I'd be happy to assist them). That's not Socialism. 

Why use ugly words like that, anyway? We both want to find the proper balance between progress and security. I don't see why we can't be civil about this.

So -to return to the issue at hand- what do you hate so much about security?"

 

When I mentioned finding a "balance between progress and security" what I specifically meant was a "balance between freedom and slavery". I used overly vague and non-threatening words to convey an idea that, if spelled out openly (we both want some freedom and some slavery), any self-respecting man would've clocked me for. This is exactly how the Left works.

 

Now, you indicated some familiarity with Atlas Shrugged and I assumed that you generally agreed with its political themes, and simply didn't see how they relate to the Law of Identity (and consequently that you were already trying to consistently apply the LoI, without knowing the words for it).

If so then the LoI is both the basis and the justification of Lassiez-Faire Capitalism, and I'd be happy to explain how it's inextricably bound up in this entire issue.

If not then it's a moot point and I'm sorry for wasting your time (and for chewing Nicky out).

 

So where exactly do you stand?

Edited by Harrison Danneskjold
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Harrison, I think I'm starting to understand what you meant.

In that vein, I would even go so far as to argue that "command-economy socialism" and "democratic socialism" really end up being the same in the end. In "democratic socialist" countries such as Greece and Venezuela, there have been: government nationalization of entire industries, government expropriation of businesses, banks and individuals' bank accounts, political repression where people have been jailed over "political crimes", etc. If there is any difference, it is one of degree (like the difference between Stalin and Khrushchev, for instance). Not a difference of kind.

As for "A is A", if I had been the author of Atlas, I would never have phrased it that way, because it's a very abstruse way of phrasing what I think she wanted to say. I would have phrased it in terms of people being intellectually honest or dishonest. (When Rand talks about "blank-outs", really she's talking about people being intellectually dishonest.)

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21 hours ago, Dustin86 said:

If there is any difference, it is one of degree (like the difference between Stalin and Khrushchev, for instance). Not a difference of kind.

Exactly.

 

Government power is firepower. Using it to coerce people into behaving a certain way is bad for you, bad for your victims, bad for everyone else involved and morally wrong.

That is primary. And that difference (between using a gun in the defense or the violation of individual rights) is not a difference of degree; it's not a matter of balance or of personal preferences or anything else; A is A and slavery is evil.

Edited by Harrison Danneskjold
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At one point in our debate I called for greater "transparency and accountability" from Wall Street. That means legally regulating what private citizens do with their own money (A is A). Because government regulations are ultimately enforced at gunpoint (A is A), this would mean having one person dictate another's actions at gunpoint (A is A). That is coercion and coercion is evil (A is still A).

If I'd protested against the label of "socialism" on the grounds thay I only wanted a little bit of government controls, I would've been saying I only want to be a little bit evil. A is A regardless of its degree or of the political correctness of pointing it out.

 

If, however, I'd protested against that label on the grounds that labelling itself is immoral and truth is all relative, the proper response would've been

"A is A"

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On 4/4/2016 at 11:18 PM, Dustin86 said:

As for "A is A", if I had been the author of Atlas, I would never have phrased it that way, because it's a very abstruse way of phrasing what I think she wanted to say.

I felt the same way, when I first tackled it.

Ayn Rand used language in a very unique way. She chose her words with utmost precision and efficiency in mind (sometimes at the expense of layman's intelligibility).

 

I'm actually a bit rusty on the axioms, at present, so I'll just leave it at this.

 

1: Capitalism is the only way for men to thrive together, on Earth. Ayn Rand outlined how one could induce (not deduce) this from axioms like "A is A". However, this is both long and full of omissions (which leave plenty of room for misinterpretation and disagreements, even among honest Objectivists).

2: The Law of Identity is a vital part of epistemology (which is a vital part of living a good life). It seems obvious, but there are numerous facets and nuances to it which aren't (especially when you get into causality); it's less like "what goes up must come down" than "F=(m1*m2)/D^2".

3: What "Objectivism" is, is actually a fairly controversial topic among Objectivists.

When Ayn Rand died, she declared Leonard Peikoff her "intellectual heir" and charged him with continuing (or it may have just been protecting; I don't remember) her work. Leonard Peikoff says that "Objectivism" consists of all of Rand's ideas, and no others, for all time and eternity - but some of those ideas (particularly the ones she, herself, considered most important) were all about thinking for yourself, with your own brain; recognizing nothing as more important than the truth. There's subsequently developed a bit of a rivalry between the "open" and "closed" Objectivists (and my earlier answer was from the former perspective).

So the answer to that question is complicated.

 

If you're interested in learning more about epistemology then The Logical Leap by David Harriman is pretty good (it gets into exactly that stuff where Identity becomes more subtle and nuanced) but the best book for it, by far, is the Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology by Ayn Rand.

Edited by Harrison Danneskjold
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When Ayn Rand died, she declared Leonard Peikoff her "intellectual heir"

Do you have a citation on this? The only time I've seen her use the phrase was about Branden in the autobiographical afterword to Atlas Shrugged. Since you use quotation marks I'd hope to see exact words.

 

Edited by Reidy
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  • 4 weeks later...

I see the relevance of A is A in considering possibilities: you could construct a chain of "if this then that", but at some point, you have to sit back and decide on the validity of the "if". Otherwise, you just end up having unintegrated contradictory "knowledge". A lot people fall back on this "knowledge" and decide not to check the validity of the "if" since it requires volitional thought. They would rather wait for reality to contradict them (this trend is becoming more common in modern physics: for eg., in string theory, they have constructed large models resulting from various "if"s. Now they are waiting for reality to contradict them). Now if reality contradicted them, they would have confirmation that their original "if" was wrong. Most people use it as a substitute for concept formation. With concept formation, you would be able to check your premises much earlier in the logic. Otherwise you are just left with perceptual level contradictions (i.e., contradictions between percepts and concepts). What you actually need is contradictions between concepts and other concepts (which is the realm of ideas). Most people would rather not deal with the realm of ideas and look for perceptual level faults/disproof. The consequence is primarily arrested thinking (since there are no ideas in their heads). You end up with theories which are "not even wrong" (until they are perceptually disproved).

This trend is also common in psychology: for eg., in evolutionary psychology, they say if man lived in such and such environments and if certain specific aspects of your psychology were genetically heritable, then these many people in the present having "in-born" traits is explained. Now, they are waiting for perceptual level contradictions. They aren't going back to check their "if"s.

Another is claiming that if homosexuality is inborn, then it must be genetic. Unable to find the genes, they posit that it must be epigenetic. What they offer as proof that it is epigenetic is the original "if". They say that if homosexuality is inborn it must be epigenetic. Hence it is proved that it is epigenetic. The subsequent "explanations" are merely assertions that "it could still be true".

Feynman's views on String theory may put things in context:

Quote

I don't like that they're not calculating anything. I don't like that they don't check their ideas. I don't like that for anything that disagrees with an experiment, they cook up an explanation -- a fix-up to say, "Well, it still might be true." For example, the theory requires ten dimensions. Well, maybe there's a way of wrapping up six of the dimensions. Yes, that's possible mathematically, but why not seven? When they write their equation, the equation should decide how many of these things get wrapped up, not the desire to agree with experiment. In other words, there's no reason whatsoever in superstring theory that it isn't eight of the ten dimensions that get wrapped up and that the result is only two dimensions, which would be completely in disagreement with experience. So the fact that it might disagree with experience is very tenuous, it doesn't produce anything; it has to be excused most of the time. It doesn't look right.

Now all this is just among scientists. Things are worse amongst other people. Most people don't check their ideas. Instead of thinking, they conclude things based on "if"s and wait for reality to contradict them. The A is non-A thing is everywhere..

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