Ninth Doctor

If I may butt in, again, what have you read by Kant? Not what propaganda about Kant can you parrot, but what have you read? Bold, overhanging, and, as it were, threatening rocks, thunderclouds piled up the vault of heaven, borne along with flashes and peals, volcanos in all their violence of destruction, hurricanes leaving desolation in their track, the boundless ocean rising with rebellious force, the high waterfall of some mighty river, and the like, make our power of resistance of trifling moment in comparison with their might. But, provided our own position is secure, their aspect is all the more attractive for its fearfulness; and we readily call these objects sublime, because they raise the forces of the soul above the height of vulgar commonplace, and discover within us a power of resistance of quite another kind, which gives us courage to be able to measure ourselves against the seeming omnipotence of nature.

I experience Kantian Sublimity in Rousseau. But maybe I just need help...

Eh, alright. I wrote all that after spending some time at the Checking Premises site, it put me in a bad mood.

The point is not that architecture isn’t Art, but that Rand contradicted herself. Or do you feel you’ve resolved the contradiction here? He already did. Are you going to address what’s already been put in front of you? Now, please answer a direct question: what have you read by Kant?

I agree with this statement, but feel that what we’ve seen on this thread are a few instances of people “personally defending” Peikoff. By this I mean there’s a certain element that defends anything he says, and I believe that it’s strictly because he says it. Quoting Ayn Rand, I called it a “mentality that’s ready for a Führer”. On the Checking Premises site we see this mentality on display, particularly in these two quotes: http://checkingpremises.org/openletter These statements amount to granting Peikoff a blank check to contradict Objectivist principles, or rather, a call to faithful cultists to ignore contradictions when they occur. He makes a statement that, coming from anyone else, would be taken as moral sanction to commit rape, and how many among the faithful can accept that his words mean what they plainly mean? There’s the claim that Peikoff “has earned the maximum benefit of the doubt”, but why should you ever need to extend him benefit of the doubt? Is he not a clear communicator? I think he was amply clear in this podcast, the main problem was his citing the Kobe Bryant case, since the facts of that case don’t line up with what he said about it. Back to “personally attacking” Peikoff. I’ve attacked a lot of things he’s said over the last few years, and wouldn’t have bothered if they were said by just about anyone else. His statements about the Ground Zero Mosque, McCaskey, the transgender (including their doctors(!)), and so on weren’t inherently interesting. The problem is that Ayn Rand and Objectivism are so visibly saddled with what Nathaniel Branden laconically (yet accurately) called “not a serious thinker”. He drives good minds away and perpetuates the public image of a Randroid loony cult. So, do I personally attack him? In a sense yes, I acknowledge that I do specifically target his public statements. In fact, the main value (and enjoyment) to be had from listening to his podcasts comes from the off-the-wall stuff he says, otherwise I’d have tuned out long ago. Does Peikoff need to be publicly exposed, and his faithful cultists along with him? Repeatedly, even ad nauseum, in whichever forum will permit it? If you value the ideas, I say hell yeah.

You don’t need to speculate on motives and failings, just stick to the ideas. And three? Only three posters on this thread interpret Peikoff differently than you? Which three?

He doesn’t give us enough information to make a judgement. What grade level is he in? How much of the day is being spent on this African business? What is the content of it? History of ancient Egypt? Or do they make the students sit through clips from Powaqqatsi, then listen to the teacher babble about how much happier these people are, carrying crap uphill on their heads, than we are using machines?

"African decent"? Yeah, whatever. Great school you're going to. St. Augustine was African, so were plenty of other influential people. Good ones too. In fact, you could argue that all people are: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wko_kMyljVU Hope they included that in the lesson plan.

Are you going to tell us what your view of that context is? Maybe explain how so many people here are getting it wrong? Tell us what he really meant? Or did you just come here to ejaculate? BTW, shouldn’t it be Galt’sGulch? What the hell’s a Gultch? Another thing, since we've taken the time to go over the details of Kobe case, let me just mention quickly that the fact pattern in The Fountainhead also has nothing to do with what Peikoff described in the podcast.

Well, “loose cannon” might be overdoing it. How about loose handful of ball bearings? In search of a missing quart of strawberries… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUp3vhMSfZE And let’s not bring up that intellectual heir business again!

Let me see if I have this right. Mr. Cline has his panties in a bunch because the MSM ignored the cancellation of an appearance by Loonwatch favorite Pamela Geller at a Hyatt conference room in Houston, while giving ample attention to the OWS movement, which took over a privately owned park in New York City for months before being forcibly evicted. How about putting this to the test, fashion an experiment? Get all the legions of dedicated Islamophobes to come together and take over the same NYC park, and see how well the MSM covers it. Crap, this thing’s 5 months old. Never mind.

Peikoff did not readdress the issue in today’s podcast. Perhaps he records these in batches, and won’t have an opportunity for a while. Or, maybe he has nothing more to say on the matter. I’m with Jonathan in being totally unsure whether he will retract, ignore, or reaffirm the worst implications of last week’s statement. We’re dealing with a loose cannon here.

Ah, finally someone who takes Islam seriously enough to study it! Um, y’know, actually it means “submission”. Maybe you were thinking of "salaam". Sounds kind of like "shalom".

Are you saying that a man can ignore the objections of a woman he’s having sex with, or thinks he’s about to have sex with, if he somehow knows or believes that her objections are being offered in bad faith? I grant that a couple can establish a pattern, to make it easy let’s say that they act out rape fantasies, and after a particular not atypical encounter, the woman tells the man: “that time no meant no”. I’d expect her not to go to the police, and if I were in the jury I’d vote to acquit. That’s simply not what we’re talking about. BTW, a feature of the Kobe case that I have heretofore assumed Peikoff intended to be relevant is that he means a first time sex encounter. I don’t think it matters, but since I’ve gone to the trouble of arguing that the Kobe case was a bad example, I’m noting this now. I think we’re all hoping for a retraction/clarification. I said earlier that if he meant this strictly to be moral guidance for women, in other words, "put yourself in this kind of position and you’re liable to be raped", then that would be fine. However, his wording doesn’t support that interpretation.

If I recall correctly from the movie, they weren't married yet, and he felt she was leading him on. I don't get the part about "leading defender of negative liberties", what are you saying? As to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, that's very different. That's about a fiduciary (social worker, in effect) abusing his position. I don't see why you're bringing it up.

Indeed, she does come across as pretty skanky. This is why I stuck to the undisputed facts, the material common to both Kobe’s account and hers. All the titillating documents you need to see are available here: http://www.thesmokin...olice-interview I don't think it will be productive to dwell on it, I think we can all agree that Peikoff's using the Kobe case as an example doesn't work.

I suppose at this point it’s worthwhile to explore the facts of the Kobe case. First, there was no drinking. She was an employee, she showed him to his suite, he asked her to come back and give her a tour of the hotel after checking in his bodyguards, she does, after the tour they go back to his suite, she shows him something about how the bears come up to his terrace window, he kisses her, they make out, he puts his hands around her neck, bends her over a chair in the living room (not the bedroom), does his thing over her protests, she leaves. He did not climax, she left blood on his shirt, and had vaginal tearing when examined the next day. These are only the undisputed facts, except Kobe disagreed about how much and how soon she protested. They bear no resemblance to what Peikoff says, which is why in the opening post I said “note the details he ascribes to it”. I suspect the Kobe encounter started consensually, and, as I put it in the opening post, the parts didn't fit together. However, there’s no reason to think at the time she went back to his suite that she’d “given every evidence that that is what you are going to do”, so the example is useless. Probably every relevant detail is different.

There’s plenty of precedent to be found for this in Rand-land. Here’s an essay on the McCaskey imbroglio: http://txpropertyrig...rd-peikoff.html For the answer to how McCaskey should be evaluated, I suggest reviewing Leonard Peikoff’s excellent article “Fact and Value”, which is available for viewing on the ARI website. Discussing Ayn Rand’s evaluation of Kant in that article, Leonard Peikoff states: In the final issue of The Objectivist, Ayn Rand described Kant as “the most evil man in mankind’s history.” She said it knowing full well that, apart from his ideas, Kant’s actions were unexceptionable, even exemplary. Like Ellsworth Toohey, he was a peaceful citizen, a witty lecturer, a popular dinner guest, a prolific writer. She said it because of what Kant wrote—and why—and what it would have to do to mankind. [bold added] In summary, ideas require an evaluation with man’s life as the standard of value. McCaskey should be evaluated for what he said about scientific induction, and what it would mean for science. I’m not going to take the time to express my opinion of this mentality, er, policy. BTW there was already a thread for this topic, and it was locked soon after it began, on the grounds that it didn’t “offer much value in relation to the forum”. http://forum.objecti...ndpost&p=288044 What I think this is really all about is the fact that you can't critique DH on her own turf (she actively deletes posts and bans people, as is her prerogative), and since OO isn't good for personal battles, having such active moderation, there is no forum for a certain element to gather. Why they don’t migrate to Betsy Speicher’s forum is a not entirely clear to me, unless you isolate the essence of this group’s identity as being that of Peikoff purists. BS ruled herself out of such a group in 2006, by disagreeing that theocracy was an imminent danger to the US, therefore vote Democratic or else you don’t understand Objectivism. She was anathematized for this by DH, hence the irony that I can assure you we Kelleyites are enjoying immensely.

What reasons? First you say he didn’t specify a context, now you’re saying what I describe is not within his context! I’ve used multiple examples, do you mean none were applicable? You could say the anal rape one wasn’t in his context because he specified that he was talking about men and women (not that women can’t get buggered). How about this, repeat to yourself the words “frees the man to have sex regardless of what she then says”, then hit play: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Va0oO571Qo Shall we go through the details of the Kobe Bryant encounter, such as they're known?

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I addressed this here: The trouble is that he did specify a context. How much more explicit did he need to be? Also, he didn’t say “almost anytime you have a woman in your room then you have every right to rape her”, and no one has accused him of saying that. Even in my intentionally over-the-top anal rape scenario I provided a set-up such that the aggressor had reason to believe, albeit mistakenly, that the victim came there for sex. The ultimate sticking point is that he doesn’t allow for withdrawal of consent. “Frees the man to have sex regardless of what she then says”, I mean how much clearer could he be?

The site is up now, and the section under discussion is still there, no changes.

“I say what you say, even black is blue…” When I wrote this yesterday I was going to include a phrase about whether I provided a link so people could check the quote for themselves. Being mildly obsessive-compulsive, I decided first to go back and check the link in the opening post, and it didn’t work. Peikoff’s site was down. I checked again last night, still down. And again this morning, and again now. Could this be the prelude to a retraction? I read into softwareNerd’s comment a day or two ago, where he said that he expects Peikoff to respond, a hint of inside information; that he’d maybe communicated with someone in the vicinity of the throne. I guess all we can do is stay tuned.