Nicky

Let me try and explain, once again, what I think his statement means: He's saying that sometimes, when you hook up with a woman, they're going to act all shy, or pretend that they're "a good girl", and claim to not want what they're clearly there for. At this point, people (like Diana Hsieh apparently), yourself, and some others split from Dr. Peikoff on what a gentleman should do next: You think he should say "Alright, Miss, your wish is my command, allow me to escort you to your cab.", while Dr. Peikoff thinks it's still fine to be pushy and have sex with her. I'm fine with either position. Really, I could care less how you go about having sex. My problem starts when people take that disagreement, and (not unlike Liberals, when they run into disagreement on racial issues) set out to explain its source. You think a person who disagrees with you on this small issue must be a wannabe rapist, while Liberals think that someone who doesn't believe in the welfare state must be a full blown racist or an Uncle Tom. That's not an OK leap to make. You're jumping from a harmless disagreement to pretty much the worst thing someone could say on the subject. It would be bad if you were talking to someone you know nothing about. It's even worse when you're talking about someone who is obviously opposed to force on principle. [edit] I posted this before I read your last reply. I guess I'm wasting my time. Bye.

No, he didn't. The "other word" he used is "sex". And that's not another word for forced intercourse, no matter how many times you repeat that it is, or call the notion that it isn't ridiculous. You can't just go around interpreting people's throwaway remarks to mean "forced intercourse", or some other incendiary thing they didn't say, with the logic of "well what else could they have meant, I can't think of anything, so it must be rape". It's no different from all the nonsense in the media about "implied racism", to the point where everything anyone says on the subject of race, and sometimes not even, somehow ends up being interpreted as "I hate blacks". I don't understand how you don't see a contradiction here. This is your position: 1. Dr. Peikoff, Ayn Rand's protege and the guy who wrote OPAR actually said that it's OK to use force on a woman, once you got her in your room, to have sex with her. He said it in other words, but he said it clearly, He said it so clearly that the mere notion that maybe he didn't really say it, and you're misunderstanding, is RIDICULOUS. 2. He doesn't think that's OK. You know this as well. You are saying that he will retract it, so, unlike Jonathan and the other guy, you at least know that he doesn't think it's OK to rape someone. Again: you know he clearly said it (other words, but still: suggesting that those other words don't actually mean forced intercourse is RIDICULOUS to you), and he clearly isn't an advocate of forced intercourse (he will retract it). Who says it's OK to force intercourse, in no uncertain terms, but doesn't mean it? I submit to you that no one. That's not a mistake anyone makes. He's clearly coherent, so it can't be that he's losing his mind. I strongly urge you to consider the possibility that what he actually said isn't "other words" for forced intercourse. Maybe he didn't make it clear enough for some of his audience (like Grames said, his audience is supposedly new-ish to Oism), but it should be clear to you. I almost have more respect for Jonathan and co.-s position. At least their obvious contradiction is with a reality they successfully detached themselves from. It's not between two statements they are making back to back.

I defended the statement, and the person who was being attacked over it, because it was a throwaway line that any rational observer would choose to look at in the context of Dr. Peikoff's obvious and highly publicized beliefs against any use of force, and interpret accordingly. I don't know what you think it "clearly meant", but I know exactly what was meant by it. I know that because I used judgement, not an emotional reaction to the word rape, to make up my mind about it. The meaning of a statement is dependent on the speaker's definitions and context. Plucking a quote out of any context, ignoring any kind of reasonable assumptions about the speaker's true intentions, and instead using your own definitions for what was meant, is fallacious. Doing that about an emotional subject like rape is clearly just people pandering to their emotions instead of bothering to think. It is so clear and obvious that Peikoff doesn't support rape, that I am ashamed that I ever even tried to argue with people who don't realize that. I guess on March 4th you will be told what everyone with judgement already knows: that Leonard Peikoff in no way advocates for the use of force, to have sex with a woman. Although I doubt that will stop most of you from ignoring that explanation too, just like you're ignoring the entire body of his work now, and continue to use the out of context quote to attack Peikoff as the number one fan of rape.

We need a President who thinks there was barely a Soviet threat, some unmentioned propaganda caused Eisenhower to back a coup, that "the people took over" in Iran in the revolution? And, more importantly, we need a President who thinks militant Islam has nothing whatsoever to do with Iran's behavior for the past four decades? It's all because we backed the Shah?

No, the US government has all kinds of commitments to its allies. And rightfully so: alliances are very important. You know wrong. And I wish you'd just make your point, instead of telling me what I mean or don't mean.

Supporting a political candidate without fully agreeing with him can be rational. In fact it would be irrational to treat Obama and Ron Paul in the same manner, just because you have disagreements with both. So, in some manner, you should support whichever candidate you like the most. Personally, I would choose Gary Johnson or even Gingrich over Paul, but you could make an argument for either of these three. The question is, how much of your time and money would it be rational to spend on that support. Again, my personal answer is: not very much. I prefer to spend most of my time and money on furthering my life directly, and the rest on supporting fully rational ideas outside the realm of campaign politics. Aside from speaking up in favor of these candidates if the subject comes up and someone is genuinely interested in my opinion, I won't bother supporting any of the current presidential candidates. The main arguments for my decision are that 1. they're not that great (except for Johnson, he's pretty good), and 2. the guy who's pretty good doesn't stand much of a chance. But, as long as you enjoy it an regard it as an opportunity to make new friends and learn new things, I think it can be rational to get involved with the Paul campaign. Just don't get your hopes up on the immediate results.

I think personal attacks and speculation on other members' motives and failings aren't allowed. We should just leave it at "somehow all three of you are getting it wrong".

That's because she's already being raped by an attacker. Yes, women who have been attacked, and are being raped will often not put up a fight. Luckily, in Dr. Peikoff's scenario, the woman hasn't been attacked, nor is she being raped. You added those yourself. Either that, or worse: you're begging the question. That's a verifiable claim. Let's say the Mythbusters decided to run with it, got a bunch of large men and small women, paired them up for some simulated sex (because Discovery wouldn't sign off on the real thing), told some women to struggle, others to not struggle. Be honest, do you really, honestly believe that their results would confirm your theory: the guys wouldn't be able to tell which women struggled and which didn't? If you like explicitly addressing the situation before you have sex with someone, that's your style, not the absolute, devoid of context "safe and intelligent thing to do". Most people manage to safely have wonderful sex without explicitly addressing anything about it. In my experience, for instance, explicitly addressing the obvious (= second guessing yourself) is not the intelligent thing to do. You certainly don't come across as intelligent and confident, doing it. That leaves the question of safety: in rare contexts, if the woman isn't obviously in control of the situation for some specific, unusual reason (like she's socially or emotionally challenged enough), it would be safer to explicitly address the situation. Otherwise, it wouldn't be.

So its usefulness depends on how complex a set of problems it can solve, and how many errors it makes solving them. Albert Einstein's mind wasn't as reliable as a computer, and it definitely wasn't transparently understandable or fixable when it made errors. But it was still pretty damn useful. And unlike with Albert, we just need to get this right once, and then we can replicate the best version over and over again. All the other ones we can throw away.

That's true for my laptop as well. A mechanism is more than the sum of its parts. The other animals that could do it (homo erectus, neanderthalensis, etc.) went extinct, as a result of climate change and the superior adaptability of our species. In both cases, there is only one way that is the most efficient. That one way is the right way. Choosing the second best way is irrational. I should of course add "within the context of one's knowledge" to all the sentences above. I didn't bother, because that's understood. A computer (or a piece of software, to cut to the chase - the computers that could do think like we do already exist, what doesn't is the software) that has no volition would also operate with the context of its knowledge. Computers can write algorithms. An algorithm is just a list of instructions, that processes input a certain way. Writing software that spits out lists of instructions is a piece of cake. I can do it in ten minutes, and you're gonna have an endless stream of algorithms, none of which have ever been written by a human being before. Moreover, give me a set of relatively simple mathematical functions, and I can write software that automatically writes one or many algorithms that calculate any one function of the set. I can make it as smart or as stupid as you'd like. I can have it instruct you to calculate any exponential function in a few steps, 100, or a random number between the two. So computers can also write algorithms that have a purpose. The reason why computers can't do that for most real life problems is because it makes no sense to teach them: whenever there's a problem to be solved, it's much easier to just solve it, than to formalize every single element of the problem (and its context), so that software (a mathematical entity) can deal with it. The problem isn't getting computers to be creative. The problem is translating a problem and its full context into a well defined mathematical language they can use as input (formalizing it). From that point on, having a computer come up with algorithms is nothing.

Where and in what way?

Oh and Dante, in anticipation of your next question: So how do you know if someone not giving consent, withdrawing consent, refusing consent etc, means it or not?, the answer is easy. You find out by NOT USING FORCE to have sex with them. Like the girl in my example. If it works, they lied. If it doesn't, then they meant it.

I'm not. So now what? I would sit back and watch hilarity ensue. It would be like having Andy Kaufman back.

Have you seen the movie "The Invention of Lying"? You should watch it, it concertizes the difference between communication and intention, by introducing us to a world where all communication is 100% honest. In that world, my answer would be yes. In this one, it's no. Communication does not equal fact. People have free will, and the ability to lie. I can refuse to consent to something and do it on my own volition at the same time. You are making a leap, and assuming that the lack of consent is an honest communication of one's true intentions, and that the only way you're gonna get this person in bed at this point is to use force. All you'd have to do is play around with the concretes for a bit. For instance, assume that the person withdrawing the consent is a 200 pound athlete, and the person who proceeds with the sex is a petite woman. Do you still agree with your own inference, that the lack of consent + sex = force was used?

I made a mistake. The part of your post I should've addressed, instead of the one I addressed (because it's a much more relevant objection), was this: Concept formation is done by volitional beings, on account that we're the only ones doing it, and we can choose to do it or not do it. We don't have to do it. But it's not a volitional process. There is only one right way to do it: if you want to do it right, you don't have options about it. Just because something has no choice but to do it right, doesn't mean it can't: That which [man’s] survival requires is set by his nature and is not open to his choice. What is open to his choice is only whether he will discover it or not, whether he will choose the right goals and values or not. (Ayn Rand, VoS) That is the extent of our choices. There aren't multiple right ways to process our input. There is only a right way and a wrong way, and we get to choose. If a computer of equal ability to process reality doesn't get to choose not to do it, that makes it better at it, not worse. I don't think volition belongs in this conversation. If the decision to fully focus and sustain that focus is made, this decision (this constant decision, made over and over again) determines the "output". That which you call your soul or spirit is your consciousness, and that which you call “free will” is your mind’s freedom to think or not, the only will you have, your only freedom, the choice that controls all the choices you make and determines your life and your character. (Galt's Speech) This is the part that's relevant to the issue, not volition. Our nature as volitional beings isn't what's causing us to be able to do this. The mechanism we use to do it (which starts with concept formation), does. There is no reason why that mechanism couldn't be reproduced, or why a new mechanism that does that couldn't be designed, without first creating a volitional being. The process of creating a new algorithm is just as "deterministic"(for lack of a better word) as the process of executing one. And by "deterministic" I mean that there is only one right way to do it, in any one context. Such a mechanism wouldn't be an independent being with rights, it would be the same thing current computers are: an extension of our mind. Great as it is, our mind has a limited capacity. We could and should design computers which are better at this process than even we are, and use them. These computers would not take over the world, they would not "look down on us as inferior beings", they would simply be better at gathering input and applying reason to it to produce the right output, than we are. Not true. Our only input is reality. What we create based on that input is by definition not input. Our thoughts are based in the reality we sense around us. Our lies are broken logic, applied to that same reality. Neither our creations, nor our lies (hallucinations, dreams etc.), are independent of our input (which is the reality we sense around us). Our only starting point, for our thoughts, is reality. Our choice lies only in processing our input properly or improperly. We don't have the third option, of ignoring our input and finding a new source to use a starting point for our thoughts. It's a long post, so I should sum it up: Our input doesn't determine our "output". But it does determine what the right output is. We don't need to build a computer that isn't deterministic. We just need one to find the one right answer which is determined by its input. For that, we need to improve its ability to collect input (especially by pattern recognition), its ability to categorize and process it, and finally, we need to figure out a way to have it create the right algorithm for solving a specific problem it comes across, without human help at each turn. But that is all a deterministic process, not a volitional one.

None of that proves that you correctly deduced "use of force from" from "have sex". That comparison is a bit arrogant. You are implying that your inference has the same merit as Isaac Newton's. That your (unmentioned) line of reasoning has the same strength as the laws of physics. Yes, and apparently several people in this thread think that the word sex describes the range between "plug your ears and bang away" and anal rape of a man. I disagree. I guess I must also think gravity is fiction.

"volitional beings" (humans) are a mechanism. That is all we are. There is nothing mystical about our brains. Why are you saying that there cannot be any other kind of mechanism that has the same attribute? If you had said "computers do not form concepts", I would be right there with you. But they absolutely could, and I bet they will.

Defend it from what? There are only two categories of people, in this thread, attacking the quote: 1. People who are falsely claiming that the quote encourages the use of force. 2. People who are claiming nothing, commenting nothing, and adding nothing except their feelings: horror, disgust, etc. Everyone else is patiently waiting for clarification. I defended it against both attacks. If better arguments come along, I'll decide whether I want to keep defending it or not based on them. I also attacked the quote, btw. I said that Peikoff must be factually wrong about the Kobe case. I did not attack the man, or his standing in Objectivism, however, because it's stupid to do that based on this little. P.S. I'm not even sure what to defend. The quote is very vague. The question was whether the use of fraud is morally permitted in sex, and Peikoff answered that clearly. Then he made a vague side note on the issue of consent, which people jumped on with ridiculous attacks.

Maximum achievable independence, in the real world, is total independence. It's not that hard to achieve, either: all it takes is for people to not initiate force against each other, and for the independent to act selfishly, and only interact with others in a mutually beneficial way.

I'm unimpressed by your horror. I bet you're not even screaming right now. People who are horrified should at least make the effort to scream. Possibly even run around the room in a panic.

Physical force amounts to force. You haven't described any force, you described a thought. It is force only if someone acts on that thought with the use of force. Once again, there is nothing in the quote that attempts to justify any kind of use of force. The only physical action mentioned in the quote, and justified, is sex. Sex is not force.

Probably not. I don't see a point in doing that, before computers get better at recognizing patterns first. After that, this seems like something that would be much easier to accomplish.

It's not an analogy. I did the gag twice, and each time I replied to the exact same statement: the claim that consent is always determined by what is said, never by what is done. I gave one example, to disprove that claim. I did not try to make any kind of an analogy. My defense of the quote is the same as Prometheus's. It contains no suggestion that a man is justified in initiating force to have sex with a woman. That is something people who aren't paying attention read into it, because it says that the man is justified in having sex with the woman. I don't know why, but some people just assume that Dr. Peikoff's idea of sex involves the use of force. Either that, of their own idea involves the use of force. Neither of those is true.

Are you kidding? In a week we'll be off bashing Mitt Romney because he loves to fire people and is not concerned about the very poor. These things come and go, we can't just wait for clarifications. It's a fast paced world we live in, you have to learn to just ignore a career as a benevolent businessman or a distinguished Objectivist intellectual, and call people a racist or a rapist the first chance you get. Then move on to the next thing. Get with the program, bluecherry. This is the state of discourse, in the 21st century. Peikoff said he wants to shut his ears and bang away. The Internet is running with this. It's a big sensation. That's the press, baby, and there's nothing you can do about it.

But I just described a context. You're a confident man.