Easy Truth

In conclusion, and for clarity, my position is that the Golden Rule, aka Ethic of Reciprocity, IS the basis of rights, and specifically the Right to Life.  When you speak of justice, you are endorsing equity which is what the Golden Rule measures, i.e., are your actions towards others consistent with what you expect from others with respect to having a right to those actions.  You are the moral benchmark, i.e., it is the quality of your selfishness that is being judged.  In this respect, the Golden Rule is entirely consistent not only with Objectivism*, but with most religious, philosophic views** regarding the nature of man and his relationship with his fellow man.
 
In reviewing material from ARL, the following statement* expresses what I agree with and base my argument on:
"The only 'obligation' involved in individual rights is an obligation imposed, not by the state, but by the nature of reality (i.e., by the law of identity): consistency, which, in this case, means the obligation to respect the rights of others, if one wishes one’s own rights to be recognized and protected." ~ Individual Rights
 
If this is not an application of the rule, then it is at the very least a reflection of what the rule validates.  While I fully appreciate Objectivist aversion to all things Kant and catagorical imperatives, to dismiss the ethic of reciprocity by association with Kant or altruism is to throw the baby out with the bath water.  I have tried to the best of my ability, to respond to every criticism of the rule, and if I have fallen short of being persuasive the fault is mine.
--
* http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/individual_rights.html
** http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Rule

CriticalThinker:
 
Your last several posts on this subject (innocents in war) are in complete accord with Objectivist principles and doctrine. I am in complete agreement with your answers, characterizations and examples. However, I think you do your argument a disservice by introducing the concept of the "emergency situation", to wit:
 

From the Lexicon:

Certainly war creates conditions under which human survival is impossible. However, it isn't unchosen (by the aggressor) and thus not unexpected, nor is it limited in time. 
 
The point is that one has a choice about whether to be aggressive or not. And the fact that an aggressor is objectively wrong is what gives your moral argument all of its weight.
 
The lifeboat is an amoral situation, meaning, there is no right answer, no right or wrong, any action you take might be appropriate. You have the right to defend yourself, but so do the others in the boat.

In war, as you have been properly arguing, there is a right answer, a universal principle: DO NOT INITIATE FORCE. If someone has initiated force against you, you have the right to defend yourself, to use force in retaliation against those who initiated it. The guys who initiated the use of force have no right to defend themselves, they have forfeited their rights. Their only option is to stop initiating force and surrender immediately.

Anyway, continue on, you are doing a great job, just leave out emergencies, you don't need them.

The word "free" or "freedom" is contextual, meaning depends on the context the word it is used in (depending on the answer to "free, from what?"), it will mean completely different things.

The freedom that's talked about in politics is political freedom, meaning the freedom to conduct certain act without retaliation from the government. You have will have all the freedoms and rights proper to a human begin in a free capitalistic society. But the freedom to enslave other individuals is not one of them, because the physical nature of human doesn't give him the right, the justification, to enslave other humans. The physical nature of human does give him the right and justification to have the right to his own life, the right to own inanimate objects, the right to self-defense..etc. in a society.



That's right, it is called immoral by consensus in our day and age. But that's not the reason why it is wrong. Public consensus doesn't make something morally right or wrong. Whether something is morally right or wrong to human is determine solely by the physical nature of human. If the public consensus coincide with what human nature demands, like in this case of condemning slavery as wrong, then the public consensus is correct. If the public consensus deviate with what human nature demands, like in the case of condemning selfishness as immoral, then the public consensus is wrong.



And that's one of the biggest flaw in politics today. The politicians thinks the justification for the any political right is the majority consensus, that whatever the majority votes on is right.

However, humans are objects with set physical nature just like trees or animals. If you want to grow a plant, whether an action is wrong or right in the path of achieving that goal is solely determined by the nature of that plant. One million people telling you it is right to grow that plant in salted soil doesn't make that action right.

The same goes with humans, with people. If you want to create a society proper to humans, it's the same when you want to create an environment proper to a plant. You base what you do on human nature, and human nature is the sole factor in determining whether something is right or wrong.

The inalienable rights SHOULD be justified under human nature, by the self-evident. But, the politicians today practice their trade, do it with disgrace and don't.

I'm glad you noticed. Yes, it is an absolute statement -- I use them whenever I can as I find that they make communication and principled discussion much easier. Rights are absolute. I'm not sure why you would call it "out of context" though. I'm sure you know the context for a discussion of rights but in case someone forgot I named the context: moral and legal. As you have acknowledged Rights are a bridge between morality and politics.

Rights pertain only to action (another absolute). Rights sanction the moral actions one must take to survive and thrive and they also delimit the actions others may take with respect to you; they may not initiate force against you. As long as someone acknowledges Rights (implicitly or explicitly) and acts accordingly, then they possess and retain their Rights. When someone decides not to live by these principles and initiates force against you, then they have repudiated the concept and must be considered as outside the boundaries of Rights. They have forfeited their Rights and so they have none that I must respect. This reading conforms much better to the quotes you provided by both Ayn Rand and Tara Smith:

"If they demand the violation of the rights of others, they negate and forfeit their own." -- AR from Racism

"An individual's rights are always held on the condition that the rightholder respect other's rights, thus throughout, I am leaving aside person who forfeit their rights by violating the rights of others. As long as a person truly possesses rights, however, he is entitled to have them respected..." -- Tara Smith (cited previously)

In both you see that persons can "forfeit their rights". And as Tara Smith notes, if a person "possesses rights [then ...] he is entitled to have them respected". So I really can't see how you think these quotes support your position. Also, I find it a little disingenuous that you disagree with what Tara Smith has to say on the subject and then try to use her quotes to support your position. You should just say you disagree and leave it at that instead of trying to manipulate what she says, as you acknowledge doing here:

"Little practical difference" is still a difference -- the difference is obvious and is not what she meant, and I think you know that.


Rights are moral principles which means they are absolutes within a moral context. So Rights are conditional upon your respect for them, as you acknowledge here in your response to me:

But then you contradict yourself not two paragraphs later:


I don't have this problem. I say that Rights are absolute (read inalienable) and contextual (read conditional). I say you should never violate anyone's Rights and the criminal is not a problem for me to deal with under this principle. Since he has already violated the principle I know that he has explicitly repudiated it and therefore I won't be violating his Rights when I treat him like the animal that he confesses to be. I take him at his word (or actions) and treat him according to the principles he holds.

You, on the other hand, say that rights are inalienable (absolute) and unconditional (non-contextual). So actually I think it is you who are dealing in out of context absolutes. When the slave and the slave-master come to you and ask which one of us is right, you are forced to say "well you both have rights and you do not forfeit them no matter what you do".

No.  Because, consent cannot be given for the unknown or bad faith, those fall outside of what has been consented to and that is fraud. If consent is given for particular action the trade is voluntary and does not constitute initiation of force.
No. Submission to tax is not voluntary because it is made under threat of force (threat of incarceration or theft) i.e. if you do continue not to pay taxes you eventually will go to jail or your property forcibly taken.
Force is well defined.  A worker may feel "compelled" to trade certain actions in exchange for a colleague not "telling on you" but this is not physical force (including fraud) or the threat thereof. 
Although force is force regardless of how the parties "parse" it conceptually, force objectively requires some element of the non-voluntary, so the mental content of the parties cannot be wholly ignored. People fight in rings for sport, the distinguishing factor for the "first punch" being sport, is the consent of the "receiver" of an action which otherwise would be a crime.
People are fallible, and conceptually may be oblivious to the their own rights, their own lack of consent or even the threat of force.  An oppressive government bureaucrat and his hapless victim of a citizen may both be oblivious to the implicit threat of "treason to the state" always hanging over a relationship that "feels" like glorious service to the state, through performance of an action, in the name of duty.  Force here is omnipresent whether or not the citizen has chosen to recognize they are NOT free to choose or act otherwise, instead zealously holding onto the evasion, the self-delusion, that they don't "want to be free to choose".  The fact IS, although man has free will, IF you choose otherwise you will be arrested, incarcerated, possibly killed.  The insanity in such societies does not negate the objective presence of force, which would immediately prevent free action, should anyone awake from the insanity and attempt to deviate.
Rand has covered this very well throughout her writings.  The AR lexicon does a good job here:
http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/physical_force.html
 
Hope this helps.

Rand differentiates between the metaphysical and the man-made (Philosophy: Who Needs It, chapter 3.) Metaphysical facts are not expressible by the concept of justice (fair, unfair, right, wrong, etc.), they just are. Justice comes from appraising the chosen aspects of other people in relation to you.

Excessive wealth can't come from anti-life activities, because, at the root, wealth can only come from virtuous action (production.) If you mean having a person with wealth that did not earn it, i.e. that acquired it by looting, in short, that did not merit it, then the law should do something about that, but then that would rule out the inheritance tax. Rand (PWNI, pp. 140-141) criticizes meritocracy on the grounds that it is a self-contradictory concept. To "merit" something is a matter of justice, and "-ocracy" refers to rulers, then "meritocracy" seeks to create a "tyranny of justice," thus collapsing into conceptual incoherency, and blanking out the different between might and right that justice seeks to create.

As far as this author's idea of a meritocracy, it is problematic to say the least. From an economic standpoint, "what alone can improve [material] conditions is more and better production. And this can only be brought about by increased saving and capital accumulation" (Mises, Planning for Freedom, pp. 92-93.) The inheritance tax is particularly damaging to capital accumulation. The prospect of an inheritance tax destroys the incentive and the power to save and build up accumulations of capital. Rothbard calls inheritance taxes "perhaps the most devastating example of a pure tax on capital" (Rothbard, Power and Market, p.1185.) It's impact will be devastating because of the far-reaching nature of the argument. The argument conceives "that everyone should line up at the same starting line," but regardless of where we start off, within a few generations every piece of property must pass to heirs, and continue in such a manner indefinitely.

Thus we can see that the difficulty with this argument is that it proves far too much than perhaps it wanted to. For which one of us would earn anything like our present real income or enjoy anything near our present standard of living were it not for inherited benefits that we derive from the actions of our predecessors (in accumulation capital stock)? Specifically, the modern standard of living resulting from the accumulation of capital goods is an inheritance from all the net savings of our ancestors. If the argument wants to be consistent, then we will have to remove all these "unfair advantages." Without them, we would, regardless of the quality of our own moral character, be living in a primitive jungle. If everyone were prevented from passing on accumulated wealth to the next generation, the result would be drastic impoverishment and mass starvation of the majority of the human race, a decidedly anti-life conclusion, would result. So if the grounds are pro-life, then this argument fails. Simply stating "but this is the logical, rational, enlightened thing to do" is of no avail.

The author states that the living do not experience the inheritance tax because the person who is being taxed is dead. But the dead are not the ones that own the property, the heir is the living owner who is taxed. Such a tax necessarily violates property rights, which contradicts the stated desire of not taking the unearned from anyone.

The meritocrat might reply that the heir didn't earn it because he didn't produce it himself, but technological production is not the only way to earn wealth. Exchange also is one way to earn wealth, and the heir acquired the property in question through the objective link of contractual exchange. Whatever he did, even if just being in the right place at the right time, caused him to earn the property in the eyes of the previous owner passing it on to the later owner. The socialist government (or society at large, or whoever is claiming the right to tax it) has established no link whatsoever with the property, has done nothing to it, so it's difficult to see why a contractually designated owner, the heir, who has an objective link to the property (earned it via contractual exchange from a previous to a later owner) should be denied ownership in favor of a non-producer, non-contractor who has no link whatsoever with the property, if the grounds specified is "he who earned it." Thus the meritocracy argument for inheritance taxation fails on its own grounds.

Branden (in Rand, ed., Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, pp.96-99) recognizes that there is a contradiction in the contention that only those who produce wealth should control it, and the inheritance tax. For if we recognized the right of those who originally produce the wealth as the legitimate right, then this also implies the right to give it away to an heir through gift. Therefore, the alleged worthiness or unworthiness of the heir is logically irrelevant.

That section is particularly instructive, because Branden also explains how inheritance does not contribute to economic instability, that one's place on the unhampered market has to continually be earned, and how the inheritance tax tends to aid the second and third generation welfare statists by keeping out rivals, thus hampering the natural market "circulation of elites."

As sNerd said Rand never said nor implied “Meritocracy” but I also remember a quote where she once remarked that such a thing was discounted immediately due to “the last 5 letters in the name”.

Donnywithana had two main problems, based on the premise: An Objectivist society is a meritocracy.

Problem one: Inheritance conflicts with meritocracy.
Problem two: Monopolies exists in an Objectivist society - wich conflicts with the idea that this society is a meritocracy.

Objectivism proposes a society based on individual rights. Primarily, the political system based on individual rights is concerned not with merit, but with justice.

If all men are rational, this will lead to a meritocracy. But this is secondary, and even merit can be interpreted differently, by different men.

It is important to note that, once someone acquires property, the sole responsibility for dispensing with that property lies with the owner, whether or not the beneficiary has merit. But merit, in this case, is determined by the benefactor - It is not just to force the benefactor to choose to make decisions regarding the distribution of property after death, using someone else's values. This leaves the benefactor free to make decisions as he sees fit; on non-political, non-economic merit, such as the familial value a father places in a son, if he so chooses. This, I believe, addresses your first problem.

Your second problem regarding the monopoly, is based on another the false premise: economic pressure is equivalent to political pressure. In other words, business strategies are tantamount to coercion at gunpoint.

True coercive monopolies exist only by government sanction. The only way a company can use force to expand and control it's market share is with government permission, or through government neglect. In an Objectivist society, coercion is banned from economic activity.

Example: While one person might be disappointed that he can't sell the best chairs at a high price because of a larger companies business tactics, the consumer will still benefit from cheaper chairs. Isn't a company that sells cheap furniture "getting by on it's merits?" Regardless of how you answer this question, nobody's rights are being violated, and people still have the opportunity to buy higher priced chairs of better quality if they want to.

I also suggest reading Objectivist material on the nature of market value. I gave a quick scan of Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal but I couldn't find it. If anyone could find that reference it could be helpful for Donny.

-Edited for punctuation and clarity.

There are two "problems" with atheism: 1) lack of something profound to admire, and 2) finding moral guidance/standards. Now, assuming you mean liberal progressive types (i.e. radicals that are essentially socialists like Bernie Sanders), the "god is replaced by society" explanation works well. Then again, I've noticed a growing sense of "god is replaced by science" in those same people. Think Richard Dawkins or Sam Harris. They may care little about philosophy, or reject philosophy outright in favor of engineering or technology fields. Moral guidance turns into finding what science has to say about cooperation - taking facts that morality tended to develop from cooperation to say that we should all be humanitarians. Science ends up having primacy over all things. It is how 1 and 2 are "solved".
 
In contrast, Objectivism would say to admire existence as such, to love it. Guidance and standards becomes focused on oneself, as existence is admired due to one's initial pursuit of life.

If it's useful, is it altruistic?

1. Reason is a method, not an argument. If I said "how do you prove the law of gravity?" And I said "reason," I'm talking about a methodology, not a specific argument. In natural rights theory, saying they "are justified by reason" just points to the methodology employed. We reason from man's life as the standard of value to what are the requirements for survival and flourishing in a political society. 
2. The end is not mere survival, it is a rich conception of a flourishing life. Food, water, shelter, of course but also learning, development of skills, career pursuit, self acceptance  and personal growth, social relationships, love, sense of purpose in life, etc. None of this can be provided at the point of a gun, it has to be achieved, and again according to the natural rights folks, that requires a sphere of independence in which we are free to act and pursue our ends.
Secondly, because someone has a right to or needs some ends it doesn't follow they have a right to be provided said end. That's just a non sequitur. Thirdly, if someone is forcibly provided some end, someone else is therefore forced to labor for someone else's ends, and that introduces a contradiction. Welfare rights are accordingly incompatible with individual rights. In short: you don't own anyone.
3. There are some serious logical leaps being taken here. I need food, corn is food, therefore I have a right to force you to labor in a cornfield for me? Doesn't follow. I have a right to this specific river, let's say, because I labored on it, I built a fishery or a mill. I don't own "water" in the abstract, I own this specific water. You don't have rights to abstract classes, just specific things you either homesteaded or traded for.

I suppose you could say we're bothered by the same hazardous economic and social trends. I would point out that the power is not at present concentrate under the seat of any singular authority. Individual rights are under attack, but not as of yet subdued.
I would check the credibility of anyone claiming to be both an Objectivist and supporter of Pinochet. In any case, we're not there yet, but the institutions of liberty in the USA make the Road to Serfdom a much longer trek. As a matter of agreement, I have express my concerns of a dystopian outcome:
American citizens being treated as children by their government? Of course, most of them always have been. But I often see signs of rationality among a minority of "commoners," giving me cause for optimism. I don't think you can make a case at this time that America is a dictatorship, but check back in another decade.

Psychological visibility as Thomas was discussing it doesn't mean being admired necessarily, it means being *understood*. It's no good being admired in a vacuum or, worse, being admired for all the wrong reasons. Personally, I prefer constructive critics to admirers--the critics help you learn how to be *better*. Fans are an intellectual dead-end and a drain.

Slavery. People think of slavery as physical possession of another human being. But it begins with mental possession of another human being. This means indoctrinating someone with a philosophy of evasion and submission.

The thing with depression is that physiological causes are rarely ever the whole story. There is also some amount of one's position in the social world, or some deeper things besides strictly how your brain is working. It's difficult at times to keep up a motivated outlook. Sometimes, physiology makes it more difficult than for other people. Personally for me, there is a mix of all this that leads me to show symptoms of depression.
Objectivism has had an important role for me so that while at times depression is there, it helps me to prevent things like self-hate, or beating myself up as a bad person. I don't feel that, and I attribute it to a few principles of Objectivism. Some Nietzsche, too, but my opinion on him is complex.
1) Benevolent Universe Premise
No, this doesn't mean the universe "wants" you to be happy. Rather, it's a belief that evil doesn't win out over the good, that is, if one acts justly and acts virtuously, evil cannot last. This isn't to say tragedies don't happen - after all, Rand wrote "We The Living", which is really good at making the point that on a wider scale, the triumph of good is affected by things like respect for individual rights.
http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/benevolent_universe_premise.html
2) Art fuels one's passions
Rand wrote this, I recommend reading all of The Romantic Manifesto:
"Since a rational man’s ambition is unlimited, since his pursuit and achievement of values is a lifelong process—and the higher the values, the harder the struggle—he needs a moment, an hour or some period of time in which he can experience the sense of his completed task, the sense of living in a universe where his values have been successfully achieved. It is like a moment of rest, a moment to gain fuel to move farther. Art gives him that fuel; the pleasure of contemplating the objectified reality of one’s own sense of life is the pleasure of feeling what it would be like to live in one’s ideal world."
http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/art.html
3) Celebrate the good
Perhaps this is obvious, but it is important to see the good in the world and celebrate it. Some people are truly jealous of success, seeing happiness as zero-sum, and think a successful billionaire is inherently bad. This is what Rand pointed to as hating the good for its good qualities. At times, a depressed person may want to wallow and blame others. If you go out of your way to admire the good, you'll have an easier time recognizing that it is possible to achieve your goals by your own efforts. It's a sense of self-responsibility.

Actually, those are two different things.  "True" and "false" are applicable only where there is some connection to reality.  A floating abstraction, not being connected to reality, can be neither true nor false.  But your general point is correct: When talking to most people, merely pointing out that they're employing a floating abstraction is useless.
 
There's a difference between erroneous reasoning and no reasoning at all.  A fallacy is an improper method of reasoning.  A floating abstraction involves no reasoning at all.

It was both fraud and force.  Fraud in the bait-and-switch and then force or the threat of force in the comply-or-else-die aspect.  I find fault with your understanding of fraud, contract and force.
Changing the subject, dignity is too subjective of an evaluation to define in objective law.  Individual elements that may be components of a concept of dignity can be objectively defined as for example to be free of unreasonable searches and seizures of one's person and personal effects, but to just use the term 'dignity' in a written law without establishing context is a legislative disaster and legal nightmare.  Dignity like beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

She changed the direction of thinking in many ways:
1. It was worth it to pay attention to what I wanted since an anxiety develops when no one is watching out for me. (altruism sucks)
2. When I was called selfish I was able to respond with "Yes, I am, What is it that you want?", instead of guilt paralysis. 
3. Rather than trying to look great, work on being great. (made the goal much clearer and simpler)
4. Knowing that my emotions have a direct relationship with my thoughts. (now common knowledge with cognitive behavior therapy)
   as in any fear that I have has a thought behind it.
5. Ethics is not a secret of priests or saints, it can be figured out.
6. Once introduced to her, I stopped trying to find answers through Abrahamic religions.
There is probably more, but that is all I can gather right now.
 

I have a fairly simple problem / question / or need (let my need become a demand on your attention!): what is a theory? From experience, I know a number of specific theories, but I do not know what the proper definition of “theory” is, and what its properties are. My ultimate goal is to say something about a particular scientific theory (to identify flaws stemming from a misunderstanding of what a theory is). To show this, I need to say what the essence of a “theory” is. By analogy, I know what the concept “concept” is. Knowing the nature of a “concept”, I know that “1967 Dodges, black cats and the act of running” –excluding all other things – cannot be a concept, since those things have no similarity.
I confess that I have a draft of a theory of “theory”, in the more literal scientific or philosophical sense (thus excluding uses where someone says that they “have a theory that X”, when they mean that they “feel that X is so” or they “have an idea that X may be true”). A theory is (defined as) a system of identifications which allow man to grasp the nature of a (conceptualized) subject. It presumes a definition of the subject concept, thus “theory of gravity” presumes a concept “gravity”, which implies a definition of “gravity”. Likewise “theory of mammals” presumes a concept “mammal” (and therefore a definition of “mammal”). A theory of a subject is a set of (highly) probable propositions which state the essential properties of that subject. The underlined parts here are my theory of “theory”.
I need to clarify a few points. A “property” of a thing is a fact about its composition that determines what it does, which is not the same as “an observation” or “a correlation” true of the thing. For example, Android is the most popular OS for smartphones, but this is not a property of Android. Plutonium is used in reactors and making nuclear weapons, but this is not a property of plutonium. As for “essential”, I first want to disclaim any connection to discussions of essential vs. accidental properties in professional philosophy, which gets bogged down in proper names as opposed to concepts, and “possible worlds”. What I mean is those properties that characterize the subject, and which are not already implied by some other property. For example, being warm blooded is a property of man, but it is not an essential property of man, since man is a mammal (etc.), and “mammal” implies “warm-blooded”. An obvious essential property of man is having the faculty of reason, also having free will. I stop short of requiring that the identifications which constitute a theory have to be proven to the point of certainly; a fairly high standard of proof is necessary, to distinguish a theory from a hypothesis. And finally, an explanation about “subject”: this is basically shorthand for “the existents subsumed by a concept”.
Here are a couple of corollaries of this meta-theory. Because of the defining nature of “theory” – it is cognitive (it is created for a cognitive purpose) – theories inherit the economy requirements of concepts and their definitions. This derives various Occamite principles such as Aristotle’s “We may assume the superiority ceteris paribus of the demonstration which derives from fewer postulates or hypotheses”, and so on. “Grasping the nature of” an existent summarizes the Objectivist epistemology: it is a proper and objective relationship between a consciousness and reality. As a form of knowledge, there must be proper evidence for the claim, and a theory cannot be arbitrarily stipulated.
I would appreciate any criticism of this meta-theory directed at whether it does correctly describe what a theory is. It is irrelevant to me whether contemporary science teaching sees “theory” as a social construct. It is likewise irrelevant that most explanations of “theory” insist on adding stuff about repeated testing, standardized protocols or “testable”, since these are non-essential consequences of more basic concepts such as “knowledge”, “non-arbitrary”, or “probable” which the concept “theory” depends on. In other words, I’m trying to say what a theory is, and I am not trying to recapitulate what others have said about theories. I had hoped that How We Know would have a pre-packaged answer, but it does not seem to. Of course, alternative theories of theory important, since any claim has to be evaluated against reasonable alternatives.

AJ, what's up. Unfortunately you're going to find a lot of nit pickers and Randroids on this forums, but alas there are many good posters. Whilst it is true Rand used her own terminology, most people recognize the resemblance of the non aggression principle with Rand's non initiation of force principle, and Rands right to life with the Lockean phrasing of self ownership and property rights. I think these are literally the same thing.
I also think that she is right, along with Rothbard and others, to criticize many other libertarians because they do not ground the axioms of libertarianism in a rational ethics. And many are just plain kooky and weird, but hey that applies doubly to many objectivists.
So I celebrate Rand's unique achievement in her melding of a neo-Aristotelian ethics of virtue with libertarian political philosophy.  I think these two both jointly supplement each other, and provide the best case for either.
Also note that Rand didn't have one argument for an NAP, one for self ownership, one for propert rights, etc, but since she believed in the Greek "unity of virtue" concept, her argument for one constitutes her argument for all.
And there's not just one single arguement for grounding the principle of rights, it is more a web of arguments, different strands depending on how you analyze different aspects of man's nature. 
There is the aforementioned aspect of her philosophical psychology, that she often posits that reason has to be an independent judgment, and that one cannot act on the basis of reason to the extent one is subjected to force, and that one needs moral autonomy to think and act independently. 
There is the trader principle, that is that living in a society can be of advantage to you, but only on certain conditions, eg., that you have the opportunity to trade, and that aggression is not a dependable and reliable means of obtaining values and so forth.
There is her observation that sustaining human life is impossible without appropriating and producing material values and one cannot reliably acquire or produce values for exclusive control under the threat of coercion, and that leads to homesteading and contractual trade and so forth.
She gives an argument based on the metaphysical equality of all men, eg., that after we have established a substantive ethics of long term happiness and well being, that if you recognize the requirements of yourself being free to act on your own reason and values, and that is a constitutive part of your own flourishing, then that commits you to valuing the same right of others to promote their well being (and this is part of her argument for the virtue of justice.)
It is in this sense a type of natural law argument, that reason shows us various aspects of man's nature has certain requirements for being able to achieve happiness and success in a social context, and that all of these things point to a thoroughly robust non aggression principle on egoistic grounds.

It is not a problem if you say that the referent of “dog” is “those existents that are dogs”. A “referent” is “a thing referred to”, and as long as you understand what it means to “refer”, there should be no problem. The question is, what things refer? A proper name, concept, or phrase can refer (the name “Rand” refers to a specific individual; the concept labeled “dog” in English refers to a class of animals; the phrase “the author of Atlas Shrugged” or “my dog” refers to a specific invidual, the latter being more dependent on context). In Classical Greek γνω- (gnō-) is only part of a word (or of many words), and it refers to “knowing”; the mathematical symbol ∂ is not a word, and it refers to “partial differential”.


 
Confusion may come from the fact that Rand says that concepts refer, but other things do refer, many of which cannot be concepts. ITOE focuses on concepts and not on language, so we do not know what her theory of “reference” would have been. She says (with bold added)


Language is a code of visual-auditory symbols that serves the psycho-epistemological function of convening concepts into the mental equivalent of concretes. Language is the exclusive domain and tool of concepts. Every word we use (with the exception of proper names) is a symbol that denotes a concept, i.e., that stands for an unlimited number of concretes of a certain kind.
…

A concept substitutes one symbol (one word) for the enormity of the perceptual aggregate of the concretes it subsumes.

Symbols include special letters, concepts and the other things I mentioned, but it is not clear what to do with phrases since calling a combination of words like “the author of Atlas Shrugged” a symbol stretches the notion of symbol. My account of “referring” is that a symbol or sequence of symbols refers. 




The question of whether “horses” is a concept is a very good one, in my opinion. There should be no doubt that “white reindeer” (in English) is not a concept, it is a phrase, similarly “my book” or “the house” are not concepts, they are combinations of concepts forming phrases. “Horses” is a combination of two concepts (and a combination of symbols): one pertaining to the animal, which is a word in its own right, and another, the symbol referring to plural, namely -s, which itself is nota word. Because of how English grammar works, that combination is itself a word, which encodes constituent concepts in the same way that “the house” combines two constituent concepts (and symbols, and words).
There are no automatic concepts, but there are natural concepts, ones that easily arise from the nature of reality and the mind. Rather than saying that it is automatic, I would say that it is inescapable.

A proper noun such as "Joe the Horse" is not an invalid concept.  This is because it is not even a concept.  Also, the alternative of valid or invalid does not apply to names.
"Presidency in Saudi Arabia" -  "Presidency" is an abstract high level concept in the area of politics.  As a concept of method it would be a valid concept even if there were no presidents because there were presidents in the past and could be presidents in the future.  "Presidency in Saudi Arabia" can be used validly when advocating a change in the method of governance of Saudi Arabia, even though it is true that there are no current or past presidents in Saudi Arabia.  "The President of Saudi Arabia" could be used validly in a conditional or future tense, but would be nonsensical in the context of current events or the history of S.A.   Context matters.
We have more concepts than we have words for them. A single word can refer to several concepts and the ambiguity is usually resolved by the context and careful writing or speaking.  Actual concretes can be the referents of many different valid concepts.  Concepts of concepts can divided up in several alternative yet valid ways as well. There is no one-to-one correspondence between words and concepts or between concepts and referents.
An invalid concept is still referred to as a concept, because if it wasn't a concept at all no rules would apply and there would be no justification to judge it as valid or invalid.  So in the sense of badly formed and thus invalid concepts there can be a concept with zero referents.

For a more detailed presentation of "unit", read the Ayn Rand Lexicon entry on unit. Objectivism does not generally use or rely on the term "referent", which is used in other approaches, and which is not well defined. As long as you don't import anything philosophically sketchy from the term "referent" besides "that which a thing refers to", then it's okay to talk about a "referent".
"Unit" does not imply any act of referring, but concepts do refer, to units (which are existents). The label (word) attached to a concept refers to those existents. To give a concrete example, dog #1 is an existent, and it is a unit, but the dog does not refer to itself – it is itself. The dog's name, such as "Poika", refers to the specific existent, and the word "dog" refers to that existent, as well as many others.

Louie, do you honestly think that anything in that quote supports the ridiculous notion that entities are epistemological? Everything I'm saying is about the claim that boundaries would disappear if all consciousness was gone being a failure to grasp what she meant by "objective rules and facts."

I would concur, a principle(s) precede ethics.
 
I would not consider a principle a concept, rather I would consider a principle a proposition.
I would apply 'valid' or 'invalid' to concepts. I would apply 'true' or 'false' to principles. The three Objectivist primary axioms are tautologies, converting them essentially into axiomatic principles.
 
All truths depend on the validity/invalidity of the concepts involved which invoke said principle.
 
As to fundamental, primary or general truths: I tend to hold that to the propositions as asserted; i.e.; are the propositions true based on the validity of the concepts invoked to assert them.