Leonid

To prove means to define, to limit, to put boundaries. That all completely impossible to apply to infinite, omniscient omnipresent omnipotent eternal being. Not to mention that all these qualities are also floating abstractions.

All statements about proving or disproving god are floating abstractions. By definition god can’t be defined and therefore proved. If someone somehow will ever prove god , he will strip him from his divine qualities. He will become an object , one among many which could be observed, studied, explained but not worshipped.

Morality is a code of values accepted by choice. Where is no choice there is no morality. All actions which are performed under duress, use of force or threat of it therefore beyond the realm of morality.

Causality is a law of identity applied to the action. And law of identity is an axiom, on which all proofs are based. Therefore law of causality is also and axiom, self-evident self confirmed claim

Like in the previous discussion this a claim ion primacy of consciousness. And this claim has been thoroughly refuted now and again. So if scientists arrive to such a conclusion they first must check their premises since this claim leads to irresolvable contradictions

Mind is secondary to existence since mind is a faculty of awareness. To be aware one should be aware of something. To deny existence is more than to deny mind. It’s a contradiction in terms since the process of denial is an action of mind. If there is no existence than there is no mind and one can’t deny anything.

"The error in sensationalism is reification: the fallacy of taking an aspect of a thing, grasped by mental analysis [color, brightness, roundness], as if it were an entity capable of separate existence." Ayn Rand never claimed that.

"Individual rights are an absolute, not to be "balanced" or limited by anybody. (And don't answer me that an individual's right to murder, for instance, is limited. Such a right never existed in the first place.) It certainly is not the government nor society that "sets up rights for an individual or group." These rights are not "set up" (nor "rigged up" nor "framed up"). They are inherent in the nature of man. Man is endowed with them by the fact of his birth." Ayn Rand

tjfields-In fact you ask-why man cannot initiate use of force to sustain his life? The answer is that man has to live qua man. The man's tool of survival is his mind, not force and this is fact of objective reality. If man lives by force he lives as an animal, not as a man. However, objectively he cannot do that. If he does, he forfeits his mind and his life.

rowsdower "You could only think I imply the latter by assuming that words are concepts." In a sense you are right. Words are not concepts, they are audio-visual symbols which designate concepts. Without concepts words are simply sounds. If your words don't designate concepts, you will speak like Mad Hatter ": 'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: All mimsy were the borogoves, And the mome raths outgrabe." -Is that what you mean by language? Words are means to retain concepts, but concepts themselves initially are pre-verbal.One doesn't need a word to notice similarity or common denominator between 2 or more units, but needs a word to retain it.

Modern psychology doesn't recognize connection between emotions and cognition and this its major problem.

You, I, he, she etc...refer to person or some times to animals and rarely to objects. You claim that they are not concepts? Are, is , be, am-verbs of existence. You claim that existence is not a concept? By-concept of relationship. Cannot see where is exactly your problem?

Empathy/ compassion to whom and for what? Altruist morality presupposes that we should feel empathy to each and every man regardless. Before they supported their claim by religious commandments, today they use social evolution theory for that purpose and therefore see no difference between apes and men. But empathy of course is not a religious imperative, nor it is a social instinct. Like friendship and love it is an emotional response to values. Only such an empathy could be sincere. And man's emotional response depends on his basic implicit or explicit premises. Therefore dichotomy between mind and empathy is a trade mark of altruist. No man could fully internalize altruist morality and live. The requirement of this morality to feel empathy to just every man on earth is simply impossible to accomplish.

Objectively the lack of solitude is not a threat to your life and solitude is not a necessarily requirement of your life. Your hierarchy of values is arbitrary and subjective. This is the source of contradiction.

By using your argument I can claim that physical beauty is my ultimate value and on this ground I can kill the neighbor next door because he is ugly. Your fallacy is that you substitute objective value-live with your subjective value-solitude. This is a philosophy of subjective irrational egoist. For him the ultimate value is anything which he wish to be. Even if you claim that your very life depends on your solitude, it won't give you a moral right to kill since such a claim has nothing to do with objective reality. Feelings are subjective and wishes are not fishes. As for question of ownership-you can own the whole island if you legally acquired it-bought, inhered etc...But as I understood this is not a case. If there were a case, you wouldn't need to invoke any other reasons except ownership. You would have a right to remove an intruder from your property by all legal means available, although in such a case killing is not an option as long as your life is not in danger.

If you live on deserted island alone, the question of rights doesn't even exist. This is a need of protection of your life and property from initiation of force against you brings up the whole concept of rights. But animals live by force. Therefore the whole concept is inapplicable to them. In regard to the treatment of animals one should talk not about rights but compassion.

If your life is an ultimate value then you'd protect it by recognition of right to live. By committing murder you forfeit this right. As for ownership question, you should explain how you use and dispose on the whole island single handed?

Exactly how a caw benefits from the slaughter?

The concept of rights and ownership on life presupposes an existence of self-awareness and Free Will. Lion doesn't possess that. Moreover, lion doesn't act on conceptual level at all. Therefore to apply these concepts like rights or ownership on life to lion is to turn them into stolen concepts. Using this argument one also could object to the treatment of malaria, since malaria parasite also has " right" to live. But of course you can try to explain to hunger lion who attacks you that you also have right to live and he has to respect it,

By claiming that metaphysically given is contingent they in fact claim that existence has volition on its own. In other words they assert primacy of consciousness.

Even so it's impossible to make all conditions exactly equal. For sure an ass will reach the water in the straight line sight-which he directly perceives.He cannot see the whole circle.

Exactly. That why it's thought experiment.

I never claimed that I intend to re-write Objectivism. My purpose was to highlight certain points.

Yes. Human is a rational being and as such he developed concept of rights which no animal ever did. Of course man is a volitional being and may choose the path of violation of rights. He may maim, kill, rob or live as a parasite by fraud. Such a man who forfeits his conceptual mind in practice is not different from a wild animal. That why we cage them in prisons, or some time even exterminate them, exactly like animals.