Leonid

RationalBiker To use any concept "regardless of context, standard, source, recipient and recipient's knowledge." is extremely dangerous in ethics or in any other field. That why I spent so much time and effort to define my terms.

Yes, in certain situations life has no value. When life is unsustainable it becomes non-life. In the situation you described John Galt won't survive for a long time spiritually and physically even without to kill himself, since his mind, the only tool of his survival will cease to function. But so will a bird with broken wings or plant without roots. However I discuss the situation in which life can sustain itself.

Marc K "By the way I don't think this comports with Leonid's understanding since I believe he is applying this idea to individuals and obviously, to some, life has no value." Thank you for the quote. I do have "Letters" and I don't know how I missed it. Life qua life has intrinsic value, some people denial notwithstanding. Some people deny many self-evident things, free will for example. Would it mean that for them free will doesn't exist? Exactly like in the case of life, such a denial is self-refuting.

Life is ultimate value and life provides the means to sustain itself. This is the essence of life as process of self-sustaining and self-generated action. The end of such a process is life itself. Therefore life cannot be an instrumental value. (value for something other then life- see definition above). Life is a value in itself, intrinsic value. Cannot see the contradiction.

You sorely miss the point all the time. All living beings have one essential property in common-the ability to initiate goal-orientated actions in order to sustain their life. They "know" how to want. However different species have different tools to do so. Plants have hard-wired mechanisms, lion has instinct, man has mind (or at least suppose to.). Man cannot live as plant and vice versa. So your sarcasm is out of place.

Rand referred to "life itself". This is accurate quotation. Read the book. "Again, that's a statement about people, not life in general. Your claims are about life. " You imply that concept of man is unrelated to the concept of life. This is complete self-evident nonsense. However if you think that I talk nonsense, then onus of proof is on you. So far you failed to exhibit any meaningful argument to disprove my claims.

Man is living being and shoes are not. Or maybe you imply that man is not alive? If man doesn't belong to the realm of the living, then to what realm he belongs? Man is rational animal. Rationality doesn't exclude vitality. On the contrary, rationality, human mind represents essential property of every living being-self initiated goal orientated interaction with environment which operates on conceptual level. In "We the Living" Ayn Rand referred to the "life itself", that is-life as metaphysical phenomenon. Please note that your attempt to separate life from mind is acknowledgement of the notion of mind-body dichotomy which completely incompatible with philosophy of Objectivism. "You are an indivisible entity of matter and consciousness. Renounce your consciousness and you become a brute. Renounce your body and you become a fake. Renounce the material world and you surrender it to evil." (Galt speech)

“The boy shook his head with a glance that was almost apology” I won't make it Mr. Rearden...I know I'm through...Man is only collection of conditional chemicals..." “You know better than that" "Yes, I guess I do...its crap, all those things they taught us...Dying...it wouldn't make any difference to chemicals...but it does to me". "Then his head fell back...and Rearden went on slowly, even though he knew that no caution was necessary any longer because what he was carrying in his arms was now that which had been the boy's teachers' idea of man-a collection of chemicals." (AS, pg 920; 922). Every Objectivist who attempts to explain life in terms of death should re-read this. Ant here is another quote: “I know what I want and to know how to want isn’t it life itself?” Ayn Rand, “We, the Living” Not only man but every living being “knows” how to want. This is the essence of life. And if we one day will wonder whether some unimaginable material system somewhere in the galaxy far away is alive or not this is the litmus test which will help us to decide.

And by what natural selection is encouraged? If you reject goal-driven self-causation then you have to involve some supernatural cause. But this is obviously not a case. Life is result of self-organization of material system. In their book "Biological Self-organization" Camazine et al. (2001: 8) define self-organization: ‘‘As a process in which pattern at the global level of a system emerges solely from numerous interactions among the lower level components of the system. Moreover the rules specifying interactions among the system’s components are executed using only local information, without reference to the global pattern. In short pattern is an emergent property of the system rather than being imposed on the system by an external ordering influence... Natural selection molds the complex ends achieved by self-organization,’’ From this definition follows that 1. A process of self-organization doesn't have antecedent cause. 2. Emergent properties of such a system are different from the properties of its components and therefore cannot be explained by means of reductionism. "The system has properties that are emergent, if they are not intrinsically found within any of the parts, and exist only at a higher level of description." http://www.calresco.org/sos/sosfaq.htm#1.2 One cannot describe life in terms of death. Since life is metaphysically irreducible axiomatic phenomenon, the science which can explain life is not biochemistry or genetics but sound philosophy. Objectivism is most suitable for this task. Complexity theory also could help to overcome philosophy of determinism and reductionism in regard to life. http://www.calvin.edu/~lhaarsma/SelfOrgComplexity2003.pdf http://informationr.net/ir/12-4/colis/colis31.html PS. I provide links for a purpose. The topic is too big and too important to be covered in details on this thread. Please read the stuff. From your response I understood that you don't.

I already responded that I discuses here life as such, not man's life qua man. However note that Objectivism is primary philosophy of mind and mind is biological phenomenon. In order to understand mind one needs first to understand life not in terms of biochemistry, but in philosophical terms. Without it Objectivism looses its epistemic and ethical ground. And for the proof observe your own attempt to divorce man's rational life from his physical life. Such an attempt is amount to acknowledgement of mind-body dichotomy' notion. Rationality is not end in itself. Mind is the only tool of human survival. To use it as a tool of death is worse then contradiction in terms. If man's mind is not originated from the essential properties which belong to every living being, that is -the ability to develop self-initiated goal orientated interaction with environment, then what it originated from? The only possible alternative is supernatural, mystic origin. Since this board is about Objectivism, I think you should reconsider your position.

Every living organism including plants and bacterium acts order to gain/keep values. Different organisms seek different values. Plant turns to light, amoeba escapes it. They select, choose values which sustain their life.

Not according to definition of instrumental value. Exactly because life is ultimate value it cannot be value for something else except life itself. On the contrary all other values are instrumental to life.

RationalBiker “That's not an answer. Something that is pre-programmed to act in a particular manner is not making a choice, it is doing the only thing it can do - follow the programming. It is not facing alternatives as it can only act as it is programmed to act. You have still asserted a contradiction.” By implying that choice presupposes existence of Free will or conceptual thinking you redefine “choice” No dictionary definition suggests that. There are many other mechanisms of choice-pain and pleasure for example. The alternative of life and death always exists for the living organism.

Dante quotes Binswanger”...what causes and explains purposeful actions is not actually the future goal, but the agent's present desire for the future goal. The future goal does not exist yet--and may never exist--but the agent is able to conceive or imagine a future goal, and it is this present mental content which causes him to undertake the action he hopes will bring about his realization of that goal...” Future goals exist as mental projection. Mind and its content is also part of reality which is self generated by man. Moreover, living organisms generate such projections on any level of evolutionary development. See “Nano-Intentionality” by W. Tecumseh Fitch1 Biology & Philosophy@© Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 200710.1007/s10539-007-9079-5 and also Rosen’s Anticipatory Systems Theory: “The Art and Science of Thinking Ahead” http://journals.isss.org/index.php/proceed...ticle/view/1249 http://www.asa3.org/ASA/PSCF/1990/PSCF12-90Cottingham.html To say “that final causation has occurred without actually acting through any antecedent causes is to elevate that final cause to a mystical, supernatural status” is as to say that process of life as self generated action has mystical status. Life qua life doesn’t have antecedent cause, cannot be reduced to the physics or chemistry. Living entity is not collection of “conditional chemicals” as Ayn Rand negatively put it in AS. It is emergent property of certain self-organized material structure which able to sustain itself far from equilibrium by the virtue of self-generation of goal-orientated action. Therefore goal is the cause of living process. Since goal also generated by the organism, this is the obvious case of self-causation. The fact that living process could be described in terms of biochemistry is irrelevant to the metaphysical essence of life. Most of the biochemical reactions could be reproduced in vitro, but that doesn’t make such a reaction alive.

"Something is said to have intrinsic value if it is good ``in and of itself,'' i.e., not merely as a means for acquiring something else." "Something is said to have instrumental value if it is good because it provides the means for acquiring something else of value." http://darwin.eeb.uconn.edu/eeb310/lecture...hics/node2.html Life is ultimate value, an end in itself and therefore it is intrinsic, not instrumental value.

Alas, there is no Objectivist definition of "choice". Varies dictionaries define "choice" as selection in the face of alternative. "“It is only a living organism that faces a constant alternative: the issue of life or death." (VOS, pg 15). From this follows that every living organism chooses such a mode of action which sustains its life. There is no doubt that even low animals constantly choose their values, any pet owner knows that. Volitional choice belongs to man, but that doesn't exclude other types of choices.

Do you mean you don't act in order to achieve goals? If so why to act at all? If by metaphysical teleology you mean some divine primary mover, you are right. But what I mean is that primary mover is every living organism. It moves itself. This is simply observable metaphysical fact of reality. Life is primary mover by definition, that is-by it metaphysical essence.

No, life is not eternal. That exactly why it needs self-causation, to keep itself alive.

JavR "The reason this looks like primacy of consciousness to you, is because you seem to think that "value" is a metaphysical attribute of a living thing that will be taken away if your theory falls apart. Value is not some thing out there in reality, it takes a valuer." I think that value is a property which inherent to life.It seems that the main point of disagreement lies in your premise of valuer as conscious volitional being. But this is obviously incorrect. Every living thing, conscious or not acts in order to gain/keep values when the ultimate value is its own life. Therefore every organism is a valuer. It chooses its values without to be conscious or volitional. Lion will choose to hunt and eat springbok but it will ignore grass as source of nutrition. Springbok will eat grass and ignore meat even if it ready available to it. They both choose their values involuntary, their choice is preprogrammed. I don't believe in God and I don't think that acknowledge of the obvious fact that self-organized system which generates self-initiated goal-orientated actions is driven by teleological self-causation is mysticism. I don't believe in reductionism either.

Serial thinker "lets start with this: "without antecedent cause" is the same as saying "without cause" and is illogical. Non-deterministic cannot be equated with non-causal." Let start. Cambridge dictionary defines "antecedent" as "someone or something existing or happening before, especially as the cause or origin of something existing or happening later" Life defined in Objectivism and elsewhere as self-generated process. Therefore to use antecedent causation as explanation of the life’s process would be contradiction in terms. Life process is self-determined .You imply that antecedent causation is the only possible mode of causation which is incorrect. Already Aristotle described 4 different modes of causation: The material cause: “that out of which”, the formal cause: “the form”, “the efficient cause: “the primary source of the change or rest”, the final cause: “the end, that for the sake of which a thing is done”." ((Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Obviously that only final or teleological cause is applicable to life since life is an end in itself. Observe that teleological cause cannot be antecedent since it doesn't exist before or even at the time of action. You work in order to be paid in the future. Your salary is the cause of your work and obviously it is not antecedent cause. It doesn't exist in reality before your action. It exists only as your mental projection into the future. If I'm a mystic then so is Aristotle, Ayn Rand and Harry Binswanger, Objectivist philosopher and biologist who dedicated whole chapter in his book “The Biological Basis of teleological Concepts" to explanation of teleological causation. You yourself are also a mystic if your actions aren't driven by any antecedent cause, but simply by your own decision, desire or wish. In other words, according to your position, you are a mystic if you acknowledge existence of your own free will.

Please explain.

Life is a self-generated action of the living organism which is self-organized structure of matter. Such a structure possesses emergent properties of self-initiated, goal orientation action which all other material structures don't possess. "The law of causality is the law of identity applied to action. All actions are caused by entities. The nature of an action is caused and determined by the nature of the entities that act; a thing cannot act in contradiction to its nature." (AS). Emergent identity of the living organism as self-organized entity determines its mode of causation which is self-causation. Self initiated action of such an entity cannot be driven by antecedent cause, that would contradict its nature.

According to Oxford Dictionary one of the definitions of " end" is " a purpose , aim". Therefore "end in itself " means purpose in itself, that which one acts to gain and/or keep, a value.

"Evil" is anything which prevents to obtain values. However values themselves defined by standard of value. Since different people hold as a standard of value different things (like God, others, society, state, tribe, class, future generations, mother-earth etc...), their definitions of evil differ. That provides the ground for moral relativism and multiculturism. The only remedy for it is to define objective standard of value which Ayn Rand successfully did.

Jake Ellison "Since things are what they are, since everything that exists possesses a specific identity, nothing in reality can occur causelessly. (Peikoff, OPAR) Seems like pretty straight forward logic to me. Shortest thread ever? " Not so fast. First, according to Peikoff, not every thing does have a cause. Existence, for example doesn't. (OPAR). Second, my claim is not that life is causeless but is that life doesn't have antecedent or efficient cause. By the virtue of life's unique identity life causation is also unique. Since life is self-organized, self-generated phenomenon the only causation of life could be final cause which is self-generated goals projected into the future. In other words it is self-causation.