Acount Overdrawn

"Taking the law into one's own hands"--the problem with this is that since it is unproved, it is no different from an act of aggression, and by that fact you become a threat to everyone else in society. I think Don Watkins III brought up some good points regarding this in his essay "Epistemological Anarchy". His point was about how objectivity in a social/political context places certain demands upon individuals--namely that they have to prove to everyone that their use of force was defensive in nature and not initiatory.

I'm not answering for SoftwardNerd, but addressing your question: "How real is it?" I agree that this is the wrong question. There are not "levels" of reality; it is either-or. Dreams are real products of one's perceptions, imaginations, and subconscious processing, and so they are real mentally, and only mentally. That doesn't make them any less real than the daily events, such as accidents. If dreams exist, then they are real, not some real thing with a few "unreal" holes poked through it which makes it less real. If you have Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, reading pages 154-158 should be helpful to you. The point made about concepts and determinacy can be generalized to any mental something (entity, unit, etc.)

Welcome to the forum. I hope this discussion proves fruitful for you. I was going to address your questions directly, but that would assume you have a conceptual consciousness, and that at some point you had to consciously choose to learn the concepts which are a part of the language you're typing in. If I take your statement exactly as you stated it, that "the real work of the mind happens in unconscious brain processes," then the logical conclusion I reach is that you're saying there is no conscious mind. The conscious mind is unreal, or at best, a by-product of unconscious processes which has no influence on the unconscious. That would certainly raise the question of where your concepts and thoughts come from, as softwarNerd has brought up. Further than that, aren't you denying mental processes, like the action of remembering, or imaging? While I would think those actions in some way correspond to certain brain functions, does the existence of such brain functions make remembering or imaging any less "real"? I think the answer to these questions will clarify what statements Ayn Rand actually made.

It's so perfect! Nice. I'm in Benpercent's position here. I'm more or less broke, and college expenses will only go up here in Michigan...

Just keep in mind that free will isn't limited to concept-formation, though that is a key ability as far as human beings are concerned (I think this is what Thomas was basically saying). If you know this, then just ignore my post.

This isn't a linguistic issue: Determinist apply their unproved notion to everything which exists, and conclude that free will is impossible, or at least this is what the more honest Hard Determinists do. A Hard Determinist would say that in all contexts you are determined: free will has no meaning or reality. But I object completely to their approach, because I object to their view of cause-and-effect which underlies it. Because their view of cause-and-effect is wrong, everything else built upon it, such as their theory, is also wrong. Nothing to me acts "deterministically": things do however act according to their identities. Even if you knew my entire biology and psychology, I would argue that you could not invariably predict every action I would make thereafter by studying my biological state, then my action, then my state again, then my action action, etc., which is what Determinists posit that they can do (unless they are of the Environmental Determinism persuasion or some other variant). My ability to choose to focus is a first cause; it isn't determined by my previous neural state (assuming a functioning mind, and a non-functioning one would only hamper or destroy the ability to focus). There hasn't been one theory of Determinism which was ever proven, which explains why there are so many different theories about how exactly we're determined. But then again, this has nothing to do with the original topic. @stuzal atla creala iuday: to understand what Objectivism means by cause-and-effect, you have to step away from the Determinist definition which is used normally and consider the issue afresh.

The best resource in book form which explains free will is Dr. Peikoff's Objectivism: the Philosophy of Ayn Rand, which covers free will in Chapter 2. To help you out, here's the part of the book which answers your question regarding Causality (Cause and Effect) and Free Will: Here's some things I've said about free will, in the "Objectivism and determinism thread": Have fun with your investigation!

I was arguing with an Agnostic once about God and "possibility," and then I brought up "Rand's Question": What facts of reality give rise to the concept? (see Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, ch. 5 on definitions). Here's what I said: To put it another way, "possible" is not an isolated item of knowledge, from which any statement can be made and deemed "possible." To know if something is "possible" is to already know in advance what would make that thing "probable" and even "certain." The concepts "probable" and "certain" are a part of the context which validates the concept "possible." Indeed, "possible" has no meaning apart from its relationship to "probable" and "certain." This is why I think the definitions you gave is wrong. If "possible" means "something that has not been demonstrated to be contradictory with known truths," then whatever could "probable" mean? "Something that really hasn't been demonstrated to be contradictory with known truths"? That definition, and the definition of possible you gave, are nonsensical. I hope my statements above have answered your question. I'll try to clarify if you don't grasp it.

First, you have to specify what you/she means by "create"; what is being created and by what means? Even in your friends' case, she's misused the concept of "possible." She still has no evidence to support her claim that such a being exists. When a person declares that something is "possible," it isn't enough for them to have "some evidence in favor" of their claim--they must also explain what a complete proof would consist of: To demonstrate that the Objectivist usage is correct, you would have to understand that all knowledge is contextual, and that every item of knowledge stands or falls with its context, with its relations with other cognitive elements which condition it. But this may be too large of a topic to discuss at 4:37 in the morning. I like Chops' answer regarding this. In the context of human knowledge up to this point, there's no evidence whatsoever for "magic" or "magical creatures," and magic as it used as a concept would contradict known facts.

Welcome to the forum. Objectivism's version of Atheism is a denial of the existence of all the beings asserted arbitrarily in mysticism (supernaturalism), regardless of the religion's specific characterization of God or other supernatural beings. Therefore Objectivists are, as Dr. Peikoff put it, But your claim is slightly different here, in that you're not explicitly saying that your being is supernatural; it is natural, but our current biological abilities (like perception) are not equipped to apprehend such beings. Even still, the Objectivist view of knowledge is that it is contextual. In your first post you spoke of "Gods" existing, and in this post you give your definition of what such a God is. In order to substantiate your claim, in order to regard it as knowledge, you have to identify the context which brought you to that conclusion. Unfortunately, by your own definition, we cannot know the existence of such beings, which includes you. Since you can present no context (by your own statements) which validates your claim of such superior beings existing, the rational response from the readers here is to throw out your claim as arbitrary, and no longer worth discussion. I don't think that the Atheist position must rule out the existence of superior beings; like beings with faster cognitive processes or something like that. Hypothetically, if we ever did have conclusive evidence for the existence for such beings, then the Atheist could not rationally deny their existence; this would be contrary to the facts, and therefore irrational. The Atheist position, at least within Objectivism, rules out any supernatural aberration or dimension which is alleged to transcend existence, not natural facts (or future natural facts).

Could you show me some type of textbook or website discussing logic where it is concluded that you can commit the fallacy without making any argument? The petitio is usually committed when a proposition in one of the premises is the one being proven in the conclusion--it revolves around arguments, not simply statements.

These aren't examples of petitio principii: The purpose of ItOE was not to prove the validity of the senses or the existence axiom--it was to prove the validity of Rand's theory of concept formation; and also to offer her solution to the "problem of universals." What I mean is: after reading ItOE, the conclusion the reader would draw is that Rand, at the very least, has provided her theory of concepts; with other conclusions being that she has given a persuasive proof of her theory or that she hasn't. I think you're committing the fallacy of Ignoratio Elenchi, specifically the irrelevant thesis fallacy. Yes, the argument you gave above is valid: Rand did not prove the validity of the senses or the existence axiom in ItOE. But that wasn't her intent in the first place.

Whenever you're dealing with a non-axiomatic subject, and you are not going to validate every item of knowledge which is the precondition of your discussion, there are some things you will have to assume--this is what happens in ItOE regarding the validity of the senses. But nothing has to be assumed if you are attempting to validate everything, as is what happens in Dr. Peikoff's Objectivism: the Philosophy of Ayn Rand: In essence, you're saying: "for all we know, our senses could be entirely invalid, but Objectivists have to take it for granted that they are valid." What I'm saying is: You're stealing the concept of "valid." Validation means any process of establishing an idea's relationship to reality, including perceptual self-evidence (OPAR, p. 8). There's nothing validating my idea that my senses perceive reality, besides the fact that they do perceive reality; like how they perceive this laptop I'm typing on, for instance. Objectivism's conclusion about the nature of perception is that there are no grounds to say that they are invalid. In fact, from the problems I have seen attributed to the senses, from Hume and others, the problems often describe what the senses perceive, then conclude somehow that they are invalid because of what they perceive; in other words, the senses did perceive reality, but not in the way the philosopher wanted, so therefore they were deemed "invalid."

There's nothing telling you that something is similar to something you've seen before, besides the fact that you saw something, saw something else resembling it (like seeing two shades of blue), contrasted it with something different but in the same range (like "red"), and concluded that the first two things were similar as compared to the third thing. Noting similarities and differences is inherent in the perceptual process; without which there would be no perception, or even sensations. If it were just differences, we would be stuck at the level of sensations; and there is no way for it to just be similarities, because differences are the precondition for noting similarities. Actually, I challenge this claim. Calling a group of books by the class "red books" does nothing to account for perceptual similarity. Saying that this class is "metaphysical" doesn't move the matter any further to a resolution, either. In short, to make a statement similar to what someone else said on this thread: Metaphysically, in reality, there are no "universal class identities." Even after forming concepts, there are still no "universal class identities." What exists metaphysically, in reality, are things, not class properties. It is you who calls a certain property a "class," not reality; and whether you say they exist externally or not, they don't exist. This does not "collapse" into Nominalism because Objectivism disagrees with the entire conception of the "Problem of Universals" being a metaphysical problem in the first place; Nominalism, Conceptualism and Realism were all wrong for their attempts at solving the problem as if it were a metaphysical issue: I'm including Conceptualism because it had three lines of thought, including Realist and Nominalist positions. It is pointless to say that Objectivism only answers the psychological problem of universals; within Objectivism, this is the only problem of universals which is actually a problem. I really don't think I have anything more to say on this thread. To answer the topic's question "So where's the solution to the 'Problem of Universals'?" my answer is: Nowhere.

I'm afraid this is a very mistaken characterization of Rand's theory of concepts. A concept is not simply the essential attributes, it is not just the "intentional" meaning. Since you've read ItOE so many times, I shouldn't have to tell you how Dr. Peikoff demonstrates how that is not the case in the essay "The Analytic/Synthetic Dichotomy." A concept subsumes all facts, all attributes of a group of existents, essential and non-essential. It is the consideration of the non-essential attributes, in addition to considering other existents (like considering humans in comparison to animals and plants), which allows for an identification of the any "essential" attributes; indeed, the attribute is essential in light of the non-essential and observing other existents. Most, if not all, non-essential characteristics are derivatives of the essential characteristic, while the broader characteristic of the essential one is known as the "genus," which includes knowledge about other existents not being directly subsumed under the concept. A class, in your description here, is no different than Rand's theory of what a concept is. I'd hope that this ends the issue; otherwise I really won't see the point in the "problem of universals" as it is being stated here.

Implicit Measurement is what makes the standard objective. In the case of colors, a person observes a specific color and takes it as the standard of measurement for that color, allowing him/her to contrast other colors as "lighter" or "darker" or in a totally different group of colors. Using implicit measurement, a person doesn't have to stick to just that color; he can easily drop the color as the standard and pick a new one, but this is only possible for two reasons. The first is that this "implicit measurement" is not subjective: the colors do possess differences in hues which allows for comparisons without needing explicit numerical terms; the second reason is that implicit measurement is not intrinsic: setting a certain color as the standard does not give it some new intrinsic property; there is a level of the optional in what thing is considered the standard, and it can always be dropped as the standard. Implicit measurement is what allows for a child's idea of "man" to differ from his adult identification (assuming that the adult has made contextual changes to his childhood identification of "man"). What is being implicitly measured is the range of consciousness, with the conclusion that man has the highest range of consciousness, the conceptual level, when he is implicitly measured alongside animals, plants, and micro-organisms. I've included plants and micro-organisms because while they have no range of consciousness, it is still an important identification to make: that plants, though living things like us, possess no consciousness, for example. To explain this range, it should go something like this: -Plants/Micro-organisms: No consciousness; passive reaction to stimuli. -Lower animals: sensations, no knowledge of entities; active reaction to range-of-the-moment stimuli. -Higher animals: perceptions, knowledge of entities; active reaction to perceived/unperceived stimuli. -Humans: volition/concepts, knowledge of facts which can apply to all entities in a given group; chosen, self-caused actions, but also capable of the "lower" forms of actions. Such as active reaction to range-of-the-moment stimuli (e.g. reflexes). When a person wants to implicitly measure things like colors or lengths, one does it by means of similarity, as you've made clear you're aware of. When someone wants to implicitly something not perceptual, one does it by means of commensurability.

I'm not speaking for Exaltron. If America were an aggressive dictatorship, then there would be no way to "settle this thing," if by that you mean peaceful diplomacy. If Canada has evidence of America making plans to conquer them, then "she" would have every right to defend "her" citizens, including nuclear warfare (though the proximity to the target would be an issue). After understanding the relation between mind and force, it becomes irrational and immoral to claim that the innocent man defending his life is to be held accountable for the death of a hostage in an attempt to kill the gun-wielder. The same logic applies to the national-scale: if a country has to defend itself, then it has to focus on targets necessary to end the conflict as quickly as possible; it would have neither the power nor resources to secure the lives of every innocent, individual rights-respecting hostage in the aggressor nation. And even if it did have such things, that is not the government's role in wartime: to protect the individual rights of another nation's people. It's role is to protect the rights of its own citizens, which in war can lead to, like in World War II, the case of deliberately destroying cities and people who didn't escape in a demonstration of power, individual-rights respecting or not.

Well, think about it. A noun to my recollection denotes a person, place, thing or idea. All those things exist, and are subsumed under the concept "existence," but more things exist. Verbs--actions and states of being--are also existents, but are not nouns. And I could go on, but I think you see the point by now. So it includes everything that a collective noun would, but is not restricted to only being a collective noun. Or at least that's my off-hand thinking on this little topic.

Again, I don't have ItOE, but Rand states somewhere, perhaps the chapter on Axiomatic Concepts, that "existence" has no Conceptual Common Denominator. Notice that your problem here relates to definitions: "existence" is an axiomatic concept; it has no formal definition, only an ostensive one. In other words, this problem you have has no bearing on the concept "existence," if my understanding of the objective theory of concepts is correct.

I'll accept your apology, but I'm still not participating in the discussion any longer. As a few closing statements, not just to Martian but to this thread, I'd like to point out as one of my statements that science is not the fundamental integrator of human knowledge; philosophy is (or is supposed to be). Every scientific hypothesis, theory, and law is informed by some kind of philosophical assumption or explicit statement. The notion of an advanced scientific theory invalidating knowledge directly observed is what should be considered absurd, not what is directly observed; it is tantamount to claiming that there is no base for higher-level knowledge, that it is necessarily detached from what we observe, and all we have to do is merely wait for science to reach all kinds of conclusions which we'll have no means of tying back to the observed facts. And if people are going to continue to argue against Determinism here, it is it's view on causality which has to be challenged. Without its view of causality, Determinism is completely empty as a theory of how things operate, and should then be given no concern as a consequence. Thanks for your time.

I don't have the relevant quote, but the concept "existence" is formed by observing things, and abstracting the fact that they "exist." Like "7," there's no thing which is just "existence." "Existence" is not a first-level concept, it is the highest-level abstraction, with its units being all entities, all events, all attributes, all actions, and all relationships. The same goes for the concept "identity" it has the exact same units as "existence"; namely, all things which exist. "Existence" is irreducible; to form the concept "existence" one notes the similarity that objects/actions/etc. exist, with the difference being the comparison of these things not existing. The only way to discuss existence is to merely restate what it is, as is true of all axioms. Unless you disagree about Rand validated why "existence" etc. are axiomatic concepts, I don't think your conclusion that existence is not a concept holds (actually, I don't think it holds either way).

I don't understand the significance of calling something a "property" when considering it a member of a class, as opposed to observing or inferring attributes. When we identify things as members of a given class, we're saying that they share a certain range of (explicit or implicit) measurements in common with one another; they possess the same attribute, but in different degrees and the abstraction includes these measurements by not specifying one particular measurement as necessary for something to be included in the class. By specifying what's essential about these units, that which explains all or most of the other attributes ascribed to the units, the need for finding out if identical properties exist seems to be a mood point. Or rather, it seems to make "property" out to be more like a metaphysical essence which conforms objects into being somehow "identical," with the "problem" then being our ignorance as to whether this exists and how we know it does. If Rand's interpretation of the "Problem of Universals" is correct, or her correction about it being an epistemological rather than metaphysical issue is correct, then I think she has solved this problem. If your interpretation is correct, then I do not see how a solution could be made. Even "properties" like "red" are specific ideas, specific concepts--if there is no valid means of speaking about concepts, why bother discussing the validity of properties? Also, you've stated that concept-formation does not solve this problem. What aspect(s) of epistemology, in your opinion, do?

This is where I respectfully bow out. You've mentioned several times that we were the ones not paying attention to your arguments, when quite the opposite has been the case; it's been my arguments that have been more or less ignored, especially concerning causality. If you accept Objectivism's law of causality, then in logic you couldn't accept Determinism's causality (they are not the same thing), and therefore would have to reject Determinism as a valid theory. Contra to the "stone age man" you're comparing me to, I pointed to observable facts and made an inference based on the context; that humans possess free will. Contra to your repeated statements, I do not think Free will is a magical or supernatural phenomena, nor do I think that the only alternatives in the universe are Determinism or Indeterminism; like consciousness, I think free will is a natural fact open to scientific study and explanation, and the same goes for the natural fact of "life." But all of this is beside the point. I've never once disrespected your intelligence or statements (though I did make some funny observations), and yet you've explicitly declared my statements to be no more reality-oriented than some brute going on about magical essences and such nonsense. Fine, if my statements are so bizarre and unfounded, I hope you do well without them. Goodbye.

Do you accept introspection as a valid means of understanding one's own consciousness? I understand your posts quite well because I understand the Soft-Determinism argument; I regard it as false, but I understand it. And what is the purpose of your posts now? If it's still trying to reconcile Objectivism and Determinism, please tell me so that I can stop posting--I've given plenty of reasons why this is impossible and do not wish to run around in circles.

Again, Objectivism does not attempt to prove the reality of free will and choices being different; free will is an axiomatic concept, an implication of the consciousness axiom and the base of conceptual cognition. It is validated, not proved, through introspective experience, through observing one's ability to raise or lower one's focus at one's will, realizing that this process of focus never becomes automatic or determined: it takes the same fundamental effort to bring oneself into a state of focus, and this effort does not determine other moments; the next instant one can choose not to expend effort and lower one's focus back into a mental haze. This is because there cannot be an infinite regress of things being proved; some ideas have to be the basis for proof, and Objectivism argues that free will is one such base. My objections to Ifatart and Martian apply to you as well. Objectivism regards Determinism as a false theory and rejects it, along with its view of causality. This includes Incompatibilism (Hard Determinism) and Compatibilism (Soft Determinism). Arguing for Soft Determinism doesn't somehow make it compatible with Objectivism, so I don't see the point of the thread anymore, unless it is now a general Free Will/Determinism thread, but I'm sure these last comments will go ignored like they were when I said them earlier. Also, Tensorman: What are your axioms?