Betsy

The world is full of people with mixed premises, and some of them make great friends -- especially those we grew up with and shared important parts of our lives with. The first thing to do is for YOU to decide what you want from your old friends. You say they are good people and you enjoy doing things with them. That's a real value. Then you say you want to help them be more responsible, teach them, etc. Why? Do THEY want to change what they think or do YOU? If they never change, is there still value for you in being their friend? There often is. You may disagree with them, but whatever mistakes they may make, or even character flaws they may have, are not your responsibility. You don't have to be their therapist or parent. Their ideas are no threat to you. You can go on being rational, responsible, and hold onto your correct ideas even if they never join you. So what do you do with them? If they offer value to you, respect and enjoy them for it. Discuss or joke about your differences, agree to disagree when you hit an impasse, and otherwise continue as you always have.

You missed something important in the plot. I'll send you a private e-mail.

I never argue reasons for or against the existence of God anymore because I have found the arguments don't matter. I have dialogued with hundreds of theists and it is never the case that someone is a former atheist who was convinced by an argument for God's existence. Arguments for God are always after-the-fact justifications for a position somebody is holding for other reasons. What other reasons? Ask him. Ask a theist why believing in God means something to him and is important and what he would lose if God didn't exist. Then you will find the real reason he believes. Here are some common ones: Security. Until a person is an adult able to provide for his own needs, it is comforting to imagine someone is watching out for him and will take care of him. Fear of social conflict. Everybody he knows believes in God. Indifference. Ask many Americans if they believe in God and they'll say "Yeah, why not?" but religion plays no part in their lives at all. They're not really theists. I call them "apatheists." Happy associations. He loves singing in the choir, church picnics, and Christmas and Easter celebrations with friends and family. That's good stuff he doesn't want to give up and God is part of it. Loyalty to values. He wants people to be honest and to treat each other decently and properly and he feels threated by the "anything goes" subjectivism of modern intellectuals. The only institution he knows of that defends moral values is religion and the only enforcer of moral values he knows of is God. Etc. === I find that when I address and deal with the real reason someone believes in God, I often add yet another "convert" to my side.

The law has to be objective -- clear and knowable to everyone in advance -- and that is why the age of majority is a definite number within a reasonable range (such as somewhere between 16 and 25). That way everybody can know when someone can make a legally binding contract, is eligible to vote, is legally liable for the harm he may do to others, etc. Also the law allows for exceptions. An independent minor can file for "emancipation" and have the court declare him a legal adult before the age of majority.

It as already been stated -- and I am waiting for an answer -- birth is an obvious and clear point of demarcation as far as the facts giving rise to the concept of rights is concerned. When it is born -- but not before -- a child becomes a biologically separate entity not dependent on any one particular individual. You write "the only difference I'm seeing here is his physical location" but please address what the different locations are. Before birth the baby wasn't in a tree. It was inside a human being possessing rights. After I give it my best shot, I would ask him to explain what his "non-religious reasons" are. In my experience, the person either gives up the conversation, changes the subject, or raises a silly, off-the-wall "objection." If a person won't deal with such obvious distinctions as one biological entity vs. two separate biological entities, and inside a human being vs. not inside a human being, there really isn't much I can say. You can't reason someone out of a belief they didn't reason themselves into.

In February of 1962 I read The Fountainhead about a year after seeing the film on TV. Boy did that grab me! I told a neighbor and she lent me her copy of Atlas. I was hooked. I found that a couple I babysat for were also Ayn Rand fans and, after their kids were asleep I read their copy of the newly reprinted Anthem and some of the recently-published For the New Intellectual. To learn more about Objectivism, I subscribed the new Objectivist Newsletter, from the first issue, and signed up for the NBI lectures. About six months later, I read We the Living and, at that point, I had real all of the existing Objectivist literature. It was a long time between books after that.

I heard her answer, when someone asked her (I believe it was at a Ford Hall Forum Q+A) what in her life, of all the things she had done, she was proudest of, and she said "That I married Frank O'Connor."

A person first has rights the instant he becomes a person -- i.e., when he is born. Before birth the fetus is not a separate person and after birth it is.

That's not corny. It's lovely! It is also a stellar example the Objectivist virtue of justice. Condemning evil, when it is rationally appropriate to do so, is important, but gratitude towards those who have given us values is always appropriate.

This is a very good description of the normal relationship of a child to his parents, a relationship you have known your entire life. It has been comforting to you, so far, to know that someone has created everything for you and provided for the needs you could not satisfy for yourself. Your parents have watched over you and it is proper to be grateful to them and respect them. But when we become adults, that changes. If all goes well, we become capable of creating the things we need and able to watch out for and protect ourselves. The more we do for ourselves, the more confident and certain we become of our own powers. Then we don't need the sense of security and comfort that comes from contemplating that there is "Father" somewhere watching out for us. I could argue that nobody created the universe and things always were, but until and unless you fully exercise your own powers to provide for and run your own life, you'll feel a need to believe in God.

Kerry also wants to spend about a TRILLION dollars on NEW government programs. Objectivism says contradictions can't exist. Kerry plans to pay for it by "taxing the rich" -- i.e. sacrificing the productive. Objectivism says a sacrifice of that type is immoral.

Indeed you do! If it's any consolation, 14 is a bad as it gets: no longer a child, not yet an adult, wanting everything, unable to get much, confused, frustrated. As all of us who have been where you are now and have survived can attest, it does get better from here. Right now there is a lot you can do to prepare for a wonderful life in the years ahead. This is a good time to think about the things you most enjoy doing and to try new things that seem interesting. Somewhere out there in the world of possibilities are many things you might do that will make you happy. You're lucky to have discovered Objectivism. It has so many good ideas to guide you toward making good decisions, coping with difficulties and achieving success. I see the angst in your posts, it's so normal, but it's not forever. Hang in there. It all really will make sense if you keep trying to understand.

Of course it is! It is also the only rational way to approach the choices in life. Life, the only rational standard of value, requires seeking, gaining, and keeping values. Simply avoiding evil doesn't achieve anything.

Is it your view that we hold people morally accountable strictly as a means of socially controlling them? Are you saying the real reason they do bad things is ignorance which isn't their fault? Are people ignorant because human beings are incapable of really knowing reality? Is that your position?

You are still merely asserting and not proving your contention. Ayn Rand demonstrated what facts of reality give rise to individual rights and the reasons why rights should be recognized. None of those facts or reasons apply to a fetus. As a result, Ayn Rand staunchly supported a woman's right to an abortion. If you base your advocacy of rights on something other than the facts and reasons presented by Ayn Rand, what are they?

Everything I have seen about them looks more like Nietzsche than like Ayn Rand.

Are you saying that holding people morally accountable for their actions requires omniscience on the part of the judger or the person being judged? Do you believe people have free will or are their actions reducible to the effects of a butterfly flapping its wings halfway around the world?

This is a good opportunity for you to hone the extremely important psychological skill of introspection. Why does it irritate you? What value of yours is at stake here? Let's assume, for the moment, that what they are doing is immoral. So what? What is it to you? How does it affect you and your values? Do you feel that it is a threat to your values if other people don't accept the same values in the same way that you do? Why? Does what they are doing interfere with some goal of yours? Does the noise they are making keep you from pursuing some activity? Do they have something, like a car or more leisure time, that you wish you had? Does the fact that they have it and you don't seem wrong and unjust to you? Emotions always involve our own values and strong emotions involve our most important values. When you have a strong reaction to something like this, you can learn a lot about yourself by introspecting and identifying the value(s) at stake.

Besides firing two government officials and blaming Americans for 9/11, is there anything else you would do?

It really helps to involve the media. TV and newspaper reporters love "honest citizen harassed by government" stories. They are derfinitely "good copy."

As "someone who has been in a war zone," what would you suggest doing about 9/11?

Are you saying that incorrect and immoral choices are always due to "misunderstanding" reality? Whatever do you mean by "absolute knowledge?" Omniscience? Reality as it "really" is? Or something else? Is this "greatest breach of morality possible" just a "misconception" on their part? The reason I am asking all these questions is because I trying to determine whether our disagreement is basically ethical or epistemological, and I beginning to suspect the latter.

In the real world, it comes from charities and organizations like Planned Parenthood. There are also long lists of would-be parents willing to pay the pregnant woman to carry the baby to term so that they can adopt it. In our country, there is absolutely no reason for a woman who doesn't want to bear and/or raise a child to be forced to.

Objectivists don't hold that irrationality is as "simple" nor as excusable as you seem to be claiming. In fact, Objectivists regard irrationality as a major vice. Through no fault of their own? How about the people who don't care and don't want to know what the right value system is? Knowledge does imply values. The Objectivist position is that our values should be derived from our knowledge of facts and that we can and should do so. Do you agree or disagree?

Not who -- some person -- but what -- objective laws -- should determine such things. That's what we mean by a government of laws and not of men. Clearly defined, publicly known, fact-based laws should define what is a threat, how it can be proved, what should be done about it, etc. That's not the issue at all. It is a matter of fact that you can interfere with a man's rights -- his freedom of action in a social context -- by threatening him with force as well as by actually using force on him. For that reason, threats of force should be outlawed and deserve retaliation too.