2046

I think this is good. I am a big fan of the priority of understanding the problem over any specific solution. And I am a big opponent of what I take to be a hand-wavy and strawman-y way of doing philosophy.
The connection between appearance and reality is a basic starting point and leads us to these themes of realism vs idealism, thus the accessibility of reality becomes a question. Once we start taking about perception, another basic theme that emerges is the question about the active or passive nature of the mind. If there is a mind-independent reality, one possible way of coming into contact with it is by being a passive recipient of information originating outside of it.
If we look at our best physiology and optics and so forth, and we start seeing that the mind is more more active, then we get the pushback against the passive model. It is now easy to caricature the view. And if then, on the other hand, minds have a much more active role, it’s easy to say that reality is then in some sense dependent on them. Then we extend that to saying our perceptual apparatus is not the only way that mind conditions reality, but our conceptual schemes as well. It’s not far to full blown idealism from there. 
 
The question is partially whether any of that really follows from the initial premise. The question of primacy is a different, but related one that follows the accessibility issue. If there is no way to hook onto a mind-independent reality, in what way can it hold any prime significance in our schemes? And if we have to jettison our active picture of mind in the process, why hold onto an inaccessible something that can’t be checked?
 
Defeating direct realism becomes a matter of simply pointing to the activity of the mind and perception. Pointing out that direct realism does not imply the passive “bucket theory” of perception becomes important. But, it is to be stressed, that isn’t the same thing as saying direct realism is a product of some proof or deduction. It becomes more a question of how and how not to defend direct realism.

That is not at all what that section of OPAR (45-6) is saying. He doesn’t say anything about anything’s being outlandish, that is not what “meta puffs” refer to, but a stand-in for whatever the fundamental particle or building blocks of matter is supposed to be. 
 
And the point he’s trying to make isn’t that whatever the fundamental particle turns out to be, it “doesn’t refute Objectivism,” he says it doesn’t have any philosophical significance. I think this is false if taken in the literal sense, because whether or not there even can be a fundamental building block of matter, and what matter is, is itself a question for philosophy of nature. But anyways, that’s not the point of that section “sensory qualities as real.”
But more to your question: what if the scientific consensus were such and such, would that be a problem, well only if you assume scientism were true. Scientism here meaning something in the neighborhood of “truth is just what the scientific consensus says it is.” If that’s not true, then it’s not a problem for any philosophy necessarily, not just Objectivism.
 
Anyways, in general what science even is and what methods it employs and question it should be addressed is also itself discussed in philosophy. So without answering those questions, the further downstream question of what is objectivism’s relationship to scientific consensus is not really helpful.

This website effectively has no moderator. Or more like, all DW really does is clean up spam. I was a moderator for a while, until DW took that away for no particular reason because I disagreed with him about some topic a while ago. There actually isn't much to do, but being a moderator also means in some way influencing or impacting conversation to push it towards more productive or valuable discussion. 
You end up with goofy threads like this as some kind of elaborate joke about not moderating. "I'm not moderating? I will show you moderating! Look at me, splitting a thread for no reason. See how dumb this is? Now leave me alone."
There isn't much to moderate anyway, there are not very many people here anymore. There isn't much need to direct the conversation. Although, it's not helping things when the moderator doesn't care anyway.

Kyary, I've an additional piece about Rand and Schelling 1800 here.
I think it most interesting to explore affinities philosophers A and B have that are positions not widely shared by other philosophers. Even then, A and B's reasons can be quite different and interesting. The case I'm still not finished with, but will probably finish in the first half of 2023, is both Dewey and Peikoff holding Kant and subsequent German Idealists as philosophers most to blame for making the culture in which the Nazis ascended to power and carried out their heinous deeds. This is a minority position; even Sidney Hook, who was Dewey's bulldog (and Piekoff's dissertation advisor) disputed Dewey on this idea. Right or wrong in the conclusion, the reasons for it from Dewey and from Peikoff, from Pragmatism and from Objectivism, are different. (I'll also dispose the correctness of the conclusion by the end of this study.)
Always, anyway, precision of representation is everything. If we are too coarse-grained or use A and B's shared words with double meaning not drawn out, we'd not be saying much.
I've noticed that it takes a lot of study and rehearsal of thinkers to be able to state the difference between them off the top of one's head. Most of my non-professional philosophy friends cannot tell me the difference between Kant and Berkeley or between Kant and Descartes off the top of the head. (As I recall, your first language is not English; do you know phrases like "off the top of the head"?) And many Objectivist friends of mine have not read much of the classical philosophers (or Freud, . . .) themselves and know only Rand's or Peikoff's representations and criticisms of them. Those criticisms do not generally get to the really deep differences between Kant and Rand because some of their understanding of Kant goes off the rails and some of the pertinent Kant is never sufficiently grappled with and understood at all. (Do you read Kant, Fichte, and Schelling in German or English?)
I take the remarks of 2046 to heart for my own sort of writing. I listen carefully and at least kick myself when I've decided to sacrifice writing advice I've gotten from my philosophy professors and professional-philosopher friends for some special concern I have for a particular audience. One reason I've always (since I began to write papers in 1984) tried to cite specific places in writings of thinkers when I represent their thought is for me to be able to easily get back to the source of my claim about them when I need to refresh my learning years later. The other reason is to give readers, with a contrary view of a thinker, that cited text for imagining how I might be led to my representation of the thinker and for such a reader, in reply, to analyze the specific text differently or bring in other countervailing text of the thinker being represented.

To confuse risk of physical force with  initiation of physical force is to confuse a potential with an actual. The whole mandatory vaccination position depends on a Parmenidean worldview in which all that exists is fully actual, combined with disregarding the need to obtain sufficient information to blame any one person for anything. It is the same fallacy employed by advocates of anti-immigration, gun control, and environmentalism. Thank you for helping to make that connection.
 

Plus the fact that freedom (and the main issue is about what political rights are at play) means I do what I want and I don't have to explain the reason to anyone.

One thing I've noticed among the pro-Russian right wingers is that they spend a lot of effort telling you about all this stuff about the US/NATO expansion, leaked phone calls, Azov, etc. to keep focus on the US/NATO as the "bad guys" in their current programming. But very few of them (?) either (a.) continue to say that since the US/NATO did all this stuff that therefore Russia's invasion is justified and amounts to self defense on the part of the Russians, or (b.) continue to say that nonetheless Russia's invasion is not justified and in fact they are committing a grave injustice worthy of resistance on the part of the Ukrainians.
Question: why is that? 
Possible answer: They're not interested in the typical philosophical questions surrounding the issue. Finding out what one ought to do about a given situation in accordance with some set of general principles. (I mean in a Socratic sense that "care for one's own soul" would lead one to make sure one wasn't supporting or condoning or excusing injustice.) The interest here isn't even philosophical or practical at all. There is no truth one is trying to get at. One's goal is something else, like promoting one's self being an exciting contrarian "maybe I can make myself look like a really cool transgressive thinker." It's kind of a role play in one's head. 
The use of one's faculties is not aimed at guiding action, but is rhetorical in nature, as if to say "don't look there!" To remind one "we're bad too!" is designed to shift the focus of the listener and leave the rest to implication.
Counter proposal: Putin/the Russian government does not have a legitimate security interest in NATO not expanding eastward or in the Ukraine wanting to be part of Europe. The reason is very simple: Putin is not a legitimate ruler and the Russian government is not morally legitimate. Putin has no right to rule at all, not over Ukraine and not even over Moscow. Indeed I, 2046 have more of a right to rule over Russia because at least I haven't violated anyone's rights or liberties and would immediately resign. It may or may not be strategically prudent to not upset Putin, to include tactical deception about one's intentions to join NATO, but he has no moral claim to keep NATO from his doorstep.

One thing I've noticed among the pro-Russian right wingers is that they spend a lot of effort telling you about all this stuff about the US/NATO expansion, leaked phone calls, Azov, etc. to keep focus on the US/NATO as the "bad guys" in their current programming. But very few of them (?) either (a.) continue to say that since the US/NATO did all this stuff that therefore Russia's invasion is justified and amounts to self defense on the part of the Russians, or (b.) continue to say that nonetheless Russia's invasion is not justified and in fact they are committing a grave injustice worthy of resistance on the part of the Ukrainians.
Question: why is that? 
Possible answer: They're not interested in the typical philosophical questions surrounding the issue. Finding out what one ought to do about a given situation in accordance with some set of general principles. (I mean in a Socratic sense that "care for one's own soul" would lead one to make sure one wasn't supporting or condoning or excusing injustice.) The interest here isn't even philosophical or practical at all. There is no truth one is trying to get at. One's goal is something else, like promoting one's self being an exciting contrarian "maybe I can make myself look like a really cool transgressive thinker." It's kind of a role play in one's head. 
The use of one's faculties is not aimed at guiding action, but is rhetorical in nature, as if to say "don't look there!" To remind one "we're bad too!" is designed to shift the focus of the listener and leave the rest to implication.
Counter proposal: Putin/the Russian government does not have a legitimate security interest in NATO not expanding eastward or in the Ukraine wanting to be part of Europe. The reason is very simple: Putin is not a legitimate ruler and the Russian government is not morally legitimate. Putin has no right to rule at all, not over Ukraine and not even over Moscow. Indeed I, 2046 have more of a right to rule over Russia because at least I haven't violated anyone's rights or liberties and would immediately resign. It may or may not be strategically prudent to not upset Putin, to include tactical deception about one's intentions to join NATO, but he has no moral claim to keep NATO from his doorstep.

One thing I've noticed among the pro-Russian right wingers is that they spend a lot of effort telling you about all this stuff about the US/NATO expansion, leaked phone calls, Azov, etc. to keep focus on the US/NATO as the "bad guys" in their current programming. But very few of them (?) either (a.) continue to say that since the US/NATO did all this stuff that therefore Russia's invasion is justified and amounts to self defense on the part of the Russians, or (b.) continue to say that nonetheless Russia's invasion is not justified and in fact they are committing a grave injustice worthy of resistance on the part of the Ukrainians.
Question: why is that? 
Possible answer: They're not interested in the typical philosophical questions surrounding the issue. Finding out what one ought to do about a given situation in accordance with some set of general principles. (I mean in a Socratic sense that "care for one's own soul" would lead one to make sure one wasn't supporting or condoning or excusing injustice.) The interest here isn't even philosophical or practical at all. There is no truth one is trying to get at. One's goal is something else, like promoting one's self being an exciting contrarian "maybe I can make myself look like a really cool transgressive thinker." It's kind of a role play in one's head. 
The use of one's faculties is not aimed at guiding action, but is rhetorical in nature, as if to say "don't look there!" To remind one "we're bad too!" is designed to shift the focus of the listener and leave the rest to implication.
Counter proposal: Putin/the Russian government does not have a legitimate security interest in NATO not expanding eastward or in the Ukraine wanting to be part of Europe. The reason is very simple: Putin is not a legitimate ruler and the Russian government is not morally legitimate. Putin has no right to rule at all, not over Ukraine and not even over Moscow. Indeed I, 2046 have more of a right to rule over Russia because at least I haven't violated anyone's rights or liberties and would immediately resign. It may or may not be strategically prudent to not upset Putin, to include tactical deception about one's intentions to join NATO, but he has no moral claim to keep NATO from his doorstep.

After reading the leaked draft, this is indeed the main line of reasoning presented: the argument from democracy. Highly contentious moral views ought to be decided by the people, this is one, therefore this ought to be decided by the people.
A second line of reasoning in the draft is an appeal to history or tradition. He argues that if a freestanding individual right to bodily autonomy is appealed to, well there's no historical basis for that, and after all it would lead to legalization of drugs and prostitution and that would just be crazy.
 
 

The concept to be placed opposite is seeking correspondence in the appropriate ways as opposed to just having correspondence. I do think there is a concept of seeking correspondence (a long winded way of saying seeking truth) in inappropriate ways. An example might be phlogiston, a substance thought to be released during combustion. They early chemists really were trying to understand something, had various reasons for why they postulated this, and began to abandon the concept after it became clear that there was no such thing and the reasons were methodically bad.

I mean if we're going by Rand's honesty, that isn't even what she says honesty is. The pivotal feature of Rand's egoistic honesty versus the conventional account is one's relationship to facts, not to the beliefs of others. 
Independence can be contrasted with dependency, but the moral 'pull' of independence comes from the responsibility one has to oneself.
Justice, in common parlance we often speak of resiliency in terms of not being unfair to too harsh or unjust to oneself. 
Rationality is often a cooperative enterprise and is inherently connected with language use, productivity without others to trade with is impossible, and pride often deals with commitment to one's moral conduct in the face of criticism or disapproval from others, as well as giving and receiving honor from others.
Integrity deals with congruence with one's words and behavior, which far from being a redundancy with "be virtuous" is a sharpening of the focus on something that comes up almost every day in life.
There are a lot more aspects to the virtues from different angles than are accounted for here. It's not easy to just put ones "founded in ethics" over in this basket, or "requiring others" in that basket. If by ethics we mean anything pertaining to our character, then they are all for that. If living well requires others, then they are all for that as well. Rather it seems they all interpenetrate in both individualizing and social ways (as one would expect who knows what logikon and politikon point towards.) We are left asking again, "what was the need for this distinction?" "What problem is it solving?" We may as well divide the virtues into those with even amount of letters and those with odd, or those over six letters long and those under. 

I mean if we're going by Rand's honesty, that isn't even what she says honesty is. The pivotal feature of Rand's egoistic honesty versus the conventional account is one's relationship to facts, not to the beliefs of others. 
Independence can be contrasted with dependency, but the moral 'pull' of independence comes from the responsibility one has to oneself.
Justice, in common parlance we often speak of resiliency in terms of not being unfair to too harsh or unjust to oneself. 
Rationality is often a cooperative enterprise and is inherently connected with language use, productivity without others to trade with is impossible, and pride often deals with commitment to one's moral conduct in the face of criticism or disapproval from others, as well as giving and receiving honor from others.
Integrity deals with congruence with one's words and behavior, which far from being a redundancy with "be virtuous" is a sharpening of the focus on something that comes up almost every day in life.
There are a lot more aspects to the virtues from different angles than are accounted for here. It's not easy to just put ones "founded in ethics" over in this basket, or "requiring others" in that basket. If by ethics we mean anything pertaining to our character, then they are all for that. If living well requires others, then they are all for that as well. Rather it seems they all interpenetrate in both individualizing and social ways (as one would expect who knows what logikon and politikon point towards.) We are left asking again, "what was the need for this distinction?" "What problem is it solving?" We may as well divide the virtues into those with even amount of letters and those with odd, or those over six letters long and those under. 

NOL doesn't have anything to say about a "basic political unit," though. It certainly doesn't try to put a number on it (like saying two or more, of three or more.) Obviously you do need two or more, but just two or even three isn't a political community. There, the concept of a polis, or political community is the proper object of political theorizing. It needs to be sufficiently large that law and customs have a need to be institutionalized.
If there is anything like a "basic political unit," it would be the individual. The argument for this is the same as the argument for individual substances being the most real things. Societies or communities aren't substances in themselves, but are composed of substances. That you would need a "basic political unit," though isn't clear to me. The political community is composed of individuals and the political community is for the happiness of the individuals composing it.

I mean this talk of a "basic political unit" what does it mean? What problem is it solving? There is a question about the foundation of politics and there is a question about the basic political unit. Are those the same thing? What work is the basic unit doing?
 

Might I suggest a different thread specifically for this tangent, I'd hate to interrupt the latest open vs closed reattack.

I mean, not really. While there is a great deal of exegesis of "the arbitrary as neither true nor false" in ch. 5 of OPAR, but the burden of proof principle is a logical commonplace.
On the second point, I had made the following remark already: "The one way we could know whether we were in error about a given faculty is by discovery of some truth which reveals us our error." This is the way to counter the method of Cartesian doubt with regards to individual faculties, that all of our faculties couldn't be in error all the time.
But the point of the simulation or BIV scenarios is not to deny existence, it's to deny your knowledge of it. Imagine someone saying you are really a brain in a vat, you are hooked up and experiencing a simulation. They're perfectly content to say yes, existence exists, you just don't genuinely experience it beyond what is fed to you. And since we can imagine this being the case, it is therefore possible, unless the realist prove it's not.
The way to counter this is the burden of proof principle, and a denial of the assumption that because something is imaginable it is possible.
 

You're confusing some things here. "Skepticism" does not mean "we're living in a simulation"/BIV scenarios. Those are two different things. Skepticism comes from the Greek skepsis or skeptikos which can mean questioning or doubt, and is associated with the suspension of judgment. The historical skeptics cultivated a refusal to assent to anything. (See Popkin's History of Skepticism.)
There are two basic types of skepticism, universal and particular. The number one argument against universal skepticism is the self contradiction argument. This argument proceeds by pointing out that the act of professing universal skepticism requires one to process knowledge about something and thus would involve contradictory beliefs. Note this isn't an "objectivist argument" at all. It's like the first thing any philosopher would probably say in response to skepticism.
The simulation scenario is a variation of Rene Descartes evil demon argument, from the Meditations. The connection with skepticism is by way of the method Descartes uses called methodical doubt. It doesn't really matter all the details of this, but the reasons Descartes gives for doubting one or more part of our faculties, but the point is it doesn't really make sense. The one way we could know whether we were in error about a given faculty is by discovery of some truth which reveals us our error.
The point is more about differing starting points in epistemology. The introduction of the evil demon, or the simulation or the BIV, the exact mechanism involved is besides the point, the point is the method. It doesn't really make sense to believe any old thing until it's disproven, that's not how cognition works. Instead you need a reason for believing something, not a reason for disbelief in something. That was the point Russell was trying to make.
It's also just not true that "everybody but objectivists" thinks this. Very few people think skepticism is the way to go, or think methodical doubt is the way to go. To know this you could spend time talking to people who do philosophy professionally. Or like attend a basic undergraduate course in knowledge theory, where undergrads are usual given Descartes as a low-ball target.
Another way you could know this is by looking at the 2020 Phil Papers survey, which surveyed the philosophical views of 1785 English-speaking philosophers from around the world on 100 philosophical questions.
For instance, the exact question that Cartesian demons and BIVs was constructed for, external world skepticism, the results were:
External world: idealism, skepticism, or non-skeptical realism?
Accept or lean towards:
idealism
6.63% (5.44%)
Accept or lean towards:
skepticism
5.44% (4.76%)
Accept or lean towards:
non-skeptical realism
79.54% (78.17%)
Other
11.62%

 

I mean, not really. While there is a great deal of exegesis of "the arbitrary as neither true nor false" in ch. 5 of OPAR, but the burden of proof principle is a logical commonplace.
On the second point, I had made the following remark already: "The one way we could know whether we were in error about a given faculty is by discovery of some truth which reveals us our error." This is the way to counter the method of Cartesian doubt with regards to individual faculties, that all of our faculties couldn't be in error all the time.
But the point of the simulation or BIV scenarios is not to deny existence, it's to deny your knowledge of it. Imagine someone saying you are really a brain in a vat, you are hooked up and experiencing a simulation. They're perfectly content to say yes, existence exists, you just don't genuinely experience it beyond what is fed to you. And since we can imagine this being the case, it is therefore possible, unless the realist prove it's not.
The way to counter this is the burden of proof principle, and a denial of the assumption that because something is imaginable it is possible.
 

I mean, not really. While there is a great deal of exegesis of "the arbitrary as neither true nor false" in ch. 5 of OPAR, but the burden of proof principle is a logical commonplace.
On the second point, I had made the following remark already: "The one way we could know whether we were in error about a given faculty is by discovery of some truth which reveals us our error." This is the way to counter the method of Cartesian doubt with regards to individual faculties, that all of our faculties couldn't be in error all the time.
But the point of the simulation or BIV scenarios is not to deny existence, it's to deny your knowledge of it. Imagine someone saying you are really a brain in a vat, you are hooked up and experiencing a simulation. They're perfectly content to say yes, existence exists, you just don't genuinely experience it beyond what is fed to you. And since we can imagine this being the case, it is therefore possible, unless the realist prove it's not.
The way to counter this is the burden of proof principle, and a denial of the assumption that because something is imaginable it is possible.
 

Yeah, after reading some more replies, I realized my position is too influenced by Theravada Buddhism, which, opposite of Mahayana, is strictly realist, and denies any and all agent in being. There is no experiencer in this understanding, hence, indirect realism is impossible. I understand, now, that this view is incompatible with Objectivism, which seems to hold consciousness a lot higher than Theravada Buddhism (not saying much, since Theravada breaks it down entirely to entirely empty phenomena with no doer even involved [Visuddhimagga XIX.20]), but a lot less than your average eternal soul believing religion. I need to read more about Objectivism. I realize now, that I was unconsciously, and wrongly, equating atheism with reductionism/mechanism thusly: If there is no soul, then there is no such thing as an experiencer. 
Thank you for your mature, well written, and polite critique.

I would recommend the Huemer book too, just for its own sake. It's a good book in the way it provides a taxonomy and introduction for many of the different ways of viewing perception and the foundation of knowledge, and provides many good arguments against indirect realism and Cartesian-style skepticism. It's also clearly and concisely written, and provides ab example of good philosophy writing. 
There are also some ways in which Huemer's account differs from, or would appear to differ from what might be Rand's account (taken that Rand didn't really have a developed account.) The major thing is that Huemer takes perceptual experience to be propositional and can contain representational (but non-conceptual) content that can either be true or false. It is this way that perception can serve as a foundation for knowledge via the principal of "phenomenal conservatism," that we are prima facie justified in taking what seems to be the case to be true, unless we have some reason to doubt it. In this way, Huemer is closer to Moore than a Rand or Aristotle.
I think the difference in Rand would be that she takes perceptual states to be non-propositional and non-representational, and is thus infallible or inerrant, and can neither be true nor false. Huemer sees that, if it is non-propositional, there is a wonder at how it can then justify beliefs. Certainly more would need to be said about abstraction and concept formation than has been said.