Eiuol

Nice Evangelion avatar!

To say that high calories means you ought to avoid it is something like an is/ought fallacy. I know you probably mean that keeping healthy is good, thus ice cream can be bad. But there is certainly a level of variability where ice cream is bad for some people yet not as much for others. There is no absolute level of calorie intake to maintain, even if there is a range of healthy levels. I think the whole point of Objectivism is to treat all values similar, where there is no absolute value to hold, while there are principles that I should follow in virtue of the similarities I share with all people by definition. If rationality wasn't needed for me, I wouldn't be human - it is the essential feature giving rise to an objective morality. I'd be careful with the word "preference" or "optional" though. Optional makes sense if you take it to mean lacking it doesn't inherently reduce quality of life. Ice cream isn't necessarily bad or good. If I choose to forgo ice cream, that is IN GENERAL optional. THAT it is optional doesn't mean there is no best choice for me. Compare that to valuing self-esteem. If you forgo that, the requirements of your existence won't be met. Preference makes sense if you mean values that don't necessarily go with a reason. There is no particular reason I prefer chocolate to vanilla, but insofar as I really do prefer chocolate, there is no sensible reason to choose vanilla. So in that context, it's a preference. In either case, for *me*, there will be a right answer. If I'm diabetic, it's against my life to then eat ice cream. If I prefer chocolate, it goes against my life to choose vanilla over chocolate. On the other hand, if someone else preferred vanilla, and bought that, it's consistent with their life. IF something has no detriment to my life and I enjoy it, I see it as self-sacrificial to deny myself whatever it may be.

I'm perplexed that you called it science fiction. It's a documentary. Science fiction has story, plot, and various scientific speculations. This is a theory, albeit a bad one. If you're going for suggesting art works that capture rhetorical or literary depth in philosophy like Objectivism does, this isn't a good example. Mostly, it's a conglomerate monstrosity of facts without anything much to say. UFO sightings are weird. The Federal Reserve sucks. Yup, heard that in Zeitgeist - Thrive is nothing new. It's the documentary equivalent of campy.

I watched parts of it just now. It's not scifi. It's not even fiction - although it might as well be.

Uhh, that's not science fiction dystopia... it's one of those weird documentaries that try to be factual but are made for people with tin foil hats.

http://www.fallacyfiles.org/etymolog.html http://www.fallacyfiles.org/fakeprec.html Artificial means imitated AND/OR man-made. So... your point isn't relevant anyway... Don't use the imitation definition, no one else is talking about that concept. * 2) everything you listed depends upon working hardware or software. People can be turned off with anesthesia i.e. lose consciousness, but if you slice them in half, they're dead. You can't reboot what is destroyed. Indeed copying is needed to prevent permanent deletion, except that's the point: maintaining existence. 3) Sorry, but your understanding of programming is flawed. True, if/then is important to programming today, it's just that even human volition is an interaction among various non-volitional parts. Good programming involves a complex creation of many interacting parts, including abstract relations between functions and objects. To be sure, no programming methodology has been developed that allows you to set up an underlying architecture for volition. We know an architecture exists, just not how it needs to be built. Once you set up an architecture, you let the AI do its thing. Even babies are like that. They're born with a cognitive architecture, then they do their own thing to learn. Generally, even though computers now aren't really based on the human mind at all, better AI research or even software development aims to be hands off as possible. That might mean to achieve "fully hands off" is a radically new hardware and programming method. My presumption/hidden premise is that volition in the sense I mean here needs a conceptual consciousness. Rights stem from man's need of using concepts, so as long as an AI can think conceptually, it would have rights.

Clearly, VECT isn't talking about imitating human intelligence. Yes, AI today is only imitation. The point is the creation of intelligence, but "artificial" also conveys man-made creation, so if you keep in mind the topic of the thread, there's no need to argue about the definition of artificial. Give it a new name if you prefer. I'll keep saying AI because it makes sense. I do NOT mean artificial as in imitation. 1) a volitional AI might not need emotions. Emotions can be useful because of how they help with efficient decision making, but that might not mean emotion is required for volition. 2) Any AI can die. An AI must preserve its hardware and software. 3) What is a "genuine" ability to choose? I get the gist of how toasters aren't doing any considerations. But it doesn't follow that non-biological entities cannot possibly be arranged to be volitional. 2 and 3 are relevant to rights. 1 is only relevant to determine what volition requires in order to work. I suspect emotion is needed, but it's only speculation, although it is needed for people.

I don't think so, but William Gibson started to get at this deeper level in Neuromancer. Cyberpunk gets into these questions more than Asimov's stories. It gets into more than the human likeness of robots - it goes into an AI superceding human cognitive ability. If and when an AI manages this, well, that's highly speculative.

I don't think Rand was unfair towards ethical philosophy in general, and Kant receives criticism especially as a result of Rand's attacking deontological ethics. Consequentialism is criticized, usually in terms of its lack of using principles to act or Rand's arguments against Pragmatism. Virtue ethics is mixed, as Objectivism has features like it. Rand attacked subjectivism as a moral philosophy, but I don't think any philosopher takes it seriously anyway. The only thing Rand didn't address is relativism, which isn't the same as subjectivism. Relativism is morality of convention, but any relativist wouldn't say the conventions are arbitrary, so that one got away. Plus, I believe relativism is more modern, so it's not like Rand even could criticize it.

August 16th is when it'll be, does it conflict with anyone?

It doesn't. Integration is epistemological.

Just... no... That's not what is meant by integration. Integration here doesn't mean a synthesis of thesis and anti-thesis. And as dream_weaver was getting at, you seem to be trying to treat Objectivism under Hegelian terms. Not as in Hegel per se, but as in Hegelians like Marx. Integration is observing a group of entities or noting some group of mental entities (e.g. concepts formed earlier), then uniting a subset of the group along some similarity. That's a one sentence version. Objectivism rejects those dichotomies you listed, it doesn't attempt to create an integration out of them to reach some transcendent truth. That's a totally different philosophical method and tradition.

Choosing the pursuit of happiness, not choosing happiness! I choose to pursue happiness, but it is never sufficient to act with only an intention in order to attain happiness as an emotion. It is always sufficient to act with only an intention in order to achieve non-emotional ends. Will yourself to be happy, and you will fail in futility - more is needed than your will and choice to act. Will yourself to pay a bill, and you will succeed - all you need is to choose to act. My motivation to pursue happiness is that it is necessary to do right actions, but there is more to an emotion than simply a consequence of my actions. I didn't say it isn't possible to achieve a desired emotional state by ways of chosen actions. It is affected also by things like sense of life especially, and any alteration to that will change how your emotions work, love included. Those changes happen naturally and aren't always subject to moral blame, as it doesn't reflect on your honesty or selfishness negatively, aside from how it's not a choice anyway how your emotions will work. In any case, if I don't take any actions, I'm doomed to fail.

You can't choose to not feel hungry, you can only choose to ignore or hopelessly try to erase the feeling. Similarly, you can't choose to not feel lonely. All you can do is take actions which establish having an emotion, but once you feel it, that's it. All you'll be able to do is take new actions to replace your emotions. On top of that, any actions you take can and will affect your emotions, even if you aren't trying to replace your emotions. Note the difference between choosing actions, with the resulting feeling that happens regardless of your intention to feel an emotion. Paying a loan is a choice in that it is entirely up to your intention, making it fair to make contracts for loans. Feeling love is only partially up to your intentions, so it isn't fair to make contracts for love. There is not necessarily moral failure if you end up feeling differently than you want - the parts of love unavailable to choices and intentions aren't up for moral judgment. Do you mean to imply a ranked list of levels of commitment? In other words, do you think marriage is inherently more commitment than a relationship of cohabitation without marriage?

You can't make such a massive generalization from Amazon reviews... Have you actually talked to many people about quantum physics? I really don't know the rest of what you're saying, I can't make out what you're saying as even Objectivism, just forcing a system into yours then using terms that don't work. Square pegs don't fit in round holes. "Fragmentation" is a loaded term, and people keep telling you that you misunderstand Objectivist epistemology. I don't mean "not agreeing", I mean not even understanding the claims. The result of your misunderstanding is seeing Objectivism as some sort of Cartesian Neoplatonism mixed with a form of Logical Positivism. What you're missing is everything about interconnectedness of all knowledge and all the views on perception (which you've sometimes taken to be the same as one's conceptual view of reality...). Showing a "problem" before having understood the relevant claims, on any subject, is more like showing what you still don't understand.

I was hoping you'd be interested. I'm thinking a weekend is best, tentatively the 16th or 23rd of August. I'm thinking meeting at a place for lunch is best, nothing fancy, maybe a pizza place or diner since that's the most agreeable for food anyone wants. Somewhere near Central Park probably.

Right, and axiomatic concepts are not perceptual content... I think Don would agree with me that "could be wrong" applies to failing to properly represent perceptual content. That's what I've been saying. I think Don has been saying the same thing, or similar. What looks like a concession to you I think is you coming/starting to understand the ideas being presented.

The possibility isn't arbitrary, but that a woman in Finland is eating an egg is arbitrary since there is no evidence. Similarly, I'd reject a person's claim that the axioms are false as arbitrary. Still, I may be wrong to the extent that I misapprehended reality. However, in one case, it is metaphysically possible for a woman in Finland to be eating an egg, while it is metaphysically impossible that eggs are also not eggs. Knowledge isn't "out there" though, so that's why even metaphysically impossible is "possibly" wrong. Fortunately it is plainly validated all the time that A isn't also ~A, making it self-evident and axiomatic. This is a logical positivist sort of argument. This is stated as an analytic truth, where it is true by logical necessity, verifiable by logic alone, absent observation. On top of that, 2+2=4 isn't axiomatic.

But nonetheless, you went through a process to determine that an axiom is in fact an axiom. A big thing in philosophy is if you can have axioms without begging the question. In other words, not all axioms are actually axioms, that's why some beg the question. If I say "the Earth orbits the sun is an axiom", I'm right that the Earth orbits the sun, but I'd be wrong to call it an axiom, or even call "orbits" axioms. So going around saying something is an axiom is not going to convince anyone that you are truly holding an axiom. All sorts of things really are treated as axioms, especially the existence of god, even more so if "god is everywhere" and "god is existence". Why do you say that is wrong? Doesn't some scientific knowledge add onto you knowing that god's existence is not an axiom?

Decent interest so far, obviously I got some people aside from posts here. I'd guess sometime in August, not sure about where to meet in the city, I'd like suggestions!

Some chatgoers and I have decided to set up a meetup sometime this summer in or near NYC. There are no plans set in stone for a date or time yet. Right now, I'm gauging the interest level of a meetup before I set anything down. Really, you could bring anyone along, provided they are into Objectivism as more than just a passing interest. Make a post here if you're interested! So far, the people interested are (I'll edit as people post): August 16th @ Noon, corner of West 59th and Avenue of the Americas. Eiuol thenelli01 splitprimary suptiche12

Nor do I... All I've argued is that marriage does not improve love, and the reason is contracts cannot secure love. Change of heart is not sufficient to breach a contract. In fact, how you feel is irrelevant. But you've argued that feeling love is relevant based on how you say marriage secures love, so clearly if love fails to be secured, the contract is broken. Then, here, you're maintaining that change of heart is not sufficient to break any contract, so it is not sufficient to say the other person fell out of love in order to claim a marriage contract is broken. In that case, the marriage contract isn't securing love. I see a contradiction. Look, I get it. A witnessed event is great, and so is declaring love. That says nothing about how a marriage contract succeeds in securing love.

Right, but legal accountability isn't the only kind of accountability, and accountability can only be in regard to choice. Falling out of love means feeling like not performing on an agreement to love, because that is a feeling. The person ceases to feel the reason to maintain the agreement. My revised case is an example where two people are doing the right actions, until one day, it hits one of them: their values changed slowly, in ways that love didn't disappear or do anything at first. They no longer feel like continuing the agreement. No one can predict love disappearing except for moral failing like abuse for instance or ignoring the other person. That is, unless you CONSTANTLY say EVERY little THING you do, which I'd say undermines love because that demands people stifle their independence.

1. You didn't respond to my revised example. 2. Needing agreements doesn't mean all agreements can and ought to be legal agreements. Nor does it translate into failing to maintain an emotional feeling is a moral failing. The vibe I get from you is that if one person falls out of love, it is a moral failure to take the actions required for love. I disagree because falling out of love can happen for completely moral reasons, like in my revised case.

No, it's not a contradiction, but you didn't show how your claim that I quoted follows from the 3 points.