nanite1018

I rather think we should have two words for "open-system" and "closed-system". The closed-system people advocate that Objectivists are people who agree with every philosophical position of Ayn Rand. What the "open-system" people advocate for, I think, is to view Objectivism not as the "philosophy of Ayn Rand"--meaning the philosophy in her head (or perhaps less restrictively the set of philosophical positions and arguments she wrote down/made public)-- and instead view it as "the school of philosophy inspired by Ayn Rand".

I've often found it weird that people use "Objectivist" in the first place. No one is a Transcendental Idealist. I doubt any person in history has ever identified as such, yet that was (to my understanding) the name given by Kant to his epistemological/ontological/metaphysical philosophy. Not only do people rarely use the names philosopher's themselves ascribe to their philosophies, they rarely if ever name their philosophy. When people refer to "Aristotelianism" or refer to something as "Aristotelian", I do not think they mean to refer to the philosophy expressed in the works of Aristotle, or something or someone as in full agreement with the philosophy of Aristotle. The same goes for "Kantian", "Spinozan", "Lockean", "Humean", "Neitzschean", "Platonist", etc. When people refer to "the philosophy of Kant" or something like that they refer to it most often by using precisely those words (or make it explicit from context that when they say "Kantian philosophy" they mean the philosophy in the mind of and/or expounded by Kant).

I view being a "Randian" as far more important than being an Objectivist-proper or not. My use of "Randian" is in direct analogy to how we discuss all other philosophers. Open-system advocates think we should simply use "Objectivism" to refer to the school, and "Objectivist" to refer to those whose philosophies are based on Rand's. I think that is rather silly, as we do this with no other philosopher. "Randian philosophy" or "Randism" or "Randianism" refer to the school, "Randian" to members of it. Objectivism can/should be left to refer to only the actual philosophical positions and arguments expounded by Ayn Rand. So I suppose you could say that in that sense I am a closed-system advocate. At the same time though, I don't put very much weight at all on whether someone or something is "Objectivist" as opposed to "Randian" as I don't view it as important. I think it is clear that all the true things in philosophy will belong in the school of "Randianism" (i.e. they will all be in the school of philosophy inspired by and closely tied to the views of Ayn Rand).

The animosity of the closed and open system people is really a debate about names. I think the open-system people should drop "Objectivism" and adopt "Randianism", and the closed-system people should stop worrying so much about whether something is "Objectivist" and instead focus on what is true in philosophy regardless of whether it is in full agreement with every philosophical position of Rand. The open-system people would change the name and the closed-system people would consider themselves Randians first and foremost (with "Objectivist" being largely irrelevant), then this whole debate would go away (or at least be rendered unimportant) and we could all go on advocating rational ideas in the culture unhindered by fractious schisms and infighting (which people then use against all Randians to paint us something as absurd as "cultists"--like people who make independence a virtue can be cultists).

Well, what you actually are wishing for, in that case, is to be a very wealthy individual in a prior age (for example the 1920s or 30s). The vast majority of lives in history have had essentially no glamour and prestige. Technological advance, for example the advent of the Internet, does not produce a culture dominated by stupidity or crudeness. Rather, the culture of the age may in part be shaped by these technologies, but it is always the people themselves who create this culture. If you have a society dominated by rational people, you will have a rational culture regardless of the technological state of the world.

While there may be no connection between technology and culture per se, this does not preclude the possibility that one might enjoy a previous era's culture more than that of today. One may even have been happier if one had lived in those times (though I don't see why one should spend much time on such thoughts). I think it is important not to confuse an admiration for the better parts of a previous era (for example, in my own case, I wish a jacket and tie was more standard dress for men rather than the "stained t-shirt and holey blue jeans" standard for younger people today--I love wearing a sport coat and a bow tie when it is a reasonable temperature outside), and a desire to go back to that era in all ways. Yes, I would love to have people dress more like they did in the early and mid-Twentieth Century. But that doesn't mean I want to give up the conveniences of modern life to do so. Rather, what I really want is to change modern culture to better emulate the specific features of the previous era that I enjoy. Now, if you really wish your milk was delivered by a man with a truck, that you could never look up any information online, that diseases like smallpox, measles, and polio ravaged people's lives on a regular basis, then that probably would[i/] be un-Objectivist (it would be trading small values--better customer service, styles of dress, etc. for greater values--knowledge, health).

We can admire parts of the culture of the past and wish to recreate those elements in the modern day, but it doesn't require turning back the march of progress to do it.

Thank you, Jaskn. The only problem I see has to do with a potential misintrepatation with Ayn Rand's statements about the falsehood and evil of mind-body dichotomy.

Let's review this text from "The New Intellectual"



" They have cut man in two, setting one half against the other. They have taught him that his body and his consciousness are two enemies engaged in deadly conflict, two antagonists of opposite natures, contradictory claims, incompatible needs, that to benefit one is to injure the other, that his soul belongs to a supernatural realm, but his body is an evil prison holding it in bondage to this earth—and that the good is to defeat his body, to undermine it by years of patient struggle, digging his way to that glorious jail-break which leads into the freedom of the grave.
They have taught man that he is a hopeless misfit made of two elements, both symbols of death. A body without a soul is a corpse, a soul without a body is a ghost—yet such is their image of man’s nature: the battleground of a struggle between a corpse and a ghost, a corpse endowed with some evil volition of its own and a ghost endowed with the knowledge that everything known to man is non-existent, that only the unknowable."


It is not in my agenda to loss my memory, to get my bones broken out of osteoporosis, to die because of a ruptured appendix or an auto-immune attack against my own cells.
Yet all those things happen. We get sick. We die.
These are things that happen because of the nature of things: for my cells being what they are; for viruses being what they are and acting according to their nature.

However, once we understand ("obey") nature, then we seek to command it. We design medicines and treatments and enhancements.

The only way I do not see a contradiction here is to consider that the real agenda of the integrated self is to survive qua man as long as a life qua man is possible.
I mean, to consider my cells as a system working with the shared goal of sustaining a particular kind of brain which underpins a particular kind of mind which seeks its own survival.
The real and only agenda of the integrated man is to seek immortality qua man.

Medicine and related sciences are, therefore, an essential activity of an Objectivist Society, as much as philosophy, for the simple reason that thinking cannot occur out of a body that underpins that thinking.

I don't see why. Guy killed a bunch of innocent people because he was crazy/consistently religious (which are basically the same thing). He despised Western civilization as such, and everything that comes with it, and he killed thousands as one battle in his war on civilization. He was one of the most vile and evil human beings on the face of the Earth. He shouldn't have been killed and buried at sea, he should have gotten a lot worse (and publicly too, so everyone can see what happens to evil mass murderers). The destruction of evil is the defense of the good, the defense of the good is part and parcel with its pursuit. Killing bin Laden was a great act of justice, a huge moral victory over the enemies of civilization. That is what people are celebrating. They're celebrating, in a sense, all the good in civilization and modernity.

They're celebrating life by celebrating a symbol of death's own slaying. I don't see why that should be frowned upon or disturbing in any way. Why should it be? What basis could there be for such an emotion? Some form of compassion or sympathy for the slain? Bin Laden was a subhuman monster who would have killed you if he had the chance, why would ANYONE feel sympathy for him? Loathing and contempt are the appropriate emotions to have to such a creature, and joy at his long overdue departure from existence.

I don't see why. Guy killed a bunch of innocent people because he was crazy/consistently religious (which are basically the same thing). He despised Western civilization as such, and everything that comes with it, and he killed thousands as one battle in his war on civilization. He was one of the most vile and evil human beings on the face of the Earth. He shouldn't have been killed and buried at sea, he should have gotten a lot worse (and publicly too, so everyone can see what happens to evil mass murderers). The destruction of evil is the defense of the good, the defense of the good is part and parcel with its pursuit. Killing bin Laden was a great act of justice, a huge moral victory over the enemies of civilization. That is what people are celebrating. They're celebrating, in a sense, all the good in civilization and modernity.

They're celebrating life by celebrating a symbol of death's own slaying. I don't see why that should be frowned upon or disturbing in any way. Why should it be? What basis could there be for such an emotion? Some form of compassion or sympathy for the slain? Bin Laden was a subhuman monster who would have killed you if he had the chance, why would ANYONE feel sympathy for him? Loathing and contempt are the appropriate emotions to have to such a creature, and joy at his long overdue departure from existence.

The point of free will is readily addressed via the search function, there are a bazillion threads on it in the Questions, Metaphysics/Epistemology, and Ethics sections (and probably a few dotted around other places too). So I won't be getting into that.

You asked "Can the superiority of logic to a specific worldview be logically proven? In other words, it seems like you start with the assumption that logic is the best criterion for a good worldview. Why? You have no logical basis for doing this, it is essentially an act of faith, isn't it?"

You are asking for a logical argument for why one should listen to logical arguments. This means that you already believe that one should listen to/adhere to logic and reason. Therefore no such demonstration is necessary. The very act of asking for a "reason" means you accept Reason as the criterion for judgment. It is implicit in the very act. No arguments can be posed which do not implicitly assume the adherence of all those engaged to the dictum "Be rational." So asking "why be rational/logical?" is pointless, as one cannot form an argument against logic/reason, nor can any argument have any force for one who renounces logic/reason.

Objectivism's metaphysical axioms are "axiomatic" in this sense: No argument may be formulated which does not assume them implicitly, and so any argument purporting to disprove them will necessarily suffer from self-contradiction. And by asking "why do you believe what you believe?" one has already conceded that one needs reasons, i.e. needs to form arguments for one's beliefs, and so must reject any notion which is self-refuting/self-contradictory.

Basic breakdown:
A is A: Reject this claim- "A can be not A." Then this means that under certain conditions the statement "A is not A" is true. But this requires, to be true or conversely that the statement "A is A" is false under certain conditions. But this means that the statements "A is not A" and "A is A" cannot both be true at the same time, therefore A and not A can never be equivalent, so A is not not A and so A is A. Also, if you reject the law of non-contradiction/law of identity, then one can form no arguments as one can reach any conclusion one desires.

Existence exists: Reject this claim- "Existence does not exist." Reply-"At the very least, the statement "existence does not exist" then exists, and in order for anything to exist, existence must exist. QED". Or if you feel snarky, just reply "Who said that?"

Axiom of Consciousness: To be conscious is to be conscious of something. If I am not aware of anything except myself, I have nothing to compare to, so I cannot even be aware of myself. Therefore if I am not aware of an outside world, I am aware of nothing, and so am not conscious. Therefore I am conscious of an external world.

That's basically it. Hope that helps, and hope you get over that nasty religion thing that's been going around these last few millenia, it gives people tummy aches.

Also, welcome to OO.net!

The point of free will is readily addressed via the search function, there are a bazillion threads on it in the Questions, Metaphysics/Epistemology, and Ethics sections (and probably a few dotted around other places too). So I won't be getting into that.

You asked "Can the superiority of logic to a specific worldview be logically proven? In other words, it seems like you start with the assumption that logic is the best criterion for a good worldview. Why? You have no logical basis for doing this, it is essentially an act of faith, isn't it?"

You are asking for a logical argument for why one should listen to logical arguments. This means that you already believe that one should listen to/adhere to logic and reason. Therefore no such demonstration is necessary. The very act of asking for a "reason" means you accept Reason as the criterion for judgment. It is implicit in the very act. No arguments can be posed which do not implicitly assume the adherence of all those engaged to the dictum "Be rational." So asking "why be rational/logical?" is pointless, as one cannot form an argument against logic/reason, nor can any argument have any force for one who renounces logic/reason.

Objectivism's metaphysical axioms are "axiomatic" in this sense: No argument may be formulated which does not assume them implicitly, and so any argument purporting to disprove them will necessarily suffer from self-contradiction. And by asking "why do you believe what you believe?" one has already conceded that one needs reasons, i.e. needs to form arguments for one's beliefs, and so must reject any notion which is self-refuting/self-contradictory.

Basic breakdown:
A is A: Reject this claim- "A can be not A." Then this means that under certain conditions the statement "A is not A" is true. But this requires, to be true or conversely that the statement "A is A" is false under certain conditions. But this means that the statements "A is not A" and "A is A" cannot both be true at the same time, therefore A and not A can never be equivalent, so A is not not A and so A is A. Also, if you reject the law of non-contradiction/law of identity, then one can form no arguments as one can reach any conclusion one desires.

Existence exists: Reject this claim- "Existence does not exist." Reply-"At the very least, the statement "existence does not exist" then exists, and in order for anything to exist, existence must exist. QED". Or if you feel snarky, just reply "Who said that?"

Axiom of Consciousness: To be conscious is to be conscious of something. If I am not aware of anything except myself, I have nothing to compare to, so I cannot even be aware of myself. Therefore if I am not aware of an outside world, I am aware of nothing, and so am not conscious. Therefore I am conscious of an external world.

That's basically it. Hope that helps, and hope you get over that nasty religion thing that's been going around these last few millenia, it gives people tummy aches.

Also, welcome to OO.net!

This is foolish. 127 Hours is a movie dramatizing Aron Ralston's ordeal of becoming trapped in a remote canyon for days because he did not tell anyone where he was going. He would have died there if he had not summoned the will to first break and then amputate his own arm. That is a hard way to learn a lesson.

Maken: What, in your mind, is the prime value in Objectivist ethics? "To hold one’s own life as one’s ultimate value, and one’s own happiness as one’s highest purpose are two aspects of the same achievement. Existentially, the activity of pursuing rational goals is the activity of maintaining one’s life; psychologically, its result, reward and concomitant is an emotional state of happiness."- Ayn Rand, "The Objectivist Ethics".

So either you think Objectivism would say that you should steal the guy's cure for cancer because "living" is the prime value, or you have to agree that having one's life as one's ultimate value and one's happiness as one's highest purpose would (as I think everyone should agree here) demand that you do not steal his cure. If you agree with Objectivism that the initiation of force is wrong, then the answer to your proposal is that no, you shouldn't steal the cure even though it could save your life. Regardless, your question doesn't highlight anything in particular about transhumanism, as transhumanism is not a philosophy unto itself, but a particular position in philosophy advocating the use of technology to expand our abilities and extend our lives for our own benefit. I haven't seen Hotu or myself say that survival at any cost is the goal in either Objectivism or transhumanism (some transhumanists might say that, but I have never heard of one).

I kind of think of it like this: Objectivists would fall in a "libertarian" place on a hypothetical political spectrum (by this I mean that, at the very least, everyone can agree that non-Objectivists would almost universally classify Objectivists as libertarians, whether or not the concept "libertarian" as well as "conservative" "liberal" and the rest are epistemologically justified, etc.). Similarly, an Objectivist is going to logically take positions in support of the development of any and all medical technologies to extend healthy life (with the obvious and I hope don't-actually-need-to-be-stated-explicitly restrictions against the use of force or fraud to achieve their development or use), as well as those that provide us with enhanced abilities of various sorts, etc. and so would be classified as a transhumanist by pretty much everyone else as a result of their positions. Now one can debate whether "transhumanism" is a valid/useful concept or not, just as one can about the names for various political orientations. But I think we can all agree that the support for the development and deployment of the sorts of technologies transhumanists call for (in the context of a free market absent any and all coercion) is an obvious application of Objectivist principles (whether or not one wants to call oneself a transhumanist).

Maken: What, in your mind, is the prime value in Objectivist ethics? "To hold one’s own life as one’s ultimate value, and one’s own happiness as one’s highest purpose are two aspects of the same achievement. Existentially, the activity of pursuing rational goals is the activity of maintaining one’s life; psychologically, its result, reward and concomitant is an emotional state of happiness."- Ayn Rand, "The Objectivist Ethics".

So either you think Objectivism would say that you should steal the guy's cure for cancer because "living" is the prime value, or you have to agree that having one's life as one's ultimate value and one's happiness as one's highest purpose would (as I think everyone should agree here) demand that you do not steal his cure. If you agree with Objectivism that the initiation of force is wrong, then the answer to your proposal is that no, you shouldn't steal the cure even though it could save your life. Regardless, your question doesn't highlight anything in particular about transhumanism, as transhumanism is not a philosophy unto itself, but a particular position in philosophy advocating the use of technology to expand our abilities and extend our lives for our own benefit. I haven't seen Hotu or myself say that survival at any cost is the goal in either Objectivism or transhumanism (some transhumanists might say that, but I have never heard of one).

I kind of think of it like this: Objectivists would fall in a "libertarian" place on a hypothetical political spectrum (by this I mean that, at the very least, everyone can agree that non-Objectivists would almost universally classify Objectivists as libertarians, whether or not the concept "libertarian" as well as "conservative" "liberal" and the rest are epistemologically justified, etc.). Similarly, an Objectivist is going to logically take positions in support of the development of any and all medical technologies to extend healthy life (with the obvious and I hope don't-actually-need-to-be-stated-explicitly restrictions against the use of force or fraud to achieve their development or use), as well as those that provide us with enhanced abilities of various sorts, etc. and so would be classified as a transhumanist by pretty much everyone else as a result of their positions. Now one can debate whether "transhumanism" is a valid/useful concept or not, just as one can about the names for various political orientations. But I think we can all agree that the support for the development and deployment of the sorts of technologies transhumanists call for (in the context of a free market absent any and all coercion) is an obvious application of Objectivist principles (whether or not one wants to call oneself a transhumanist).

My evaluation of Peikoff's statement:
1. This point is understandable, though it would still, in my understanding of his letter, mean that McCaskey is a bad person/not an Objectivist/severely damaging to the Institute and the Objectivist movement. So it is a denunciation, in any case.

2. I don't believe McCaskey demanded that exact letter, nor do I understand, even if he did, why Peikoff wouldn't have written a real response immediately and either given it to McCaskey or published it shortly after McCaskey resigned in order to head off obvious criticisms that he should have known were going to come and to actually explain his actions.

3. He hates McCaskey and won't explain why, and says he is an ignoramus. And that justifies his not dealing with him at all. Well I don't get him calling him an ignoramus. In any case this whole point is kind of pointless.

4. Not really new or important either. But it is a little weird he didn't say anything before.

Rest: His high estimation of himself is largely valid, though of late he has made some big errors in applying philosophy (don't have the right to build a mosque anyone? That was pretty off in my opinion). However, he is outside of ARI now. And he should not be involved with it at all. He should not have the ability to throw people off the board because he doesn't like them, nor should he threaten to (apparently, since it's his only power) remove all rights to the works of Ayn Rand, etc. from ARI because they don't go along with what he wants. He should either be officially involved or have no influence on ARI at all, otherwise it gets all mushy and wibbly like it is now, which damages the Institute.

He doesn't explain how McCaskey actually disagrees with AYN RAND. No such argument has been given, ever. Knowledge develops, our definitions of concepts change, the context of concepts changes as knowledge grows, etc., and so I think McCaskey's whole "spiral" idea could very well be compatible. And there obviously is a process where one does not have a crystal clear concept but one is using a fuzzy concept to try to integrate information in order to spot new connections that can be used to clarify the concept, which I don't see as contradictory to Objectivist epistemology, nor a contradiction of anything Ayn Rand said (at least not that I've read, and I've read almost all of her books like VOS, ITOE, AS, TRM, etc. , none of "The Objectivist" or anything like that though). Plus, "The Logical Leap" is NOT a work of Objectivist cannon, as that was all pubished prior to Rand's death (with the exception of OPAR). And I never saw McCaskey sneer in any context, but simply criticize an academic work (well, work of philosophy along broadly academic lines anyway), which is not at all an issue. If criticism of other Objectivists work is impossible, then the ARI is not an academic organization, period.

I don't think he is dictatorial (not generally anyway), or an opponent of free speech. I simply think that he does not want ARI to be an academic institution, because an academic institution must be able to criticize work done by people in the Institute. Unless the criticism is clearly contradictory to Objectivism, (which I haven't seen any argument for, certainly not from Peikoff or Harriman) then one can't kick anyone out over a dispute without losing the status of a true academic institution.

And oh boy, let's go after Craig Biddle and the Hsieh's, Biddle because he criticized Peikoff because Piekoff hasn't ever given an argument for why McCaskey is wrong, and the Hsieh's apparently because they dare to tell people about the various statements of people on all sides (they posted a link to Peikoff's statement too, so it's not like they're being unfair up to this point). Peikoff is, apparently, incapable of making a mistake, nor does he have to explain his actions (that is, exactly how McCaskey ever criticized Objectivism). And so Objectivism is going to be torn apart as a cohesive movement because Peikoff is apparently too weak to remain silent but too strong to actually explain his actions. Fantastic.

Seriously. According to McCaskey, Whewell did some good work on the idea of induction, but didn't quite have the notion of a concept down correctly. He attributes much of the progress of the very science Harriman praises so highly in the 19th Century as a result largely of the influence of Whewell's views on induction, and that when they fell out of favor, problems began to arise in science (in a very similar manner as Harriman claims the rise of bad epistemology has led to the corruption of physics, from the various articles I have read of his in the Objective Standard).

Indeed, looking over the induction section of Whewell's article on the Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, I find it to be pretty good. His conception of "fundamental ideas" is stuff like "space","time", "cause", "resemblance" and the like. Those are, broadly speaking, directly observable things about reality. Indeed, we directly perceive color, shape, texture, length, differences between objects and attributes, simple causation etc., all through the nature of our perceptual apparatus. So in a way, the idea of "length" (generalized to "space") is provided for us in our make-up as people with a particular sort of perceptual apparatus, and we just have to work it out explicitly, as with the others listed above. Maybe he didn't get it entirely right, since we derive them and explicate them based on our observations of reality (but he does say that we need empirical evidence to clarify our conceptions in order to make them more precise and correct, so that's something). He seems on the right track at least. His idea that the identification of a concept is applied to data about the world in an attempt to find an integrating theme seems to be along the lines of what Harriman was talking about (again, from what I have read of "The Logical Leap", reviews of it, and from articles I have read of Harriman's online), even if it isn't exactly it, and he lacked Rand's idea of concepts.

Reading the section on induction, I see Whewell as someone who was on the right track, but didn't get some things quite right (like the nature and origin of his Fundamental Ideas, and what exactly a concept was and how one goes about forming one). But given those errors, he doesn't seem to be bad. He defends reason and induction, and the existence of an objective external universe knowable through the means of logic, experiment, and observation. Really, I don't ask much more of an epistemologist pre-Rand, and I certainly don't see him as some horrible philosopher that should be rejected absolutely as a bad pre-Rand epistemologist by every Objectivist. Heck, he seems to be pretty good, far far far far far far far better than say Popper or Hume or Kant.

I'll leave it up to everyone else to read the article and decide what they think, but I think my description of Whewell (based on that article as all the information I have about him) is a more accurate analysis than Miovas's (no offense Miovas, I just think yours isn't the correct conclusion to draw based on that article).