AshRyan

Well, she's much more sympathetic than my father, at least (who is downright hostile toward Objectivism).

But that was when she was there as a scab. There wasn't a question of her doing other kinds of work. It is in the context of her relationship with John, not her work (which hasn't just been tossed aside). At the end, when she returns to the valley with the strikers as a striker and they are planning their return to the outside world, they talk about how Dagny will run trains--and take the shirt off Hank's back with the freight rates she'll charge!

And I, for one, won't be so complacent and dismissive about it...as soon as you give me some evidence of it.

I have seen this exact example before. The robot's actions are not self-sustaining in the relevant sense here. Perhaps you should reread Ayn Rand's wider discussion of this issue in "The Objectivist Ethics" in The Virtue of Selfishness. In the case of the plant (or whatever), the process is indeed an active, goal-directed one. In the case of the crystal, it is not. You do not seem to have really grasped the distinction that Ayn Rand made in the passage Bowzer quoted. But if you want a much more detailed argument supporting that point, I will second Bowzer's recommendation of Harry Binswanger's pamphlet (or his lengthier book The Biological Basis of Teleological Concepts).

You mentioned that you've already read "the standards" including Orson Scott Card. I actually don't care much for his "standard" works--the Ender series--but I just thought I'd mention that some of his other stuff, while not as famous, is really good (in fact much better in my opinion) in case you haven't read it. In particular, some of his fantasy stuff is quite good--especially Hart's Hope. I'm not a big fan of fantasy in general, but Hart's Hope is--besides being one of Card's best-written works, in my opinion--a really great story that deals with important themes of mercy versus justice. Card is a Mormon, and that issue has kind of an uneasy position in Mormon doctrine (it was one of the major issues over which I left the Mormon church)--and the way Card addresses it in Hart's Hope is not what you would probably expect from a Christian writer. It is quite thoughtful and even inspiring. Really good book.

I bought Illium but haven't got around to reading it yet. It looks interesting, and it will probably be one of the next things I read once I finish getting caught up on the Sword of Truth series.

Putin has moved to replace direct elections of regional leaders (governors and such) with approval by Putin-loyal regional legislatures of Putin-nominated leaders, among other changes. Do a quick google search and you should easily find more information. Just put in "Putin power grab" or something like that.

I'll second some of the authors that have already been recommended, like Ray Bradbury and Terry Goodkind (I'm in the middle of his Sword of Truth series right now and enjoying it a lot). I'll also recommend Dan Simmons. He is an excellent writer, though his ideas aren't always that great (but that probably goes for a lot of the other authors in this thread). He's written some straight science-fiction, such as the Hyperion / Endymion series, but I haven't read that so you're on your own there. He's also done some quasi-scifi stuff like The Hollow Man. He has also written everything from fantasy/horror, historical fiction, hard-boiled detective novels, etc. One of my favorites of his is A Winter Haunting. It's kind of a sequel to an earlier, Stephen King-like horror novel (though a very well-written one) called Summer of Night, so you might want to read that first, but A Winter Haunting is a much subtler, psychological kind of ghost story. Great characterization, involving story, beautiful writing. Check it out.

And possibly of a particularly malevolent variety. Does she mean that if her charity work were to finally succeed, and no one had such big problems anymore, then she would feel terrible because no one else would be worse off by comparison? The way you put it, at least, makes it sound as though she is gratified by or takes pleasure in the fact that others suffer greatly. And isn't that exactly what altruism requires?

I know Ibsen primarily as a playwright (and both of his works that you recommended are plays). Was he also a novelist, or was that just written in error? But anyway, I'll second the recommendation. I've loved Ibsen since high school, largely due to the two plays you mentioned here.

I'm surprised that this thread died out without any comment on Putin using the attack as an excuse for an unprecedented power grab. Of course, this should come as no surprise to anyone who knows anything about Putin's political history, and I have been predicting precisely this sort of thing for some time now. And believe me, if he gets away with this (and he will), it'll only be the beginning...

Who said that? I'd be surprised if anyone here claimed that "everyone will be their own private Dr. Peikoff." A supporting quote would have been nice here.

A few points: If you want to understand the argument between ARI and TOC, do a search on this site--it has been discussed here several times. The points of disagreement are hardly trivial. Next, I'm curious--which conference did you attend? I've been at the last two, and I didn't notice either a lack of women, or any complaints about such a lack. I think most Objectivists agree with the idea of hero worship--but if you take that to mean that women "want to be owned/possessed/dominated" then I think that's a straw man, because I doubt many Objectivists would hold anything resembling that view. (As for Dominique, I think if you put it in the context of the story you can see that she has many virtues and will have no problem being a productive person after the end of the novel now that she has realized that Roark is right.)

I forgot I posted that!

Okay...I was taking it for granted that the way to fight religious ideas is primarily to offer Objectivism as an alternative. Apparently I should have been more explicit about that. That being the case, I think we are much more in agreement than it initially appeared. I'm just going to leave it at that for now.

Let me get this straight: you haven't read any of Ayn Rand's work? Then why are you on an Objectivist discussion board? No, that would be an intrinsicist definition of language. Again, I'll refer you to ItOE. More intrinsicism. What is obvious nonsense is that that's what an objective theory of language would be. Concepts are the basic building block of language. So? Again, I suggest you stop posting this kind of stuff here until you've read Ayn Rand's relevant work. Or at least restrict yourself to the "Basic Questions" forum.

Certainly. I see it as a turn from one kind of irrationality to another. Maybe it's a better kind in some ways, and maybe in other ways it's worse. I have made no claims one way or the other about the motivation behind it--because I do not believe such general claims are justified either way. Certainly many people who are turning to religion or even more actively promoting the religious views they've held all along are decent people--and certainly some of them are not so decent (you would have to be blind not to see that). In the cases in which the person's motivation is as you state, then certainly we can and should support that motivation--I have never claimed otherwise--but only while actively opposing their ideology. So, putting the motivational issue aside, are you saying now that you disagree with me that it is a bad ideology that we need to actively address? You are very hard to pin down on this point. Again, I don't think you can make this kind of generalization. I see some of them as people we must do battle with, and some of them as potential allies. But above all it is the ideology that I say we must fight. That is what I have been saying all along. Do you disagree? If so, how do you propose to make allies of them or convert them without fighting their bad ideas? On the other hand, you seem to see all leftists as enemies we must do battle with, calling them "hopeless" in general. But inductively, I don't believe this to be the case. Again, I think that some of them are certainly our enemies, but it is mainly their ideas that we must fight. And there are many of them who are not are enemies, as in my experience (judging from Objectivists whose pre-Objectivism ideological backgrounds I know) there are almost as many former leftists among Objectivists as there are former(?) conservatives. In fact, out of the extremes on either side, I know of more former hard-core leftist Objectivists than former religious zealot Objectivists. Why, Fred Weiss just said recently on the forum that he used to be a Communist! So forgive me if I'm not going to just write off everyone with a certain political label as "hopeless." And, while I haven't been involved with Objectivism as long as you, I've won over several people myself. I think we're fighting the same battle, Betsy. I just hope this will all be cleared up quickly now, because this conversation is starting to get tiresome.

Have you read Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology? If not, I suggest you do before making claims such as this here again. If so, would you care to give an argument to refute the entire point of that book, rather than just asserting the opposite? While most of the things you listed as evidence of this claim are to some extent true, that does not prove that language (i.e., concepts) is inherently "inobjective."

I haven't read any of his more recent stuff. Escher was bad enough that I wouldn't care to read any of his other work.

Yes, you're right, that was a bad way of putting it.

Right. And my point has been, that's precisely the problem! If everyone is turning back to religion, then it is religion that is potentially the more harmful ideology and we must actively address it. Now you seem to be agreeing with me that is primarily to the religious right that we need to take the battle of ideas. Are you?

I got my copy a week or two ago, and I agree with everything Kitty Hawk said.

This is a false alternative, common in many areas but rearing its ugly head in a more fundamental issue here. "Volitional" does not imply "arbitrary." If it takes an act of volition to come to hold a belief--i.e., if you have to choose to believe something (and I think that is the case)--that says nothing about whether your reasons for choosing to do so were objective or arbitrary in any given case.

Please forgive the grammatical error. No, I didn't know Miss Rand and her husband personally, but enough evidence can be gleaned from sources about her personal life such as Michael Paxton's documentary Ayn Rand: A Sense of Life to tell that their romantic relationship bore no resemblance to your ideas about what is proper in such a context to the rational man and woman. Of course I think she could be feminine when she wanted to be--I just disagree that the essence of femininity has anything to do with most of the attributes you listed.

Just for the record, I thought it was pretty obvious that Zeus was joking. At least, I hoped he was joking.