monart

Indeed, Christine Massey, has done that and continues to do so, e.g., for measles, and received same or equivalent "no records found". (Although I keep track of her updates, I don't pay close attention to each one.) Yet. the requirement of isolation and purification in identifying a virus is a standard mentioned in textbooks. Here are quotes from Virus Mania: .. Complete purification is an indispensable pre-requisite for virus identi­fication as stated by textbooks, virus researchers such as Luc Montagnier, and the second of Koch’s postulates... “Purification”… means the separation of an object from everything that does not belong to it … Only on the basis of such a complete purification can it be proven that the nucleic acid sequences found in the particles in question originate from a new virus. We also contacted Charles Calisher, who is a seasoned virologist. In 2001,Science published an “impassioned plea ...to the younger generation” from several veteran virologists, among them Calisher, saying that "[modern virus detection methods like] sleek polymerase chain reaction ...tell little or nothing about how a virus multiplies, which animals carry it, [or] how it makes people sick. [It is] like trying to say whether somebody has bad breath by looking at his fingerprint." And that’s why we asked Calisher whether he knows of a single paper in which SARS-CoV-2 had been isolated and then truly purified. His answer: "I know of no such a publication. I have kept an eye out for one." The FOI requests were carefully worded to ensure that "isolation" means separate from everything else, worded so for the very reason that those who claimed they isolated SARS-CoV-2 did not actually do so. No a priori conspiracy-mindedness is needed to word the FOI requests thus. A possible opposite motivation for such wording is to disconfirm a conspiracy theory.

You're still assuming, begging the question, that there were millions of excess deaths and that these excess deaths were caused by SARS-CoV-2, when the existence, i.e., isolation, purification, and identification of the virus is put into doubt because of all the FOI requests returning with "no records found".

As referenced in my 2nd post, the documentation of the FOI requests are shown at Christine Massey's site.

I don't dismiss the value of a book, especially on this topic, merely from reading the titles and a brief description. For Virus Mania, I read the whole book, with focus on the chapter about Covid-19 and how the authors' investigation shows no evidence that the CoV2 virus has been isolation and purified. For some of the representative papers they analyzed and sought confirmation from the papers' authors that, in fact, they did isolate the virus, the answers were in the negative. One of the papers, (that your AI bot listed and that I've read myself 3-4 yrs ago and again a few days ago) is the first (or among the first) paper from Communist China, "A Novel Coronavirus from Patients with Pneumonia in China, 2019". One of the authors of the paper, Wenjie Tan, in reply to Virus Mania's authors' request for confirmation of isolation and purification, wrote that they did not and that "(We show] an image of sedimented virus particles, not purified ones". Also, I note that the paper did not account for other possible (non-microbial) causes for the cases of pneumonia by "unknown causes" that the authors selected for their study. They ignored the long-time pre-existing epidemic of respiratory illness/death caused by the severe air pollution in Wuhan. The Virus Mania excerpts in my 3rd post explain what isolation and purification must consist of, how difficult and complex the process is, especially for a new virus. So, even if you don't have the book, the excerpts I posted are valuable in helping with the understanding. The obvious factual question remains: If there exist records that SARS-CoV2 has been isolated, purified, and identified, why have all 220 FOI agencies contacted so far responded with "no records found"? Incompetence? Ignorance? What?

To claim that your grandfather died from covid so "it exists" is circular reasoning, begging the question. The existence, i, e, the isolation, purification, and identification of SARS-CoV2 is in doubt because no records of such action has yet been found by FOI (Freedom of Information) government agencies (220 to date) thoughout the world.

Yes, I copy from the aforementioned post: VIRUS MANIA: How the Medical Industry Continually Invents Epidemics, Making Billion-Dollar Profits at Our Expense ... the final chapter, "Total Corona Mania" of a 515-page volume, with 1456 references. It's the 3rd English 2021 Edition, first published in Germany in 2007 (currently Amazon Bestseller in Microbiology) Authors: Torsten Engelbrecht Dr. Claus Kbhnlein, MD Dr. Samantha Bailey, MD Dr. Stefano Scoglio, BSc PhD Forewords: Prof. Etienne de Harven, MD Dr. Kelly Brogan MD Dr. Andrew Kaufman, MD Topics: Corona/COVID-19, Measles, Swine Flu, Avian Flu, Cervical Cancer, SARS, BSE, Hepatitis C, AIDS, Polio, Spanish Flu

Thanks for pursuing this, Alex. As I acknowledged in my reply to Stephen, absence of evidence, alone, is not evidence of absence. I do not definitively claim that SARS-CoV2 does not exist, just that it has not been proven to exist, based on the fact that Christine Massey's FOIA requests to government-medical institutions (now at 220 of them) resulted in "no records found". So, yes, maybe there are records, like the papers you offered that seem to be such, but may not be (as explained in the Virus Mania excerpts in my 3rd post responding to Stephen). If there are actually records, why haven't the FOIA agencies have not cited them? Is it just ignorance and Incompetence?

You asked an AI bot, and it says yes. But Christine Massey and her team, referenced in my 2nd post, asked through FOIA requests, hundreds of government/research institutions all over the world, including CDC and Health Canada, and they all say, "No Records Found". What gives? Maybe the AI bot took "isolation" to mean "isolated from patient", not "isolated from all other biological material" -- the latter is what the FOIA requests specifically and explicitly defined as "isolation". Apparently, the research labs did not perform the latter, just the former. So "No Records Found." On this topic, see also my 3rd post with excerpts from the book Virus Mania. (I read that Zhang et.al paper, listed by the AI bot, about 3 years ago, and it reported "isolation" from the alleged novel coronavirus patient only, not from all other substances.)

Yes, you may be right about the funding for gain of function research, but if it had anything to do with the "novel" SARS-CoV2, there is, to date, no record of it having been isolated and purified.

Intentionally, accidentally, from bats, from labs -- it's irrelevant to the fundamental question: Where is the documentation that SARS=CoV2 has been isolated, purified, and identified?

Stephen. Yes, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence - or, more precisely, absence of evidence alone is not evidence of absence. But then the onus of proof is on they who assert, not on others to prove that the assertion is false. As I presented in my previous posts: No records have been located that document the isolation, purification, and identification of SARS-CoV2. No expertise in virology is needed, just basic logic, to understand that, without such proof of the virus' existence, the virus is hypothetical, and nothing downstream (testing, masking, distancing, lockdowns, vaccination) is valid or justified when derived from this alleged existence. And granting the "experts" (and the governments) some benefit of the doubt, when none is justified, is to surrender one's independent judgement to these alleged "experts".

Hi Stephen, No, (regarding the claim that SARS-Cov2 has been proven to exist) I'm saying, that, up to even today, no records have been found, in response to FOIA requests to government health/research labs all over the world, for documents reporting the isolation and purification of SARS-CoV2 apart from other biological matter. The whole "pandemic" is based on the assumption by nearly everyone that SARS-Cov2 has been scientifically proven by someone to exist -- when no record is available of anyone who has. Here is an earlier post (Feb 13, 2022) on this topic. ----- Exposing the Pandemic Tyranny I. SARS-CoV-2 Still Not Proven to Exist (2) The fact that, more than 2 years later, there are still no records of SARS-CoV-2 having been isolated and identified, strikes at the root of the pandemic deception (shamdemic). For that reason, more attention should be given to understanding what isolation/purification is and why it should be done. If the alleged novel coronavirus hasn't been scientifically identified, then neither do all the testing, drug treatments, vaccines - government emergency powers - have any validity or justification. A helpful guide to gaining this understanding is a section in a significant new book, _Virus Mania_, (mentioned in previous post): "Lack of Detection of So-Called SARS-CoV-2", in the final chapter, "Total Corona Mania" of a 515-page volume, with 1456 references. It's the 3rd English 2021 Edition, first published in Germany in 2007 (currently Amazon Bestseller in Microbiology). Excerpts from that section follow (reference numbers omitted): --------- Lack of Detection of So-Called SARS-CoV-2 ... Complete purification is an indispensable pre-requisite for virus identi­fication as stated by textbooks, virus researchers such as Luc Montagnier [see attached image at the end] and the second of Koch’s postulates... “Purification”… means the separation of an object from everything that does not belong to … Only on the basis of such a complete purification can it be proven that the nucleic acid sequences found in the particles in question originate from a new virus. For this, one must remember that the PCR is extremely sensitive. This means that it can “pick up" even the smallest genetic fragments-i.e. DNA or RNA fragments. But it is not possible with the PCR to determine where these nucleic acid sequences come from. This must be determined beforehand in a separate process. And since PCR tests are “calibrated” to nucleic acid sequences, in this case RNA sequences (since it is assumed that SARS-CoV-2 is an RNA virus), it must of course be clearly proven that these genetic fragments are actually part of the claimed virus. And in order to prove this beyond any doubt, the correct isolation and complete purification of the suspected virus are indispensable pre-requisites. … Thus, when cells, cell debris and particles are mixed in a laboratory culture, the only way to determine which RNA (or even proteins) are viral is to separate the particles from all non-viral material. However, some researchers use the term “isolation” in their work to give the impression to the uninitiated reader that a virus has been isolated in pure form. In fact, however, this has not happened, because the procedures described in these works do not represent a proper process of isolation including complete purification. Conse­quently, they misuse the term “isolation” in their publications. And so we decided to be the first in the world to ask the research teams of the relevant papers cited in connection with the alleged detection of SARS-CoV-2 whether the elec­tron microscope images shown in their in vitro studies depict completely purified viruses. However, not a single team of authors-including those of two pivotal studies (Zhu et al., Wan Beom Park et al. ) - could answer this question with a yes. And it should be noted that no one wrote back suggesting that complete purification is not a necessary step for solid virus detection. [See attached image at the end] We only received answers such as “our electron microscope image does not show a com­pletely purified virus” (see table, which has been published in the article that appeared in the OffGuardianon June 27,2020 and was the first in the world to fundamentally demon­strate that SARS-CoV-2 PCR is without substance: “COVID-19 PCR-Tests Are Scientifically Meaningless” by Torsten Engelbrecht and Konstantin Demeter), Altogether, the authors of five relevant papers (Zhu et al.,1353 Wan Beom Park et al.), which are mentioned in connection with the detection of SARS-CoV-2, conceded on request that they did not complete purification. We also contacted Charles Calisher, who is a seasoned virologist. In 2001, Science published an “impassioned plea ...to the younger generation" from several veteran virologists, among them Calisher, saying that “[modern virus detection methods like] sleek polymerase chain reaction ...tell little or nothing about how a virus multiplies, which animals carry it, [or] how it makes people sick. [It is] like trying to say whether somebody has bad breath by looking at his fingerprint.” And that’s why we asked Calisher whether he knows of a single paper in which SARS-CoV-2 had been isolated and then truly purified. His answer: “I know of no such a publication. I have kept an eye out for one.” … If no such particle “purification” has been done anywhere, how can one claim that the RNA obtained is part of a viral genome? And how can such RNA then be widely used to di­agnose infection with a new virus? We have asked these two questions to numerous rep­resentatives of the official corona narrative worldwide, but nobody could answer them. The fact that the RNA sequences that the scientists extracted from the tissue samples and which the SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR tests were finally “calibrated” belong to a new patho­genic virus called SARS-CoV-2 is therefore based on faith alone, not on sound research. Consequently, it cannot be concluded that the “pulled” RNA genetic sequences in these studies, belong to a very specific virus, in this case SARS-CoV-2, which can then be “de­tected" by the developed RT-PCR test. We have also looked at all the studies claiming to have isolated and even tested the virus. But in all of them, they actually did something very different: the researchers took samples from the throat or Lungs of patients, ultracentrifuged them (spun them at high speed) to separate the larger/heavy from the smaller/lighter molecules, and then took the supernatant, the upper part of the centrifuged material. And this is what they called their “isolate,” to which they then applied the PCR. But this supernatant contains all kinds of molecules, billions of different micro- and nanoparticles, including extracellular vesicles (EVs) and exosomes, which are produced by our own body and are often indistinguishable from viruses: “Nowadays, it is an al­most impossible mission to separate EVs and viruses by means of canonical vesicle isolation methods, such as differential ultracentrifugation, because they are frequently co-pelleted due to their similar dimension," as it said in the study “The Role of Extra­cellular Vesicles as Allies of HIV, HCV and SARS Viruses,” published in May 2020 in the journal Viruses. So how do you extract a specific virus from this huge mixture of billions of indistin­guishable particles, including naturally occurring exosomes? Well, you simply cannot, it is impossible, unless you have purified the particles of whom you think they belong to a new virus beforehand (and then you have to define its genetic structure and dis- ease-causing properties). In fact, the scientists “create” the virus by PCR: They take artificial and entirely hypothetical primers (previously existing genetic sequences available in genetic banks) and put them in touch with the supernatant of the pharyngeal or broncho-alveolar fluid of the patient, that is with tens of billions of RNA and DNA molecules; and if, as it is likely, the primers attach to something in that broth, they conclude that whatever attached to the primers, then forming a DNA molecule with the help of the enzyme reverse transcriptase, it is the new and unknown SARS-CoV-2. As if that weren’t enough, the primers used are just an infinitesimal fragment of the al­leged genome of the virus; they are in fact made up of only 18 to 24 bases (nucleotides) each; while the SARS-CoV-2 virus is assumed to consist of 30,000 bases, that is to say the primers represent only 0.07 percent of the virus genome. How is it possible to select the specific virus you are Looking for with such a minute sequence, and moreover in a sea of billions of virus-like particles? Again, it is just impossible! As the virus you are looking for is new, there are clearly no ready “off-the-shelf” genetic primers to match the specific fraction of the new virus. Instead, you take primers that you believe may be close to the hypothesized virus structure, but it’s only a rough guess. When you apply the primers to the supernatant broth, they can attach to any one of the billions of molecules present in it, and you have no idea if what you generated is from the virus you are looking for. … Incidentally, SARS-CoV-2 was “pieced together" on the computer. The physician Thomas Cowan called this “scientific fraud.” He wrote on October 15, 2020: “This week, my col­league and friend Sally Fallon Morell brought to my attention an amazing article put out by the CDC, published in June 2020. The article’s purpose was for a group of about 20 virologists to describe the state of the science of the isolation, purification and biological characteristics of the new SARS-CoV-2 virus, and to share this information with other scientists for their own research. A thorough and careful reading of this important paper reveals some shocking findings.” In fact, the article section “Whole Genome Sequencing” shows that rather than having isolated the virus and sequencing the genome from end to end, that the CDC“ designed 37 pairs of nested PCRs spanning the genome on the basis of the coronavirus reference sequence (GenBank accession no. NC045512).’’ ...Consequently, it cannot be concluded that the RNA gene sequences “pulled” from the tis­sue samples prepared in these studies and “calibrated” to the PCR tests belong to a very specific virus, in this case SARS-CoV-2. Especially since the electron microscope images, which are supposed to represent SARS-CoV-2, actually show particles that vary greatly in size. In one paper, the particles range from 60 nm to 140 nm. A specific virus that has such extreme size variation cannot exist by definition. ------------- VIRUS MANIA: How the Medical Industry Continually Invents Epidemics, Making Billion- Dollar Profits at Our Expense Authors: Torsten Engelbrecht Dr. Claus Kbhnlein, MD Dr. Samantha Bailey, MD Dr. Stefano Scoglio, BSc PhD Forewords: Prof. Etienne de Harven, MD Dr. Kelly Brogan MD Dr. Andrew Kaufman, MD Topics: Corona/COVID-19, Measles, Swine Flu, Avian Flu, Cervical Cancer, SARS, BSE, Hepatitis C, AIDS, Polio, Spanish Flu

[Feb 11, 2022] It was evident from the first Wuhan reports of a "novel coronavirus" that there was deception involved in the propagation of the claim of a SAR-CoV-2 pandemic. The consequent Covid-19 tyranny has since been justified on the basis of a fraud: that SARS-CoV-2 has been proven to exist. But, in reality, it hasn't been. To exist is to have identity. Existence is Identity. If SARS-CoV-2 is claimed to exist, its identity must also be defined and shown to be distinct from all other existents. It must be isolated and purified from all other substances in order to be distinguished separately. Only then could its characteristics and any infectious qualities be discovered and verified. But this purification and identification has not yet been accomplished, only a deceptive appearance of having done so. As of today, Feb 11, 2022 - 166 Freedom of Information (FOI) requests to health and science institutions worldwide, by Christine Massey and her team, for any documentation of SARS-CoV-2 having been isolated and purified, have resulted in responses of "No records found". As written on Christine Massey's webpage https://www.fluoridefreepeel.ca/fois-reveal-that-health-science-institutions-around-the-world-have-no-record-of-sars-cov-2-isolation-purification/?fbclid=IwAR3Mr8pWM3y1gXcSNf23zlUyj7bNdklh2f-IXSn7YgP5rTZa5TYzF6J0jhY "Would a sane person mix a patient sample (containing various sources of genetic material and never proven to contain any alleged “virus”) with transfected monkey kidney cells, fetal bovine serum and toxic drugs, then claim that the resulting concoction is “SARS-COV-2 isolate” and ship it off internationally for use in critical research (including vaccine and test development)? "Because that’s the sort of fraudulent monkey business that’s being passed off as “virus isolation” by research teams around the world." In the past two years, numerous voices have drawn attention to this fraud, but they've been ignored or maligned by the mainstream media and the medical/virologist professions as a whole, and thus the governments continued their tyranny. But the deception is becoming more and more exposed, and the tyrants will be backing off, having achieved their goals, even if their fraud doesn't get known by the masses. A few significant books have already been published exposing one or another part of the fraud. _Virus Mania_ , authored by a team of MDs, PhD, led by a journalist, is one such book on the non-isolation of CoV-2.

Remembering the CG Computer-Generated Pandemic Tyranny It's been nearly four years since the "Covid-19 pandemic" campaign was announced (March 11, 2020) by the WHO and subsequently implemented by governments throughout the world -- using fear and force to "lockdown" then "vaccinate" billions of misinformed and misled, confused and compliant masses. How did the Covid-19 pandemic come to be? How did such a pandemic tyranny get established so quickly and easily? For one's mental and moral health, as well as one's physical health, in order to keep on the betterment of oneself, find out what really was/is the Covid-19 Pandemic. How to Establish a Pandemic Tyranny (with or without an actual virus) Tyranny can be established in a few strokes, in countries where rights are not absolute and inviolate, and where they can be even more restricted in emergencies (i.e., in all countries). The extent of the tyranny depends on the severity of the emergency. Wars, terrorist attacks, and natural disasters are common justifications for invoking emergency tyrannical powers. Epidemics and pandemics are among the less common justifications, but have advantages for tyrants that war and disasters do not have. When the “enemy” is sub/microscopic and invisible, it is easier to fool and frighten the people into believing in the emergency and accepting the tyranny. Indeed, a viral enemy is even more effective for fear-mongering than a bacterial enemy, a virus being far more minuscule and mysterious than bacteria. For the first time in history, a pandemic tyranny was successfully established, all across the globe. How was it done? 1. Conduct pandemic simulations (“Event 201”, “Crimson Contagion”) to train and prime, among other effects, the health authorities and policy makers for the “real” pandemic to come. 2. Have the “outbreak” start in tyrannical China, where the truth is whatever the Party decrees, and the whip and gun is its main method of persuasion – and in Wuhan, with its pre-existing epidemic of respiratory illness/death caused by severe air pollution, which can be renamed "covid", as needed. 3. Have WHO previously lower the criteria for declaring a pandemic – and then to extol China as the exemplar for the rest of the world to emulate in response to the new invisible enemy, to be quickly named as SARS-CoV2. 4. Have the Chinese doctors claim that the pandemic is caused by a coronavirus, but a “novel” one - so that it could have the frightening and flexible characteristics as needed to initiate, manipulate, and sustain the belief in the pandemic. 5. Do not require that the novel coronavirus be isolated, purified, quantified, or uniquely characterized - so that its true nature (even if it exists) would not be there as a reality-check on the downstream computer modeling, testing protocols, case numbers, and mandates on social distancing, masking, and vaccination. 6. Create epidemiological models that predict, on demand, apocalyptic infections and deaths, with ready excuses that failed predictions are actually successes due to heeding the models and implementing lockdowns and mandates. 7. Design testing protocols, such as over-amplifiable PCR tests (designed for research, not diagnostic use), and the even less valid, proxy tests like anti-gen tests and sewage surveillance tests. These tests can yield false positives, as needed, on demand. Then saturate the population with tests, tests, and more tests. 8. Inflate the test-derived case numbers by providing incentives to re-label other respiratory infections as “covid-19” and ignore or downplay co-morbidities. The pre-existing common colds linked to already known coronaviruses are plentiful sources for claiming covid cases. 9. Refer to government health authorities as “top doctors”, whose scientific expertise is beyond question or reproach. Marginalize and punish those who question, challenge, or expose the covid irrationality - dismiss as being purveyors of “misinformation” and as threats to public health. 10. Ensure the medical/health, educational/academic institutions, and mainstream media are allied with the campaign - so that the masses are both intimidated and comforted in their fear and obedience, with little question or protest. 11. Enroll the evermore power-seeking politicians to enact the policies already in place by invoking public-health/emergency powers - so that the increased tyranny appears legitimate and legal, and the masses accept as necessary. 12. Join forces with the vaxxers and mass-advertise the vaccine as the only way out of the pandemic and the lockdowns - so that the masses rush into long line-ups for the shots - so that the psycho-socio-medical experiments and conditioning, among other agendas, can be perpetrated and perpetuated - and so that the test-kit and vaccine manufacturers and purveyors continue to make their billions. --- The key and essential preconditions for this covert./overt campaign to establishing a pandemic tyranny include the following: - A legally enslaved society where government controlled and tax-funded healthcare and education (along with the other welfare statist policies) are already widespread, which condition the people into dependency, conformity, and obedience. - An intellectually and morally bankrupt world where collectivism (mob rule), altruism (self-sacrifice), and mysticism (faith) prevail, institutionally and politically, over individualism, rights, and reason – where delusion is believed over objective reality and consensus overrides logic and facts. --- How to demolish this pandemic tyranny? By exposing the massive deception that it is (as shamdemic, plandemic, covert-19). Learn and understand, teach and advocate, declare and defend - ultimately to establish and institutionalize the philosophy of reality, reason, rights, and romance – and create a free, rational, individualist society. ------ “. . . The truth twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools.” – Rudyard Kipling, “If” “Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.” – Alexander Pope, “An Essay on Criticism” “The action is the aim and the aim is the action.” – Zarlenga, The Orator “Don’t bother examining [too much] a folly, ask only what it accomplishes.” –Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead ===== Image: Like in a movie, the CG world of SARS-Cov2....

Rationality – A Good Choice - For Life [A Simple Re-Minder] To be rational is to choose to be good in order to live as a human being. Rationality is good for happiness. A basic fact of life is that its existence is conditional. Life needs values for sustenance. Human life needs rational values and the work to produce them. Success is neither automatic nor guaranteed; it depends on will and skill. Rationality is a choice and requires effort. If the choice is to live, then choosing to think and be rational is a good choice, because rationality sustains and promotes life and so is good for life. A good life is the way to a happy life, so rational actions lead to a successful life of happiness. Reason and rationality is the only human, moral way to live. Rationality is the virtue of acting in accordance with reason. Reason is the ability to know reality through sense and logic - identifying, abstracting, and integrating sensory, perceptual observations into concepts and propositions. Forming concepts, making words, is a uniquely human method of knowing: the basic means by which are possible the philosophy, science, technology, art - all the cultures of modern civilization that bring unprecedented comfort and convenience, safety and security, entertainment and exploration, health and happiness, etc. All these life-enhancing conditions and opportunities are products of reason needed and to be enjoyed for a fully realized life (but too often taken for granted or, worse, depreciated and decried). Rationality is the ethical source of the virtues of independence, integrity, honesty, justice, and courage. Without rationality, there is no real reason for those virtues. It is rationality’s grounding in reality that gives the reason for all the values of rights and romance. From rationality comes truth, goodness, and beauty. By rationality and its connection and correspondence to reality, is sanity maintained. Rationality ensures against being a stupe and a fool, or a crook and knave. Because reason is the cardinal value and rationality the primary virtue - does that mean that one should be fully, 100% rational all the time? Yes, living isn't always easy; it's not without obstacles and oppositions, conflicts and confusions, mistakes and misunderstandings. But rationality is the only true way to solve the problems of life and achieve full self-realization, which is happiness. Why should one not choose the best possible, using the best means possible? Why settle for less? One is not infallible or invulnerable, not omniscient or omnipotent, but one is confident and competent to know and do the very best one can. That's the way to make and enjoy life. That's life's meaning and purpose: to achieve happiness by the best standards and all the virtues of rationality. Since reason can know what is real and true, it is the source of what one feels or experiences as being for or against the well-being of life. Without reason, the feelings of emotions are blind and shallow, unconnected with or opposed to reality. With reason, emotions are solid, deep, and in harmony with reality. Rationality ensures feelings are pure and do not conflict with true thinking, bringing the bliss which is the reward of life. “Happiness is a state of non-contradictory joy.” –Ayn Rand. To reason is to live as a human being. Reason is the source and means by which human life survives and flourishes. A successful, thriving life is a happy life. Rationality is the good choice for life and happiness. [Source: "The Objectivist Ethics", Ayn Rand] --- "Nothing on earth or beyond it is closed to the power of man's reason. Yes, reason could solve human problems—but nothing else on earth or beyond it, can." (From “Apollo 11” by Ayn Rand.) ===== Image: A future world built by rationality: The High Frontier, an orbital country in space, envisioned by Gerard O’Neill. Painting by Don Davis, circa1975. (Note the family by the water, the butterfly near the rock, the birds and clouds in the sky, the bridge connecting the towns.

WHY BE MORAL - THE REAL REASON Be Moral - To Live From Metaphysics to Morals Towards Self-Realization and Self-Betterment [Presented as a syllogistic synopsis] ---- Reality exists - objectively, absolutely. To believe that reality doesn’t exist is to believe in contradictions. To believe in contradictions is to believe that something exists and doesn’t exist at the same time in the same respect. To believe that it is real that there is no reality, is to believe in contradictions, that existence doesn’t exist. To believe that reality is subjective is to believe that it is objective that reality is subjective – a contradiction. To believe that reality is relative is to believe that it is absolute that reality is relative – a contradiction. In reality, contradictions do not exist, cannot be real. Contradictions exist only in the mind. Minds perceive reality, do not create it. Minds with contradictions mis-perceive, mistake reality. Real minds think non-contradictory, logical thoughts. "Consciousness is Identification of Existence...Existence Exists. Existence is Identity." (Ayn Rand) In reality, each thing exists as a something, not as a nothing, not as an anything. Some things exist as living things, distinct from things that are non-living. Non-living things always exist, changing their forms, never ceasing to exist. Living things do not always live, they exist conditionally. Living things can die, cease to exist as life, leaving dead non-living matter. Living things face alternatives - life or death. Living things exist by acting to stay alive. To stay alive is to take actions to sustain one's life. To die is to fail to take actions that sustain one’s life. "Life is a process of self-sustaining and self-generated action." (Ayn Rand) Living things need values, values "that which one acts to gain and/or keep" to sustain one’s life. (Ayn Rand) Values that further, enhance, or promote one's life are the good. Values that hinder, harm, or destroy one's life are the evil. Some living things pursue values automatically, instinctively, without choice. Some living, human, things pursue values by choice, by choosing to act for one’s life. "A code of values accepted by choice is a code of morality" (Ayn Rand). To be moral is to choose to live and act by a code of values, for life. Being moral is being human - being logical, objective, absolute. Being moral is being real. Be moral - to live. ----- [Source: "The Objectivist Ethics", in The Virtue of Selfishness, by Ayn Rand]

OBJECTIVE REALITY AND OBJECTIVE LIVING [Here are some highlights, from the perspective of self-realization and self-betterment, of the meaning of the concept of Reality or Existence: the widest, most abstract and fundamental of all concepts, subsuming and integrating all other concepts – yet, at the same time, it’s the most simple, concrete, directly observable concept, seen in each and every thing that’s real and exists. Reality exists all around; it’s all that which is there. One lives in reality and need to know it. One's rationality, morality, and sanity depend on knowing it.] ---------- Reality. Existence. Reality Exists. Reality is Real. Existence is Real. Existence Exists. A is A. It’s worth repeating: Existence Exists. The reality of existence and the existence of reality is so fundamental, essential, absolute, so objective and important, it bears restating again and again – to underscore and re-affirm its primacy and its ultimate abstraction of all existents and all real things. It’s in this reality of all real things that we, as knowing beings, live and act, so this objective reality is the axiomatic basis of our real, objective living. Living objectively is living with respect for and in accordance with the reality, objectivity, and primacy of existence. Reality is all that which exists – all entities, their attributes and actions – existing in all ways, at all times. Reality is _all_ that there is in existence, nothing more and nothing less. Even that which could be real comes from all that which is already real. Causality is reality in action. You can transform reality, i.e., re-arrange things, to re-create reality into a new form of reality, but it’s still something already existing that has changed or formed. A tree is a tree, not a rock or an elephant. Rivers and landslides move down- not upward. Ice comes from water, not alcohol. Acorns grow into oaks, not tigers. Babies come from mothers. You need to eat in order to live. Money doesn’t grow on trees. Neither love nor reason can be forced. Politicians don’t produce anything good. Only from something real comes something real. Nothing comes from nothing. There is nothing above, below, before, after, behind, in between, or outside reality. This one reality is all there is. There’s no getting around it. Reality exists, everywhere, everywhen, everyhow, in everywhat. If reality doesn’t really exist, you wouldn’t be here to know that; neither would you be here in the first place. If there is nothing, there is nothing. Reality exists, reality is real, existence exists – this the deepest you can go in reaching for the most fundamental axiom of all we know and all we do. All proofs and justifications depend on this axiom, which itself requires no proof because its evidence for existence is its existence itself, and because it’s the basis of, and presupposed by, all proofs or by any attempts to deny it. All knowledge and action rest on the basic fact that reality and existence exists, existing prior to our awareness, consciousness, and knowledge of it. Objective reality is the absolute standard of truth for all that we know about existence and about our consciousness of that existence. Existence precedes consciousness and has primacy over consciousness. Before or without existence, there would be no consciousness. Existence exists even without consciousness. Without mind, there is still matter. Real matter exists regardless of one’s mental awareness or evaluation of it. Whether one knows it or not, whether one likes it or not, existence is the object of consciousness: reality exists as it is: reality exists objectively, independently of minds and selves. As formulated by Ayn Rand and presented in her Atlas Shrugged, “This is John Galt Speaking”, and in “Axiomatic Concepts”, in her Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, this is the first axiom of reality, with its corollaries: "Existence Exists. Existence is Identity. Consciousness is Identification". Existence exists and is identified by consciousness. To know is to know something as it is. Consciousness is conscious of existence by identifying its objective reality: by recognizing reality for what it is, not what one thinks or wishes it to be – by knowing that consciousness is objective Identification of existence, that existence has identity, that existence is identity, that to be is to be something, that a thing is what it is. That A is A. Something exists or it doesn’t exist. Something cannot exist and not exist at the same time. Either something exists or it doesn’t exist, not both in the same respect. To exist, it must be a real thing, a something that is itself, not another thing in the same way. What things are, the Identity, and what they do, the Causality – This is Reality. Identity, that A is A, that A acts as A, is the starting point of the logic of all objective knowing. Since knowledge is essential to successful living, objective knowledge applied to living is objective living. Objective living is living in accordance with objective reality, with the basic fact that A is A. Living objectively is acting with true respect for the facts of reality; which is, acting with reason – the human faculty of knowing reality existing as it is. Objective living is rational living; which is to recognize and respect, not evade and reject, the facts and logic of real existence; which is, acting with the virtues of independence, integrity, honesty, justice, productiveness, and pride. Living objectively, being in touch with reality through reason is the way to a successful, happy, moral, and sane life. How does one live objectively in everyday life? That is the purpose of one’s ethics: to provide a moral code to guide one’s objective rational actions in everyday life. “The Objectivist Ethics”, in The Virtue of Selfishness, by Ayn Rand, is a powerful essay on such an objective ethics. “The Metaphysical and the Man-Made”, in her Philosophy: Who Needs It, is another. Following Rand’s work, detailed presentations of this ethics are in Ayn Rand's Normative Ethics: The Virtuous Egoist, and Viable Values: A Study of Life as the Root and Reward of Morality, both by Tara Smith, who also delivers speeches on Objectivist Ethics. One recent talk by her is “Objectivity Every Day”, recorded here -- (Search the ARI Youtube Channel.)

[The following article is inspired by Ayn Rand's "'What Can One Do?'" and "Don't Let It Go" (in The Ayn Rand Letter Vol I-Nr7,4,5 republished in Philosophy: Who Needs It). This article is a philosophical, perpetually youthful, romantic resolution for real noble best living.] === What Can One Do? 1 Jan 2024 When one is faced with the challenges of life, or when sometimes demoralized by doubts about one’s choices, or when oppressed by others’ irrational or criminal acts – but always seeking to effect right causes and make good changes – what can one do? For a start, one can just begin: begin with another chance and another choice. Each morning, one can begin with the thoughts, the philosophy and the arts, that support this focus, this aspiration, this declaration: --- I am at my best. I am becoming better and better. Today, I will get better in everything I do. I will grow smarter, stronger, straighter . . . more serious and serene. I will act more alive and be really real. Really, I am always at my best, at my best personality, my best individuality, my best self. To be my best self, I must live well. To live well, I must act. To act, I must know. To know, I must think. To think, I must look and listen, touch and taste. To be really alive, I will make life, not fake it. I will seek true values of goodness and beauty. I will be sensible, logical, reasonable. I shall mind my rational, romantic morality. Morality: the motor of morality is the mind. The mind drives morality to the achievement of a successful, happy life. Minding my morality is the way to doing right, being good, and living well. The mind matters most. A mindful morality is the motive power that moves me with integrity and courage towards beauty and joy. I won’t mangle or mess with my mind. or it will become meek and mushy. A mangled or messy mind gives a mangled, messy morality and a mangled, messy life – life without power or drive or aim, drifting away to a deadening mortality. Without mind, there is no reason for living, no rational morality, no romantic happiness. My morality, I shall always mind. With my mind, I am powerful and effective in making my values, but I don’t know everything and I may mis-understand, mis-remember, mis-take illusion for reality. I may get unlucky, get sick and tired, get fooled or mugged. I may get distracted or be tempted by fantasies of false shortcuts or by excuses of being meek, lazy, or unready. I may face intimidation or bribery for my conformity and dependency. I may get diverted or overwhelmed by intense fear, anger, hatred, disgust, contempt, pity, grief, or guilt. Depression and despair may threaten to demotivate and immobilize me. I may become numb to suffering and get deluded into complacency or stupor. . . . I may lose my mind and let go of my love and joy. Let go of my self I may, but I shall NOT. Misery and shame I do not want. If I weaken, I will find a way to get stronger, straighter, smarter, more serious and serene. I will act better. I will not lose sight of reality and abandon my reason. My rights and romance for the best life, I will defend and honor. Not for pain and suffering will I let go of my mind and morality. For truth and beauty, for joy and happiness, I will act and achieve. For a better life will I persevere. So, given the gift of life, and having the freedom to act with it, what can one do? I can, today, starting right now, I can and will do better: act by act, thought by thought, choice by choice, step by step, breath by breath, from here on. At my best, I shall be, every day every way, at work and at play. This I vow, each morning now, when rises here, another chance, another choice. Proudly, for my happiness, with my head up and forward, I shall be, at my best, my very, very noble best. === “What Can One Do?” is also a title to an article by Ayn Rand, in her January 3, 1972, The Ayn Rand Letter Vol I-7. Republished in Philosophy: Who Needs It? The article’s theme is: “The role of the individual in the philosophical re-education of the country.” Excerpts: “The battle is primarily intellectual (philosophical), not political. Politics is the last consequence, the practical implementation, of the fundamental (metaphysical-epistemological-ethical) ideas that dominate a given nation's culture. You cannot fight or change the consequences without fighting and changing the cause; nor can you attempt any practical implementation without knowing what you want to implement.” “If you want to influence a country's intellectual trend, the first step is to bring order to your own ideas and integrate them into a consistent case, to the best of your knowledge and ability.” “. . . when you ask "What can one do?"—the answer is "SPEAK" (provided you know what you are saying).” “If a dictatorship ever comes to this country, it will be by the default of those who keep silent. We are still free enough to speak. Do we have time? No one can tell. But time is on our side—because we have an indestructible weapon and an invincible ally (if we learn how to use them): reason and reality.” ===

For your enjoyment, here (with permission) is a 5-page comic-book story by Aura Pon, with contribution from her young sons. It's a light-heated story about the power of reason to change minds for the better. Aura is a PhD musician, composer and oboist.

[This was written as part of a message to my grandson for his recent 10th birthday. He is an intelligent, articulate, and athletic free learner who doesn't go to government school, won''t eat animals, and is a healthy, happy individualist.] Self-Sufficient - being Smart, Strong, and Straight Being Smart is Knowing clearly what’s real and what’s not. Discovering what exists, what it does, and what goes together or not. Learning well your words, numbers, pictures, and sounds. Understanding deeply who you are, where you’re going, and why. Seeking with reason what is true, what is good, and what has beauty. Being Strong is Working smart and working hard, using your mighty mind. Spending all the energy and effort it takes to get it done. Making the best and most of your life, not settling for less. Never giving in to fear or despair, holding tight your love and joy. Fighting for your rights without surrender, with goodwill constant. Being Straight is Staying smart and strong, pointing always at your shining star. Keeping on your true course until the end, unbent and unbroken. Moving up and forward – free and flexible, curious and caring. Honoring your principles and promises, having solid integrity. Aiming proudly for your noble purpose, striving for romantic happiness. ------ Image: "Out of the Box" by Bryan Larsen

Hi Stephen, You wrote, “I'd say that Rand's neglect of the "you," such as I think true to romantic love, as in my second paragraph above, was an error, specifically, a not fully evicting yet the egocentric from the kingdom of self-esteem." About “evicting…the egocentric”: One who doesn’t care about friends and beloved is not “egocentric” - just as one who disrespects or violates the rights of another isn’t “selfish”. In both cases, they disrespect and subvert the integrity of their own selves and fail to value and care for the friends and beloved they claim to cherish. When the “I” doesn’t care for the “you” in “I love you”, the “I” is primarily not caring about the “I”; only as consequence that the “I” doesn’t care about the “you” (or the "I" is being insincere about loving the "you"). Without first knowing and caring about the “I”, one couldn’t truly know which “you” complements the “I” and is deserving of love. About Ayn Rand’s “neglect of the ‘you’”: it doesn’t exist – as vividly shown in her art, e.g., in the love between Dagny and Galt, Roark and Dominique, Roark and Wynand, Francisco for Rearden, Rearden for Wet Nurse, and Roark for Mallory. Ayn Rand, as a person, is extraordinarily benevolent and loving, as reported by a myriad of friends who knew her. (See books, 100 Voices, Facets of Ayn Rand, Letters of Ayn Rand; and in refutation of Brandens’ memoirs, see The Passion of Ayn Rand’s Critics.) In Ayn Rand’s own words (from “The Ethics of Emergencies”, in Virtue of Selfishness😞 ---- “Love and friendship are profoundly personal, selfish values: love is an expression and assertion of self-esteem, a response to one's own values in the person of another. One gains a profoundly personal, selfish joy from the mere existence of the person one loves. It is one's own personal, selfish happiness that one seeks, earns and derives from love.” “Any action that a man undertakes for the benefit of those he loves is not a sacrifice if, in the hierarchy of his values, in the total context of the choices open to him, it achieves that which is of greatest personal (and rational) importance to him.” “The proper method of judging when or whether one should help another person is by reference to one's own rational self-interest and one's own hierarchy of values: the time, money or effort one gives or the risk one takes should be proportionate to the value of the person in relation to one's own happiness.” “The virtue involved in helping those one loves is not ‘selflessness' or ‘sacrifice’, but integrity. Integrity is loyalty to one's convictions and values; it is the policy of acting in accordance with one's values, of expressing, upholding and translating them into practical reality. If a man professes to love a woman, yet his actions are indifferent, inimical or damaging to her, it is his lack of integrity that makes him immoral.” “The same principle applies to relationships among friends. If one's friend is in trouble, one should act to help him by whatever nonsacrificial means are appropriate. For instance, if one's friend is starving, it is not a sacrifice, but an act of integrity to give him money for food rather than buy some insignificant gadget for oneself, because his welfare is important in the scale of one's personal values. If the gadget means more than the friend's suffering, one had no business pretending to be his friend.” ----- As for her generalized love for humanity, Ayn Rand writes (in “The Goal of My Writing”, in Romantic Manifesto😞 ---- “It is a significant commentary on the present state of our culture that I have become the object of hatred, smears, denunciations, because I am famous as virtually the only novelist who has declared that her soul is not a sewer and neither are the souls of her characters, and neither is the soul of man. The motive and purpose of my writing can best be summed up by saying that if a dedication page were to precede the total of my work, it would read: To the glory of Man." ----

Hi Stephen, Thanks for your good comments. You wrote, “…one must first be a definite self, and know what that is, and one must first also be able see another and care about seeing that other…” It’s true that, like the saying goes, “It takes two to tango”, and “I love you” inextricably joins “I” with “you”. Ayn Rand, in the prefacing quotation, does not deny that, but gives moral-psychological priority to the “I”. You wrote, “I don’t recall any writer advocating selfless love when it comes to romantic love.” To do so, to equate or to bind selfless love with romantic love, would be mutually contradictory (which is why I opposed the two in my precis). You seem to hold a favorable view of agape: as being a generalized, abstract love for humanity. Yet agape (in contrast to eros) is extolled by altruist ethics, such as the prevalent Judeo-Christian morality, as an unconditional, unearned, and unselfish love, a including "brotherly love". But "brotherly love”, if not based on some true chosen value to oneself, is really an “other-ly love” behind the cover of “br-”. Yes, Kant is an advocate of abject selflessness, of pure duty-bound, "commanded" love, love without any inclination or desire, indeed, love in spite of and because of disgust and aversion: “…love as an inclination cannot be commanded But beneficence from duty, when no inclination impels it and even when it is opposed by a natural and unconquerable aversion, is practical love, not pathological love; it resides In the will and not in the propensities of feeling, in principles of action and not in tender sympathy; and it alone can be commanded.” (Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals, middle of First Section, ~p16)

Image of typical depiction of paragon of selfless love

Image of "Alchemy", sculpture by Danielle Anjou

Image of "Love's Light in Flight", sculpture by Danielle Anjou