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ttime

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Everything posted by ttime

  1. It's also important to remember that different people have different goals in their lives (and these could themselves all be equally moral), which is an important factor in determining how to act. Basically, the question (in very broad terms) that each person must ask themselves before making a choice is "Is this a sacrifice, or a profit?". It doesn't make sense to draw from this, as your friend did, that morality is not absolute. Morality is merely contextual, and to divorce it from context is to divorce it from reality.
  2. Yeah, one gets "popular" when you "Friend" everyone that comes into the chat :P

  3. I realize you think this, but I am asking you, that if you claim that people are justified in believing things just because things seem that way to them, then why are you even arguing about anything? Are you trying to change the way things "seem" to us? But even if you were, if we already have a way of interpreting what you say according to what "seems" to be true, what makes you think you could get a point across? Okay, then give me the standard by which a belief can be said to "seem true".
  4. The problem is precisely that if there is no criterion by which one is justified with respect to propositions other than what things seem like to certain people, it just brings us back to our original point of disagreement with no real way of being sure whether or not our beliefs have anything to do with reality and to what degree. If you reject the possibility of certain knowledge entirely, then that is another issue, but I am assuming that this is not the case. Simply put: that epistemological view essentially says, you are justified in believing something if you think that you are justified. And this means that we have no real referent for the concept of justification; i.e., it is meaningless.
  5. Aristotle brought about the first philosophic foundations necessary for science to succeed with his views of causality and identity. And he was not Christian.
  6. And if I held the belief that weak foundationalism was wrong because it seemed to not be true, what then? Such an "epistemology" leads us nowhere.
  7. ttime

    Objectivist Music

    "Time" by Hans Zimmer is amazing, it's on the Inception soundtrack. It really captures my sense of life. It sounds like something that should go with Atlas Shrugged.
  8. This scenario is nonsensical. A non-elected leader has already violated rights; if he was not elected, I assume you mean he took power by force. And why would an Objectivist want to be a dictator? As 2046 said, the system of government itself would contradict his political principles. Anyway, we are not yet at the stage where it is proper to throw out the current government by force; however, that may be proper at some later stage if it develops into a full dictatorship where it is literally impossible to live a rational life.
  9. I recommend some time thinking about it a lot more every day for a little while, and observe instances of people being dishonest (it's everywhere, shouldn't be a problem) and try to find out what it does for them in terms of living a rational, reality-oriented life. And try to reduce the principle that honesty is good back to perceptual reality. Ask yourself: "What other concepts would I need to know/grasp in order to understand what honesty is and why it is good? And what would I need to know in order to understand those concepts?" And after a while, you will have traced the conceptual hierarchy back to its roots in observation.
  10. The liar is not acknowledging all facts of reality. Lying is a deliberate rearrangement of reality is an untruthful way in order to present it to other people. Deliberately rearranging one's view of reality like this is not conducive to living a rational, reality-oriented life. You might as well have said "the robber is acknowledging the principle of individual rights to himself, but he occasionally acts otherwise around other people."
  11. This is true, but does not tell us very much in the context of this conversation. "Material objects as such have neither value nor disvalue; they acquire value-significance only in regard to a living being—particularly, in regard to serving or hindering man’s goals." - Ayn Rand Let's examine this quote, for example. Now, something you want to acquire by cheating does not have a value as such. It is only a value if it is pursued or acquired in a certain way, and in a certain context. Another question: you said that something is a value if it objectively further's one's life. I assume you mean that the value you chose, then, was chosen by attending to the facts of reality. Would you agree with this? And then, consider this: what is the relationship between cheating or lying, and facts of reality?
  12. Let's go back to the fundamentals. What makes something an objective value? Is something a value, like the religionist would argue, just because he blindly believes it? Is something a value, like the hedonist would argue, just because he feels it?
  13. Where to begin... 1. PowerPoint isn't a medium of written communication, it's a digital means of communication. And what are you comparing it to, anyway? 2. What do you mean exactly by "made more efficient"? 3. When Peikoff makes the claim that knowledge is hierarchical, he is is primarily meaning it in the context of a discussion about concepts; i.e. we build up concepts from perceptual information and then from that our concepts get more and more abstract, in a hierarchical fashion. It is very useful to grasp this in order to be sure to "reduce" your concepts back to reality; that is, trace the 'hierarchy' of concepts back to the directly perceivable to check their validity. I don't know if this helps you, since you should already know this after reading the chapter, but I really don't think there is any meaningful connection to be made between this and Microsoft PowerPoint. Tristan
  14. Well, I think I would need a bit more information to say with certainty. However, assuming that the religious reference is minor, it would be irrational to use that as a reason for forsaking all the work that you already put into the musical; obviously, the religious aspect doesn't define the musical, and is nonessential, otherwise you probably wouldn't have loved it in the first place. The mindset of the newfound Rand fan in that context must be something along the lines of "Oh man, I really love this musical, but religion is evil and so I cannot sanction it in any way, therefore I must quit working in this musical!" This is an instance of context-dropping, because while religion is indeed evil, one is not necessarily sanctioning it by participating in a musical with a small religious reference. One can still work for and love the musical (and the most important parts of it), and still think the religious reference is wrong. The important thing here is: In this context, am I working for something that is essentially evil or essentially good? And, in this case, assuming you love the musical (and working on it) for the right reasons, the latter would be the correct answer. In any case, I would be interested to know how someone who worked hard for a musical only found out about a religious reference in it just shortly before it was staged. Tristan
  15. I would say that the main problem is trying to apply principles out of context, and failure to induce the principles individually to fully grasp them.
  16. Very interesting Grames, I had never thought of the solution to the is/ought problem in this way. Do you think it would be fair to say that the solution to the is/ought problem is self-evident? That is, the very labeling of it as a "problem" presupposes that one has made a connection between "is" and "ought" already? Or do you think that "self-evident" would be a misleading term in this particular context? Tristan
  17. You have a website for your music compositions?

  18. Creating, producing, thinking.

  19. I don't want to get too off topic, but what exactly makes you think that principles don't apply when you are close to dying? Whether or not you are close to dying is irrelevant to the source of morality. Morality derives from your nature as a human being, and then from your choice to live, and how to be consistent with that choice. It seems to me that even when you might die soon you have still chosen to live (made only more explicit in this particular case by the fact that you are taking out a loan) and you are still a rational being. In any case, I totally agree with David here...it is quite simply dishonest. I am not sure why, but it seems like a few of the recent threads here have been tinged with questions from a libertarian ethical perspective...remember that just because something is legal, does not mean it is moral. The scope of moral actions is not as wide as the scope of legal actions, despite the fact that Politics is based ultimately in Ethics. Tristan
  20. Same here. I think one of the best ways (for people new to Objectivism) to use this site is to read posts/ask questions while they are reading the non-fiction (most importantly "The Virtue of Selfishness"), that way they can ask questions to help clarify certain points they do not fully understand. Of course, even before doing this, it is probably good to have some sort of feel for Ayn Rand's philosophy by reading her fiction.
  21. I noticed he had some Rawls influence as well, especially identifying himself as a "liberal egalitarian." Incidentally, Hobhouse, do you believe that free will exists at all? That might be a good starting point before we discuss justice.
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