Why Dont any Major Objectivists Participate in Online Forums?

[Jon Southall]

Jonathan. It's great to see your contributions to this forum, I thank you.

[Eiuol]

3 hours ago, Jonathan13 said:

How are you not understanding that that's exactly what I'm doing?!!!

I'm explaining to young, amateur philosophy hobbyists and unskilled promoters of Rand's ideas how to curb their irrational instincts, unearned and unwarranted hubris and zealotry, and improve their methods.

Well fine, and I'm not saying it's wrong to talk about things you think are an issue. But what you're saying is an issue isn't as much an issue as you make it out to be, at least here. I'm not being defensive, I'm saying your solutions I agree with, but they are things already done when it comes to moderating. There is no criticism being censored or banned. There is nothing akin to a loyalty oath on this website, nor should there be. It is true that moderation occurs when people disagree, but that doesn't mean the cause of the moderation was disagreement. Even cases like that are not frequent, almost absent.
 
The one interesting point you have is to actively seek out criticism, which I don't think is the goal of this forum. But it would be interesting to do in other ways. That brings us to the OP. Why don't major Objectivists participate in online forums? Probably because it doesn't serve their goals well. As was mentioned by Bluecherry's post just before Harrison joined in the thread, people who participate contribute less probably because they're less interested in taking a teaching role. This would especially apply to major Objectivists who would rather move to addressing the public at large or non-Objectivists.

If you are asking me personally if I act like I have confidence in Rand's and my ideas, I do. No one here who is a moderator is actively censoring anyone, and if opposition did post here, no one would snarkily impede them. That is, if there were opposition and I vociferously spoke against it, I would not moderate them as long as they speak without unwarranted hubris and zealotry. I don't think anyone else would.

So when I ask how you would help change things, I'm asking for more specifics on either how to get a major Objectivists to participate in forums, or the equivalent of increasing social relevancy. What you suggest for this forum at least is already done, so what would you do next?

Edited April 5, 2016 by Eiuol

[JASKN]

4 hours ago, Jonathan13 said:

The Objectivists who call me rude are generally the ones whom I've defeated in arguments, and who are resentful that I've destroyed their poses as being brilliant and guru-like. It can be very upsetting for people to be shown to have been wrong, and on a very elementary level, after they were crafting an image of themselves as being very intelligent and important.

You've got an ax to grind and show up only to spew criticism in vile ways. Who would want to take "method" advice from you?

[JASKN]

4 hours ago, Jonathan13 said:

It's all just a set of tactics to avoid substance or evade admitting to errors.

You seem to know the people you hate very well, to be so sure of their true motivations.

[JASKN]

5 hours ago, Jonathan13 said:

They should be eagerly inviting criticism and debate on Objectivism, especially from academia, rather than running away from it and doing the best to prevent it.

The owners and moderators here should be doing the same thing, albeit on a smaller level.

Refusing to engage does not imply evading.

[Not Lawliet]

I guess I came in late to this thread. Thought I'd throw my two cents in. I think it would be great for *us* if major Objectivists participated in forums, but it would be a waste of their talents, and not in their own interests. They've likely got their own circle of Objectivist friends without forums, and they can better propagate Objectivism through public debates and visits to colleges.

Edited April 6, 2016 by Not Lawliet

[Jonathan13]

17 hours ago, Jon Southall said:

Jonathan. It's great to see your contributions to this forum, I thank you.

Thank YOU!

J

[Jonathan13]

12 hours ago, JASKN said:

You've got an ax to grind and show up only to spew criticism in vile ways. Who would want to take "method" advice from you?

Hey everyone, see what I'm talking about?

Thin-skinned mischaracterization of my posts, smugness, condescension and bitterness. Throwing gasoline on the fire.

J

[Jonathan13]

12 hours ago, JASKN said:

You seem to know the people you hate very well, to be so sure of their true motivations.

Indeed, I do know them very well. I know them by their actions. Observing years of people's behavior is a very reliable way of discovering their motivations. They're predictable, testable.

J

[Jonathan13]

12 hours ago, JASKN said:

Refusing to engage does not imply evading.

Refusing, alone, doesn't necessarily imply evading. But it does imply evading when combined with other chronic patterns of behavior, such as bluffing and blustering, censoring and banning, puffing and posing, vilifying, bullying and then immediately playing victim, demanding that others treat one with more civility and respect than one extends to them, tough talk but an unwillingness to step outside of one's cloistered turf or safe space.

It all adds up. It's not one element out of context, but multiple elements over years of context.

J

[Jonathan13]

Let's try it this way.

Let's imagine one of the "major" Objectivists showing up here, and doing so under a pseudonym (he wants to test the waters before revealing who he is -- he wants to see if this site is truly Objectivist, and that its owners, administrators, moderators and regular posters are worthy of his valuable time).

Okay, so, after signing up here, he happens to open the most recent thread that he sees, and reads that certain people are making claims about "man's life" being the standard of aesthetic judgments.

He recognizes this as false, and says so, but also provides reasoning and evidence that Rand separated ethical judgments from aesthetic ones. He demonstrates that Rand's view was that one need not like or agree with the philosophical content expressed in a work of art in order to rate it as aesthetically great. He shows that Rand's view was that an artist could show mankind as vicious and monstrous yet his work could still be judged as being aesthetically great despite being morally abhorrent. He provides quotes that the Objectivist position is that "man's life" is not the standard by which Objectivists should judge a work of art's aesthetic value, but rather the standard is how well the artist expressed his own view of existence, regardless of whether that view is pro-man or anti-man.

He then looks in his private message box and sees that a moderator is informing him that his post has been removed, and the moderator's "reasoning" is that the pseudonymous major Objectivist was intentionally trying to misconstrue and misrepresent Rand's position.

Heh.

Do you think that he would stick around? Do you think he'd rate OO as being worthy of his time?

J

[Jonathan13]

This post will probably be removed (or not allowed in the first place), but I just wanted to state, for the record, that I posted a response to Eiuol's last post, but it's been removed. Interesting how that works, no? Here, on a thread where we're being reassured that moderation and nannying isn't happening, my post gets removed.

J

[DonAthos]

9 minutes ago, Jonathan13 said:

This post will probably be removed (or not allowed in the first place), but I just wanted to state, for the record, that I posted a response to Eiuol's last post, but it's been removed. Interesting how that works, no? Here, on a thread where we're being reassured that moderation and nannying isn't happening, my post gets removed.

J

Quite honestly, I believe that what's going on in this thread currently is as much about personal matters and history as it is about anything else. I'd rather we all stick to discussing issues.

Does this site's moderation have to do with why some Objectivists ("major" or otherwise) may choose to interact here? Possibly. And I think we can have that discussion in the abstract, and it's certainly relevant to the thread, but I would rather it not devolve into accusations about either specific moderators (who do make mistakes, occasionally) or posters (who can, too).

Here's what I can say, for sure. If you'd like to make arguments either criticizing Rand's aesthetics, or defending what you believe to be her position, it will not be moderated/hidden. Those arguments are welcome. Insofar as there are personal insults or flames peppered in posts, well, that's subject to moderation and it is not advised (from either side of any debate).

[Jonathan13]

9 minutes ago, DonAthos said:

Here's what I can say, for sure. If you'd like to make arguments either criticizing Rand's aesthetics, or defending what you believe to be her position, it will not be moderated/hidden. Those arguments are welcome.

Well, the reality is that I have been moderated for disabusing others of their mistaken opinions on the Objectivist Esthetics, and for informing them of Rand's actual positions. I posted a link earlier that covered the issue in detail.

And, seriously, I'm not upset about it. I laugh about it. I share it with others as a source of amusement. The point, though, is that if you want to be taken seriously, and have "major" Objectivists participate in your online forum, it's not going to happen if you have moderators who assert that Rand held positions which she did not, and then they censor the people who correct them.

Now, it you're saying that those old days of such censorship on OO are gone, then, hey, I hope you're right. From my perspective, though, it's not looking as rosy as people are claiming.

J

 

[Eiuol]

54 minutes ago, Jonathan13 said:

This post will probably be removed (or not allowed in the first place), but I just wanted to state, for the record, that I posted a response to Eiuol's last post, but it's been removed. Interesting how that works, no? Here, on a thread where we're being reassured that moderation and nannying isn't happening, my post gets removed.

J

I mean, I know that you would prefer literally no moderation of anything and would prefer that my standards of civility are your standards of civility, but it doesn't follow that there is a massive issue of censorship preventing any intellectual growth of Objectivism. What I'm trying to find out is how you would promote intellectual and productive discussions (rather than bickering between each other). Suppose moderation were perfect for you. What else would you suggest next to encourage  intellectual growth?

 

[Jonathan13]

3 hours ago, Eiuol said:

I mean, I know that you would prefer literally no moderation of anything and would prefer that my standards of civility are your standards of civility, but it doesn't follow that there is a massive issue of censorship preventing any intellectual growth of Objectivism. What I'm trying to find out is how you would promote intellectual and productive discussions (rather than bickering between each other). Suppose moderation were perfect for you. What else would you suggest next to encourage  intellectual growth?

I haven't been arguing against civility, but against the instances where people have been censored for their views regardless of how polite they were.

And you're still not hearing what I've been saying. How would I promote intellectual and productive discussions? Invite and encourage criticism, and then answer it, if you can. If you can't answer it, then reconsider your opinion. Challenge people to try to demonstrate any ways in which Objectivism is wrong, or ways in which they think it might not have sufficient proof to back up some of its assertions. Dare them to try to knock Objectivism's block off.

Treat philosophy as an objective science. Science doesn't exclude, prevent and resent testing and criticism. Objectivism is a proposed theory. Many of its supporters have self-graded it as superb, if not perfect. Well, the next step is inviting people who are not its supporters to test it and criticize it. The next objective step in the process is to encourage doubters and the harshest critics to throw everything they've got at and try to disprove any or all of it.

[Eiuol]

I split the thread to here.

[Harrison Danneskjold]

On 4/6/2016 at 4:05 PM, Jonathan13 said:

Let's imagine one of the "major" Objectivists showing up here, and doing so under a pseudonym (he wants to test the waters before revealing who he is -- he wants to see if this site is truly Objectivist, and that its owners, administrators, moderators and regular posters are worthy of his valuable time).

Okay, so, after signing up here, he happens to open the most recent thread that he sees, and reads that certain people are making claims about "man's life" being the standard of aesthetic judgments.

I knew it! You're Harry Binswanger! 

 

On 4/5/2016 at 6:55 PM, Eiuol said:

The one interesting point you have is to actively seek out criticism, which I don't think is the goal of this forum.

Why not? This is an excellent place for it.

 

I've started numerous threads here, for the explicit purpose of opening my own ideas up to criticism. If they're wrong, someone will point it out in relatively short order. If nobody here can find any holes in my theory then it's basically been certified as a grade-A contextual certainty.

I mean, it can't replace the critical analysis of my own mind, but as a final Quality-Control step it really does provide an unparalleled service. I get some help in forming the best conclusions I possibly can and everyone else gets to show off their philosophical chops.

 

Who doesn't win from that?