What are some counter-cultural rules you live by?

[stansfield123]

By "counter-cultural", I mean that the vast majority of people in your society don't live by that rule. I don't mean that it's frowned upon, I just mean that most people don't follow it. No reason to restrict this just to stuff people openly disagree with. Anything people refuse to live by is "counter-cultural", whether they claim to agree with it or not.

[DavidOdden]

I suppose first there has to be a “rule”. In my culture (the US), very few people use hanh phi in cooking and they don’t eat ugali, but that isn’t a “rule”, it’s a cultural accident that it isn’t a commonly-known option. It’s not really a “cultural rule” that people don’t have a Ph D or that you aren’t an accountant. There are cultural prohibitions against incest, theft, loud noises in the middle of the night. public nudity, using the N word, and so on. Any legal prohibition is a cultural rule against doing that thing. One other thing: norms for children are not the same as norms for adults, so we ought to limit the context to adult behavior.

It is a cultural rule that a man stands up when a lady enters the room, however the vast majority of (male) adults do not follow this rule. Now, I’m old enough that I am aware of this rule, but I suspect that this rule was quietly repealed by the cultural legislators in the early 70’s. So it’s not entirely clear that there is any such a rule, and maybe we should say that it is a former rule.

There is a new cultural rule of language that every adjective must be preceded by the adverb “super”. I refuse to abide by that rule. I know a number of people who don’t abide by that rule, but I don’t know if they are aware that there is this rule – in a few cases, I know that they are aware and they refuse, for the majority, they may be unaware that this is a rule.

There is also a cultural rule regarding copying intellectual property without the permission of the owner. A considerable percentage of those who violate this rule do so willfully i.e. they refuse to follow the rule, but an even bigger percentage don’t follow the rule because they misunderstand the rule (usually thinking it only applies to copying for profit but not copying for personal use or the use of friends and family).

In short, there are zillions of rules that most people don’t follow, mostly because they don’t know that there is such a rule, or believe that the rule has been repealed.

[Reidy]

Shirts on the left, sorted left to right from least to most recently washed. Pants on the right, sorted in the same sequence. Continuing to the right, around the corner: washed but not ironed, then worn but not yet ready for the laundry, neither in any special order.

[stansfield123]

When I said "rule", I meant that YOU have a rule which you consciously set up, for yourself, to go against a cultural trend. Not that you go against a cultural rule. Frankly, I don't think popular rules mean much, because most people are neither rule followers, nor rule makers. Most people just follow their culture by default (by virtue of an absence of thinking about rules).

Just to give a simple example of a rule I have: I noticed, in my youth, that many of my peers got into debt by spending on consumer goods. So I set up a rule for myself: never buy consumer goods on credit. Note that these other people, who got into debt, weren't following any societal rule. They were in fact not thinking about rules at all. They just sensed, intuitively, that it's culturally permitted to buy a big TV on credit, and they wanted to have a big TV. That was the extent of it. There's no societal rule for or against buying consumer goods on credit. I'm the only one with a rule, in this story. No one else has one.

The reason why I ask is because Objectivism is considered, I would say by most, to be a counter-cultural movement. A "radical" belief system, which implies that it's radically different from other belief systems. Even Rand herself embraced the "radical" label. And I'm not as convinced that it is, in fact, that different. In fact, I think Objectivism is, first and foremost, a coherent synthesis of ~10K years of accumulated human knowledge. So, about as traditional as it gets.

I think one of the ways to determine just how radical Oism is is precisely by asking Objectivists the above question. To see if people who live by Objectivism do actually live in a way that's radically different from the way everyone else lives.

Because truly radical ideologies do produce a radically different life style. If I walked into an Amish community and asked this, they would have a long list of rules they live by, that make their lives fundamentally different from the lives of everyone else. Same if it was a radical marxist, a radical environmentalist, a neo-nazi, a radical whatever the Unabomber was, etc. Radical means different. And I'm struggling to see how Objectivists are different...myself included. We're (hopefully) a bit more deliberate in our actions and decision making, but does that actually produce a DIFFERENT LIFE? Doesn't seem like it does. Rand's life wasn't really different, was it? She lived like a typical successfully self employed woman of her time would live ...

Edited November 22 by stansfield123

[Boydstun]

1 hour ago, stansfield123 said:

. . . 

I think one of the ways to determine just how radical Oism is is precisely by asking Objectivists the above question. To see if people who live by Objectivism do actually live in a way that's radically different from the way everyone else lives.

. . .

What meanings do the behaviors have to the agents? What is the understanding of the scope and context of the behaviors among people who all do the same acts such as deciding on what education they should pursue, acts such as making a living, acts such as driving safely, or acts such as being in and buoying a romantic relationship? Does not a more examined and self-conducted and understood life make one more alive? Is not human life with one's living mind among others more life than life of the wild animals? and are not the animals such as a fox or chipmunk more and higher life than plants? Is not "behavior" most fitting to actions of that middle group, the non-human animals? Who would want to imitate all the acts and whole arc of a human self-directed life and not instead be directing one's own acts and arc best one can? The former, the pure imitation, warrants focus on mere human behavior, the latter on a life that is actually human.

I share the distinctive policy and practice you mentioned for yourself. Who cares about radical differences in such things in comparison to wisdom in such things?

 

Edited November 22 by Boydstun

[stansfield123]

2 hours ago, Boydstun said:

Does not a more examined and self-conducted and understood life make one more alive?

Of course it does. But this isn't a radical idea. This is just the age-old definition of a (true) intellectual.

I'm suggesting that this is what Ayn Rand was, and what she urges us to be as well: a true intellectual. She was a great one, and greatness is certainly unusual ... but it doesn't mean radical. Radical doesn't mean great, radical means different. Usually, in a bad way. Radical usually means someone who isn't willing to learn from the lessons of history.

I think Objectivism is great, but not that different. I think it's mostly the result of a 10K year long process of incremental improvement. It's not a radical kind of greatness, it's a traditional kind of greatness.

Quote

Who would want to imitate all the acts and whole arc of a human self-directed life and not instead be directing one's own acts and arc best one can? The former, the pure imitation, warrants focus on mere human behavior, the latter on a life that is actually human.

You say "imitate". But is it possible to produce good outcomes through mere imitation? Without the core ideas being present on some level, within that person living a good life?

People who never read Rand do have good lives, all around us, do they not? Are those lives not the product of good ideas? The same kinds of good ideas that we hold?

If let's say a Mormon or (religious) Jewish neighbor lives a life similar to yours, doesn't that mean his life is based on similar ideas to yours? Perhaps less clearly, but those ideas are still a part of him, and are still the cause of his way of life, are they not? It's not just imitation: surely there are degrees of clarity and understanding, not just "imitation vs. understanding"?

[Boydstun]

I wasn't saying that any real people are living a life by purely imitation. I was making a thought experiment.

I don't know about Mormons in particular, stansfield, but all people have some way or other of responding to the circumstance that when anyone dies, that is the total absolute end of that individual. Only memories and presence in some minds continuing for a while after one, continue one somewhat for that while. Some people will do almost anything to avoid squarely facing that fact, including burning fellows at the stake for rocking the collective religious psychosis denying the plain fact of full death.

Objectivists and the way they should assimilate their mortality is not enormously different from others acknowledging that the natural world is all there is. Except that, for one important thing, the Objectivist knows that it is only in the circumstance of being alive that there are such things as alternatives, aims, problems, health, bettering, or making worse. So not only does the Objectivist leave behind God's backing as source of moral standards (however correct some of those rules might be from a purely rational standpoint), the Objectivist has a particular natural source of values, aside other natural-value theories subscribed to by other secularists.

The major virtues in Rand's moral philosophy are some usual ones at least in name. But when she defines them, they are often given a different, new meaning. And they end up having a stronger unity with each other than usual. Then too, some traditional virtues are rejected in this ethical theory. 

Along the roadway in front of a neighborhood shopping center near our home, there recently appeared some signs, presumably for some local organized charity, saying "Give good." If I understand correctly, the meaning includes a usual tying of giving to others less fortunate as of great moral significance. Actually, many people's notion of what morality is is most typified by such giving as in "yes there is a Santa Claus for children everywhere you find unselfish love." The Objectivist will dispute that such gifts are the core of what is the moral. It is unlikely these different, contrasting understandings result in no differences in actions. I don't think, however, that your search for radical differences in actions because of radical differences in morality is a reasonable expectation. Most human actions are overdetermined: multiple sufficient reasons are in play in the head of the decision maker for a given decision. Similarly, many variations among different individuals in accounts, radically different, of what is moral action in a situation need not be revealed by radical differences in actions.

Moreover, as Rand conveyed in her Galt's Speech, any success and joy attained in any human life was on account of living in some accord with the moral code she was putting forth.

Edited November 23 by Boydstun

[EC]

Radical doesn't mean "different".

"Those who reject all the basic premises of collectivism are radicals in the proper sense of the word: “radical” means “fundamental.” Today, the fighters for capitalism have to be, not bankrupt “conservatives,” but new radicals, new intellectuals and, above all, new, dedicated moralists."

Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal “Conservatism: An Obituary,”

Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, 201

[DavidOdden]

You are correct that Objectivists do present Objectivism as being “radical” in some sense (in fact: it means "root" at least in Rand's usage) , but that is a contingent truth, not a defining property. In a cultural context where most people adhere to Objectivist principles, we would drop that characterization.

As a rhetorical device for summarizing our stance in relation to others, the term “radical” is more appropriate than “conservative”, “traditionalist”, or “liberal”. I am not personally invested in defending the sound-bite use of the term “radical”. It is true and accurate to say that Objectivism does not support a wide range of popular beliefs and practices, and perhaps we could talk about what those “counter-cultural” beliefs are. The system is radically different from all other previous systems, although individual statements with which we agree and have even adopted can be found historically over the past 2,000 years or so (extending this back 10,000 years is too much of a stretch, or too little, since humans learned how to make fire much further in the past, and learned how to hunt even before we were humans). That is, the system is more than just the individual parts, it is the logical relations between the parts. The system has been sorely lacking, historically.

We don’t have long lists of rules, because we have a system, whereas the Amish (perhaps) have long lists and no system. The principle of “simplicity” is belied by the fact that they have clothing styles that are 400 or so years old – not 10,000 – that they use domesticated animals, metal chisels.

The most productive way that I know of to understand the practical application of Objectivism is to focus on a comparison of why you act the way you do, and how that differs from how other people act. The actual behavior may be same for Objectivists and non-Objectivists, but the chain of reasoning that leads to a choice will differ. Objectivist reasoning is not rooted in “the greater good”, whereas most people reduce their choices to some kind of social benefit.

[Doug Morris]

Objectivism is radical in its ideas, not necessarily in concrete behaviors.  Most people have enough grasp, on some level, of their true interests and of various rational ideas from various sources that they can come up with mostly decent choices and actions.

Objectivism protects us from various errors others can fall into, such as feeling or thinking that giving and/or helping is an obligation for them, feeling guilty because they supposedly haven't done it enough, confusion about where their interests lie, thinking that business is fundamentally immoral or amoral, buying into collectivist and statist ideas, or thinking that mysticism is necessary in order to have morality.

 

[Eiuol]

On 11/22/2023 at 3:17 PM, stansfield123 said:

but does that actually produce a DIFFERENT LIFE?

Well, even in your examples, people lead different lives relative to the beliefs they hold. To the extent that I believe similar things as people around me, I am like other people. But to the extent that people adopt their own code, the less they will fit into a specific "mold". You don't need a different analysis than that.