Male Female differences/ Women Presidents etc

[IAmMetaphysical]

Your response to this question will necessarily involve a circular argument because this is what your whole theory is built on. A beard will be called "unessential" to the "theme" of the male body because YOU have decided that the male body is a symbol of efficacy "as a whole". You say that one will see a certain theme from these features only by "disregarding a few of these features".

It is this that is an argument against objectivity, you are directing it at symbolism but it applies the same to concepts. The answers to your questions are in ITOE, about how one goes about figuring out what a concept's distinguishing characteristic is and the process in which one forms concepts objectively. When I say that I do not wish to discuss it with you here it is NOT AN ARGUMENT, or a fallacy, it is the cessation of argument. I am not trying to suggest that your argument is invalid because I say so, and that the book is the argument HERE. I am stopping the conversation with you. My discussions on this board, unless they involve a discussion of fundamentals, are had with the assumption that the person I am discussing with has a basic understanding and agreement with certain fundamental principles, and that I can then discuss higher application of those principles with them. It is in these cases where I do not wish to get sidetracked into actually having to defend those fundamental principles.

[blackdiamond]

It is this that is an argument against objectivity, you are directing it at symbolism but it applies the same to concepts. The answers to your questions are in ITOE, about how one goes about figuring out what a concept's distinguishing characteristic is and the process in which one forms concepts objectively. When I say that I do not wish to discuss it with you here it is NOT AN ARGUMENT, or a fallacy, it is the cessation of argument. I am not trying to suggest that your argument is invalid because I say so, and that the book is the argument HERE. I am stopping the conversation with you. My discussions on this board, unless they involve a discussion of fundamentals, are had with the assumption that the person I am discussing with has a basic understanding and agreement with certain fundamental principles, and that I can then discuss higher application of those principles with them. It is in these cases where I do not wish to get sidetracked into actually having to defend those fundamental principles.

IAmMeta,

Are you now denying that you have contradicted yourself?

Hey, look. You obviously do have the right to cease discussion and i will make no attempt at stopping you because this discussion has now lost any value to me for as long as you continue to evade a simple point.

But you must consider that there is a very high chance that you are the one who has misunderstood the theory of concept-formation as it applies to symbolism. Why? Because there appears to be some contradictions in your statements that i have brought out through my last two posts. You said one thing earlier, but when i pointed out how it contradicts your theory [that there is only ONE correct theme for the human body], you simply refer me to ITOE. (If the first part of my post is flawed, this does not mean the questions i have asked in that same post are not valid; so you could just point out the flaw and still answer the question since the question is independently built on your own statements, as my last post shows). it was you who said that one object can symbolise different things, not me. And it is you who has failed to show why the body has the special status of only symbolising one thing and nothing else when other objects can symbolise more than one thing. And it is you who stated that you ignore some attributes of the body in order for your symbolism to work, but have shown no reasons why someone else can't ignore other attributes and use the same body to symbolise something else. ITOE can not answer these contradictions, only YOU can.

You must also realise that i would have some grounds for being skeptical about your understanding of concept-formation and symbolism simply because the one who wrote those books apparently failed to see the "symbolism" of the male and female bodies the way you do and instead came to the same "false" conclusion of masculinity's relationship to femininity as those of us who have failed to understand ITOE. If your theory is so obviously connected to what Rand wrote on epistemology and aesthetics, i wonder why she and the other Objectivist experts could not make the apparently obvious and simple step to your theory.[1]

I suspect that the reason is simply that they would have to face the same logical contradictions you have now come against. But i doubt they would simply evade them by asking people to just read all their books.

[1.this is not an argument, by the way, just grounds to suspect that you might be the one who might have misunderstood these other books on which your theory is supposedly based.]

[IAmMetaphysical]

You must also realise that i would have some grounds for being skeptical about your understanding of concept-formation and symbolism simply because the one who wrote those books apparently failed to see the "symbolism" of the male and female bodies the way you do and instead came to the same "false" conclusion of masculinity's relationship to femininity as those of us who have failed to understand ITOE. If your theory is so obviously connected to what Rand wrote on epistemology and aesthetics, i wonder why she and the other Objectivist experts could not make the apparently obvious and simple step to your theory.[1]

Suspicion from authority. I do not believe Ayn Rand failed to see it as her characters are very good examples of symbolism and the very nature of those symbols I have been saying. But I really don't care to discuss whether or not Ayn Rand might have agreed with me or not, I'm interested in the truth. When I talk about "correct" theme, or "valid" concepts I am taking the widest context of human knowledge.

There is no contradiction to what I have said, you have merely misunderstood and misrepresented my position. I never said that the gender symbolize ONLY one thing, without context. That is the part you have continually failed to grasp; the fact that I am not positing intrinsicism. I have always maintained that the genders symbolism a certain thing in a certain context, and that they are something different in different contexts, e.g. in more primitive societies. Context is very important here and you keep disregarding it.

[blackdiamond]

I do not believe Ayn Rand failed to see it as her characters are very good examples of symbolism and the very nature of those symbols I have been saying. But I really don't care to discuss whether or not Ayn Rand might have agreed with me or not, I'm interested in the truth. When I talk about "correct" theme, or "valid" concepts I am taking the widest context of human knowledge.

Characters in a novel can indeed be symbols of some abstract concepts, as can muscles in a painting. But this does not mean that real people in life, no matter how much they behave like characters from novels, are symbols of anything, and neither does it mean that the real muscles on any real person are symbols of anything either. Your body is NOT a work of art and it has NO "theme". This is just your fruitful imagination at work.

Even your car parked in your garage is not a symbol of anything, but in a work of art it can be used to symbolise something (something reflected in its properties); this does not mean that cars you see in real life are in fact symbols of abstract concepts. Of course a designer can deliberately decide to represent an abstract concept in his design of a car or building, and it then becomes partly a work of art. But it is not a work or symbol of art just because it is an entity and has certain attributes.

And because of this, it is just wrong to say that the human body is a work of art or a symbol of abstract concepts. It is not, except when it's on canvas - or in a novel - and presented as auch.

That is the part you have continually failed to grasp.

[IAmMetaphysical]

Still dropping context...

[IAmMetaphysical]

I was just thinking and I realized I made a mistake, and need to elaborate. The paragraph I quoted from you, Blackdaimond, was not an argument against objectivity, but a request for explanation, an explanation I would rather not give. That is why I referred you to ITOE, because Rand explains it better than I could ever praphrase and I don't feel like searching through it and finding the relevant quotes for you. I just ask you to re-evaluate what you think it is I am propounding as I am not saying and never said anything to imply(at least I hope I haven't) that I am talking about symbolism without context. Even in this response to Hunterrose you can see the importance of context:

A woman should realize that her body appears a certain way to others and that it refers to higher level concepts whether she wants it to or not. IF she wants to be a model (and is feminine) she would be a better model if she chose to model and portray those things which her body refers to the best. In non-artistic endeavors, the fact that her body symbolizes certain things would only come up really in terms of attracting a mate, if her mate is attracted to femininity. So I guess my short answer is: "It doesn't matter much."

[blackdiamond]

I was just thinking and I realized I made a mistake, and need to elaborate. The paragraph I quoted from you, Blackdaimond, was not an argument against objectivity, but a request for explanation, an explanation I would rather not give. That is why I referred you to ITOE...

Thanks.

Perhaps you misunderstood my request. You see, i believe i do understand Objectivist concept-formation, including the function of essentialisation in the process. I just just don't see how you applied it in your case when you stated that a beard, for example, is unessential in your symbolism, when it's essential in your particular definition, of masculinity. I just can't see why the beard is any more unessential than a deep voice, for example, in establishing what masculinity symbolises, unless you are working backwards from the "context" of your own answer - efficacy - which is why i said you would need a circular argument.

You can't just say ALL these attributes are all part of the concept "masculinity", but these and these must be disregarded for the symbolism, and yet masculinity "as a whole" symbolises x. You can't have your cake and eat it, Meta. You just can't.