2 hours ago, softwareNerd said:
It’s really a different concept for which the same word is used.
I agree with your two contrasting distinctions. I am thinking different contexts (with/without force), along the axis of major/radical change. What you’re saying is less obvious to me than something like “rock”, the rock you can sit on, or the act, to rock your baby to sleep in a rocking chair.
Without intention of changing the debate to a question of what constitutes a revolution or what doesn’t, the industrial revolution also brought with it a very political change. As Ayn Rand pointed out in For the New Intellectual, for the first time in history, the producer became a major player in political affairs. All the same, it wasn’t intended as a rebellion, but it had much more sustainability than, for example, the Pheasant Revolt of the 14th century. In regard to my argument, mob actions or forms of violating private or public property would less likely advance a rational social change, whereas a more gradual and intellectual revolt may succeed, or may not succeed, but definitely would reduce the likelihood of an escalation to pitched confrontation, leading to destruction.
9 hours ago, Repairman said:
Go ahead and shout down whomever you wish. I don’t think that really impresses the sort of rational egoists needed for a more rational society. In fact, I would approve of some genuinely intelligent and proper humiliation of the perpetrators irrationality. It would help if we had a more public exposure accompanied by a charismatic spokesperson. Such is not the case at present.
Not sure what you mean by impresses an egoist. I mean, there is no enjoyable or fun way to deal with irrationality, so it’s not impressive that way. But if it is a genuine way to not let irrationality overwhelm you, it’s impressive that way.
If you do approve of some proper humiliation, we seem to mostly agree. I’m not suggesting it’s a first step, or it supercedes educating people as well. At the same time, it is an important element of political action to at times deliberately ignore manners and social norms. I don’t think big emphasis on freedom of speech as an ethical principle works at all for Objectivist ethics, and Don’s talk of optics is mostly a strategy discussion. So I’m trying to argue about political action as specifically related to virtues of justice and integrity.
“We may hold a shared opinion that Trump, the Pope, and Vladimir Putin are irrational. Yet, it is merely a subjective opinion until proven otherwise”
What do you mean? It doesn’t take arguing with them to really know.
Eioul,
To be sure, we can agree on a few things, maybe more. We may disagree on the proportion of emphasis on public displays of outrage, as opposed to more gradual and cerebral persuasion. To your first question, I wanted to place the emphasis on persuasion of more rational thinkers to take a closer look at Objectivism. One of the best means of communication is through comedy, so for example, we would be better served with a front-man/woman able to host a regular nightly comedy-news program-just an example. Hopefully, we may see a talent able to deliver “proper humiliation.”
17 minutes ago, Eiuol said:
If you do approve of some proper humiliation, we seem to mostly agree. I’m not suggesting it’s a first step, or it supercedes educating people as well. At the same time, it is an important element of political action to at times deliberately ignore manners and social norms.
We can agree that educating people is critical, I would say, the most important. As for protocol or etiquette, I really don’t care; anything goes until it breaks down into a name-calling contest.*
To call any opponent “irrational” without providing evidence is little more than name-calling. Even if we can judge, let’s take your example, Trump to be irrational, there are apparently a great many more people who judge him to perfectly rational. And the fact that he has such a fortune made through legal means helps their subjective opinions. But if Trump is the specific object of your opposition, I’d rather not construct an argument around this unfortunate success story. My primary concern is lending support to people who, like myself, had some vague idea of what is wrong with the world, and had no supporting comprehensive philosophy, nor a collection of thinkers, egoists, with which to exchange ideas, not for any other noble purpose than my own satisfaction.
*Incidentally, I would be insincere if I were to suggest that I’ve never engaged in a bit of bad manners, even on this forum. But if there were a chance of finding the common ground, I tend to more restrained.
3 minutes ago, Repairman said:
As for protocol or etiquette, I really don’t care; anything goes until it breaks down into a name-calling contest.*
But what if you knew that certain forms of “protocol” or “etiquette” lent you a greater chance at convincing a rational opponent – or the undecided? What if you knew that flouting such norms of civilization meant that otherwise rational people would tune you out, or increased your chances of getting into a “name-calling contest,” and destroying the possibility of rational discourse?
Would you care then?
3 minutes ago, Repairman said:
Incidentally, I would be insincere if I were to suggest that I’ve never engaged in a bit of bad manners, even on this forum. But if there were a chance of finding the common ground, I tend to more restrained.
I don’t think there’s a person on this forum (or possibly on the Internet) who is innocent of occasional lapses; I am unusually sensitive to this subject, not alone because I’ve been the recipient of “bad manners,” but because there are times when I lose control of my emotions and let myself fly, to some greater or lesser degree. And when I have done, I’ve made an effort to study the impact of such on myself, and on those with whom I’ve conversed, and on third parties, and the results I’ve witnessed suggest to me that it is typically a failure in every way. Where I’ve let my manners lapse – and where I’ve seen others do the same, whether as an emotional outburst or some supposedly rational calculation – I have yet to see some productive, positive outcome as a result.
At the same time, maintaining “good manners” doesn’t promise good outcomes… but I have come to believe that it at least allows for that possibility.
(For the record, Repairman, you are among one of the more pleasant posters, in my experience. Thank you.)
Otherwise – and I don’t plan a full response on this point, but just to note – I am dismayed that we are discussing “humiliation” as a positive tactic.
And one last thing, on the subject of the “irrational” (meaning: those who cannot be reached by reason, though I think the term has been equivocated a few times over the course of this thread), and the uselessness of persuasion in those cases, here’s an interesting little tidbit I’d come across recently. Once again, this is far short of a full argument, but I think it’s an illuminating story, and worth reflecting upon.
DonAthos,
If I may clarify: I am less concerned with the tactics used by others, and try to maintain my own standard. If there were to be a measurable spike in public interest of Ayn Rand, I certainly hope anyone speaking on behalf of “our side” reflects the highest standards of intelligence and wit. Having seen the rise of movements come and go over the years, I know of few that have the body of well-reasoned literature to guide such a movement as Objectivism. There are established institutes, of course, but I truly would hope to see the beginnings of a popular movement. From that, my only hope is that the participants maintain the dignity commonly seen on this forum. The conduct of a crowd can get ugly, so I’m not too favorable toward mobs of demonstrators, unless they’ve assembled orderly and purposefully. All said, I still see the greatest barrier to progress will be religion; one doesn’t have to be a religious fanatic to distrust or even hate atheists, (not saying all Objectivists are atheist, but many are), especially if they form a mob. That fact alone puts me on notice to conduct myself with a higher standard.
First, about irrationality. I’m not speaking of irrational as in wildly mistaken, or wildly ignorant. I mean what Rand means by at, as in evasive of facts. This is not from simple error, but a systematic failure to reason. Providing more facts will not dissuade them. Pointing out a contradiction will not matter, since reason does not motivate them. For sure some KKK members are mistaken and able to be persuaded by reason. By and large, though, they are purely irrational, a reasoned discussion will go nowhere. Those are the people that require a different response besides reasoning. All this talk about reasoning or communication is critical to political action, but I do not see how it is going to answer the proper response to irrationality when you have political goals. I see this as a starting point for figuring out a deeper theory of political action.
Next, yes, it is fine to feel dismayed that tactics besides reasoning or communication need to be discussed. But it makes me feel dismayed that any people are deeply irrational. We’re not pacifists, yet it would be fine to feel dismay for needing to retaliate at times. Similarly, ugly actions from others may require ugly response, even if non-political contexts I’d opt to ignore the person. In particular, political disagreements of opponents often lead to real action taken against you if it’s bad enough. But if a huge portion of that political disagreement is due to deep irrationality, what do you do?
Generally, I’m a fan of mockery if I know the side is not one of reason. Not just poking fun, but going further to demean them. I do not see it as different than loud protests, disregard of an oppenent, or overwhelming a side so it can’t be heard. This is all possible without subverting your dedication to individual rights. What tactics would work, and follow important virtues?
Also, I’m still interested about responses to my claims about “reflective equilibrium”. I’m saying that if we aim to let all people be heard fairly, even irrational people as I described, we’d be following a liberal playbook of liberal premises. I don’t mean non-liberal leftists - I mean more people that talk all about “we just need a discussion where all sides are heard!” I linked to an article on it, so it’s fine to argue that I didn’t quite understand your (Repairman and Don) position.
By the way, I’m interested in other aspects of political action. For example, is voting really a useful political act anyway?
4 hours ago, Eiuol said:
But if a huge portion of that political disagreement is due to deep irrationality, what do you do?
Apologies for these abbreviated replies; I haven’t had much time of late.
But look. Taking “reason” or “persuasion” as an abstract – one of many possible tactics for achieving political change – we should favor it because it is our key strength and advantage. We are not guaranteed of success on the battlefield, having the mightiest warriors or arms; we are not guaranteed of success when it comes to contests of “mockery” or “humiliation,” or comparing numbers of adherents, or wealth, or etc; the one arena where we are guaranteed success is when it comes to a rational assessment of arguments and evidence.
Therefore tactically – again in the abstract – I would advise that we try and try and try to bring whatever battles we face back to that same battleground. The irrational everywhere (including on this website, and they’re not hard to find) LOVE shouting matches, and insinuation, and insults, and mockery, and humiliation. They revel in it as swine in shit. And the reason why is because that’s how they avoid the contest of reasoned discussion, where they are at an insuperable disadvantage.
By moving ourselves away from reason or persuasion, generally, and towards the typical tactics of the irrational, we cede our natural advantage and play instead where others may well best us. (And we further make ourselves indistinguishable with the irrational from the outside/to some third party observer.)
In this world of ours, characterized as much as it is by irreason, I believe our best course is to promote reason. And this is where we must consider “reason” and “persuasion,” not simply as abstract tactics, but in their full measure. Objectivism is the philosophy of reason, and we demonstrate our belief in its power by suiting our means to our ends. We say that we believe that men should deal with one another by persuasion, and this alone; let’s prove it.
31 minutes ago, DonAthos said:
By moving ourselves away from reason or persuasion, generally, and towards the typical tactics of the irrational, we cede our natural advantage and play instead where others may well best us. (And we further make ourselves indistinguishable with the irrational from the outside/to some third party observer.)
Okay, so what do you do? Ignore them, as they make a pigsty of your world? I honestly don’t see how this makes sense, to say reasoning and calm persuasion would do anything at all to an irrational wave of Trump style populism for example. You wouldn’t be indistinguishable from those people if you also employ reasoning and persuasion as well. Most of the time, reason and persuasion is superior. It must be promoted. But if you want a theory of political action, it requires deciding when persuasion alone isn’t going to work, even if it usually works - you need more tools in those cases. This is easy to decide in dictatorships. With representational democracies, it’s a lot harder.
Eiuol, I don’t see a middle ground between persuasion and force. Ultimately you’re trying to do one or the other. If you’re trying to use force, but to limit it to be within the realm of individual rights (e.g. going around trying to disrupt things), that’s at best going to be an ineffective strategy, just because people have rights to their property (including throwing you off of it) - and at worst you’re going to start justifying violating people’s rights just because they are being irrational. If instead you’re trying to expand on persuasion by being provocative and trying to seek attention (e.g. flipping over tables and denouncing people), then that could make more sense, if you actually had a compelling case to make and your actions were appropriate (though extreme) pursuant to making that case. The problem is that a lot of these attention-seeking types don’t have a compelling case, or are taking extreme actions that really aren’t appropriate (or are actually rights-violating), and they just end up coming across as crackpots/jackasses/criminals (see your RATM example).
I think the main thing is just getting the word out about Objectivism to a wider audience. I understand wanting some means other than persuasion to deal with an irrational opponent, but if we are talking about having an impact on the culture, we are talking about mass communication, not about individual rational or irrational people. People have a variety of beliefs and values, so any communication that is heard by a large enough number of people will get some people interested.
For illustration, suppose you had a pro-Objectivist message that was heard by ten million people. Even if only one in a hundred people got interested in Objectivism due to the message, that’s 100,000 people, which is equal to the entire current population of Objectivists by Yaron Brook’s estimate. That would definitely have an impact on the culture.
So, I don’t think we need “radical action,” we just need to keep stating our case clearly to the widest possible audience.
On 7/22/2016 at 5:34 PM, Eiuol said:
Compare that to a person totally wasted and drunk. You don’t persuade them, you don’t reason with them. You treat them accordingly.
Actually, I’ve composed a large portion of my OO posts while severely drunk and that didn’t invalidate my ideas (which, after all, were also my sober ideas); it just made them harder to express. So I wouldn’t compare drunkenness (or any other state of mind) to irrationality.
“A is A” means that A=A, regardless of the coherence of its speaker. It’s a trivial point, but I suspect it may be a clue to something else.
On 7/13/2016 at 7:27 PM, DonAthos said:
It suggests cowardice to me, and an inability to compete with arguments or reason.
… Or uncertainty about the rightness of one’s own convictions.
In “Ethics in Education” Rand observed that, if most adults truly considered childhood Romanticism unrealistic, they’d treat it the way we treat Santa Claus or cootie-outbreaks. When they scold, ridicule or punish a child for it, instead, they reveal their own self-doubt.
By what method would Howard Roark silence dissenting opinions?
45 minutes ago, Harrison Danneskjold said:
In “Ethics in Education”* Rand observed that, if most adults truly considered childhood Romanticism unrealistic, they’d treat it the way we treat Santa Claus or cooties
*Art in Education
45 minutes ago, Harrison Danneskjold said:
By what method would Howard Roark silence dissenting opinions?
“What do you think of Ellsworth Toohey?”
“Why should anyone ever think of Toohey?”
"Actually, I’ve composed a large portion of my OO posts while severely drunk and that didn’t invalidate my ideas (which, after all, were also my sober ideas); it just made them harder to express. So I wouldn’t compare drunkenness (or any other state of mind) to irrationality. " -Harrison
Drinking severely affects your ability to think. Furthermore it severely impairs ability to reason. At best, you could only assemble what you already know like a parrot. Reasoning with a drunk person is a waste of time. My point isn’t about whether the words are right. We’re talking about ability to reason rationally, and all that goes with it. Communication goes out the window. My idea is that ignoring these people is best, but if they’re going for political action as well, you must respond. Except, reasoning won’t work, hence tactics that skip persuasion entirely.
Epist says there is no middle ground between persuasion and force. I don’t see how that’s the case. Although if being provocative is actually a form of persuasion, then yes, all I’m doing is expanding on persuasion to go past simply a well-formed argument or piece of writing. Whether it’s just attention-seeking is a good point, but at least that means it’s only a question of specific application. (What do you mean by RATM, Epist?)
On 7/28/2016 at 6:53 PM, William O said:
I think the main thing is just getting the word out about Objectivism to a wider audience. I understand wanting some means other than persuasion to deal with an irrational opponent, but if we are talking about having an impact on the culture, we are talking about mass communication, not about individual rational or irrational people. People have a variety of beliefs and values, so any communication that is heard by a large enough number of people will get some people interested.
For illustration, suppose you had a pro-Objectivist message that was heard by ten million people. Even if only one in a hundred people got interested in Objectivism due to the message, that’s 100,000 people, which is equal to the entire current population of Objectivists by Yaron Brook’s estimate. That would definitely have an impact on the culture.
So, I don’t think we need “radical action,” we just need to keep stating our case clearly to the widest possible audience.
I don’t even think this is accurate. This is what Obama thinks his biggest problem is: he just hasn’t been able to communicate his message to these Republicans clearly. It’s exactly the opposite, Republicans have been clear on what his message is for a long time, and they simply disagree with it. Same goes with Objectivism. I think what we really need is to answer people’s reservations and disagreements convincingly, and then the ideas will sell themselves. People’s feelings and passions follow from their prior thinking and judgments. On this principle, ask yourself, why did Rand’s fiction sell so much better than her non-fiction - i.e. what was it in her thinking, in her philosophy, that was different in one medium vs. the other? I think we ought to be a lot more introspective on what it is we are even trying to sell in the first place. For example, why are there as many different positions on Objectivist metaethics as there are people writing on the subject? If the logic of Objectivist metaphysics/epistemology/ethics/politics has inconsistencies, and there are other philosophies that give more consistent answers, Objectivism is going to lose followers to those systems.
14 hours ago, Eiuol said:
At best, you could only assemble what you already know like a parrot.
Really?
That’s weird, considering all of the reasoning that I remember doing (analyzing arguments, following implications, drawing analogies, formulating arguments, correcting the mistakes of my drunken fingers, rearranging arguments, finding my cognitive mistakes and discarding the posts that asserted them, forming and integrating conclusions, et cetera). I clearly recall doing all of the work of a normal post while also compensating for my own impairment; simultaneously working on two problems (which is what made it fun).
If you can tell that none of that actually happened, from no evidence except the blood content of my alcohol system (without even knowing which of my posts were made thusly), then I must have some serious cognitive deficits.
Maybe I need to quit drinking.
:twisted:
14 hours ago, Eiuol said:
My point isn’t about whether the words are right. We’re talking about ability to reason rationally, and all that goes with it. Communication goes out the window.
_ If _ we’re discussing people who truly cannot reason then, yes; communication, cooperation and even rights go out the window, at that point. That puts us right back at political-square-one.
However, what do you mean when you say that someone “cannot reason”? I think we either put such people onto life support or allow them die, depending on the wishes of their loved ones.
If what you actually mean are the sort of people who attend Trump rallies (or even neonazis) then it’s not as cut and dry as you portray it; not even close.
I am not saying that your idea is just wrong. It’s complicated, and I’m still trying to untangle it.
I am saying that if we’re going to treat human beings like animals in the jungle then we’d better have a damn good reason.
On 7/23/2016 at 5:19 AM, Repairman said:
For example, let’s take the matter of anti-mysticism as a desirable Objectivist social norm. If you were to shout down your religious opponents, or in anyway deny them their opportunity to speak their piece, you will only alienate and enrage them.
And worse:
You only try to silence ideas that you take seriously. Nobody has ever tried to outlaw Santa because, while it’s false, it’s also harmless. To legally gag an idea draws attention to it and makes it seem mysterious, exciting and very important; it puts that idea into bold italics, in the minds of your victims. Just look at the way Christians (particularly young ones) will insist that the very existence of the Devil is an obscenity before pouring into any movie theatre that’s showing it.
For the alleged champions of reason to outlaw mysticism would be the worst thing we could ever do. If we all started blowing up schools and hospitals, by explicitly organized intention, it would do less damage to our cause than that would. It’s suicidal.
On 7/23/2016 at 5:19 AM, Repairman said:
To the specifics of these ideals, I leave to those future generations.
Why?
While I disagree with a number of Eiuol’s conclusions, he has one (implicit) premise which I truly cannot stress enough:
If this is our goal then we should try to find a way to achieve it for ourselves, here, on Earth; to Hell with “future generations” - you and I will not be there! ‘The universe began when I was born and while I live it’s mine to conquer’, and all that.
Eiuol is absolutely right to look at it that way. I just don’t know what we should do about it, concretely (that’s the complicated part).
Here are two of my issues with this fixation on the welfare of “the Objectivist movement”:
Firstly, I don’t believe that the nature of our government is actually the problem we’re trying to solve. Sure, it’s insufferable, but it’s also predictable; the great thing about democracy is that you can see new legislation coming years or decades in advance; all it really means is that we’ll have to work a little harder, to compensate for it. I’m taking a wild stab, here (based on nothing more than my own experiences), but I suspect that the real motive behind this thing is loneliness.
We are social animals; just not in the way that most people think. We’re perfectly capable of surviving without each other and we usually work best when working alone (unlike bees or ants) but nobody wants to spend a lifetime in solitary confinement (not even Howard Roark or Ayn Rand, herself).
So I think that this desire to change the culture has less to do with any law than with the quality of the people that we have to deal with on a daily basis. And there’s nothing wrong with that! In fact, it simplifies things enormously.
If all we’re after is a community of our own then that’s something we can accomplish here, on Earth, within our own lifetimes. We wouldn’t have to change anybody’s mind about anything.
Secondly, I don’t think that changing people’s minds is the right approach to this. We’re acting like insurance salesmen and people can sense it, which ultimately makes it self-defeating.
There’s an old saying: “when the student is ready, the master will appear” (and not before). Philosophy isn’t something you can show to anyone who isn’t interested; they have to make all the connections for themselves, which means that they have to have a good reason to. So we shouldn’t be trying to bring our ideas to the world; we should simply be ready to share them with anyone who’s interested.
I know how frustrating that sounds. After all, how many times in any of our lives will one of our acquaintances actually approach us about our own philosophy, and how many times will it “stick”?
However, as William O pointed out, there’s no reason to limit ourselves to personal acquaintances when we have the internet. A message of “we’re here to discuss the meaning of life, whenever you’re interested” is a message that we could send pretty rapidly to billions of people, without sounding like salesmen.
I’m out of time but I’ll post the rest soon.
Harrison Danneskjold:
On 7/23/2016 at 5:19 AM, Repairman said:
If we are to ever witness an Objectivist victory over irrational mystic, collectivist, and socialist norms, it will be a victory achieved only after the establishment of a base of majority, consisting of people who believe in free-minds and free-markets. To the specifics of these ideals, I leave to those future generations.
On 8/2/2016 at 3:33 AM, Harrison Danneskjold said:
Why?
I hope this is merely a rhetorical question. I believe you and I, as well as most of the contributors to this thread would prefer to live in a world that frowns on irrational moral codes, but you’ll forgive me for being realistic. We’re a long way from that point. My application of Objectivist principles serves my needs, and if I were young enough, I might make a career of broadcasting rational values and promoting the virtue of rational egoism as a matter of self-fulfillment. I enjoy being right. Yet, no matter how hard I’d have worked at it, I wouldn’t have changed the present state of politics in the US, and certainly not on the international stage, either. If I am to achieve and sustain my happiness, I must act within the perimeters of reality. At times, I feel like Henry Cameron, although I haven’t been driven to drink. I have been driven to various forms of creativity, such as my writings on this forum.
I could make a case for ignoring the anti-individualist, anti-capitalist, anti-rationality voice of the masses so often represented in the politics of our times. But I wouldn’t. Neither will I make a case for taking actions that cause needless destruction or fail to convey the right message, even contradict ideals of Objectivism. Under the belief that there is no such thing as a collective consciousness, I can assume that there are more than a few young and independent minds that “get it,” and that they may be the formation of a solid base upon which a rational society might develop. It really is up to that future generation. Until then, one’s moral code is a matter for the present-day individual.
On 8/2/2016 at 3:33 AM, Harrison Danneskjold said:
I just don’t know what we should do about it, concretely (that’s the complicated part).
No one ever said it was going to be easy.
On 8/1/2016 at 11:44 AM, Eiuol said:
Drinking severely affects your ability to think. . . At best, you could only assemble what you already know like a parrot.
I am drinking to this. You may judge for yourself whether the results qualify as “reasoning”.*
11 hours ago, Repairman said:
I believe you and I, as well as most of the contributors to this thread would prefer to live in a world that frowns on irrational moral codes, but you’ll forgive me for being realistic. We’re a long way from that point.
While we all live amongst irrational people, it doesn’t follow that the only way for us to live in that world is to do something about them. “We” aren’t far from that point; they are.**
This whole thing assumes that we’re essentially shackled to these people and forced to share in whatever fate they bring upon themselves. Although it seems like a safe assumption, it also seems like a Kobayashi Maru (which I consider sufficient grounds to question it).***
And if it’s not possible for any of us to live in that world then neither is it really worth thinking or talking about. The unreal is unreal and can be of no value.
* Tipsy @ 11:45 PM
** Unable to remain upright & stationary @ 12:10 PM
*** Unable to feel face @ 12:50 PM