Recently, in an AI-focused thread, user @necrovore interestingly argued that Peikoff and Harriman’s denial of modern physics is not truly grounded in the Objectivist metaphysics. But, says necrovore, P&H had good intentions: to save realism from philosophers that deny that existence exists. They just went too far.
Off the top of my head, I can’t recall any philosophers that claim that existence doesn’t exist (apart from Gorgias, who was actually humorously advertising his rhetorical skills), so I assume he is taking “existence doesn’t exist” to mean “existence is not mind-independent.” This makes this thread better suited for posting my thoughts on necro’s objection.
On 6/23/2025 at 1:30 AM, necrovore said:
On 6/23/2025 at 1:00 AM, KyaryPamyu said:
To restate the point more succinctly: the “axioms” do not say enough to effectively safeguard human cognition from error or distortion. The evidence for this lies in how figures like Leonard Peikoff and David Harriman have attempted to retrofit science to conform with Objectivist premises—most notably in The Logical Leap and the “Physics” chapter of The DIM Hypothesis. These works illustrate that what they read into the axioms simply isn’t justified by the axioms themselves. The axioms are too minimal, too hollow, to mean what P&H take them to mean.
Even if what you are saying is correct, it would be a problem with Peikoff and Harriman, not with the axioms.
The axioms don’t tell the universe what to be or do; that would be a contradiction in terms because the axioms can only exist because of what the universe already is and what it already does.
But I think what Peikoff and Harriman object to is that philosophers who already hold that existence doesn’t exist will eagerly seize on certain quantum phenomena as if those phenomena “proved” that existence doesn’t exist, when actually the phenomena, though real, prove no such thing.
If the nature of particles is surprising or counter-intuitive in some way, then so what? (Or if they are not really even “particles” but some kind of “particle-wave duality” or something we struggle to find the right words for…) We have to accept that surprising behavior and we can even use it for technological devices. There is no axiom to the effect that we will never be surprised or that our intuitions about particles (or space or time or gravity etc.) are always correct or always applicable in new domains.
So this argument is sort of like, guy A says, “I found a rock that proves the existence of God!” and guy B says, “No, your rock proves no such thing, there is no God,” so guy A says, “Are you saying this rock isn’t real? Here it is, I’m holding it in my hand! Your denial of God logically necessitates that you deny the existence of this rock! But it exists! …” It is not a contradiction for guy B to then say, “yeah, your rock exists, but its existence doesn’t mean what you think it means…”
I think guy B’s position is analogous to the proper Objectivist position on quantum physics.
And guy A only holds his position because he believed in God in the first place, before he discovered the rock.
This defense, while astute, ultimately misses the forest for the trees. To argue that the catastrophic failures of the system’s chief defenders are merely personal errors, leaving the foundation untouched, is to misunderstand the purpose of a philosophical foundation. A foundation that provides no guidance, that allows its most devoted followers to veer into a direct denial of empirical reality, is not a foundation at all. It is a Rorschach test.
The problem is not that Peikoff and Harriman failed to apply the axioms correctly. The problem is that the axioms are so abstract and hollow that they are compatible with any application, including one that is wildly unscientific.
Your attempt to salvage the system by proposing a “proper” Objectivist reading—one that accepts quantum facts but rejects their philosophical implications—is an untenable compromise. You’re trying to graft the mind-dependent behavior of quantum phenomena onto a mind-independent metaphysics. It cannot hold.
Before you object that I am relying on a mere “interpretation” of quantum mechanics (such as the Copenhagen interpretation), let us be clear. The raw experimental data—the “rock” in your analogy—shows us a world where properties like position, momentum, and spin do not have definite values until they are measured. This observer-dependence is the stubborn fact we must explain. The various “interpretations” are simply different attempts to make sense of this bizarre reality. Let’s see which interpretation, if any, saves Rand’s Aristotelian worldview:
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Do you accept the standard view (Copenhagen)? Then you must concede my central point: reality is indeterminate and brought into definite being through the act of observation. Rand’s ‘A is A’ realism collapses.
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Do you prefer the Many-Worlds Interpretation? To avoid the “collapse” caused by an observer, you must posit that reality splits into a near-infinite number of parallel, unobservable universes at every quantum event. To save Rand’s simple realism here, we must embrace a monstrously un-parsimonious and untestable fantasy everywhere else.
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Do you gravitate toward the “realist” Bohmian Mechanics? This theory saves definite particle positions, but only by introducing a non-local “pilot wave” that connects the entire universe instantaneously. To save Objectivism’s discrete, separate “entities”, we must sacrifice locality and accept a spooky, holistic connection that binds every particle to every other, faster than light. This vision of an indivisible, interconnected whole is far closer to metaphysical idealism than it is to atomism.
Try to pick your interpretation. An observer-created reality? An infinite multiverse? A spooky, indivisible holism? None of these options rescue the common-sense, local realism that Objectivism requires. Each one demolishes it in its own spectacular way. An appeal to “interpretations” is not a shield; it is a menu of poisons from which we must choose.
This menu, of course, does not exhaust all the possible options. Science, after all, advances. Maybe coming up with an Objectivist-friendly interpretation will be possible, right? But, this would be an abandonment of philosophical argument in favor of a promissory note—a statement of faith that a future discovery will rescue a worldview that is contradicted by every known piece of relevant evidence. This is not a defense, but a deferral.
Let us be very clear: to save Objectivism, we are not merely hoping for a new scientific theory. We are hoping for a theory that accomplishes a feat that is mathematically and logically impossible.
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The constraints are not interpretational, but mathematical. The core issue is not a matter of philosophical taste. It stems from proofs like Bell’s Theorem. John Bell proved mathematically that any theory based on the principles of local realism—which states that objects have definite, pre-existing properties, A=A, thus in principle cannot influence each other faster than light—will make statistical predictions that are different from the predictions of quantum mechanics.
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Experiment has given its verdict. For decades, experiment after experiment, closing every conceivable loophole, has confirmed the predictions of quantum mechanics and has violated Bell’s inequality . This is not an interpretation. It is the single most important experimental fact of the last half-century. It is a decisive, empirical refutation of local realism. The “rock” in your analogy is not just a rock; it’s a rock that has been proven, in a laboratory, to violate the very principles of “rock-ness” that your philosophy depends on.
Therefore, our hope for an “Objectivist-friendly option” is a hope for a theory that can simultaneously uphold the principles of local realism and reproduce the experimental results that have definitively falsified local realism. This is not a scientific challenge. It’s like asking for a four-sided triangle.
The problem is not that science has yet to find an Objectivist-friendly answer. The problem is that it has found, with mathematical and empirical certainty, that one cannot exist. The way forward is not to wait for science to conform to a 2000 year old metaphysical-realism, but to develop a metaphysics that can account for what science has already discovered.
Ultimately, your defense tries to rescue a 19th-century, billiard-ball ontology by cordoning off the inconvenient findings of 20th and 21st-century science as mere “surprising behaviors.” It’s not about surprise at all. Those behaviors reveal that the very concepts of “object,” “identity,” and “existence” you take as foundational are in fact abstract contraptions that break down at the fundamental level of reality.
The failure of Peikoff and Harriman, therefore, is not an anomaly. They saw, correctly , that modern physics was incompatible with Objectivism. We may even praise their decision to take Objectivism to its actual conclusions.
Let us be clear from the outset: Existence—that grand tapestry of space, time, and causality—is not a brute and alien stage upon which thought briefly appears, only to vanish. The very grammar of reality is inseparable from thought, just as “subject” and “predicate” are meaningless outside cognition. To imagine a world apart from thought is to relegate thinking to a lesser reality—less real than a tree or a stone—yet somehow still the gateway to ultimate truth. This is a sleight of hand. We mistake the cogitations of intellect for unmediated encounters with “the real,” forgetting that every such product is saturated with the architecture of that cogitation.
The illusion is that thought’s conceptions are not themselves thought—that they are direct, passive reflections rather than active, self-sufficient articulations. We fail to see that the content of consciousness is spiritual through and through, and cannot be otherwise in principle. And so, the illusion of a world merely thought-about—a world untouched by thought’s translucent inwardness—dissolves.
Why, then, does the contrary belief persist with such stubborn force? Why the near-universal assumption that reality is a mindless stage, and we are but fleeting specks of dust upon it? The answer is as crude as it is persistent: we have identified consciousness with the animalistic senses—with the eye, the ear, the hand. In such a brutish framework, the destruction of the organ naturally annihilates its function. Is it any wonder that the modern mind cannot fathom why a robot, whose constitution allows it to detect light, or tickling, or loudness, is not conscious—no matter how human-like its behavior might seem due to technological advancement?
The true idealist asks a more profound question: not if Nature is a function of thought, but why it is structured precisely as a plurality of individuals, each experiencing reality through the fragile vessel of a body. The answer lies where it always has: the features of our empirical world are not random; they are the formally or structurally necessary ways in which self-conscious cognition occurs. Reality is through-and-through intellectual in nature.
This brings us to the most persistent and puerile caricature of idealism, an effigy erected by lazy minds: the idea that idealism means altering reality by mere wishing. This is a profound error, born of a metaphysics so shallow it amounts to “what you see is what you get.” It assumes a world that just is, without reason or purpose, where thought is a ghostly whisper in the skull—miraculously free, but utterly impotent. Within this prison, thought is reduced to hoping and dreaming, partitioned from the “real world.”
True idealism makes no such childish demand. We would no more wish to alter the spatio-temporal structure of the world than we would wish to abolish the subject-predicate form of a judgment, or deny the always-present, quiet asserting of “I am” which self-awareness is. Why? Because these structures are not prisons; they are the very tools that make thought, self-awareness, and meaning possible. To demand a world that bends to your whim is not a sign of power, but a desire for the annihilation of Spirit itself. It is a caricature that a thinker like Rand should know better than to entertain.
The nature of Thought is dialogical. It is inherently self-reflexive. Within each of us resides an inner tribunal, a critical witness that observes our actions and makes us self-conscious. This “inner society” is not some psychological quirk; it is a necessary, constitutive, and indigenous form of thinking. Therefore, in practice, the teacher is also the pupil, because to teach, he must step into the pupil’s shoes as a form of understanding. In the same way, the pupil is identical with the teacher—the pupil is always teaching himself.
How else could these agents—the self and the other, the I and the Thou—engage in the grand dialogue of consciousness without the abstract cathedral of space, time, multiplicity, lawfully synthesized through causal principles? Look at Nature and see it for what it is: not a heap of concrete things, but an expression of a profoundly abstract, rational, mathematical logic. It is a structure so intelligible that the mind can penetrate its surface and discover equations where others see only rocks and trees. Peikoff’s dismissal of Einstein and quantum mechanics flows from the same willful blindness. There is no honest (and frankly, good-willed) way to deny that Nature is an expression of a _logos _in which man is the crown.
Therefore, the quest for the “unconditioned”—an uncaused material dimension that always was and always will be—is a fool’s errand. It is the search for an unconditioned tile on a floor where every tile supports every other. It is a category error. Unable to locate this phantom, the materialist must invent an abstraction to do the work—a “totality” called Existence, an uncreated god-term smuggled in to patch a leaky metaphysics. They mistake the map for the territory, the shadow for the substance. The ultimate reality—the only true concrete—is not the atom, but the Soul; not the object, but self-conscious intelligence. Binswanger was right to question the ghost in the machine, but he did not go far enough. There is no machine. There is only Spirit.
Naturalism is ultimately the separation of the intellect from the will. To recall a recent example, Dawkins’ Selfish Gene presents the human being not as a spirit, but as a sentinel—a blind carrier for an unconscious reproductive algorithm. In this view, human bodies and brains are robots doing the biddings of the genes. We are executors of a project not our own, driven by forces that do not care whether we suffer or flourish. But the bleakness lies not in that alone—it’s in the stupidity of the force. Thus, this form of naturalism is ironically the successor of Schopenhauer’s metaphysical Will__en. The genes, or the Will, do not use us out of malice; they don’t even know they are duping us. That’s what makes it worse: there is no interlocutor, no God, no cosmic dialogue—just mindless, blind churning.
This is the fundamental insult of Schopenhauer’s metaphysics: that intellect, that soaring, sublime instrument—what evokes awe, reverence, sublimity—arose not to reveal itself as truth or beauty, but to serve survival. It is just another evolutionary prosthetic, like feathers, or claws, or teeth. Ayn Rand’s Roark captured this bluntly in his courtroom speech: “[Man’s] brain is his only weapon. Animals obtain food by force. Man has no claws, no fangs, no horns, no great strength of muscle.” Like Schopenhauer, Roark conceives the intellect only as a protuberance (or so-called “faculty”) arising in order to serve processes which are ultimately devoid of intention or intellect—like hunger and reproduction.
And so, suffering in Schopenhauer’s or Dawkin’s vision, has no raison d’être. It has no deeper, intellectual meaning other than blackmailing the organism into eating and drinking once more today, and preventing it from putting a rope around its neck. Naturalism, therefore, is not purely about whether someone is a metaphysical idealist or a metaphysical realist. It’s about whether reality is meaning-laden—and any divorcing of reality from the intellect (from Good__ness) is, at root, doing the bidding of Naturalism.