Posted on 12/30/2003 10:29:35 AM PST by G. Stolyarov II
One of the most vexing problems that I have encountered in my experiences with Objectivism, is the fact that many people seem deathly afraid of our viewpoint – EVEN people with whom we should have most in common. They just don't seem to be able to understand it, even if we explain it patiently and calmly. Everything we say gets systematically distorted into something horrible. This used to bother me quite a lot, and still does to some degree. But I have come to a conclusion after a VERY long time thinking about it:
When people misunderstand what Objectivism is, and the things for which we stand, many of them are simply ignorant, NOT willfully antagonistic.
Take, for example, a situation that will doubtless be VERY common to most Objectivists: the issue of religion, and atheism. Whenever I would make statements to the effect that I didn't (and still don't), believe the Judeo-Christian mythology, everybody would go into emotional meltdown: their powers of reason would mysteriously disappear.
You can't really blame them, however. Most "Believers" (in whatever religion), simply don't understand, or think about, their religion very deeply. They are "religious" enough that atheism makes them nervous, but actually have very little understanding of the Bible, Koran, or whatever "holy book" they believe.
Most people don't really understand what Christianity means by "God". They have no idea that the concept makes no sense, as their religion teaches it. To them, "God" is somewhere between Santa Claus and Uncle Sam – a benevolent, strong, heroic Father figure "in the sky". Most of them have only a vague notion of heaven, and no interest in hell whatsoever.
When confronted with the works of Thomas Paine, Robert G. Ingersoll, or Ayn Rand, they honestly do not understand how those critiques of religion could apply to them. And can you REALLY blame them? After all, as we all know, most of the Christian Clergy THEMSELVES don't know half of how bloody and evil parts of the Bible are.
Most "Christians" in this country (and others) couldn't care less about the bible. The only parts of it they know halfway clearly are the "Christmas story", and the Easter thing. They understand the "ten commandments" in a very rudimentary, common sense way. They don't CARE that the "thou shalt not steal" thing is an injunction against stealing your neighbor's SLAVE. Most people honestly have no idea what the bible actually says, or what Christianity actually teaches.
They get terrified by "secular humanism" or "Godless atheists" because pretty much the only exposure to such things has been from socialists, communists, and suchlike. Hell, how do you think the destroyers of the United States were able to hoodwink people into putting "Under god" in the pledge of allegiance, in the first place? The sales-pitch was to make us different from the "Godless Commies". In the popular mind (controlled and shaped as it is by the "activists" and their social agendas), the concepts of Communism and Atheism were skillfully and secretly blended, so that the Common man can no longer tell one from the other.
This is part of what makes Conservatives useless, as I said. Most of them have no idea what their Bible teaches; nor will they listen. More often than not, when they DO find out, they get every bit as disgusted as we do, and worse: you ever wonder where all those preachy "born-again atheist" sites come from?
Same thing with capitalism: what most people in this culture mistakenly think of as capitalism is the lukewarm, state-entangled version: government-backed monopolies, licensing, franchises, tariffs, etc. Most of these people have never tried (as I have), to start a business, or create their own wealth. They've all bought into the mediocrity-mentality that says the only way to make it is as somebody else's "employee". The Entrepreneurial spirit is mostly dead in them, and they see "their jobs" as nothing more than a means to continue subsisting at the same mediocre level.
Reason? Too hard. Easier to watch TV, and give a half-hearted appearance of a religion you don't understand, every Sunday.
Purpose? Work, sleep, watch TV, breed the next generation of slaves, and die in a pool of your own urine.
They haven't learned any better. The government-controlled schools specialize in killing off every trace of the heroic impulse. Generations of potential Howard Roarks are systematically processed into docile, conformist Keatings, by schools, families, and 'peer pressure'.
But ask yourself: having never had self-made goals, how can they be expected to be creatures of "self-made soul?"
It's actually rather heartbreaking, to consider the masses of living zombies lock-stepping through life, their only goal to keep up with the Joneses, afraid to stand taller than the crowd because "what will the neighbors think." It's horrifying.
These poor fools equate "Altruism" with goodheartedness, human warmth, and private charity. They've probably never read Comte, Bismarck, Hegel, or Marx, and barely even heard their names.
So what's the answer?
PATIENCE. Those of us who know a better way MUST stand for it, and MUST reach out to them. Otherwise, this entire world is as good as dead.
So "professional philosophers" don't take Objectivism or Rand very seriously? Screw 'em. It's not ABOUT winning over Academia, in the long run. It's about reclaiming the Human Spirit from its destroyers, and getting people do understand that they DO have a right to exist, and they DO have a right to resist their Masters. We are a slave rebellion, friends: an "Underground railroad" of the Human Spirit.
Academia is a joke. Most so-called "philosophers" have deteriorated into gibbering wordplay, or convinced themselves they don't even exist. To think we're actually going to make headway there is wishful thinking at least, and suicidal at most.
The philosophical gangrene set in several centuries ago. We must ask ourselves: do we have 200 years to wait? Can we afford to let the wheels of history turn, and hope against all evidence that that the inhabitants of that time will still even be recognizably human in spirit and mind?
No. We don't have the time for that.
Even a cursory examination of history will reveal a pivotal fact; namely, that "paradigm shifts" – massive changes of gestalt thinking NEVER originate from WITHIN the old paradigm. In other words, history supports Miss Rand's premise that the "Mavericks" – the Roarks and Galts of the world – are the Atlas's who make the world turn.
So do not despair, friends. We must take up the torch, fight for all that is good and genuine and beautiful and true, and NEVER submit. "Second Renaissance" is eminently appropriate for an Objectivist bookstore's name, but it is ALSO – MUST be – our credo.
WE, and those of like mind, must be the heralds of a "new birth of freedom".
There's no other choice.
I don't understand what you are getting at here. The fact that enjoying any benefit of my labor depends on a complex social environment has nothing at all to do with giving up my capacity to reason.
Recall that this discussion goes back to your claim that "we observe that every man is a rational being whose individual mind can bring about enjoyment of the fruits of his labor". I'm just pointing out that my (and just about everybody else's) enjoyment of the fruit of labor is dependent on a complex social environment. My individual mind isn't sufficient for bringing about said enjoyment.
Getting back to the point of our entire discussion, you hold that there is clear objective reason from observable evidence that theft is wrong. So I'm asking you for the reasoning and the evidence.
And most of the traditions you malign are the reason for the things you value most: freedom, rationality, and the concept of natural law. As F. A. Hayek famously put it, morality is not the product of our reason; it is the other way around. Our systems of though grew out of the traditions we followed.
Ironic, isn't it, that your world-view comes closest to to that of the leftists: that reason is king, that the rationally ordered and explained is much superior to the product of tradition and the uncontrolled product of mass decision-making (socialism over capitalism), and society and tradition is devalued compared to one person's inferior "knowledge." That's the end product of your intellectual path, you know. What arrogance, that you would claim to know better than the millions that have lived and died to establish our Western traditions. You really should read some Hayek, specifically The Fatal Conceit, but I guess that might actually require you to examine your belief system, and a rational person like you couldn't possible examine his own premises, could he...
I would ask you then, where does this "morality" come from? Does this morality derive from rational principles, is it independent of human thought or claim, or is it divinely mandated? You conflate the term "moral" with "ethical," where they are most certainly not equivalent. What is the origin of morality?
I think that you need to learn the use of words of loigic, rather than emotive judgment.
Bye.
You are extremely presumptuous. You have no idea what things I value most or why I value them. It is apparent to me, you do not even know what values are, much less what mine are.
Except for the physical laws, there is no such thing as "natural law." Please keep your traditions of superstitious oppression and blind obedience to whatever outrages one's forefathers engaged in. That fits the psychology and value systems of Muslims and all other repressive collectivist ideologies and societies, and yours, apparently as well.
Freedom means responsibility, something only possible to those with the full authority to make their own choices, using their own minds, not surrendering their minds to stupid tradition and arrogant authority.
Hank
I don't require a short answer. Just give me the first step or two of a long answer.
The evidence is human nature. One cannot steal without violating the requirement of one's own nature.
To understand that, however, requires one to understand what the nature of man is, and what the requirements of that nature are, and, then, how stealing is a violation of that nature. No creature can live successfully in violation of its own nature, but man is the only creature capable of choosing to do just that.
Hank
You are always reasonable, even when we disagree, and I appreciate that. If you do not mind, I would like to ask you a question that is a little off-subject.
I am asking this seriously, and will not criticize your response, even though I will almost certainly disagree with it. What is there about, "heaven," (or whatever your notion of the 'afterlife' is) that appeals to you? Why would you want it? I am presuming it is not just to escape some kind of suffering or torment you see as the alternative, but, if that is the case, please say so.
I am still waiting for someone to explain why anyone would want to go to heaven. There is not in any description of the afterlife by anyone I know that has one thing about it that appeals to anyone in this life, and have always wondered why they think they are going to just love in the next life what totally bores them and they have no taste for in this life, and why they think never having any of the things they most enjoy in this life will satisfy them in the next?
Hank
No, I did share my thoughts with you, but I did not claim those thoughts were proof. There is no proof except in the Word of G-d. The reason we debate is so that we can find some of the errors in our thinking and correct them.
Shalom.
To understand that, however, requires one to understand what the nature of man is, and what the requirements of that nature are, and, then, how stealing is a violation of that nature. No creature can live successfully in violation of its own nature, but man is the only creature capable of choosing to do just that.
My questions were, "Is there, on your view, clear objective reason from observable evidence that theft is wrong? What, on your view, is the evidence?"
What aspects of human nature do you wish me to observe?
We might make more progress if you list the relevant observable evidence and spell out the reasoning from this observable evidence.
Thank you.
We might, but I am an autodidact and I expect others to be also. If you really want the answers to these questions, first try examining some of the material at the links I provided. I told there is no short answer and I am not enclined to give free lessons in philosophy.
I do not mean to be harsh and am perfectly willing to answer specific questions; but, what you are aksing for would require just such a course.
I will even try to answer your current question, but first, you must answer a question for me. What do you believe the purpose of your life is?
Hank
Occam's Razor is a suggestion, not a law, and a pretty poor one under many circumstances. And the Identity principle no more refutes than supports the existence of God. Nothing in modern meta-mathematics, or natural sciences supports your thesis. Ayn Rand is a fine polemicist for our puritan heritage, as befits a good novelist--as a philosopher of ontology or logic, well--she's a fine novelist. Look up the logical problem of under-determination if you want more technical detail as to why this argument is so laughably unpursuasive to a modern professional logician's ear.
Hitler? AFAIK, he was a theist all his life.
That which I choose of my own free will.
For now, I will say dittos and good night, Hank.
Atos
Well, in that case, you should be made aware of the fact that the "old-school" logic of Aristotle contained two syllogistic errors of set containment that were not detected until the 20th century.
Occum's Razor is not a rule of logic, it is a highly fallable guideline which, if followed exclusively, would quickly lead science into the crapper. Few of the painstaking, generations-spanning breakthroughs in science followed from Occum's Razor. From Mendeleev's peas to Woese's re-organization of the tree of life at it's root is as twisty and convoluted a story as one could imagine. Continents glued to the planet is an orders of magnetude simpler explanation for their existence than the theory of plate tektonics.
Whatever you may think of under-determination, it is a varifiable presence in science. Nothing in the world was more "determined" than Newton's laws of gravity, but, as it turned out, Newton's laws were not the final word on the subject, and the present betting is that Einstein's aren't either. In like manner, no amount of verifying inductive evidence in favor the natural causes for the Big Bang, or life, in any manner eliminates the possibility of a supernatural Prime Mover--science only deals in physical evidence and only finds proximate physical causes--and it makes no claim as to the exclusive closure of those causes--is it's own history makes all too plain. You put a weight on logic it cannot bear when you claim it is dispositive against the existence of God. Like Ayn Rand, you have no evidence, and you have no proof, you just have a great deal of chutzpah, and the capacity to throw around the vocabulary of formal proof, but it means butkis. If Ayn Rand, or any of her erstwhile accolytes actually had a proof of the non-existence of God, they'd trot it out, instead of wordy razzle-dazzle peppered with logical techno-ese, delivered with a patronizing air.
I certainly welcome you not to believe in God, if you like, but trying to give the impression that science or logic makes it a decided issue everyone else is just too benighted to see is stretching the available evidence a great deal farther than it can reach.
Underdetermination is an embarassingly historically evident condition in science, and philosophers cannot wish it out of existence merely because they don't like it. As objectivists have been wont to point out for half a century--the social (or philosophical) consequences of an idea about the natural world are no kind of evidence in favor of, or against it.
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