Replies

ModelBreaker

Because both the author and Ayn Rand would have been appalled by the idea that "the nature of reality is that we are meat." It is disgusting. Did you read none of the quotes? Meat is physical, but life, consciousness, and the volitional nature, while natural, are not physical, and the nature of man is a rational/volitional conscious being, for whom life is not mere existence and for whom pleasure is only a value when it is earned.

If you did not understand even this much, you were never an Objectivist. I am not an Objectivist, by the way, but regard Ayn Rand as the greatest philosopher so far. The problem with Christianity is first and foremost, the belief that evil can or ought to be forgiven.

Hank

The problem with Christianity is first and foremost, the belief that evil can or ought to be forgiven.

Pretty sure that is not a tenet of Christianity or Christian scripture.

Evil is not a thing, it is an absence of a thing like dark is the absence of light, evil is the absence of God. In the presence of God, evil is not forgiven, it simply cannot exist.

Because both the author and Ayn Rand would have been appalled by the idea that "the nature of reality is that we are meat." It is disgusting. Did you read none of the quotes? Meat is physical, but life, consciousness, and the volitional nature, while natural, are not physical, and the nature of man is a rational/volitional conscious being, for whom life is not mere existence and for whom pleasure is only a value when it is earned. If you did not understand even this much, you were never an Objectivist. I am not an Objectivist, by the way, but regard Ayn Rand as the greatest philosopher so far.

Hank. I thought we had an interesting, not disgusting, exchange going there. I apologize for offending.

Yes, I did read the quotes. The notion that consciousness and volition can be separated from the our physical bodies is quixotic if the universe is physical and uncreated by a Creator. In that case, "consciousness" and "volition" must be properties of the our physical beings.

If the universe just happened, our world, our volition, our consciousness, our societies, our drives, and our desires are all just happenstance byproducts of natural selection and physics applied to molecules that happen to exist in a universe that has our particular value of, say, Planck's constant. Molecules that assemble themselves into animals have a property that we call consciousness and some of them have a property that we call volition. To assume otherwise (in a Godless universe) would be a sneaky form of mysticism by positing consciousness and volition to derive from a source different from our physical reality.

In such a universe, if you want to think lofty thoughts, develop theories of volition, develop grand codes of ethics, and build epistomologies based on A=A, that's fine. Some people want to do that that kind of thing. But there's no particular reason to do that rooted in reality. Each person has their own set of drives and preferences. If your preference is ethics, then ethics is fine. If it is serial murder, then that is fine. There is no logical reason to adopt one or the other except the balance between your preferences and your analysis of the projected consequences of the two alternatives.

Even survival is a subjective driver for ethics. Severely depressed folks put a profoundly different value on survival than do I.

And that's why I used the 'meat' language. In a Godless universe, there is no particular reason for doing other than succumbing to the meat's desires and drives (whether lofty or base) except probable consequences balanced against the probable pleasure from fulfilling your desires (whether those desires are lofty or base--this, of course, assumes that it is possible to assign labels like "lofty" or "base" in a Godless universe; I submit you cannot). Consciousness and volition, being mere byproducts of physics and evolution, ought to be directed in whatever way each individual sees fit to maximize their internal, subjective pleasure index.

I was much younger when I read every word Ayn Rand and Nathaniel Branden wrote that I could put my hands on. I didn't even know what "deconstructionism" was then. But after trying hard to satisfy myself that Rand's epistemology was supportable, I finally determined that it was not logically derivable from the reality it posits, a Godless universe. Ultimately, the deconstructionists are more logically consistent with a Godless universe than are Objectivists.

The problem with Christianity is first and foremost, the belief that evil can or ought to be forgiven.

You are a much stronger man than I. Every day, I accumulate a big pile of stuff for which I need forgiveness. And in my past, there was a big pile of stuff that was pretty bad--maybe even evil. I don't carry that around today because I get to lay that stuff at the foot of the Cross.

But it doesn't matter what you and I want in that regard. The reality of the universe, IMHO, is a created universe with a personal God. He gets to make the rules and one of them is that terrible sinners who come to the Cross get forgiven and that apparently good people who do not are not. I would prefer different rules. But it's not my call.

The problem with Christianity is first and foremost, the belief that evil can or ought to be forgiven.

Interesting take, that. I've heard lots of complaints that a loving God wouldn't send people to Hell, either.

So, a nice paradox...

The odd thing is that people attack Christians for having differing opinions, but it is seldom noted that attacks upon Christianity often come from mutually contradictory directions.

When will people have the sense of humor or irony to realize that maybe their own intiution of what "ought" to be, might be what is incorrect? :-) (No, no personal attack--just responding to a dilemma with a counter-dilemma).

Cheers!