Objectivism Doesn't Make Sense

Blank.

 

Merry Christmas.


I'm going to keep beating this dead horse for reasons that I don't fully understand but can only describe as masochistic.

First, Iconoclast's and Heeh2's arguments are both equally bad, in that they offer no arguments as such. There, I said it.

What I want to draw our attention to now is Objectivist teleology, if there is one. If I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times: I don't know much about Objectivism. But if the Primacy of Existence Axiom entails as much as some Objectivists think it does, Objectivist teleology is impossible. If the mind can play no active role in constituting reality, then the appearance of goal-directed phenomena must be illusory. This means that I cannot go to the fridge to get a beer, for the sake of getting drunk, and that human artifacts are impossible.

But this is incredibly naive because human intentionality is obviously goal-directed, and human artifacts obviously exist. So, either Objectivism is wrong, or some self-proclaimed "Objectivists" are drastically misrepresenting their philosophy.

The former is probably not the case because, as I have just learned, Gotthelf, an excellent philosopher of biology at Pitt, which has one of the best philosophy of science programs in the world, is, at least in part, influenced by Rand. And Gotthelf is certainly a teleologist. It also makes sense that Rand would endrose a limited teleology because of her Aristotelian influences. Not to mention, what the authors of the links posted think is entailed by the Primacy of Existence Axiom just seems sketchy. The Axiom does too much. Besdies, I'm going to take Gotthelf's word over some guy's I found on the internet.

So, what are we to make of this? How is Objectivist teleology possible possible, and what does the Primacy of Existence Axiom really entail? Now, I don't think that Heeh2 is an Objectivist (correct me if I'm wrong), but he seems to know the most about Objectivism out of anyone who has posted on this thread. So, if you, Heeh2, can settle the matter, or at least point us in the right direction, please do so.

 

My own personal belief is that Rand is not spectacularly bright, did not actually bring anything highly original to philosophy merely adapted others work to suit her own musings on the subject. You would be better off discussing what Locke found so unappealing about Kants work, Rand merely took her ideas from Locke. Rand is at best a minor blip in the history of philosophy and I almost disagree entirely with everything she wrote but thats not to say I entirely support Kant either
Rand takes a few days of anyones time to understand and dismiss.- Kant and Locke take a lifetime of study to understand and be able to dismiss.
If you want to understand Rand understand Locke
By the time you understand how much you would like to dimiss what Kant said you also understand the enormity of his mind. Believe me - Kant is still now a powerful figure in philosophy, one that demands a great deal of study to understand why you might want to oppose him - its not easy to find your own reason for saying he is wrong - Rand cant, at the end of the day, dismiss him entirely

this is from wikipedia
Kant defines his theory of perception in his influential 1781 work The Critique of Pure Reason, which has often been cited as the most significant volume in modern philosophy. Kant maintains that our knowledge of the external world has its foundations not merely in experience, but in both experience and a priori knowledge.

Before discussing his theory it is necessary to explain the distinction between the analytic and the synthetic. An analytic statement is a statement in which the predicate is contained in the subject – ‘a black horse is black’, for example. We require no further knowledge than a rudimentary grasp of the language to understand this proposition. We know that a black horse is black without needing to be told anything other than that there is a black horse, to which the quality of blackness is necessary. Synthetic statements, on the other hand, are those in which the predicate is not contained in the subject – ‘the horse is black’. In this instance, blackness is not necessary to the horse; until we are told that the colour of the horse we do not know that it is black. In this case, experience of the horse is required before its blackness becomes clear.

The rest of what you write hardly relates to the initial propositions you offer

wikipedia is always a good place to start
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kant

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayn_rand

she is a weakling of the philosophical world - one which the right wing often put forward to show (in some bizzarre way - which is not borne out in her work) they are progressives and uphold feminism - if that were the case they would show Simone de Beauvoir, to be a prime example of female genius in the struggle against oppression. She is anyway more important to philosophy than Rand. Without de Beauvoir there would be lacking a certain train of thought - without Rand, we would simply fall back on Locke and not miss her. Rand altered nothing of the world we live in - de Beauvoire defined a whole world-wide mass movement

 

i could copy and paste some facts....quote wikipedia....mabey add my two sense in were i see fit.....

but whats the point.....

this hole thread was basically what you called it.....

and this horse has been dead....for a long time......

objectivism is a good idea....but i get tons of those when im high.....

why are you even trying to understand it?

 

If I understand your quandry correctly, then I believe that Rand would have considered it axiomatic--it's simply the nature of man to be goal oriented (her stock man-qua-man answer).

But I feel where you are coming from. If I understand Objectivism correctly, the Existential Axiom infers direct metaphysical realism--Reality exists independently of the observer. I'm completely on board with this. The observer perceives Reality directly. I understood her to believe mere perception is nothing special. What is special is conceptualization--the ability of the observer to create concepts in order to recognize the "facts" of Reality. The rest of her epistemology is hashing out this theory, which, to me, isn't an epistemic theory at all. Naively, it makes some sense, but I find that it lacks the nuts and bolts necessary for epistemology. From my perspective, this conceptualization is subjective--it derives from the subject; objectivists deny this. Of course, it is asserted that there exists only one set of correct concepts; therefore it's not subjective but objective. So, I would guess that they would claim teleology within this conceptualization. I have no idea if I addressed your quandary.

All this being said, I'm onboard with a lot of Objectivism: elimination of the synthetic/analytic concept; elimination of the concept of a priori knowledge; direct metaphysical realism; rational self-interest (not their brand though); capitalism, but not dogmatically so. I just find it not fully developed, a tad sloppy, too dogmatic, and permeated with her unpleasant personality.

 

There is no understanding Rand, like I said before its just a right wing attempt to proffer their most intellectual female who doesnt even make a blip on the philosophical landscape in comparison to de Beauvoir. Ayn Rand is nothing more than an advocate of Locke - she added nothing - not a thing to the debate and most of what she said on that was laughably naive - to prove it

Where does she talk about a mirage - that appeals to the senses - a mirage or an hallucination may have all the qualities she would would advocate as objective to the senses - yet her philosophy cannot account for that without appeal to shared objectivity - her philosophy ends in a farsical devolution of whatever she says - she has to keep going back to the corroboration of earlier philosophies - her work isnt credible doesnt stand up to scrutiny
she didnt move philosophy forward even a millimetre

read this
in the universities Ayn Rands name is sneered at !
http://www.inblogs.net/maverickphilosopher/2004/05/is-ayn-rand-good-philosopher.html

her entire "body of ... work" is merely a device of the pseudo intellectual to force a particular naturalistic view of the world without getting into the complexities - it all adds up in her ethics which are pathetically right wing
and as simplistic as her logical "axioms"

 

i still love her novels....

 

Never read one. I've heard such widely varying opinions on them I'm not sure what to believe. The real nasty reviews I've heard are probably poisoned by hatred of Rand herself. I'll eventually get to one, but, since graduation a few years ago, I've had almost no time to read. Damnable life and all.

 

The main objection to Rand is simply this (and I put it in simpler terms than usually expressed so a lot of what I say could be open to criticism but it is none-the-less basically true)
Although it is natural to assume that the objects around you exist when you are not there to see them, you cannot prove this is true.
When you look at a peice of paper it looks white in white light. You are inclined to say this is white paper. However look at that paper under blue light or red light and it looks a different colour. This is the simple refutation of rands work. It does not account for the fact that the conditions under which you percieve an object dictate to your mind the objective qualities of the object. There is no ideal condition under which we can say - "this is how the object can be seen as it really is" because a peice of paper is red under the condition of red lighting - white under white and so on.
Not only that but if you cannot see the paper you cannot know what conditions the paper is currently in so if you say to someone - go get the red paper - if they walk into the room lit by a green bulb they will see no red paper.
therefore the refuutation of Rands work is simple - for any condition she calls an objective reality she cannot take into account - the question - "whose reality"?
my reality where I see the oibject under red lighting conditions or your reality where you can only see the paper under a blue light

you see what I mean?
she tries to say that objects have an existence independent of the mind but ask yourself
"am I seeing the object or merely its attributes as presented to the mind by the eyes" - the opposition to rand in its extreme is that nothing exists without a mind to percieve it - it is a counter intuitive philosophy but one which - when you grasp it fully is correct. its your mind that makes the object not the other way around

 

I've been investigating Rand's teleology for a few days now, and I'm actually very impressed with it. Here's what I've pieced together so far.

I found one site that explicitly said that Rand was not a teleologist, but they qualify this remark, with reference to intentionality or God. The thing is, this is not a rejection teleology but only of Platonic teleology, the forerunner of contemporary intelligent design. Granted, since ID is garbage. But Aristotelian teleology is not ruled out, on which teleology is confined to the biological realm, there is no reference to intentionality or God, and the "good" in question is the good for a particular organism. Since Rand is an Aristotelian (not a Lockean like sentient said), we shouldn't be surprised if she was an Aristotelian teleologist. (p.s. I don't see how Locke could have criticized Kant, since Locke was dead).

As it turns out, Rand is an Aristotelian teleologist because (I believe) she meets the three conditions outlined just above. The really remarkable thing is how the third condition, concerning the good, works into her ethics. Rand believes the good to be really "out there," and it is the nature of organisms to seek out what is beneficial for them (that's Rand's ethical egoism). So, I think you see how Rand's teleology and ethics meshes well with Darwin, survival of the fittest, etc. Generally, I've been disappointed with Rand's philosophy, but I think I found a real gem with her teleology.

 

Yeah well, somehow I'm not convinced. Frankly, this is just a bad argument that no one's believed since Berkeley. You know, esse est percipi. There are several refutations that I'll go over now, not the least of which is just plain common sense.

Here's a summary of Kant's refutation of idealism, which is adequate:

(1) "I am aware of my own existence as determined in time" (B275)

(2) I do not determine myself in time on the basis of anything represented to me about myself.

(3) Thus, if I am going to determine my own existence in time, I could only do it via the contents of inner sense.

http://www.meta-religion.com/Philosophy/Biography/Immanuel_Kant/realism_in_the_refutation_of_ide.htm

The argument runs like this: I perceive the passage of time (e.g. by the causal sequence, watching a clock, etc.). Self-consciousness is not the source of the determination of time. When I consider myself as a pure subject, I can't get the concept of time out of it. Like Descartes' self, the pure subject is intemporal. So, where does the concept of time come from? Well, time rests on change. So, change (and time) require us to have a concept of continuity through time, meaning that an object in flux is still the very same object it was before, whether we see it or not. So, external objects are antecedent to the concept of time. Without external objects, time would be impossible.

The Berkelean view leads to a pickle. For example, according to Berkeley, all subjective sense-data are accurate. (And you want to talk about dreams?!) If I hold a meter stick before me and move it further away from my eyes, then the meter stick appears shorter. But the meter stick is the rule by which the concept of "meter" is determined. So, how can I have a concept of meter? (Berkeley has a lot of problems with spatial representations too). This is something of a Wittgenstinian argument.

Here's something directly from Husserl:

"Berkeley reduces the bodily things which appear in natural experience to the complexes of sense-data themselves through which they appear. No inference is thinkable, according to Berkeley, through which conclusions could be drawn from these sense-data about anything but other such data. It could only be inductive inference, i.e., inference growing out of the association of ideas. Matter existing in itself, a je ne sais quoi, according to Locke, is for Berkeley a philosophical invention. It is also significant that at the same time he dissolves the manner in which rational natural science builds concepts and transforms it into a sensationalistic critique of knowledge."

http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/ge/husserl.htm

This isn't so much an argument as it is the outline of an argument. Husserl is only commenting on the history of philosophy here, not actually arguing against Berkeley. But the point is clear. Berkeley was practicing empirical psychology, not philosophy. His bare-bones empiricism was the wrong way to go about things, because (1) All knowledge is not inductive. If it were, then a whole lot of science (and its certainty) go out the window, and (2) we can make inferences to things we don't perceive. That's just the great thing about logic.

So, no, your refutation of Rand doesn't "work" for anyone but a handful of Englishmen who died 300 years ago. The part where you ask "Whose reality?" is particularily aweful because there's only one. Further suggestions:

(1) Give up empirical psychology. It's not philosophy, and epistemology is certainly not first philosophy. Try philosophy of language instead. Facts are inter-subjectively verifiable. Meanings are inter-subjectively constructed. This does not entail relativism; it certainly does not entail subjectivism.

(2) Adopt the transcendental method. Some facts can be taken as given and as apodictically certain (e.g. arithmetic, geometry, physics, etc.) The job of philosophy is to abstract from these facts and determine why they are necessarily true. Science is trustworthy, much more trustworthy than philosophy. The proof is in the track-record.

In short, your philosophy is out-dated, and it's time to upgrade.

 

1. Teleology is confined to the biological realm.
2. No reference to intentionality or God.
3. "Good" is the good for a particular organism.
What does 3 actually mean? Does it mean whatever the particualar organism wishes or does it mean good in relation to some standard like survival or procreation or something?

 

(3) excludes anthropocentric teleology, on which the good is always for the benefit of man. (3) also excludes "best of all possible worlds" teleology, like Intelligent Design, on which the good is the good for the world as a whole. So, yes, (3) basically means "good in relation to some standard like survival or procreation" for the individual organism in question. It's really amazing how Aristotle anticipated Darwinism. Most people think that Darwin disproved teleology, but natural selection is really a teleological theory of the Aristotelian variety. Lennox wrote a very good paper on the matter. So did Gotthelf, I think.

Now, Darwin knew very little of Aristotle's work. He was much more familiar with Natural Theology, and he was, in fact, a sympathezer with the Natural Theologians before his trip on the "Beagle." After that, Darwin himself thought he had refuted teleology because he was only familiar with the Intelligent Design theories of the Natural Theologians. But, late in his life, Darwin was directed to read some Aristotle by a friend. Even Darwin had to admit the striking similarities.