It is the real world, not logic, which makes a thing true. Facts, nature, reality constitute the standard of truth, not logic. I would also note that, while there exists an infinite number of logical expressions (after all, every mathematic equation is a logical expression, and there are an infinite number of such expressions), only a small fraction of those will find exemplification in existence. Logical validity is therefore no warrant of truth.
Peikoff's attack on the analytic-synthetic dichotomy is primarily an attack on the distinction, central to "metaphysical" realism, that facts are empirical and logic is ideal. In order to carry out his attack, Peikoff draws inferences from the analytic-synthetic dichotomy that only the most doltish philosophers would ever dream of accepting:
Analytic truths ... are non-empirical -- because they say nothing about the world of experience. No fact can ever cast doubt on them, they are immune from future correction -- because they are immune from reality....
Synthetic propositions, on the other hand, are factual -- and for this, man pays a price. The price is that they are contingent, uncertain and unprovable.
The theory of the analytic synthetic dichotomy presents men with the following choices: If your statement is proved, it says nothing about that which exists; if it is about existents, it cannot be proved. If it is demonstrated by logical argument, it represents a subjective convention; if it asserts a fact, logic cannot establish it. If you validate it by an appeal to the meanings of your concepts, then it is cut off from reality; if you validate it by an appeal to your percepts, then you cannot be certain of it. [IOTE, 93-94]
Here we find a choice example of a failure to get the point. When Wittgenstien wrote, "The propositions of logic all say the same thing: that is nothing," this was not meant as an attack against logic or truth; it was meant as an attack against rationalistic speculation. Logic, by it's own devices, can only insure that the conclusion of an argument are consistent with its premises (i.e., that it says "the same thing," as Wittgenstien puts it). It's not the function of logic to determine whether the premises or the conclusion are true. While logic can be a very useful tool in testing and arriving at truth, it is not itself true, nor is it a fail-safe test of truth.
If there's a flaw in analytic synthetic dichotomy (at least in the version presented by Peikoff), it arises from the expression "analytic truth." There is, properly speaking, no such thing. All truth is empirical (i.e., synthetic). Now this does not mean, as Peikoff incorrectly infers, that no analytical propositions can be empirically true. Many undoubtedly are. But they are not true for logical reasons; they are true because they serve as appropriate descriptions of reality. 2 + 2 = 4, if taken as an analytical statement, is not true, it's merely correct. As an empirical statement, it may be true in some instances and false in others. As Karl Popper has pointed out, if you place two plus two drops in a dry flask, you will never get four drops out of that flask. A logical argument, assuming it's valid, is correct; it may also be true; but if true, the truth comes from reality, not from logic. Logic tests the validity (i.e., the correctness) of arguments. It is not a test of truth (although it can be used to falsify universal statements). Empirical testing, rather than logic, is the test of truth. Logic may play a critical role in the empirical testing; but one should not confuse the method with the result. Grammar is the method of speaking and writing correctly; but grammar isn't true of reality, nor is grammatical speech even necessary for making oneself understood.
Another misunderstanding that emerges from Peikoff's analysis of the ASD involves a failure to distinguish between significant and trivial truth. Modern philosophers object to true analytical propositions, not because they wish to deny A is A or existence exists, but because they find such propositions to be trivial and unworthy of any philosopher who is attempting to convey significant insights about the real world. Such propositions are trivial because nothing specific can ever be deduced from them. From a tautological premise, only tautological conclusions can be deduced. A philosophically literate person should know this, but, as David Stove explains, philosophers sometimes forget this important truth:
Just so, the fact that philosophers all know that necessary truths have only necessarily-true consequences, and tautologies only tautological ones, is no guarantee that they will always bring this knowledge to bear in cases where they should. It is perfectly possible that they will mistake a particular argument, say, from a tautological premise to a contingent conclusion, for a valid one.
Not only is this possible: it is a temptation to which everyone, including philosophers, is constantly exposed. For we all want, as it is perfectly reasonable to want, our conclusions to be as interesting as possible, our premises to be as certain as possible, and our reasoning to be as conclusive as possible. And who cannot see that this threefold want, if it is not restrained by our own better knowledge, will sometimes lead us to imagine that these three desiderata have all been maximally satisfied at once: for example, that some non-tautological conclusion has been rigorously derived from a tautological premise?
It is in just this way that millions of people, some of them philosophers, have concluded that all human effort is ineffectual, from the premise that whatever will be, will be; have concluded that everyone is selfish, from the premise that a man's desires are necessarily his desires; have concluded, from the tautology that every effect has a cause, that every event has a cause. Shall I go on? Shall I mention … Hegel, fixing the number of planets, with no other premises than truths of logic? Bentham, whose only real argument from "the principle of of utility" was, that "it is but a tautology to say, that the more consistently pursued, the better it must ever be for mankind?"
Tedium forbids that this list be lengthened: we have all heard this complaint far too often. Ever since Francis Bacon, a hurricane of complaint has been blowing, to the effect that philosophers have tried to do "a priori," or "deductively," or "speculatively," what can only be done "inductively" or "a posteriori," or "naturalistically," if it can be done at all…. This hurricane of complaint is blowing still…. But it is, and always has been, essentially right….
… it must be admitted that this temptation to produce non tautological rabbits out of tautological hats is especially strong for philosophers. For consider. Rigorously valid reasoning is both part of philosophers' subject-matter, and one of their boasts; philosophers' conclusions are, characteristically, extremely general and interesting, not to say amazing; and yet, except per accidens, they have no more knowledge of any contingent matter [i.e., matter of fact], that could serve as the premises of their reasonings, than the next man has. Any special expertise which they possess is all confined to "the realm of essence" [i.e., the meanings of words]. Clearly, therefore, it must be an occupational hazard for philosophers to be tempted to milk interesting results out of tautologies; even though they are also the very people who best know that the thing cannot be done. [Idols of the Age, 156-157]
When David Stove declares that all philosophers know that only tautological conclusions can be drawn from tautological premises, he obviously betrays ignorance of Rand and her disciples. For in Objectivism we discover philosophers who appear entirely innocent of the empirical vacuity of tautologies. And it is largely in the service of perserving this rather quaint philosophical illiteracy that Peikoff trots out his "refutation" of the analytic-synthetic dichotomy. While Objectivists are opposed to rationalism in others, they are not opposed to rationalism in their own speculations; and that is why they must attack the distinction between tautological (i.e., analytical) propositions and synthetic propositions (i.e., statements about matters of fact). Objectivism cannot be an empirical philosophy for the simple reason that too many of its core doctrines fail to accord with reality. Man is not a blank slate governed by general premises; physical reality is not "logical"; definitions do not define concepts; morality cannot be founded solely on reason; laissez-faire capitalism is not a politically feasible system. Objectivist views on these matters cannot be defended on the basis of empirical research and testing. They can only be defended speculatively, on the basis of tautologies and empirically vacuous generalizations. Peikoff's attack on the ASD is an attack on empiricism from a rationalistic perspective.
A few minor quibbles: you write "all truth is empirical", but of course there isn't only one "true" meaning of the word "true" (that comes perhaps from reading too much Objectivist texts...). For example, Merriam-Webster gives as one of the meanings of "true": logically necessary. In logic you can use truth tables, in which the variables have the value "true" or "false". Nobody calls them "correctness tables".
ReplyDeleteThe point is of course that one should distinguish this kind of truth from empirical truth, and that is just the analytical synthetic dichotomy.
Further, not all analytical truths are trivial, unless you think that mathematics is a trivial business. Some tautologies are so difficult to derive that they couldn't be proved for centuries. Of course in themselves they still don't tell us anything about the world of experience, but they might be usefully applied in finding empirical truths.
Blergh! I never fail to be disappointed when people I know to be otherwise intelligent bust out "A is A," believing they've just refuted all contrary arguments.
ReplyDeleteIt's like someone opening with King's Pawn to E4 and declaring "Checkmate!" (Except that KP to E4, at least, advances the game.)
Greg,
ReplyDeleteYou write:
_____
Objectivism cannot be an empirical philosophy for the simple reason that too many of its core doctrines fail to accord with reality. Man is not a blank slate governed by general premises; physical reality is not "logical"; definitions do not define concepts; morality cannot be founded solely on reason; laissez-faire capitalism is not a politically feasible system. These are all assertions about matters of fact that cannot be defended on the basis of empirical research and testing.
____
True, but O'ism does claim to be an empirical philosophy. Everything (except perhaps axioms) can be traced to sensation. This even includes the principles of logic, mathematics and grammatical concepts such as conjunctions.
If you think about it, O'ism is a very radical version of empiricism, although what an orthodox O'ist would say about things such as mathematics is not entirely clear.
David Gordon once noted that O'ists spend much more time arguing that its doctrines are coherent than that they are true.
"True, but O'ism does claim to be an empirical philosophy."
ReplyDeleteTrue, but anyone can claim to be anything. All it takes is words. What matters isn't what they say but what they do. And what do they do? They try to establish matters of fact by way of a priori reasoning.
"If you think about it, O'ism is a very radical version of empiricism."
I have thought about it, and I don't see anything resembling empiricism in their actual as-practiced methods.
In response, I'd like to cite something I recently read:
ReplyDeleteArt, according to Objectivism, serves a human cognitive need: it allows human beings to grasp concepts as though they were percepts. Objectivism defines "art" as a "selective re-creation of reality according to an artist's metaphysical value-judgments"—that is, according to what the artist believes to be ultimately true and important about the nature of reality and humanity. In this respect Objectivism regards art as a way of presenting abstractions concretely, in perceptual form.
(source: http://aynrand.co/objectivism/philosophy/aesthetics:-metaphysical-value-judgments)
"Objectivism defines "art" as a "selective re-creation of reality according to an artist's metaphysical value-judgments"—that is, according to what the artist believes to be ultimately true and important about the nature of reality and humanity."
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately for Objectivists wanting to make their case for the utility of art (at least on their own terms), the world of art in general tends to hold a far broader view of what art is than this. Plus I'd quibble over terms like "selective re-creation of reality" - really? Reality itself re-created? I guess A can become B after all.
Really, any time someone says "Objectivists define such-and-such as---" we can pretty much assume that their definition is skewed enough away from common usage as to be nearly useless to non-Objectivists...
Or in the case of Ayn Rand Fans, they move KP to E4 and shout "King me!"
ReplyDeleteYour argument rests on a misunderstanding of what objectivists mean by "Logic."
ReplyDeleteLogic, in objectivism, is the art of non-contradictory identification. Thus logic cannot be separated from empirical reality, because logic is the process of identifying reality.
Once this failure of identification in your argument is identified, the rest of your argument falls apart. One ought not critique the objectivist view of logic without identifying what it is. But that's exactly what you've done.
Because that would be a failure to identify reality. A failure to understand what one is talking about. A failure to understand one's opposition.
Which would be illogical.
When objectivists cry "A is A," they are not making an academic philosophical argument. That would be tautological, and they know it. When they cry "A is A," the are uttering a cry for moral standards. It's a fundamental, primal demand to accept What Is.
That demand is driven by arguments like the one you make here, in which you fail to identify what A is. You critique objectivist logic based on a failure to _identify_ what objectivist logic is.
But A is A. Not as an argumen, But as an immutable fact opponents of objectivism are not fond of accepting.
"Really, any time someone says "Objectivists define such-and-such as---" we can pretty much assume that their definition is skewed enough away from common usage as to be nearly useless to non-Objectivists..."
ReplyDeleteBy this reasoning, non-Objectivists are only capable of understanding concepts in "common usage." What a sad view of non-objectivists -- that they are unable to understand and evaluate ideas on their merits, as they are capable only of understanding words as "commonly used." Whatever that means.
In reality, there is no such thing as "common usage." everybody uses words differently. Philosophy is the process not of adopting "common usage," but of clearly identifying what _you_ mean, and what _others_ mean by a particular word in a particular context.
Unless you want to sling mud instead of understanding people. Then you claim to be the authority on how people are allowed to use words.
for a study in how philosophers clarify word use to show that words as "commonly used" are loaded with contradiction, vague definition, confusion, and ultimately evil, you might read "socrates."
ReplyDeleteoh wait. he didn't believe in the "common use" of words. he challenged common use. pass the hemlock.
@ungtss: Logic, in objectivism, is the art of non-contradictory identification. Thus logic cannot be separated from empirical reality, because logic is the process of identifying reality.
ReplyDeleteYes, I know the words, and I'm all in favor of identifying reality. But I disagree with you that it's the non-Objectivists here who are failing to correctly identify reality or "accept What is."
Words aside, Greg's overarching theme, in his posts here and in his book, is that Ayn Rand failed in important ways at the task of "identifying reality," particularly when it comes to human nature. Reality -- including an ever-growing volume of empirical, scientific research, examples of which are regularly featured in the posts here -- shows that conscious cognition (including reason) is only a small part of human cognitive activity. Human nature can't be reduced to anything as simple as "rational animal" (or "irrational animal" for that matter).
Objectivists tend to blow off all this research, on the theory that science relies on reason and therefore can't be used to "invalidate" reason -- that would be conceptual grand larceny. But that's just another Randian false dichotomy. Nobody is invalidating reason; what science is showing is that there's a lot more to human cognition than just application of "the method of non-contradictory identification."
You can, of course, refuse to accept that this particular A is A and insist that the "A" of human cognition be limited to a small subset of what it really is. You can cling to Rand's reassurances that you can be perfectly rational and that reason is all you need for survival and/or happiness. But A is still A, and all that pre-conscious stuff is happening inside your head, whether you choose to accept it or not.
untgss:
ReplyDelete>Your argument rests on a misunderstanding of what objectivists mean by "Logic."
Oh, so when they use the word "logic", you claim Objectivists are referring to a *different* system from the standard bivalent logic most people are referring to with the use of the term?
If so, can you demonstrate how this Objectivist logical system differs by showing us a couple of examples of its workings?
If not, then then Greg and Objectivists are in fact referring to the same thing, so there is no misunderstanding. If this is the case then it seems you, like so many other Objectivists, are merely bluffing. Or perhaps confused, like this Objectivist idiot who does not even understand the difference between validity and soundness.
ungtss claimed:
ReplyDelete>In reality, there is no such thing as "common usage."
LOL, have you heard of things called "dictionaries"?
What do you think their pages are filled with?
“Words aside, Greg's overarching theme, in his posts here and in his book, is that Ayn Rand failed in important ways at the task of "identifying reality," particularly when it comes to human nature.”
ReplyDeleteThere are two issues – her method, and her consistent application of her method. In this post, his criticism is of her method itself. His criticism of her method is that “It is the real world, not logic, which makes a thing true.”
This is the classic false dichotomy. The real world is not true or false. It simply is. Only ideas can be true or false. And ideas are true or false to the degree to which they reflect the real world – and our method of developing ideas that reflect the world is … logic. Non-contradictory identification.
“Reality -- including an ever-growing volume of empirical, scientific research, examples of which are regularly featured in the posts here -- shows that conscious cognition (including reason) is only a small part of human cognitive activity.”
Ayn Rand never disputed that. She consistently argued that man’s default state is one in which “conscious cognition is only a small part of human cognitive activity,” but that human beings may – by exercising volition – come to exercise control over ever larger parts of their cognitive activity. This has been borne out by recent research. Our prefrontal cortex has the ability to rewire the subconscious portions of our brain – neuroplasticity is well-established. We can rewire ourselves.
“Oh, so when they use the word "logic", you claim Objectivists are referring to a *different* system from the standard bivalent logic most people are referring to with the use of the term? If so, can you demonstrate how this Objectivist logical system differs by showing us a couple of examples of its workings?”
Daniel, no, not a different system. Just the obvious fact that logic cannot be detached from the object of logical discussion, into an abstraction devoid of any factual content. Logic includes both the abstract rules and the practical application of those rules of facts. Thus the rules of bivalent logic decree that I am either a) alive, or b) dead. But Logic in the broader sense is the process of figuring out what I am by applying abstract rules to concrete observations.
“LOL, have you heard of things called "dictionaries"?”
Daniel, dictionaries only scratch the surface of meaning. They are a superficial introduction to basic concepts. In reality, we all mean different things by the same words. For instance, your concept of “love” is doubtless very different from mine. We may both be able to agree with what the dictionary says, but below that superficial level, our concepts are going to be quite different.
The recognition that people mean different things by the same words – and that it is critical to understand what words mean, and to be very careful about how we use our words – is the beginning of one’s escape from ignorance.
ungtss:
ReplyDelete>Daniel, no, not a different system. Just the obvious fact that logic cannot be detached from the object of logical discussion, into an abstraction devoid of any factual content.
So ungtss, I take it that like Perigo et al, you don't (or can't) differentiate between the validity of an argument and its soundness either.
Standard bi valent logic does.
You claim Objecti-logic doesn't.
Therefore Objecti-logic *is* different from standard bi valent logic, according to you.
But then...you are also claiming it isn't.
I think you and your philosophy are in the grip of an opening day fallacy...;-)
@untgss: His criticism of her method is that “It is the real world, not logic, which makes a thing true.”
ReplyDeleteThis is the classic false dichotomy.
You apparently do not know what a false dichotomy is. A dichotomy is an assertion that two options, P and Q, are mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive of the possibilities (an either/or). Some dichotomies are true (e.g., either Ayn Rand is alive today or she is not). Some dichotomies are false (e.g., you are either rich or poor).
Greg hasn't asserted a dichotomy between logic and the real world (or between logic and truth). What he has asserted is that "logic" means something different from "the real world" -- not that logic is somehow mutually exclusive with the real world. (If you read the rest of the paragraph you quoted from, that becomes abundantly clear.) So there's no dichotomy, false or otherwise.
The real world is not true or false. It simply is. Only ideas can be true or false. And ideas are true or false to the degree to which they reflect the real world – and our method of developing ideas that reflect the world is … logic. Non-contradictory identification.
So, misused jargon aside, your disagreement with Greg is actually on what "logic" means. And there you have a problem, as Daniel has pointed out. You don't seem clear on whether logic, on Rand's definition, is the same as or different from standard bivalent logic. (That, by the way, is a true dichotomy.)
One other thing ... at least for now:
ReplyDelete@ungtss: Just the obvious fact that logic cannot be detached from the object of logical discussion, into an abstraction devoid of any factual content.
Hate to tell you this, but in the sense in which Greg and Daniel are using the term "logic," the "obvious fact" is that it not only can be but has been has been detached from any real-world object. The pioneer in this detachment was none other than Aristotle, who did the earliest (known) work on valid versus invalid syllogisms (forms of inference, independent of any content). He was the first to divorce the form of an argument (what Greg and Daniel mean by logic) from the substance. It proved to be such a valuable tool that it's still taught and used today.
And to save you repeating yourself, I'm fully aware that what you (and Rand) mean by "logic" is not limited to (or even primarily) syllogistic reasoning. Rand formulated her definition ("the art of non-contradictory identification") to encompass a broad range of mental processes, including not only the application of syllogistic reasoning to particular content-bearing premises but also inductive reasoning (generalization), trial-and-error, scientific method, reasoning by analogy, pattern recognition, etc.
Greg's argument here goes to examining the limitations of syllogistic reasoning as such ... and demanding that we adopt your definitions doesn't defeat the argument.
“So ungtss, I take it that like Perigo et al, you don't (or can't) differentiate between the validity of an argument and its soundness either.”
ReplyDeleteDaniel, no, the distinction between validity and soundness is quite simple, intact, and not in question. However, neither validity nor soundness are relevant in the context of logic in the sense of “non-contradictory identification," because logic in that sense is an _identification_, not an argument. One does not "argue" one's way into understanding what a thing is. and one cannot identify what a _thing_ is without reference to the thing.
To make it concrete, in using logic to determine the problem with my car, neither validity nor soundness of arguments are relevant considerations. I am not making any arguments. I am attempting to identify the problem. I therefore use a process of experiment and deduction to logically isolate the problem, until I identify it. It is the _identification of the problem_, not the validity or soundness of any arguments, that matters.
That is not to say that validity and soundness are indistinguishable, or that they do not exist. It’s just to say that they are irrelevant outside of the context of an academic mind-mush, because what matters in the real world is _figuring out what things are_.
“A dichotomy is an assertion that two options, P and Q, are mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive of the possibilities (an either/or).”
Echo, a false dichotomy need not be an affirmative _assertion_ that two options are mutually exclusive. It also may be an implicit assumption that two options are mutually exclusive. That’s the form of false dichotomy present here.
“your disagreement with Greg is actually on what "logic" means.”
Actually, my disagreement with Greg is whether he is correctly identified what objectivism means by logic, since he purports to criticize it. The question is not “what is logic” but “what does Ayn Rand mean by logic and is that a legitimate understanding?” he did not get through the first part of the analysis. he did not correctly identify the object of his criticism.
“You don't seem clear on whether logic, on Rand's definition, is the same as or different from standard bivalent logic. (That, by the way, is a true dichotomy.)”
As I’ve said, bivalent logic is part of a broader context of logic. It’s part of the abstract rules, but in its purely abstract form, it does not touch any questions about the real world, and is therefore not sufficient to be a _practical_ and _useful_ logic.
“Hate to tell you this, but in the sense in which Greg and Daniel are using the term "logic," the "obvious fact" is that it not only can be but has been has been detached from any real-world object. The pioneer in this detachment was none other than Aristotle, who did the earliest (known) work on valid versus invalid syllogisms (forms of inference, independent of any content). He was the first to divorce the form of an argument (what Greg and Daniel mean by logic) from the substance. It proved to be such a valuable tool that it's still taught and used today.”
ReplyDeleteThat’s not what I meant by detachment from the real world. That’s the process of abstracting principles. I’ve never said that the abstract principles of logic are not valid, only that they are not _useful_ until applied to practical questions of fact. For instance, a syllogism that is valid but not sound is of academic interest only. It is not useful in any practical sense. This is different from the obvious fact that patterns of logical thinking (and fallacy) can be abstracted and identified. Of course they can be abstracted and identified. But in order to be applied, they must be applied to the _real world_.
“Greg's argument here goes to examining the limitations of syllogistic reasoning as such ... and demanding that we adopt your definitions doesn't defeat the argument.”
I’m not demanding that anybody adopt my definitions. I’m telling you it’s foolish to criticize a person’s definition of logic after having failed to properly identify what it is. You go ahead and call logic whatever you like. But don’t pretend that somebody else is wrong just because you choose not to learn what they’re saying.
"By this reasoning, non-Objectivists are only capable of understanding concepts in "common usage." What a sad view of non-objectivists -- that they are unable to understand and evaluate ideas on their merits, as they are capable only of understanding words as "commonly used." Whatever that means."
ReplyDeleteNot at all. Understanding Objectivist attempts to use non-standard definitions of words can be done, it's merely more difficult and fatiguing in conversation, and increases the chances of being misunderstood.
The problem is that it often seems (and probably is) an attempt by Objectivists to "win" arguments and score "debate points" by smugly "correcting" non-Objectivists whenever such a word comes up. Rather than try to communicate a concept in a way that a non-Objectivist can easily digest, the Objectivist spends energy telling the non-Objectivist what is "really" meant by these words, to the point of completely avoiding whatever original idea was trying to be conveyed in the first place in favor of an argument about defining words. If I say "in a democratic state" and you derail things to inform me what "democratic" means, we have left the realm of productive discussion.
I suspect a certain amount of this is by design.
"Not at all. Understanding Objectivist attempts to use non-standard definitions of words can be done, it's merely more difficult and fatiguing in conversation, and increases the chances of being misunderstood."
ReplyDeletethat's different from saying that an objectivist's word use is so non-standard as to be useless to non-objectivists, which was originally said. it is in fact difficult, because she literally redefined a large number of words. however, my experience in having adopted her definitions is that they are substantially preferable, because they eliminate the contradictions, ambiguities, and outright falsehoods inherent in the words.
you'll get no argument from me that a lot of people calling themselves objectivists exhibit personality flaws in their discussions with non-objectivists. i have yet to find anyone calling themselves an objectivist that i find personally enjoyable to be around. but my experience has been that the flaws in objectivism -- and indeed the flaws in the life and thought of ms. rand herself -- stem from a failure to comprehensively apply her ideas.
most "objectivists" think atlas shrugged was about capitalism. which it wasn't. it was about the role of man's mind in existence. most "objectivists" think ayn rand was glorifying the behavior of reardon and dagny. but she wasn't. they were the bad guys. most "objectivists" think atlas shrugged is a glorification of greed. which it wasn't. the entire plot is about how difficult it is to give up false wealth in exchange for the spiritual value of freedom.
most "objectivists" have no idea what she was talking about. they take a few of her ideas out of context, alter them to justify whatever personality flaws the objectivist seeks to rationalize, and ignore everything else.
but that is not a reflection of the ideas themselves. which in my opinion are earth-shattering.
one example of a particularly challenging redefinition is her integration of "logic" and "emotion." the dominant philosophical schools all place them in opposition -- logic is a-emotional, and emotion is a-logical. but this is outright false, and AR showed why. emotion cannot be separated from logic, because our emotional reactions necessarily rely on our interpretation of events through our logic and values. you see a dead person. are you happy or sad? well, depends on who the dead person is and what you think about their death.
ReplyDeletein the same way, logic cannot be separated from emotion, because emotion provides the _goal_ of logic. why is being logical preferable to being illogical? because success in the universe feels better than failure in the universe, and logic is our road to success.
so she redefined logic so as to not be opposed to emotion, but in fact to be inseparable from it. and she was absolutely right. placing logic as against emotion is plain stupid. of course most people still use "logic" and "emotion" in opposition, and when speaking to them one needs to be clear about one's meaning. but AR's definition is far, far better than the conventional one, because it eliminates contradiction from word-use.
"that's different from saying that an objectivist's word use is so non-standard as to be useless to non-objectivists, which was originally said. it is in fact difficult, because she literally redefined a large number of words. however, my experience in having adopted her definitions is that they are substantially preferable, because they eliminate the contradictions, ambiguities, and outright falsehoods inherent in the words."
ReplyDeleteWould you prefer "so difficult as to be nearly useless"? The end result is the same-- having to adjust for Rand's definitions, their alleged superiority aside, makes for a discussion where at least one side is at a communication disadvantage. The intent may be to remove contradictions, the actual effect is to hamper communication.
ungtss:
ReplyDelete>To make it concrete, in using logic to determine the problem with my car, neither validity nor soundness of arguments are relevant considerations. I am not making any arguments. I am attempting to identify the problem. I therefore use a process of experiment and deduction to logically isolate the problem, until I identify it. It is the _identification of the problem_, not the validity or soundness of any arguments, that matters.
Dear Lord. Logic is not "a process of experiment and deduction." Logic is not figuring out an unidentified problem with your car by trial and error. That is called, um, "trial and error". Logic is a set of rules to test the consistency of statements, or beliefs. You can use it to deductively test theories about why your car isn't working (and incidentally, things like validity and soundness will in fact matter if you decide to use logic to to help fix your car!). But those theories are created by imagination and experience - that is, they are guesses, like "perhaps it's the battery" - and of course generating guesses like this has nothing whatsoever to do with logical rules.
If Objectivists want to mean by "logic" merely the process of trial and error, like fixing your car, well of course they can. But all they're really doing is just playing a word game and dressing it up in pseudo-philosophical drag to confuse and impress, just like so many of the "academics" they affect to criticise. And, indeed, given the ineptness of their arguments it seems they even confuse themselves.
Incidentally, ungtss, I suggest you don't try to formally model the deductive logic in testing what's wrong with your particular car, any more than you should try to formally model the precise chemical reactions taking place in your particular battery before you put on the jumper leads.
ReplyDeleteDoes this mean that chemistry is "academic mind-mush" too?
“Would you prefer "so difficult as to be nearly useless"? The end result is the same-- having to adjust for Rand's definitions, their alleged superiority aside, makes for a discussion where at least one side is at a communication disadvantage. The intent may be to remove contradictions, the actual effect is to hamper communication.”
ReplyDeleteI don’t see any logical link between “difficult” and “useless.” Usefulness is determined by one’s goals. If one’s goal is to understand and criticize an opposing point of view, then one must learn to understand how the opposing point of view uses words, no matter how difficult it is. Just as if one wishes to understand a Turk so as to contradict him, one must learn to speak Turkish. No matter how hard it is.
Many of the most useful things in life are the most difficult. Difficulty is not a criterion for usefulness.
“Dear Lord. Logic is not "a process of experiment and deduction." Logic is not figuring out an unidentified problem with your car by trial and error.”
You’ve rewritten what I wrote into something quite different. “trial and error” is not the same as “experiment and deduction.” As anyone who’s ever fixed a car or debugged a computer program knows, fixing problems is not “trial and error,” it is experiment and deduction. You run the program, and see what goes wrong. Then you use abductive reasoning to hypothesize what might cause the error. Then you conduct an experiment to test your hypothesis – typically isolating the testing the portion you’ve hypothesized might be the problem.
“But those theories are created by imagination and experience - that is, they are guesses, like "perhaps it's the battery" - and of course generating guesses like this has nothing whatsoever to do with logical rules.”
You might read up on abductive reasoning. It may open some doors to you.
“If Objectivists want to mean by "logic" merely the process of trial and error, like fixing your car, well of course they can.”
And if you want to ignore the scrupulously logical process involved in repairing a car or debugging a computer program, treating it as some sort of arbitrary guesswork, you can to. Those of us who actually do these sorts of things know how scrupulously and ruthlessly logical a process it is. And how few people are willing or able to do it.
Here's what WP has to say about abductive reasoning.
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abductive_reasoning
"logic is a-emotional, and emotion is a-logical. but this is outright false, and AR showed why. emotion cannot be separated from logic, because our emotional reactions necessarily rely on our interpretation of events through our logic and values."
ReplyDeleteI don't think AR showed anything of the sort. She tried to establish that her values were the most sensible values, that her values arose through basic logic (through some faulty reasoning and switching definitions mid-argument). But it's the old is/ought question.
Values are not inherently logical, at least their roots are not. Logic helps us proceed from those values but it can't establish those values.
"why is being logical preferable to being illogical? because success in the universe feels better than failure in the universe, and logic is our road to success."
Facts not in evidence. Does success, in fact, feel better? Doesn't that depend on how you define success? If a depressive feels better by lounging around all day in front of the TV binging on junk food subsisting off of welfare checks and food stamps, does logic bring them to that state, and does that qualify as success? I suspect Rand would be horrified at the prospect of someone existing in such a state and calling it a success or valuing that state over her standards for productive existence.
So either we have to be very liberal with how we define success, making it a subjective, personal measure, or we have to allow that success (as determined by Rand or some other arbitrary factor) may not always feel better to every person.
And if the yardstick for success is that vague, what of logic being preferable to non-logic? Is there no success when intuition and hunches are followed? Where someone claims their success was due to divine interference or even blind luck? If two musicians make songs, and one becomes a profitable hit and one does not, where is the logic at work? The "Harlem Shake" is currently a fad and has profited its creator, but if there's logic at work there I find it difficult to detect.
"Incidentally, ungtss, I suggest you don't try to formally model the deductive logic in testing what's wrong with your particular car, any more than you should try to formally model the precise chemical reactions taking place in your particular battery before you put on the jumper leads."
ReplyDeleteNo, one must have a model within one's head, to allow abductive reasoning. one must understand how the car works, so that one can abduce a likely problem from a known problem, through the lens of a known system.
“Values are not inherently logical, at least their roots are not. Logic helps us proceed from those values but it can't establish those values.”
ReplyDeleteActually, I think logic necessarily helps us establish values, by showing how values are interconnected. For instance, of one values time with one’s daughter, one must also value one’s life, because one’s life is a logical, practical prerequisite for spending time with one’s daughter. And if one values one’s life, then one must value one’s health, because health is a logical prerequisite for life of the sort that makes spending time with one’s daughter necessary.
When one examines the interconnection between values, one is left with a stark choice. Then one chooses. And the consequences follow.
Morality and values in objectivism are not "oughts" so much as "if/thens." If you do this, then this will happen. So choose wisely.
“Facts not in evidence. Does success, in fact, feel better? Doesn't that depend on how you define success? If a depressive feels better by lounging around all day in front of the TV binging on junk food subsisting off of welfare checks and food stamps, does logic bring them to that state, and does that qualify as success?”
Would a depressive call himself a success in the universe? Not in my experience. In my experience they are keenly aware of their own failure. That’s why they are depressive.
“Is there no success when intuition and hunches are followed? Where someone claims their success was due to divine interference or even blind luck? If two musicians make songs, and one becomes a profitable hit and one does not, where is the logic at work? The "Harlem Shake" is currently a fad and has profited its creator, but if there's logic at work there I find it difficult to detect.”
Success stemming from intuition and hunches is hit-or-miss. You may succeed once or twice by luck, but you cannot succeed systematically, because you do not know what you’re doing. Hence the prevalence of the “one hit wonder.”
"If one’s goal is to understand and criticize an opposing point of view, then one must learn to understand how the opposing point of view uses words, no matter how difficult it is. Just as if one wishes to understand a Turk so as to contradict him, one must learn to speak Turkish. No matter how hard it is."
ReplyDeleteThat is pretty much nonsense. The Objectivist movement has no qualms about using their own terms in the critique of everything non-Objectivist, or in insisting on using their own definitions when talking to others.
Why should the onus rest on non-Objectivists to understand the Objectivist?
The Objectivist is the minority opinion, attempting to persuade away from established norms. Why then should anyone be obliged to take on the added struggle of adapting to Objectivist terminology?
The cynical answer is that it is not actually the Objectivist goal to persuade, but to proclaim superiority and resist any critique of same.
“That is pretty much nonsense. The Objectivist movement has no qualms about using their own terms in the critique of everything non-Objectivist, or in insisting on using their own definitions when talking to others. Why should the onus rest on non-Objectivists to understand the Objectivist?”
ReplyDeleteTo the extent to which people calling themselves objectivists do this, they necessarily fail in any efforts to persuade anyone outside their little circle of trust. Thus to the extent anybody uses this method, they fail in their goals. Even if they call themselves objectivist.
Which means that the method doesn't work.
You're applying a social standard -- "you do it, why can't i?" that's nonsense. if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. no matter who uses it.
“The Objectivist is the minority opinion, attempting to persuade away from established norms. Why then should anyone be obliged to take on the added struggle of adapting to Objectivist terminology?”
I don’t know, ask Socrates. He tore up the conventional terminology of his day to show how warped it was. We’re still reading him today.
“The cynical answer is that it is not actually the Objectivist goal to persuade, but to proclaim superiority and resist any critique of same.”
Perhaps some objectivists have this in mind. But I don’t.
"Actually, I think logic necessarily helps us establish values, by showing how values are interconnected. For instance, of one values time with one’s daughter, one must also value one’s life, because one’s life is a logical, practical prerequisite for spending time with one’s daughter. And if one values one’s life, then one must value one’s health, because health is a logical prerequisite for life of the sort that makes spending time with one’s daughter necessary."
ReplyDelete"Morality and values in objectivism are not "oughts" so much as "if/thens." If you do this, then this will happen. So choose wisely."
But note the root cause in your chain: you don't establish why one would value time with their daughter, so all of this if/then derives from an emotional root without logical cause. That's the whole point of the is/ought question that AR seems to have not understood: human motivation stems from entirely illogical feelings. Follow the chain of each derived value or action back and you end up with a completely emotional, non-logical root. There is only a "stark choice" if you simply accept that you want some outcome because you want it and proceed from there.
"Would a depressive call himself a success in the universe? Not in my experience. In my experience they are keenly aware of their own failure. That’s why they are depressive."
Let's stipulate that "your experience" does not constitute the full range of possible or even probable states of existence.
“But note the root cause in your chain: you don't establish why one would value time with their daughter, so all of this if/then derives from an emotional root without logical cause. That's the whole point of the is/ought question that AR seems to have not understood: human motivation stems from entirely illogical feelings.”
ReplyDeleteAs I said earlier, there’s no such thing as an emotional root without logical cause, because our emotions arise from how we _think_ about things. First we must decide, through facts and logic, what a daughter is and what different courses of action will lead to. Only then are we capable of feeling _one way or the other_ about spending time with her. Emotions without logic are impossible, because emotion arises through our logical interpretation of our circumstances.
“Follow the chain of each derived value or action back and you end up with a completely emotional, non-logical root.”
Within conventional philosophy, that is true. That’s why our world is as fucked up as it is. Within objectivism, the root is not only logical, but self-evident. Axiomatic. Life is the root. Because as a matter of objective empirical fact, life is the root of all other values. To live without loving one’s life is a contradiction. A contradiction most people live their lives in.
“Let's stipulate that "your experience" does not constitute the full range of possible or even probable states of existence.”
True, but not relevant. It constitutes my experience. And if you want to argue that depressives think they’re successful at life, it’s on you to provide some evidence. I think the idea of a depressive who views himself as a success is self-contradictory and absurd. If one views oneself as a success, there is no basis for depression. I am not obliged to soften my opinions based on speculations that some other self-contradictory state of existence might exist somewhere.
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ReplyDeletethe importance of objectivism's integration of emotion and logic cannot be overstated. it underlies the whole system. conventional philosophy drives a wedge between the two, telling us that our values are ultimately "non-logical." objectivism unites the two by pointing out that values without logic are impossible, because logic is the means by which we interpret our reality so as to come to values.
ReplyDeletethe ultimate effect of driving a wedge between logic and emotion is to allow for arbitrary emotion -- emotion that cannot be reached, attacked, or criticized by logic. thus we fool ourselves into thinking we may be arbitrary about our values.
objectivism explodes this delusion. there is no room for arbitrary values, because logic and emotion are inseparable. our emotions stem from our interpretation of reality. how you think _defines_ how you feel. and how you think is right or wrong.
"As I said earlier, there’s no such thing as an emotional root without logical cause, because our emotions arise from how we _think_ about things. First we must decide, through facts and logic, what a daughter is and what different courses of action will lead to. Only then are we capable of feeling _one way or the other_ about spending time with her. Emotions without logic are impossible, because emotion arises through our logical interpretation of our circumstances."
ReplyDeleteThen demonstrate this.
Honestly, this seems completely ass-backwards to me, so if there's to be any serious contemplation of this premise, that facts and logic determine emotions, you're going to have to provide a concrete example where, indeed, the emotions come after the facts, where thinking about what a daughter is will determine what emotion is at work. Show your math, as it were.
I am willing to bet that you can't, or that your attempt to do so will be remarkably strained. What may happen is that you attempt to offer some other emotional value as a logical root to one's love for one's daughter, but that itself will have no logical root.
"True, but not relevant. It constitutes my experience. And if you want to argue that depressives think they’re successful at life, it’s on you to provide some evidence. I think the idea of a depressive who views himself as a success is self-contradictory and absurd. If one views oneself as a success, there is no basis for depression. I am not obliged to soften my opinions based on speculations that some other self-contradictory state of existence might exist somewhere."
ReplyDeleteThis is an example of the whole business about sliding past the real issue of a discussion to quibble about differences in definitions. Whether a person who is depressive would call themselves a success "in the universe" is really beside the larger issue, which is how success itself is defined by different people, thereby casting your earlier statement into doubt. I could have used the example of a thief who prides themselves in the way they support themselves by taking from others as a better example. There have been examples of this in street culture. Are they successful by their own standards? Is not the "gangsta rapper" who makes wealth by trading on this image also successful?
What's more, you're using the "if I haven't seen it, it must not be possible" argument. If you can't handle a hypothetical that is at least plausible, then you don't have the footing to argue for some universal standard for all people.
"That’s why our world is as fucked up as it is. Within objectivism, the root is not only logical, but self-evident. Axiomatic. Life is the root. Because as a matter of objective empirical fact, life is the root of all other values. To live without loving one’s life is a contradiction. A contradiction most people live their lives in."
Life is not the root of all other values, except inasmuch as only something living (and with a certain amount of sentience) can possess values at all.
Many creatures live without appearing to overmuch love their lives.
But let's assume you meant human-style sentient life. How is not loving one's life a contradiction?
I think I can see where this is going: that if one does not love their life, why live it at all? --making the suicide the only one who, not loving their life, does the sensible thing and ends it.
But this is a far too binary way to look at things. Some people may not enjoy life, but prefer it to the fear of death. This is not "love" so much as it is tolerance. And there is no reason for it to be a contradiction of anything. Life is not itself love of life.
Further, this all comes back to the is/ought question. Why love life? What is the fact or reason that says one should? Just because one possesses life? Rand failed to make this connection, leaving it as self-evident only because most folks seem to prefer existing to not existing. But this is hardly a logical, fact-based reason, just consensus by majority viewpoint. Even possible reasons you might give for loving life (such as "I enjoy the sensations that living provides") are themselves rooted in arbitrary feelings.
One thing is right: logic and emotion are heavily linked, as logic is a means by which we can achieve our emotion-based goals. But far from "exploding" anything, Objectivism claims more than it delivers when it comes to logic.
“Whether a person who is depressive would call themselves a success "in the universe" is really beside the larger issue, which is how success itself is defined by different people, thereby casting your earlier statement into doubt.”
ReplyDeleteActually I think it’s exactly the issue, because the issue is ultimately empirical. Is there some absolute standard for “success?” the factual question of whether depressives view themselves as successes is an extremely relevant factual issue toward answering that question. If depressives can think they’re successful, then the hypothesis that success is arbitrary and subjective gains support. If they cannot, then the hypothesis that success is not arbitrary, but rather objective, gains support.
The ultimate test of an idea is whether it comports with Reality. The question of depressives who think they’re successful is part of Reality.
In reality, you are the one dodging that factual question, and retreating to an abstract discussion, devoid of factual content, in which “success” can be arbitrarily defined, because the definition need not interface with factual questions like “can depressives feel successful?”
“I could have used the example of a thief who prides themselves in the way they support themselves by taking from others as a better example. There have been examples of this in street culture.”
That’s another empirical question that demands factual evaluation. In my experience, thieves are inevitably ashamed of themselves. They do not take pride in their capacity to steal. They may brag about their skills with their coconspirators, but in the very act of bragging they reveal their shame, because they’re trying to get their coconspirators to help them pretend their theft is anything other than shameful.
This is my first-hand experience with thieves in my family, thieves as former friends, thieves when I was a cop, and thieves when I was a defense attorney. I’ve never run across a thief who was proud of himself. If you want to posit that one exists, bring evidence.
“What's more, you're using the "if I haven't seen it, it must not be possible" argument. If you can't handle a hypothetical that is at least plausible, then you don't have the footing to argue for some universal standard for all people.”
This is another trick conventional philosophy uses. Any principle needs to account for whatever a priori hypotheticals you can come up with. That way you can throw whatever hypotheticals you like into a discussion, and they have to be taken seriously. It’s utter nonsense. Philosophy starts with an evaluation of reality. You want a hypothetical on the table, bring some evidence that it’s more than just a speculation.
“Life is not the root of all other values, except inasmuch as only something living (and with a certain amount of sentience) can possess values at all.”
ReplyDeleteThat’s exactly the reason it’s the root of all other values. No matter what you love, you must love your life as a means to the end.
You’re right that many people exist without loving their life. This is a contradiction, because if one values anything on earth so as to make it worth continuing to live, then one ought to value one’s life as the prerequisite for any other values. And if one values nothing on Earth, including one’s own life, then it is self-defeating to continue to live. One ought to take the steps necessary to die, instead of continuing to exist in a life one hates in every respect.
“But this is a far too binary way to look at things. Some people may not enjoy life, but prefer it to the fear of death. This is not "love" so much as it is tolerance. And there is no reason for it to be a contradiction of anything. Life is not itself love of life.”
Yes, that’s true. Such tolerance is the approach most people take to their lives. And it’s certainly their right to live that way. But it’s self-contradictory. Why would one “tolerate” everything in life? What is the point of it? A sense of duty to live a life one does not wish to live?
No, the issue is necessarily and inescapably binary. Either you love something in life, in which case you are logically obliged to love the means of loving it. Or you love nothing in life, in which case you are torturing yourself for no reason.
“Why love life? What is the fact or reason that says one should?”
As I’ve said, life should be loved as the prerequisite to all other values. Do you love being your with your shitzu? Then you must love the life that allows you to be with your shitzu. Do you love supporting Namibian orphans? Then you must love the life that permits you to do it.
One cannot love the end without loving the means. Life is the means to all ends. Therefore if you love anything on this earth, you must love the life that keeps you here.
"As I’ve said, life should be loved as the prerequisite to all other values. Do you love being your with your shitzu? Then you must love the life that allows you to be with your shitzu. Do you love supporting Namibian orphans? Then you must love the life that permits you to do it."
ReplyDeleteWhich is essentially what I said: "I enjoy the sensations that life provides" - ultimately, a non-logical root to one's motivations. As I predicted, you cannot but go around in a circle in this matter - you will never settle on a logical root as the primary motivation for anything.
"But it’s self-contradictory. Why would one “tolerate” everything in life? What is the point of it? A sense of duty to live a life one does not wish to live?"
Why love a shitzu? In the end, just because you do. If you fear death more than you love life, as terrible as that may sound, you continue to live. That does not compel you necessarily to optimize the living of your life. Why would it? There is no hard logic that can always resolve two unpalatable options especially if they approach equal value, which is why there are such things as failed suicide attempts, substance abuse, and other actions and states which don't equate to total death or total life. That you cannot imagine the logic behind these states does not mean such logic does not exist, that is perfectly reasonable logic given each individual's myriad emotional values.
One can indeed love the end without loving the means. I love to have money. I don't like my job, but it is the job I must have in my situation to gain money, until some other opportunity presents itself. I will never love the job I have now, but that cannot in any way prevent me from loving to have the money. What compels me to love the means? Nothing. Is that a contradiction? No. Only the most tortured rationalization could claim it to be so.
“Which is essentially what I said: "I enjoy the sensations that life provides" - ultimately, a non-logical root to one's motivations. As I predicted, you cannot but go around in a circle in this matter - you will never settle on a logical root as the primary motivation for anything.”
ReplyDeleteWe’re not saying the same thing:).
Allow me to illustrate how logic drives emotion.
Scenario a. You see a dead man. Do you feel happy, sad, confused, angry, or something else? Depends on what you think about the dead man. Are you a racist, and is he of the racial group you hate? Then it might make you happy. Is it your beloved child? Then it might make you sad.
The sensation itself – of seeing a dead man – do not determine the emotion. The sensation itself must be _interpretted_ before an emotional response is possible.
Scenario B. You have a kid. Do you want to spend time with the kid, or not? Depends how your kid relates to your goals. Does the kid get into the way of going to the casino because you want to gamble? Then you don’t want to hang with the kid. Is the kid your economic future? Then you want to train the kid into some lucratic skill. Is the kid your friend? Then you want to play. Do you value watching a kid find her own way? Then you give her opportunities to explore.
Your “wants” are determined by what you think of your kid. Inseparably.
“ultimately, a non-logical root to one's motivations.”
Only if one divorcese logic from emotions, which cannot be done. There is no “pure logic” justification for emotional responses, but neither is there an emotional response without a logical framework. The two are inescapably interdependent.
“Why love a shitzu? In the end, just because you do.”
There are many reasons to love a shitzu. Perhaps the dog gives you social status in the neighborhood. Perhaps it makes you feel confident. Perhaps it serves as something of a watchdog. Perhaps it gives you companionship.
All of these are ultimately also both logical and emotional, simultaneously. Why want a watchdog? Because you don’t want your stuff stolen. Because you like your stuff. Etc. etc. etc. Logic and emotion, intertwined, anywhere you go.
“One can indeed love the end without loving the means. I love to have money. I don't like my job, but it is the job I must have in my situation to gain money, until some other opportunity presents itself. I will never love the job I have now, but that cannot in any way prevent me from loving to have the money.”
In the objectivist frame, that’s a contradiction. The punishment of contradiction is suffering. In the case of loving money without loving your means of acquiring money, in my experience, the punishment is typically a growing sense of despair, entrapment, and resentment. I’ve loved every job I’ve ever had, precisely because it is the means to ends I value. Everyone I’ve known who has split the two has ended up extremely unhappy in the long run.
" What compels me to love the means? Nothing. Is that a contradiction? No. Only the most tortured rationalization could claim it to be so."
ReplyDeleteIt's not a tortured rationalization to recognize that means and ends are inescapably intertwined, since that the means is critically important and valuable insofar as it provides you with the end. Do you love being fit but hate working out? Then you're living in contradiction. Do you love having a wife but hate caring for her needs? Then you're living in contradiction.
The causal relationship between means and ends demands that they be conceptualized as a single, unified whole. Trying to split a causally-related series, selectively liking some parts of the chain while hating others, is contradictory and self-defeating. The result is suffering.
"The sensation itself – of seeing a dead man – do not determine the emotion. The sensation itself must be _interpretted_ before an emotional response is possible."
ReplyDeleteBut those interpretations are themselves derived from emotional states. Do you enjoy seeing the dead man because you are a racist? Fine, but why then are you a racist? Does your child annoy you because it gets in the way of gambling? Fine, but why do you enjoy gambling? You want to play with the child, but why is it your friend?
In the end, despite what you say, you will run up against a root for which you have no real logical reason, a purely emotional stance, and the best you will be able to do is either run around in these circles, chasing emotional value after emotional value, or trying to rationalize a value somehow after the fact.
"In the objectivist frame, that’s a contradiction. The punishment of contradiction is suffering."
Which is why Objectivism is often not taken very seriously. I cannot force myself to like an unpleasant job simply because I enjoy having money, so in that regard it could be said that I "suffer", but not as much as I might were I jobless.
Many people do not like their jobs but tolerate them for the sake of sustenance or gaining money. That Objectivism seems to insist the job must be loved to avoid contradiction is part of the reason Objectivism is sometimes regarded as a utopian philosophy, demanding unrealistic behaviors from those who must grapple with all of life's realities.
"Do you enjoy seeing the dead man because you are a racist? Fine, but why then are you a racist?"
ReplyDeleteAs always, for both emotional and logical reasons. In the case of racism, the logic is flawed, but still there. I may view people of a particular race as being a threat to humanity's future. And I value humanity's future. Again, emotion and logic, together.
"Does your child annoy you because it gets in the way of gambling? Fine, but why do you enjoy gambling?"
perhaps I enjoy gambling because i'm good at it and can make a living. And i like making a living. Logic and emotion. or perhaps i enjoy it because it allows me to hang out with my friends.
again, logic and emotion intertwined.
"You want to play with the child, but why is it your friend?"
perhaps because we share the same interests. perhaps because we have a common enemy. again, logic and emotion intertwined.
"I cannot force myself to like an unpleasant job simply because I enjoy having money, so in that regard it could be said that I "suffer", but not as much as I might were I jobless."
An alternative to forcing yourself to like something is to understand it within its context. Which is what objectivism advises. When you understand your job in context, you see its value. It may not be everything you can imagine it might be, but it's better than the alternative. and that makes it valuable.
you can't "force" yourself to see this. nevertheless, it's true. if you're able to understand it in context.
"It's not a tortured rationalization to recognize that means and ends are inescapably intertwined, since that the means is critically important and valuable insofar as it provides you with the end. Do you love being fit but hate working out? Then you're living in contradiction. Do you love having a wife but hate caring for her needs? Then you're living in contradiction."
ReplyDeleteThis is actually the most tortured of rationalizations, because it does not allow for things other than total love.
I would like to be more fit, but that does not mean I like it enough to put in the extra work. I can appreciate one without the other. It means that either I won't be more fit, or that I will push myself to endure something I don't like for the sake of something I would like. But there is still no valid reason for my emotional like or dislike of any state or activity to fall one way or another through some kind of logical domino effect. You may be able to say, "because I love money, I love my job," but outside of your own emotional state, there is no real logic in which to draw that conclusion. And it should not be thought that such a leap of logic will be universal, or that other logical chains that don't link up the same way are somehow invalid.
"I would like to be more fit, but that does not mean I like it enough to put in the extra work."
ReplyDeleteWe seem to be talking about two issues -- whether it's possible to hold both of these views at a time, and whether they are logically consistent.
I'd agree that it's possible to hold both views. But it is also absolutely logically inconsistent. It is the contradiction that leads us into unhappy, unfulfilled lives. "I'd like this, but not enough to do it." I'd like to travel, but I don't want to get the education necessary to get a job where I can afford it. I'd like a girlfriend, but I don't want to make myself attractive to women. I'd like a job, but I don't want to put the work into finding one.
I'd like the end, but not enough to employ the means.
One of the great strengths of objectivism is seeing the two are inseparable. Whenever one is engaged in a means, one sees it in the broader context of the end one is pursuing. In a fundamental sense, the means becomes an inseparable _part of_ the end. loved in the same way, and to the same extent.
Not everybody needs to think this way. But not everybody needs to be happy if they don't want to, either.
For what it's worth, I've employed this idea to great success in my life. It has given me boundless energy to achieve the goals I set for myself. It works.
"again, logic and emotion intertwined."
ReplyDeleteThis will be my final word for a while, as I have other things to do.
But they are not intertwined, not as you make them out to be.
First, it seems kind of ironic that after chiding me for hypotheticals you come up with things like "because we have a common enemy" for reasons why you're a friend to your daughter.
Still, each logical step you describe, each example you give, is the result of an emotional reaction. They are only intertwined as much as one drives the other, as much as I'm intertwined with my car's steering wheel.
Emotion is the root, the base. It all derives from that. You can seem to argue against it with each example you give, but you fail to trace everything fully back, to ask "why" yourself to each cause you give, because if you did so, you'd be forced to confront that hard truth.
I could play that game, ask "why" to things like "because I value humanity", and continue on beyond to see how far you'd go, but at this point I think just stating the facts as they stand should suffice.
"Still, each logical step you describe, each example you give, is the result of an emotional reaction. They are only intertwined as much as one drives the other, as much as I'm intertwined with my car's steering wheel."
ReplyDeleteIt's the result both of an emotional reaction and a logical interconnection. I am racist because I want to feel superior, and because I have certain ideas and thoughts about myself in relation to other races. The two go together.
I want to train my daughter to be some cheesy hollywood star because i emotionally want to be rich, and because i logically believe that certain types of training will make her lucrative to me.
You're pointing out that there is emotion below each example of logic. but you're forgetting that there's logic below each example of emotion. there is no "bottom." it's all intertwined. no matter what emotional matter you speak of, there is a logical basis for it. and no matter what logical matter you speak of, there's an emotional basis for it.
Getting back to logic ...
ReplyDelete@Daniel Barnes: If Objectivists want to mean by "logic" merely the process of trial and error, like fixing your car, well of course they can. But all they're really doing is just playing a word game and dressing it up in pseudo-philosophical drag to confuse and impress, just like so many of the "academics" they affect to criticise.
You nailed it, Daniel. The more I think about it, the more I think this is exactly Rand's game. "Logic," as real philosophers use the term, refers specifically to the field of identifying relationships among propositions in which the truth of the premises renders the conclusion inescapable (unless of course one is willing to embrace contradiction). So to call something "logic" is to imply that it has this sort of inevitability.
But Rand cleverly redefines "logic" to include any cognitive process that's aimed at making ideas conform to reality -- everything from deductive reasoning to inductive reasoning to the scientific method to trial and error ... all of it is just "logic" and therefore just as inevitable, just as certain, as deduction. Never mind that it isn't deduction; it's still logic so it's still certain!
Academic philosophers distinguish logic from other forms of reasoning -- and for very good reason. Rand tries to obliterate this distinction by throwing a whole lot of disparate processes together under the rubric of "non-contradictory identification." And that allows her to pretend to certainty in areas where certainty just isn't possible.
If it were anyone other than Rand doing it, she'd have accused them of "package-dealing."
"Logic," as real philosophers use the term, refers specifically to the field of identifying relationships among propositions in which the truth of the premises renders the conclusion inescapable (unless of course one is willing to embrace contradiction)."
ReplyDeletenonsense. you're claiming that propositional logic (the type you're describing) is the only form of logic.
http://www.iep.utm.edu/prop-log/
real philosophers, and real people, know that logic is much broader than the narrow field of propositional logic.
http://logical-critical-thinking.com/logic/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logic
I wrote:
ReplyDelete"Logic," as real philosophers use the term, refers specifically to the field of identifying relationships among propositions in which the truth of the premises renders the conclusion inescapable (unless of course one is willing to embrace contradiction).
To which ungtss replied:
nonsense. you're claiming that propositional logic (the type you're describing) is the only form of logic.
Actually, no, I don't just mean propositional logic. What I mean is that logic is about the form of argument -- whether that mental leap (inference) from premises to conclusion is reliable or not -- as distinguished (abstracted if you prefer) from the separate question of whether the premises are true. Logic is not about "Is A true?" but "If A is true, what further B can I justifiably infer?" This distinction is no less legitimate or useful today than it was when Aristotle came up with it.
To illustrate my point (at some risk of launching a new tangent), the "problem of induction" is a famous problem of logic. The problem is this: Given some set of specific premises A, under what, if any, circumstances can I infer a more general conclusion B with a gurantee that if A is true, so is B? It's considered a problem of logic because it's about form, not content.
@ungtss: real philosophers, and real people, know that logic is much broader than the narrow field of propositional logic.
Yes, and they know that logic is all about form, not content. If you actually read the Wikipedia article and that other site you pointed to, you'll see that they are using the term "logic" to talk about the same thing I described above: form, not content. You may also notice that when someone refers to an argument as "illogical," they don't just mean wrong; they mean wrong as to form -- the conclusion doesn't follow from the premises.
Getting back to the OP, Greg's statement there is that "It is the real world, not logic [i.e., the form of inference], which makes a thing true." In other words, making an inference -- even of a form that gurantees true conclusions given true premises -- isn't enough to guarantee you truth. There's still that separate question of whether you started with truth, which is outside the field of logic. Rand wants to lump these separate issues together as different aspects of "non-contradictory identification," but it doesn't work. It obliterates a useful distinction and gives a veneer of logical entailment to conclusions that are far from logically entailed.
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ReplyDeleteso "real logic" is only logic before it's applied to actual, real world problems? it's logic to define an informal fallacy, but not logic to determine that a particular argument fits the definition? it's logic to define the form of a syllogism, but not logic to mentally build one while fixing a car?
ReplyDeleteyou can use words that way if you like. but then you've defined the sciences out of your notion of logic. and programming. and life.
it's like saying, "it's logic until you use it. then it's something else."
awfully weird way to use words. i can't think of any other areas in which we call principles one thing before we use them, and another thing entirely after we use them.
further, defining logic in this way is going to leave it desperately lacking in a critical aspect -- _correspondence to reality_. if one is concerned with form, not with function, then one has no way to identify principles which can only be drawn from experience with reality -- such as abduction.
that's perhaps why academic philosophy has become such a dead, useless pursuit. because so many of its practitioners have chosen to insulate from the proper object of logic -- _reality_.
perhaps this explains the gap between academic philosophy and objectivism. objectivism was born outside the ivory tower, from a life spent thinking practically about real world problems, and deriving principles of thought from that real world experience. academic philosophy, as you say, has decided to insulate its study of logic from a reality that could sharpen its concept of logic by pointing out that reality just isn't how the ivory tower philosopher would have it be.
ReplyDeletethis is because thought cannot exist in a vacuum. form without content is a ghost. thinking logically demands consideration of real world questions in a real world context. any discipline that fails to do so is bound to get itself caught up in a lot of empty talk about nothing.
@ungtss: so "real logic" is only logic before it's applied to actual, real world problems? it's logic to define an informal fallacy, but not logic to determine that a particular argument fits the definition? it's logic to define the form of a syllogism, but not logic to mentally build one while fixing a car?
ReplyDeleteI distinguish pure and applied logic, the same way I distinguish pure and applied math. Pure math is about numbers as such; applied math is using the knowledge you have about numbers as such to figure out something specific in the real world (like how much money I need to save to retire in x years). I would not say that applied math isn't math. Likewise, defining an informal fallacy is pure logic; constructing a syllogistic argument about what's wrong with your car is applied logic. I would not say applied logic isn't logic ... it's just not what Greg was talking about in the OP.
I don't see any problem with this sort of distinction. Objectivists do, and it leads to nonsense such as questioning whether pi is "really" a number (which Harry Binswanger did, although he may have eventually come around). In this discussion, I've been assuming Greg was talking about pure logic, so I've been trying to keep the focus on that.
further, defining logic in this way is going to leave it desperately lacking in a critical aspect -- _correspondence to reality_. if one is concerned with form, not with function, then one has no way to identify principles which can only be drawn from experience with reality -- such as abduction
Why is "correspondence to reality" critical to logic as such? This, I suspect, is the heart of our disagreement.
For my part, I'm happy to say that logic is a tool that can help me understand reality ... but it's not the only tool. Those other tools going to get a lot of use in coming up with premises, and then I can use logic to come up with further conclusions by inference. Yes, I'm going to end up with uncertainty (sometimes a lot of it), partly because my premises aren't always going to be certain and partly because I'm going to have to use uncertain inferences. But that's okay with me. Most of real life is about acting in the face of uncertainty. I can deal with that.
It seems that you, like Rand, want to say that logic is our only tool for understanding reality (or logic plus sense-perception, depending on whether you fold perception into "art of non-contradictory identification" or not). I'm not going to agree with you there.
This will likely be my last reply on this topic as I have too much real-world stuff to do, and I doubt that further discussion will shed more light.
ungtss:
ReplyDelete>academic philosophy, as you say, has decided to insulate its study of logic from a reality that could sharpen its concept of logic by pointing out that reality just isn't how the ivory tower philosopher would have it be.
ungtss, this is all just talk.
Why don't you cut to the chase and give us one - just one - example of an actual logical derivation that actual "academic" philosophers - please name names - widely approve of yet that an Objectivist such as yourself can demonstrate to be incorrect.
Let's not forget that while Rand may not have been part of any established "ivory tower" of academia, she sure worked hard to build a tower of her own.
ReplyDelete“I distinguish pure and applied logic, the same way I distinguish pure and applied math.”
ReplyDeleteThen I must have misunderstood what you meant when you said philosophers “know that logic is all about form, not content.” In fact, logic is about both, depending on context. In any event, despite my apparent misunderstanding, it appears we agree.
“I've been assuming Greg was talking about pure logic, so I've been trying to keep the focus on that.”
He is indeed focused on pure logic, to the exclusion of applied logic. And that’s the problem. He says things like “Facts, nature, reality constitute the standard of truth, not logic.” But facts, nature, and reality are only understood by application of logic to experience – through _applied_ logic.
“Why is "correspondence to reality" critical to logic as such? This, I suspect, is the heart of our disagreement.”
Because when it comes to human life, applied logic is what counts. Pure logic may be a useful tool toward refining applied logic, but logic’s value lies in its _application_, not in empty, ivory tower speculations. Syllogisms are valuable because _in the real world_, they yield truth under the proper conditions. e.g. if the form is valid and the premises are factually true in reality, then you can _know_ the conclusion will be factually true in reality, even without having direct knowledge of the truth of the conclusion. Syllogism describes something _about reality_.
“For my part, I'm happy to say that logic is a tool that can help me understand reality ... but it's not the only tool.”
This leaves ambiguous whether we are talking about narrow “pure logic” or broad “applied logic.” If you’re talking about pure logic, then I agree with you. The other tool is applied logic. But if you’re talking about applied logic, then I’d say applied logic is so broad that it encompasses all our reliable and useful means of cognition. And if you don’t agree with this, then what sort of “non-logical means of cognition” are you referring to?
“Why don't you cut to the chase and give us one - just one - example of an actual logical derivation that actual "academic" philosophers - please name names - widely approve of yet that an Objectivist such as yourself can demonstrate to be incorrect.”
Daniel, you’re asking me to put the cart before the horse. in the context of this thread, attempting to “demonstrate” anything to you would be a fool’s errand, because we cannot even agree on the criteria for a demonstration. Which is the fundamental problem. Until we have some common epistemological ground, no demonstration of anything else is possible.
ungtss:
ReplyDelete>Until we have some common epistemological ground, no demonstration of anything else is possible.
The situation is simple ungtss. You can either produce an example of widely used "academic" logic which Objectivists can demonstrate is erroneous, or you can't.
And of course the "criteria" for such a demonstration are simple: the rules of standard bi valent logic, which you've already said you agree with. Well, so do we! So there is no problem whatsoever.
You tell us all how these modern logical errors are everywhere, due to epistemological corruption or whatever Randian buzzphrase you've adopted, and how terrible it all is. Yet when pressed, you can't give us a single example. Not one. Not a sausage!
If you can't think of any example, it can't be much of a problem then...;-)
"And of course the "criteria" for such a demonstration are simple: the rules of standard bi valent logic, which you've already said you agree with."
ReplyDelete"the rules of bivalent logic" are not an adequate criterion for truth, because they say nothing about whether a thing is true _in reality_. That's the whole issue we've been discussing in this thread. Claims about reality must make reference to _reality_. "the rules of bivalent logic" are not enough to get you there.
am i allowed to refer to reality? if so, what criterion must i meet to establish that what i'm saying about the real world is in fact true? must i prove it beyond any "hypothetical alternate state of affairs?" may i refer to my experience? may i cite a scientific study? what must i do to prove to you that a thing is true _in reality?_
i need to know this because in my experience, opponents of objectivism are fond of moving the goal posts, to make sure demonstration is impossible when they want it to be impossible, and easy when they want it to be easy. i'm not playing that game. if you want a demonstration, then tell me what i must do to demonstrate that a thing is true.
ungtss:
ReplyDelete>if you want a demonstration, then tell me what i must do to demonstrate that a thing is true.
Once again: if it is true that "academic" philosophers have corrupted logic, then give us actual examples!
"Once again: if it is true that "academic" philosophers have corrupted logic, then give us actual examples!"
ReplyDeleteI cannot give you an example, and demonstrate it, until you tell me what it would take to prove it. I can't just say "objectivists disagree on that point." that's not going to prove the academics are wrong. i must do more than that. and you need to tell me what you expect me to do to prove it.
of course, you won't identify the standard. you'll just demand that i satisfy a standard that you haven't defined, so you can change it whenever it suits you.
that's why i'm not falling for it.
No one's asking you to prove anything.
ReplyDeleteJust give us an *actual example*of what you're complaining so long and hard about.
I can't resist. Maybe I can save everyone else's virtual breath:
ReplyDeleteDaniel Barnes challenges ungtss: The situation is simple ungtss. You can either produce an example of widely used "academic" logic which Objectivists can demonstrate is erroneous, or you can't.
ungtss dodges: I cannot give you an example, and demonstrate it, until you tell me what it would take to prove it. I can't just say "objectivists disagree on that point." that's not going to prove the academics are wrong. i must do more than that. and you need to tell me what you expect me to do to prove it.
Really, ungtss, this is so simple! I suspect you're dodging because you know exactly where this is going. So I'll play for you, drawing on my days as an Objectivist (when I was on the other side of these arguments) ....
Objectivist: Academic philosophers agree that the following is a logically valid argument, by the rules of standard bi-valent logic:
Argument A
P1. Anything that is made of cheese is edible.
P2. The moon is made of cheese.
C. Therefore, the moon is edible.
But they are wrong. Argument A is invalid. It's invalid because it contains a contradictory identification: P2 contradicts a host of known evidence/observation/sense data. Therefore, Argument A is illogical, invalid, pointless. QED.
Academic: No, you're conflating validity with truth. They are two separate issues, and that's precisely what Argument A illustrates.
Argument A is valid. What it is not, is sound -- because P2 is false (counter-factual). And some academics would qualify that by saying P2 appears to be or probably is counter-factual given known evidence while refusing to completely disallow the possibility that we've all been duped and the moon is in fact made of cheese. And one or two may ask how we can ever be sure there is a moon, let alone what it's made of, since we could just be brains in vats.
But what matters here is that they all agree on the following points: (1) soundness is a different issue from validity; (2) logic only cares about the latter; and (3) if you want to determine whether P2 is true or false, you're going to need more than just logic.
Objectivist: No, no, validity and truth are inseparable. You guys with your vats and your conspiracy theories are just being irrational; there's no basis in reality for any of that. And I can prove it. "Validation includes any process of relating mental contents to the facts of reality." Your argument isn't valid because you haven't, and can't, connect P2 to reality. The moon is not made of cheese, so Argument A is invalid. Honestly, why can't you see this?
Academic: No, no, no, you're missing the point. "Valid" is a term that describes the inference and has nothing to do with the facts of reality; that goes under soundness. Your definition obliterates this distinction, so I reject it. Argument A is valid regardless of whether P2 (or for that matter P1) is true. Now, if you want to talk about soundness rather than validity, then you'll have to talk to my friend over there who suspects NASA is conspiring to hide the cheese.
Objectivist: No, no, no, no, you can't just disregard the content like that ... and I can't talk to you, you're so irrational!
(Exit Objectivist, in a puff of smug self-satisfaction, negative opinion of academics duly reinforced.)
The bottom line: Objectivists don't want to concede that sound/valid is a useful distinction. If they did, they'd have to face up to the fact that there's no valid (in the academic sense) form of inference that leads inevitably from "Existence exists" to "Capitalism is the only moral social system." That would cost them their invaluable certainty.
Well said, ECE.
ReplyDeleteWhen you think about it, Objectivists are really just all screwed up over that fact logic has nothing to say about the soundness of an argument. Wishing it did just cos Rand said so won't make it so!
ReplyDeleteAyn Rand overhyped the power of logic whilst seeming having no awareness of its limitations, such as the problem of induction or that you can't derive an "ought" from an "is". She was bluffing; and her hapless followers are now doomed to having their bluff called over and over again for eternity...;-)
Daniel:
ReplyDelete"No one's asking you to prove anything."
That's not true. Earlier you said I needed to stated that the standard was the "rules of bivalent logic." now when i showed that those rules don't prove anything, you've retreated to claiming you're not asking me to prove anything.
"Just give us an *actual example*of what you're complaining so long and hard about."
Examples of ideas widely accepted in academic philosophy which objectivism proves false: Certainty is impossible, morality is arbitrary and socially defined, reality cannot be grasped as it is.
Echo, i don't know who's making the "objectivist position" you're describing, but i'm not. I've said repeatedly that the distinction between soundness and validity is legitimate, but that only soundness is the only question of interest, because it is the only one that has practical application. whatever crazy other argument you think you're hearing isn't coming from me.
this has helped me clarify a critical difference between objectivist thinking and conventional thinking.
ReplyDeletein focusing on "arguments" and "validity," you are focused on whether one person can, through argument, oblige another person to believe a certain thing -- a fundamentally social concern.
but within the objectivist frame, i'm not concerned with whether i can oblige another person to believe a certain thing -- i'm only concerned with whether i can satisfy myself of its truth according to proper rules, such that i can practically apply it in my daily life.
i don't know that any of the original objectivists have ever articulated this distinction. if they have, i haven't heard it. but i think it's a valid one.
objectivism is selfish, even in the form and purpose of its logic. that's why it works. a social mode of logic, focused on trying to force others to accept conclusions, is an endless cesspool of pointless yammering. because a person who does not want to accept the truth of a proposition can always rationalize his way out of it.
but _properly_ used, logic is not about obliging others to accept your conclusions, but rather about figuring things out and using them. _identifying_ things.
i don't need to "prove" to you that things are true. i can _see_ they're true. and that's enough for me.
"because a person who does not want to accept the truth of a proposition can always rationalize his way out of it."
ReplyDeleteYes, you've certainly demonstrated THAT well enough.
""because a person who does not want to accept the truth of a proposition can always rationalize his way out of it."
ReplyDeleteYes, you've certainly demonstrated THAT well enough.""
Right there, you're arguing from a social frame. it's a put-down. not substantive. not logical. not by demonstration. just a naked put-down. an intimidation tactic.
within a social frame, that's probably satisfying to you in some way i can't possibly understand. it probably means something to you, while to me it means only that you're unwilling to think about what's being said here, but want to maintain the illusion that you have something of value to say.
within a selfish frame, it's utterly, incomprehensively stupid. because fails to communicate any meaningful information.
fascinating. this has been an invaluable voyage for me. i will now leave your little "aren't we smarter than they are club" in peace.
ungtss:
ReplyDelete>i don't need to "prove" to you that things are true. i can _see_ they're true. and that's enough for me.
..and BOOM! The final Objectivist collapse into subjectivism...;-)
>>i don't need to "prove" to you that things are true. i can _see_ they're true. and that's enough for me.
ReplyDelete>..and BOOM! The final Objectivist collapse into subjectivism...;-)
Subjectivism does not have anything to do with _who is doing the understanding_, it is defined by the _method by which one arrives at understanding_.
the real subjectivism is the idea -- which i only identified just now -- that a thing is true only if one can compel others to believe it. whereas objectivism is the idea that a thing is true based on whether it was arrived at by means of a proper method, whether or not anybody else accepts it as true.
ReplyDeletesubjectivist philosophy therefore takes the form of arguments and polemics, whereas objectivist philosophy takes the form of description and explanation.
this is really good stuff.
ungtss:
ReplyDelete>Examples of ideas widely accepted in academic philosophy which objectivism proves false: Certainty is impossible, morality is arbitrary and socially defined, reality cannot be grasped as it is.
LOL. Now after much stalling you're just changing the subject, which was, if you recall, your claim that "academics" had an incorrect understanding of logic which Objectivism could correct.
In response I challenged you to present one - just one! - example of a commonly used "academic" logical rule or formulation that Objectivism could demonstrate to be false.
Your response: deafening silence.
Look, it's transparently obvious you're just faking. We see this all the time; someone rocks up and claims Ayn Rand solved, say, the is/ought problem, Now, is/ought is a problem of logical derivation, so we ask them to simply show us their workings; they suddenly find something else pressing to talk about.
Really the only people Randians are kidding are themselves.
"That's not true. Earlier you said I needed to stated that the standard was the "rules of bivalent logic." now when i showed that those rules don't prove anything, you've retreated to claiming you're not asking me to prove anything."
ReplyDeleteBut that standard was only brought in at your prompting, by complaining that you did not know what the standards for "demonstrating" things was. His original request, properly read, required no actual demonstration, just the example of something you COULD demonstrate. You can't blame Barnes for your own inability to keep on track.
"Right there, you're arguing from a social frame. it's a put-down. not substantive. not logical. not by demonstration. just a naked put-down. an intimidation tactic."
If you're leaving and won't see this, very well, but I suspect you'll lurk around just long enough to catch any reactions.
That comment WAS a put-down, but hardly from a social frame. It is an observation: you are too locked into your own assumptions to seriously consider the possibility that you might be wrong.
Of course you think you are correct and properly justified in all the reasoning you make - most unquestioning adherents of some ideology do.
But your post that ends thusly:
"i don't need to "prove" to you that things are true. i can _see_ they're true. and that's enough for me"
--is by and large a rationalization that allows you to not actually complete the apparent task you started in these comment threads - to challenge and debunk the supposed errors here and display your superior wisdom - and instead flounce off with "well, I don't need to actually prove anything to YOU, I just KNOW I'm right, so there."
And that is how something is both a put-down AND substantive.
Subjectivism is where the standard of truth is you, ungtss....;-) And you just put yourself right there.
ReplyDeleteObjectivism has always had strong subjectivist/relativist elements, so we actually see this a lot. Its theory of truth, for example, is almost fully relativist. But I really don't think you understand Rand's theories well enough to understand this criticism.
>Your response: deafening silence.
ReplyDeleteDaniel, I listed three. Did you notice them?
>""i don't need to "prove" to you that things are true. i can _see_ they're true. and that's enough for me"
--is by and large a rationalization that allows you to not actually complete the apparent task you started in these comment threads - to challenge and debunk the supposed errors here and display your superior wisdom - and instead flounce off with "well, I don't need to actually prove anything to YOU, I just KNOW I'm right, so there.""
Brilliant. this is strengthening my hypothesis. you think my purpose was to challenge and debunk supposed errors and disply superior wisdom. from a social frame, one might well set that as one's goal. but from a selfish frame, such a goal would be unimaginably stupid. my goal is not to display my skills to total strangers on the internet. my goal is to learn. one learns philosophy by practicing it. practice forces me to formulate and articulate ideas, and encourages others to provide me with ideas that i might learn from.
but you don't see that. because you're thinking in a different frame than i am. you think i'm here to "display my superior wisdom."
what you don't realize is, i'm not here for that at all. i'm here to learn. i'm excited and happy, because i learned something new today. i don't give a damn what you think about me.
"Subjectivism is where the standard of truth is you, ungtss....;-) And you just put yourself right there."
ReplyDeleteDaniel, you need to learn to read better. The standard is not _me_ in an arbitrary subjective sense, but a particular, objectively defined, consistently applied method. my application of the method is what counts, not whether you are convinced.
"i don't give a damn what you think about me."
ReplyDeleteAnd you're willing to tell us this repeatedly. Because you want us to KNOW about your not-giving-a-damn-ness.
I'll grant that you don't care if we like or respect you, but your actions, your posts here demonstrate quite clearly that you are very invested in wanting us to be aware of your opinion of us. You want us to think, "why, that Objectivist is so aloof and contemptuous of us!"
In point of fact, you do give quite a damn about what we think about you, nearly this whole exchange being the evidence of such.
"Because you want us to KNOW about your not-giving-a-damn-ness."
ReplyDeleteHaha not at all:). I'm saying it because a) i'm learning it and learning to articulate it, b) i'm curious what i might learn from your response, and c) it seems fair to explain to you why your insults don't strike home, so that perhaps you might stop insulting me.
but learning is my primary goal. and i learned quite a bit from your response. i learned that to you, even when somebody says "i don't care what you think," you assume they're trying to make an impression on you, rather than simply telling you what i'm thinking.
you're interpretted everything i say through a narcissistic "what they think of me" frame of mind. a frame of mind i don't have:).
"You want us to think, "why, that Objectivist is so aloof and contemptuous of us!""
Again, nothing could be further from the truth:). But the fascinating truth to be learned here is that you're interpretting everything i say through that lens. which says a lot about you.
"i learned that to you, even when somebody says "i don't care what you think," you assume they're trying to make an impression on you, rather than simply telling you what i'm thinking."
ReplyDeleteIt's one thing to say "I don't care what you think" - its a slightly different prospect to say "I don't give a damn what you think about me".
The very fact of your being here (after you said you were departing) belies your claim. You can say you don't care all you want, but what you actually do speaks far louder than your words.
And again this "I'm learning so much" routine smacks of rationalization. Can this possibly be the first time you've ever encountered non-Objectivist viewpoints? The reason your words aren't taken at face value is because they don't entirely hold up under scrutiny.
If you don't care what I think, why would me insulting you be of any concern, and why would you then devote any energy at all to (supposedly) trying to discourage the insults? Either you aren't as immune as you'd have us believe, or you haven't fully embraced your own stance.
"It's one thing to say "I don't care what you think" - its a slightly different prospect to say "I don't give a damn what you think about me"."
ReplyDeleteYes, the connotations are different, but neither i'm trying to prove anything to you:). "give a damn" is just a more emphatic, idiomatic way of something "care."
"The very fact of your being here (after you said you were departing) belies your claim."
Only if you assume that I'm here to make some impression on you, rather than to learn. Your comments continue to be fascinating to me. One can learn a lot about onesself by contrast to somebody else.
"Can this possibly be the first time you've ever encountered non-Objectivist viewpoints? The reason your words aren't taken at face value is because they don't entirely hold up under scrutiny."
Of course not, but it's the first time I've encountered someone both somewhat familiar with objectivism and opposed to it. It's the first time I've discussed objectivism with opponents who have some semblance of an idea what they're opposing.
"If you don't care what I think, why would me insulting you be of any concern, and why would you then devote any energy at all to (supposedly) trying to discourage the insults?"
Because they're a waste of time. I have to read through your psychologizing in an effort to find something relevant and interesting. If you cut the crap, we can get to the interesting part more directly.
Well, ungtss is clearly finding the discussion educational, even exciting. This is because - amazingly! - it is completely confirming his original world view, which is that world is populated by Ayn Rand villains filled with evil, corrupted ideas, and that Objectivism is the sole and ultimate guide to Absolute Truth. ungtss sees himself - just as Rand says he should - a radiant, lonely star against the surrounding intellectual darkness. The only thing he will ever learn, or wants to learn, is just how right he has always been.
ReplyDeleteThe ARCHNblog is, as always, happy to be of service...;-)
haha that's so cute Daniel:). i've actually learned something quite concrete and powerful today that neither ayn rand nor any other objectivists ever articulated, at least to my knowledge. i learned that there are social and selfish modes of logical thinking. and i've seen them in action, with your unwitting assistance. this has been enormously valuable to me.
ReplyDelete" i learned that there are social and selfish modes of logical thinking."
ReplyDeleteIf by "learned" you mean "decided that it was so and proceeded to interpret all evidence as supporting this notion, except for any contradicting evidence which was eagerly ignored," then sure.
"Examples of ideas widely accepted in academic philosophy which objectivism proves false: Certainty is impossible, morality is arbitrary and socially defined, reality cannot be grasped as it is."
ReplyDeleteThose are things which Objectivism claims to have proven false, not things which it has proven false.
We can all make mistakes and their is no method that can totally prevent us fom doing so. So often we all find that arguments that we thought were compelling were not. And we find that they were not mistakes of logic. They were mistakes in what we used logic on. Perhaps we left something relevant out or there was a subtle confusion about an idea. Or some of what we thought were facts were not. Are you saying that you never make that sort of mistake? Are you saying that you have a mens of always preventing that sort of mistake? Because I dont't know anyone who does.
You seem to think that you have a method that will never lead you astray, that needs no error correction method. If you do then you have just increased your chance of making mistakes. The ways of correcting errors are to be aware of your own failibility and to listen to others' criticism of your ideas.
"You seem to think that you have a method that will never lead you astray, that needs no error correction method."
ReplyDeleteThe method _is_ error correction and refinement. the method is that whenever confronted with new facts that appear to contradict your previous ideas, you stop, check your premises, and figure out how to integrate the new fact into your ideas.
this follows the same distinctions between "selfish" and "social" logic. you are presupposing a social logic, in which certainty demands the ability to be 100% accurate at any given time, and one makes declaration of absolute truth in a form others are obliged to accept.
but selfish logic sets a more practical standard -- "true enough for effective action."
for instance, i may not know everything about how a car works. but i know enough to know what i need to do with it. and if my car ever does something weird, i take a look under the hood and figure out the problem.
this sort of "absolute knowledge" is a false standard, because it doesn't exist. human knowledge doesn't work that way.
but within the context of a selfish, pragmatic mode of knowledge, certainty is quite possible.
Logic, in objectivism, is the art of non-contradictory identification. Thus logic cannot be separated from empirical reality, because logic is the process of identifying reality.
ReplyDeleteI don't "seperate" logic from empirical reality, I distinguish them. I believe even an Objectivist should be able to understand, and would even agree, that reality is not logic. Where they get confused is whether reality is "logical." There seems to be a naive presumption among Objectivists that in order for logic to be "valid," reality must also be "logical."
Your argument rests on a misunderstanding of what objectivists mean by "Logic."
That would only be true if you assume that the Objectivist view of logic actually exists, i.e., that it is an actual method of thought employed by Objectivists. Such a logic may exist as a kind of vague theory, but not as a method of thought that can be applied. Therefore, it has no bearing on my argument; and to suggest so is to assume a point at issue. Objectivists may be doing many things when they are under the illusion that they are thinking; but following a special method of logic is not one of them. They merely do what most ideologues do: they rationalize a set of predetermined conclusions formed largely on the basis of their admiration of Rand and/or their personal preferences. "Logic," whether of the formal or Objectivist variety, has little, if anything to do with it.
"I don't 'seperate' logic from empirical reality, I distinguish them. I believe even an Objectivist should be able to understand, and would even agree, that reality is not logic. "
ReplyDeleteI'm afraid you are. When you say:
"Facts, nature, reality constitute the standard of truth, not logic,"
you are placing "Reality" and "Logic" as alternative "standards." One _or_ the other. Thus you're treating them as separable. As though it's possible to use _reality_ as a standard by some means other than the application of _logic_.
in so doing, you're omitting the fact that a standard must be _grasped_ before it can be applied. and you're omitting the fact that our only means of _grasping_ facts, nature, and reality is by _means_ of logic applied to perception.
Thus "reality" is not _useful_ as a standard of truth, because we need to be able to grasp a standard to apply it, and we can only grasp reality by means of Reason.
The only proper standard is _Reality through the lens of properly applied Reason/Logic_.
Not either/or, but both. Not separate, but inextricably integrated.