tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29196034.post1739324553449492917..comments2024-03-27T05:47:21.295-07:00Comments on Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature: Rand's Ethics, Part 6Daniel Barneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06359277853862225286noreply@blogger.comBlogger11125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29196034.post-33125815329567265832008-04-19T01:39:00.000-07:002008-04-19T01:39:00.000-07:00"Rand reasons from is to ought in defiance of Hume..."Rand reasons from is to ought in defiance of Hume and divorces reason from emotion in defiance of cognitive science."<BR/><BR/>You said in another post that Rand said that that emotions follow from cognitive contents. You also said there was no evidence for that. Busted x 2.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29196034.post-42046287488625327342008-02-10T10:45:00.000-08:002008-02-10T10:45:00.000-08:00Jay: "How do we know whether someone's desire is t...Jay: "How do we know whether someone's desire is the product of natural disposition, environment, or conscious deliberation?"<BR/><BR/>Most impulses come from all three sources (although innate and environmental factors tend to dominate). Innate factors, particularly those that go beyond immediate life sustaining functionality (such as hunger and thirst), generally require some environmental factor to trigger them. There is, for example, no such thing as an innate snake phobia in the absence of some event (i.e., an unpleasant encounter with a snake) that triggers it. In addition to this, all such a impulses pass through some kind of intelligence involving such issues as discovering the means to their satisfaction and coordinating them with other impulses.<BR/><BR/>The source, then, of the impulse is no criterion of whether it's natural. What would be a criterion? Simply this: the satisfaction of natural impulse leads to what the Greeks called eudomania, which can be translated as "well being" or "a life lived well" or "happiness." Artificial dispositions are those that don't achieve this eudomania. They are just the sort of desires or impulses the satisfaction of which doesn't make us as happy as we expected—indeed, often makes us rather disappointed (though we may be loathe to admit it}. A rational ethics simply means using intelligence to distinguish between these artificial dispositions, based on errors of judgment and false ideals, and those dispositions the satisfaction of which would really make us happy.gregnyquisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13653516868316854941noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29196034.post-71951359490376456762008-02-10T10:06:00.000-08:002008-02-10T10:06:00.000-08:00Ian: "Is there a resource you'd recommend to read ...Ian: "Is there a resource you'd recommend to read alongside Life of Reason? The language, while poetic, is a bit beyond my ken."<BR/><BR/>Sorry, I don't know of any good resources along those lines. <EM>Life of Reason</EM>, particularly the first and last volumes, may be the most difficult well-written work of philosophy ever produced. It's worse than Nietzsche in this respect. Even so eminent a philosopher as G.E. Moore confessed he couldn't make heads or tails of it.gregnyquisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13653516868316854941noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29196034.post-36552055407671743762008-02-09T20:21:00.000-08:002008-02-09T20:21:00.000-08:00While we're speculating, you may be interested in ...While we're speculating, you may be interested in this approach:<BR/><A HREF="http://www.amazon.ca/Narrative-Means-Sober-Ends-Addiction/dp/1572308354/ref=pd_bowtega_1/702-2305343-8317646?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1202615200&sr=1-1" REL="nofollow">Narrative Therapy.</A><BR/><BR/>I've personally seen this approach dramatically working in with other, non-alcoholic psychological problems. It's been around for about 20 years, and while it has definite postmodern influences such as Foucault, it also coheres with some of Karl Popper's theories about the objective-abstract nature of problems.<BR/><BR/>In narrative therapy, instead of following the old psychological idea that the source of a problem is rooted in a person's psyche somewhere, and needs to be uncovered and repaired, problems are treated as <I>separate</I> from the person involved. They are more like a virus, carried around in the cultural atmosphere, which people might have a predisposition towards catching or resisting. Rather than being deeply and even intractably rooted and then inevitably manifesting in various ways, they are seen as invasive forces that deprive people of their lives, which the person might be aided by outsiders in resisting.<BR/><BR/>The basic logical problem with the traditional approach, which I'll call the "inherent problem", is that the person <I>is</I> the problem. How are you supposed to fix that?! It's like trying to get a hard drive to reformat itself. With the narrative approach, the problem is <I>separate</I> from the person, with its own life cycle and goals. Thus the logical issue is overcome. The person is the person, the problem is the problem.<BR/><BR/>The consequences of this shift are enormous. It means we can think of the sufferer as, say, a country under hostile invasion, who we can help in their own resistance movement. This resistance movement can be detected even in the most seemingly overrun cases if the therapist is careful enough.Often, like a cowed nation, the sufferer has been propagandised by the problem into thinking themselves beaten, when this is actually not quite the case.<BR/><BR/>The other issue is that even professionals are not good at detecting mental problems, often reading completely normal symptoms as problem symptoms. This was decisively illustrated in the famous <A HREF="http://members.aol.com/ahunter3/psych_inmates_libfront/vol_2/Rosenhan/rosenhan.html" REL="nofollow">Rosenhan</A> experiment in the 70s. (see also the wiki entry) <BR/><BR/>There are of course good criticisms of narrative therapy (such as whether it is falsifiable). However at the very least it opens up some intriguing approaches, ones that as I have mentioned I have personally seen succeed. Perhaps the pomos have hit on something here.Daniel Barneshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06359277853862225286noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29196034.post-65678578471200943122008-02-09T19:40:00.000-08:002008-02-09T19:40:00.000-08:00Greg,Is there a resource you'd recommend to read a...Greg,<BR/><BR/>Is there a resource you'd recommend to read alongside <I>Life of Reason</I>? The language, while poetic, is a bit beyond my ken.<BR/><BR/>-- Ian.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29196034.post-41230659757709788262008-02-09T18:54:00.000-08:002008-02-09T18:54:00.000-08:00Dan,I appreciate Greg's investigating her claims. ...Dan,<BR/><BR/>I appreciate Greg's investigating her claims. In fact, he's completely convinced me that Rand was clueless on psychology. <BR/><BR/>However, I'm not convinced that part of alcoholism <B>doesn't</B> emanate from a person's view of the world. I don't think it's something you can will out of existence overnight, because there is clearly a chemical element at work. But there are definite attitude similarities among alcoholics. Many, for example, are extremely hostile to introspecting their thoughts and feelings. Many of them do feel that the world is set against them from the start so why bother. When I see things like that I can't help but think, "Gee, if this person had a freakin' attitude adjustment, they might be able to kick that habit." The truth of that statement is properly the work of painstaking study but, if all we're doing is speculating, it seems like a halfway decent hypothesis.JayCrosshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15565955869872328326noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29196034.post-19516924650625743742008-02-09T18:38:00.000-08:002008-02-09T18:38:00.000-08:00Jay:>How do we know whether someone's desire is th...Jay:<BR/>>How do we know whether someone's desire is the product of natural disposition, environment, or conscious deliberation?<BR/><BR/>That is the $64,000 question, and you will not find the denizens of the ARCHNblog or anyone else with any real knowledge of the field telling you the definitive answer. All this is still unknown, hence vague, but some really big pieces of the puzzle are now to hand, and the shape they are forming empirically seems to strongly falsify Rand's contention that man is a "blank slate" and that all desires are the byproduct of man's philosophical ideas. <BR/><BR/>On the alcoholism issue, little is still known about its cause, and less is known about the genetic vs environmental influences on it. There is mere speculation at this point a)because it turns out genetic disposition itself is <I>way</I> more complex than might have been imagined even a few years ago and b) environment has a strong influence of the <I>expression</I> of genetic tendencies anyway and of course c)obviously not all offspring inherit all traits in the first place. Anyone who gives you a definitive answer to such a question is simply pretending to know. <BR/><BR/>Rand, however, <I>would</I> give you a definitive answer: alcoholism is the result of your philosophical premises.<BR/><BR/>Hence she is pretending to know. And Greg is painstakingly compiling the evidence demonstrating this.Daniel Barneshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06359277853862225286noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29196034.post-10595779139879565122008-02-09T18:10:00.000-08:002008-02-09T18:10:00.000-08:00simply a cover for whatever artificial disposition...<I>simply a cover for whatever artificial dispositions the individual formed for himself, either form his own thinking or the thinking of others.</I><BR/><BR/>How is something I form for myself by my own thinking "artificial?" After all, our minds are part of us; they too are natural. <BR/><BR/>One big problem I have with natural dispositions (and maybe it's because I haven't done enough reading) is they seem very vague. How do we know whether someone's desire is the product of natural disposition, environment, or conscious deliberation? It seems that very often, all three come into play. I also question whether natural dispositions are always more powerful than thought. <BR/><BR/>An anecdotal example: I am one of the only males in my family who does not have and has never had a drinking problem. I grew up being told constantly that "alcoholism is in my blood" and the like. Now, I'd like to think the reason I'm not an alcoholic is because I've seen what it's done to my family members and resolved not to repeat their mistakes. But if the abuse of alcohol is a natural disposition in males in my family, would Santayana say I should not repress it? Or more to the point, shouldn't it have overpowered my meager attempts to overcome it?<BR/><BR/>Maybe that's a bad example, it's just the easiest one I can think of offhand.JayCrosshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15565955869872328326noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29196034.post-12938559254122562082008-02-09T14:04:00.000-08:002008-02-09T14:04:00.000-08:00Jay: "This seems like a very passive point of view...Jay: "This seems like a very passive point of view. Some people "really and truly esteem" total submission to other people, or self-pity, or excuse making. But is that really a 'given?'"<BR/><BR/>It would be a given if people "really and truly" esteemed it. It's not likely, however, that anyone truly or really esteems self-pity and excuse making, though some may really and truly esteem submission to a wise and great leader. You have to keep something in mind here. The adverbs "truly" and "really" signify that what is esteemed is natural. Santayana was a thorough naturalist who believed that innate impulses were natural adaptions of organisms to the world. Therefore, except in extreme pathological cases, these impulses are not something that should be distrusted or discounted. They are signs telling us what we really need and value. All moral decisions have to be made with them in mind. <BR/><BR/>Jay: "Would Santayana uphold the desires of a child in the first scenario because 'that's the way he learned?'"<BR/><BR/>No, what a person learns is not necessarily in line with their natural dispositions. In fact, it is just such learning that Santayana tends to oppose as artificial, as something based on "partial interest" or "partial disillusion." The main point where Santayana and Rand disagree is on the question of natural dispositions. Rand doesn't believe any such dispositions exist, so of course from her point of view what a man "truly and really esteems" is simply a cover for whatever artificial dispositions the individual formed for himself, either form his own thinking or the thinking of others. But that is false psychology: the Cognitive Revolution has long ago refuted that blank slate view. <BR/><BR/>If one is to take a naturalist point of view, one has to admit natural dispositions: the evidence for them is overwhelming. But can we trust such dispositions? Well, if one believes that these dispositions are a product of evolution, I don't see why not. If these natural dispositions really were bad, they would have long ago been weeded out by natural selection. <BR/><BR/>By not accepting the existence of natural dispositions, Rand is basically denying the existence of natural values. Her ethics, in this sense, is a manifestion of an anti-nature point of view. We are asked to decide what we want, based on some process nebulously described as "reason." <BR/><BR/>Now the real difficulty in a naturalist-based rational ethics is that a lot of people don't know what they really want. They've been told what they should want, or they want contrary things, so that's why Santayana emphasizes self-knowledge and discipline. One does not merely blindly follow whatever impulse swims within one's ken, but one subjects oneself to a kind of Socratic inquisition to determine which impulses represent something vital and central to the organism. Not some "random" or "learned" or the product of artifical "brain-washing"; but something that expresses a genuine, natural demand of the pscyhe. This natural demand, whatever it may be, is not an epistemological given: it is not something that is cognitively obvious. Hence Santayana's assertion: "Happiness is hidden from a free and casual will." Through experience and discipline the individual learns to distinguish between the natural and the artificial. But once natural disposition is glimpsed and discovered, it is, and cannot help being, a <EM>moral</EM> given. Keep in mind: in order to avoid Hume's fallacy, you have to take <EM>something</EM> as a given. You can't reason from an is to an ought. You need the ought premise to get your rational ethics off the ground. Your choice is between natural disposition and artificial disposition. Which should one choose? Which is more "rational"?gregnyquisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13653516868316854941noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29196034.post-88097772973517053662008-02-08T15:58:00.000-08:002008-02-08T15:58:00.000-08:00And upon further reflection, is Rand's ignorance o...And upon further reflection, is Rand's ignorance of cognitive science really that devastating to her goal of a rational ethics? I can concede that reason and emotion are intertwined. However, as Santayana admits, a rational ethics is still something that <B>should</B> be pursued.<BR/><BR/>Someone who grows up being brainwashed to hate America <B>should</B> study history and abandon violent jihad as his life's purpose. Someone whose mother and grandmother wasted their lives in empty, loveless relationships <B>should</B> look around and wonder if that's all there is. Someone who meanders through life with no real purpose <B>should</B> spend some time thinking about what he truly wants. <BR/><BR/>Any ethical system that said, in effect, "Well whatever, you want what you want and there's really no changing it" is lazy, lying, or both. It might as well be called "The Ethics of Chance", since how things randomly came to be is what is worshiped and made the center of all decision making.JayCrosshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15565955869872328326noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29196034.post-78654107605721341712008-02-08T15:32:00.000-08:002008-02-08T15:32:00.000-08:00Santayana, on the other hand, holds that values ca...<I>Santayana, on the other hand, holds that values can only be determined by consulting what a man really and truly esteems. These Santayana takes as givens. They are based on natural dispositions.</I><BR/><BR/>This seems like a very passive point of view. Some people "really and truly esteem" total submission to other people, or self-pity, or excuse making. But is that really a "given?" Not in the sense that gravity or season changes are given. Environment has a lot to do with it, as Nathaniel Branden writes in his essay "A Culture of Accountability."<BR/><BR/><I>Children are unlikely to learn self-responsibility from adults who are passive, self-pitying, prone to blaming and alibis, and who invariably explain their life circumstances on the basis of someone else’s actions or on “the system.” Such adults do not teach self-responsibility, and if they do pay lip service to it, they are probably not convincing.<BR/><BR/>If, however, children grow up in a home or are educated in a school system among adults who hold themselves accountable for what they do, are honest about acknowledging their mistakes, carry their own weight in relationships, and work for what they want in life, there is a good probability, although never an absolute guarantee, that this behavior will be perceived as normal and as what is appropriate to a human being.</I><BR/><BR/>Would Santayana uphold the desires of a child in the first scenario because "that's the way he learned?" Would he really say that a life of excuse-making and squandered potential is "what he wants", even though he only "wants" it by default of his parents failing to provide a proper upbringing? I cannot accept this to be the case. A desire that you reach randomly because of how you were raised or the people you were surrounded with isn't something you "really and truly esteem."JayCrosshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15565955869872328326noreply@blogger.com