Fact and Value
Posted by random 8 years, 2 months ago to Philosophy
I agree completely with “On Sanctioning the Sanctioners,” Peter Schwartz’s article in the last issue of TIA. That article has, however, raised questions in the mind of some readers. In particular, David Kelley, one of the persons whom the article implicitly criticizes, has written an articulate paper in reply, identifying his own philosophy on the relevant topics. He has sent a copy of this paper to me and to many other individuals.
In my judgment, Kelley’s paper is a repudiation of the fundamental principles of Objectivism. His statements make clear to me, in purely philosophic terms and for the first time, the root cause of the many schisms that have plagued the Objectivist movement since 1968. The cause goes to the essentials of what Objectivism is. I have, therefore, decided to interrupt my book on Objectivism in order to name this cause once and for all.
In the following, I am presupposing a basic knowledge of Ayn Rand’s ideas. I am writing to and for Objectivists, whether or not they have seen Kelley’s paper.
Read Fact and Value: http://www.peikoff.com/essays_and_art...
In my judgment, Kelley’s paper is a repudiation of the fundamental principles of Objectivism. His statements make clear to me, in purely philosophic terms and for the first time, the root cause of the many schisms that have plagued the Objectivist movement since 1968. The cause goes to the essentials of what Objectivism is. I have, therefore, decided to interrupt my book on Objectivism in order to name this cause once and for all.
In the following, I am presupposing a basic knowledge of Ayn Rand’s ideas. I am writing to and for Objectivists, whether or not they have seen Kelley’s paper.
Read Fact and Value: http://www.peikoff.com/essays_and_art...
Such cold, hostile, contemptuous, suspicious and dictatorial an atmosphere for human relationships is anti-value. The way Peikoff sketches his version of Objectivism, its reality is joyless, tense, fearful, even paranoid. He is the one who has turned gold into a lead chain around the minds and hearts of his adherents.
And he is so shackled into his role as guardian of the legacy that he cannot see that Kelley has rescued Ayn Rand's philosophy from Peikoff's rigor mortis to bring it into the light of life, reason, achievement and happiness. Thank you, David.
The mere tolerance of the rejection of reality, of life and it's effects upon others; willing or unwilling, knowing or unknowing, capable or incapable of the accounting for the outcome; not just to the one, but to all, is evil, disorder, a form of max entropy and will eventually lead to disorder and chaos.
Kant, and the left lead their perversions from a rejection of absolute right and wrongs.
There are inherently rights and wrongs built in to creation itself.
They lack the mind or the will to know them.
These are the creatures I identify in my work as parasitical humanoids; devoid of conscience, a mind and are just a body with only a brain.
Funny...until now, I didn't think this was an objective truth.
Thank you, Carl
Do you really think Leonard Peikoff would be asking for a source? He spent more than half his life with Miss Rand,
The "use of the word schism or attribution of evil to legitimate arguments" is not the cause of a lack of "larger audience". You can believe whatever you like and read whatever you like. It doesn't allow someone who doesn't understand what she wrote and contradicts much of it to be "90% Objectivism" because he has convinced himself that he has derived a philosophy "from first principles".
She recognized that she was challenging all the major philosophical tenants that have become widely accepted and very much rejected those who tried to compromise in the name of her philosophy. Those who resent that are still personally attacking her and Leonard Peikoff for retaining their integrity. That is not a "'told you so' from a frustrated parent" or "because I say so". Those who want to rewrite Ayn Rand should simply go elsewhere and do whatever they do in their own name.
Ayn Rand's philosophy has a content. It does not just say go out and "be independent", or "be rational", or "have common sense". It advocates fundamental principles to be applied in one's life through understanding of the reasons for them -- not go cook up whatever you want to in the name of "independence" contradicting what is known and in the name of her philosophy regarded as "open" to whatever you want it to mean.
The six aspects of rationality she identified and explained as basic are independence, integrity, honesty, justice, productiveness, and pride. Which ones are you "not a fan of"?
The detailed, systematic explanation and illustration of the primary virtues are in her "The Objectivist Ethics" and Atlas Shrugged, and Leonard Peikoff's Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand.
Leonard Peikoff explained the nature of the virtues in detail and systematically. After seven chapters preceding and establishing the basis for the one on "Virtue", he began:
"'Rationality' is a broad abstraction. Now we must learn more fully how to apply it to the concrete choices of human life. We must study the derivative virtues (and values) recognized by the Objectivist ethics.
"Since these virtues are expressions of rationality, they are logically interconnected, both in theory and in practice. None can be validated in isolation, apart from the others; nor can a man practice any one of them consistently while defaulting on the others. In defining a series of virtues, Ayn Rand is abstracting, separating out for purposes of specialized study elements of a single whole. What she seeks to clarify by this means, however, is the whole. The Objectivist ethics upholds not disconnected rules, but an integrated way of life, every aspect of which entails all the others..."
"... Ayn Rand defines six major derivatives of the virtue of rationality... [she] did not regard this list as necessarily exhaustive or the order of its items as logically mandatory. Her concern was not to cover every application of virtue, but to identify the essentials of rationality in the most important areas and aspects of human life. This is the minimum moral knowledge needed by a man if he seeks to follow reason consistently, as a matter of principle, in his daily choices and actions..."
The difference between her ethics and an ethics prescribing "duties", as in religion and Kant, are explained in her "Causality Versus Duty" in Philosophy: Who Needs It and in the chapter "The Good" in Leonard Peikoff's Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand.
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