I'm an Objectivist. Debate me.

Well, what do you propose for low IQ people.

What are you talking about? In capitalism you are paid for the value that you produce with your work.

 

This is your thread. What would you do with low IQ folks who cannot contribute in a meaningful way that does not infringe their constitutional rights?

You and I both know this is nonsense. Our economy is a blended one with a slant toward capitalism. Even ignoring minimum wage, where do you presume to think people are paid for the "value" of their work?

We both know HR departments exist. Why do they exist? Generally to control costs via wage restriction schemes, like "brackets" or "steps" for specific jobs and an unwillingness to increase wages beyond that regardless of productive output.

 

Are we going to continue in a respectable manner?

Can we focus on only one issue at a time. I can't have a discussion when you throw out multiple points and claims.

I think we should discuss this point: What ethics are you proposing? I think that individuals should hold themselves above the group, tribe, or common good. An individual is not to sacrifice themselves to the group. I think it is immoral for a man to live for other people, and for other people to live for him. Every man must live for himself in accordance to what he values.

Let's focus on this point.

 

You don't get to commandeer the conversation until you address the points I made above about tribalism and our evolutionary history, because those points countermand the fallacies of Rand's thought process.

We can then focus on the hypotheticals you propose.

also, I will have your responses to my points made about objective/subjective/political truths.

 

Well, I think man isn't just an animal ruled by evolutionary history. Man's greatest asset is his mind, and he can use his ability to reason to make his life better and more fulfilling. I think it's because man has this ability he no longer lives in tribes. A man doesn't live in a grass hut anymore struggling to survive by hunting and gathering. He has risen above that way of life by creating technology and the society that we live in today. We don't have to struggle for survival and instead pursue our happiness.

 

A few points;

1. Equating tribes to "grass huts" is disingenuous. Tribalism extends beyond the stone age image it conjures. Why do you think we have so many issues today regarding multiculturalism?

2. Ok. So what if his greatest asset is his mind? His mind does not exculpate him from the genealogical history that flows through his every cell.

3. A flaw in Randian philosophy is evident here; what if said man uses his mind to make life better and more fulfilling for the collective of humanity?

I'd also like you to address the objective, subjective and political truths I posted above.

Namely, it's your truth that this system is the best even though you deny the objective truth of our tribalist, altruistic evolutionary roots, and despite the political truths that we're all individuals, we still are bound by the confines of evolutionary processes.

Moreover, I would also like an answer to the inherent genocide you're endorsing, because many, many people would be left to die with your philosophy fully installed.

You do realize, don't you, that this philosophy is inhumane and more like than not unconstitutional?

 

What do I propose. Bring back unskilled living wage jobs and stop with the slave labor scheme that globalism is grounded upon.

Who determines that value of your work? Let me tell you how the real world actually operates, and I will use my own small manufacturing business as an example, because it was successful for over 40 years before I retired and sold it. Ready?

The industry average in this production work were not middle class wages. And yet when I look at my future competitors, I saw these big fine homes, and high living. Once I entered into this market, I found out why they lived like veritable kings, compared to most people in my area. They paid working poor wages, and never had any problem in getting employees. Why? Lower IQ people have to work. Reality, not some silly disconnected from reality idealism.

And so, once I was up and running, and showing a profit, a very good profit, I increased wages, which made me an anomaly in this sector of manufacturing. I added benefits. And over a few years got the best, most productive workers from my competitors. What did these higher wages and treating people like valuable assets to my company yield? Dependable work behavior. Minimum sick days needed, which in this sector could really hurt you, given the nature of this production. And loyalty to this company.

Every quarter I would feed the crew supper, and we would go over the P and L, which was basically a schooling in the importance of controlling costs and expenses. My waste, from errors dropped exponentially, saving us money, because I included the workers in this enterprise. I could go on and on as to how I ran this business, that paid a living middle class wage, so that my employees did not have to live in old house trailers and could save for their own retirement.

What did it cost me personally? Well, I never owned a huge, very expensive home that told my peers I had arrived! I never bought my own kids brand news cars at my competitors did, but used ones and I never took very expensive vacations (but I took vacations) and I never joined the exclusive country club, as they did. In short, I kept less, so that I could offer my employees a living wage and a decent job, for their hard work.

And if you do not think this is what reality actually looks like, you have never been the owner of a profitable business, who chose to pay what you would say is impossible! A living wage for low skilled work, by lower IQ people.

And so when I hear people say that the market determines wages, I say, it ain't necessarily so. It is much more than that, and that is the dirty little secret some would not want others to know.

For the market average in wages in my sector was far below what I actually could pay and did pay. I just spread around the success of my company where most seem not to do that out of nothing but simple greed.

 

Man's mind is what allows him to go beyond his biology, evolution, or whatever. He has the capacity to think and choose. The brain that is responsible for reason is what humans evolved to have.

And man can use his mind to help the collective of humanity, that doesn't mean he should or that it would work. Communism is an idea that humans tried to make the collective better, but it didn't work.

Genocide, according to the dictionary, is the deliberate killing of a large group of people. I have never said to kill anybody.

Philosophy is not inhumane. But we are not discussing that point.

 

Well, free market capitalism is voluntary free trade. If someone wants to pay their workers 100 dollars an hour, that's fine. If someone wants to pay their workers 2 cents an hour, that's fine to. It doesn't matter because all interactions are voluntary.

But when you started your business and maintained it for 40 years, we never had free market capitalism for that time period. We had crony capitalism and socialism. So whatever you're talking about didn't actually happen in a free market.

However, if we take a sweeping job for example, nobody is going to pay you 100 dollars an hour to do that job. So businesses reduce their wage. But the reason why businesses don't pay 2 cents an hour is because no one is willing to work for 2 cents an hour, especially when there are other businesses who are willing to pay more for the job. So the market usually determines the wages.

But for you to spread your success around your company... as long as you did it because you wanted to then that is fine. But if you spread your money around because you felt like it was a duty, or something you had to do when you didn't want to, I would consider that immoral.

People should spend the money they earn however they want because they have earned.

 

Again, a hole in Rand's theory is if an independent man decides to use his mind to make life better for all people instead of adhering with the selfish principal she sets forth. I think it's more than condescending that a middling author who has awful prose can presume to tell all of us precisely how we "are" in her version of truth, and instead of questioning it, a lot of folks blindly accept her demagoguery on the subject as an objective truth.

Note, I've noticed you're refusing to address points I make, specific to evolutionary objective truths and their outcomes. One wonders why.

Aw, we come to the crème de la crème. That doesn't mean he should; this statement alone proves that Rand's thinking is morally bankrupt and hinges on unethical designs that would lay waste to society as we know it.

Communism is a failed political theory, objectivism is an oligarchs fantasy, and unfettered laissez faire, such as endorsed by Rand herself, led to grain famines that killed thousands of people. I am not sure why you're drawing a comparison between the individual choosing to make the lives of all people better and a communist state forcing their tyranny on those that compose the collective. Sounds like you're setting up a straw man.

I would say if you know your political/philosophical ideology is going to lead to deaths, you are willingly accepting genocide. You choosing to embrace an ideology that would result in death and destruction is an endorsement, not just tacit, of that outcome.

I disagree. Some philosophy is inhumane; like philosophy that would require the many suffer so the few who already own so much can own more and more and more and more and more.

But I digress. I am still waiting for you to answer my questions and observations about objective, subjective and political truths.

 

You're ignoring the boss/worker master/slave dichotomy here. Another glaring issue with Randian philosophy is it entirely imbalances power structures and places all authority with those who have; something you ignored above when I mentioned HR departments and their wage control schemes.

I have bills. It isn't voluntary for me to have a job. It's a requirement. That's the issue. The imbalance of power in the hiring process and the fantasy land Rand required in her abject thinking.

This is pure opinion and subjective truth, something you have yet to answer for as I noted above, multiple times.

The free market has every reason to suppress wages. Your ideology proves that with the nobility of selfishness clause, so color me unimpressed that you and other objectivists ignore the reality of the power imbalance.

Who are you to tell a business owner what is moral? Even if he felt a duty to share the wealth of his company with the -workers that enabled that wealth through their labor- it's none of your business, and labeling it immoral is downright preposterous.

I agree; but that doesn't mean you have no obligation to the society that enables your wealth or essentially everything else you do - drive to work in safe cars on safe highways, for example.

Ever seen how people drive in Africa? That's Randian philosophy at work. Hardly maintained roads with essentially no laws. They all drive like lunatics.

 

Yes.

No.

Yes.

They should be removed.

I really like this idea.

I don't know what democratic sub-groupings are.

It would be acceptable.

Yes.

With all the letters, it sounds very similar to insurance. Everyone pays a fee, that they all voluntarily decide to pay, so that the service can only provide for those people that paid for the fee. So this can work for anything, like health, social security, or fire departments.

I really like this system because that way, people cannot leech off of each other, nor does someone sacrifice a great deal of their money for something that hardly pays them back in return.

I think that is fair and just.

 

Well, you're rejecting your own truths. You live in a capitalist system. We live in a relatively free country that places individual rights above the collective or above the tribe. People live for their dreams and pursue their own happiness. They do not live for the sake of other people. We aren't living tribalism anymore. We live in a free country, and it's because we chose not to follow our evolutionary tribalism.

 

If you don't like your boss, then don't work for him.

Beggars can't be choosers.

In 1978, there was no free market capitalism. I think that's a fact.

No it does not. Businesses compete for labor.

For example, a stores need a cashiers to run the registers. If I pay my cashier 2 cents an hour when another store would pay him 1 dollar an hour, which job do you think I'll take? And what if there's a sweeping job that will pay me 3 dollars an hour? Businesses pay wages based on how valuable your labor is.

I recognize his right to spend his money however he wants to, but that doesn't mean I have to approve of it.

Laws for driving safe on the road isn't something that I want to get rid of. I am no advocating for an anarchy. And we can have private roads, or roads built by the private sector. Roads aren't really what I'm criticizing.

What I don't like is socialized medicine, social security, welfare programs, and basically the idea that the richer you are, the more money you have to give to the poor. That any wealth you make somehow belongs to other people when it does not.

 

You're not making any sense. You claim in other posts that we aren't living in a capitalist society, and now claim that we do. You then offer no actual rebuttal to the objective truth of human evolution and refuse to answer when called upon to discuss subjective, objective and political truths.

Yes, this is a relatively free country where individuals are pursuing what they want. So what? That doesn't actually matter, nor does it counter the points I've made about tribalism; in fact, it sharpens those points. Hence the issues we have currently with backlash against multiculturalism.

I'm waiting for you to answer about those subjective/objective and political truths. You're tiring me out with the constant dodging here.

 

Social security is an earned benefit. I don't give a damn if you don't like it. Go work under the counter and do what you want. Why do you have to seek to force your fantasy beliefs on other people by taking away earned benefits?

Again, you're not answering basic challenges to your arguments in the form of objective, subjective or political truths; you're simply regurgitating randian talking points. If you're interested in open debate, you ought to learn it looks poorly on you when you ignore arguments.

As for the bit about "Beggers can't be choosers," well, I rest my case. I don't need to build an objectively moral picture for my belief system nor do I need to explain it; you just did it for me. Your ideology would leave those people in the dust, all so a few haves can have more and more.

I am against equality of outcome. I am however absolutely resolute in my defiance of Randian tyranny and the genocide it would endeavor to bring to this nation.

 

I only know the name and haven't paid much attention to the philosophy thanks for sharing and you're doing well if you're conversing at a young age this way

 

We aren't living in a free, unregulated, laissez-faire, capitalistic economy. We have an economy with many market characteristics, but we still have a lot of socialism and cronyism due to government regulation and interference.

To pursue what you want in a free country is self-interest. It is not in the interest of the tribe or the collective. Multiculturalism problems happen because people refuse to rise above their tribal natures.

 

Thank you very much, FivepointFive. I appreciate it.

 

Why is it my moral duty to pay social security? I have no self-interest in paying for something that I do not value. And how is it moral for people to rely on others to pay for their own problems?

 

It's a welfare system wrapped up in rhetoric that people like you love to repeat and get angry when challenged. If you earned it, then you have a property right in it. And, that's not the case. You have no property right in Social Security and there's no property there, anyway.

 

Except when you are poor and you are one failed paycheck away from homelessness or starvation, your interactions with potential employers are not really free.

 

Okay so?

 

So it’s not really a free exchange.

Your whole “beggars can’t be choosers” is an admition of this.

For all you claim “well if poor workers don’t like their pay, working conditions, etc, they freely agreed to them and can freely leave”, you also acknowledge that is bullshit because the poor have the constant coercion of homelessness and starvation at their backs.