I'm an Objectivist. Debate me.

Discussion in 'Religion & Philosophy' started by Appleo, Sep 3, 2018.

  1. Starjet

    Starjet Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    At best, this is nonsense. At worst, this pretentious goobly-gook to the hide it's true meaning; Ayn Rand's philosophy doesn't work for the average human being who doesn't look past his own nose. And on this you are correct.


    For example, your first point: First off, you definitely cannot speak for each and every individual in the human race when you say humans aren't primarily motivated by self-interested. Hell, the wrecked wretch Mother Theresa proved that as well as Hitler, Pol Pot, Kim Jong Un, Che Guevera, AOC, the Clintons, the Bushes, McCain, Trump, and on, and on, and on. Additionally, she never said every human is motivated by self-interest. As a matter of fact, she described a "lack of self-interest" as one of the intellectual, philosophical, and cultural defects leading America to a fascist dictatorship. What she did say was, and this is my interpretation--a proper morality is one that promotes selfishness and egoism. That, in essence, to act in one's own self-interest is to live your life using your reason to reach the best within you to soar as high as the love of your life will take you.

    Indeed, what you have done is use a lot of college social science package-deal anti-concepts to simply say the following: Ayn Rand's philosophy is not based on a statistical average; it is not meant for the girl next door or the boy down the street. It's not for the dopers, the partiers, the altruistic, the traditionalists, the blind, the stupid, the dumb. It's for anyone who still believes in the heroic, and whose love of life has not yet been extinguished. It's for the soul that sees a jet flying and smiles in wonderment. It's for the soul who looks at Mars and wonders how soon. It's for the soul who sees the works of Santiago Calatrava and sees beauty, excitement, and inspiration.

    In other words, Howard Roark is not Peter Keating; and Ayn Rand's philosophy was written for Howard, not Peter; though the Peter's of the world could benefit from it.

    The rest of your post is just pure nonsense. As is your statement: I like her ideas, but don't like her writing, and her ideas don't work.

    Your head is dead, dude.
     
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  2. rahl

    rahl Banned

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    All of this word salad is you hand waiving away the flaws pointed out and saying "nuh uh". Nobody takes Rand seriously as a philosopher. She had a few good points with objectivism, but as has been pointed out, it is quite unworkable in the real world.

    As I said, most philosophies are like this. There is no one perfect way of living. My opinion is to learn from many different philosophies and take the best parts of each and apply them, in order to avoid their flaws.
     
  3. Starjet

    Starjet Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    What's Wrong With Ayn Rand's Philosophy:

    "Many articles have been written about what’s wrong with Ayn Rand’s philosophy. But, to my knowledge, none of them presents her ideas accurately. So I thought it would be helpful to write one that does.

    Here’s what’s wrong with Rand’s ideas:

    Rand held that “existence exists,” that reality is real, that there is a world out there, and that we are conscious of it. She held that everything in existence is something specific; everything has a nature; a thing is what it is. (A snake is a snake. A woman is a woman. A pillar of salt is a pillar of salt.) She held that a thing can act only in accordance with its nature. (A snake can slither; it cannot speak. A woman can speak; she can’t become a pillar of salt.) And Rand held that there is only one reality: the one we perceive, the one we experience, the one in which we live.1

    Where to start with all of the problems in just that one paragraph?"..

    To read the rest and find out what's really wrong with her philosophy, instead of the floating fantasy and pretentious pooh-pooh--and I don't mean Winnie--of rahl, click the link below
    https://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2018/02/heres-whats-wrong-ayn-rands-philosophy/
     
    Last edited: Jan 31, 2019
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  4. Starjet

    Starjet Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Rand's Philosophy, I'll agree,
    Wasn't written for all,
    Nor for thee.

    And you wouldn't know a word salad if someone poured it over your head...

    I Am the Walrus
    " I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together
    See how they run like pigs from a gun, see how they fly
    I'm crying

    Sitting on a cornflake waiting for the van to come
    Corporation tee-shirt, stupid bloody Tuesday
    Man, you been a naughty boy, you let your face grow long
    I am the eggman, we are the eggmen, I am the walrus
    Goo goo g'joob"--The Beatles (John Lennon)

    Now that's a word salad.

    See?
     
    Last edited: Jan 31, 2019
  5. rahl

    rahl Banned

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    I'm sorry you go against your own favored philosophical beliefs, and completely reject reality. But that doesn't make it go away.
     
  6. Starjet

    Starjet Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Time will tell, won't it? Let's see what wins out; your nonsense or this:

    Ayn Rand--
    "The Objectivist ethics proudly advocates and upholds rational selfishness—which means: the values required for man’s survival qua man—which means: the values required for human survival—not the values produced by the desires, the emotions, the “aspirations,” the feelings, the whims or the needs of irrational brutes, who have never outgrown the primordial practice of human sacrifices, have never discovered an industrial society and can conceive of no self-interest but that of grabbing the loot of the moment.

    The Objectivist ethics holds that human good does not require human sacrifices and cannot be achieved by the sacrifice of anyone to anyone. It holds that the rational interests of men do not clash—that there is no conflict of interests among men who do not desire the unearned, who do not make sacrifices nor accept them, who deal with one another as traders, giving value for value."--http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/selfishness.html

    Now, it is true that you are right, not all humans live like this...it would be wise for them to do so, and as quickly as possible, if its happiness and life on earth they seek.
     
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  7. rahl

    rahl Banned

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    Time has already told you. Rand is not taken seriously by any philosopher. Neither is objectivism. This is due to the many fatal flaws within her philosophy. Most of which have been pointed out to you in the past 30 pages.

    You are emotionally invested in objectivism, and it overrides your reason and ability to acknowledge reality. This is a violation of your own philosophical beliefs, which is what makes it so humorous.
     
  8. Appleo

    Appleo Newly Registered

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    Well obviously she's not taken seriously right now. If she was taken seriously by most intellectuals today, the world wouldn't have so many problems like it has now. They wouldn't be preaching such destructive ideas to young people in the schools and universities. There would be no problems today like the apparent lack of freedom, altruism and irrationalism, and increasing power of government control. In the future, her ideas will be taken seriously and will be the norm of the future. She was so way ahead of her time that most people, and even todays intellectuals, cannot even grasp or understand where she's coming from. We'll need another enlightenment before people start to see because we're still in the dark ages.
     
    Last edited: Jan 31, 2019
  9. Starjet

    Starjet Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    This is the stupidest thing I have ever heard, with the exception of the Nazi's exhortations to have an open mind while they were busy pouring blood down the open sewer of human history; and the communists excused their mass executions with: You can't break an amulet without breaking a few eggs, while breaking human bodies and spirits.

    Lord, almighty. The truth of falsehoods of Ayn Rand's ideas depends upon the sanction of left-wing academia. Please, spare me the fraud.

    Next you'll be spouting the thoughts of the "we" outweigh the ideas of the genius; or worse--the needs of the many outweigh the rights of the one; or god forbid, Payne was a fool, man has no rights, society does.
     
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  10. rahl

    rahl Banned

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    she never has been taken seriously.
    of course we would. Her philosophy doesn't work in practice or reality. It only works in fiction.
    lol, no
     
  11. rahl

    rahl Banned

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    this is an emotional rant, not a rational rebuttal. This too, violates your beloved objectivism philosophy.
     
  12. Appleo

    Appleo Newly Registered

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    I take her seriously.

    Atlas Shrugged is explaining what's happening in America right now you know. It's not fiction like Harry Potter; it's fiction that's quite applicable to the real world.

    lol, yes
     
  13. Starjet

    Starjet Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Well, you take it any way you want. Me. I tell it like it is.
     
  14. rahl

    rahl Banned

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    good for you. You and the dozen or so others can change the world! lol


    Complete detachment from reality.


    nope
     
  15. rahl

    rahl Banned

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    clearly you don't. you outright reject reality when presented with inconvenient truths. that is a direct violation of your beloved philosophy.
     
  16. Starjet

    Starjet Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    You do not matter.

    Ayn Rand: "It does not matter that only a few in each generation will grasp and achieve the full reality of man's proper stature—and the rest will betray it. It is those few that move the world and give life its meaning—and it is those few that I have always sought to address. The rest are no concern of mine; it is not me or "The Fountainhead" that they will betray: it is their own souls. "
    https://www.optimize.me/quotes/ayn-rand/19128-it-does-not-matter-that-only-a-few-in-ea/

    [​IMG]
     
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  17. Appleo

    Appleo Newly Registered

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    The subjectivist says I'm detached from reality...
     
  18. rahl

    rahl Banned

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    there is only one reality. Not different versions of it.
     
  19. rahl

    rahl Banned

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    claiming a work of fiction, is not a work of fiction, is a detachment from reality. Sorry.
     
  20. Appleo

    Appleo Newly Registered

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    Do you even know what objectivism is? lol
     
  21. Appleo

    Appleo Newly Registered

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    Maybe if you read the book you could see the parallels to reality.
     
  22. rahl

    rahl Banned

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    of course. As I said, I am a fan of some of it's principles. I was introduced to it via Terry Goodkind in his fantasy series "The Sword of Truth". Great series of books. Probably my favorite series.
     
  23. rahl

    rahl Banned

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    I've read it. It is a complete and total work of fiction.
     
  24. Starjet

    Starjet Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    The truth, period. The naysayers are free to believe as they wish.

    Ayn Rand:"...There are the various schools of modern philosophy which, rejecting the law of identity, proclaim that reality is an indeterminate flux ruled by miracles and shaped by whims—not God’s whims, but man’s or “society’s.” These neomystics are not man-worshipers; they are merely the secularizers of as profound a hatred for man as that of their avowedly mystic predecessors.
    "A cruder variant of the same hatred is represented by those concrete-bound, “statistical” mentalities who—unable to grasp the meaning of man’s volition—declare that man cannot be an object of worship, since they have never encountered any specimens of humanity who deserved it.

    The man-worshipers, in my sense of the term, are those who see man’s highest potential and strive to actualize it. . . . [Man-worshipers are] those dedicated to the exaltation of man’s self-esteem and the sacredness of his happiness on earth."--http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/man-worship.html
     
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  25. Appleo

    Appleo Newly Registered

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    Yeah but you don't understand how it translates into the real world.
     

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