I'm an Objectivist. Debate me.

No, it would okay for someone to be a soldier, firefighter, or police officer.

You can love humanity as a whole or a concept. It doesn't mean you can love every individual person. That's impossible because not every individual person serves your rational self-interest. Love is selfish. We love people for selfish reasons, not selfless reasons.

In Objectivism, one values things because one values their life. To let something or someone that I value die would be betraying myself because what I value gives my life value.

 

We value things because we have to choose things. If you become immortal, you don't have to value things to make your life better because you can't die. Nothing is better than another. You can't value anything.

What you're saying is like... the alternative to cold is warm. We value being warm. Rand says, one who cannot be cold cannot value warmth. Then you say, if there were opportunity to be warm forever, would you take it? If you don't take it you are passing up to be warm forever. But if you do take it, you would take away your ability to value warmth. Should you take it or not... I don't know? If there wasn't sadness there couldn't be happiness. Do we want to take that away? Probably not.

Not to mention, but this is impossible, so who really cares?

I don't really know how this makes Objectivism flawed. You're just stating a fact.

Bananas are yellow, ergo Objectivism is flawed!!!

 

If people couldn't die, I don't think Ayn Rand would've created Objectivism. She wouldn't be worried about a totalitarian enslaving mankind because people couldn't die. But people clearly can die and can be enslaved and sacrificed under a totalitarian dictatorship, and that's why she said to value your life and to have other values that benefit your life.

 

All of whom are willing to risk their lives for strangers, making them evil in Objectivism.

Except you are now preaching the exact opposite of Objectivism. You say that the things you value give your life value. Objectivism says the opposite: it is your life that gives the things that you value their value. They have no value apart from your life. I agree with your anti-Objectivism, however.

 

I am definitely not John Galt, because I'm not a genocidal snowflake.

John Galt's feelings were hurt, so he deliberately destroyed the world's economy, thus killing many millions or even billions. Moral people should not consider such behavior to be something praiseworthy.

If I was wronged, and the choices were "suck it up, buttercup" or "kill a billion people", I'd suck it up. The fact that objectivists would choose the "kill a billion people" option tells you to steer clear of them.

 

When I debate Objectivists, I often like to point them to another capitalist philosopher, this one with a much better grasp on human nature.

"How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it, except the pleasure of seeing it. Of this kind is pity or compassion, the emotion which we feel for the misery of others, when we either see it, or are made to conceive it in a very lively manner. That we often derive sorrow from the sorrow of others, is a matter of fact too obvious to require any instances to prove it; for this sentiment, like all the other original passions of human nature, is by no means confined to the virtuous and humane, though they perhaps may feel it with the most exquisite sensibility. The greatest ruffian, the most hardened violator of the laws of society, is not altogether without it." - Adam Smith

Now, Smith wasn't entirely correct on that last point. There do seem to be some diseased minds that do not have capacity: those of psychopaths. I have always found it odd, although I think people make too much of it, that Rand idolized and hero-worshiped a serial killer psychopath in her youth.

 

I do indeed come up with a variety of my own "improvements" as it were to Ayn Rand's philosophy and statements. For example, in her stories, she conflated two groups of people into one, the thinkers and the doers. Those are two very different groups of people, and it's extremely rare to find anyone who falls into both camps. Her "solution" to the is/ought problem is completely lacking as well, and after a brief excursion into the intricacies of it, I decided it simply cannot be solved because if something was an is, it simply wouldn't need to be an ought. Objective reality can tell us nothing about the solution of moral dilemmas.

I think you misunderstood me when I said that everyone acts out of selfish reasons. That doesn't mean that I don't agree with Rand when she said that we ought to act with rational self-interest. I don't find the soldier who jumps on a grenade to be acting rationally. Selfishly, yes, but not rationally. He's not acting in his own rational best interest. And most altruists don't.

As for the circular reasoning, I suppose you can say it's nonfalsifiable, but it doesn't come from nothing, it comes from a deep understanding of human motivation, of why it is people do what it is they do. One of the great puzzles of life for me was understanding why people do stupid sh!t. Are they stupid? In some cases, yes, but in all cases, it's because that's who they are. People do stupid sh!t because somewhere, somehow, deep inside, that stupid sh!t is tied up with their identity. One psychologist talked about the gallows smile, that men who were about to be hanged would sometimes smile, why? Because they were fulfilling their destiny that their mother or father laid out for them, that someday they'd end up at the end of a rope. It was their identity.

I have to agree with Rand on the subject of intrinsic value. Only your own life can have intrinsic value because only human life gives anything on earth value of any sort. Everything on earth can be measured in terms of whether it adds or detracts from human life. If it adds, it is valuable. If it detracts, it is to be gotten rid of. Others, then, fall into the same two categories. Friends add to life and therefore are valuable. Murderers detract from life and therefore must be destroyed. Some things fall into both categories and are therefore mixed blessings, like coal, for example. Without life, without human life, nothing on earth has any value, not diamonds, not gold, not fields of corn. And without your own life, nothing on earth can have any value to you. Once you are dead, everything becomes of complete irrelevancy to you. So to the extent that things add to your life, they have value, and to the extent that things detract from your life, they have none or negative value. Another example: My friend likes to eat healthy and is always bugging me to eat healthier. But to me, that's backwards... why extend your life if all you can eat is hay? How is your life better to live longer but less happily? Isn't it better to live more happily even if it's not as long? But the longer life has more value to her than eating sweet or fatty foods, while enjoying my food has more value to me than living (theoretically) longer. Only my life (or her life) gives either option any value at all. Everything else has derived value. You own a house and land, and that's valuable, why? Because it gives you shelter, it adds to your life. You have a wife and she's valuable, why? Because she gives you sex and children, she adds to your life. You have a brother-in-law and he's a moocher, he has no value or even negative value, why? Because he takes from you, he detracts from your life. Someone finds a gold mine on the other side of the world. It means nothing to you because it neither adds to nor detracts from your life. A village is destroyed by an earthquake on the other side of the world. It means nothing to you because it neither adds to nor detracts from your life. Only your life has intrinsic value and everything else can be judged based on whether it adds to or detracts from it.

 

To whom are you referring, anyway?

I've always meant to read Adam Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments. I've read Wealth of Nations, skipping over the vast portions that covered the minting of gold coin.

 

Yes. Do you realize how psychotic it is to sacrifice yourself to someone you don't even know?

There's a difference between risking your life for someone you love and a complete stranger, or worse an enemy.

Did you not learn anything from Atlas Shrugged?

 

You can't defend the existence of firefighters, police officers, and soldiers while also calling them psychotic and agreeing that, according to your philosophy, they are all evil. Which is it?

But Objectivism is either inconsistent or it can't even justify risking your life to save someone you love. The lives of those I love would only have value in relation to my life. My life might have somewhat less value in it if they were to die, but it would still have its inherent value. Meanwhile, I would have no more value at all if I die. I'd be placing my value of my loved one's life over my value of my own life, which makes no sense in Objectivism. Objectivism can't justify having any interest in my loved one's life beyond my own life. There can be no Objectivist value, for example, in the idea that my wife might continue to live a few happy years after I'm gone; this should bring me no happiness at all if I were to follow Rand philosophy and humans should rid themselves such a notion. The Objectivist choice for whether or not it is permissible to sacrifice my life for my loved one is a choice of having some value subtracted from my life or eliminating all value; as an Objectivist egoist, my only ethical option would be to allow my loved one to die; attempting to save them in any way that risks my own life would be a violation of the core of Objectivist ethics.

 

First of all, firefighters, police officers, etc... that's a job. They get paid to do that. And I'm assuming they're doing it because they enjoy it. You're not sacrificing your life for anyone. You are risking your life, but within rational means. Firefighters are equipped to handle fire. Police officers are equipped to deal with shoot-outs... Soldiers are kind of a mixed bag. It depends who has control over you and if you are fighting for a worthy cause. Are you dying for Hitler? That's bad. Are you dying in the Vietnam War? That's also bad. Dying for your freedom, that's good.

You're kind of missing the point. There's a difference between dying for a stranger and someone you love. You'd die for your child. You'd die for you spouse. No one would let the people they love just die without risking their own life. To die for someone you love is selfish because you value it. And to live without a top value when you could've done something would be too depressing.

 

I did not see many of the replies to your query so pardon me if you fully addressed this previously. I read Rand's writings starting way back in the late 1960s as she used to be quoted extensively in William F Buckley's National Review.

As for objectivism representing "reality, reason ... rationality, purpose, and self-esteem", what do you make of Rand's life of degeneracy, hard drinking, hard smoking, adultery, welfare receiving, and political Pharisaism?

It is well established that her degeneracy is what drove her husband to drinking and she collected social welfare all the while publicly condemning such safety valves. This is possibly the worst example of hypocrisy that I have seen in my many decades of observing politics.

What say you to all this?

 

Unless money is more valuable than your life, that point is moot.

Not if Objectivism is correct. If Objectivism's account of value is correct, it is irrational to risk your life, unless it can't be avoided, for anything else. Everything else you value gets value from your life. If you risk your life for anything, you are risking a lesser value for the only thing with inherent value, and even the lesser value only has its value in light of the later inherent value.

Even when equipped, the risks are significant and you are risking the only the with real value for something with no value: the lives of strangers. Keep in mind that most firefighters are volunteers.

If Objectivism is correct, one's life is the only truly worthwhile cause. No cause can be greater than your life. If there is such a value, greater than life, then Objectivism is false.

If there is any cause worth sacrificing your life over, then you value that cause more than your own life. You can try to define that as "selfish" in some way, but it is a complete contradiction of Objectivist ethics' concept of rational self interest.

That's a completely nonsensical statement in light of Objectivism. You can't die for your own freedom. If you die, you have no freedom.

Of course no one would. That's part of why Objectivism is false. It can't account for this behavior and, if taken to its logical conclusions, condemns such a risk as evil.

But this notion of value is not compatible with the Objectivist theory of value, for reasons already explained.

A depressing life, in Objectivist terms, has far more value than a noble death, which is the end of value.

 

I don't recall anyone dying in Atlas Shrugged except in the train wreck. You as a lefty assume that if the people with the brains stopped working for the people with the political power that all those needy people would starve to death. I'm not so pessimistic. I anticipate that most people would figure out a way to get their daily needs met without their handout from the government.

 

No it's not. It's because if a selfish person wants to sacrifice themselves for something it's because they have a selfish-interest in it. If you spend your entire life working on something, you would die to keep that part alive because you value it more than your own life because it is a part of your life.

What's the point in living as a slave if you cannot live your life the way you want to live it? You are living for other people. That's selfless and immoral.

You just want Objectivism to be false because you don't like Ayn Rand.

Yeah well that's your incorrect opinion of Objectivism. Ayn Rand who actually created the philosophy would say otherwise.

 

Wow, I love how you completely ignore all the good aspects of her life. Did you forget that she came from Soviet Russia – a horrible place. She had to leave her family and come to Russia alone. And you criticize her for doing drugs? People are so harsh towards her and cannot give credit where credit is due. No one is 100% bad or good. Did you forget that she wrote best selling novels in a language that wasn't her own language that influenced so many people's lives? How is that a life of degeneracy?

Oh my god, give me a break. Do you have anything to say about her actual philosophy? Her writing is a masterful antithesis to a totalitarian dictatorship and you can't seem to recognize any of it as good.

 

You do know Greenspan betrayed those values he professed.

 

So there, let that be the end of such nonsense as romantic idealism--statistics, averages, and the next door neighbor are better, safer, and more easily manipulated than the independent spirit of Man.

 

Oh, she is a long way from dead. Proof? This forum.

 

Her vices are way overstated; her virtues, admired by the few, ignored by the many, and viciously attacked by the fearful

 

I've read your posts and replies. You're doing great. Thank you.

 

Thank you! I appreciate it very much.

 

You right. It's not. Its government interference in the marketplace.

 

I learned that even Rand couldn't imagine Objectivism working without adding fantasy technology.

And the real world has confirmed the failure of objectivism. Its success rate is up there with communism

 

So you learned nothing. Nice!

Yeah, I'm sure it has...