About
Content
Store
Forum

Rebirth of Reason
War
People
Archives
Objectivism

Post to this threadMark all messages in this thread as readMark all messages in this thread as unreadBack one pagePage 0Page 1Page 2Page 3Page 4Page 5Page 6Forward one pageLast Page


Sanction: 10, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 10, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 10, No Sanction: 0
Post 80

Monday, April 4, 2005 - 7:22amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
I agree with Joe's interpretation of Saddamite, and I have a problem with this definition:
As the one who coined the term, let me say that as far as I'm concerned "Saddamite" applies to anyone who succours Saddam. Period. That includes those who say the liberation is merely "unstrategic" (*that* gives Saddam succour) as well as the vicious, overtly anti-American scum who post on Rockwell, Raimondo, Mises & the like.
On one hand, "unstrategic" could simply mean weasel words to hide moral opposition to the war or other variants of Saddamism (see Joe's post), in which case I fully support the Saddamite label.

But this doesn't mean its right to rule out any strategic argument against the war. The US certainly had other options for deploying its resources. For instance, perhaps the US would have caught Bin Laden by now if it hadn't diverted resources to Iraq. Others might argue that a better strategy would have been to take out the Iranian leadership. 

Are we therefore to label supporters of the Iraq war (including myself) "BinLadenites", or "Khamenei-ites" for "giving succour" to Bin Laden and Khamenei?


Post 81

Monday, April 4, 2005 - 3:40pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Tim, through the Perigo line of reasoning on this, yes.  That would be a consistent application of the principles behind the term 'Saddamite'. 

Post 82

Monday, April 4, 2005 - 5:16pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
The problem is, the 'Perigo line' isn't reasoning - just a fogged mirror.......
(Edited by robert malcom on 4/04, 5:18pm)


Post 83

Monday, April 4, 2005 - 5:20pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
You know, Robert, some of your other comments on this site are suddenly making sense now.  Thanks for clearing that up.

Jason


Post 84

Tuesday, April 5, 2005 - 7:05amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Just a short comment about "intimate."   We live in a culture where Presidents talk about the underwear they prefer, "penis" and "erectile disfunction" are part of everyday ads and grabbing one's crotch is a standard dance move.  Ayn Rand was born in 1905 for god's sake, during the waning years of Victorian mores.  She no doubt thougth that her sex life was the business of very few, if any, of her intimates.  As to the main thrust of this thread, I find it very interesting that many Objectivists on all sides of the TOC/ARI schism are coming to the conclusion that knowledge is, indeed, contextual, as Rand, Peikoff and Schwartz have often pointed out.

Post 85

Tuesday, April 5, 2005 - 12:06pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
This is a difficult issue you raise in your post, James, and it may not be settled by this necessarily short reply.  You begin by saying that "the last sentence of this passage is just plain false." You go on to say that "the truth of an idea is its relationship to the facts of reality, my reasoning about it or logical processing of an idea within my context of knowledge has no bearing on its truth." 

You are, if I am reading you correctly, taking Peikoff's sentence to imply some sort of subjectivism and/or relativism of a pernicious kind, and you are making an effort to counter that implication. And if that were the implication, you would be right, in that context, to re-emphasize that A is A, the facts are the facts independent of man's consciousness.

The problem for epistemology that is being addressed in the passage you quote is not, however, the axiomatic concept "identity". It is, rather, the problem of what process of identification establishes a "fact" or a "truth" for human consciousness. And, more to Peikoff's immediate point, given that the process is fallible, how can anyone establish the truth of an idea (i.e its correspondence to the facts of reality) with certainty.  I think if you read Peikoff's final sentence with this issue in mind, you will see that Peikoff, far from saying that "anything goes" in establishing an idea as true with certainty, is saying exactly what the sentence says (and which, by the way, I think you actually say in your remaining paragraphs), viz:  "Logical processing within a specific context of knowledge is necessary and sufficient to establish an ideas truth (i.e. its correspondence to the facts of reality)." 

Granted that the sufficiency of these criteria is not the accepted view in most philosophy departments (usually what is added is the totally circular criterion that P be true), I would want to know what else is needed that would "establish an ideas truth" if not a logical process within a specific context of previously established knowledge? Do you believe that somehow we can come to know the truth of an idea (i.e. its correspondence to the facts of reality) by direct intuition, or divine revelation, or social conditioning? Of course you don't. So what is the process if not the one Peikoff identifies?

One of the prior conclusions of Objectivism's theory of knowledge is that there is no such thing as an "unprocessed" fact of reality. Quite a large section of IOE and of Kelley's EOS is devoted to making this case (and to showing that the fact of "processing" does not lead us to Kant's conclusion that we can never know "reality as it really is")  There is no proposition P that is true (i.e. corresponds to the facts of reality) or that we can claim to be true, independent of the process of coming to know that it is true. It is this process that Peikoff is identifying in this passage. And since I believe that he has correctly identified the facts of reality that supports it, I believe his last sentence is true (i.e. correctly identifies the necessary and sufficient conditions for an ideas' being true.)

One final note about the issue of "integration of data" which you raise. You say, "he seems to be more concerned with how an idea fits together with what he already knows than with gathering additional data."  I think that this is merely a division of labor.  Peikoff is a philosopher and is, thus, more concerned with, in this case, for example, the epistemological issue of how we know and how we can be certain of our knowledge, no matter what the particular data in any given case.  The conclusions he reaches in his area of expertise can then give the scientist who is collecting data a context of method and certainty within which to operate.  This very thread points to an example -- Rand's affair -- of his willingness to gather new data when it is presented (the fact that he did not consider the Brandens trustworthy should not be surprising given the battle that was being waged at the time -- and appears to still be going on, if BB's comments re: Peikoff in this thread are any indication)(note to Barbara: I've been around a long time and know this story inside and out. I don't get the joke.)



Post 86

Friday, April 8, 2005 - 4:22amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Takeyes,

It is not fallibility which necessitates the use of context to delimit claims and establish certainty, it is the finite nature of our conceptual consciousness. Fallibility requires that we use logic to verify or discover the truth of an idea, not to establish it.





Post 87

Friday, April 8, 2005 - 6:10pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Am I to understand Linz's position that if one were to take the position that a United States invasion of Iraq was unnecessary, would mean that person was a supporter of Saddam's murderous actions against Iraqis?

Linz, do you advocate we go to war with any country that violates the human rights of its citizenry? Or do you feel war, at least a moral war, is a means of retaliation against the initiation of force? Or do you think I'm presenting to you a false dichotomy?


Post 88

Friday, April 8, 2005 - 6:20pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
John - I suggest you read the innumerable previous threads here on the Iraq War.

Linz

Post 89

Friday, April 8, 2005 - 6:21pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Could you trouble yourself to provide me a link?

Post 90

Friday, April 8, 2005 - 6:35pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Tim I certainly agree with your assesment that our country has finite resources. Therefore arguing whether one country is more strategic to invade than another does not imply you are a supporter of the country's dictator you consider the least important strategically. That would imply one would not even support the population of that country overthrowing the dictator. Then one would truly be a supporter of that dictator. The question has always been who should do it. Would Linz be considered a Putinite or perhaps a Castroite for not advocating an invasion into Russia or Cuba or any of the dozens of dictators in this world.

Is the United States government morally responsible for the human rights of the world or of its own citizens?

But I would like to know why you would consider an invasion of Iraq to be of any strategic importance?

(Edited by John Armaos on 4/08, 6:37pm)


Sanction: 6, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 6, No Sanction: 0
Post 91

Friday, April 8, 2005 - 9:01pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
John A wrote:
 
But I would like to know why you would consider an invasion of Iraq to be of any strategic importance?


Hate to butt in here--boy, am I more active now, or what?!?!---but:

map_middle_east.gif

Iran seems a bit hemmed-in right now...strategically speaking. 




Post 92

Friday, April 8, 2005 - 9:20pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Jeremy, I don't understand what you're trying to say. Are you saying the invasion into Iraq and Afghanistan was so that we could better invade Iran? Your post is incoherent.
(Edited by John Armaos on 4/08, 9:24pm)


Post 93

Friday, April 8, 2005 - 9:47pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
LoL.  First, we didn't invade anyone.  My tax dollars and a lot of brave folks did, but I sure as shit didn't.

And B, I don't see how I could be more coherent.  I mean....I drew a picture.  

I could have thrown in a diatribe or two about whatever I think Iraq was "really" about, but you didn't ask about that.  You asked what was the strategic importance of seizing and controlling most of Mesopotamia, not what I thought "our" intentions "really" were.  (Note the scare quotes.)  I pointed out that surrounding Iran--the alleged fount from which all Islamic hatred springs--has a decided strategic advantage: it scares the piss out of them.  I didn't say whether or not this was the Bush team's actual intention.  Though it would make strategic sense.  I'm not endorsing one position or another in that post.  I'm indicating a fact of reality. 

?hguone tnerehoc

(Edited by Jeremy on 4/08, 9:49pm)


Post 94

Thursday, May 12, 2005 - 9:31pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Barbara wrote:
Adam, I certainly hope that you are correct and that better things are beginning at ARI. They have been in many ways a disaster for Objectivism, and nothing would be more wonderful than for them to abandon their cultism. But, frankly, I'll have to see it to believe it.
Why don't you go to a lecture by Yaron Brooks and see for yourself?


Sanction: 4, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 4, No Sanction: 0
Post 95

Saturday, May 14, 2005 - 10:41pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
LoL.  First, we didn't invade anyone.  My tax dollars and a lot of brave folks did, but I sure as shit didn't.
Interpreting my words in the most literal sense to make yourself feel smart does nothing other than to make you look like an ass. The fact that my tax dollars paid for an invasion makes me a moral participant in that invasion. Objectivism does not differentiate between soldiers fighting a war and the citizens who aid and support the soldiers fighting.

And B, I don't see how I could be more coherent.  I mean....I drew a picture.  
Your picture implies invading Iraq and Afghanistan was for the strategic importance of invading Iran. Jeremy you must have a poor understanding of the military capability of the United States. Our military can invade any country, at any time, especially Iran, without the use of World War 2 "invade Belgium first" tactics. We are capable of defeating Iran within weeks time without invading neighboring countries that border Iran. That is not strategic at all Jeremy. In fact, why invade any country if you can invade the countrys that neighbor it first, oh well in that instance, why not invade the country's neighbor's neighbor, then invade the country's neighbor, then eventually the country you originally wanted to invade. It doesn't make any sense given the realities of our military. Hence, your picture is, and still remains, incoherent.

I could have thrown in a diatribe or two about whatever I think Iraq was "really" about, but you didn't ask about that. 
What Iraq was "really" about? The incoherence continues. What do you mean what it "really" is about? The Iraq invasion was "about" something or it wasn't, not "really" about something. Try taking the word "really" out Jeremy and re-read your sentence. Means the same thing doesn't it? Do you understand why you are incoherent in your posts? Didn't you learn how to deconstruct sentences in your high school english class?

You asked what was the strategic importance of seizing and controlling most of Mesopotamia, not what I thought "our" intentions "really" were. 
I can never know what the Bush Administration's intentions really were beyond what has been told to me by the Administration. Unless you have some other information no one else is privy to, I have every reason to believe the Bush Administration advocated war with Iraq because they perceived Iraq to be a threat to our national security. They "strategically" thought it was the right thing to do in the war on terror because they perceived Iraq with WMD as a part of that war.


(Note the scare quotes.)  I pointed out that surrounding Iran--the alleged fount from which all Islamic hatred springs--has a decided strategic advantage: it scares the piss out of them.  I didn't say whether or not this was the Bush team's actual intention.  Though it would make strategic sense.  I'm not endorsing one position or another in that post.  I'm indicating a fact of reality. 
You apparently don't like endorsing anything. Unless I can call you a nihilist, you can stop the childishness and tell me what you endorse. The fact of reality is that no one could rationally explain invading Iraq was strategically important to an eventual invasion of Iran. That's just plain stupid.


?hguone tnerehoc
Such the intellectual giant! How can you stand yourself?

(Edited by John Armaos on 5/14, 10:46pm)


Post 96

Monday, May 30, 2005 - 4:21pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Whew.  I clearly overstepped my bounds. : P  Thanks for reigning me in, there.  I don't know anything about the military.  I'm lost.   What's a platoon?  Huh? What's going on?  My head hurts.  No more tactics lessons, please!  I don't know which end of the rifle spits out the bullet, and my sentences aren't deconstructurized.  Ignore my post or say something witty (sic) and save me from myself.  Pfffft.

Sanction: 4, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 4, No Sanction: 0
Post 97

Monday, May 30, 2005 - 6:03pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Sorry, let me be nice for once and enunciate exactly what I mean by way of hypothetical example.  Let's say you're the United States, say, circa 1965.  The USSR invades and conquers Mexico, then one year later strikes into the heart of Canada and seizes all the maple syrup factories along with the hockey stadiums by easily brushing aside the much-feared Canadian Mounties.  You, the United States, might just feel a bit hemmed in, no?  You might feel the pressure building, correct?  After putting so much effort into stemming the expanding Soviet empire's commie ambitions ten thousand miles away, in Korea and Indo-China, having them set up aggressive invading launching points to the direct north and south of your nation would probably make you feel a bit anxious.  The Great Satan is nigh, prodding your funny bone and poking your ribs. 

So sit the mullahs of Iran.


Sanction: 17, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 17, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 17, No Sanction: 0
Post 98

Tuesday, May 31, 2005 - 1:40amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit

Pre the 1986-1989 schism(s) I had admired Peikoff and on tape he seemed very smart and reasonable to me. I too am a big fan of his "Principles of Grammar" course. I think there was some good participation from Phil Coates in that course. Peikoff is extremely articulate and good on his feet. His Ominous Parallels did strike me as having a dogmatic tone, though that isn't too unusual for polemical tracts. And one couldn't forget all the 1968 stuff, or that Peikoff seemed to be the only disciple left standing from the original Collective.

 

But then The Passion of Ayn Rand came out, and out went all the reasonableness. From Peikoff and others there were many examples of unsavory conduct toward people like Robert Hessen, Barbara Branden, George Walsh, David Kelley, etc. Later George Reisman got the treatment. 

 

It was David Kelley's little talk before Laissez Faire's little supper club, saying liberty needs an Objectivist foundation, which in the late 80s somehow provoked an attack on David Kelley by Peter Schwartz in The Intellectual Activist, and which thus got the ball ostensibly rolling on this particular schism. But the real cause was the publication of Barbara's 1986 biography of Rand, and Kelley's coolheaded refusal to damn it as the worst thing since Critique of Pure Reason and then hire Wesley Snipes to ram a stake through its heart. Laissez Faire Books, of course, carried the biography and published a glowing review of it by the late and great Roy A. Childs Jr.

 

In any case, the official word post-Passion was that you couldn't have no truck with Laissez Faire Books and still be a rational proselytizer of the faith. Yet back in 1982 Peikoff had signed copies of his book for the very book vendor that he and his homeys were now regarding as arch-evil and not even minimally sanctionable. To reconcile the apparent contradiction, Peikoff began telling people that then-proprietor Andrea Rich had assured him in '82-83ish that the catalog would "no longer carry" the offending type of libertarian titles--Andrea Rich had made no such assurance. So, Peikoff lied. That's along with all the other lies and self-delusion rampant duing this period. So much for the virtue of honesty because you want to stay connected to reality and reality is your friend type thing. Bidinotto in Post 22 has it right. (BTW, even if Rand never sat down with Peikoff and said, "I had an affair with Nathan," I think he did know or at least suspected that she and Branden had an affair. He's not that dense.) 

 

Then came the 9/11 attacks and you know the rest.

 

I submit that it was never much of an issue whether these folks can be reasonable and personable when functioning within their comfort zones. They can give good talks, write good op-eds and books (all within certain limits, given how the ghost of Ayn Rand is looking over their shoulders and redlining their copy), hold a conversation without smoke coming out of their ears, connect A to A, etc. In his pre-Passion course "Understanding Objectivism," Peikoff even fairly openly worked to undo some of the harm of a more dogmatic approach to Objectivism. Post-Passion, though: wild relapse. Did he have motives for his actions? Sure. But he could have said "Let me go to the Bahamas for a couple weeks and think this through." He didn't. And Barbara's right. Where's the apology for the scurrilous treatment of her, or of anyone else, from that quarter? It's been twenty years now since Passion was published. Plenty of time for deep breathing.

 

And new depths are now being scraped. As we see with the publication of Valliant's cultist screed and all its dishonest logic-chopping ratiocination and pre-fabricated condemnatory conclusions, when it comes to Ayn Rand, the Brandens, Who Owns Objectivism and such-like, all the same tendencies persist and are ready to emerge at a moment's notice (as Andre Zantonavitch reports in Post 9 above). Yarron Brook was acceptable to Binswanger and Schwartz for a reason. Valliant got access to Rand's notes for a reason. One can only hope, and I think it's a reasonable hope, that as new generations come to the fore they're not going to have the same vested interest in flame-keeping for its own sake. With luck, after about 3289 A.D. or so, Rand's books will no longer be distributed with the little ARI cards.

 

Have we seen dyspepsia on both sides of the schism? Sure, people are people, factionalism is factionalism. It's not very healthy to tie your identity too closely with the "official take" of any ideological coterie, however relatively reasonable. The best thing is just to go off and do your own thing and forget about the weirdos (which is not to say one should never slap weirdo-ism upside the head). Get your daily sanction from yourself and from friends and family who haven't read Atlas Shrugged more than 87 times in a row.

(Edited by David M. Brown on 5/31, 1:48am)

(Edited by David M. Brown on 5/31, 1:51am)

(Edited by David M. Brown on 5/31, 1:54am)


Sanction: 11, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 11, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 11, No Sanction: 0
Post 99

Tuesday, May 31, 2005 - 8:58amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
David, just to add one salient detail to your chronology, and to my own account posted earlier on this thread (in Post #22):

The immediate provocation for the antagonism between Peikoff and Kelley was Kelley's refusal to disassociate himself as an "adviser" to the Objectivist newsletter On Principle after it published my glowing June 1986 review of Barbara Branden's Passion of Ayn Rand. Peikoff by this time regarded one's response to Barbara's book as a litmus test of his loyalty to Objectivism. Because of my past writings in Schwartz's publication The Intellectual Activist, Peikoff (like Schwartz) was incensed over my rave review of the book, and regarded its publication in On Principle as beyond the pale. Peikoff then pressed Kelley to sever his "adviser" status with On Principle; Kelley refused; and the rest, as they say, is history.

After that happened, Peikoff and Schwartz then publicly seized upon Kelley's earlier speech at the Laissez Faire supper club to manufacture a case of Kelley's disloyalty to Objectivism. Schwartz's subsequent anti-Kelley screed, "On Sanctioning the Sanctioners," amounted to the first public declaration of war; Kelley's brief response, "A Question of Sanction," joined the battle. Then followed Peikoff's "Fact and Value," and finally, Kelley's monograph-length reply, Truth and Toleration  (now The Contested Legacy of Ayn Rand).

And so here we are.


Post to this threadBack one pagePage 0Page 1Page 2Page 3Page 4Page 5Page 6Forward one pageLast Page


User ID Password or create a free account.