Reply to: Paradise Lost **potential mini spoiler if you intend to read Atlas Shrugged**

[pjclarke]

He is stuck in some archaic view of the world, where appeals to authority actually mean something - must be a takeaway from the AGW doomsday cult.

A cult that has published tens of thousands of studies. I'd be grateful if you could point out any errors of science, fact or logic in my posts....

[pjclarke]

This guy argues fiercely as if he understands what he's talking about, but...

He doesn't understand what morality is - he just blindly asserts that something is or isn't virtuous as if morality is nothing more than convention, subject to whatever is in vogue at the time.

He doesn't understand what selfishness or greed is. He mistakes selflessness for selfishness, and mistakes selfishness for greed.

He mistakes collective conformity for individual rationality.

He mistakes egoism for egotism, obligation for love, and consensus for reality.

He mistakes the avoidance of death, for living.

He mistakes appeals to authority for reasoned debate.


You can't make him see his mistakes, because to think like a man, rather than to go with the flow like an animal, is a choice only he can make. The best that you can do is to highlight his ignorance for others to learn from.

Blah blah. Whatever. More evidence-free assertions; responses slavishly copied from the High Priestess herself. 'How to deal with Unbelievers'. I guess she never got round to writing 'How not to sound like a condescending asshole'.

Do let us know when your little personality cult makes the intellectual bigtime.

[pjclarke]

The other approach is to find some interesting ideas, as there are in Marx, Engels and many other political philosophers. But dogmatic belief in the ideas, and in particular the view that you know an objective truth that others reject is folly.

Sure is. Unfortunately for us, libertarian New Right are in the ascendent, the economic argument lost, they remain inexplicable successful politically.

[Zero Liability]

P

He is stuck in some archaic view of the world, where appeals to authority actually mean something - must be a takeaway from the AGW doomsday cult.

[Old Greg]

Bowing out of this now. I really can't be bothered to discuss something with someone who is only able to quote other people's opinions as they haven't bothered gaining the necessary knowledge to develop their own. Not only that but you have the audacity to criticise those who do have an understanding because they have actually read the book. May I suggest you try Anthem - it was another of her works and is around 100 pages so you may actually get through it - perhaps then we could have a slightly more informed discussion.

You do realise, Lisa, that SO thinks you are EVIL because you support a degree of taxation, which is theft by threat of violence?

[SpontaneousOrder]

Which is something that I and I suspect most would agree with. But then she has to go and twist the definition of the word such that the 'moral' thing to do is to consider how the charitable giving will benefit the donor's happiness:-.



So the next time you approached by a volunteer in the High street shaking a tin, according to Rand your proper response should be 'what's in it for me?'.Which is something that I and I suspect most would not agree with. This, I think, is my problem with Rand and her 'philosophy' (BTW it is not a philosophy at all, it is a skewed belief system at best, when my interest was first piqued, I went to the literature; The Oxford Companion to Philosophy does not deem her or her ideas worthy of mention nor does The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy. I found this in the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

)

she has elevated selfishness to the position of a moral virtue, backed up with several tens of thousands of words of superficially compelling but ultimately empty assertions. When you have to redefine words such as altruism and charity into almost their opposites it is a sign you've gone wrong.

Of course she is popular, there is no shortage of selfish people in the world and Rand gives them a pseudo-intellectual rationale for their self-interest, indeed some seem to read Rand at an early age and stop thinking, believing they have found The Answer. Others grow up.

You'll have no luck, Lisa.

This guy argues fiercely as if he understands what he's talking about, but...

He doesn't understand what morality is - he just blindly asserts that something is or isn't virtuous as if morality is nothing more than convention, subject to whatever is in vogue at the time.

He doesn't understand what selfishness or greed is. He mistakes selflessness for selfishness, and mistakes selfishness for greed.

He mistakes collective conformity for individual rationality.

He mistakes egoism for egotism, obligation for love, and consensus for reality.

He mistakes the avoidance of death, for living.

He mistakes appeals to authority for reasoned debate.


You can't make him see his mistakes, because to think like a man, rather than to go with the flow like an animal, is a choice only he can make. The best that you can do is to highlight his ignorance for others to learn from.

[LisaContractorUmbrella]

Which is something that I and I suspect most would agree with. But then she has to go and twist the definition of the word such that the 'moral' thing to do is to consider how the charitable giving will benefit the donor's happiness:-.



So the next time you approached by a volunteer in the High street shaking a tin, according to Rand your proper response should be 'what's in it for me?'.Which is something that I and I suspect most would not agree with. This, I think, is my problem with Rand and her 'philosophy' (BTW it is not a philosophy at all, it is a skewed belief system at best, when my interest was first piqued, I went to the literature; The Oxford Companion to Philosophy does not deem her or her ideas worthy of mention nor does The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy. I found this in the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

)

she has elevated selfishness to the position of a moral virtue, backed up with several tens of thousands of words of superficially compelling but ultimately empty assertions. When you have to redefine words such as altruism and charity into almost their opposites it is a sign you've gone wrong.

Of course she is popular, there is no shortage of selfish people in the world and Rand gives them a pseudo-intellectual rationale for their self-interest, indeed some seem to read Rand at an early age and stop thinking, believing they have found The Answer. Others grow up.

Bowing out of this now. I really can't be bothered to discuss something with someone who is only able to quote other people's opinions as they haven't bothered gaining the necessary knowledge to develop their own. Not only that but you have the audacity to criticise those who do have an understanding because they have actually read the book. May I suggest you try Anthem - it was another of her works and is around 100 pages so you may actually get through it - perhaps then we could have a slightly more informed discussion.

[Old Greg]

Which is something that I and I suspect most would agree with. But then she has to go and twist the definition of the word such that the 'moral' thing to do is to consider how the charitable giving will benefit the donor's happiness:-.



So the next time you approached by a volunteer in the High street shaking a tin, according to Rand your proper response should be 'what's in it for me?'.Which is something that I and I suspect most would not agree with. This, I think, is my problem with Rand and her 'philosophy' (BTW it is not a philosophy at all, it is a skewed belief system at best, when my interest was first piqued, I went to the literature; The Oxford Companion to Philosophy does not deem her or her ideas worthy of mention nor does The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy. I found this in the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

)

she has elevated selfishness to the position of a moral virtue, backed up with several tens of thousands of words of superficially compelling but ultimately empty assertions. When you have to redefine words such as altruism and charity into almost their opposites it is a sign you've gone wrong.

Of course she is popular, there is no shortage of selfish people in the world and Rand gives them a pseudo-intellectual rationale for their self-interest, indeed some seem to read Rand at an early age and stop thinking, believing they have found The Answer. Others grow up.

The other approach is to find some interesting ideas, as there are in Marx, Engels and many other political philosophers. But dogmatic belief in the ideas, and in particular the view that you know an objective truth that others reject is folly.

[pjclarke]

What she is saying is that true charity comes from a desire to help and not an enforced moral obligation - she's not saying that charity is wrong

Which is something that I and I suspect most would agree with. But then she has to go and twist the definition of the word such that the 'moral' thing to do is to consider how the charitable giving will benefit the donor's happiness:-.

'The proper method of judging when or whether one should help another person is by reference to one’s own rational self-interest and one’s own hierarchy of values: the time, money or effort one gives or the risk one takes should be proportionate to the value of the person in relation to one’s own happiness.'

So the next time you approached by a volunteer in the High street shaking a tin, according to Rand your proper response should be 'what's in it for me?'.Which is something that I and I suspect most would not agree with. This, I think, is my problem with Rand and her 'philosophy' (BTW it is not a philosophy at all, it is a skewed belief system at best, when my interest was first piqued, I went to the literature; The Oxford Companion to Philosophy does not deem her or her ideas worthy of mention nor does The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy. I found this in the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

'The influence of Rand's ideas was strongest among college students in the USA but attracted little attention from academic philosophers. Her outspoken defense of capitalism in works like Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal (1967), and her characterization of her position as a defence of the 'virtue of selfishness' in her essay collection of the same title published in 1964, also brought notoriety, but kept her out of the intellectual mainstream.'

)

she has elevated selfishness to the position of a moral virtue, backed up with several tens of thousands of words of superficially compelling but ultimately empty assertions. When you have to redefine words such as altruism and charity into almost their opposites it is a sign you've gone wrong.

Of course she is popular, there is no shortage of selfish people in the world and Rand gives them a pseudo-intellectual rationale for their self-interest, indeed some seem to read Rand at an early age and stop thinking, believing they have found The Answer. Others grow up.

[SpontaneousOrder]

Not saying that is right, infact that' probably what is wrong.

Bingo.

The Myth that Laissez Faire Is Responsible for Our Present Crisis - George Reisman - Mises Daily

[ZARDOZ]

Even if that were true, it's the socialising of the losses that's the problem. You do dumb stuff - you fail. That is capitalism. When business fail for doing dumb stuff, then people try their hardest not to do dumb stuff.
All state regulation bundled with state protectionism does is to encourage people to try as much dumb stuff as they can legally get away with.

It's akin to suggesting that if a mother doesn't set rules to force her live-in grown up son to clean his room, he'll end up living in squalor.
What's far more likely to cause him to make a mess is the fact that mum cleans up his room for him when he does.

Without rules to a system you have chaos. The effect was so big with the financial crisis that starting again was unthinkable. The banking organisations intertwined their investment and retail banking so heavily that it would have wiped out almost everything in what equated to no more than an elaborate Ponzi scheme. Having a savings account, shouldn't really come with high expectations of risk but it turned out it did. We shouldn't have to socialise the debt I agree, which is why we need to make sure it can't happen like that again.

The Government does not work independently of the private sector, trying to hamper it. The decisions being made are often heavily influenced by lobbying from the big players in said sectors. Not saying that is right, infact that' probably what is wrong.

[Old Greg]

I can't help feeling that's a loaded question OG but the answer would be very little

Of course it's a loaded question.

[LisaContractorUmbrella]

How much of the Koran have you read, Lisa?

I can't help feeling that's a loaded question OG but the answer would be very little

[Old Greg]

The book is over 1100 pages - reading 70 pages does not give you a realistic insight into the philosophy

How much of the Koran have you read, Lisa?

[LisaContractorUmbrella]

Remind me of one? Oh, I concede you're better than I at playground insults: 'brain damaged;, 'slime', 'a numpty', 'rotter' . Some might feel this is rather more indicative of a ' landed fish desperately twitching and flapping ', I could not possibly comment.

And we await a cogent apology for the parody video that started the thread. Wot it was real?

Its a lie to say I have not read the book, I did not finish it, but the 'point' was obvious by Page 60 and I reckoned I could get the same effect as reading the last 700 pages by closing it and banging myself over the head for two hours, I saw enough of the prolix hectoring lectures, shrill tone, risible assertions, turgid style, lack of character development, strained un-natural dialogue and implausible plot to conclude that there were more deserving tomes on my to-read list.

Upthread I challenged you to support the opinion that the evidence shows that 'public expenditure on healthcare makes it more expensive'



I also pointed out that the assertion that because I demur from that proposition that charity donors need to assess 'the value of the person in relation to one’s own happiness.' before helping someone, why then I must treat random strangers as I treat my son is a non sequiteur (does not follow). Random strangers do benefit, in a small way, from my charity, without me paying for their University fees. Numpty.

Then there's the purile debating tactic of posing a question to which we both know the answer in the hope of framing the debate and making, yet again the same sledgehammer metaphor of taxes as theft.

No, I don't think I'll take any lessons in logic from this particular source, thank you.

The book is over 1100 pages - reading 70 pages does not give you a realistic insight into the philosophy