Why I Am Not an Objectivist, 5: Ethics
Sam Cantrell
(Michael Huemer) wrote:
> 5. ETHICS
>
> 5.1. THE VALUE OF LIFE
>
> I said earlier that what is wrong with Rand's attempted derivation
> of ethics is that it requires the evaluative presupposition that
> life is good, which has not been and cannot be inferred purely from
> observations. Some Objectivists say that life actually isn't good,
> but everything which promotes life is good. I think this (i.e. the
> first part of that claim) is obviously false, besides being a
> distortion of Rand's views, but not to press that--this view has
> the same problem as all attempts to bridge the is/ought gap, i.e.,
> it just raises the question, how do we know that what promotes life
> is good?
Because without life, there is noexistance for humans! Life/death are not
just two states for people. If you are dead, there can be no value
judgements, no good or bad. One is not "better" than the other, it's
either life or nothing. Life is a precondition for all happiness (and
sadness). This is like a debate over wether free-will exists or not.
--
Sam Cantrell
cant...@netcom.com
Tony Donadio
> >> of ethics is that it requires the evaluative presupposition that
> >> life is good, which has not been and cannot be inferred purely from
> >> observations.
If you think this, then you don't understand Rand's argument. To say
that something is good (ie, a value) IS to say that it bears a positive
relation to a being's life.
This objection essentially treats "value" or ("good") as the more
fundamental concept, to which life has to be reduced, and criticizes
Rand for not doing so. This gets Rand's argument backwards. Her
whole theory rests on the identification that _life_ is the more
fundamental concept, to which *value* must be reduced. See her
article in _The Virtue of Selfishness_ for details.
Tony Donadio
Jim Miller
cant...@netcom.com (Sam Cantrell) wrote:
>In article <4hqqm2$o...@niflheim.rutgers.edu>, o...@niflheim.rutgers.edu
>(Michael Huemer) wrote:
>> I said earlier that what is wrong with Rand's attempted derivation
>> of ethics is that it requires the evaluative presupposition that
>> life is good, which has not been and cannot be inferred purely from
>> observations. Some Objectivists say that life actually isn't good,
>> but everything which promotes life is good. I think this (i.e. the
>> first part of that claim) is obviously false, besides being a
>> distortion of Rand's views, but not to press that--this view has
>> the same problem as all attempts to bridge the is/ought gap, i.e.,
>> it just raises the question, how do we know that what promotes life
>> is good?
>
>Because without life, there is noexistance for humans! Life/death are not
>just two states for people. If you are dead, there can be no value
>judgements, no good or bad. One is not "better" than the other, it's
>either life or nothing. Life is a precondition for all happiness (and
>sadness). This is like a debate over wether free-will exists or not.
How so? Debates over free will are valid, illuminating, and pertinent.
If you mean that both of these ideas *seem* so obvious that they are often
taken for granted, perhaps you are right.
This one isn't as cut-and-dry as Rand would like you to believe, either --
just ask one of Dr. Kevorkian's clients (grim joke not intended).
-Jim
--
| Jim Miller | "The whole problem with the world is that|
| ji...@netcom.com |fools and fanatics are always so certain of|
| j...@umcc.umich.edu |themselves, but wiser people are so full of|
|http://www.umcc.umich.edu/~jgm/ |doubts." -- Bertrand Russell |
Jerry Henderson
You must choose to live or not to live. That is the basic question. If
one chooses not to live then they don't have to do anything but just die.
Death doesn't require any actions it just requires that someone not do
anything. Don't eat, don't sleep, don't even breath, just die. If one
tries to pursue any value than when has chosen to live.
Lance Neustaeter
On 13-Mar-96 11:10:45, Jerry Henderson KXG...@prodigy.com wrote:
> Troy,
> You must choose to live or not to live. That is the basic question.
The basic question is "To focus or not". All other choices are derivatives
thereof. There can be only one fundamental, primary choice.
Lance
--
Geneticist#1: What do you get when you cross a road with a chicken?
Geneticist#2: To the other side.
Michael Huemer
>>In article <4hqqm2$o...@niflheim.rutgers.edu>, o...@niflheim.rutgers.edu
>>(Michael Huemer) wrote:
>>> distortion of Rand's views, but not to press that--this view has
>>> the same problem as all attempts to bridge the is/ought gap, i.e.,
>>> it just raises the question, how do we know that what promotes life
>>> is good?
>>
>>Because without life, there is noexistance for humans! Life/death are not
>>just two states for people. If you are dead, there can be no value
>>judgements, no good or bad.
Okay, so you propose the following argument?:
(1) Unless we are alive, we cannot judge something to be good.
(2) Therefore, life is good.
I'm sorry, but I don't follow this at all. It looks like a total non
sequitur to me. You might just as well say, if the above is valid:
(3) Unless we are alive, we cannot judge something to be bad.
(4) Therefore, life is bad.
Of course, if we were dead, we could not JUDGE that state to be either
good or bad -- just as we could not judge that there are 9 planets in
the solar system, or that the sky is blue. But that doesn't show that
the existence of 9 planets depends on life, and it also doesn't show
that life is blue.
>> One is not "better" than the other, it's
>>either life or nothing.
Yes to the second part, but why does this mean that being alive is
good?
Keep in mind that what I'm asking for is a theoretical explanation
of HOW we know this -- I am not doubting that it's true. To make it
easier, answer this:
(1) Do we know that life is good?
(2) Is this knowledge empirical or a priori?
(3) Is it based on inference, or is it direct knowledge?
This corresponds to my argument for the a prioricity of ethics - I
pointed out that the knowledge that life is good is not a sense
perception, that it isn't inferred from sense perceptions, and
therefore it must be a priori.
What you've said above, if it were valid, would appear to be an a
priori argument that life is good. To be a good Objectivist, you need
to explain what *observations* validate the claim that life is good.
>> Life is a precondition for all happiness (and
>>sadness).
Of course, but again, why does that mean it's good? Mightn't that
just as well mean that it's bad? In order to conclude from this that
life is good, you would need the suppressed premise that happiness and
sadness are good.
>> This is like a debate over wether free-will exists or not.
No, again, I'm not trying to debate *whether* life is good or not.
I'm interested in debating *how* we have this knowledge - in
particular, has it been validly deduced from empirical facts?
--
^-----^
Michael Huemer <o...@rci.rutgers.edu> / O O \
Rutgers Univ. (Philosophy Dept.) | V |
\ /
Michael Huemer
...
>If you think this, then you don't understand Rand's argument. To say
>that something is good (ie, a value) IS to say that it bears a positive
>relation to a being's life.
>fundamental concept, to which *value* must be reduced. See her
>article in _The Virtue of Selfishness_ for details.
I presume you're referring to "The Objectivist Ethics," which I was
responding to. I do not see any need to read it again. I discussed
at a fair length the idea of trying to define "good" as that which
furthers life, and thereby validating the principle that whatever
furthers life is good. To remind you, briefly, there were the
objections
(1) that if valid, this would apparently be a way of 'validating' any
ethical system whatever
(2) that if you take the Objectivist theory of meaning, then the claim
that you reproduce above, "to say that something is good IS to say
that it bears a positive relation to a being's life," like any claim
about meanings, requires proof, and in particular, empirical evidence
to justify it. You cannot just assert it.
(3) if you take my theory of meaning, on the other hand, where the
meanings of words can be known by direct introspection, then your
claim is false, and it is refuted by Moore's Open Question Argument.
Troy Waite
>> >> I said earlier that what is wrong with Rand's attempted derivation
>> >> of ethics is that it requires the evaluative presupposition that
>> >> life is good, which has not been and cannot be inferred purely from
>> >> observations.
>If you think this, then you don't understand Rand's argument. To say
>that something is good (ie, a value) IS to say that it bears a positive
>relation to a being's life.
You are right on. a being's life really does bear a positive
(I would have used necessary) relation to a being's life. There
is nothing more persuasive than a tautology.
Then the matter is complicated by adding the proviso that
the life of man qua man is the good. Man qua man. This makes
the assumption that the quality of life is related to a human's
rationality. To be sure, in an adverse environment a human must
keep his wits about him to stay alive, but this begs the
question about the goodness of staying alive.
Hence one must be rational to stay alive. But why stay alive?
To be rational, of course!
One can tend to his own welfare and
physical survival or not. If staying alive as a human is
a good then it is not an imperative good since the matter of
continuing to live is an option. Do we say that one is
evil because he did not wish to go on? Not at all. The most
one can say is that under the same (apparent) circumstance
he would have chosen to go on. If , on the other hand, we have
no choice about trying to stay alive, our vitality drives us
on, then we are no longer volitional. Take your choice.
Rand's grounding of ethics is the weakest part of her philosophical
system. There is nothing about it that breaths the hot breath
of necessity, comparable to the axiom: Existance exists. That one
is irrefutable (allowing self refernce).
To be or not to be that *is* the question.
Tony Donadio
: >that something is good (ie, a value) IS to say that it bears a positive
: >relation to a being's life.
: >fundamental concept, to which *value* must be reduced. See her
: >article in _The Virtue of Selfishness_ for details.
: I presume you're referring to "The Objectivist Ethics," which I was
: responding to. I do not see any need to read it again. I discussed
: at a fair length the idea of trying to define "good" as that which
: furthers life, and thereby validating the principle that whatever
: furthers life is good. To remind you, briefly, there were the
: objections
: (1) that if valid, this would apparently be a way of 'validating' any
: ethical system whatever
I was not following the thread at the time, but I do not see how this
could possibly follow.
: (2) that if you take the Objectivist theory of meaning, then the claim
: that you reproduce above, "to say that something is good IS to say
: that it bears a positive relation to a being's life," like any claim
: about meanings, requires proof, and in particular, empirical evidence
: to justify it. You cannot just assert it.
No, and Rand does not "just assert it." Her validation essentially is to
examine the hierarchical and logical roots of the concept "value." This
is explained in The Objectivist Ethics, as well as in Galt's speech.
: (3) if you take my theory of meaning, on the other hand, where the
: meanings of words can be known by direct introspection, then your
: claim is false, and it is refuted by Moore's Open Question Argument.
I am not familiar with the poster's personal theory of meaning. As a
general remark, however, meaning cannot be known by "introspection" -- if
that means focus on the subject, and not the object, of cognition. It is
known precisely by *extrospection* -- ie, focus on the object, not the
subject, of cognition. This is how concepts are formed in the first
place.
--
Tony * Money is the material shape of the principle that men who wish
Donadio * to deal with one another must deal by trade and give value for
* value. - Francisco D'Anconia, in ATLAS SHRUGGED, by Ayn Rand
David Friedman
(Jerry Henderson) wrote:
...
> You must choose to live or not to live. That is the basic question.
...
> If one
> tries to pursue any value than when has chosen to live.
I think I understand this part of the Objectivist argument, and I think it
is clearly wrong. You are talking as though the only alternatives are
"chose to live" and "chose to die." But suppose my value is spreading the
ideas of liberty. I wish to live in order to achieve that value. I happen
to be faced with three alternatives.
1. Take the action that makes me most likely to continue to live ("choose
to live"). That means not trying to spread liberty, for fear some opponent
of liberty will kill me.
2. Take actions which give me a substantial but lower chance of continuing
to live, while achieving my goal.
3. Choose to die.
I choose option 2. I am neither "choosing to die" nor "choosing to live."
I am choosing to spread liberty, and to live only to the extent that
living is a means to that end. So you cannot deduce how I ought to behave
from answering the question "what actions best serve my life." So "live or
die" is not really such a fundamental choice after all--there are lots of
alternatives which involve different probabilities of those two outcomes,
and lots of reasons other than life relevant to choosing among them.
David Friedman
David Friedman
Will Wilkinson <wwi...@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu> wrote:
> Yes. It is rather easy to deduce how you ought to behave. Since your
> project is the spread of liberty, you should pursue this, so that you have
> an internal motive to live. Further, satisfied projects cause greater
> happiness, which futher distances one from self-nihilating tendencies.
But in some situations, the best way of pursuing my goal might
substantially lower my chance of surviving. Certainly it is possible that
pursuing my goal will, via the psychological mechanisms you suggest,
maximize my chance of biological survival--but there is no logical reason
why it must happen. So I am pursuing the goal and not pursuing life--nor
death. I am neither adopting the policy that maximizes, nor the policy
that minimizes, my odds of survival.
David Friedman
Thomas Clarke
> >>Because without life, there is noexistance for humans! Life/death are not
> >>just two states for people. If you are dead, there can be no value
> >>judgements, no good or bad.
> Of course, if we were dead, we could not JUDGE that state to be either
> good or bad -- just as we could not judge that there are 9 planets in
> the solar system, or that the sky is blue. But that doesn't show that
> the existence of 9 planets depends on life, and it also doesn't show
> that life is blue.
{Excuse me if I have parsed the attributions wrongly}
I know that Objectivists don't seem to much like quantum mechanics
and its seeming necessity for subjective observation, but I think
it may throw some light on the above. [Somewhere in AS Rand has
one of the characters (the old physicist?, I'm terrible with names)
saying something that makes modern physics sound absurd]
The following interpretation can be given to modern cosmology in
the light of quantum mechanics. There was a big bang, a singular
event, that started the universe. [Actually Hawking says that this
is the wrong way to look at it, the big bang was not an event, but
just a region where the laws of physics get funny.]
Since the big bang the wave function of the universe has been
changing according to the laws of physics.
The current wave function, according to quantum mechanics,
would be a supperpositin of all possibilites that agree with the laws
of physics and with the initial conditions. The wave function would
thus contain part of a 9 planet solar system, part of an 8, a 7 , a 6, a 10,
a ... planet solar system.
BUT ... according to quantum mechanics when the wave function is
observed (what that means is subject to current debate), only one
of the possibilities is observed. When you look at the wavefunction
of the universe you see only one of the possibilities.
In our case we see 9 planets. But before we looked there was only
a superposition of the possibilities of any number of planets.
Thus in some sense, physics, quantum mechanics seems to be saying
that we created or selected the content of the universe by looking,
by observing. Existence, specific existence anyway, may thus
depend of life, on consicousness according to physics.
The sky may inevitably be blue, however. For life to exist certain
chemical conditions have to obtain - for carbon life anyway, it is
unknown if there can be any other king. These conitions probably
(again a speculation) can only occur on a planet much like the earth
about the right distance from a star like the sun (hotter star too much
ultraviolet, cooler star too little for chemical synthesis).
Thus the sky will be blue if there is life on the planet so that
only the components of the universal wave function that correspond to
blue sky can be observed.
Philosophical speculations along these lines fall under the term
"anthropic principle". The universe is the way it is because if
it were any other way then we would not be here to observe it and it
is an empirical fact that we are here to observe the universe.
Tom Clarke
Will Wilkinson
On Thu, 14 Mar 1996, David Friedman wrote:
>
> I think I understand this part of the Objectivist argument, and I think it
> is clearly wrong. You are talking as though the only alternatives are
> "chose to live" and "chose to die." But suppose my value is spreading the
> ideas of liberty. I wish to live in order to achieve that value. I happen
> to be faced with three alternatives.
This is an area of gross misunderstanding, which is really too bad. I
take the more sophisticated Objectivist argument to be that the choice to
live is implied in any having any goal. Life is not chosen just for its
own sake, but because there are projects that persons want satisfied. And
having projects is just what it is to have a *human* life. Since project
pursuit (human life) is the reason biological life is chosen, if these
pursuits are denied (either by self or other)one's chances at having a
fully human life is denied and therefore one's motive for biological life
is negated and thereby endangered from within.
So, the choice to pursue no project, or choices counter to such
project pursuits (such as habitual evasion) are *implicitly* choices
against life, since it is the pursuit of these projects that gives rise
to the desire and will to live. Hence the suicidal ennui of young adults
who have yet to undertake a project; or the suicidal despair of young
homosexuals who feel that the major life-project of romantic and sexual
self-expression is denied to them.
So, really, the choice to merely survive biologically is either irrational
or self-contradictory. If I undertake my preservation with the greatest
fervor, I will eat healthily and work out, take no risks--and doing these
things will become projects in and of themselves and I will come to value
them independently of the purported end. Paradoxically, I will come to
feel that I value biological life because it allows me to pursue those
goals, which are important to me becasue they help me pursue biological
life--that is, my sole end will become instrumental to the ends that are
supposed to be, but in psychological reality are not, instrumental. I
really will to live *so that* I can exercise and eat right and avoid risks.
It turns out then that in logical, not psychological, order I must first
choose to live. But it also turns out that, psychologically, the precondition
for wanting to live is having a project. So if one chooses to live, one
must choose a project. Since one already wants to pursue projects, one
must choose to live by actually having those projects.
If one does not already want to pursue any projects (which I think can
happen in cases of horrible childhoods where only pain is known), then one
doesn't really want to live and probably will commit suicide, opting out
of morality altogether. (You could also say that one's project is non-life
and that suicide, paradoxically, is then constitutive of perfect
actualization).
> I choose option 2. I am neither "choosing to die" nor "choosing to live."
> I am choosing to spread liberty, and to live only to the extent that
> living is a means to that end. So you cannot deduce how I ought to behave
> from answering the question "what actions best serve my life." So "live or
> die" is not really such a fundamental choice after all--there are lots of
> alternatives which involve different probabilities of those two outcomes,
> and lots of reasons other than life relevant to choosing among them.
Yes. It is rather easy to deduce how you ought to behave. Since your
project is the spread of liberty, you should pursue this, so that you have
an internal motive to live. Further, satisfied projects cause greater
happiness, which futher distances one from self-nihilating tendencies. So
you morally ought to develop habits of character helpful to your end.
Such habits include a high level of attentive focus; productivity; a
feeling of efficacy and worth extending from the mastery of certain
relevant arts and sciences (perhaps writing, rhetoric, economics,
philosophy; etc.) To the extent that you fail, from faults of your own, to
attain these character traits, then you are jeopardizing the success of
the project that gives you a reason to live, thereby jeopardizing your
very life. Since your life is the pre-condition for that which you most
value, you are acting your own deeply vested interest--that is, you are
acting imorally.
- Will Wilkinson
Jimmy Wales
follow these threads closely. I do hope that my comments here are
helpful, and that they do not repeat to closely what anyone else has said.
>Okay, so you propose the following argument?:
>
> (1) Unless we are alive, we cannot judge something to be good.
> (2) Therefore, life is good.
It is important to keep clear the difference between something *being*
good, and our *judging* it so. This is particularly true with an
objective theory of value such as Rands, in which there is a tight
connection between the individual's life and the meaning of evaluative
concepts.
What we want to understand here is the concept of "value." As Rand
points out, asking questions about *what* is good or bad (even life) is
premature before we understand what it *means* for something to be good
or bad. Only when we understand the grounds a preconditions of value
can we really understand value.
So we have to ask ourselves: what are the facts of reality that give rise
to the concept "good"? To what _in reality_ does this concept refer?
Is there any cognitive purpose for this concept? Do we need it, and if
so, why?
Rand identifies three broad facts about humans that give rise to concepts
of moral value. First, humans are living beings, which is the essential
fact that gives rise to concepts of value in the first place. Non-living
entities can not engage in valuing, nothing is of value to a rock.
Second, humans are volitional. We have the real capacity to _choose_
among various courses of action open to us. This is the fact that makes
moral values possible. And finally, we are conceptual, fallible beings.
So when we exercise our capacity to _choose_, we also have the capacity to
choose wrongly, to make mistakes. We need some standards, then, by which
to make our choices.
If you take away any of these foundational concepts, then the very idea of
_moral value_ becomes quite literally unintelligible. These are the facts
in reality to which _all_ moral concepts _refer_, in one way or another.
Rand phrases it this way, with respect to the central concept: "It is
only the concept 'life' that makes the concept 'value' possible."
(In _The Objectivist Ethics_.)
>...being alive is
>good?
> Keep in mind that what I'm asking for is a theoretical explanation
>of HOW we know this -- I am not doubting that it's true.
If anything is good, then life is. For without life, nothing has any
value at all. (Try to turn this formulation around the way you did
above, and you'll see the absurdity: "If anything is bad, then life is.
For without life, nothing has any value at all." But "no value at all"
is meant literally -- the very concept of value is meaningless apart
from life.)
One thing I haven't focussed on in this presentation is that any question
of value presupposes and answer to the questions: to whom and for what?
This cuts off at the roots any intrinsicist attempt to divorce life and
value by equivocation.
>(1) Do we know that life is good?
Yes.
>(2) Is this knowledge empirical or a priori?
All knowledge is empirical, in the sense of either being direct awareness
of reality, or inference using logic, based on direct awareness of reality.
I know you don't accept this, and I don't expect to change your mind in
this post.
I do commend you for realizing, if you do, that your critique of the
Objectivist ethics is directly and fundamentally related to your own
epistemological views.
>(3) Is it based on inference, or is it direct knowledge?
Both! You are aware of the goodness of life in a couple of ways. First,
you have just read my presentation of Rand's argument, so you have grasped
the fact that without life, no value is possible. But more fundamentally,
you are directly aware of your own emotional reactions. Happiness is the
concomitant of life lived well. And, to the extent that you live your
life well, you are happy. This the the emotional _purpose_ of morality.
--Jimbo
Michael Huemer
>You must choose to live or not to live. That is the basic question. If
>one chooses not to live then they don't have to do anything but just die.
>Death doesn't require any actions it just requires that someone not do
>anything. Don't eat, don't sleep, don't even breath, just die. If one
>tries to pursue any value than when has chosen to live.
None of which answers *my* question: How do you know that life is
good? The fact that you have chosen something does not prove it good.
Rather, presumably you choose to continue living *because* you think
life is good. Fine. Now tell us something about why you think that.
The fact that you wouldn't need to take any positive action if you
wanted to die does not prove that life is good. That's another non
sequitur.
My challenge: Produce an inference having the following
characteristics:
(1) It's valid (the conclusion logically follows from the premises).
(2) Every premise is a direct observation.
(3) The conclusion says "life is good" or "what promotes life is good"
or something of that nature.
Is there such an inference?
Michael Huemer
(me:)
>: (1) that if valid, this would apparently be a way of 'validating' any
>: ethical system whatever
>
>I was not following the thread at the time, but I do not see how this
>could possibly follow.
I realize the essay I posted was very long, so people probably haven't
had time to read all of it. See sections 5.1 and 5.2 for the present point.
>: (2) that if you take the Objectivist theory of meaning, then the claim
>: that you reproduce above, "to say that something is good IS to say
>: that it bears a positive relation to a being's life," like any claim
>: about meanings, requires proof, and in particular, empirical evidence
>: to justify it. You cannot just assert it.
>
>No, and Rand does not "just assert it." Her validation essentially is to
>examine the hierarchical and logical roots of the concept "value." This
>is explained in The Objectivist Ethics, as well as in Galt's speech.
I disagree. I have read "The Objectivist Ethics" more than once, and
Galt's speech. There is no PROOF of the principle in question. It IS
just asserted. If you think that there is an *argument* for it
contained in either of those places, perhaps you could tell me what
the premises of that argument are, and the intermediary steps. If you
do so, please try to formalize it as much as possible (i.e., something
like a syllogism, though not necessarily exactly a syllogism).
Rand says that living things face an alternative: they can either
continue to live, or not. Then she says that living requires action.
Then she says that whatever serves life is good. That is a non
sequitur. The two premises are true. But there has been no proof
that it is better to continue to live.
>: (3) if you take my theory of meaning, on the other hand, where the
>: meanings of words can be known by direct introspection, then your
>: claim is false, and it is refuted by Moore's Open Question Argument.
>
>I am not familiar with the poster's personal theory of meaning.
See section 1 of "Why I Am Not an Objectivist," previously posted.
>As a
>general remark, however, meaning cannot be known by "introspection" -- if
>that means focus on the subject, and not the object, of cognition.
Sometimes the object of cognition is itself something existing in the
mind. That is introspection. For example, you can become aware of
your own emotions. All of psychology is about this kind of thing.
In my view, 'meanings are in the head' -- the meaning of a word is the
idea that it expresses. See section 1, again.
Michael Huemer
>In article <4i7qe7$e...@niflheim.rutgers.edu> o...@niflheim.rutgers.edu (Michael
>Huemer) writes:
...
>> Of course, if we were dead, we could not JUDGE that state to be either
>> good or bad -- just as we could not judge that there are 9 planets in
>> the solar system, or that the sky is blue. But that doesn't show that
>> the existence of 9 planets depends on life, and it also doesn't show
>> that life is blue.
>The current wave function, according to quantum mechanics,
>would be a supperpositin of all possibilites that agree with the laws
>of physics and with the initial conditions. The wave function would
>thus contain part of a 9 planet solar system, part of an 8, a 7 , a 6, a 10,
>a ... planet solar system.
...
>In our case we see 9 planets. But before we looked there was only
>a superposition of the possibilities of any number of planets.
>Thus in some sense, physics, quantum mechanics seems to be saying
>that we created or selected the content of the universe by looking,
>by observing. Existence, specific existence anyway, may thus
>depend of life, on consicousness according to physics.
Look at your two statements above. Do you see the problem? If the
universe was evolving according to the Schrodinger equation, it is
almost impossible that it would be in an eigenstate of the *existence
of observers*. In other words, if what you said in the first
quotation is true, the universe should only have gotten to a
*superposition* of a state in which observers exist and a whole bunch
of states in which observers (living things) don't exist. Since the
observer doesn't *really* exist, there is no one around to observe the
universe and to collapse the wave function.
In order to make us, living things, really exist, you'd need a special
observer to observe us, to collapse the wave function from the
superposition of states in which there are no living things and states
in which there are living things.
frank forman
>one chooses not to live then they don't have to do anything but just die.
>Death doesn't require any actions it just requires that someone not do
>anything. Don't eat, don't sleep, don't even breath, just die. If one
>tries to pursue any value than when has chosen to live.
All right, and I have it on an even higher authority, to wit:
For the liuing know that they shall die:
but the dead know not any thing, neither
*haue* they any more a reward, for the
memorie of them is forgotten.
Also their loue, and their hatred; and
their enuy is now perished; neither
*haue* they any more a portion for euer
in any thing that is done vnder the Sunne.
(Ecclesiastes IX:5-6, 1611 spelling)
This is all very nice to know, but what does it tell me about how I
should live my life, beyond taking the minimla steps necessary to keep on
living?
Jeff
>KXG...@prodigy.com (Jerry Henderson) writes:
>>You must choose to live or not to live. That is the basic question. If
>>one chooses not to live then they don't have to do anything but just die.
>>Death doesn't require any actions it just requires that someone not do
>>anything. Don't eat, don't sleep, don't even breath, just die. If one
>>tries to pursue any value than when has chosen to live.
>None of which answers *my* question: How do you know that life is
>good? The fact that you have chosen something does not prove it good.
>Rather, presumably you choose to continue living *because* you think
>life is good. Fine. Now tell us something about why you think that.
>The fact that you wouldn't need to take any positive action if you
>wanted to die does not prove that life is good. That's another non
>sequitur.
To put the point somewhat negatively. Without life there is no good
(or bad) death is nothing. Now you may counter how do I know this,
and that is a presupposition. I will say that Objectivism is a
philosophy for the living. If one chooses death that is one's choice,
but ethics as we know them apply to the living. To me it is obvious
that life is good, but I don't know if that is neccesary for
Objectivist's ethics.
Michael Huemer
>jwa...@MCS.COM (Jimmy Wales) writes:
>>All knowledge is empirical, in the sense of either being direct awareness
>>of reality, or inference using logic, based on direct awareness of reality.
>
>Good, that was my definition of "empirical" too.
Sorry, I missed this the first time I read it: That's not what
"empirical" means - and I'll bet it's not what you mean by it either.
Empirical means known through the senses, or logically justified by
something which is known through the senses.
*OF course*, I agree that all knowledge is either direct or indirect
awareness of reality -- which is all you said above. What I call a
priori knowledge, I say is awareness of reality, obviously. I just
don't think that this awareness is obtained by the senses.
Gary G Forbis
> ...It's comparable to
> (1) x makes me happy.
> (2) Therefore, x is good.
>
> ? Of course, that's invalid. So I don't see how knowledge of my
> emotions can lead to any knowledge of ethics.
Hmmm.. I'm not sure I want to bring this up because you are clearly
much more knowledgable than I.
I've tried to use my emotions to help guide me towards morals. I've used
an approach where I consider:
(1) x makes me happy.
(2) x makes no one unhappy.
(3) x is probably morally acceptable.
I have a somewhat less restrictive one:
(1) x makes me happy.
(2) x makes y unhappy for reason z.
(3) z is invalid.
(4) x may be morally acceptable but it may also cause future problems.
Here another:
(1) x makes some unhappy for valid reasons.
(2) x may not be morally acceptable.
-- gary for...@accessone.com
Will Wilkinson
On 17 Mar 1996, Michael Huemer wrote:
Jimmy Wales:
> >to the concept "good"? To what _in reality_ does this concept refer?
Michael Huemer:
> Good. This is an example of why I think that 'objectivists' are
> actually not objectivists about value. MY answer to your questions
> are:
> (1) The fact that some things ARE, *in reality* good.
> (2) It refers to goodness.
> This is the obvious answer that I think any genuine moral objectivist
> should give -- notice that it is the same answer you would give for
> any other property that is known to exist objectively. If I asked you
> to explain what 'in reality' the idea of the sun refers to, surely the
> answer is "the sun". Of course, the question would be bizarre and out
> of place, because it seems to imply that the sun itself isn't part of
> reality. And so does your (Jimbo) and Rand's question. What do you
> mean "what in reality" does it refer to -- isn't goodness itself part
> of reality? If so, isn't this a completely trivial question? So why
> is it supposed to be so profound?
Michael, I think you (should) know that the Objectivist meaning of
"objective" has to do with a relation between consciousness and existence;
it does not mean "consciousness independent." So it seems like you're
riffing off an equivocation.
Myself, I find the question about "what in reality" a concept refers
perfectly intelligible. Especially if treated as a metaphysical question.
To what category of being does 'value' or 'goodness' belong. The
Objectivist denies that the mode of the existence of 'value' is that of
the sun. The sun is one of the class of existents that exist independently
of life. 'Value', we discover, belongs to the class of existents
ontologically dependent on the existence of biological organisms. And so
we discover that value exists as a relation; the value is always the value
*of* a valuer. And we don't discover this unless we pose the "trivial"
question.
> >Is there any cognitive purpose for this concept? Do we need it, and if
> >so, why?
>
> Again, compare my asking, "Do we need the idea of the sun?" That's a
> strange question. The sun is just THERE. You can decide to recognize
> it or not, but your not 'needing' the idea of the sun won't make the
> sun go away. Nor does an explanation of why we need the sun exhaust
> the nature of the sun itself.
>
> The fact that Objectivists think you have to ask these questions about
> "value" that you do not ask about any of the things that are obviously
> and uncontroversially objective, suggests to me that you do not regard
> values as objective, even though you think you do.
You are again using 'objective' as if it meant some kind of independent
of everything sort of being. And Objectivists reject this sort of
"objectivity" of value. Value uncontroversially *exists* or *has being*,
and the question about to what value refers concerns what kind of being
it has.
> >of moral value. First, humans are living beings, which is the essential
> >fact that gives rise to concepts of value in the first place. Non-living
> >entities can not engage in valuing, nothing is of value to a rock.
>
> There's an ambiguity here, between "value" in the sense of something
> that is really good, and 'value' in the sense of something that is
> believed to be good, or desired, or pursued. Extermination of the
> Jews was a 'value' to Hitler, in the second sense. But it was never a
> value in the first sense -- i.e., it was never objectively of value.
And this is a problem? Because the word 'value' names a psychological
concept, this is supposed to say something about a philosophic concept using
the same name?
> Now of course value in the subjective sense depends on living things
> -- just like the awareness of any property depends on living things.
I see you could be helped by asking "what in reality does the
psychological concept 'value' refer?" We see that it is (1) dependent on
life--like the philosophic concept, but that (2) it depends on
consciousness or awareness for its being, while the other concept doesn't
(quite an important distinction--the second concept is applicable to only
a miniscule fraction of the first!). And so we understand there are
two separate concepts at work and can avoid conflating them and making
unsound arguments from premises that erroneously assume that the two words
mean the same thing.
What a useless question!
> Here's a rough analogy to the confusion you're committing: Suppose I
> said that since only intelligent beings can number things, the concept
> of 'number' depends on the concept of an intelligent being; and
> further, I might add, the existence of number depends on the existence
> of intelligent life.
>
> Obviously, this is a confusion -- one sense of "number" (as a verb) is
> "to count" -- i.e., to become aware of the number of things there are.
> The second sense of number, well, it's probably undefinable, but it's
> how many things are actually there. The planets are nine in number,
> and that fact is independent of human consciousness -- even though our
> numbering the planets (i.e. becoming aware of the fact that they are
> nine in number) depends on human consciousness.
"Probably undefinable." Great, convincing. "...[B]ut it's how many things
are actually there, " only makes sense if we add, "when things are
regarded as such, that is, regarded by some consciousness as abstract
units in a group of such units." Enumeration requires the existence of a
group, which requires the focal awareness of some conscious being. But
we've gone astray. Let it be noted that yours is, at best, a very
distracting argument, since your interlocuters certainly don't buy the
premises. Indeed, it probably begs some of the vey qustions at hand.
> Similarly, our 'valuing' things -- i.e., taking things to be good --
> depends on the existence of life. But that doesn't mean that the
> existence of good things depends on the existence of life.
It depends on the concepts of 'good' and 'value'. In their philosophic
senses, I consider them more or less synonymous.
> Further confusion, unfortunately, is added to the issue by the fact
> that it's plausible to argue that living things and events that affect
> living things are the only good things there are. It's particularly
> easy for Objectivists to confuse this fact with the false claim that
> the concept 'good' derives from the concept 'life' in some manner. To
> see that this would be a mistake, consider this analogy: Even if the
> only thing in the universe that weighs over a million pounds is a
> star, that doesn't mean that the concept "over a million pounds"
> logically depends on the concept of a star, or that "over a million
> pounds" should be defined in terms of "star".
Right, because neither the concepts of arithematic nor the concept of
weight depend on the existence of stars. This argument goes nowhere.
> Btw, suppose that we could make conscious robots (like Data on Star
> Trek). Doesn't Commander Data value things? And further, aren't some
> things that happen to him really good, and some things bad? Is the
> Star Trek story somehow incoherent?
Consciousness requires life. If Data is conscious, then he is a species of
living organism and he does value. This is a whole other bag of worms. So
lets move on.
> >Second, humans are volitional. We have the real capacity to _choose_
> >among various courses of action open to us. This is the fact that makes
>
> Right.
>
> >moral values possible. And finally, we are conceptual, fallible beings.
> >So when we exercise our capacity to _choose_, we also have the capacity to
> >choose wrongly, to make mistakes. We need some standards, then, by which
> >to make our choices.
>
> That doesn't follow. The reason that seems to make sense is that the
> reader is implicitly assuming: If you don't have a standard, then you
> are liable to make mistakes, but if you do have a standard, then you
> won't make mistakes. But this isn't the case. Even if you have a
> standard, you are still fallible. You could misapply the standard or,
> more importantly, you could make a mistake in choosing the standard
> itself. By your logic above, this means that we need a standard for
> choosing standards. But then this leads to an infinite regress.
It doesn't follow that that is what the "reader is implicitly assuming."
The "standard" Jimmy speaks of isn't just any standard. I don't think
anybody but a dip would implicitly assume that simply having a standard
ameliorates the possibility of mistakes. The "standard" is just knowledge
of the basis of value and disvalue; when we know the valuable (the good),
we can then choose it whenever we bring this knowledge to bear to our
situation (which is itself a moral choice), rather than hitting or missing
by accident. You are still fallible (1) because bringing a standard to
bear includes that which it is brought to bear upon, a situation, and
knowledge of the situation may well be incomplete, (2) you have inadequate
knowledge of what really is value and disvalue, (3) you choose not to bring
the standard to bear.
Yes we need a standard for choosing standards. These are our
epistemological standards for determining what really is. Our
standard for choosing epistemological standards is whether or not our
epistemological standard lead us to identify what is. And what is just is.
> >If anything is good, then life is. For without life, nothing has any
> >value at all.
>
> Okay, so here's the argument:
> (1) Without life, nothing has any value.
> (2) Therefore, if anything is good, then life is. (from 1)
> (3) Something has value. (suppressed premise)
> (4) Therefore, life has value.
> Notice that (3) is necessary to get the conclusion. Notice also that
> (3) is evaluative. (So, by the way, are (1) and (2).) So to really
> give a foundation for ethics, you would have to prove 1, 2, and 3, on
> the basis of some descriptive propositions. None of this have you
> done.
Another argument:
(1) there is life
(2) to live is to function in a certain way
(3) function facilitates further function
(4) that which performs its function is called good
(5) that which facilitates performance of function is called a value
(6) function is conditional upon values
(7) values are called good by extension, since they make goodness possible
----
(8) there is no value without life (from 5 and 2).
(9) if anything is good then [the] life [of a living thing] is (from
2,3,4,5,7).
Further an evaluation is just an ascription of value to some thing or other.
So there is no hitch in getting from desription to evaluations.
Evaluation is just a certain sort of description. It is the description
of that which enables a thing to function.
I'd like to go on, but I'm tired. So I snip.
>
> This, by the way, is another instance of the 'Objectivist'
> subjectivism about ethics. In MY view, which really is objectivist,
> there is a fact of the matter about what is good; in your view,
> there's only a 'good for so-and-so'; i.e., you only recognize that
> there's such a thing as "good from my point of view", "good from the
> virus' point of view," and so on - with there being no adjudication
> between the different points of view. They're all equally valid, for
> the creature in question.
Yes. There is only 'good for so-and-so'. But it's improper to add 'from my
point of view's. This results from your conflation of the two senses of
'value' as discussed before. That which is good (a value) for anything is
good independent of any point of view it might have. What it desires or
sees as expedient may or may not be values in this sense. Value is
"agent-relative", as the jargon has it, since each species has a slightly
different function and each individual within a species differs, albeit
very minimally, from other individuals of the species in regard to
function. Most disagreements in psychological evaluation can be adjudicated
by refence to the common species-character (or between species by the
genus-character). But there are some small differences that are
unjudicable, namely those stemming from ontological individuality.
Much of what I've deleted has to do with the same error about missing the
difference between psychological and biological value.
- Will Wilkinson
Jimmy Wales
>...
>>So we have to ask ourselves: what are the facts of reality that give rise
>
>actually not objectivists about value. MY answer to your questions
>are:
>(1) The fact that some things ARE, *in reality* good.
>(2) It refers to goodness.
How do you avoid the charge of circularity, the charge that you haven't
actually given content to your concept? Surely you see that this charge
looms perilously over the horizon.
>This is the obvious answer that I think any genuine moral objectivist
>should give -- notice that it is the same answer you would give for
>any other property that is known to exist objectively.
Oh no, of course it is not. I would give an answer that would introduce
you to, make you familiar with, bring into your awareness, the external
facts of reality to which I am referrring.
>If I asked you
>to explain what 'in reality' the idea of the sun refers to, surely the
>answer is "the sun".
If you really asked this, this would not be a sufficient answer. Suppose
I am talking about a planet named "X-dar." You ask me "to what in reality
does that term refer?" I wouldn't be very helpful if I answered "The planet
X-dar" of course. That isn't a sufficient explanation of meaning. You would
rightly say to me "You are being circular and cryptic. You can't
specify what you mean in reality by a term just by stating it again."
So if you really asked about the sun, and you had grown up underground,
for example, so that I would regard the question as not just a joke, I
would take you outside and point it out to you. I would _point_ to something
_in reality_.
"The sun" isn't a concept, of course, but a proper name. So the answer to
Rand's question is kinda obvious. But in other cases, it becomes necessary
to go through a more complex process of explanation. If you ask "To what in
reality does the concept "furniture" refer" I would have a bigger task.
"Furniture" isn't a first-level concept. I would have to make you aware of
this chair, of that chair, of chairs in general, of this table, of that
table, of tables in general. Or some process like that, I don't mean to be
insistent on the details.
Ultimately, every concept's meaning can be explained only by making you
aware, by pointing or something similar, to the things being subsumed
under the concept. You need to be made aware of the relevant measurement
omissions involved, etc.
I'm not an expert on your theory of the "intuitive moral faculty" but I
would suppose that the same kind of thing would be necessary there? To
differentiate moral concepts such as "justice" or "honesty" from each other,
wouldn't it be necessary to make me aware of specific instances of each, and
the differences and similarities between and among them.
> Of course, the question would be bizarre and out
>of place, because it seems to imply that the sun itself isn't part of
>reality.
If you think it implies anything of the sort, you haven't understood
something crucial. I'm having a hard time even speculating what you mean
here. When someone uses a term that I don't understand, how does asking
"To what in reality are you referring when you say X?" imply that X is
not a part of reality?
> And so does your (Jimbo) and Rand's question. What do you
>mean "what in reality" does it refer to -- isn't goodness itself part
>of reality? If so, isn't this a completely trivial question? So why
>is it supposed to be so profound?
I think my answer above may make this clearer to you.
If someone asks "to what in reality does the concept cat refer," it is
not sufficient to answer "cats." That doesn't explain anything. What is
necessary, speaking generally, is a process of explanation that allows you
to see the facts that I have seen, and to understand how I have
integrated them into a concept.
>>Is there any cognitive purpose for this concept? Do we need it, and if
>>so, why?
>
>Again, compare my asking, "Do we need the idea of the sun?" That's a
>strange question. The sun is just THERE. You can decide to recognize
>it or not, but your not 'needing' the idea of the sun won't make the
>sun go away. Nor does an explanation of why we need the sun exhaust
>the nature of the sun itself.
You'll have to be much more precise. Here you mention "why we need the
sun", but I think you must have meant "why we need the idea of the sun"
or "why we need a word to refer to the sun".
Do you recognize the difference between a concept and a proper name?
I ask because you keep giving examples of proper names (Jocate, the sun)
in a discussion of _concepts_. There are some similar features, but
I just want to make sure you are aware that there is a difference, and
that I think the differences are relevant.
>The fact that Objectivists think you have to ask these questions about
>"value" that you do not ask about any of the things that are obviously
>and uncontroversially objective, suggests to me that you do not regard
>values as objective, even though you think you do.
You are mistaken about what Objectivists think. Objectivists think that
you have to ask these questions about _any_ concept about which you have
some confusion. It is a technique or method for helping insure objectivity.
It is important, in all fields of knowledge, to be careful to specify
exactly what it is that you are talking about, and simply repeating the
same words doesn't do any good.
In her book on epistemology, Rand uses an extended example, running
through much of the book, of concepts of furniture, of tables, of chairs,
etc. So it hardly makes sense to say that we don't think that we ask
these questions about any concepts other than concepts of value.
>Similarly, our 'valuing' things -- i.e., taking things to be good --
>depends on the existence of life. But that doesn't mean that the
>existence of good things depends on the existence of life.
Do you mean to say that some things would be objectively good, and some
things objectively bad, even in a universe without living beings. If so,
I wonder if you could tell me how you would answer the question, with
respect to these non-life-related values, "of value to whom and for what?"
If that question doesn't really make sense with respect to these values,
I wonder if you could run through the process I outlined above, of
explaining to what you are referring when you think of something that
is "good" and something that is "bad", all in a universe without any
life at all. There must be some means of distinguishing them, some
characteristics that I could focus on, in order to make a successful
discrimination between them. This would be an explanation similar to an
explanation of how to successfully discriminate between red and blue.
>Btw, suppose that we could make conscious robots (like Data on Star
>Trek). Doesn't Commander Data value things? And further, aren't some
>things that happen to him really good, and some things bad? Is the
>Star Trek story somehow incoherent?
No. Data is alive in the relevant sense! He has volition, apparently in
the same sort of way that people do. He can be destroyed or damaged.
He's a different sort of living being, an unusual kind of living being.
But he is not indestructible, and he isn't just the sum of his parts any
more than you are.
>That doesn't follow. The reason that seems to make sense is that the
>reader is implicitly assuming: If you don't have a standard, then you
>are liable to make mistakes, but if you do have a standard, then you
>won't make mistakes. But this isn't the case. Even if you have a
>standard, you are still fallible. You could misapply the standard or,
>more importantly, you could make a mistake in choosing the standard
>itself.
Of course I don't assume that. Rand treats this point specifically. Is
it hard to make the right choices by using principles? Yes. But it is
infinitely harder to make the right choices in the *absence* of principles.
Principles thus have a crucial value to us, by virtue of our method of
thought, of our nature as conceptual beings.
>Also, btw, if you're trying to explain evaluative concepts in general,
>this is the point where circularity appears in your analysis. What do
>you mean by choosing "wrongly"? If I shoot my uncle, is that a
>'mistake'? Why is it a mistake?
It is a mistake because it doesn't further your life. And furthering you
life is what good *means*.
>You assert that without life, nothing has any value. That's plausible
>- I'm certainly not going to argue against it.
Wait, but didn't you argue against it above? You said, directly, that
some things would be good or bad, even in the abscence of any life at all.
(I just reread what you said, and you may not have meant this the way I
took it. Can you clarify for me? Do you think that there exist objective
values that have nothing to do with life, i.e. that would continue to be
"objectively valuable" even in a universe with no life at all?)
--Jimbo
Lance Neustaeter
On 15-Mar-96 10:34:58, Michael Huemer o...@amenti.rutgers.edu wrote:
> In my view, 'meanings are in the head' -- the meaning of a word is the
> idea that it expresses.
So then what is the meaning of the idea? Surely, we must get "out of the
head" eventually?
Lance
--
Q: Why did the chicken cross the road?
Hippocrates: Because of an excess of light pink gooey stuff in its pancreas.
Jeff
>jrou...@ix.netcom.com (Jeff) writes:
>>To put the point somewhat negatively. Without life there is no good
>>(or bad) death is nothing. Now you may counter how do I know this,
>>and that is a presupposition. I will say that Objectivism is a
>>philosophy for the living. If one chooses death that is one's choice,
>>but ethics as we know them apply to the living. To me it is obvious
>>that life is good, but I don't know if that is neccesary for
>>Objectivist's ethics.
>I think you're missing my point. I am not arguing that life isn't
>good. I'm also not arguing that there are no ethical facts, or that
>we can't know anything about ethics. Keep in mind what my position
>is: it is that the knowledge of ethics is a priori. It is based on
>facts which are *self-evident* in the manner that the axioms of
>arithmetic are self-evident; it is not based on observations.
A priori, self evident, no, but you're right it's not just based on
obsevation. Rand did observe animals(humans included) survive by
certain means. She also observed that man's method of survival , and
that which seperates us from animals, is reason. She then concluded
that it is therefore best if humans live by that method that best
enable his survival. Besides, arn't all arithmec truths self evident
only after they are observed in some manner? I mean that any fact has
to be discovered by some means of observation even axioms.
>But if you're going to be an Objectivist, this can't be good enough
>for you. To be an Objectivist, you have to hold
>(1) That you *know* moral principles to be *true* (it is not merely
>that they are useful or that you choose to believe them -- that is the
>pragmatist philosophy).
>(2) That this knowledge is empirical, i.e., based logically on
>observations.
Knowledge is empirical. As I said before even 2+2=4, had to have been
observed by some means in order for one to know it. No one is born
knowing 2+2=4, nor are they born knowing reason is there main tool
for survival. Both forms of knowledge HAS to be gained by some means
if you contend that Rand's ethic are self evident, on these grounds I
would agree, but many people don't realize that. Just as many people
don't know the qaudratic (sp?) eqaution until it is pointed out to
them.
>In order to defend (2) I'm asking you to explain the nature of that
>inference, from which observations. You can't just say, "well, it's
>obvious to me" -- not if you're going to call yourself an Objectivist.
Michael Huemer
>> In my view, 'meanings are in the head' -- the meaning of a word is the
>> idea that it expresses.
>
>So then what is the meaning of the idea? Surely, we must get "out of the
>head" eventually?
That question is a category mistake in my view. Ideas do not HAVE
meanings; ideas just ARE meanings.
As to getting out of the head: that's a metaphor, of course. I'm not
sure how to interpret it. We get outside of our heads in the sense
that some of our ideas *refer* to external objects.
Jimmy Wales
>>actually given content to your concept? Surely you see that this charge
>
>is indefinable.
But my point is not about definition, per se. It is about _content_,
about _meaning_, about _referring_. And it isn't about _words_ or
_language_ so much as it is about _ideas_, about _concepts_.
Whenever I think, I attempt to make cognitive contact with reality.
It is important, then, that my ideas be clear to me, that they actually
refer to something in reality, that when I use them I am _intending_
or _meaning_ or _referring to_ something.
The process of philosophy is, in large measure, the process of
explicating and analyzing the meaning of my ideas. That's why
I view Rand's Question ("To what in reality does this concept
refer? What are the facts of reality that give rise to this
concept?") as a crucially important technique. It helps me ensure
that any idea I have is not insufficiently precise, that any idea
I have has some referents in reality.
When I fail to do this, I have "floating concept" -- essentially, I
have a certain type of sound/mental entity in my mind that can
perform some of the functions of the real thing, but while actually
failing to help me in my primary cognitive goal: connection with
reality.
> But suppose I were a perfectly
>normal human, with perfectly good English speaking capacity, and I
>asked you to what *in reality* the word "sun" refers. And suppose I
>asked this in a perfectly serious tone. No doubt you would think it
>odd. If you were able to take me seriously, you would perhaps
>interpret me as some kind of radical skeptic.
Not necessarily. It would be an unusual question to ask in
everyday conversation, but so are most deeply philosphical
questions. But if you really asked the question, you would
really deserve an answer. Because your question, and your
proposed answer, would probably be relevant to any understanding
of your ideas about the formation of any concepts, for example.
(When Rand uses her extended example of furniture, she doesn't do
so in order to gain a deeper understanding of household items, but
to illustrate the process of concept formation.)
>Still, there's something left to your question that isn't purely
>perverse: you seem to want to know something like a definition of
>"good", or else a theoretical explanation of how we come to know how
>to use the word. That's a reasonable interest, even for a perfectly
>ordinary word that we all know the meaning of (which, in fact, I think
>"good" is).
Something like this. What I want to know is what you *mean* by the
word. We probably *do* have some disagreements about how the word
ought to be used. But that is of secondary importance. Because it
seems likely to me (very likely) that you don't even *have* a concept
of good! You have a floating concept, which appears to you to be in
many ways inexplicable (you can't define it, you can't say what it
means in reality other than repeating the word), but that's all. So
it isn't any wonder if we disagree about how to use it in many instances.
You _kinda_ know how to use it, because, as you put it, you picked it
up in the same unreflective way that you picked up the concept "milk".
You heard your dad use it. You know how people tend to use it, you
know how to put it into sentences in places that don't cause people to
give you funny looks. But you can't really put your finger on what
it means.
Think of it this way. Suppose someone used a big word, and you
thought that they didn't know what it meant. Let the word be
"gregarious". Someone says that they feel "gregarious." You
eye them warily, since you don't think that makes sense, given
their behavior. "What do you mean, gregarious?" you ask. The
reply: "Oh, I mean _gregarious_, of course. I'm referring to
my propery of _gregeriousness_, and that's all there is to be said
about it."
You would rightly think them to have not answered the question.
That's the way I am with respect to you. You use the word "good"
but you claim (quite literally) to not know what it means. You
say that you know how to use it because you've seen other people
use it. But as to specifying particularly what it means, you have
no tools at your disposal other than repetition: "By _good_ I mean
_good_."
>What we do is show you various people who have the property of
>'honesty'. Eventually, you get the idea.
Well, I do agree with this, except that the way you put it, this
looks like some kind of miracle. I think that "you get the idea"
by a specific process, and that the process can be explained and
explored, and that the result can be explained and explored.
I'm in danger of misinterpreting you. Do you mean that you think
that "honesty" is inexplicable in the same way that you think
"good" is inexplicable? That no definition or explanation of the
meaning of the concept can be given?
If not, that's fine. I just don't want to misunderstand.
Which other concepts _do_ you think are inexplicable in the way that
"good" is. With concepts like "cat" or ideas like "the sun", or even
second-level abstractions like "furntiture," we can go into great detail
about what is subsumed under them, give detailed criteria for inclusion,
etc. But it seems like you are saying that "good" (and its evaluative
cousins) is different and (as far as I understand you) unique in that
we can't say what is subsumed under them, give detailed criteria for
inclusion, or really do anything other than repeat "Good is good, it
refers to goodness" or some such.
>Okay, now I think I understand your question better. It's an
>epistemological question, about how one comes to understand what a
>certain word refers to; or perhaps about the experiences that led to
>the formation of the concept.
No, it is about the _meaning_ of the concept. The question is:
to what in reality does the concept _refer_? What is wanted is
an explanation of what entities are subsumed under the concept
and why, with the "and why" tied back to some cognitive purpose.
>Okay, so then the explanation for why they don't go around asking "to
>what in reality does 'anthill' refer?" is just that they don't think
>there's any confusion about "anthill"?
Right. We don't normally get into philosophical debates about
anthills, or furniture. Philosophical questions are questions
of great subtlety, and it is here that you'll find the greatest
need for a technique of conceptual clarity.
I've used the technique extensively in order to get a better
understanding of the concepts in my own field (finance). What
is "risk"? What is "return"? What is a "derivative security"?
What is an "option"? What is a "utility function"? These are
questions of comprehension that appear simple enough on the surface
but which present many conceptual difficulties at the level at
which I work. I know of no other thing to do than to go through
the process of concept-formation for each of them, asking what
it is that I mean in reality when I use them.
>Well, it's still strange to me that ethics is the only issue with
>respect to which I've ever heard you, or any other Objectivist, raise
>that question in that particular form.
You should attend a summer seminar. I'm sure you could get a
scholarship. You'd hear it often enough, then. :-)
>The only candidate I can think of is beauty, and that I'm not even
>sure of. I'm not sure whether the existence of beauty depends on
>consciousness.
I'll help you out. Beauty is an evaluative concept. Evaluations
are only possible to conscious beings. The concept of "beauty"
depends genetically on the concept of "consciousness". The concept
is literally _meaningless_ if you attempt to divorce it from
cognitive appreciation.
--Jimbo
Michael Huemer
>Michael Huemer <o...@niflheim.rutgers.edu> wrote:
>>actually not objectivists about value. MY answer to your questions
>>are:
>>(1) The fact that some things ARE, *in reality* good.
>>(2) It refers to goodness.
>
>How do you avoid the charge of circularity, the charge that you haven't
>actually given content to your concept? Surely you see that this charge
I wasn't trying to define goodness. As you know, I think that "good"
is indefinable.
>>If I asked you
>>to explain what 'in reality' the idea of the sun refers to, surely the
>>answer is "the sun".
...
>So if you really asked about the sun, and you had grown up underground,
>for example, so that I would regard the question as not just a joke, I
>would take you outside and point it out to you. I would _point_ to something
>_in reality_.
Notice, though, how you modified the example: you suppose that I grew
up underground or had some special condition such that I really
wouldn't be familiar with that term. THEN it might be appropriate for
me to ask "To what does the sun refer" (N.B. "in reality" now appears
redundant; why do you insert that?)? But suppose I were a perfectly
normal human, with perfectly good English speaking capacity, and I
asked you to what *in reality* the word "sun" refers. And suppose I
asked this in a perfectly serious tone. No doubt you would think it
odd. If you were able to take me seriously, you would perhaps
interpret me as some kind of radical skeptic.
Your question about "good" is more like the latter case than like
former case. In the latter case, it seems to me it IS perfectly
appropriate to just look at me sidelong and say, "It refers to the
SUN, of course."
Still, there's something left to your question that isn't purely
perverse: you seem to want to know something like a definition of
"good", or else a theoretical explanation of how we come to know how
to use the word. That's a reasonable interest, even for a perfectly
ordinary word that we all know the meaning of (which, in fact, I think
"good" is).
I have already said that it can't be defined.
I also said that goodness couldn't be perceived, so that seems to
leave out ostensive definitions.
There are two remaining things that enable you to understand what
people mean by "good":
(1) As in all cases, you apply the principle of charity (implicitly)
when learning a language; i.e., you assume that the judgements people
are expressing with their words are pretty much the truth (so when Pop
says, "This is a glass of milk" you assume that "milk" refers to the
kind of stuff that is in the glass). So once you have judged (by your
own, personal faculty of intuition) that various things are good, you
then notice that everyone around you seems to be applying this word,
"good" to this class of objects that don't seem to have anything in
common other than that they are all pretty much good.
(2) Also, you observe people's behavior: After they say something is
'bad', people often act, apparently deliberately, so as to avoid that
thing; and after saying something is 'good', people generally try to
bring it about. Thus, you are able to tell that "good" is the most
general term of positive evaluation.
>I'm not an expert on your theory of the "intuitive moral faculty" but I
>would suppose that the same kind of thing would be necessary there? To
>differentiate moral concepts such as "justice" or "honesty" from each other,
>wouldn't it be necessary to make me aware of specific instances of each, and
>the differences and similarities between and among them.
What we do is show you various people who have the property of
'honesty'. Eventually, you get the idea.
>If someone asks "to what in reality does the concept cat refer," it is
>not sufficient to answer "cats." That doesn't explain anything. What is
>necessary, speaking generally, is a process of explanation that allows you
>to see the facts that I have seen, and to understand how I have
>integrated them into a concept.
Okay, now I think I understand your question better. It's an
epistemological question, about how one comes to understand what a
certain word refers to; or perhaps about the experiences that led to
the formation of the concept.
Of course, since I'm a rationalist, I won't accept the requirement
that there be some experiences that led to the formation of every
concept. (I don't really know whether there are or not.)
>>Again, compare my asking, "Do we need the idea of the sun?" That's a
>>strange question. The sun is just THERE. You can decide to recognize
>>it or not, but your not 'needing' the idea of the sun won't make the
>>sun go away. Nor does an explanation of why we need the sun exhaust
>>the nature of the sun itself.
>
>You'll have to be much more precise. Here you mention "why we need the
>sun", but I think you must have meant "why we need the idea of the sun"
>or "why we need a word to refer to the sun".
Actually, no; the analogy was: an explanation of why we need a
concept does not exhaust the nature of that concept (i.e., it doesn't
provide a complete analysis of it); likewise, an explanation of why we
need the sun isn't a complete analysis of the nature of the sun.
>Do you recognize the difference between a concept and a proper name?
You mean, other than that one of them is linguistic, and the other is
mental?
Of course I know the difference between a proper name and a common noun.
>I ask because you keep giving examples of proper names (Jocate, the sun)
>in a discussion of _concepts_. There are some similar features, but
Well, I describe these as expressing 'ideas'. 'Concepts' I take to be
a subclass of ideas -- namely, abstract ideas, or ideas of universals.
It's just often easier to think about concrete ideas.
>You are mistaken about what Objectivists think. Objectivists think that
>you have to ask these questions about _any_ concept about which you have
>some confusion. It is a technique or method for helping insure
Okay, so then the explanation for why they don't go around asking "to
what in reality does 'anthill' refer?" is just that they don't think
there's any confusion about "anthill"?
Well, I don't think I have any confusion about "good" (although I
grant a whole lot of other people do - but it's mostly caused by their
misguided attempts to analyze it).
>In her book on epistemology, Rand uses an extended example, running
>through much of the book, of concepts of furniture, of tables, of chairs,
Well, I've never heard quite the phrase, "To what *in reality* does
the concept 'chair' refer?"
In fact, I have only ever heard it asked about value. But I take your
word for it that you, for one, think that we have to ask this about
everything.
Well, it's still strange to me that ethics is the only issue with
respect to which I've ever heard you, or any other Objectivist, raise
that question in that particular form. "What's the definition of x?"
is asked often enough, but that doesn't quite have the same
connotations.
>Do you mean to say that some things would be objectively good, and some
>things objectively bad, even in a universe without living beings. If so,
I'm not really saying that. Perhaps living beings are the only things
that are objectively good.
>I wonder if you could tell me how you would answer the question, with
>respect to these non-life-related values, "of value to whom and for what?"
>
>If that question doesn't really make sense with respect to these values,
That's right, it doesn't make sense.
>I wonder if you could run through the process I outlined above, of
>explaining to what you are referring when you think of something that
>is "good" and something that is "bad", all in a universe without any
>life at all.
If there are such things (beauty would be the only candidate I can
think of), what I mean by "good" when I call them good is exactly the
same as what I mean by "good" in every other case.
> There must be some means of distinguishing them, some
>characteristics that I could focus on, in order to make a successful
>discrimination between them.
There's only one characteristic: they're good.
> This would be an explanation similar to an
>explanation of how to successfully discriminate between red and blue.
I don't think you could explain to someone 'how' to identify red and
blue, either, if he didn't just have the innate capacity. Could you?
Could you describe some properties that red has (other than redness)?
>Of course I don't assume that. Rand treats this point specifically. Is
>it hard to make the right choices by using principles? Yes. But it is
>infinitely harder to make the right choices in the *absence* of principles.
>Principles thus have a crucial value to us, by virtue of our method of
>thought, of our nature as conceptual beings.
I don't think that really answered my point. You were arguing that
because we are fallible, it follows that we need a standard in order
to make judgements. If this is valid, why would it not be valid to
argue that because we are fallible about choosing standards, we need a
standard for choosing standards? And then a 3rd-order standard for
choosing 1st-order standards?
Of course, I make moral judgements using principles too -- principles
like, happiness is better than suffering, you should keep your
promises, you shouldn't attack people without provocation, et al. So
what's the objection? It seemed to me that your objection was that I
didn't have a standard, i.e., a higher-order principle, for choosing
those principles themselves.
>It is a mistake because it doesn't further your life. And furthering you
>life is what good *means*.
Well, I discussed this extensively in the essay, so you know what I
have to say about that.
>took it. Can you clarify for me? Do you think that there exist objective
>values that have nothing to do with life, i.e. that would continue to be
>"objectively valuable" even in a universe with no life at all?)
The only candidate I can think of is beauty, and that I'm not even
sure of. I'm not sure whether the existence of beauty depends on
consciousness.
Michael Huemer
>of life. 'Value', we discover, belongs to the class of existents
>ontologically dependent on the existence of biological organisms. And so
>we discover that value exists as a relation; the value is always the value
>*of* a valuer. And we don't discover this unless we pose the "trivial"
>question.
Or, if it's not a discovery but an error, then we don't fall into this
error unless we pose the trivial question.
I just don't see how this thing is 'discovered'. At some point in the
exposition, the Objectivist always seems to just assert, "And 'good'
just means 'promotes my life'." Well, sorry, but I think it's pretty
obvious that it does NOT mean that, and I don't see how anything Rand
ever said about life (other than this), even if it's all true, would
show that it did mean that.
>You are again using 'objective' as if it meant some kind of independent
>of everything sort of being. And Objectivists reject this sort of
>"objectivity" of value. Value uncontroversially *exists* or *has being*,
>and the question about to what value refers concerns what kind of being
>it has.
I'm using it to mean being independent of *observers* qua observers.
What is the Objectivist sense of "objective"? Does anything that
exists count as 'objective'? If so, then social conventions count as
objective? So then cultural relativism could also be a form of
objectivism?
>"Probably undefinable." Great, convincing.
Sarcasm will get you nowhere. If you know of a reason for thinking
"number" is definable, great. Tell us.
> "...[B]ut it's how many things
>are actually there, " only makes sense if we add, "when things are
>regarded as such, that is, regarded by some consciousness as abstract
>units in a group of such units." Enumeration requires the existence of a
>group, which requires the focal awareness of some conscious being.
No, there were 9 planets long before humans existed. The planets in
the solar system are a group, and they existed long before humans did.
I don't see how the planets' nine-hood differs from other properties
in this respect.
> But
>we've gone astray. Let it be noted that yours is, at best, a very
>distracting argument, since your interlocuters certainly don't buy the
>premises. Indeed, it probably begs some of the vey qustions at hand.
Well, I didn't think you were going to say that numbers of things were
mind-dependent too. If so, take something else, say, shapes. I could
do the same illustration, only it's not so convenient, because the
verb "shape" really means to change the shape of, rather than to
become aware of the shape of.
>> Further confusion, unfortunately, is added to the issue by the fact
>> that it's plausible to argue that living things and events that affect
>> living things are the only good things there are. It's particularly
>> easy for Objectivists to confuse this fact with the false claim that
>> the concept 'good' derives from the concept 'life' in some manner. To
>> see that this would be a mistake, consider this analogy: Even if the
>> only thing in the universe that weighs over a million pounds is a
>> star, that doesn't mean that the concept "over a million pounds"
>> logically depends on the concept of a star, or that "over a million
>> pounds" should be defined in terms of "star".
>
>Right, because neither the concepts of arithematic nor the concept of
>weight depend on the existence of stars. This argument goes nowhere.
It's not an argument. It's an illustration, of the distinction
between saying something like "All A's are B" and saying something
like "'A' means 'B'".
>It doesn't follow that that is what the "reader is implicitly assuming."
>The "standard" Jimmy speaks of isn't just any standard. I don't think
>anybody but a dip would implicitly assume that simply having a standard
>ameliorates the possibility of mistakes. The "standard" is just knowledge
>of the basis of value and disvalue; when we know the valuable (the good),
>we can then choose it whenever we bring this knowledge to bear to our
>situation (which is itself a moral choice), rather than hitting or missing
>by accident.
If we need a standard of the good, why don't we also need a standard
of truth -- or do you think we do? Do we also need a standard of
redness? If so, what is it?
You are still fallible (1) because bringing a standard to
>bear includes that which it is brought to bear upon, a situation, and
>knowledge of the situation may well be incomplete, (2) you have inadequate
>knowledge of what really is value and disvalue, (3) you choose not to bring
>the standard to bear.
and (4) You might have picked the wrong standard.
>Yes we need a standard for choosing standards. These are our
>epistemological standards for determining what really is. Our
>standard for choosing epistemological standards is whether or not our
>epistemological standard lead us to identify what is. And what is just is.
Don't you see the circularity there? How do you know that A is B?
Well, by applying standard S1 (the standard of B's). How do you know
that S1 is a good standard? Well, by applying S2 (the standard of
standards). How do you know that S2 is correct? Well, because S2
leads us to identify things as having the properties that they do in
fact have. And how do you know what properties things in fact have
(or in your terminology: how do you know 'what is')? Well, by
applying S1, and all the other 1st-order standards.
There cannot be any end to this. Once you start the need for
standards, you are either off on an infinite regress or a circle.
This is known as the problem of the criterion. To know A, you need a
standard, S1. To know S1, you either apply S1 to itself
(circularity), or you have another standard S2. To know S2, you
either apply S1 or S2 to S2 (more circularity), or you have a third
standard, S3. And so on, ad infinitum.
The skeptical philosopher Montaigne discovered this.
>(1) there is life
>(2) to live is to function in a certain way
>(3) function facilitates further function
>(4) that which performs its function is called good
>(5) that which facilitates performance of function is called a value
>(6) function is conditional upon values
>(7) values are called good by extension, since they make goodness possible
>----
>(8) there is no value without life (from 5 and 2).
>(9) if anything is good then [the] life [of a living thing] is (from
>2,3,4,5,7).
...
>So there is no hitch in getting from desription to evaluations.
Of course, the hitch is (4). To avoid equivocation, "function" has to
mean simply what things do (since that's what it seems to mean in
(2)). The statement that that which does what it does is good is not
only obviously false, but obviously an evaluation.
If that is not what "function" means, then you need to explain what it
does mean. If "function" means that which a thing ought to do, then
(4) is plausibly true, but then (2), if not equivocal, is a value
judgement (viz., that there is a way that living things ought to act).
You need to prove (4).
>I'd like to go on, but I'm tired. So I snip.
Me too.
Paul Hsieh
Michael Huemer <o...@niflheim.rutgers.edu> wrote:
>I wasn't trying to define goodness. As you know, I think that "good"
>is indefinable.
>I also said that goodness couldn't be perceived, so that seems to
>leave out ostensive definitions.
So how do you *know* if something is "good"? Is your ultimate guide some
sort of "intuition"?
And in that case, what if two people have moral intuitions which guide
them in exactly opposite directions? Suppose person A says, "Abortion is
evil. Outlawing abortion is good", and person B says, "Allowing women a
right to have abortions is good. Outlawing abortions is bad." Both may
have equally strong intuitions about this matter.
Would they then both (somehow) be right? Or would one of them be right
and one of them be wrong?
And if the latter, then does one need something else besides a firm "moral
intuition" in order to correctly identify something as "good"?
===================================================================
|| || "What if everything is an illusion and ||
|| Paul S. Hsieh || nothing exists? In that case, I ||
|| <hsi...@crl.com> || definitely overpaid for my carpet." ||
|| || ||
|| || --- Woody Allen, _Without Feathers_, 1976 ||
===================================================================
Will Wilkinson
On 20 Mar 1996, Michael Huemer wrote:
>
> Or, if it's not a discovery but an error, then we don't fall into this
> error unless we pose the trivial question.
> I just don't see how this thing is 'discovered'. At some point in the
> exposition, the Objectivist always seems to just assert, "And 'good'
> just means 'promotes my life'." Well, sorry, but I think it's pretty
> obvious that it does NOT mean that, and I don't see how anything Rand
> ever said about life (other than this), even if it's all true, would
> show that it did mean that.
Well I don't think that it's obvious that 'good' means what I say it
does. But it's by no means "obvious" that it doesn't. Why do you think
so? Because this is not how people use it? Maybe so. But the question is
whether the ordinary use really refers to anything in reality or to
some emotive chimera. I find it narcoleptically uninforming to be told
that the referent of 'good' is the good.
The Objectivist argument is about the conditions of evaluation. If it is
agreed that 'good' is an evaluative term, a question arises about the
root of evaluation. If the answer to the question rubs against tradition
or common sense, so what. The tradition, common sense need changing.
> I'm using it to mean being independent of *observers* qua observers.
> What is the Objectivist sense of "objective"? Does anything that
> exists count as 'objective'? If so, then social conventions count as
> objective? So then cultural relativism could also be a form of
> objectivism?
The Objectivist sense of "objective" is a right relation between
consciousness and existence. It's a relational, intentional concept
denoting a mental grasp of things as they are.
I understand that this is an unconventional use of the term, but it's
what Objectivists mean by it. So no, everything that exists isn't
objective; everything that exists is an existent. Social conventions are
existents, cultural relativism is an existent too. A failed idea, like
cultural relativism exists as a certain sort of mental entity.
> No, there were 9 planets long before humans existed. The planets in
> the solar system are a group, and they existed long before humans did.
> I don't see how the planets' nine-hood differs from other properties
> in this respect.
>
> > But
> >we've gone astray. Let it be noted that yours is, at best, a very
> >distracting argument, since your interlocuters certainly don't buy the
> >premises. Indeed, it probably begs some of the vey qustions at hand.
>
> Well, I didn't think you were going to say that numbers of things were
> mind-dependent too. If so, take something else, say, shapes. I could
> do the same illustration, only it's not so convenient, because the
> verb "shape" really means to change the shape of, rather than to
> become aware of the shape of.
Yes, things, like planets, are mind independent. But it's easy to project
an anthropomorphized, pre-epistemologized perspective onto existence as
such, then say that there have always been nine and that nineness somehow
has always inhered as a property of the planets of the solar system taken
together.
I mean, who is setting the limit of planets in this solar system? Who has
identified what a solar system even is? How is a planet distinguished from
a meteor or a moon, or whatever? Sure, once you've taken a lot of very
observer-dependent knowledge for granted, it's easy to drop context and
imagine that the observer derived context just hangs there without any
mind to hold it into a coherent frame of attention. But it doesn't. The
fact is that things of a certain class (like planets) may only
be numbered when they are differentiated from a background, then
considered as abstract units in a group. And it takes a consciousness to
do this. As consciousness differentiates from a background then holds
individuals in attention as units in group based on ontologically real
similarities among the individuals, it may be said that the number of
units in any possible group exists potentially, needing a consciousness
to bring the enumeration based on metaphysically real characteristics
into actuality.
> If we need a standard of the good, why don't we also need a standard
> of truth -- or do you think we do? Do we also need a standard of
> redness? If so, what is it?
I think 'truth' perhaps a gratuitous concept. We do need a standard for our
concepts and propositions and theories. And that standard is existence.
That, to me, seems plain.
No, we need no standard for redness. Redness is simply evident to us. We
may call it whatever we want. If we call it the same thing enough, then
that word is the automatic sign for red for us. Whenever we see red, we
become aware of the word we've attached to it. We link red with 'red'
without even trying. We usually can't even stop ourselves from thinking
'red' when we see it. I'm not sure where a standard fits in at this level.
It's something we are naturally so constituted to do.
> Don't you see the circularity there? How do you know that A is B?
> Well, by applying standard S1 (the standard of B's). How do you know
> that S1 is a good standard? Well, by applying S2 (the standard of
> standards). How do you know that S2 is correct? Well, because S2
> leads us to identify things as having the properties that they do in
> fact have. And how do you know what properties things in fact have
> (or in your terminology: how do you know 'what is')? Well, by
> applying S1, and all the other 1st-order standards.
I wonder whether it is proper to speak of "standards" or "criteria" when
we speak of the simplest ascriptions of identity. Take recognizing someone
walking down the street. I certainly don't apply any standard. I just say,
"That's Bob." I know Bob. I know what he looks like (like Bob!). I
recognize him. How do I know my memory of Bob, or anyone or anything is a
good standard? Because I very, very rarely fail to recognize anything that
I have made previous cognitive contact with. So, I get about rather
swimmingly in the world. And I reckon you do too.
So isn't your talk of standards a little unnatural, sort of at an odd
angle to life as it's lived? A little over epistemologized in the bad old
Cartesian way?
Part of recognition is biological, and there is simply little to say
about it epistemologically.
> There cannot be any end to this. Once you start the need for
> standards, you are either off on an infinite regress or a circle.
> This is known as the problem of the criterion. To know A, you need a
> standard, S1. To know S1, you either apply S1 to itself
> (circularity), or you have another standard S2. To know S2, you
> either apply S1 or S2 to S2 (more circularity), or you have a third
> standard, S3. And so on, ad infinitum.
I don't need a standard to see my mother. I just see my mother. And I
don't need a standard to recognize her. I just recognize her. "Mom!" There
can be failings in perceptual judgment due to ill conditions of
perception, or a good illusion (someone made up to look like my mother),
but there are no standards for seeing through a good illusion. If you do
see through it, then it just wasn't good (she just didn't really look like
my mother). I find yours to be an uninteresting, invented problem.
> The skeptical philosopher Montaigne discovered this.
Oh, Montaigne's problem, rather.
> >(1) there is life
> >(2) to live is to function in a certain way
> >(3) function facilitates further function
> >(4) that which performs its function is called good
> >(5) that which facilitates performance of function is called a value
> >(6) function is conditional upon values
> >(7) values are called good by extension, since they make goodness possible
> >----
> >(8) there is no value without life (from 5 and 2).
> >(9) if anything is good then [the] life [of a living thing] is (from
> >2,3,4,5,7).
> ...
> >So there is no hitch in getting from desription to evaluations.
>
> Of course, the hitch is (4). To avoid equivocation, "function" has to
> mean simply what things do (since that's what it seems to mean in
> (2)). The statement that that which does what it does is good is not
> only obviously false, but obviously an evaluation.
No. My use of 'good' isn't evaluative, its stipulative. When I say "is
called good," I'm not saying, "I like it" or "Things that function make
me feel like cheering". I'm saying that from now on this is what the
word 'good' shall mean when I use it. I am describing the denotation of
'good', not making an emotive commitment to function.
> If that is not what "function" means, then you need to explain what it
> does mean. If "function" means that which a thing ought to do, then
> (4) is plausibly true, but then (2), if not equivocal, is a value
> judgement (viz., that there is a way that living things ought to act).
I need say no more than that if the organism is to live, then it must
function.
> You need to prove (4).
It's not necessary to prove a stipulation.
I'm afraid we're bound to not come to any consensus here. I'm simply
soaked in aristoleanized Objectivism, and so I'm not even talking ethics
yet. This is just philosophic biology for me, as applicable to a fern as
to a person. And if I were talking ethics, I would assume that ethics is
about personal character. Not about the good or the right or the moral or
the terms of so called "moral language." I'd be concerned with the
development of emotive and active habits consonant with the happiest
possible life. What you might term "good" I would assimilate to
"praiseworthy." However, for me, the praiseworthy is not the last word,
nor does is lead to the best life.
You seem similarly soaked in an a priorist, non-cognitivist approach that I
just don't harmonize with. I find ethics so done a simple misuse of the
meaning of "ethics". And you may likewise have deep-seated misgivings
about the whole neo-aristotelean tradition. But I'm not sure if it is
possible for us to ajudicate our differences, especially in this form
or forum.
- Will Wilkinson
Lance Neustaeter
On 20-Mar-96 12:15:11, Michael Huemer o...@niflheim.rutgers.edu wrote:
> la...@portal.ca (Lance Neustaeter) writes:
>>> In my view, 'meanings are in the head' -- the meaning of a word is the
>>> idea that it expresses.
>>So then what is the meaning of the idea? Surely, we must get "out of the
>>head" eventually?
> That question is a category mistake in my view. Ideas do not HAVE
> meanings; ideas just ARE meanings.
So how can "meaning" be a category of being (as in "an idea *is* a
meaning") *and* be a category of relationship (as in "a word *has* a
meaning, which is its idea (which *is* a meaning...)"). There's some kind
of ugly regress in that last one...
Lance
--
Q: Why did the chicken cross the road?
Werner Heisenberg: We are not sure which side of the road the chicken was on,
but it was moving very fast.
Michael Huemer
>enable his survival. Besides, arn't all arithmec truths self evident
>only after they are observed in some manner? I mean that any fact has
>to be discovered by some means of observation even axioms.
On this, see section 3 of my essay. I think math is a priori too, but
take note of the definition of "a priori".
>Knowledge is empirical. As I said before even 2+2=4, had to have been
>observed by some means in order for one to know it. No one is born
>knowing 2+2=4, nor are they born knowing reason is there main tool
>for survival.
Although, again, I think there's lots of a priori knowledge, I don't
think there's any INNATE knowledge. A priori knowledge is that which
is acquired directly through the exercise of the faculty of reason,
not by the senses nor by inference from observations made by the
senses.
> Both forms of knowledge HAS to be gained by some means
>if you contend that Rand's ethic are self evident, on these grounds I
>would agree, but many people don't realize that. Just as many people
>don't know the qaudratic (sp?) eqaution until it is pointed out to
>them.
Well, I don't think *Rand's* ethics is self-evident, but I get the
point. Btw, the quadratic equation isn't self-evident, and it can't
be just 'pointed out'. It requires a fairly lengthy proof (well, I
suppose it's short by mathematical standards).
Remember that a self-evident principle is one that is known, without
need of other principles or beliefs to prove it.
Olaf Weber
> My use of 'good' isn't evaluative, its stipulative. ...
In which case you cannot use it to argue that there is no problem in
getting from a description to an evaluation, because it doesn't
provide an evaluation.
While there is little point in arguing about the meaning of technical
term, I do want to point out that I think your usage of "good" is
definitely not a good idea, as it is likely to mislead people who read
your posts.
--
Olaf Weber
David Friedman
> explicating and analyzing the meaning of my ideas. That's why
> I view Rand's Question ("To what in reality does this concept
> refer? What are the facts of reality that give rise to this
> concept?") as a crucially important technique. It helps me ensure
> that any idea I have is not insufficiently precise, that any idea
> I have has some referents in reality.
> --Jimbo
On a slight tangent, I think this is very close to the justification for
the idea that, when doing economic theory, you should always figure out
how to test it. That is a way of connecting the words and symbols of your
theory to the real world we observe.
My first published article, "An Economic Theory of the Size and Shape of
Nations," was originally submitted to the JPE when George Stigler was
editor. He sent it back with the comment that I would have to find some
way of testing the predictions of the theory I was proposing before the
article would be acceptable. I did so. The result was not merely to get a
little evidence in favor of the theory, but to force me to rethink the
theory more clearly in the process of figuring out how to test it.
David Friedman
Will Wilkinson
On Thu, 21 Mar 1996, Olaf Weber wrote:
> Will Wilkinson writes:
>
> > My use of 'good' isn't evaluative, its stipulative. ...
>
> In which case you cannot use it to argue that there is no problem in
> getting from a description to an evaluation, because it doesn't
> provide an evaluation.
You're assuming that you know what it is to evaluate something
beforehand. The purpose of my argument was to give precise, foundational
meaning to a couple of concepts that cause a great deal of cognitive
short circuiting because of massive imprecision in ordinary use.
I'm saying that an evaluation, in the foundational sense, is only a
description of what enables an organism to function. I'm simply sserting
that this is so, because I think the benefits to our thinking a ways down
the line when we get into the thick of an ethical theory will be greatly
clarified. Now, evaluation in the psychological sense is different,
involving the beliefs and emotional habits of the evaluator. Such an
evaluation may or may not confer psychological value upon the right
things, namely things of biological value. And this is why we need to know
what kind of organism we are and what is our characteristic mode of
function, so that our psychological evaluations can be made to correspond
to real biological values.
> While there is little point in arguing about the meaning of technical
> term, I do want to point out that I think your usage of "good" is
> definitely not a good idea, as it is likely to mislead people who read
> your posts.
Well, I'm a careful rhetorician, and I never use a word in a way
contrary to convention without explicitly outlining why and how I'll be
using it differently. When I say "This is good ice cream. I love it!" I mean
just what everyone else means. I leave my philosophic theories of the
good and of love behind.
- Will Wilkinson
David Friedman
> So how do you *know* if something is "good"? Is your ultimate guide some
> sort of "intuition"?
>
> And in that case, what if two people have moral intuitions which guide
> them in exactly opposite directions?
Consider the analogous question for positive disagreements. I think I saw
a lion's tail behind the bush, you are sure there is no lion behind the
bush. One approach is to ask other people; if almost everyone agrees there
is nothing behind the bush, I am probably seeing things. Another approach
is consistency. We both agree that lions are large animals native to
tropical regions. You point out that there is snow on the ground. You
point out that the bush is not very large, and if there were a lion behind
it bits of him would stick out where we could see him. I conclude that I
was mistaken, and that whatever I saw was not a lion's tail.
Apply the same approach to normative discussions. We observe a very high
level of agreement on very fundamental normative perceptions (aka
intuitions)--"in this clearly specified situation, did X act badly?" That
is why, when libertarians argue with liberals, they have such a hard time
agreeing on the assumptions of the hypothetical situations they are
judging--the assumptions the libertarian wants would tend to make the
liberal agree with the libertarian conclusion, and vice versa. We find
less agreement as we move up from "perceptions" to general
principles--just as we do with positive issues. Very few people believe
there is a tiger behind the bush, but many people believe that
laissez-faire leads to monopoly, or anarchy to videspread violence.
Similarly, few people can read a well written novel without sympathizing
with the characters the author wants them to sympathise with. But lots of
people disagree about whether abortion is murder, or everyone has a right
to a living wage.
David Friedman
Al Mok
>So how do you *know* if something is "good"? Is your ultimate guide some
>sort of "intuition"?
I think most people would consider icecream "good"; I'd venture to say
that this evaluation is probably integral to our neural circuits.
On complicated issues involving ethical judgements, however, I'd say that
the answer is often not so clear. Because we are all closely related
genetically on the evolutionary scale, it is possible that most of us
are predisposed to consider certain things "good" and others "bad".
However, I am not so sure how big a part environmental effects temper
our judgements. Inasmuch as we do not have total access to our own belief
structures nor sufficient time to introspect, I must say that I often act
with bounded rationality: what you might call "intuition".
>And in that case, what if two people have moral intuitions which guide
>them in exactly opposite directions? Suppose person A says, "Abortion is
>evil. Outlawing abortion is good", and person B says, "Allowing women a
>right to have abortions is good. Outlawing abortions is bad." Both may
>have equally strong intuitions about this matter.
>
>Would they then both (somehow) be right? Or would one of them be right
>and one of them be wrong?
If I say that A is right, I am saying no more than that my own belief
structure is consistent with A's belief structure on a particular issue.
If I believe strongly that A's action is evil, I might do something to
counter A's action out of moral indignation, if my nature so compels.
>And if the latter, then does one need something else besides a firm "moral
>intuition" in order to correctly identify something as "good"?
Suppose we build two cybots by endowing them with the same learning algorithm
and the same initial mental state. Suppose further that we equip these two
cybots with perfect sensors so that they always get true (consistent with
reality) information from their environments. Will these two cybots always
agree on every decision? Well, I'd say that would depend on their individual
experiences. If their learning algorithms or initial states are very different,
then certainly all bets are off. However, I can't rule out the possibility
that these two cybots may be sufficiently similar in their constituency
that they always end up with similar belief structures, independent of their
individual experiences.
I can only hope that we are all sufficiently similar so that the human race
will not eternally broil in irreconcilable, fundamental conflicts.
I think most of us appreciate beauty, human kindness and, of course, icecream!
Cheers,
-- Al Mok
--
Aloysius K. Mok m...@cs.utexas.edu Department of Computer Science
University of Texas at Austin
"Why?" "Why not?" Austin, Texas 78712
(512)471-9542
Al Mok
Will Wilkinson <wwi...@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu> wrote:
#
#On Thu, 21 Mar 1996, Olaf Weber wrote:
#
#> Will Wilkinson writes:
#>
#> > My use of 'good' isn't evaluative, its stipulative. ...
#>
#> In which case you cannot use it to argue that there is no problem in
#> getting from a description to an evaluation, because it doesn't
#> provide an evaluation.
#
#You're assuming that you know what it is to evaluate something
#beforehand. The purpose of my argument was to give precise, foundational
#meaning to a couple of concepts that cause a great deal of cognitive
#short circuiting because of massive imprecision in ordinary use.
Will,
I'd like to ask you to disambiguate the following:
You said that:
#I'm saying that an evaluation, in the foundational sense, is only a
#description of what enables an organism to function.
Are you equating "evaluation" with the biochemical processes which allow
scientists to draw the line between living and non-living (I'll accept
the fuzziness of this line)? If so, am I not allowed to say that the
tumbleweed in my backyard is capable of, and indeed must be "evaluating"?
If you want "evaluation" to be more specific, e.g., referring only to certain
capability of "higher" organisms, I'd like to hear a precise specification
of what the restrictions are.
Olaf Weber
> [W]e need to know what kind of organism we are and what is our
> characteristic mode of function, so that our psychological
> evaluations can be made to correspond to real biological values.
So let's pursue this line of questioning. The first step is to note
that humans are organisms, and many of their charcteristics will be
those of organisms in general.
Rand seems to have believed that for organisms their life is an end.
She was wrong -- it is a means to an end. One of the best established
facts of evolutionary biology is that (in the first approximation) an
organism's life is a means of getting its genes into the next
generation. (The second approximation takes some other factors into
account, but once you realize that these are things like eusociality
and group selection it is obvious that they do not support Rand's
view either.)
Biologically speaking, the function of an organism is the propagation
of its kind, and while humans may be special, they're not _that_
special. If you die childless then you are failure as far as the your
biological function is concerned. (Note that this also provides a
counterargument to Rand's indestructible robot: it could value the
production of new members of its kind, with all the derived values
that come with that.)
Now consider the morality the belongs with a ruthless pursuit of our
real biological function. This may be what the human organism should
value, but is it what a _person_ should value? Perhaps it's time to
look for an escape clause.
Humans _are_ somewhat special: our species is extremely K-selected.
Humans have relatively few children, who need years of intensive care
in order to become independent of their parents. And in order to
reproduce successfully, a young human must do more than stay alive.
Gathering sufficient resources to raise children and attracting a mate
are non-trivial projects whose success depends on long-term planning,
as well as intelligence to cope with the occasions when those plans
fail.
Due to our somewhat limited perspective the means of long-term plans
tend to become ends in themselves. Thus the line from our biological
function to our actual functioning is quite tenuous; it is easily
stretched, and often broken. Interestingly enough, if we had the
ability to consistently plan years ahead, evolution would have
harnessed it towards fulfilling our biological function -- we would
have no choice of goals.
It is the impossibility of long-range planning in a changing world
that has left us with that most precious commodity: free will. Our
biology imposes fewer constraints on our ability to choose what to do
next than any other organism has.
Now what should we choose to do?
--
Olaf Weber
Will Wilkinson
On 22 Mar 1996, Al Mok wrote:
I wrote:
> #You're assuming that you know what it is to evaluate something
> #beforehand. The purpose of my argument was to give precise, foundational
> #meaning to a couple of concepts that cause a great deal of cognitive
> #short circuiting because of massive imprecision in ordinary use.
>
> Will,
>
> I'd like to ask you to disambiguate the following:
>
> You said that:
> #I'm saying that an evaluation, in the foundational sense, is only a
> #description of what enables an organism to function.
>
> Are you equating "evaluation" with the biochemical processes which allow
> scientists to draw the line between living and non-living (I'll accept
> the fuzziness of this line)? If so, am I not allowed to say that the
> tumbleweed in my backyard is capable of, and indeed must be "evaluating"?
Okay. This is a good thing to clear up. I am not equating *evaluation*
with these biochemical process. These processes and the conditions of
these processes are *values*, and they are such independently of any act
of evaluation. So your tumbleweed (are tumbleweeds alive, we don't have
'em out in Iowa?)isn't evaluating anything, although the conditions of
its function are real values for the tumbleweed.
There *is* a sense in which a plant might be said to evaluate, and this
is in that it acts in a certain way *for the sake of* its
function. Roots reaching toward water, for instance. Water is a value and
motion toward a value might be construed as a sort of evaluation. Of
course it is very important that it is understood that this is all
*non-mental* and has nothing to do with emotions or desires or anything
psychological. It's a purely biological sense of value and evaluation. In
this sense, certain cellular functions are values for me independently of
any awareness I might have of them and independently of how I happen to
feel about matters of life and death at the moment.
> If you want "evaluation" to be more specific, e.g., referring only to certain
> capability of "higher" organisms, I'd like to hear a precise specification
> of what the restrictions are.
No. I don't want it to be more specific. It is a concept that should cover
all living organisms. The interesting questions arise when the specific
nature of an organism is investigated and a certain distinctive mode of
function is discovered. Take the case of conscious animals who have
*psychological* desires, for instance. Now these organisms apparently make
certain choices, prefer some things over others. Now how is this a benefit
of biological function, a value? Are there cases when psychological
attractions and aversions can in fact short circuit the function of the
organism? How is the psychological contentment of the conscious animal
related to the excellence of its overall function? I find these to be
fascinating questions. Even when I ask them in terms of the life of my
dog.
I don't know where I draw the line for psychological evaluation. I have
no idea what organisms count as conscious or not. All I know is that my
dog is conscious and my fern is not, so my dog has both a biological and
psychological set of values, while my fern has only the former. I also
know that if my dog has psychological values in tune with his biological
values, he tends to be happy.
-- Will Wilkinson
Michael Huemer
Let me answer a few questions and clarify my views:
jwa...@MCS.COM (Jimmy Wales) writes:
>ought to be used. But that is of secondary importance. Because it
>seems likely to me (very likely) that you don't even *have* a concept
>of good!
Well, the feeling is mutual. Or rather, I know you have the concept
'good', but you also confuse it with other things, so you don't have a
*distinct* concept of 'good'.
By the way, if you look up "good" in the OED, it says, "the most
general term of commendation." That's right. That's just what it is.
When I want to understand the meaning of a word, what *I* ask (like
Socrates) is, what is the one thing that is common to all the cases in
which the word is used in this particular sense? The only thing that
is common to all uses of the word "good" is that they are all used to
make a positive evaluation of something. That's the meaning of the
word. The most common confusion about goodness is confusing the
meaning of "good" with WHAT is postiively evaluatED. In other words,
there is x, and x is evaluated positively (you think that x is good).
If x is the one and only kind of thing that you positively evaluate,
then you have a tendency to confuse the meaning of "good" with a
general description of x.
>You _kinda_ know how to use it, because, as you put it, you picked it
>up in the same unreflective way that you picked up the concept "milk".
...
>give you funny looks. But you can't really put your finger on what
>it means.
I know *exactly* what it means. I know exactly how it is used. But
notice that a request to explain what something refers to, verbally
(like a request over the internet) must in practice amount to a
request for another series of words, presumed to be more easily
understood, which have the same meaning as the first word. I have no
other way of telling you what "x" means than by substituting some
other word or words, "yzw".
My problem is not that I 'can't put my finger on' what "good" means.
My problem is that the only other words that have the same meaning are
single words that you would not consider helpful ("desirable",
"positive", "worthwhile").
>"gregarious". Someone says that they feel "gregarious." You
>eye them warily, since you don't think that makes sense, given
>their behavior. "What do you mean, gregarious?" you ask. The
>reply: "Oh, I mean _gregarious_, of course. I'm referring to
>my propery of _gregeriousness_, and that's all there is to be said
>about it."
>You would rightly think them to have not answered the question.
>That's the way I am with respect to you. You use the word "good"
Except that I haven't used "good" in any unusual way. And, if I asked
you what "gregarious" meant in that context, I would probably be
satisfied (and you would probably be satisfied) with some examples of
gregarious behavior, and some synonyms or near-synonyms of it.
What one cannot do is *define* "good". That is because a definition
always requires breaking a concept into its simpler elements.
Consequently, the simplest concepts cannot be defined (and there must
be some simplest concepts, or else there would be an infinite
regress). However, one can say some important things about an
undefinable concept all the same:
e.g., one can state its genus (in this case, 'property');
- and what kinds of things it applies to (in this case, to states of
affairs, as in "it's good that such-and-such is the case);
- and some examples of things it correctly applies to (happiness,
freedom, and knowledge are good);
- and things it clearly doesn't apply to;
- and some synonyms or near synonyms;
- also some principles that are true about it (e.g., goodness comes in
degrees; you can have 'more good' or 'less good' ("better" and
"worse"); goodness is probably additive).
So the fact that you can't *define* something doesn't mean there's
nothing to say about it.
>but you claim (quite literally) to not know what it means. You
Of course I never said anything of the kind.
>say that you know how to use it because you've seen other people
>use it.
Which is the case with every word.
>I'm in danger of misinterpreting you. Do you mean that you think
>that "honesty" is inexplicable in the same way that you think
>"good" is inexplicable? That no definition or explanation of the
>meaning of the concept can be given?
No, honesty should be definable, if anything is. "The character trait
of tending to tell the truth and otherwise not deceive others" would
be a good first try at a definition.
>Which other concepts _do_ you think are inexplicable in the way that
>"good" is.
Any *simple* concept is undefinable in the same way that "good" is. A
simple concept (or thing) is one that isn't composed of other things.
What would be examples of simple concepts? Well, I think 'time',
'existence', 'matter', 'pain', 'yellow' are all undefinable. Probably
a whole bunch more, if you're really interested.
There really is no difficulty involved in this, unless you are
confusing the ability to define (or verbally explain, in terms of
simpler notions) something, with the actual understanding of it. But
there are plenty of things that you understand that (a) you couldn't
describe, and/or (b) you couldn't conceptually break down into simpler
elements.
>No, it is about the _meaning_ of the concept. The question is:
>to what in reality does the concept _refer_? What is wanted is
>an explanation of what entities are subsumed under the concept
>and why, with the "and why" tied back to some cognitive purpose.
Well, the problem is that the word *already is* a description of the
entities subsumed under a concept. That's the point of words. And
the only way you can further describe that class of entities is by
giving more words. But if the second batch of words should be taken
as a description of what in reality a certain concept refers to, why
shouldn't the original word itself have been counted as such?
>I'll help you out. Beauty is an evaluative concept. Evaluations
>are only possible to conscious beings. The concept of "beauty"
>depends genetically on the concept of "consciousness". The concept
No, we've been over this before. You're equivocating. Only conscious
beings are capable of making evaluations -- just like only conscious
beings are capable of measuring the length of an object. But that
doesn't mean that the existence of *fact* that the evaluation
corresponds to depends on the existence of consciousness, any more
than it shows that the existence of lengths are only possible if there
are conscious beings.
Michael Huemer
>I've tried to use my emotions to help guide me towards morals. I've used
>an approach where I consider:
>
> (1) x makes me happy.
> (2) x makes no one unhappy.
> (3) x is probably morally acceptable.
[snip other examples]
Well, I think this is a good approach, in an ordinary context. But in
the present context, the relevant point is that the above argument is
based on your implicit knowledge that happiness (at least, in itself)
is good and unhappiness bad. (By that I don't mean that an instance
of happiness always has good effects overall; just that in itself it's
good - better than unhappiness.) And of course that principle is
obviously right. But the point is just this: In order for you to
obtain the evaluative conclusion ("x is morally acceptable"), you need
some evaluative knowledge to base it on ("happiness is good").
So how do you know that happiness is good?
*I* say that this is *self-evident*, but I don't think an Objectivist
could say that. (Strictly speaking, the only thing that's
self-evident in any empiricist philosophy is sense perceptions.)
Btw, the statements about 'valid' and 'invalid' reasons are also
evaluative, as I'm sure you realize.
My interest right now is not in whether that sort of inference
provides a practical way of determining what is right or wrong. My
present interest is just in whether our knowledge of right and wrong
would be empirical. And as part of answering that, I want to focus on
the question, would our knowledge of right and wrong be based on
purely descriptive premises? So you see I'm not really objecting to
your arguments; I'm just saying that they wouldn't bridge the is/ought
gap.
Gary G Forbis
> Another argument:
> (1) there is life
> (2) to live is to function in a certain way
> (3) function facilitates further function
> (4) that which performs its function is called good
> (5) that which facilitates performance of function is called a value
> (6) function is conditional upon values
> (7) values are called good by extension, since they make goodness possible
> ----
> (8) there is no value without life (from 5 and 2).
> (9) if anything is good then [the] life [of a living thing] is (from
> 2,3,4,5,7).
I don't get (8). How does it follow from 2 and 5? Now if you gave:
(2) to live is to function
I might accept it, though I don't define "to live" that way nor do I defind "value"
the way you do.
Gasoline facilitates an engine's function. Is Gasoline a value? Is an engine alive?
While I think "a good engine" functions I believe "a poor engine" functions as well. I
don't think this is what you mean by "good" as you wish to conclude in (9).
-- gary for...@accessone.com
Michael Huemer
>Well I don't think that it's obvious that 'good' means what I say it
>does. But it's by no means "obvious" that it doesn't. Why do you think
>so? Because this is not how people use it? Maybe so. But the question is
Well, it's not how *I* use it. And, to tell the truth, it's not how
you use it either. It's a little like saying that "blue" means "round".
>I mean, who is setting the limit of planets in this solar system? Who has
>identified what a solar system even is? How is a planet distinguished from
>a meteor or a moon, or whatever? Sure, once you've taken a lot of
That's the characteristic fallacy of subjectivism. Your questions
don't make any sense. I said that there were 9 planets long before
humans existed. Do you disagree with that? There's scientific proof
of it. Should I put your questions in the present tense or the past
tense?
Right now, who has identified what a solar system is? We have.
A billion years ago, who had identified what a solar system is? No
one. But what's your point? There was still a solar system. No one
had *identified* it, but it's just pure subjectivism to conclude that
therefore it wasn't there.
And of course, trivially, in order to *say* or *know* that there are 9
planets in the solar system, there has to be intelligent life. But
something similar could be said about any fact whatever. And it
certainly does not mean that the *fact* depends on the existence of
intelligent life.
>observer-dependent knowledge for granted, it's easy to drop context and
>imagine that the observer derived context just hangs there without any
>mind to hold it into a coherent frame of attention. But it doesn't. The
>fact is that things of a certain class (like planets) may only
>be numbered when they are differentiated from a background, then
>considered as abstract units in a group. And it takes a consciousness
I never said that THE KNOWLEDGE that there are 9 planets existed
independently of consciousness. I just said that 9 planets existed
independently of consciousness.
>No, we need no standard for redness. Redness is simply evident to us. We
...
>I wonder whether it is proper to speak of "standards" or "criteria" when
>we speak of the simplest ascriptions of identity. Take recognizing someone
...
>I don't need a standard to see my mother. I just see my mother. And I
Agreed. So what's the problem if I say that I don't need a standard
of goodness; I just am immediately aware of it?
>So isn't your talk of standards a little unnatural, sort of at an odd
>angle to life as it's lived? A little over epistemologized in the bad old
>Cartesian way?
It certainly is, but you started it.
>No. My use of 'good' isn't evaluative, its stipulative. When I say "is
If you're just *stipulating* your, personal sense of "good", then the
argument becomes uninteresting. I challenged you to derive an 'ought'
from an 'is'. Well, of course, you can 'derive' any statement you
like from any premise whatever, provided you define the words in the
right way. It's like if someone asks me to prove that I have at least
a thousand dollars to my name, and I say, "Sure. First let me define
the phrase '1 thousand' to refer to whatever amount of money I
presently have..."
>called good," I'm not saying, "I like it" or "Things that function make
>me feel like cheering".
I don't believe in emotivism either. The above are other failed
attempts to define "good".
>> If that is not what "function" means, then you need to explain what it
>> does mean. If "function" means that which a thing ought to do, then
...
>I need say no more than that if the organism is to live, then it must
>function.
So then 'function' is whatever activities are necessary to survival?
>I'm afraid we're bound to not come to any consensus here. I'm simply
I think you're right about that part.
Michael Huemer
>So how can "meaning" be a category of being (as in "an idea *is* a
>meaning") *and* be a category of relationship (as in "a word *has* a
>meaning, which is its idea (which *is* a meaning...)"). There's some kind
>of ugly regress in that last one...
I don't see the problem. There are words, and there are ideas.
'Meanings' are the same things as ideas, so another way to say the
same thing is: there are words, and there are meanings. Now the
words have a certain relation to the ideas -- they are used to
*express* the ideas. Equivalently, words are used to express their
meanings.
Now to say that something 'has' a meaning is just to say that it is
used to express that meaning.
Michael Huemer
>So how do you *know* if something is "good"? Is your ultimate guide some
>sort of "intuition"?
That's what I've been saying all along! (but without the scare quotes)
>And in that case, what if two people have moral intuitions which guide
>them in exactly opposite directions? Suppose person A says, "Abortion is
This was discussed in section 5.4.
>evil. Outlawing abortion is good", and person B says, "Allowing women a
Btw, nobody has any such intuitions. Both sides present *arguments*
for their positions.
>Would they then both (somehow) be right? Or would one of them be right
>and one of them be wrong?
Obviously, at least one of them would be wrong.
Lawrence M Sanger
>>Would they then both (somehow) be right? Or would one of them be right
>>and one of them be wrong?
>
>Obviously, at least one of them would be wrong.
You didn't finish the thought, Mike. Obviously what Paul means to ask
is *how* you would know which one is right, or in other words, in virtue
of what you could show that one view, rather than the other, is justified?
Is it your view that if, on some sufficiently fundamental ethical issues,
two different smart and well-meaning people claim to have intuitions which
are completely at odds with one another, the people simply cannot resolve
their dispute rationally?
Larry Sanger
P.S. Nice work on JASP #2. The Check Is In The Mail.
Jimmy Wales
>I have no
>other way of telling you what "x" means than by substituting some
>other word or words, "yzw".
Right, but with "good", am I right in understanding you to be insisting
that it can't be done? That for the word "good," all that can be said
is that it means "good"?
It seems that you may have shifted your position here, but perhaps
you are talking about _two_ different concepts. The meaning of "good"
you have explained as "the most general term of positive evaluation."
That's true enough, but hardly the thing that we are talking about,
as I'm sure you will agree. What we are interested in is discovering
or elucidating what sorts of things _are_ good, by which I mean, which
are _correctly_ evaluated positively.
We agree that to say that something is good is to say that we evaluate
it positively. But what we want to know about, as philosophers, is
when and under what circumstances such judgments are true. Now, if
I have understood you correctly, you say that such judgments are
true just when the thing being evaluated actually *is* good. By
that, you don't mean "actually *is* evaulated positively" do you?
I don't think so, it wouldn't fit with your claim to be a moral
objectivist.
You and I are philosophically inclined people. Hopefully, we are
thoughtful and reflective. But I'm sure that we have some disagreements
on what is, in fact, morally good. In such cases, as you have said,
one of us is right, and one of us is wrong. But which one? How
do we tell? If I say X is good, and you say X is not good, then
I am right if X is, in fact, good. O.k., so how do we tell?
I disagree that "red" is a "simple concept" of the kind you have
said that it is. I *can* tell you how to tell the difference between
red and not-red. So if two rational people disagree about a particular
item, I can tell you how they might proceed to rationally settle their
dispute. All they have to do is check the frequency of the light as
reflected to the eyes.
Is there something like that which you think we might check, in
case we disagreed about good?
> But
>there are plenty of things that you understand that (a) you couldn't
>describe, and/or (b) you couldn't conceptually break down into simpler
>elements.
No, you are mistaken. Give me an example, and I'll show you how
to do it.
>>I'll help you out. Beauty is an evaluative concept. Evaluations
>>are only possible to conscious beings. The concept of "beauty"
>>depends genetically on the concept of "consciousness". The concept
>
>No, we've been over this before. You're equivocating. Only conscious
>beings are capable of making evaluations -- just like only conscious
>beings are capable of measuring the length of an object. But that
>doesn't mean that the existence of *fact* that the evaluation
>corresponds to depends on the existence of consciousness, any more
>than it shows that the existence of lengths are only possible if there
>are conscious beings.
Have we been over this before? If so, I must not have given you
my answer, for surely you would remember it.
The evaluation *is* the fact. If there is no evaluation, there is
no beauty. The concept of "beauty" literally makes no sense, apart
from the evaluation.
I would be making the equivocation you accuse me of, if I said
something like this: "'Rock' is a concept. Without consciousness,
there would be no concepts. Therefore the concept of 'Rock' depends
on consciousness. Without consciousness, there would therefore be
no rocks." That argument confuses the identification with the thing
being identified.
Beauty is different. The thing being identified is *itself* a kind
of evaluation, a kind of cognitive process. The concept beauty is
a mental entity integrating instances of evaluations (themselves,
obviously, mental). The relevant point is that *those evaluations*
are mental, and could not exist without minds, so that the concept
of beauty depends _genetically_ on the concept of consciousness.
This is the most important part of my response, and I'd like to run
through this again if you still don't get what I'm saying. This will
come up again and again until we sort it out effectively.
--Jimbo
Al Mok
Will Wilkinson <wwi...@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu> wrote:
#Okay. This is a good thing to clear up. I am not equating *evaluation*
#with these biochemical process. These processes and the conditions of
#these processes are *values*, and they are such independently of any act
#of evaluation. So your tumbleweed (are tumbleweeds alive, we don't have
#'em out in Iowa?)isn't evaluating anything, although the conditions of
#its function are real values for the tumbleweed.
#
#There *is* a sense in which a plant might be said to evaluate, and this
#is in that it acts in a certain way *for the sake of* its
#function. Roots reaching toward water, for instance. Water is a value and
#motion toward a value might be construed as a sort of evaluation. Of
#course it is very important that it is understood that this is all
#*non-mental* and has nothing to do with emotions or desires or anything
#psychological. It's a purely biological sense of value and evaluation.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
So I take it that you consider all the biochemical processes are values to
the plant because they maintain the plant's life. This does not seem
to me a neutral identification of the term *value* since it presupposes
that the function of the plant is to live on. Why not pick some other purely
biological function such as propagating the plant's genetic heritage to
identify what is a value to a plant? By picking survival as the primary
function in formulating a general definition of *value* for living organisms,
are we not in danger of making an emotive commitment to survival as primary
when we move on to ethical issues for "higher" organisms such as humans? While
I'd agree that your definition is general, I see no reason to believe that it
is the only one possible.
#mok wrote:
#> If you want "evaluation" to be more specific, e.g., referring only to certain
#> capability of "higher" organisms, I'd like to hear a precise specification
#> of what the restrictions are.
Will wrote:
#No. I don't want it to be more specific. It is a concept that should cover
#all living organisms. The interesting questions arise when the specific
#nature of an organism is investigated and a certain distinctive mode of
#function is discovered. Take the case of conscious animals who have
#*psychological* desires, for instance. Now these organisms apparently make
#certain choices, prefer some things over others. Now how is this a benefit
#of biological function, a value? Are there cases when psychological
#attractions and aversions can in fact short circuit the function of the
xxxxxxxx
#organism? How is the psychological contentment of the conscious animal
#related to the excellence of its overall function? I find these to be
yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
#fascinating questions.
You've lost me here. Is the function the maintenance of survival? And is the
xxxxxxxx
overall function different from function and may actually subsume it? If so,
yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy yyyyyyyy
have you not just extended the primary in the identification of *value* for
living organisms?
David Friedman
> said that it is. I *can* tell you how to tell the difference between
> red and not-red. So if two rational people disagree about a particular
> item, I can tell you how they might proceed to rationally settle their
> dispute. All they have to do is check the frequency of the light as
> reflected to the eyes.>
> --Jimbo
I don't think this works. Monochramatic light of the right frequency will
indeed appear as red to anyone with normal vision--but I don't think it is
true that anything that appears as red must be, or even contain, light
from the right frequency range. At least I remember reading a very long
time ago about some experiments by Edwin Land in which he produced images
that observers saw as containing regions of a particular color, although
no light of that color went into the image. Land's explanation, as I
recall, was that human color perception depended in part on relations
between one part of the image and other parts. The article was published
In _Scientific American_, I would guess in the late fifties or sixties. So
if it was right (and if my memory is right), "red" as describing a human
perception is not identical to "red" as describing a frequency range.
Putting this point aside, for the moment, is it worth considering this
sort of question in the context of a person who does not yet have the
relevant scientific information? Suppose you asked Aristotle to define
red. He would be in roughly the same position that Michael apparently
believes he is in with regard to "good." He knows what it means, other
people know what it means, but he cannot give any definition beyond "if
you see it you know it, and here are some examples." So isn't Michael's
position defensible in the form of "perhaps there is some more fundamental
definition of "good," but neither I nor anyone else knows what it is, and
I do not have to know what it is in order to use the term?" Like "red."
David Friedman
Will Wilkinson
On Fri, 22 Mar 1996, Gary G Forbis wrote:
> Will Wilkinson wrote:
> > Another argument:
> > (1) there is life
> > (2) to live is to function in a certain way
> > (3) function facilitates further function
> > (4) that which performs its function is called good
> > (5) that which facilitates performance of function is called a value
> > (6) function is conditional upon values
> > (7) values are called good by extension, since they make goodness possible
> > ----
> > (8) there is no value without life (from 5 and 2).
> > (9) if anything is good then [the] life [of a living thing] is (from
> > 2,3,4,5,7).
>
> I don't get (8). How does it follow from 2 and 5? Now if you gave:
>
> (2) to live is to function
>
> I might accept it, though I don't define "to live" that way nor do I defind
> "value" the way you do.
Well, your (2) and mine our the same. I only made explicit the rather
obvious point that any function is a function with a certain identity. I
did this because I didn't want to ignore the fact that each kind of
organism functions somewhat differently and that there is no abstract
Platonic form of function that all organisms participate in, but rather that
each organisms life is the function of just that kind of organism.
Most people don't define "life" or "value" in my way. But part of my
argument is that things that concern all of us are illuminated and
clarified by such unusual concepts of "life" and "value" and that our
understanding of ourselves and the world is thereby deepened by our
internalization of them. I think this usage really identifies something
fundamental.
> Gasoline facilitates an engine's function. Is Gasoline a value? Is an
> engine alive?
Rand made a distinction between the metaphysical and the man-made. And it
is an important distinction to keep in mind. Aristotle too made such a
distinction. Both have in mind that the existence of certain things can be
explained only by reference to things with a more fundamental mode of
existence. For instance, Aristotle would deny that an engine is even a
metaphysically distinct thing (a substance). Rather, it is a composite of
substances, which are the natural materials from which the engine was
made. And the working and combination of these substances is caused by
some end that an end-having being has in mind (moving a train, say). The
engine's function is thus a *derivative* function, intelligible only with
reference to the natural or metaphysical function of the organism from
which its existence derives.
So gas is a value only to organisms whose functioning has come to
include getting about in gasoline-engine driven things. It is
metaphoric to say that the engine values gas.
> While I think "a good engine" functions I believe "a poor engine" functions
> as well. I don't think this is what you mean by "good" as you wish to
conclude in (9).
Sure there are good engines. But they are good only derivatively, not
independently. They need human purposes in reference to which their
goodness or badness can be established (not to mention their very
existence). Without people, no engines. And if everyone suddenly died, no
engine would have a function or be good; it would be a dumb concatenation
of raw materials--naturally existing stuff that was once someplace else and
is now in another.
- Will Wilkinson
Will Wilkinson
On Fri, 22 Mar 1996, Olaf Weber wrote:
> Will Wilkinson writes:
>
>
> Rand seems to have believed that for organisms their life is an end.
> She was wrong -- it is a means to an end. One of the best established
> facts of evolutionary biology is that (in the first approximation) an
> organism's life is a means of getting its genes into the next
> generation. (The second approximation takes some other factors into
> account, but once you realize that these are things like eusociality
> and group selection it is obvious that they do not support Rand's
> view either.)
I don't think we should be too hasty in saying that Rand is wrong here.
And I think we should not be hasty about what the facts of evolutionary
biology are either.
Survival *is* the primary end of an organism, from the aspect of the
organism, which is the real biological unit. The propagation of a
particular genetic sequence is a non-necessary consequence of individual
organismic survival, though a necessary consequence of gene-code
propagation. Reproduction can be seen as the end of the organism only if
an organism is considered as an instrument in a larger goal, the goal of
the preservation of the genetic sequence. And this is no goal at all,
because there is no organism that has it. The maintainence of a genetic
sequence through time is an *as if* or *metaphorical* goal of a certain
DNA pattern. It suits us to loosely (stolen) conceptualize it thus, but
since DNA isn't itself alive, it cannot actually survive, and our use of
'goals' in regard to DNA cannot be a proper application of the concept.
So, evolution occurs incidentally *because* the organism has first
survived and because it is, incidentally, an organism with means of
reproduction. If a mutation were to occur rendering a certain litter of
puppies infertile, yet otherwise normal, and they went on to lead a full
dog lifespan, then they would have been *biologically* successful
organisms, since the biological unit is the individual and the individual
functioned properly biologically. They would, however, be *evolutionary*
failures, since they did not send on their genetic codes. However, this is
not a goal, as I have said, of the organism qua organism, but only an *as
if* goal of the organism qua evolutionary unit.
I've done a great deal of de-tasseling out here in Iowa, and I have a
hard time believing that I rendered all of those corn plant biologically
unsuccessful, for they still grew and flourished even after my serial
emasculation.
> Biologically speaking, the function of an organism is the propagation
> of its kind, and while humans may be special, they're not _that_
> special. If you die childless then you are failure as far as the your
> biological function is concerned. (Note that this also provides a
> counterargument to Rand's indestructible robot: it could value the
> production of new members of its kind, with all the derived values
> that come with that.)
So I think that I have explained why this is simply not true.
*Evolutionarily* speaking, the function of an organism is propogation.
But this really takes us out of biology and into something more like
ontology, as strange as that may sound. Evolution is really an
ontological concept. It identifies conditions for the being of certain
classes of things across time. And so too, the acription of an
*evolutionary* 'function' to organisms is a kind of stolen concept, since
we get the idea of 'function' first from an understanding of the life of
organisms independent of an any idea of evolution. Evolution doesn't
function in a biological way. It is a causal sequence involving
biological entities. Evolution just happens to extend causally from the
identity of biological phenomena, like entropy follows causally from the
identity of energy fields.
I think your robot agument very misguided. 1) robots, like all artifacts
can only have derivative functions extending from the primary function of
some biological organism. 2) reproduction is not a biological value
(sexual behavior may be a biological value, but the biological unit, the
organism, is indifferent to whether reproduction follows). 3) value,
conceptually, is genetically dependent on life and robots aren't alive, so
robots can't value anything.
> Now consider the morality the
> belongs with a ruthless pursuit of our
> real biological function. This may be what the human organism should
> value, but is it what a _person_ should value? Perhaps it's time to
> look for an escape clause.
There is no need for an escape if it is seen that reproduction is not,
strictly speaking, part of our biological function or a biological value.
>
> Humans _are_ somewhat special: our species is extremely K-selected.
> Humans have relatively few children, who need years of intensive care
> in order to become independent of their parents. And in order to
> reproduce successfully, a young human must do more than stay alive.
> Gathering sufficient resources to raise children and attracting a mate
> are non-trivial projects whose success depends on long-term planning,
> as well as intelligence to cope with the occasions when those plans
> fail.
See, evolution explains *why* our biological functions are as they are
(these functions led to our existence), and you describe some of the
evolutionary reasons for certain features nicely. But it simply doesn't
follow that our biological function *is* evolution. Evolution is the
*pre-condition* for our existence and we can explain the existence of our
functions by reference to their evolutionary "value". But the
evolutionarily derived function of the organism qua organism is
indifferent to the historical conditions of its being. As an organism, all
the organism is "concerned" with is the self-generated activity that we
call life. Again, if there were a mutation that rendered the organism
infertile, it would still be a properly biological organism, and there
would no way to describe its functions except in terms of *being for the
sake of* its further function, i.e., its life. Evolution is successful
insofar as it is able to work reproductive mechanisms and generative
actions or behaviors into the functions that constitute a certain
organism's living. At that point, further DNA propagation is dependent on
that thing's *survival as* the sort of thing it was evolved to be.
However, a thing need not have these evolutionarily relevant mechanisms or
actions to have functions and goals, i.e., to be a biological thing.
Mutations or un-"intended" consequences of otherwise evolutionarily
helpful functions (choosing to become a nun, say) may take a thing out of
the evolutionary domain without taking it out of the biological
(goal-oriented, valuing) domain.
>
> Due to our somewhat limited perspective the means of long-term plans
> tend to become ends in themselves. Thus the line from our biological
> function to our actual functioning is quite tenuous; it is easily
> stretched, and often broken. Interestingly enough, if we had the
> ability to consistently plan years ahead, evolution would have
> harnessed it towards fulfilling our biological function -- we would
> have no choice of goals.
Now whose long-term plan is genetic propogation? No one's. I think you're
reifying a metaphor.
It should be "...the laws of evolution would have caused a different
biological function" not "evolution would have harnessed it towards
fulfilling our biological function," as you say. If reality were
different, then what it is to *function as* a certain kind of organism
would be different (and it would therefore be a different organism). The
function itself would still be its own further function.
> It is the impossibility of long-range planning in a changing world
> that has left us with that most precious commodity: free will. Our
> biology imposes fewer constraints on our ability to choose what to do
> next than any other organism has.
Who could or couldn't do this long range planning? Nature? As if nature
(existence) had plans?
> Now what should we choose to do?
I for one am so constituted and so situated that I find it desirable to
now seek a frothy beverage.
Bottoms up!
-- Will Wilkinson
Will Wilkinson
On 23 Mar 1996, Michael Huemer wrote:
>
> Well, it's not how *I* use it. And, to tell the truth, it's not how
> you use it either. It's a little like saying that "blue" means "round".
It *is* how I use it: in the specialized context of philosophy--a science
concerned with identifying many things left slurred over by conventional
thought. It is more like giving the picky geometric definition of 'round'
irregardless of the fact that the ordinary use of 'round' is "ball-like."
> >I mean, who is setting the limit of planets in this solar system? Who has
> >identified what a solar system even is? How is a planet distinguished from
> >a meteor or a moon, or whatever? Sure, once you've taken a lot of
>
> That's the characteristic fallacy of subjectivism. Your questions
> don't make any sense. I said that there were 9 planets long before
> humans existed. Do you disagree with that? There's scientific proof
> of it. Should I put your questions in the present tense or the past
> tense?
We're going to get stuck here. You have to admit that there is controversy
over whether *numbers* of things exist prior to their enumeration. I don't
doubt that the things were there to count and that they all have
properties that make it likely that they will be lumped together by a
consciousness of certain identity into an single abstract group of nine
units. I just think it's wrong to say there is some nineness floating
around out in space enveloping the planets of the solar system. I'm not a
subjectivist because I don't go in for funny metaphysics.
I think the proper analysis of "there were nine planets before there were
any people" is "if some person were to go back to before there were
people and count the planets, he would count nine." But I think the idea
of "nine" independent of consciousness is raucously unintelligible.
> Right now, who has identified what a solar system is? We have.
Fine; and we count nine planets in it.
> A billion years ago, who had identified what a solar system is? No
> one. But what's your point? There was still a solar system. No one
> had *identified* it, but it's just pure subjectivism to conclude that
> therefore it wasn't there.
I didn't conclude this. I only said that 'number' and 'nine' are human
concepts and that for numbers to get applied, somebody has to engage in
an act of attention to isolate a group of similar entitities, and that
withough somebody to thus attend to the relevant entitites, they have
no number, but only raw being, undifferentiated from the being of all else.
> And of course, trivially, in order to *say* or *know* that there are 9
> planets in the solar system, there has to be intelligent life. But
> something similar could be said about any fact whatever. And it
> certainly does not mean that the *fact* depends on the existence of
> intelligent life.
Oh. So there are *facts* floating out there in space too. Somebody's
metaphysics smells funny. What color are these facts. How long are they?
I consider a fact to be any entity or set of entities and their relations
considered from the aspect of their potential intelligibility. So there
are facts of which I am not aware, but no facts if there is no potential
awareness. In the latter case there would only be whatever happens to
be--no facts. When we say that a fact exists independently of
consciousness, what we are saying is that if there were no consciousness,
and then there suddenly was, there would be still something to be aware
of. Which is just another way of saying that some thing is a potential
object of awareness. If we take consciousness out of the picture for good
and don't smuggle it in surreptitously, then talk of facts *really* being
there is just gratuitous. There is just whatever is and since we've taken
consciousness out of the picture, it's just an invalid move to say that
some of whatever is, whatever it is (who knows?), is facts.
> >I don't need a standard to see my mother. I just see my mother. And I
>
> Agreed. So what's the problem if I say that I don't need a standard
> of goodness; I just am immediately aware of it?
Because you're not. You're immediately aware of pleasure or pain, trees or
clouds, your mother or your dog. Good is too abstract to be just aware of
unless it is assimilated to some object of perceptual judgment. And the
assimlation of 'good' to some immediate experience seems to me even more
arbitrary than my stipulation of 'good' as "biological function" and
derivatively as "things amenable to biological function." Since I think I
can seamlessly build a second, psychological sense of 'good', a sense that
includes your own, on this "objective", biological, foundational sense, it
seems to me clearly to be preferred.
> >No. My use of 'good' isn't evaluative, its stipulative. When I say "is
>
> If you're just *stipulating* your, personal sense of "good", then the
> argument becomes uninteresting. I challenged you to derive an 'ought'
> from an 'is'. Well, of course, you can 'derive' any statement you
> like from any premise whatever, provided you define the words in the
> right way. It's like if someone asks me to prove that I have at least
> a thousand dollars to my name, and I say, "Sure. First let me define
> the phrase '1 thousand' to refer to whatever amount of money I
> presently have..."
But I don't think my stipulation is arbitrary, as you imply it is. I think
a chain goes back from the familiar psychological sense to this
awareness-independent biological sense (but this is the low road of
justification). More importantly, I think it identifies something crucial
and that we think more clearly about the way things are when we take up
this use.
I can level the same sort of criticism at you. One can just decide
beforehand that evaluation and description are two, never intersecting,
sorts of things, and then infallibibly defend that you can't get an
evaluation from a description by denying that some statements are either
descriptions or evaluations whenever it's convenient to do so. First let
me define 'evaluation' as "something never inferred from descriptions"....
> >I need say no more than that if the organism is to live, then it must
> >function.
>
> So then 'function' is whatever activities are necessary to survival?
Yes, since survival (continued life) is just ongoing function.
- Will Wilkinson
Paul Hsieh
David Friedman <dd...@best.com> wrote:
>I don't think this works. Monochramatic light of the right frequency will
>indeed appear as red to anyone with normal vision--but I don't think it is
>true that anything that appears as red must be, or even contain, light
>from the right frequency range.
That is correct.
There is a fascinating book entitled _Color for Philosophers_ by C.L.
Hardin which discusses this in more detail. This is a book on the
physiology of vision and color perception written in laymen's terms. The
author was motivated to write this book because of the many discussions of
color vision in the philosophy literature written by people who knew
little about the actual relevant neurophysiology (and who were therefore
making factually incorrect statements).
I'm only about one-third of the way through this book, but so far
everything I've read is consistent with what I learned in medical school.
I highly recommend it to anyone interested in a deeper understanding of
how our eyes and our brains perceive color.
==================== ~~~ *** ~~
|| || * * ~ ~~
|| Paul Hsieh, MD || /\ ** ** _
|| <hsi...@crl.com> || _ | | ** ** __ | |
|| || __| |__|__|__ ** ** | |___| |
==================== | | | | ** ** | | | |
Jimmy Wales
[Some stuff about the definition of colors being more complex than
range of frequency.]
Yes. The definition of colors is more complex than I made it out to
be. In addition to the frequency of light, you have to take into account
certain facts about the human perceptual mechanisms. This doesn't change
my basic point.
> So isn't Michael's
>position defensible in the form of "perhaps there is some more fundamental
>definition of "good," but neither I nor anyone else knows what it is, and
>I do not have to know what it is in order to use the term?" Like "red."
If that was his position, it would be *somewhat* defensible, but I don't
think that's his position. His position is that good is not the sort of
concept that can be defined. I don't think that's defensible, since it is
obviously false. Rand has provided the explication of the concept that
he needs to consider.
--Jimbo
David Friedman
> David Friedman <dd...@best.com> wrote:
> [Some stuff about the definition of colors being more complex than
> range of frequency.]
>
> Yes. The definition of colors is more complex than I made it out to
> be. In addition to the frequency of light, you have to take into account
> certain facts about the human perceptual mechanisms. This doesn't change
> my basic point.
I'm not sure you are right. Suppose we write a definition of "red" in
physical terms. We then do some experiments similar to Land's and discover
some things that look red but do not fit our definition, so we modify the
definition to include them.
How did you know your original definition was wrong? Because you saw some
things that were red that didn't fit it. But how did you know they were
red? It cannot be from the definition--nor will it be from your new
definition. So it looks as though "red" means "perceived as red," and your
definition is simply a list, possibly incomplete, of things that are
perceived as red. Doesn't that correspond to Michael's account of good? He
can list lots of good actions, and someone who already understands what
good means but does not speak his language can deduce that "good"
corresponds to whatever he calls the same concept, but the list is not the
definition.
David Friedman
Michael Huemer
>You didn't finish the thought, Mike. Obviously what Paul means to ask
>is *how* you would know which one is right, or in other words, in virtue
>of what you could show that one view, rather than the other, is justified?
Well, I didn't say I would know which one was right. You'd have to
show me the particular situation you had in mind, before I could tell
you whether, and if so how, I personally knew which of them was right.
Paul's example (about abortion) wasn't a good one, because I don't
think either of those views was intuitive.
If you mean, how could one of the involved parties know which of them
was right, the one who is wrong, of course, does not know which of
them is right (because he doesn't satisfy the *truth* condition on
knowledge). He might come to find out, if he discovered that his
intuition in this case conflicted with some other intuitions.
The one who is right can know that he is right, if he knows that
(maybe he won't know it because he won't be *certain* of it), by means
of intuition, of course.
Now, what is the point of your question? Are you trying to articulate
an objection? If so, could you be more explicit? I suspect that you
have an objection in the wings that is based on an Alstonian 'level
confusion' -- i.e., you're asking me how we could know that we were
justified, as if that were a condition on *being* justified. And
actually, there seem to be a couple more confusions involved in the
question -- such as that in order to be justified in believing
something or to know it, you have to be able to *show* that it is the
case, and also that if one of the parties is wrong, then that party
must also be unjustified (since you thought that "how do you know
which one is *right*" was equivalent to "how do you *show* that one of
them is *justified* and the other not").
I don't know if you believe those things -- I very much doubt that you
think that being wrong entails being unjustified (nor do you think
that I think that) -- so maybe you could rephrase.
>Is it your view that if, on some sufficiently fundamental ethical issues,
>two different smart and well-meaning people claim to have intuitions which
>are completely at odds with one another, the people simply cannot resolve
>their dispute rationally?
That could certainly happen. You have to add into the antecedent
there that neither of their intuitions will turn out to conflict with
other intuitions, and also that further reflection and further
education about the descriptive aspects of whatever case is in
question do not change their intuitions. In other words: If they
have different intuitions, and nothing happens that would change their
intuitions, then they cannot resolve their dispute. Of course!
It's also true that if two people have different sense perceptions,
and nothing happens to change their perceptual beliefs (e.g., no other
observations are found that disconfirm one of their perceptual
beliefs), then they can't resolve that dispute either.
>P.S. Nice work on JASP #2. The Check Is In The Mail.
Thanks. I did my best to follow your lead.
--
^-----^
Michael Huemer <o...@rci.rutgers.edu> / O O \
http://www.rci.rutgers.edu/~owl | V |
\ /
Al Mok
Will Wilkinson <wwi...@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu> wrote:
#On Fri, 22 Mar 1996, Olaf Weber wrote:
#> Will Wilkinson writes:
#> She was wrong -- it is a means to an end. One of the best established
#> facts of evolutionary biology is that (in the first approximation) an
#> organism's life is a means of getting its genes into the next
#> generation. (The second approximation takes some other factors into
#> account, but once you realize that these are things like eusociality
#> and group selection it is obvious that they do not support Rand's
#> view either.)
#
#I don't think we should be too hasty in saying that Rand is wrong here.
#And I think we should not be hasty about what the facts of evolutionary
#biology are either.
Will,
Rand seemed to have made a very strong claim: that survival is the primary
end of an organism's actions. Would you at least agree that she has NOT
substantiated her claim? I'd think that basing ethics on an substantiated
claim is wrong (irrational) by Objectivist standards.
#Survival *is* the primary end of an organism, from the aspect of the
#organism, which is the real biological unit.
^^^^
This is an assertion with which Olaf obviously disagrees. What I am
interested in is the criterion by which one can/should justify such an
assertion. Here're two candidates on which I thought you were basing
your argument, but apparently not. Correct me if I have misunderstood you.
(1) Survival is the primary end of every organism because an organism
always intends everyone of its action to maintain its own survival
as the primary goal.
Now since I think you'd agree that plants can't cogitate, the "intention"
of a plant's action can at best be inferred from correlating all the
(action, result) pairs of the plant. This is very slippery ground indeed,
since identifying *the* result of an action is in itself subject to
the bias of the identifier (us). Suppose I cook a catfish, eat it and
toss the bones to my neighbor's cat Jenny. Should or should not an observer
conclude from my action that my main intention for cooking the catfish
is to feed Jenny?
Correlation might be evidence but is no *proof* for intentionality.
In science, a law A is more fundamental than another law B if B can be
explained by A. If we take explanatory power as the criterion for
identifying (action, result) pairs, I am afraid you'll have to do much
better to show why Olaf's evolution-based approach is not as powerful
as your survival-based approach. If you are not relying on explanatory
power (in which case Objectivism seems to differ from the scientific
method), let us try an epistemological approach.
(2) It is meaningful to talk about X being a value to an organism Y only
if Y has life. Therefore, survival must be the *ultimate* end for Y.
Assertion (2) in itself does not answer the question: Why should survival
be Y's primary choice IF Y ALREADY HAS LIFE at the time Y makes a choice?
The *definability* of A by B does not necessarily imply B's *desirability*
to A. Whether B is desirable depends on how desirability is to be
established. Suppose my wife insists on living with her mother, the fact
that I live with my wife does not necessarily mean that I must desire to
live with my mother-in-law :-). So at least a psychological approach to
establish desirability will not yield (2). We have already seen from (1)
that a causality (explanation-based) approach is also problematical.
In fact, it is observed in nature that some organisms do sometimes act in
such a way as to jeopardize their own survival, e.g., the enormous and
sometime fatal expenditure of energy in performing reproduction; I can
still remember marvelling at the salmon swimming upstream the last time
we drove up the Columbia river.
If my layman's understanding of cell biology is correct, every division of
our cells might weaken the telemerase(?) in our chromosomes so that this
action alone spells our own eventual demise (aging).
So what facts of reality are we talking about when Objectivists assert that
survival *is* the primary end of an organism's biochemical actions?
Just to toss another grenade :-) the identification of biological units
is not as clear-cut as it might seem. I think that it is more of an artifact
of human thinking e.g., dividing the world up into units so that we can
effectively figure out how we can best interact with it. There are many ways
to group things into units, depending often on a preconceived utility.
It is by no means clear why any particular a priori organization of the world
is *the right way* in discussing ethics.
#Bottoms up!
#
#-- Will Wilkinson
Al Mok
>In article <Pine.A32.3.91.960324...@black.weeg.uiowa.edu>,
In my last posting:
#Will,
#
#Rand seemed to have made a very strong claim: that survival is the primary
#end of an organism's actions. Would you at least agree that she has NOT
#substantiated her claim? I'd think that basing ethics on an UNsubstantiated
^^
#claim is wrong (irrational) by Objectivist standards.
My fingers did it again :-)
frank forman
Michael Huemer <o...@niflheim.rutgers.edu> wrote:
>hsi...@crl.com (Paul Hsieh) writes:
>
>>So how do you *know* if something is "good"? Is your ultimate guide some
>>sort of "intuition"?
>
>That's what I've been saying all along! (but without the scare quotes)
>
>>And in that case, what if two people have moral intuitions which guide
>>them in exactly opposite directions? Suppose person A says, "Abortion is
>
>This was discussed in section 5.4.
>
>>evil. Outlawing abortion is good", and person B says, "Allowing women a
>
>Btw, nobody has any such intuitions. Both sides present *arguments*
>for their positions.
>
>>and one of them be wrong?
>
>Obviously, at least one of them would be wrong.
It's not obvious and in fact is false. Something is immoral for me if it
harms my long-run self-interest. Assuming I am a woman here, it may be
that case that *my* having an abortion will harm me, but it can also be the
case that it would not harm some other woman.
Or so I conclude from an egoist ethics. Now if you investigate the world,
you may well find that there are *some* moral absolutes, but in general
you'll find them to be at least somewhat relative to time, person, and
circumstance.
I append a piece I posted on abortion some time ago.
Frank
The abortion controversy shows no sign of
terminating, even here where we start with
rational premises. (The controversy cannot
*possibly* terminate when the premises are
irrational, as they are with Christianity.) The
reason why is because our concept of rights is
not as grounded as it ought to be. The notion
floats too freely (though far less freely than
it does for irrationalists), resulting in too
much talk and too little tying into facts.
We need to think about the notion of rights more
carefully and in the context of an egoist
ethics. To say *you* have a right to do
something free from *my* coercive interference
is *not* to say that *you* are harmed by *my*
interference. The fact of *your* harm is not
doubted, but that is of no special concern to
*me*, at least not straightforwardly. Your
interests are not the subject of *my* ethics.
Additional facts are needed to derive rights,
and they must take the form of showing that *my*
initiating coercion against *you* harms *me* (as
well as you). And I think it does. My happiness
comes, not from having things but from the
pursuit of actions that are in accord with my
nature. Foremost, this means the active use of
reason. I can act efficaciously only if I know
what the world is, and I can only know what the
world is if I employ reason.
When I initiate coercion against you, I am
trying to reap the products of the coercion (a
material thing if I am a robber, say) without
employing the reason necessary to have been able
to make the thing in the first place (or
something equivalent that I might have traded
for it). This short-circuiting undermines my
sense of efficacy and thus my happiness. We also
know, as a matter of experience, that robbers,
frauds, and such are rarely happy people.
This, and not harm to *you*, is why you have a
right to remain free from coercion. But this
reasoning cannot be applied in the case of a
fetus. (I'm pretending to be a woman here!) I am
not short-circuiting any sense of my own
efficacy, as least not obviously. Perhaps the
readers can suggest some non-obvious way in
which I really am harming my happiness through
attempting to short-circuit reason whenever I
get an abortion.
But egoist ethics is not primarily concerned
with the issue of rights, though it might appear
that way, based upon the number of words devoted
to it. Ethics is about *all* the principles by
which I am to guide my life. We may certainly
follow Ayn Rand and classify rationality,
productiveness, and pride as the three cardinal
virtues, and further elucidation and
subclassification is an urgent task in
broadening Objectivism.
I think, but can only state, that there may be
other virtues that are not easily classified as
subvirtues of the principle ones. Kindness may
be one such, which is why we should not be cruel
to animals and respect life generally. I would
not say that governments should prohibit it,
since I have every suspicion that such meddling
in private affairs harms the *meddlers*, which
is *not* the case when justice is imposed on a
rights infringer.
We must apply the principle of egoism thoroughly
and consistently. Of course, when we have built
up a concept of rights and have gotten a body of
results, then we can speak at that level and not
have to trace everything back down to egoist
principles every time we discuss the matter, any
more than we need to trace every mathematical
theorem back to the original axioms. Knowledge,
after all, is hierarchical. But we don't have
such a body of results yet.
Instead of violating a fetus's rights, let me
suggest that aborting it will violate the minor
virtue of kindness and its general respect for
life. If so, then ordinarily one should not
abort, just as ordinarily one should be kind to
one's neighbors. But there are certainly
instances where one should not be kind to a
particular neighbor, and I think there will be
cases where one should abort one's fetus. But in
neither case should there a legal duty to be
kind to neighbors or to carry a fetus to term.
Imagine what "kindness police" would be like,
and you imagine not a few liberals.
I claim no proof here at all, just opinion and a
potential line of attack on the issue of
abortion. Any maybe the fetus does have rights,
and not we rights to abort them, but we will
need to better grasp what rights are.
Olaf Weber
> Now if you want to say that the color red is identical with those
> collections of light, still there is something that the colorblind
> person is unable to understand, and that is not defined by a
> description of wavelengths -- you might call it the 'quale' of red
> or the sensation of red, or something like that.
One way to navigate these waters is by keeping a close eye on what we
mean by "understanding". There are two kinds of knowledge that seem
relevant here: tacit and explicit knowledge.
Explicit knowledge is (roughly) equivalent to conceptual knowledge.
It is the kind of knowledge of red that a colourblind person would
have after a thorough explanation of the way perception of red works.
Tacit knowledge is (roughly) equivalent with the ability to perceive
red. Typically, no amount of explicit knowledge will give you tacit
knowledge. Tacit knowledge can be innate, something which is doubtful
og explicit knowledge. But tacit knowledge can be aquired as well: I
know how to ride a bicycle, but this is tacit, not explicit knowledge.
I could show you how it is done, but not explain it to you.
In Searlian terms, the totality of your tacit knowledge would be the
Background of abilities needed to support the Network of your explicit
knowledge and tie it to the world.
> Keep in mind what the point of this example was. I was not saying
> that all words are indefinable. I say that some words are and must
> be indefinable (otherwise, we would have an infinite regress). Now,
> is Jimbo arguing against *this*? Is he arguing that ALL terms are
> definable? If so, I would ask how he hopes to avoid either
> circularity or infinite regress.
My view is that all terms (part of explicit knowledge) can be
defined. The resulting circularities are not a problem, provided the
connection with the Background isn't lost.
One example is the origin of logic. I think it likely that we are
born with some tacit knowledge of logic. That is, we have a "logical
intuition" or "faculty for logic" or whatever you want to call it.
This tacit knowledge need not, of course, be perfect. In fact that
would be rather unlikely. But it should be good enough to allow
observation of the way people argue and what arguments appear
intuitively to be valid to fuel a conceptualization of the rules
apperently followed, a process that ultimately yields an explicit
knowledge of logic. And this explicit knowledge can then be used
normatively to override intuitive judgements.
The kind of circularity that you can see above is a genteel form of
pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. Which is why this kind of
process is known as "bootstrapping".
One thing that I haven't addressed yet is the origin of innate tacit
knowledge. I put the blame on evolution, of course. For more on
this, and for reasons why I don't think anything is wrong with talking
about tacit innate knowledge, see _The Nature of Knowledge_ by Henry
Plotkin (also published as _Darwin Machines and the Nature of
Knowledge_).
--
Olaf Weber
Olaf Weber
> On Fri, 22 Mar 1996, Olaf Weber wrote:
> Survival *is* the primary end of an organism, from the aspect of the
> organism, which is the real biological unit.
Let's take this as a premise, and try to check it. The way to
approach this problem is by reverse engineering, in particular we
assume that organisms function reasonably well. Then we can try to
determine an organism's utility function: on the assumption that an
organism is trying to maximize something (like its chances to live
another day) see if we can determine what it is.
Now observe a very revealing point: many organisms cease to bother
with trying to survive once they've reproduced. The pacific salmon is
a particularly spectacular example. And in all species, members of
either sex will run considerable risks to life and limb in order to be
successful at reproduction.
None of this makes sense if you assume that survival of the organism
is the _primary_ end of the organism, but it makes perfect sense if
reproduction is the primary end, and survival a secondary end that is
derived from and subservient to the primary.
This is a very important point: if you take survival _a priori_ as an
organism's function, then the conclusion is inescapable that they're
not very good at it. If you accept _a priori_ that organisms function
reasonably well, then from that it follows that reproductive success
is their function.
My conclusion is that the premise that an organism's primary function
is its own survival has been checked, and been found invalid.
> The propagation of a particular genetic sequence is a non-necessary
> consequence of individual organismic survival, though a necessary
> consequence of gene-code propagation. Reproduction can be seen as
> the end of the organism only if an organism is considered as an
> instrument in a larger goal, the goal of the preservation of the
> genetic sequence. And this is no goal at all, because there is no
> organism that has it.
If you infer an organism's goals from what it actually does, then it
is clear that successful reproduction is its ultimate goal, and
survival only a means to achieve that goal. What empirical data leads
you to believe otherwise?
> The maintainence of a genetic sequence through time is an *as if* or
> *metaphorical* goal of a certain DNA pattern. It suits us to
> loosely (stolen) conceptualize it thus, but since DNA isn't itself
> alive, it cannot actually survive, and our use of 'goals' in regard
> to DNA cannot be a proper application of the concept.
I'm not ascribing a goal to a DNA pattern, but to the organisms that
carry the pattern, so this objection is irrelevant.
> So, evolution occurs incidentally *because* the organism has first
> survived and because it is, incidentally, an organism with means of
> reproduction. If a mutation were to occur rendering a certain
> litter of puppies infertile, yet otherwise normal, and they went on
> to lead a full dog lifespan, then they would have been
> *biologically* successful organisms, since the biological unit is
> the individual and the individual functioned properly biologically.
> They would, however, be *evolutionary* failures, since they did not
> send on their genetic codes. However, this is not a goal, as I have
> said, of the organism qua organism, but only an *as if* goal of the
> organism qua evolutionary unit.
But once the infertile puppies have grown into dogs, they'll invest as
much time and energy in finding mates as their fertile conspecifics.
Such behaviour of the organism qua organism simply makes no sense,
unless you accept that it is pursuing the goal of reproduction,
unaware of the fact that the attempt is futile because some necessary
preconditions are not met.
And consider the _sterile_ castes of the eusocial insects. Their
behaviour is still understandable in terms of an attempt to maximize
inclusive fitness. (There is some debate about _whose_ inclusive
fitness is maximized, the worker's or its mother's, but that is
another matter.) And these workers often value their lives _less_
than their fertile relatives -- just think of the soldier castes.
Organisms pursue their goals as evolutionary units with far more
vigour than what you take to be their goal as organisms.
>> Biologically speaking, the function of an organism is the
>> propagation of its kind, and while humans may be special, they're
>> not _that_ special. If you die childless then you are failure as
>> far as the your biological function is concerned. (Note that this
>> also provides a counterargument to Rand's indestructible robot: it
>> could value the production of new members of its kind, with all the
>> derived values that come with that.)
> So I think that I have explained why this is simply not true.
And I think I have explained why this _is_ true.
> *Evolutionarily* speaking, the function of an organism is
> propogation.
But we know that evolution shapes biology, and thus that what you call
biological functions are derived from and subservient to evolutionary
functions. Biological functions need not have reproduction as their
immediate effect in order to have it as their ultimate function.
> But this really takes us out of biology and into something more like
> ontology, as strange as that may sound. Evolution is really an
> ontological concept. It identifies conditions for the being of
> certain classes of things across time.
No, evolution characterizes the process by which certain (classes of)
things come into being. And the functioning of those things cannot be
fully understood without the context of the process that produced
them.
> And so too, the acription of an *evolutionary* 'function' to
> organisms is a kind of stolen concept, since we get the idea of
> 'function' first from an understanding of the life of organisms
> independent of an any idea of evolution.
In fact, we probably get an understanding of function from man-made
things and processes (something functions if it serves its purpose).
The dubious step is to apply the concept of function to organisms,
since there is no concious design involved in the process that
produces them. (But if you were to insist, I could just replace
"function" with "adaptedness" and the argument would still stand.)
And once you accept that organisms can have a function, figuring out
what that function is is a matter of reverse engineering.
> Evolution doesn't function in a biological way. It is a causal
> sequence involving biological entities. Evolution just happens to
> extend causally from the identity of biological phenomena, like
> entropy follows causally from the identity of energy fields.
This is backwards: the identity of biological phenomena follows
causally from evolution, the process that produced them.
> I think your robot agument very misguided. 1) robots, like all
> artifacts can only have derivative functions extending from the
> primary function of some biological organism.
This sounds very Searlian, and very wrongheaded. You assume that a
fundamental difference between artifacts and organisms lies in the
latter have "original functionality" or something like it. This is
hardly established.
> 2) reproduction is not a biological value (sexual behavior may be a
> biological value, but the biological unit, the organism, is
> indifferent to whether reproduction follows).
But an organism that has its own survival as its primary goal, should
not pursue reproduction _at all_. If sexual behaviour did not lead
to offspring organisms would not value it. It is just too risky and
time-consuming.
Moreover, I find your assertion that the organism is indifferent to
whether or not reproduction follows rather puzzling. The difference
between successful fertilization and its failure is usually profound,
affecting for example whether or not subsequent sexual behaviour is
valued.
> 3) value, conceptually, is genetically dependent on life and robots
> aren't alive, so robots can't value anything.
It is possible to value things without having a concept of value (or
most organisms do not value things after all). Thus there is no
intrinsic problem with even simple robots valuing things in much the
same way that we speak of organisms valuing things. (Think of the
robot pets I mentioned in another thread.)
And it's a fair bet that if we ever are unlucky enough to meet a
(nearly) indestructible robot, it will be one that values the
reproduction of its kind.
--
Olaf Weber
Michael Huemer
Jimbo wrote:
>> I disagree that "red" is a "simple concept" of the kind you have
>> said that it is. I *can* tell you how to tell the difference between
...
>> dispute. All they have to do is check the frequency of the light as
>> reflected to the eyes.>
In addition to what David said on this, most colors (maybe not red,
because it's at the end of the spectrum) can occur either with a
single frequency (like the frequency corresponding to orange light) or
with a combination of frequencies at the same time (like yellow & red
light). As a result, there doesn't seem to be any *one* thing that,
for example, all orange objects have in common, if you just look at
the frequencies of light.
>relevant scientific information? Suppose you asked Aristotle to define
>red. He would be in roughly the same position that Michael apparently
>believes he is in with regard to "good." He knows what it means, other
>people know what it means, but he cannot give any definition beyond "if
>you see it you know it, and here are some examples." So isn't Michael's
...
I also agree with what David says here.
However, we've conceded too much to Jimbo. Take a color-blind person.
You can tell them what wavelengths of light correspond to 'red',
perhaps even describing in detail the different metamers and the
effects that David mentioned. But would that give them the equivalent
of our understanding of 'red'? Would that enable them to know what
'red' was? I don't think so. It would appear to them just an
arbitrary assemblage, with nothing in common to all the instances. A
color-blind person never understands what *we* mean by "red".
Now if you want to say that the color red is identical with those
collections of light, still there is something that the colorblind
person is unable to understand, and that is not defined by a
description of wavelengths -- you might call it the 'quale' of red or
the sensation of red, or something like that.
Keep in mind what the point of this example was. I was not saying
that all words are indefinable. I say that some words are and must be
indefinable (otherwise, we would have an infinite regress). Now, is
Jimbo arguing against *this*? Is he arguing that ALL terms are
definable? If so, I would ask how he hopes to avoid either
circularity or infinite regress.
Michael Huemer
>the preservation of the genetic sequence. And this is no goal at all,
>because there is no organism that has it. The maintainence of a genetic
>sequence through time is an *as if* or *metaphorical* goal of a certain
>DNA pattern.
Can you explain why you say that it isn't an organism's goal or
'function' to reproduce its own genetic sequence? I understand why
you say the DNA itself doesn't have a goal (because it's not alive),
but why is there no organism that has this as its goal?
From what I understand, your sense of "goals" is not dependent on
consciousness, so it might be my 'goal' to reproduce my genes even if
I don't actually want that, just as plants can have 'goals' even
though they don't have any desires.
>I've done a great deal of de-tasseling out here in Iowa, and I have a
>hard time believing that I rendered all of those corn plant biologically
>unsuccessful, for they still grew and flourished even after my serial
>emasculation.
Again, explain why. For me, your terms "function", "goal",
"successful", "unsuccessful", and "flourish" have virtually no
meaning. I have no idea how I'm supposed to determine whether the
corn plants were 'successful' in your sense or not. I think this is
the problem with teleological ethics: it's hopelessly vague, so much
so that in practice it amounts to intuitionism (you just have to use
your intuitions about what counts as 'flourishing').
Is there such a thing as a *scientific proof* that 'the function' of
an organism is x, or that a particular organism is 'flourishing'? Is
it even theoretically *possible* to have such a thing? If so, can you
describe just one, ideal example of such a thing being proven?
>> Biologically speaking, the function of an organism is the propagation
>> of its kind, and while humans may be special, they're not _that_
...
>So I think that I have explained why this is simply not true.
I don't think you have *explained* why this is not true. You have
*asserted* that it is not true, and none of us are in a position to
refute you because we don't have a clear understanding of what a
'function' of an organism is, and how one discovers them.
Note that this is not like my use of "good", because your use of
"function" is as a *technical term*. I also have strong suspicions
that it derives from a kind of animism and confused attribution of
quasi-mental properties to inanimate objects that was perhaps
excusable in Aristotle's time, but is less so in ours. I suspect that
what vague content there is to your idea of 'goals' is derived from
our understanding of *conscious goals* (i.e. things desired that one
tries to achieve), but then you tell us that we're not to connect your
'goals' with consciousness.
Michael Huemer
>think that's his position. His position is that good is not the sort of
>concept that can be defined. I don't think that's defensible, since it is
>obviously false. Rand has provided the explication of the concept that
>he needs to consider.
Why is that obviously false? Because all concepts are definable? Or
do you admit that there are some indefinable ones, but you think it's
just *obvious* that "good" couldn't possibly be one of them?
What Rand has provided is the *assertion* that "good" means "furthers
an organism's life." So far, that seems to me to be comparable to
'proving' that everyone should obey the Bible, or 'explicating' the
concept of good, by simply saying that "good" means "conforms to the
will of the Deity, as expressed in the Bible." What can you say
against such a claim? Merely that it's obviously false. That just is
not what I or anyone else means by "good". We use "good" as a term of
*positive evaluation*, not a descriptive term. Further proof that
it's false is found in the fact that atheists are very well able to
consider things 'good'.
How does Rand's alleged 'explication' differ from this?
Olaf Weber
> If my layman's understanding of cell biology is correct, every
> division of our cells might weaken the telemerase(?) in our
> chromosomes so that this action alone spells our own eventual demise
> (aging).
As a technical point, what happens is that whenever chromosomes are
duplicated, they become a bit shorter. In normal cells, the
end-points of a chromosome have a special structure, and are called
telomeres. As long as the shortening is confined to the telomeres,
nothing's wrong, but once those have been whittled away, the genes can
get damaged.
Some cells produce an enzyme, telomerase, that prevents the shortening
of the telomeres (apparently by adding a piece before the duplication,
which is then the part that gets lost). The only healthy cells in the
human body that produce telomerase are the germ-line cells, that live
in the testes of ovaries. However, production of telomerase is also
typical of some cancers, leading to the "immortal" strains of human
cancer cells that can be found in laboratoria all over the world.
For a more extensive explanation, see for example the Scientific
American of February 1996, pp 80-85.
> So what facts of reality are we talking about when Objectivists
> assert that survival *is* the primary end of an organism's
> biochemical actions?
I haven't got the faintest idea.
--
Olaf Weber
Gary G Forbis
An event can said to be "good" if it satisfies a human need and has
no consequenses that frustrate the satisfiaction of human needs.
This might be so restrictive as to make the set of good events the Nul
set.
-- gary for...@accessone.com
Tomm Carr
>
> In article <4j7eoj$u...@daffy.cs.utexas.edu>, Al Mok <m...@cs.utexas.edu> wrote:
> >In article <Pine.A32.3.91.960324...@black.weeg.uiowa.edu>,
> In my last posting:
> #Will,
> #
> #end of an organism's actions. Would you at least agree that she has NOT
> #substantiated her claim? I'd think that basing ethics on an UNsubstantiated
> ^^
> #claim is wrong (irrational) by Objectivist standards.
>
AR substantiates her claim in, if memory serves, the first chapter of *The Virtue of Selfishness*
among other places. Hint: it is based on the metaphysical nature of life itself. You may
disagree, but there it is.
AAMOF, I hope you do disagree. I would like to hear your theory as to the primary end of an
organism's actions if it other than survival. I am not being flippant. I really would.
--
Tomm Carr |Philosophers study logical fallacies
| so they won't use them.
|Lawyers & politicians study logical fallacies
| so they can use them more effectively.
Al Mok
David Friedman <dd...@best.com> wrote:
#In article <4j6eai$p...@Venus.mcs.com>, jwa...@MCS.COM (Jimmy Wales) wrote:
#> David Friedman <dd...@best.com> wrote:
#> [Some stuff about the definition of colors being more complex than
#> range of frequency.]
#>
#> Yes. The definition of colors is more complex than I made it out to
#> be. In addition to the frequency of light, you have to take into account
#> certain facts about the human perceptual mechanisms. This doesn't change
#> my basic point.
#
#I'm not sure you are right. Suppose we write a definition of "red" in
#physical terms. We then do some experiments similar to Land's and discover
#some things that look red but do not fit our definition, so we modify the
#definition to include them.
#
#How did you know your original definition was wrong? Because you saw some
#things that were red that didn't fit it. But how did you know they were
#red? It cannot be from the definition--nor will it be from your new
#definition. So it looks as though "red" means "perceived as red," and your
#definition is simply a list, possibly incomplete, of things that are
^^^^^^^^^^
#perceived as red.
Indeed, such definitions may be incomplete in a technical sense.
Consider the definition of "good". We can think of someone's (say Curry's)
brain as providing an implementation of a boolean function GOOD such that
GOOD(x) = true if Curry thinks that x is "good" and false otherwise.
Now, can we give a definition of the GOOD function independent of Curry's
anatomy? If one believes that Curry's brain can compute more than recursive
functions, then GOOD might be one such function and so cannot in general
be defined by an algorithmic method. Even if one believes that Curry's
brain can compute only recursive functions, it is unclear how we can
infer the definition of GOOD from Curry's responses alone without making
at least some "smoothness" assumptions. I think there are some results
in computational learning theory which might bear on this question, but
I rather suspect it is still too early in the game even to know that we are
addressing the right issues. In any case, GOOD should probably be considered
as a functional which complicates matters a tad.
Rand might not have had access to our knowledge about information processing
systems when she was thinking about Objectivist epistemology; it seems that
she didn't consider much about our "inner reality", the nature and limitation
of the human information processing system which is part of reality too.
But Rand certainly was unabashed about her beliefs!
Cheers,
John Alway
>... snip ...<
> that all words are indefinable. I say that some words are and must be
> indefinable (otherwise, we would have an infinite regress). Now, is
> Jimbo arguing against *this*? Is he arguing that ALL terms are
> definable? If so, I would ask how he hopes to avoid either
> circularity or infinite regress.
Objectivism gets around that problem by one of its
most crucial, central tenets: all knowledge ultimately
gets back to the ostensive; the metaphysically given.
Definitions rest upon reality. Reality doesn't
rest upon definitions. So, you can't reverse the
two. And, in fact, the only way to define reality
is by pointing to it.
...John
--
___________________________________________________________________
\_The most formidable weapon against errors of any kind is Reason._\
/_I have never used any other, and I trust I never shall.__________/
\_____________________________________________________Thomas Paine_\
/__John Alway jal...@icsi.net______________________________________/
Robert H. Bass
In a previous article, tomm...@aol.com (Tomm Carr) says:
>Al Mok wrote:
>>
>> #Rand seemed to have made a very strong claim: that survival is the primary
>> #end of an organism's actions. Would you at least agree that she has NOT
>> #substantiated her claim? I'd think that basing ethics on an UNsubstantiated
>> ^^
>> #claim is wrong (irrational) by Objectivist standards.
>>
>
>AR substantiates her claim in, if memory serves, the first chapter of
*The Virtue of Selfishness*
>among other places. Hint: it is based on the metaphysical nature of life
itself. You may
>disagree, but there it is.
>
>AAMOF, I hope you do disagree. I would like to hear your theory as to
the primary end of an
>organism's actions if it other than survival. I am not being flippant.
I really would.
Actually, her claims & arguments on that subject are hopelessly
muddled. On one hand, she seems to want to make use of an Aristotelian
notion of natural end. On the other, she denies the existence of any
teleological principle at work in nature & says that she's just talking
about how organisms in fact act/behave/respond. If she's just talking
about what organisms actually do, then why does she omit the fact that
they die? Why isn't "ending up dead" part of the natural end of an
organism?
There may be sensible use, in a suitably Darwinized framework, for
the notion of natural ends but, if so, it seems that only a selective
& biased reading of the evidence could lead one to think that the content
of the natural ends of all organisms is their own survival. The unit of
selection is not the organism but the gene, & many organisms appear to be
genetically programmed to act in ways that decrease the probability of
their own survival but increase the probability that copies of their
genes will be projected into future generations.
This touches upon one of the bases of my own objection to the use
of the notion of natural ends as a touchstone for ethics. To give only
one example, our sexual drives are no doubt contoured by the conditions
for optimal reproduction in paleolithic environments. Does that mean that
we're somehow immoral if we don't behave in ways that would have led to
optimal reproduction in the Paleolithic? (Or, more simply, the function
of sex is reproduction. Does that make contraception immoral?)
More generally, any sensible, testable theory about the content
of our natural ends is going to appeal to a Darwinian story about how we
are designed by natural selection to pursue that end or those ends. (Of
course, there might be an appeal to a supernatural Designer, but I take
it that [a] that is neither sensible nor testable & [b] is not at issue
in any case in this discussion.) Whatever the details of that Darwinian
story are, it will involve an explanation in terms of the contribution of
the design feature to organisms with it out-reproducing those that lacked
it under conditions extant when the feature was selected for. But there
is no case that those features are always, in an ordinary sense of the
word, good for us now.
Cheers,
Rob
Tony Donadio
: >... snip ...<
: > Keep in mind what the point of this example was. I was not saying
: > that all words are indefinable. I say that some words are and must be
: > indefinable (otherwise, we would have an infinite regress). Now, is
: > Jimbo arguing against *this*? Is he arguing that ALL terms are
: > definable? If so, I would ask how he hopes to avoid either
: > circularity or infinite regress.
I have to wonder what definition of "definable" Mr. Huemer is relying on
here. The "regress" he describes stops with the data of sense-perception
-- which is the base of all human knowledge. Perception is the *given*,
the starting point of human knowledge, on which *everything* else rests.
For elaboration, see Rand's _Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology_,
or Chapter 2 of Dr. Peikoff's _Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand_.
At the base, when one asks you to define something that is perceptually
given, you respond essentially by "pointing." This is what is referred
to as _ostensive definition_.
John Alway wrote:
: Objectivism gets around that problem by one of its
: most crucial, central tenets: all knowledge ultimately
: gets back to the ostensive; the metaphysically given.
This will sound like a nit, but I would NEVER respond to a question with a
sentence that starts with the phrase "Objectivism gets around this by..."
Objectivism does not put forth ideas and then search for ways to "get
around" objections; that would be a process of rationalization.
--
Tony * Money is the material shape of the principle that men who wish
Donadio * to deal with one another must deal by trade and give value for
* value. - Francisco D'Anconia, in ATLAS SHRUGGED, by Ayn Rand
John Alway
> Biologically speaking, the function of an organism is the propagation
> of its kind, and while humans may be special, they're not _that_
> special. If you die childless then you are failure as far as the your
> biological function is concerned. (Note that this also provides a
> counterargument to Rand's indestructible robot: it could value the
> production of new members of its kind, with all the derived values
> that come with that.)
If a doctor told you that you would have to give up
your life if you decided to have children, would you
do so? Let's assume that otherwise you'd live a long
and prosperous life.
And, what of the pleasure pain mechanism? Sex is
a value to me, because it brings great pleasure. This
is something which allows for the enjoyment of life.
If it didn't bring pleasure, I can't see why one
would want to engage in it. IOWs, the value to
ones life is the criterion here.
Al Mok
>AR substantiates her claim in, if memory serves, the first chapter of *The Virtue of Selfishness*
>among other places. Hint: it is based on the metaphysical nature of life itself. You may
>disagree, but there it is.
>
>AAMOF, I hope you do disagree. I would like to hear your theory as to the primary end of an
>organism's actions if it other than survival. I am not being flippant. I really would.
Tomm,
I have read VOS and have in fact had sporadic exchanges with folks on
a.p.o. (e.g., Chris Sciabarra) in the last year. If it is not too much
of an imposition, I'd suggest that you retrieve those postings. I must
confess that I am too lazy to dig them up myself.
In a nutshell, my reading is that Rand's reasoning is at least ambiguous.
Maybe you can help me by rereading VOS and tell me what Rand means (from
the flow of her argument in VOS) by the term *life* when she asserts that
the ultimate motive of a man's every action is his own *life*. To be more
specific, I assume that Rand has the following model of human decision
making:
Whenever faced with a choice, a man asks why he chooses A. He realizes
that he chooses A because he really wants B. He then realizes that
he chooses B because he wants C etc. He finally realizes that he
choices are ultimately for the reason that he wants Z. Z, Rand asserts,
is the man's own survival, and this applies to all of his decisions.
In order for a man to maintain his *life* (survival), he must act in
accordance with his nature _qua man_, i.e., he must eat, drink, sleep.
All the _qua man_ properties refer only to survival needs. Thrills such
as icecreams are not automatically considered to be survival needs
_qua man_ unless one can demonstrate scientifically that the man will
die if deprived of them.
Now for the $64 question: what is man's ultimate goal?
I'd say that I don't know if there is a universal goal
that every man is mandated to go after vis-a-vis his
own nature. There might be enough similarity in our
genetic heritage so that most of us like certain things,
e.g., the beauty of a sunrise, the camaraderie among family
and friends etc. To me, that's why literature, the arts,
religion (in a broad sense, such as Einstein's view) and of
course science are all germane to the $64 question: they all
speak to certain truths about the human condition. Some might
become despondent if they can't have an absolute proof of an ultimate
goal by which to structure their lives, that we might all just
be the manifestation of complex biochemical reactions which are
just there. In my opinion, the human experience is not quite
that bleak. We perceive beauty, we display great curiosity about
the world around us, we feel empathy for our fellow men, we marvel
at the human spirit in overcoming adversity, and we feel sadness
at our misfortunes too.
I rather like the Taoist philosophy in this respect: we don't need
to prop Man up as being heroic or anything; we are what we are.
Life is a journey of discovery we are all privileged to participate
in. Now if someone can tell me whether Lao Tzu really recognizes the
nonrecursiveness of truth ...
Al Mok
#
# Objectivism gets around that problem by one of its
# most crucial, central tenets: all knowledge ultimately
# gets back to the ostensive; the metaphysically given.
#
# Definitions rest upon reality. Reality doesn't
# rest upon definitions. So, you can't reverse the
# two. And, in fact, the only way to define reality
# is by pointing to it.
Larry, Curry and Moe find a contraption which spills out a stream
of numbers:
3 1 4 1 5 9
Larry takes a look at the numbers and says: "Let me define a PIE
machine as a contraption that spills out the digits in the number PI."
Larry then points to the contraption as a _possible_ real-life example
of a PIE machine.
Curry objects: "Nope, you can't talk about a PIE machine if you want to
talk about reality. You can only define things by first observing reality.
You can give a definition for a group of things which you have observed by
identifying their common properties, but no more. We have no evidence to
warrant the definition of a PIE machine. Now based on what we observe,
we can define a PI_PREFIX_n machine if we see a contraption which spills
out the first n digits of the number PI." Curry then points to the
contraption to justify the definition of a PI_PREFIX_6 machine, nodding:
"Yes, now we can talk about PI_PREFIX_6 machines when we talk about reality."
Moe comes along and says: "That depends on what you want to use the definition
for, isn't it? If you want to find an explanation for the behavior of this
contraption, then why not allow Larry's definition of a PIE machine? We can
then use this definition to check the hypothesis that there is a computer
running a program which computes the digits of the number PI inside this
contraption."
These three then try to break open the contraption but without success.
In the meanwhile, the contraption keeps on spilling out the digits of the
number PI. Curry throws up his hands and says: "That's it, boys, the
definition of this contraption changes every time it spills out another
digit. That's reality." Larry shakes his head and says: "I tell you, this
is probably a PIE machine."
Moe takes out a hundred dollar bill from his pocket and announces: "Whoever
guesses the next digit that this contraption spills out wins this."
Cheers,
-- Al Mok
I am having too much fun :-) Gotta get back to work!
John Alway
>
> John Alway <jal...@icsi.net> writes:
>
> >> Jimbo arguing against *this*? Is he arguing that ALL terms are
> >> definable? If so, I would ask how he hopes to avoid either
> >> circularity or infinite regress.
> point to are indefinable, and that "red" would be a perfect example.
Well, yes, in the classical sense, but there is no need
of a definition if you can reference something by pointing
to it, or by recalling it. And, all definitions must rest
upon the ostensive. As an exercise, you might pick a word
out of the dictionary (preferrably a higher level concept),
and trace the genus and differentia of each word back to
the ostensive. A word that can't be tied down is a word
which is meaningless.
Understand, words are what we use to deal with the
huge number of _concretes_ we must deal with every
day. They are a powerful tool because they do allow
us to deal with them.
DEFanyo
In article <formanDo...@netcom.com>, frank forman (for...@netcom.com) writes:
>
>I claim no proof here at all, just opinion and a
>potential line of attack on the issue of
>abortion. Any maybe the fetus does have rights,
>and not we rights to abort them, but we will
>need to better grasp what rights are.
The following is a very bare theory of what rights are and why the
concept of rights came into existence. It does *not* touch on laws
nor government nor even morality per se, but only on when and
why rights are necessary and how they function theoretically. With
one exception, the model is based on two people: You and Me.
Enter at your own peril (and mine! :))
RIGHTS
A stripped-down model
*A right is a political condition necessary to the life of a morally
autonomous being.* Thus the elegant Radcliffe definition, which I
accept without reservation. Rights are abstractions outlining the
necessary conditions between people, such that, if all partake,
then individual freedom obtains.
The operative words in the definition are "morally autonomous"-- in
order to practice moral autonomy, I must be free of interference
from you; in order for you to practice moral autonomy, you must be
free of interference from me. "Moral autonomy" here does *not* mean
that such autonomy necessarily results in morality; it simply means
that I am free to decide what is moral.
Rights are *not* intrinsic. We do not inherit rights. Since our
evolutionary ancestors were not morally autonomous beings, they did
not have rights; we cannot inherit what is not there to inherit.
It was the process of _cultural_ evolution which gave birth to the
idea of individual freedom from the coercion of other men, from
which arose the concept of rights.
Nor are we born with rights -- an infant obviously is not a morally
autonomous being.. Rights are *political (social) conditions*
necessary for morally autonomous beings to live in freedom in
society; the concept of rights applies in every relationship which
that being has with other morally autonomous beings.
It's the desire to live by practicing moral autonomy which creates
the need for rights. It's the basic need for the condition of being
free that creates rights. Rights are necessary only *if* you are to
live in freedom.
Just as there must be a certain number of termites before they
will start building a nest, there must exist two morally autonomous
beings interacting with each other before rights come into
existence. Were you alone on a desert island, rights would not
exist, for I would not be there to coerce you in any way.
You don't own rights, nor do I. You can think of rights forming a
pool between you and me. Theoretically, each of us has full access
to all of them. On the shores of the pool, I can talk about Your
Rights and My Rights, even though neither of us actually *owns*
them, nor are they _in_ us -- they are *conditions*, and neither
you nor I can own conditions.
There is such a pool of rights between any two people who have
anything to do with each other. If I wiolate you by punching you on
the nose, I have in effect thrown the right to not be punched in the
nose out of the pool, and I no longer have access to that right; so
you may punch me in the nose without violating my right because I no
longer have access to that right -- I've thrown it out of the pool
by punching your nose..
Therefore, if I violate *your* rights, at the same time I violate
*mine*, for that right has disappeared from the pool of rights.
A. If I violate your rights, at the same time, I violate mine.
B. To violate my own rights is downright stupid.
C. Therefore, to violate your rights is stupid.
I use the word "stupid" here because such an action is not worthy
of being called "right" or "wrong"; in this context such an action
really _is_ stupid. And "stupid" here does not refer to a low level
of intelligence, but to the misuse of an adequate intelligence.
(Life _always_ penalizes deliberate stupidity. It penalizes
inherent stupidity as well, but that's another matter. )
Thus, if you retaliate against force I have exerted against you,
you're not the one who violates my rights -- I've already violated
my own rights and cleared the way for relatiation.
As soon as restitution has been has taken place, the pool between
you and me again contains the right which was violated.
(If the violation is on-going, such as the welfare state in which
we live, then you and I are no longer wholly morally autonomous
beings.)
It's the idea of living as a morally autonomous being (free of the
interference of other such beings) which gives rise to the concept
of rights. Rights are abstractions -- you can't see them, hear
them, taste them, smell them, nor touch them -- but freedom demands
that you live by them.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism
by those who have not got it. GBShaw
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Brad Aisa
>Keep in mind what the point of this example was. I was not saying
>that all words are indefinable. I say that some words are and must be
>indefinable (otherwise, we would have an infinite regress). Now, is
>Jimbo arguing against *this*? Is he arguing that ALL terms are
>definable? If so, I would ask how he hopes to avoid either
>circularity or infinite regress.
Have you read Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology? Ayn Rand covers all
of this.
Many things can only be defined *ostensively* -- by referring to an
instance. Sensations are one such thing, since they are a phenomenon of
consciousness in response to stimulation of a sensory organ.
The purpose of definitions is to keep one's concepts mutually distinguished
and tied to reality.
Obviously, to avoid circularity, you have to have a final end -- that is
reality. Sooner or later, all rational cognition must rest on percepts,
which are integrated groups of sensations that refer to particular
existents. And as Rand has pointed out, it is percepts that are the root of
cognition, not sensations -- those are identified later, as a scientific
phenomenon, and considering them psychologically requires a great effort of
isolation and abstraction, to isolate them from the percepts they are
automatically integrated into. Cognition does not build up from
definitions, it builds up from percepts and into concepts.
On the subject of color and blindness. It is possible to explain to a blind
person what is color *conceptually* (i.e., "the form in which persons with
the intact faculty of sight experience differing reflected wavelengths of
light reflected from entities"), but not to share an ostensive definition
with them, since they lack the faculty of vision. (Just as we can
understand a bat's echo-locating sense, but not experience it ostensively.)
But senses are only the *means* of becoming aware of reality -- the things
in reality still exist. This is what makes it possible for someone like
Hellen Keller to become completely literate, despite being blind and deaf.
--
Brad Aisa <ba...@hookup.net> web: http://www.hookup.net/~baisa/
1 Mises (M1.00) = 0.01 troy ounce gold; 1 Rand (1R) = 0.01 Mises
"The highest responsibility of philosophers is to serve as the
guardians and integrators of human knowledge." -- Ayn Rand
DEFanyo
In article <315ABF...@icsi.net>, John Alway (jal...@icsi.net) writes:
>Olaf Weber wrote:
>
>> Biologically speaking, the function of an organism is the propagation
>> of its kind, and while humans may be special, they're not _that_
>> special. If you die childless then you are failure as far as the your
>> biological function is concerned. (Note that this also provides a
>> counterargument to Rand's indestructible robot: it could value the
>> production of new members of its kind, with all the derived values
>> that come with that.)
> If a doctor told you that you would have to give up
> your life if you decided to have children, would you
> do so? Let's assume that otherwise you'd live a long
> and prosperous life.
If that same doctor told you that in order to have that long and
prosperous life you'd have to give up sex altogether to insure
that you'd have no children, would you do so? Your question
implies that you want to have your cake and eat it too, so let's
even out the playing field. :-)
> And, what of the pleasure pain mechanism? Sex is
> a value to me, because it brings great pleasure. This
> is something which allows for the enjoyment of life.
> If it didn't bring pleasure, I can't see why one
> would want to engage in it. IOWs, the value to
> ones life is the criterion here.
If I read Olaf correctly, he's saying that if you die without
reproducing, you fail as far as biology is concerned. As an
individual, you may have a fine, successful, happy life and that's
great for you. But biologically, you haven't done much.
Did you ever wonder _why_ you enjoy sex, why it's a pleasure?
Mother Nature cares not one fig for your enjoyment. Your biological
function is to have offspring... don't you think enjoying the
begetting might increase the chances of the species continuing to
exist? I have a _hunch_ that down the evolutionary ages, the
animals that enjoyed sex the most had the most offspring and
therefore had the most to do with the next generation. And down
the generations, sex may have become ever more enjoyable. Then
along came the Big Brain able to think about sex, to anticipate it
and to savor it after the fact, to invent the notion of
romantic love, and the drive becomes intensified beyond anything
known before. Lucky us! But as far as nature is concerned, it's all
about reproduction.
Thinking that sex was built into us purely, of even mainly, for our
enjoyment comes close to saying that flowers are here solely for us
to smell and the stars shine solely for us to admire. We aren't
quite _that_ important in the grand scheme of things, no matter how
important each of us is unto himself. Sometimes you have to take
the long view, see where you fit in the big picture of Life of
Earth; this is one of those times.
Enjoy a childless existence -- with modern medicine (barring
accidents -- nature is very persistent!) it's close to a cinch.
However, do know if you don't reproduce, biologically you haven't
even entered the race.
(Tom Radcliffe and others would hasten to add correctly that if you
help raise some of your kin, then you've helped get _some_ of your
markers -- your genes -- into the next generation. However, there
would never exist a human who is carrying _your_ genes as half of
his inheritance.)
I am _very_ happy that there are people on earth carrying my
genes. I find great joy in thinking about the continuity of life,
about being a bridge between the generations before me and the
generations coming after me, all actors on the great stage of
Life. Life's a wonder...
--Dorothy
Michael Huemer
>: Michael Huemer wrote:
...
>: > Jimbo arguing against *this*? Is he arguing that ALL terms are
>: > definable? If so, I would ask how he hopes to avoid either
>: > circularity or infinite regress.
>I have to wonder what definition of "definable" Mr. Huemer is relying on
>here. The "regress" he describes stops with the data of sense-perception
>-- which is the base of all human knowledge. . .
>For elaboration, see Rand's _Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology_,
>or Chapter 2 of Dr. Peikoff's _Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand_.
Okay, three people have said the same thing here so far, so let me
answer John Alway, Tony, and Brad at once, and hopefully forestall any
further repetitions.
First, yes, I have read ITOE and the beginning of OPAR, as well as
several other of Rand's books, including Atlas, The Fountainhead, We
the Living, Night of January 16th, Anthem, Philosophy: Who Needs It,
The Romantic Manifesto, and The Virtue of Selfishness. There is
therefore no need to recommend to me any more reading of Rand.
Second, I meant by a 'definition' an explanation of the meaning of a
word in simpler terms; or an analysis of a concept in terms of simpler
concepts. I wouldn't consider pointing at something to be a
'definition', though this is a verbal issue.
Third, if you look at the context, Jimbo was arguing that color terms
like "red" can be defined *in that sense*, i.e. verbally defined,
specifically, by a description of light reflectance spectra. This is
what I objected to. I said that "red" is a *simple* concept and could
not be 'defined' for that reason (i.e. it can't be analyzed in terms
of simpler ideas).
Finally, the larger context was a discussion of my view of "good",
which is that good is also simple and therefore indefinable in the
same way. Now, if you want to count listing *examples* of a category
as 'defining' it, then you CAN do that for "good", just as you can for
what you call 'ostensively defined' terms.
Michael Huemer
> upon the ostensive. As an exercise, you might pick a word
> out of the dictionary (preferrably a higher level concept),
> and trace the genus and differentia of each word back to
> the ostensive. A word that can't be tied down is a word
> which is meaningless.
Well, you can't literally point to a universal, which is what all (or
almost all) of the terms in the dictionary are going to refer to. The
exceptions will be where it might have an entry for "Napoleon" or
"Mount Everest", but it's clear that those things won't be enough to
form all concepts. "Red", for example, refers to a universal. You
can't literally point to redness as such. What you can do is point to
several instances of 'red', and then say that by "red" you mean the
property that all of those instances have in common.
But that is just what I say you have to do with "good", so where's the
problem in my view? True, the instances you list in the case of
"good" will be other universals (like 'happiness', 'beauty',
'freedom'), but I don't see why that should be a problem.
David Friedman
> help raise some of your kin, then you've helped get _some_ of your
> markers -- your genes -- into the next generation. However, there
> would never exist a human who is carrying _your_ genes as half of
> his inheritance.)
...
> --Dorothy
Each of my parents is carrying half of my genes, for the same reason that
I am carrying half of each of theirs. On average and ex ante, my sister is
also carrying half of my genes (ignoring some comlications re X and Y
chromosomes).
Or is "your genes" supposed to mean genes in my cells? In that sense, my
children are not carrying my genes either--just copies.
David Friedman (who agreed with most of the rest of Dorothy's post)
John Alway
> John Alway <jal...@icsi.net> writes:
> > upon the ostensive. As an exercise, you might pick a word
> > out of the dictionary (preferrably a higher level concept),
> > and trace the genus and differentia of each word back to
> > the ostensive. A word that can't be tied down is a word
> > which is meaningless.
> Well, you can't literally point to a universal, which is what all (or
> almost all) of the terms in the dictionary are going to refer to.
I realize this, but universals are only possible because
there are instances. Concepts are formed _from_ concretes.
To be more technical, you need three or more concretes to
form a concept. The third being the CCD, which you are
probably familiar with from ITOE.
It is the concretes subsumed under the concept (the universal)
which you have to be able to find in order to give meaning
to a word.
> The
> exceptions will be where it might have an entry for "Napoleon" or
> "Mount Everest", but it's clear that those things won't be enough to
> form all concepts. "Red", for example, refers to a universal. You
> can't literally point to redness as such.
What you can do is point to things which are red. Redness
isn't made up out of thin air, afterall. The concept is
useful because there are red things in existence.
> What you can do is point to
> several instances of 'red', and then say that by "red" you mean the
> property that all of those instances have in common.
Exactly! And this is the point. Without this, concepts
would be meaningless. I think your trouble is that you aren't
taking the _order_ of concept formation seriously. There is
only one order by which they can be formed, and that is from
the concrete particulars to the abstract.
> But that is just what I say you have to do with "good", so where's the
> problem in my view? True, the instances you list in the case of
> "good" will be other universals (like 'happiness', 'beauty',
> 'freedom'), but I don't see why that should be a problem.
You did have a problem in your order, but, otherwise,
what you say above is absolutely right! There are
endless instances of living organisms thriving and
perishing which allow one to derive the concept "good."
In fact, you might have noted in Ayn Rand's approach to
ethics, that she hunts down the facts which give rise
to the concept "value."
Billy Beck
tdon...@panix.com (Tony Donadio) wrote:
>This will sound like a nit, but I would NEVER respond to a question with a
>sentence that starts with the phrase "Objectivism gets around this by..."
>Objectivism does not put forth ideas and then search for ways to "get
>around" objections; that would be a process of rationalization.
Well, "Objectivism" might not do that, but *Objectivists* do.
Witness the "monopoly of force" dispute.
Billy
http://www.mindspring.com/~wjb3/free/free.html
"Rant" updated 2/19/96
haskell jack
<re: Al Mok>
You appear to be confused about the nature of Objectivism and the
terms it makes use of such as "man qua man".
In Objectivism, there is no artificial division between mental and
physical nature of man in that phrase. The survival of man qua man
means the survival of the autonomous whole, minus any contrived mental
and physical dichotomy.
Yet your argument proceeds from the physical survival traits of your
own particular notions of Objectivism to the more mental type survival
traits, that you don't see (or don't want to see) in Objectivism.
I don't believe that Ms Rand left any room for that type of
misunderstanding or misinterpretation.
You say you rather like the Taoist Philosophy, I think that is just
fine, for you. Taoism or Zen seems to be more appropiate to the kind
of mind/body dichotomy you seem to prefer.
/jack
haskell jack
>An event can said to be "good" if it satisfies a human need and has
>no consequenses that frustrate the satisfiaction of human needs.
Well, it doesn't cover distinctions between rational and irrational
needs. And addict needs his fix, but his desire doesn't make his
choice rational.
/jack
Michael Huemer
>> But that is just what I say you have to do with "good", so where's the
>> problem in my view? True, the instances you list in the case of
>> "good" will be other universals (like 'happiness', 'beauty',
>> 'freedom'), but I don't see why that should be a problem.
>
> You did have a problem in your order, but, otherwise,
> what you say above is absolutely right! There are
I'm glad we seem to agree here.
However, the difference between me and Ayn Rand is that she thinks you
can explain "good" by a verbal definition, analyzing it in terms of
simpler concepts. You can, according to Objectivism, define "good"
something like "serves my (the speaker's) life". I say that you
cannot define "good" in this sense.
Consider an analogy: Consider the prospect of defining "table".
Well, you can point to a lot of examples of tables and say, "See,
these sorts of things are all called 'tables.'" However, you can ALSO
do something else: you can give a VERBAL definition of "table",
something like this: "a piece of furniture having an elevated, flat
surface, intended for supporting other, smaller objects." Let's
distinguish these two things as "definition by examples" and
"verbal definition" (or "definition by description").
But in the case of "red" you can give ONLY a 'definition by examples';
you cannot give a verbal definition.
Now here's my difference with Rand: She seems to think that you could
give both kinds of 'definition' of "good". I think that you can
*only* give 'definition by examples'; you cannot give a verbal
definition of "good".
DEFanyo
True -- and I did mean copies of the same genes. :-)
Thanks for bringing up a point which I failed to make clear.
However, my sister is carrying only _some_ genes which correspond
to the genes I'm carrying from our in-common mother and father.
The combination of genes from parents of two siblings ,while having
some correspondence, can vary considerably or my sister and I would
be identical twins.
However, the point still holds. If I were childless and helped
raise my neices and nephews, daughters and sons of my sister, I
would be furthering the continuity of some, but not half, of the
genes I carry.
haskell jack
The natural end or outcome of the life of a rational being should be
happiness, at least according to Aristotle and Ms Rand, it should be.
But as also should be noted, happiness or sense of well being, is an
internal quality, not an external one.
/jack
Eric Taneda
>Finally, the larger context was a discussion of my view of "good",
>which is that good is also simple and therefore indefinable in the
>same way. Now, if you want to count listing *examples* of a category
>as 'defining' it, then you CAN do that for "good", just as you can for
>what you call 'ostensively defined' terms.
If "good" is a sensation, as opposed to judgment, why is it that
different people consider different things to be good? Why does
the religious terrorist, for example, consider killing innocent
people in the "service of God" to be good, while most people
consider the same thing to be bad?
This curious disagreement does not exist with respect to sensory
data, such as color, size, etc.
Gary G Forbis
You're right about the addict and "needs" but I specifically didn't
separate rational and irrational needs. I did this because I believe
human needs are not appropriately so classified.
While I need to eat I don't know why a need to eat should be
thought of as a rational need.
-- gary for...@accessone.com
Gary G Forbis
"Good" is an exceptionally weak sense data. In many respects its
identification is taught by the blind to the blind. Should it come
as any surprize when the blind misidentify the color of objects or
that the sighted taught by the blind misidentify the color of objects?
"Good" and "bad" are taught very early in life. It is exceptionally
hard to change a person's classifications for thse terms. When I've
seen it done most often through authoritarian principles rather than
an openning of one's eyes.
-- gary for...@accessone.com
Michael Huemer
>> If "good" is a sensation, as opposed to judgment, why is it that
>> different people consider different things to be good? Why does
Good isn't a sensation or a judgement. It's a property of states of
affairs.
There are lots of reasons why people disagree about what properties
things have. People disagree about whether God exists, and if so,
what he wants us to do. What does that show?
Al Mok
#You lost me at the very first point. He chooses A *because* he really
#wanted B??? That doesn't make sense and is certainly nothing I get from
#*anything* that AR wrote. I'm afraid you will have to ellaborate on this.
Tomm, here A is a subgoal of a deeper goal B, e.g., I want to start my car
(goal A) because I want to go to my office (goal B). This is from Rand's
VOS where she also makes the claim that there is no such thing as an
unending chain of goals related by the "subgoal" relation.
#> In order for a man to maintain his *life* (survival), he must act in
#> accordance with his nature _qua man_, i.e., he must eat, drink, sleep.
#> All the _qua man_ properties refer only to survival needs. Thrills such
#> as icecreams are not automatically considered to be survival needs
#> _qua man_ unless one can demonstrate scientifically that the man will
#> die if deprived of them.
#
#You are simply not making a distinction between that which man needs for
#survival qua biological lifeform and that which he needs to survive qua
#man. To be fair -- neither does AR. The "qua life" requirements are a
#subset of the "qua man" requirements (in order to survive as *man*, he
#must first survive) and are generally the same as for any other
#warm-blooded mammal. However, for the purposes of discussion, I will
#treat the "qua life" and "qua man" requirements as if they were separate,
#as long as we keep in mind that one is contained in the other and sometimes
#the distictions between them can be arbitrary.
So I take it that you regard man's ultimate goal as: to live a life *qua man*
and not just to survive physically. Fine, but without being more specific about
what life *qua man* entails, I don't think you have a precise way to judge
whether an action is ethical or not. If Rand intends to establish a precise
theory on how man should behave ethically, she needs to justify why some goal
is *qua man* and another is not. If she leaves this to be open to individual
interpretation of what *qua herself* means, then I don't think she has an
objective theory of ethics, e.g., on what grounds should the desires of an
individual be allowed/disallowed to dictate what is ethical for herself?
#What is the nature of that which man requires to survive qua man? Man's mind,
#his ability to reason and form abstract concepts, is man's main tool of
#survival. He must use it to satisfy his biological needs *and* his psychological
#needs.
I think people's psychological needs do differ in some ways. Some people
might feel a psychological need to help those in despair while others might
have less of such a psychological compulsion. Should the former regard the
latter as unethical or vice versa? By what agent-independent criterion should
we use to decide who is right?
#When AR discusses the mind of man, it is in the context of its function as his
#tool for survival. She recognizes that each man must *choose* to use his mind,
#must choose to think. But her unvoiced assumption is that the choice *to survive*
#has already been made. In *The Objectivist Ethics*, she writes:
# Life can be kept in existence only by a constant process of self-
# sustaining action. The goal of that action, the ultimate *value*
# which, to be kept, must be gained through its every moment, is the
# organism's *life*. [Emphasis hers]
I am not so sure if the quote above makes an unvoiced assumption of choosing
survival as a precondition to Rand's ethics theory. It seems to be an assertion
about man's ultimate value which Rand might have intended to back up.
If it is indeed Rand's unvoiced assumption, such an assumption should be
justified by the facts of reality. The usual response that I have seen
Objectivists made is along the line: "If you don't choose to live, then you will
just die and there won't be any more ethical decisions for you to worry about."
This type of response is simply bad logic.
Suppose one chooses something other than survival, say X as the ultimate motive
for all of one's actions. If X is consistent with one's survival, then one
might or even must try to survive in order to attain X. It is only when X and
survival are at odds that one has to consider a life-or-death decision.
In real life, I rather doubt if people ordinarily make choices this way.
I think most people would forgo some measure of security to gain what makes
life worth living, e.g., speaking for myself, I still go skiing even though
this sport is certainly not risk-free. For many people, I suspect that it is
unrealistic to characterize ultimate goals by binary choices instead of more
complicated tradeoffs.
#But actions do not have goals. The organism performing the action has a goal
#it wishes to reach when it performs the action. Is the *ultimate* value life?
#Man, either as an individual man or as Mankind, has no intrinsic purpose or
#goal. But his survival , qua man, *requires* a goal! Other animals do not
#question their own existence. They do what they need for their individual
#survival; they breed for the survival of the species; they die. They have no
#goals; they require none.
Preconditioning a theory of ethics by the needs of survival and taking
this precondition for granted is tantamount to mandating survival to be man's
ultimate goal. I doubt if you really mean to depend on this line of
argumentation. Please follow the responses to Will Wilkinson's postings in this
thread. The identification of an organism's goal can be rather tricky.
#Man's mind must provide what he needs to survive. That is brilliantly covered
#in the writings of AR. What she failed to consider is that man's mind must
#also provide him the *desire* to continue living -- goals.
Ok, Tomm, maybe I should have asked you what Rand considers as man's
ultimate *desire*.
#Instead of existence projecting its meaning upon man, it is man who must
#project his meaning upon existence.
#
#But in accepting meaning from god, king, or family, we convince ourselves that
#meaning was external -- somewhere "out there". That is why the Egoist
#philosophy is rejected with so much passion by many. While not being able to
#muster logical arguments against it (witness the vitriol right here in apo),
#they nevertheless realize that it represents a tremendous threat. Not only
#must we take responsibility for our own survival, we must find our own meaning
#of life -- our own reason to survive. I can bear witness that the "switch over"
#from externally directed goals to internally directed goals -- from *finding*
#the meaning of life to *producing* meaning in life -- is an uncomfortable
#process. As you can imagine, any existing self-doubt can magnify that
#discomfort to sheer torture.
Interesting how our perspectives differ! I don't think the egoist philosophy
is viewed with suspect by many because people find it difficult to switch from
externally directed goals to internally directed ones. For one thing, I think
the egoist philosophy means different things to different people. For example,
consider an atheist who empathizes with the poor so much that he feels compelled
to devote his life working in the slums. Why can't we say that this atheist
has found his own meaning of life? If by "internally directed" you mean
benefitting the Self, is or is not this man's goal of helping the poor
"internally directed"? Surely, he has not been directed by an external authority,
like God, to help the poor. Can we say that this man is an egoist/altruist
short of reading his mind?
Egoism is suspect to me because I think that it is within our nature to have
needs as an individual *and* also as a social animal; egoism, to the extent
that it is unambiguously defined and vigorously defended by Objectivists,
seems to ignore those aspects of man's nature as a social animal. We care
about our own family, community and mankind (to different degrees) because
we are capable of having empathy for other human beings, and not necessarily
because we have been told by authority figures to do so. Is it possible that
your perspective might be culturally induced since Christianity looms so large
in Western culture?
#Goals, like rights, are individual in nature. There are no group goals. A
#group of men may share a common goal, just as they may share a common idea.
#But a group goal, like a group thought, would require a group mind -- which
#does not exist.
If you could indulge my curiosity :) suppose someone comes up with a proof
that the functioning of our minds can be explained by a conflict resolution
mechanism S which takes as inputs the behavior of a number of autonomous
"faculties" and that our consciousness is the output of S whose inputs are
not accessible through introspection. Would you consider these faculties as
constituting a group mind?
Cheers,
-- Al Mok
Actually, the last question is my crude way to get a data point on what people
would intuitively consider to be a "distributed system".
Al Mok
haskell jack <mei...@chelsea.ios.com> wrote:
#You appear to be confused about the nature of Objectivism and the
#terms it makes use of such as "man qua man".
Jack, maybe you can clarify things by specifying the decision procedure by
which Rand would have us determine whether an action is "qua man" or not,
and support your interpretation by Rand's nonfictional writings.
#In Objectivism, there is no artificial division between mental and
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
#physical nature of man in that phrase. The survival of man qua man
#means the survival of the autonomous whole, minus any contrived mental
#and physical dichotomy.
From Rand's indestructible robot analogy, it'd seem to me that Rand uses
the term survival to means physical survival. Of course, a man probably
won't survive for long if he doesn't engage his mental capacity, but I'd
think it matters to recognize the difference between:
(M1) Being dead
and
(M2) Alive but in various degrees of unhappiness
In saying that Objectivism makes no such artificial division, are you
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
saying that (M1) and (M2) are compatible under all circumstances, in the
context of man's ultimate goal? I think it is rather farfetched to consider
a cancer patient who is undergoing painful therapy a happy person,
although we might not be able to directly measure his emotional state.
#Yet your argument proceeds from the physical *survival* traits of your
#own particular notions of Objectivism to the more mental type *survival*
#traits, that you don't see (or don't want to see) in Objectivism.
#
#I don't believe that Ms Rand left any room for that type of
#misunderstanding or misinterpretation.
But this is how Rand's argument seems to flow in her Virtue of Selfishness!
In VOS, Rand first asserts that physical survival is the primary motive
for the actions of all (not only man) living organisms, and then she
specializes the argument *qua man*. Accordingly, an activity is *qua man*
only if it is required for the individual's physical survival. This
interpretation is consistent with somebody who wants to come up with an
contextually absolute theory of ethics. I think Rand tried to ground her
theory on a decidable (by observing reality) property such as physical
survival.
I must say that I find Rand's writing to be sufficiently imprecise as to
make it hard to pin down her meaning. From what you said above, I take
it that you consider life as meaning more than *not being dead* in the
context of man's ultimate goal. Yet, you refer to *survival* [emphasis
mine] both times. Surely, you are not saying that whatever a man feels
that he needs to do is by default needed for his survival. So you do
admit that there is a dichotomy between (M1) and (M2), yes?
What I don't see in Objectivism is an unambiguous specification of what
*qua life* means if it includes quality-of-life properties in addition
to what is required for physical survival. I'd also expect a justification
for such, in a manner which is at least consistent with the facts of
reality, as can be established by the scientific method.
#You say you rather like the Taoist Philosophy, I think that is just
>in this outlook on life
#fine, for you. Taoism or Zen seems to be more appropiate to the kind
#of mind/body dichotomy you seem to prefer.
Jack, if by mind/body dichotomy you mean recognizing the difference between
(M1) and (M2) above, I'd plead guilty as charged. If you are asking me
whether I consider the complex processes inside our brains (however little
I understand them) to be just like any other physical process, then I'd
plead ignorance, although I see no reason why the same set of physical laws
which govern other aspects of the physical world should not apply to our
brains too.
Cheers,
-- Al Mok
I don't claim to be an expert in Taoism or Zen, but I think it is bad form
to lump Taoism and Zen together. Taoist philosophy (as opposed to Taoist
religion) is indigenous in China, while Zen is the school of Buddhism (which
originates from India) that is particularly popular in Japan. My limited
understanding of Taoism (classical Chinese is difficult :( to read) is that it
does not recognize different types of laws as governing the body and the mind.
While there might be some similarities between Taoism and Zen, I am not sure
if Zen Buddhism acknowledges a mind/body dichotomy or even what such a term
might mean in Zen Buddhism. To me, Taoism and Buddhism are quite different in
their outlooks on life.
DEFanyo
Yes! And, just as important, it *originates* inside. No one else,
nor any set of circumstances, can make you happy at the core --
either can make you *happier*, like adding some frosting to the
cake. But you have to furnish the cake.
Life's _sorta_ like a party. If you go and do nothing but sit
silent and poker-faced, waiting for someone to come along to make
you enjoy the party, you'll probably be a long time waiting -- and
if someone does approach you, it will be that downer coming to tell
you what a boring gathering it is.
If, on the other hand, you stride into the party, happy and
confident, with your own enjoyment shinning, it's amazing how others
will gather and add to that enjoyment of a great party. Evident
happiness draws -- like nectar draws bees.
Nathaniel Branden and Harry Browne have much to say about the way
things work... about visibility.
Happiness, at the core, is dependent on what you think of
yourself... all other things you're happy _about_ are added, not
the cause of...
David Friedman
> Thanks for bringing up a point which I failed to make clear.
> However, my sister is carrying only _some_ genes which correspond
> to the genes I'm carrying from our in-common mother and father.
> The combination of genes from parents of two siblings ,while having
> some correspondence, can vary considerably or my sister and I would
> be identical twins.
>
> However, the point still holds. If I were childless and helped
> raise my neices and nephews, daughters and sons of my sister, I
> would be furthering the continuity of some, but not half, of the
> genes I carry.
>
> --Dorothy
Of course the combination of genes varies between you and your sister. It
also varies between you and your children. Your genes are (ignoring some
fine points) a random draw of half your father's genes and half your
mother's. So are your sister's. So any one of your father's genes (say)
that you have, your sister has a 50% chance of having. So on average, your
sister has half of your genes. The only significant difference between the
case of your sister and your daughter is that your daughter has exactly
half of your genes, while your sister has on average half of your genes,
but might have more or less.
Your nieces and nephews have, on average, a quarter of your genes--just
like your grandchildren.
If you were childless and helped bring up one younger sibling you would,
on average, be furthering the continuity of half your genes, just as you
would by bringing up your own child. The same is true for bringing up two
nieces or two grandchildren (although in both of those cases, "half your
genes" might include the case of two each of a quarter of your genes--I am
weighting my average by the number of people carring each gene). Raising
more than two neices and nephews does more towards the survival of your
genes than raising one daughter.
David Friedman
Lance Neustaeter
On 28-Mar-96 13:58:38, DEFanyo de...@teekay.win.net wrote:
> *A right is a political condition necessary to the life of a morally
> autonomous being.*
I would question this. I have had my rights violated, and I'm still
alive (and morally autonomous, if we are using the same definition of
that term).
> The operative words in the definition are "morally autonomous"-- in
> order to practice moral autonomy, I must be free of interference
> from you; in order for you to practice moral autonomy, you must be
> free of interference from me. "Moral autonomy" here does *not* mean
> that such autonomy necessarily results in morality; it simply means
> that I am free to decide what is moral.
Wouldn't that be political autonomy? Normal humans *are* morally
autonomous as long as they have their rational faculty.
For another view on rights you may wish to look up:
http://www.jim.com/jamesd/rights.html
Lance
--
. . . I have found that Objectivism is its own protection against
people who might attempt to use it as a dogma. --Ayn Rand
DEFanyo
In article <1058.666...@portal.ca>, Lance Neustaeter (la...@portal.ca) writes:
>
>On 28-Mar-96 13:58:38, DEFanyo de...@teekay.win.net wrote:
>
>> autonomous being.*
>
>alive (and morally autonomous, if we are using the same definition of
>that term).
Without the concept of rights, one could not live as a morally
autonomous being in a political (social) world. You and I are
reading that definition from different viewpoints.
>> The operative words in the definition are "morally autonomous"-- in
>> order to practice moral autonomy, I must be free of interference
>> from you; in order for you to practice moral autonomy, you must be
>> free of interference from me. "Moral autonomy" here does *not* mean
>> that such autonomy necessarily results in morality; it simply means
>> that I am free to decide what is moral.
>
>Wouldn't that be political autonomy? Normal humans *are* morally
>autonomous as long as they have their rational faculty.
But rights _are_ in the political (social) domain. Rights for a
person living alone is a useless concept -- there's no one to
interfere with him. That's one point I made: rights are not _in_ a
person; they operate _between_ people. Note the definition again:
"A right is a political condition..."
>For another view on rights you may wish to look up:
>
>http://www.jim.com/jamesd/rights.html
I tried... Netscape told me it couldn't find the DNS, whatever that
means...(I'm an Internet newbie.) And, yes, I checked that I had
the URL typed as above. Netscape was adamant.
--Dorothy