Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: Notesfiles; site hpfclp.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxt!houxm!vax135!cornell!uw-beaver!tektronix!hplabs!hpfcdc!hpfcla!mike
From: mike@hpfcla.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.books
Subject: Re: Re: Objectivism, mysticism don't mix
Message-ID: <4500029@hpfclp.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 21-Oct-85 16:33:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: hpfclp.4500029
Posted: Mon Oct 21 16:33:00 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 25-Oct-85 04:26:47 EDT
References: <2388@sunybcs.UUCP>
Organization: 21 Oct 85 14:33:00 MDT
Lines: 106

>> This should probably go in net.philosophy, but I refuse to post anything
>> into that epistemological black plague of a notesfile.

> Looks as if the plague is spreading ...

You don't know how far it has spread.

> Rand's identification of existence and perception is plausible at first,
> but it ignores the Gestalt principle of perception: that we can
> perceive things only as contrasts.  To perceive an apple, or a toothache,
> or love, or ghosts, or free will, you must distinguish it from what it
> is not.  I suspect that this is what Aristotle meant by the primacy of
> dialectic, though he seems to have stood the principle on its head.

Perception is a cognitive process fueled by sensory input and controlled
by  discrimination.  This process is a characteristic  of man, but it is
not his  distinguishing  characteristic.  It is possessed  by other life
forms; it is automatic,  absolute, and it is not capable of "distorting"
reality.  When you perceive, you see your subject as distinguished  (not
contrasted)   from  all  other   existents;  you  observe  the  physical
properties  that  distinguish  your  subject  as  a  genuine   existent.
Perception tells you that existents exist, your conceptual faculty tells
you what the existents are.

Man's  distinguishing  characteristic  is his  conceptual  faculty;  his
ability to form concepts out of percepts; to reason about  concepts in a
non-contradictory  way, to  test  his  knowledge  against  an  objective
reality.  Concepts  do not free man  from the  bounds  of  reality,  but
instead  allow  him to  understand  it,  and  thus  use  reality  to his
advantage;  that is, to further  his life.  How good a concept is can be
measured by how closely it tracks reality.  If a contradiction is found,
it's the concept  that's in error, not reality.  Percepts  tells us that
something exists; concepts tell us what it is.

> Hence all perceived reality is a plexus of relativism.  If you can
> accept this--better still, if you can verify it in your own experience--
> then the arguments against "anti-concepts" and "unreality" lose their
> force.  We are surrounded by things that we can perceive but do not
> exist (like Mickey Mouse) or exist but cannot be perceived (like the
> Tao).  They nevertheless serve us well, to instruct and entertain us,
> and to contrast in a relevant way with reality.  

To  claim  something  is  perceptible,  but does not  exist is  flagrant
contradiction  in terms.  That which does not exist, has no  properties,
attributes,   or   characteristics.  To  perceive   that  which  has  no
properties,  attributes, or  characteristics  is to perceive nothing; to
perceive  nothing is to contradict the meaning (the concept) of the word
"perceive".  Your cartoon  character  exists qua cartoon  character, and
nothing  more.  Concepts  are not made of rubber; you cannot  invalidate
man's perceptual faculty by asserting that your concept is not concrete;
you have merely tripped (and fallen) on a metaphysical  stepping  stone.
A cartoon character IS a cartoon  character and there is nothing more to
say about it.

To claim  that  something  exists,  but is not  perceptible  is  another
contradiction in terms.  Man's conceptual faculty is fueled by percepts.
To  formulate  a  concept  means  to  integrate  percepts  into a  class
distinguished by some identifying  property(s).  To formulate a concept,
with no percepts  (e.g.  no basis in reality) is to formulate a useless,
unsubstantiated,  unprovable  notion.  People  who say they  "feel"  the
presence of God, the Tao, Jesus, etc., have abandoned  their  perceptual
faculty  and are  using  their  feelings  as  tools  of  cognition.  But
feelings do not tell you the facts of  reality,  they are simply a meter
of your  emotional  well-being.  Feelings  will not tell  you if it will
rain  tomorrow,  feelings will not tell you what is wrong with your T.V.
set,  feelings  will  not  tell  you the  structure  and  properties  of
sub-atomic  particles;  feelings do not tell you ANYTHING about reality.
People who fuel their  conceptual  faculty with feelings  form  concepts
based on their  current  emotional  state.  It is sickening  to hear how
many of these  concepts  (anti-concepts)  abound.  If I were to tell you
that I feel the  presence  of a  super-being  who has five  heads,  eats
asteroids,  and writes  poetry,  are you going to believe  me?  I do not
perceive  such a being  but I claim  that I FEEL  its  presence;  Do you
believe me?  This  super-being has the same  epistemological  stature as
God,  Jesus,  the  Tao, ad  infinitum;  that  is, a  severe  lack of any
perceptible sensory data.  They do not exist.  The burden of proof is on
the one who claims they do.

> On the other hand, Rand appears to share one principle with some
> mystics: that you will be happier dwelling among your perceptions than
> among your thoughts and abstractions.  This is also a tenet of the
> Gestalt school of psychotherapy; if it indeed has therapeutic value (as
> I believe), it may account for the evangelical fervor of some
> objectivists.

This is an  insolent  lie.  Man  cannot  survive  except  by  using  his
conceptual faculty.  Rand was the most ardent advocate of reason in more
than a century.  This is why she appeals to me:

  "Man  cannot  survive  except  through  his  mind.   He  comes to earth
   unarmed.  His brain is his only weapon. Animals  obtain food by force.
   Man has no  fangs,  no horns, no great  strength  of  muscle.  He must
   plant  food or hunt it.  To plant, he needs a process of  thought.  To
   hunt, he needs  weapons,  and to make  weapons--a  process of thought.
   From this  simplest  necessity to the highest  religious  abstraction,
   from the wheel to the skyscraper,  everything we are and everything we
   have  comes  from a  single  attribute  of  man--the  function  of his
   reasoning mind."

From:  The  Fountainhead.  Note  that  the use of the  word  "religious"
above does not refer to the  institution  of  religion  or  contemporary
religious  ideas, but rather man's  exaltation  in  discovering  what is
possible by the efforts of his own mind.

Michael Bishop
hplabs!hpfcla!mike-b