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From: berman@psuvax1.UUCP (Piotr Berman)
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: Ayn  Rand's  definitions of force and reason
Message-ID: <1929@psuvax1.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 18-Dec-85 13:13:06 EST
Article-I.D.: psuvax1.1929
Posted: Wed Dec 18 13:13:06 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 20-Dec-85 03:46:57 EST
References: <1482@hound.UUCP> <1910@psuvax1.UUCP> <309@l5.uucp> <1915@psuvax1.UUCP> <332@l5.uucp>
Organization: Pennsylvania State Univ.
Lines: 72

> What I don't understand is why Piotr Berman thinks that feelings and reason
> are not related to each other in the form ``your feelings are caused by your
> beliefs about reality''.  (I suspect that it us because he has other
> beliefs about reality!)  Considering that this is one of the current hot
> theories about depression is psychiatry today, I suppose I should not be
> surprised.
>
> If my belief is correct then there is no problem whatsoever in deciding
> ethics by reason (at least in theory -- at a practical level it is a
> tough problem).

I did not say that feelings and reason are not related.  What I said is that
feelings cannot be reduced to reason.

Consider the following example: one person (say, Euclides) claims that
given a point A on a plane P and a stright line s1 on P, there exists
exactly one stright line s2 such that s2 contains A and s1 and s2 do
not intersects in one point only.  Another person (say, Lobachevsky) claims
that there may be many such lines s2.  The logic shows that if one claim
is consistent, so is the other.

In my views the connection of beliefs and reason should be similar
to the connection between axioms of say, geometry, and logic.  To
claim that logic is sufficient and axioms unnecessary is just false.

> .......................
> Clearly there are a few principles which one uses in trying to create an
> ethic, but I do not believe that they are emotionally based.  For
> instance, while the use of force on human beings disgusts me, I do not
> believe that the disgust is what lead me to believe that you should not
> do this -- rather it is my belief that human beings are valuable which
> causes me to be disgusted.  (If I were not disgusted, I would realise that
> for all I claim to believe that human beings are valuable, in some
> fundamental way I deny this and would try to find and change this problem.)
     
OK, you believe that humans are valuable.  I do not see any reason why
this is the case, nor do I see a possibility to find a reason.  "Valuable"
is not an actual characteristic, based on observation.  It is a value
judgment.  Reason should enlighten us about the consequences of our value
judgments, to avoid nasty conclusions and/or contradictions.  Still,
what does it mean 'valuable'?  Having a market value (like in a statement
'people are earning as much as they are worth')?  As you see, it is
difficult to state your primary beliefs in a precise fashion.

> It is reasonable to ask the question ``why do I think that human beings are
> valuable'' but, although I could demark certain qualities which I value
> which are posessed by human beings, you could back this up again and ask
> and at some point I would say ``because this is self-evident''.  Here is
> as good a place to stop for the purpose of argument as any.  Some
> philosophers have claimed that all self-evident truths are emotional ones.
> I believe that they are way off the mark here.  Self-evident truths are
> rational truths, because to deny them is to abandon rationality altogether.
>
Only observations are self-evident.  Newton laws were generalizations,
by now we know that they are only approximating the current laws of
mechanics.  When you say 'self-evident' you should say 'I assume so'.

> Of course, it is still possible to argue whether or not something is
> self-evident, but I think that if you lose sight of the fact that what
> your are arguing about is rational you will end up believing that it is
> impossible to be rational at all.
>
I say that it is impossible to be an objectivist, nevertheless it is
possible to reason.  However, it is not reasonable to make asumptions
(some of them questionable to me), draw conclusions and then announce
that to deny those conclusions is to deny 'rationality' or 'reality'.
>
> Laura Creighton
> sun!l5!laura          (that is ell-five, not fifteen)
> l5!laura@lll-crg.arpa

Piotr Berman