Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site mmintl.UUCP
Path: utzoo!lsuc!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!gamma!epsilon!zeta!sabre!petrus!bellcore!decvax!linus!philabs!pwa-b!mmintl!franka
From: franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams)
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: Ayn  Rand's  definitions of force and reason
Message-ID: <902@mmintl.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 17-Dec-85 09:12:54 EST
Article-I.D.: mmintl.902
Posted: Tue Dec 17 09:12:54 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 20-Dec-85 21:52:20 EST
References: <1482@hound.UUCP> <1910@psuvax1.UUCP> <309@l5.uucp> <1915@psuvax1.UUCP> <332@l5.uucp>
Reply-To: franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams)
Organization: Multimate International, E. Hartford, CT
Lines: 35

In article <332@l5.uucp> laura@l5.UUCP (Laura Creighton) writes:
>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.)
>
>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.

Your argument is similar to one I have been propounding in net.philosophy,
but there are some points of disagreement.  It is not clear to me that
moral decisions ultimately come down to self-evident truths.  I think at
the bottom one comes down to a question of belief.  I will agree that
emotional misses the mark, but I don't think rational is right, either.

>Of course, ti si 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.

How can something be self-evident if it is possible to argue that it
is not?

Frank Adams                           ihpn4!philabs!pwa-b!mmintl!franka
Multimate International    52 Oakland Ave North    E. Hartford, CT 06108