Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 4.3bsd-beta 6/6/85; site l5.uucp Path: utzoo!lsuc!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!gamma!epsilon!zeta!sabre!petrus!bellcore!decvax!decwrl!sun!l5!laura From: laura@l5.uucp (Laura Creighton) Newsgroups: net.politics.theory Subject: Re: Ayn Rand's definitions of force and reason Message-ID: <355@l5.uucp> Date: Mon, 23-Dec-85 23:06:56 EST Article-I.D.: l5.355 Posted: Mon Dec 23 23:06:56 1985 Date-Received: Sun, 29-Dec-85 01:01:13 EST References: <1482@hound.UUCP> <1910@psuvax1.UUCP> <309@l5.uucp> <1915@psuvax1.UUCP> <332@l5.uucp> <902@mmintl.UUCP> Reply-To: laura@l5.UUCP (Laura Creighton) Organization: Nebula Consultants in San Francisco Lines: 53 In article <902@mmintl.UUCP> franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) writes: > >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. We may be using more than one definition of rational here; I hope not. If we go round and round in circles then I think that this is where the problem will lie. Okay -- beliefs. We all have them. But why should you have any that you think are not either *self-evident* or *logically derived from self-evident truths*? (I am including empirical evidence here as being ``self-evident''.) As a practical matter, everyone is bound to have beliefs that they have because they believed something that somebody else told them, or that they read somewhere, but these beliefs can all be questioned and disgarded if it becomes likely that they are false. So, forgetting these for a moment, what other beliefs should you have? > >How can something be self-evident if it is possible to argue that it >is not? > Lots of reasons. To begin with, we may use language differently and thus not actually be talking about the same thing. (See my first paragraph above, on ``rational''). Secondly, even if we are using language the same way to mean the same thing, one or both of us may not be systemetically following through the consequences of our beliefs, and thus not finding the crucial inconsistency which makes one conclude ``no, I cannot doubt this and still be rational''. Since this is hard work, this is even likely to occur. Thirdly, one can allow intellectual dishonesty to creep in. You may close your mind to arguments because you wish that they were not so, or the reverse. I run into this a lot, because I ask people to be compassionate and rational. I do not deny that it is hard work to be both, though, and I have watched a good many people do their best to misunderstand what I am saying. Very rarely have I managed to punch my argument home to them, and had them admit that they didn't *really* want to hear what I was saying, because if I was correct then they would have to radically change their lives and they didn't want to go to that trouble. I believe that this goes on to a greater or lesser extent all the time. Finally, there is always the possibility that the self-evident truth cannot be grasped by a damaged mind. Here I am talking about real morons, not the sometimes moronic posters to usenet! ;-) What to do with people who cannot (as opposed to will not) reason is an interesting question for all philosophies of ethics, though. -- Laura Creighton sun!l5!laura (that is ell-five, not fifteen) l5!laura@lll-crg.arpa