a1fa50b8
XPost: alt.society.liberalism, soc.culture.usa, alt.politics.libertarian
XPost: alt.society.anarchy
From: cbell97@bellsouth.net
On Nov 9, 12:52 pm, Anarcissie wrote:
> > ...
> >> > [Objectivist] axiomatic concepts: Existence, Identity, Conscious and
> >> > have at least once before this last time specifically and with exact
> >> > definition referred to 'axiomatic concept' in a different way than
> >> > you keep wanting to refer to something else [axiom = something taken
> >> > on faith, etc.]
>
> >> By 'taken on faith' I mean not believed in against evidence, or in
> >> spite of the lack of evidence, but that the proposition is accepted
> >> although not proved.
>
> > Exactly, and in every way a wrong descriptor/appellation to the
> > 'axiomatic concept', and even to Descartes' sort of 'axiom' in that a
> > theory of innate ideas is not something which has to be taken on faith
> > but rather a poor (unscientific) explanation.
>
> >> The fact that one can't disprove something does not prove it.
>
> > The axiomatic concept is something which requires neither proof or dis-
> > proof
>
> Well, in my vocabulary, concepts don't require proof
As to the matter of your criticism of Rand's novel and her philosophy
Objectivism it is necessary for you to have read what she means by
"concept" and, in particular, "axiomatic concept", to analyze those
and then offer comment:
> Rand distinguishes her theory from nominalism, which she
interprets
> as a subjectivist approach to universals. What concepts are in
> relation to an external reality from the mind, one would have to
read
> Rand's Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology.
> IOE, 2.
> A concept is a mental integration of two or more units which are
> isolated according to a specific characteristic(s) and united by a
> specific definition.
> The units involved may be any aspect of reality: entities,
> attributes, actions, qualities, relationships, etc.; they may be
> perceptual concretes or other, earlier-formed concepts. The act of
> isolation involved is a process of abstraction: i.e., a selective
> mental focus that takes out or separates a certain aspect of
reality
> from all others (e.g., isolates a certain attribute from the entities
> possessing it, or a certain action from the entities performing it,
> etc.). The uniting involved is not a mere sum, but an integration,
> i.e., a blending of the units into a single, new mental entity which
> is used thereafter as a single unit of thought (but which can be
> broken into its component units whenever required).
> IOE, 6.
> Axioms are usually considered to be propositions identifying a
> fundamental, self-evident truth. But explicit propositions as such
> are not primaries: they are made of concepts. The base of man's
> knowledge—of all other concepts, all axioms, propositions and
> thought—consists of axiomatic concepts.
> An axiomatic concept is the identification of a primary fact of
> reality, which cannot be analyzed, i.e., reduced to other facts or
> broken into component parts. It is implicit in all facts and in all
> knowledge. It is the fundamentally given and directly perceived or
> experienced, which requires no proof or explanation, but on which all
> proofs and explanations rest.
> [. . . ]
> It is not the abstraction of an attribute from a group of existents,
> but of a basic fact from all facts. Existence and identity are not
> attributes of existents, they are the existents. Consciousness is an
> attribute of certain living entities, but it is not an attribute of a
> given state of awareness, it is that state. Epistemologically, the
> formation of axiomatic concepts is an act of abstraction, a selective
> focusing on and mental isolation of metaphysical fundamentals; but
> metaphysically, it is an act of integration—the widest integration
> possible to man: it unites and embraces the total of his
experience
>
> >> Causality is another can of philosophical worms,
>
> > No, It is not. I could cite and quote Aristotle as to the matter that
> > there is no identity without causation (that that was his greatest
> > contribution to philosophy and remains indisputable), but you would not
> > read that, too.
>
> I haven't been worrying about identity (yet).
That A is A is something that you have said you cannot refute, so you
have 'worried' about it.
> >> since most events in the physical world have a multiplicity of
> >> antecedents from which they might be said to descend.
>
> > That says nothing whatsoever against causation (and from which it is
> > corollary to Identity).
>
> > To move this back to Atlas Shrugged, one gets nothing from the novel
> > without understanding that the failings of all modern moral philosophy
> > is equal to the failings of all religious moral teaching in the the
> > removal of causality from morality, and that such failings distributed
> > among individuals within society leads to poverty and death.
>
> I found _Atlas_Shrugged_ rather dreary; I read about
> two-thirds or three-quarters of it a long time ago.
You found a novel about a dystopian, bleak future "dreary" ? And that
you did not finish reading that novel to its uplifting, optimistic
ending makes you qualified by any measure to comment on it?
> Novels don't prove anything, and often they don't
> even illustrate anything beyond one person's peculiar
> view of the universe. As for religions and moral
> philosophies, there are all kinds abroad in the land.
> Not many of them are as quietistic as you seem to be
> suggesting.
>
As to the matter of your criticism of Rand's novel and her philosophy
Objectivism it is necessary for you to have read what she wrote.
> > < > humanity and preach that the highest virtue man can practice is to hold
> > his own life as of no value. Do they tell you that the purpose of
> > morality is to curb man's instinct of self-preservation? It is for the
> > purpose of self-preservation that man needs a code of morality. The only
> > man who desires to be moral is the man who desires to live.>> Galt's
> > Speech, Atlas Shrugged
>
> Almost no one actually holds his life as of no value,
By all measure -- in that I have never read anything you wrote in its
entirety, -- I opine that you do.
--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)
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