I should have added that another use of debate between two thinkers who are seriously at odds on fundamental issues is to enable undecided third-party listeners to make up their minds or to sharpen their own thinking. Believe it or not, in writing that final paragraph in my last post I was not even thinking of Marc, who I am sure will not change his mind due to anything I say.

The theory Marc puts forth is ultimately self-refuting (observe his rejection of the laws of logic). What I mean is that while it seems to hang together if one keeps one’s mind out of focus, it does not survive sustained, focused philosophizing sans context-dropping. I think Marc may change his own mind eventually. It’s kind of like shooting fish in a barrel: a superfluous exercise, since the fish are doomed anyway—they live in a barrel. (Sorry, I know metaphors don’t prove anything. I just thought this was an interesting one.)

So I refuse the challenge to change Marc’s mind. I will, however, give brief answers to those of his points that seem to need addressing. Just not at this time.

Daniel, I guess you’ve changed your mind about this thread having moved on. (We continued the discussion by email—the upshot is, he’s still a Popperian.) Now I’ll have to go back and answer his last post, I suppose, if I can. My artistic and intellectual moods alternate with each other.

I’ll take this opportunity to express doubts about these Atlas icons. It seems logical that Marc and Daniel don’t have any, since obviously it is Objectivists who are voting. But what does it tell us except that their views are unpopular here, which we will know anyway after reading the discussions? They are both capable and sincere debaters (or, if they are not honest, it is wrong to say so because at this point we can’t know that for sure)—within the intellectually crippling framework of modern thought—who each are representing a particular philosophic system. Shouldn’t disapproval be expressed in an argued post rather than an anonymous click with no reasons having to be given? You might say that people shouldn’t care about others’ opinions of them, but since we believe that why do we have the icons?

Of course, the icon capability is part and parcel of the software used for forums such as these, and the feature may be an interesting one to try out for a time. All I am saying is maybe we should consider phasing it out in the future, as it seems odd in the light of the Fountainhead message.

Update: Joseph Rowlands has answered me on this icons issue and I stand persuaded with certain caveats. See the Poll Discussions.

(Edited by Rodney Rawlings on 4/05, 5:51pm)

I would expect you to read "Rand and Sullivan" prior to writing your critical essay of Rand's portrayal of Kant for the last advanced seminar, and certainly prior to writing your book AYN RAND, OBJECTIVISTS AND THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY, but better late than never. Your analysis of "Kant versus Sullivan" indicates that you probably did not read the two preceding essays in Rand's PHILOSOPHY WHO NEEDS IT?  In the essay "Faith and Force: The Destroyers of the Modern World" Rand refers to Kant directly. In the essay "From the Horse's Mouth,” she analyzes Friedrich Paulsen's book "Immanuel Kant: His Life and Doctrine." Reading the three essays in sequence shows how Feyerabend would not have been possible without Kant and Paulsen. As I said in my comment to your essay, the issue is not whether Kant intended his ideas to be developed as they were by Paulsen and Feyerabend, but the fact that his ideas were developed in that way.  We are not here to accuse Kant or punish him - he had been dead since 1776 - but to understand how his ideas were developed and used in order to destroy the Enlightenment.

It is easy to find in CRITIQUE OF PURE REASON positive references to sensory experience as the source of conceptual knowledge, because Kant attempted to eat the cake of reason vs. faith and have it too.  I can find references in CRITIQUE for Kant's attempt to build a case for a-priori conceptual knowledge. Here is one:

"There is of reason, as there is of the understanding, a purely formal, that is logical use, in which no account is taken of the contents of knowledge; but there is also a real use, in so far as reason itself contains the origin of certain concepts and principles; which it has not borrowed either from the senses or from the understanding. The former faculty has been long defined by logicians as the faculty of mediate conclusions, in contradistinctions to immediate ones; but this does not help us to understand the latter which itself produces concepts. As this brings us face to face with the division of reason into a logical and a transcendental faculty, we must look for a higher concept for this source of knowledge..." (A;294-298; B:350-354)

-- Michelle