About
Content
Store
Forum

Rebirth of Reason
War
People
Archives
Objectivism

Post to this threadMark all messages in this thread as readMark all messages in this thread as unreadBack one pagePage 0Page 1Page 2Page 3Page 4Page 5Page 6Page 7Page 8Page 9Forward one pageLast Page


Sanction: 20, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 20, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 20, No Sanction: 0
Post 160

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 11:15amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
The Talmudic expression applies to genuinely human social relations. It is not a pact of appeasement between those who live according to human standards and those who adopt the barbarism of the jungle.
Chris made some very important points as well about the interconnectedness of Objectivism and Branden's pioneering work in applying Objectivist principles to everyday living and human interaction -- the quest for individuation, autonomy, and self-actualization.  Branden also contributed to Rand's book,  The Virtue of Selfishness.

Objectivism is a tool for living life. It is the framework for our sense of life.  It's more than a rigid set of rules or a carefully guarded brand name owned by ARI.  I just don't get why many Objectivists sneer at psychology and self-help and Dr. Branden in particular.  They take offense at the phrase, "'A hero is one who knows how to make a friend out of an enemy" and see real life Objectivist heroes such as Branden as the enemy. That seems screwed up to me.  The split happened nearly 40 years ago.  Move on.  

Dr. Branden's  work compliments, not contradicts, Ayn Rand's and is a vital part of the Objectivist school of thought.  After all it is pretty tough to be selfish without a self.

Kat



(btw- MSK will be offline until later tonight)

(Edited by katdaddy on 8/28, 11:31am)


Sanction: 11, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 11, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 11, No Sanction: 0
Post 161

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 1:49pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Katdaddy:

What you said makes too much sense. What's wrong with you? You should be creatively rationalizing to "support" your condemning moral judgments. Don't worry it makes sense or not. What matters are the judgements and the effusive use of  moral self-righteous polemics in pronouncing your judgements. Until you do so, you're simply not doing what a "good" Objectivist should be doing.

Shame on you!

-Walter

PS - All that being said, you still get a sanction point from me.


Sanction: 9, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 9, No Sanction: 0
Post 162

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 9:31amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Ayn Rand, as others have pointed out, actually depicted her heroes "helping" each other as Branden would like us to do--but in context. He drops this gem as a criticism of Rand's approach to moral judgment--and out of context.

Sanction: 14, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 14, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 14, No Sanction: 0
Post 163

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 2:29pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
And let me guess, Nathaniel was the second gunman on the grassy knoll too.

---Landon


Post 164

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 5:47pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
I would like to say one thing, because I've been critical of Nathaniel Branden here.  I think too many people see any criticism of him as just 'Branden hatred' due to the great schism.  This completely fails to put things in their proper context.  I criticise his psychotherapy because it is not scientific.  My criticism has nothing to do with the fact that it's Nathaniel Branden that is involved with it, but simply because it seems to be a lot of bunk-at least to me and what I've seen of it.  I certainly have no beef with N.B. due to something that happened before I was born, and to tell the truth, from the accounts I've read about what happened, I always symphathised with Nathaniel and especially Barbara.

Kat-

 The split happened nearly 40 years ago.  Move on.  

I suppose all of this is in response to this statement of yours.  Though I'm sure some here still carry that grudge, as a critic of his psychotherapy, I just want to make it clear that I never had a grudge and that my criticism has nothing to do with anything that happened in his personal life as it related to O'ism.  I'm a science geek and this is what all of this is about with me.  Nothing more, nothing less.


Sanction: 4, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 4, No Sanction: 0
Post 165

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 5:49pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Landon-
I don't think he was the second gunman, I just think he used some of this "energy psychology" stuff to make the bullet do crazy things.


Post 166

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 5:57pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Oh, and p.s Kat-

I think I've heard Michael say he lives in Florida.  I hope it's not in that extreme western part of the state.


Sanction: 2, No Sanction: 0
Post 167

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 6:15pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
I don't know what would constitute or could ever constitute scientific psychotherapy or why that would be enough reason not to have any psychotherapy. Maybe it should just be called "counseling"????

Now as I see it (as someone who received "psychotherapy" from Nathaniel Branden 3 decades ago), counseling is talking to an outside party about life problems and getting advice. Psychotherapy means using an altered state of consciousness to experience what you already know more starkly and from a different perspective than the usual one--to learn what's important and apropos to the issue at hand. Not just intellectual, it becomes visceral.

Today NB also uses energy psychology techniques to bypass re-traumatizing clients and for the apparent speed and effectiveness involved. I can't comment of these, although there doesn't seem to be any science to speak of here either.

Psychotherapy was and seemingly still is the art of psychotherapy. As I experienced and used it it seemed to do me a lot of good, but I was very good at coming to NB with the work 2/3rds done and he used techniques, mostly sentence completion, to finish the job. He was mostly helpless to do effective work--seemingly effective work--unless his client really wanted to work.

--Brant

(Edited by Brant Gaede on 8/28, 6:16pm)


Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Post 168

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 6:25pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Jody,

The post was mainly
directed at the troll, you seem to have your reasons and though I disagree with them it didn't really have anything to do with you.

But on the topic of psychology
vs. psychiatry.  The best way to characterize the differences between the two is psychiatry is concerned with the problems that arise from a physically malfunctioning mind (i.e. caused by chemical imbalances and the like) and psychology deals with the problems of a physically functional mind.

Branden's ideas are directed at people who have fully functioning minds but have problems within the functions in the mechanism of the mind itself with nothing to do with physical factors.

And it's funny that you're calling psychiatry the real science because just a few months ago I was in another discussion where someone called that the pseudoscience and gave the comparative real science of
neurology. My main point being that are we really that far removed from a time when it was believed any physical ailment could be cured by a trip to the barber and a little bloodletting.  When sciences are new there are a lot of missteps by intellectually honest but mistaken people, and there is a lot of room for charlatans on the fringes.  But the key thing is they can only exist on the fringes so what we really need to be doing is studying each field on it's own merits and withholding the blanket denunciations until there is more evidence one way or the other, and the fringes shrink with the expansion of real knowledge.

As an aside, my fiancee is a diagnosed
schizophrenic, who after several missteps in how she was treated through the years, has reaped some great benefits from both psychiatry and psychology.

---
Landon


Post 169

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 6:37pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Landon-
I never thought you were attacking me...just trying to make a funny.  Call it an inept sense of humor.

Hope your fiancee is doing well now.  When is the big day?


Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Post 170

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 7:04pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Well this is the embarassing part.  In order to afford her meds she has to stay on medacaid, if we're married my income counts against it... we're kind of taking a chance just living together.  But we're shooting for improving our financial situation enough in the next five years though.

I don't like it but she's just now getting to the point where she might be able to work and we just can't afford her meds without insurance on my warehouse pay.

---Landon


Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Post 171

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 7:35pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Landon-
Nothing wrong with living in sin, my fiancee and I have been doing it for 4 years.  We're supposed to put put an end to it Sept. 24th, only problem is that the wedding in supposed to be in New Orleans.  However, hurricane Katrina is not lending us her blessings.

(Edited by Jody Allen Gomez on 8/28, 7:35pm)


Post 172

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 7:38pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
maybe is a message - don't do it if not needed...


Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Post 173

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 7:42pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
I always did like to give the middle-finger to the gods and their messages.  It's going to be a small, secular ceremony, so not all bad.

Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Post 174

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 7:42pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
That's the thing, I want to.  I'm just embarassed about the whole medacaid part.

But thanks for the sentiment.

---Landon


Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Post 175

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 7:47pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Landon-
I think what matters most is what's between the two of you, not between the three of you: you, her, and the state.  All my best to the two of you.


Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Post 176

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 7:47pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
I always did like to give the middle-finger to the gods and their messages.  It's going to be a small, secular ceremony, so not all bad

My sentiments exactly.  We're hoping for a small/medium sized secular ceremony with all the things we love highlighted (good colors, Daredevil and Elektra on the wedding cake and a nice looking building).

I just hate having to put it off.

---Landon


Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 3, No Sanction: 0
Post 177

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 7:48pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Landon-

 Daredevil and Elektra on the wedding
Carmen Elektra?!  I keed, I keed.


Sanction: 8, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 8, No Sanction: 0
Post 178

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 7:56pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Jody,

Thank you for your concern. I live in Merritt Island, on the east coast of Florida, so all we got was a little rain.

About homeopathic medicine, it is a field where much research has been conducted in other cultures (like Brazil). Much of the material I read in the past is in Portuguese and, frankly, I am way too busy with other projects and under severe time constraints to go off on this tangent. As it is an alternative approach, many players who have a financial stake in making our society an addicted one (to prescription drugs) actually have people under contract to debunk such alternative approaches. If you are reading one such debunker, be forewarned that his "facts" might be extremely slanted.

I am pretty sensitive about all drug use (which should be obvious, if you have read much of what I have written on Solo recently). When I came to the USA after over 30 years in Brazil, one of the things that screamed out at me and sounded all kinds of warning bells in my head was the vast number of drug advertisements all over the place.

OK, now there is a purple pill and "better is better." But dayaamm, that huge quantity of prime time advertisements on all major (and minor) channels running for several months goes into big bucks. In Brazil, average meals are much healthier than here. Look at all the fat walking around. People eat so much crap piled on top of crap mixed in with crap in the USA that now they have a wonder pill to make it stop hurting. The emphasis is on taste and not nutrition. This is a huge discussion for another thread, but I see no good at all in unhealthy habits and overkill on a drug to make you feel better, but leave the noxious effects of your unhealthy habits.

On proof, one good way to go about "proving" alternative medicine and get around these "debunkers" is to use the results of studies sanctioned by the FDA, which is an approach being brilliantly conducted by a guy called Doug Kaufman (his program is called "Know the Cause.") Objectivists probably will not sympathize with him because his show is on a Christian channel and he is religious. But he hardly discusses religion at all and his findings bear up to every rational standard I can think of.

His idea is that fungi are the main cause of a huge majority of ailments because they produce mycotoxins, which do not go away after the fungi die. This includes antibiotics, but his main focus is on all fungi, wherever they are found. Where he gets his facts from are the drug companies themselves and he tells people that instead of stopping to see their doctors, they have to educate them. Also, his treatment actually works on a preventive level and his approach is starting to be incorporated (very slightly, but starting) by major health industry players.

I do not know of this kind of approach for homeopathy. I do know of several organizations in Brazil (with registered sanction from the Ministry of Health) that carry out scientific research on it. Some debunkers I have read attack the methods used, results obtained and whatnot. I personally have seen it work with great efficacy on people. Of course there is some snake oil in the culture. Science should weed this out over time. (btw - Your questions were extremely general, somewhat akin to asking how many words are in a book.)

On using the scientific method for psychotherapy, one of the main problems to using a laboratory method - with blind controls - is that the elements to be used are actual human beings with problems. It is hard to find two with the exact same problem to the exact same degree with then exact same degree of emotional stability or instability and receptivity. As this field is in its infancy and is growing, I have no doubt that methods for controlled experiments not only will be developed (as many already have started to be), but techniques like hypnosis, brain entrainment and other manners of altering the minds with sensory input will be used to great effect (as they already have started to be).

All this goes way beyond mere counseling and being labeled as unscientific.

Michael


Sanction: 5, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 5, No Sanction: 0
Post 179

Sunday, August 28, 2005 - 8:00pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Michael-
I was just about to sign off for the night, and saw your post.  I skimmed it and though I think we disagree about some things I sanctioned.  Thanks for answering in a spirit worthy of SOLO.  I'll give it further thought and a better response tomorrow. 

Glad to hear you are in a safe neck of the woods.


Post to this threadBack one pagePage 0Page 1Page 2Page 3Page 4Page 5Page 6Page 7Page 8Page 9Forward one pageLast Page


User ID Password or create a free account.