Which Ideas Matter?

This came up on MSK's Objectivist Living in the topic called "I want this on record" about recent statements made by Lindsay Perigo.

"Good God! We have supposed Objectivists -- Craig Biddle et. al. -- recommending that we bomb mosques and schools in Iran, and now a self-styled Objectivist hoping for the murder of a presidential candidate. We have supposed intellectual allies -- at ARI -- editing out of Ayn Rand's work what they prefer she had not written; we have excommunications worthy of a religious inquisition; we have Objectivists rewriting the history of the movement and the life of Ayn Rand ..." -- Barbara Branden
http://www.objectivistliving.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=6214&st=0

The discussion there will go its own way. I ask here, "Which ideas matter?" How is it that co-religionists (which is what we are) disagree to the point of personal animus. On the other hand, we all know people with whom we socialiize -- we even marry them! -- who do not share our personal philosophy.

What, then, is this philosophy?

What I see is that people are who and what they are independent of their espoused beliefs. People latch on to complex abstract ideas to explain their actions and their prejudices.

Branden (and Maslow) would say that we actualize ourselves. However, we do not adopt ideas that change who we are inside.

Robert Ardrey would say that each of us here is only using the language of Objectivism as a territorial call.

Other models work as well.

Post 1

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 9:15am

Mike,

"Which ideas matter?"
The ones that form your character and your trading partnerships with others.

How is it that co-religionists (which is what we are) disagree to the point of personal animus.

Co-religionists disagree because of having different ...

1) information sets
2) scopes of integration

On the other hand, we all know people with whom we socialiize -- we even marry them! -- who do not share our personal philosophy.

Finding someone on the exact same rung of ascension on the ladder of spiritual growth is impractical and, therefore, wrong-headed -- even if perfect in some idealized sense. You ask too much of socializing, and of marriage.

What, then, is this philosophy?

A philosophy for (man) living on Earth.

What I see is that people are who and what they are independent of their espoused beliefs. People latch on to complex abstract ideas to explain their actions and their prejudices.

You see people who latch on to ideas to explain their prejudices, but that doesn't detract from those who latch on to ideas because they are knowably true -- and then gain "prejudice" because of their very discovery of the truth of a matter. Just because statistics can be used to forward a prejudice, doesn't mean that statistics itself is inherently biased or misleading. We use tools and can misuse them. When folks misuse tools that doesn't detract from the good use of tools.

If some folks, because of their yet-to-be-transcended character flaws, use a screwdriver to hammer in nails -- it doesn't detract from the whole human enterprise of carpentry. Stop looking at the examples around you as if you had your face "pressed up close to an event and were staring at it myopically" and don't look at the folks immediately around you to delimit what it is that must be all that it is that is possible (which Gotthelf writes about at the end of the booklet: On Ayn Rand).

Branden (and Maslow) would say that we actualize ourselves. However, we do not adopt ideas that change who we are inside.

Speak for yourself or those immediately around you. Don't speak for humanity as such.

Robert Ardrey would say that each of us here is only using the language of Objectivism as a territorial call.

I don't know who Robert Ardrey is, but he seems like a "contemporary social scientist." I use the term disparagingly, but is it true?

Ed

Post 2

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 9:52am

Ed, Michael,

Pardon my ignorance, but can one of you provide a definition of what co-religionist means?

I just figure that if I am a co-religionist (according to Michael), I ought to at least understand the definition.

As the expression says, "Know thyself!"

jt

Post 3

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 10:43am

JT,

Pardon my ignorance, but can one of you provide a definition of what co-religionist means?

It's when you share a worldview.

Ed

Post 4

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 11:54am

Ed, as always, your replies are cogent and substantive. I agree with you that generalizations based on personal experiences are more often arguable than they are provable. If little else, they reveal more about the speaker than the topic.

In private security, there are very few ways to pre-qualify a guard. Government police forces devote far more resources with no better results. Do good guardians "go bad" or did they "slip through"? Is it a matter of "bad apples" or "bad barrels"? One tool we do use is the self-report.

True or False: Most people are basically honest.
True or False: Sometimes you have to break the rules to get things done.

The assumption is that you only know yourself. If you think that most people are honest, it is because you are. On the other hand, last month, I interviewed with a company that thought it had better metrics. (I disagreed.) The owner said to me about the self-report that after 35 years in law enforcement and security, his view was that most people are not basically honest, even though he is. -- but it was still only his view...

So, yes, all I can say about my generalizations is that if the shoe fits, wear it.

Post 5

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 12:35pm

Here come the Zebra stripes!

MM: "Which ideas matter?"
ET: The ones that form your character and your trading partnerships with others.

Dead nuts on, as you so often are. We see those in operation. They are not declared. Actions speak louder than words.

Co-religionists disagree because of having different ...
1) information sets
2) scopes of integration

I think that what Rand called "sense of life" is closer to the answer. Even there, what we respond to in another person --- what we can accept and what we cannot -- is deeper than their happy/sad hormonal set-point.

MEM: On the other hand, we all know people with whom we socialiize -- we even marry them! -- who do not share our personal philosophy.
ET: Finding someone on the exact same rung of ascension on the ladder of spiritual growth is impractical and, therefore, wrong-headed -- even if perfect in some idealized sense. You ask too much of socializing, and of marriage.

I don't mean it that way. I don't mean like you went to Catholic schook K-12 and then to Holy Martyr College but she only went to catechism because she had a public education, but you're both "Catholic." And you still read Thomas Aquinas in Latin and post essays on the soc.religion.catholic-doctine newsgroup and she does not.

I mean, she gives little thought to "spiritual growth" and you have been and remain the Tarot Deck "Seeker" and you even have three different tarot decks, but you stopped using them when you discovered Ayn Rand and now you own all the Ayn Rand books. But when you shopped at The Von Mises Institute you bought all the Anarcho-Capitalist books, and you vote Libertarian, not Republican -- and she does not vote at all. See? It has nothing to do with "rungs of personal ascension." There is something else at work totally in a mateship. But that violates all the tenets of all the religions. I married a collectivist! (Well, not me, actually... My wife is an individualist, but too much of one to ever hang out with a group of Objectivists, if you see the point.) And that's the point. People here may not be "mated" but we have indeed chosen to "marry our fortunes" in some sense.

ET: You see people who latch on to ideas to explain their prejudices, but that doesn't detract from ...Just because statistics can be used to forward a prejudice, doesn't mean that ... When folks misuse tools that doesn't detract from the good use of tools.

Granted. Well said, once again.

If some folks, because of their yet-to-be-transcended character flaws ... Stop looking at the examples around you as if you had your face "pressed up close to an event and were staring at it myopically" and don't look at the folks immediately around you to delimit ...

Ah, yes, again that is good advice. Once you make your point, there is no further need to convince, convert, or defend. I submit once more, Ed, that you feel that way because of who you are inside independent of Objectivism. You can quote Rand to support that point, also. In "How to Lead a Rational Life in an Irrational World" Rand says that you do not need to carry the argument -- you might not even need to say anything at all, if speaking is a total waste or perhaps "dangerous" in some context. But you do need to identify the facts of reality, if only to yourself. Again, that is stipulated. I agree. Why do so few here share that perspective? How is it that discussions go on for dozens of posts, hundreds, sometimes, with acrimony, name-calling, denunciation.

My point is that those habits are independent of the philosophy of Objectivism and belong to the frame of mind of the individuals. The wider consequence is that to some extent, the fiction of Ayn Rand may always enjoy measurable readership -- as do the works of Chaucer, Hemingway and Vonnegut -- and the world will continue pretty much unchanged.

MEM: Branden (and Maslow) would say that we actualize ourselves. However, we do not adopt ideas that change who we are inside.
ET: Speak for yourself or those immediately around you. Don't speak for humanity as such.

Ed, can you give me one example of how any person changed inside as a result of a new idea?

Thanks again,
Mike
PS

Robert Ardrey is an author you should know. He wroteThe Territorial Imperative.

Robert Ardrey (b. October 16, 1908, Chicago, Illinois�d. January 14, 1980, South Africa) was an American playwright and screenwriter who returned to his academic training in anthropology and the behavioral sciences in the 1950s.
African Genesis and The Territorial Imperative, two of Robert Ardrey's most widely read works, as well as Desmond Morris's The Naked Ape (1967), were key elements in the public discourse of the 1960s which challenged earlier anthropological assumptions. Ardrey's ideas notably influenced Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick in the development of 2001: A Space Odyssey,as well as Sam Peckinpah, to whom Strother Martin gave copies of two of Ardrey's books. -- Wikipedia

Don't take my word for it. As the Rev if he thinks the work is worth your time.

Post 6

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 1:26pm

Michael, I hardly know where to start.

You said, "The assumption is that you only know yourself. If you think that most people are honest, it is because you are." Whose assumption? Certainly not mine! You are making an epistemological statement that in this area of reality we can't know what is true.
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Jay, Co-religionist means just a bit more than one who shares a world-view, particularly here on an objectivist forum where religion has an association with belief based upon faith. Most dictionaries define it a person of the same religion, which for us has that dogmatic, irrational faith-based tinge.
--------

Michael says, "What I see is that people are who and what they are independent of their espoused beliefs. This can only be said, in seriousness, by a man who wants to believe that you can say anything and nothing will matter, that ideas are arbitrary. Rand, and Objectivists, believe that reality exists, that it is knowable, that we form who we are by our beliefs, that acting on our beliefs will determine our future, that the sum of our futures will one day be the history of our time. Ideas matter. They are the connection between our ephemeral self and the outside world. They are the primary cause informing our destiny. Anyone who makes a statement like Michaels is profoundly disconnected from cause and effect in the world of ideas.
--------

Michael says, "People latch on to complex abstract ideas to explain their actions and their prejudices." Yes, they do to some degree... We all have at some point... But that is what most of us work to correct, with varying degrees of success. Those who answer that description to a major degree, who don't work to seek the truth, even if it counters a prejudice, are suffering from a psychological condition and not functioning in a healthy fashion. It is obvious that if all humans used their minds only after the fact, only to justify actions, and had no other purposeful attachment to complex abstractions, we would not even know or understand what the concepts of truth or justice might mean. That statement is a profound moral, psychological, epistemological insult to human nature as I know it to be. Speak for your self, Michael.
--------

Michael says, "...we do not adopt ideas that change who we are inside." This is such nonsense! It makes ideas totally unconnected to reality. It makes character something that must be genetically determined or an accident of our surroundings. It requires throwing free will out the window in any area that has to do with change to who we are inside (All that exists on the inside happens to be a gigantic subject area in itself, but perhaps not for those who see it so deterministically.)
--------

Michael says, "...all I can say about my generalizations is that if the shoe fits, wear it." Michael, I'm assuming that this smelly old shoe fits you and will let you keep it, because I know it doesn't fit me, or many of the others here.
--------

Let's see now... Michael is a determinist of some sort who believes ideas don't change people, that people can't know anything about some areas of reality (the area that has to do with other people), he is an anarchist and disagrees with Rand on self-defense. But he still calls himself an Objectivist. And paints all Objectivists as religionists who only use ideas to cover up prejudices. Clearly Michael has latched on to complex abstract ideas with no regard for their substance and throws them about as if meaning were arbitrary.

Post 7

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 2:56pm

Oddly enough, it was Ardrey who was convinced he was wrong and the Naked Ape premise was the correct one...
(Edited by robert malcom on 11/08, 2:57pm)

Post 8

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 3:05pm

Mike,

I think that what Rand called "sense of life" is closer to the answer.

Okay, but look at it this way. A sense of life is an appraisal tendency. Like a simple emotion, it has to do with an evaluation of yourself and/or your surroundings. Rand said you can't easily change your sense of life by trying to. Think of trying to "will" yourself into happiness, or trying to get rid of a resentment or fear -- through an act of will alone. Rand did say that a sense of life can change, however. It -- just like simple emotion -- can change in response to changed premises (just deeper ones).

So, basically, we can be saying the same thing -- but in two different ways. My idea of the psycho-epistemological marriage of our information sets with our unique scopes of integration results in none other than a sense of life!

I mean, she gives little thought to "spiritual growth" and you have been and remain the Tarot Deck "Seeker" and you even have three different tarot decks, but you stopped using them when you discovered Ayn Rand and now you own all the Ayn Rand books. But when you shopped at The Von Mises Institute you bought all the Anarcho-Capitalist books, and you vote Libertarian, not Republican -- and she does not vote at all. See? It has nothing to do with "rungs of personal ascension."

I think you misunderstand "personal ascension." I disagree that not thinking about spiritual growth and that thinking and acting on spiritual growth have nothing to do with spiritual growth (personal growth or ascension). That would be like saying that not thinking about crime and thinking and acting about crime have nothing to do with legality or rights (or rights violation). I would say that thinking or not thinking and acting or not acting not only have everything to do with personal growth -- but actually exhaust all there is that can be done about personal growth. They are, in a sense, definitive of what it means to be personally growing.

I submit once more, Ed, that you feel that way because of who you are inside independent of Objectivism.

That doesn't make it untrue, though. Just because I'm swayed by myself, doesn't mean I'm wrong (on extrapolation to others). For instance, I could turn it around and say that just because other folks feel differently (because of who they are on the inside) does not make them right. Do you see what happens on that flip-flop -- when you look at the same question from the point of view of the person who feels the opposite (because of who they are on the inside)?

In neither case does the truth of the matter hinge on how someone feels because of who they are on the inside.

How is it that discussions go on for dozens of posts, hundreds, sometimes, with acrimony, name-calling, denunciation.

Because the kind of competitive communication that we have here, while being useful and even fun, can get ugly when folks think it's breaking down somehow. You see the denunciations as the break-down, but it happened before them. It's like socialists not willing to wait for the Invisible Hand to right things -- they'd rather control what they can (even if that means a reduced scope of influence, long-range).

It's not cause folks aren't being rational, per se, it's because they're being motivated by fear or whatever. Think of a person who is willing to sell-out on his and your right to privacy (Patriot Act enthusiasts) -- all because they are so pitifully scared, like whiny little girls, that some bumbling idiots from the Middle East somewhere are going to come into their neighborhood and nuke them to high heaven.

In hindsight, it's silly. But, at the time, a lot of otherwise-reasonable folks thought that we need to give up our rights to privacy (in order to gain security from the "bad men" that are "out there" trying to "get us").

My point is that those habits are independent of the philosophy of Objectivism and belong to the frame of mind of the individuals.

Great point. And this jives real well with what I just said.

Ed, can you give me one example of how any person changed inside as a result of a new idea?

You forget that I used to be a wide-eyed Christian socialist. Just look at me now, all anti-religion and pro-capitalism. I've got capitalism seeping out of my ears!

Ideas are what it is that changed my insides (for the better).

Ed

Post 9

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 3:41pm

SW: Michael says, "...we do not adopt ideas that change who we are inside." This is such nonsense! It makes ideas totally unconnected to reality. It makes character something that must be genetically determined or an accident of our surroundings. It requires throwing free will out the window in any area that has to do with change to who we are inside (All that exists on the inside happens to be a gigantic subject area in itself, but perhaps not for those who see it so deterministically.)

Steve, you are right. You speak from one of your own special areas of knowledge and experience as a psychological counselor. I know first-hand that identifying the facts of reality about oneself can cause change. It may not. But it can. And when it does, we say that the counselor and the client were successful.

In one of my criminology classes, we watched a video documentary about a parolee who was not successful. He was being counseled by another ex-offender who was. (That man, the successful one married a woman who was herself an ex-offender working at his neighborhood McDonald's. He perceived from her cues that she was a parolee. She thought she was hiding it. More to the point, she thought she needed to. He saw past that and saw the real her. They seemed to have gotten their lives in order.) Our viewpoint character did not. The counselor said at one point, "He will tell you whatever he thinks you need to hear to get what he wants from you." He knew that the other man had not changed inside, despite the announced "new beliefs."

I see that here, as well. Capitalism and epistemology and all that are merely espoused beliefs. They only go so deep. Repeating them does not alter the internal arrangement. We see that in others, as well. Christianity says, "Thou shalt not kill" and insists that when someone hits you, that you turn the other cheek. Yet, Christians go to war. Not all of them do, though. Some Christians choose pacifism -- and they sometimes do so after they have volunteered for military service. Obviously, military indoctrination failed to change them, though it seems to work for others.

As you say, those internal processes are "a gigantic subject area."

Just one point of clarification. I have to apologize if my writing was not clear. I have two checks on my desk for published works this week, but they are small checks, so perhaps my inability to always be clear explains my modest income from writing. When I wrote,"The assumption is that you only know yourself. If you think that most people are honest..." that was in the context of the discussion on how we do or do not sort out capable guardians. While I agree with the general statement that often, as most people are not professional therapists, when someone says, "Most people..." they mean "I." That is not always true. That assumption was argued by the security professional referenced in that passage.

Post 10

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 4:03pm

MEM: Ed, can you give me one example of how any person changed inside as a result of a new idea?
ET: You forget that I used to be a wide-eyed Christian socialist. Just look at me now, all anti-religion and pro-capitalism. I've got capitalism seeping out of my ears!

Hallelujiah! You saw the light! Amen!

I submit, Ed Thomson, that you are the same person you were before. Now, you espouse beliefs more fully consonant with that person. That person did not change.

People do change. I know a guy who was a pushover. He had an MBA and worked for major corporations, but people took advantage of him. One night, someone ran a red light. He did not know it. All he knew is that the light turned green and he woke up in bandages in a hospital bed with his wife sitting next to him. Now, (at least in business, which is how I know him) he's a bastard. He told me, "Life's too short to let people take advantage of you." That much changed. The rest of him is still the same, though. I still find him reliable, insightful and trustworthy. Those things did not change.

Without knowing you very well I could say easily that you were always interested in ideas and that you always were an "idealist" who wanted to discover and do the right thing. On a deeper level, you accepted not only "metaphysical" responsibility for your choices, but personal responsibility, not just now, but always, probably from birth. You have always been your own man.

That is not the same motivation as someone who is attracted to Objectivism because it provides a clearly stated unwavering set of beliefs that are strongly validated, internally consistent and easy to remember.

(Edited by Michael E. Marotta on 11/08, 4:22pm)

Post 11

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 4:28pm

Michael, you said, "The counselor said at one point, "He will tell you whatever he thinks you need to hear to get what he wants from you." " This does happen - it is very prevalent with criminal populations. Talk therapy has no techniques that I know of capable of addressing the sociopathic personality disorder. By it's definition it is a barrier to change because it is always so intensely defensive that all input is interpreted in terms of what should be reflected back - with no regard for truth and no connection of what comes in to that part of the self that can take things personally - i.e., feel them. It reminds me of the hog-nosed snake I saw one time in North Carolina. It defends itself by playing dead. The problem is that if you roll it back right-side up, it immediately rolls back over, destroying the illusion.

But it doesn't require either the absence of a personality disorder or the presence of a good counselor to create change from ideas. People change constantly, or we would all still be sucking our thumbs. We change daily. We change as we absorb new information and the way we change has to do with how we examine the information and process it. We are always building the character and the identity of the person we are becoming. It is in an on-going process. Most people do stop, to a degree, in some areas. We all stop improving on those areas that reach a 'good enough' rating - sometimes the stop is temporary, sometimes it was a mistake to stop, sometimes it was defensive, sometimes it is appropriate. I no longer work on the multiplication tables, nor on some of the common character traits. But my character in the future will not be the same as it is now and the choices I make, minute by minute, including how I respond to you, is informing who I will be.

Post 12

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 4:54pm

ET: I think you misunderstand "personal ascension." I disagree that not thinking about spiritual growth and that thinking and acting on spiritual growth have nothing to do with spiritual growth (personal growth or ascension). That would be like saying that not thinking about crime and thinking and acting about crime have nothing to do with legality or rights (or rights violation). I would say that thinking or not thinking and acting or not acting not only have everything to do with personal growth -- but actually exhaust all there is that can be done about personal growth. They are, in a sense, definitive of what it means to be personally growing.

We agree that personal growth is or is not important at some level to different people. Some people would not understand what you mean by it. Other people might think that you "stop growing" when you are an adult. You might learn some new ideas in college, but after awhile, you have to "settle down" and live a "practical life." There are many other views, of course.

I was thinking of the alternative paths to "personal growth." The imaginary spouse -- not mine -- may not identify her hobbies as "personal growth" though they are. Furthermore, there are some people who do these things -- yoga and tai chi and all -- and at least from the outside seem to not "grow" very much at all.

Think of trying to "will" yourself into happiness, or trying to get rid of a resentment or fear -- through an act of will alone.

I don't know what that means, "through an act of will alone." I do know that as a grumpy kind of guy, even as a child, there are times when I will be driving down the road complaining to myself about some injustice or other and I stop and realize that it is a nice day -- or not; a Christian taught me to always thank the Lord for any weather, and I do: snow is good, too -- and that I have complete control over what I feel about the events around me. I might think of the man in a concentration camp who was praying and smiling. "Why," someone asked. "I am thanking God," he replied. What can you thank God for in a place like this. "I thank God that I am not like them." So, I do change my state based on "will" if you want to call it that, but mostly by the application of ideas.

Even God, for that matter. I'm an atheist. "God" is a convenient concept, like "society." So, I thank whatever gods may be for my unconquerable soul. I take credit for its care and maintenance. I don't take credit for its existence. In fact, if credit goes to anyone it is to my mother. One day when I was about five, I was rattling around the house and my mother was tired of it and asked me why I was acting like that. "Does the voice inside your head tell you to act like that?" she asked. See, that was "conscious" which is different from "conscience." Conscience was Jiminy Cricket in my head telling me that I had done something wrong after the fact. Nothing prevented me from doing it ahead of time. Once I got in touch with my consciousness, my life changed.

Over the years, that contact was lost through defensive insultation. However, I reconnected some years later and changed again. Other changes were less dramatic, at least as reported by those around me.

Post 13

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 5:30pm

SW: "... People change constantly, or we would all still be sucking our thumbs. We change daily. We change as we absorb new information and ... But my character in the future will not be the same as it is now and the choices I make, minute by minute, including how I respond to you, is informing who I will be.

Thanks for that personal statement. I did not quote all of it, but anyone interested in Steve qua Steve should read all of it.

SW: ... the way we change has to do with how we examine the information and process it.

That "how" is the you-ness of you and the me-ness of me: Man qua Man: the essence of who you are. That can change, or so it is reported. I believe that such changes are rare, at best, and unlikely, in fact. The genetic basis of personality is not synonymous with "determinism." I have cited here on RoR this work: Fox, Sidney W., ed., Individuality and Determinism: chemical and biological bases, Plenum Press: New York, 1984. Conference held at the University of Miami, Coral Gables, Florida, at Key Biscayne, Florida, May 1-2, 1982. Each of us is different. Just as some people are tall or dark, so, too, are some self-actualizing, while others are not. You cannot rationally argue someone out of a belief that they were not rationally argued into in the first place.

Thanks for explaining yourself in a small way, Steve. I trust that you will continue to change in productive, efficacious modes that enhance and expand your self-actualization.

Post 14

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 8:25pm

Mike,

I was thinking of the alternative paths to "personal growth." The imaginary spouse -- not mine -- may not identify her hobbies as "personal growth" though they are. Furthermore, there are some people who do these things -- yoga and tai chi and all -- and at least from the outside seem to not "grow" very much at all.

The counterfeit growth folks seek in yoga and buddhism and "cultural relativity" and whatnot actually helps prove my point. Folks know, on some level, that life is growth (rather than stagnancy). They feel an underlying urge to be doing something, to have a purpose, to appear to themselves or others as people ascending somehow.

Me:
Think of trying to "will" yourself into happiness, or trying to get rid of a resentment or fear -- through an act of will alone.

You:
I don't know what that means, "through an act of will alone."

I guess I mean by wishing it were so. Wishing won't make it so. Wishing won't ever make you happy, and it won't work long-term for shedding your resentments or fear. There is a willful focus on gratitude (which you mention) that is a partial -- if not a total -- antidote to unhappiness, resentment, and fear. It's a willful shift of focus, though -- not a willful wishing away or a willful command to yourself to effortlessly transcend what has been limiting you.

Conscience was Jiminy Cricket in my head telling me that I had done something wrong after the fact. Nothing prevented me from doing it ahead of time. Once I got in touch with my consciousness, my life changed.

Over the years, that contact was lost through defensive insultation. However, I reconnected some years later and changed again.

But what do you say to the retort that, in your case (like in my case), it was ideas that changed your insides?

Ed

Post 15

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 8:29pm

Mike,

Without knowing you very well I could say easily that you were always interested in ideas and that you always were an "idealist" who wanted to discover and do the right thing. On a deeper level, you accepted not only "metaphysical" responsibility for your choices, but personal responsibility, not just now, but always, probably from birth. You have always been your own man.

Thanks for the compliment. But -- and don't take this the wrong way -- but what do you say to the retort that this sounds like a purposefully-generic horoscope, carefully crafted to appeal to the inner human desire we all have (to have our personal sovereignty validated, etc)?

:-)

Ed

(Edited by Ed Thompson on 11/08, 8:30pm)

Post 16

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 9:34pm

Me:
Think of trying to "will" yourself into happiness, or trying to get rid of a resentment or fear -- through an act of will alone.

You:
I don't know what that means, "through an act of will alone."

I guess I mean by wishing it were so. Wishing won't make it so. Wishing won't ever make you happy, and it won't work long-term for shedding your resentments or fear. There is a willful focus on gratitude (which you mention) that is a partial -- if not a total -- antidote to unhappiness, resentment, and fear. It's a willful shift of focus, though -- not a willful wishing away or a willful command to yourself to effortlessly transcend what has been limiting you.

Wishing won't make it so, but thinking often helps a lot. Much unhappiness is caused by caring too much about the wrong things. Often I will find myself worrying about things outside my control, or at the wrong time. for instance, lying in bed at night thinking about something from work. Iliterally can do nothing about it.
I have to stop and think "what am I getting 'paid' to do?" The answer once I'm in bed is - to fall asleep. A lot of the unhappiness I see in otherwise productive people is of this sort of misguided "effort" worrying about matters that one should either address in their own times, or should not be the subject of worry at all. In these cases not wishing but thinking does make it right.

Post 17

Saturday, November 8, 2008 - 9:48pm

Ted,

I agree that directed thinking is a solution. It's like rational-emotive therapy, or ... like Objectivism. Get rid of your contradictions and then integrate all that you know, and the (integrated and noncontradictory) truth will set you free. Much mental illness in the world is from unintegrated or contradictory thought(s).

For instance, one reason why left-liberal socialists (folks mentally unhealthy) have been consistently estimated as being less happy, is probably because they focus so much of their time, energy, and inclination on trying to control that which is not in their "natural" sphere of influence.

Ed

(Edited by Ed Thompson on 11/08, 9:50pm)

Post 18

Tuesday, November 11, 2008 - 3:39am

Ed, all of that brings us back to "Which Ideas Matter?" Obviously, just espousing the law of identity and laissez faire does not create the emotional ( and therefore intellectual) climate for a productive and rewarding relationship.

I went back through your posts to me and I see the disconnects now, I think, and I understand your viewpoint better. My assumption was that someone could have no interest in climbing the rungs of personal growth and still be a good person: honest, reliable, interesting, etc. Your point was that whether they know it or not, they must be at some level of personal growth, as they are at some level of physical health or -- your analogy for my benefit -- criminality. I agree. Thanks.

One idea that seems not to matter is respect for those with whom you disagree. One of the critiques of Objectivism is William F. O'Neill's With Charity Toward None. I confess that I never read it, but the title speaks volumes. And I am just as guilty as everyone else here and the other Objectivist boards. I expect that if we begin with the same premises, we must reach the same conclusions, and if we do not, someone must be wrong. And that may well be true. But there is a difference between wrong and evil.

That said, I believe that there are, indeed, evil people associated with Objectivism. You might say that they are on a lower rung of personal development. That would be kind -- and, in fact, charitable...

Post 19

Tuesday, November 11, 2008 - 6:20am