| | "The rationalism involved in thinking you don't need to do the reading and can simply deduce positions on all kinds of complex matters has long disturbed me. It is a rare student of Objectivism that I meet who, if -almost any- topic comes up doesn't proclaim that he has the final answer with great certainty in areas he's never studied."
The paragraph above is from an earlier post on this thread from Phil Coates.
Unfortunately, Mr. Coates does not see fit to consistently apply to his own investigations this excellent advice about the necessity of examining facts, as opposed to deducing "correct" conclusions about complex matters. The complex matter that I refer to is the official story about what destoyed the three World Trade Center towers on September 11th, 2001, together with many other aspects of the events of that day. A great deal of incontrovertible evidence that contradicts the politically-sponsored fairy tale is presented in David Griffin's book, Debunking 911 Debunking.
I think if more Objectivists consistently displayed respect for facts and evidence, this would change their ideas about the morality of US military adventuring--an issue that has been huge over the past 40 years. Perhaps then non-Objectivists would be attracted to the irresistable power of logical coherence that reason, and the philosophy of Objectivism, offer.
Of course, a deep reluctance to look at even elephant-sized fatcs that disturb one's view of the world is not restricted to Objectivists. People from all intellectual perspectives sometimes indulge in this destructive behavior. We're all familiar with the Left's denial of the Soviet Holocaust, even to the point of refusing to retract the Pulitzer Prize awarded to Walter Duranty for his mendacious reporting about conditions in the USSR during the Thirties.
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