Quote:
Originally posted by GottaBigOne+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(GottaBigOne)</div><div class='quotemain'><!--QuoteBegin-Dr. Dilznick
Prove it.
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Things exist. To deny this presupposes one's existence and is self defeating. Things can not cease to be, they merely change form.
Life exists. To deny this results in the same as above. Life can cease to be, to a living entity there are two alternatives, life or death. The concept of values then can only be discussed in relation to living entities. They are the only things in which their existence is dependant on certain conditions. Those conditions which are conducive to its life are good, those which are not are bad. It is right then to seek the good, and wrong to seek the bad. To seek the bad is to seek one's own destruction.
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Haha, that's proof? No. It's just a re-stating of what Objectivism is (more or less anyway). Your argument is thence reduced to "I am right because Ayn Rand says so." We're a country of many religious and moral perspectives and no one moral system is supposed to reign supreme here, including Objectivism. At least that is how democracies are supposed to work.
Read and weep:
Critique of "The Objectivist Ethics" 1. Rand's Argument:
Rand's argument seems to be as follows. I enclose in parentheses required implicit premises that I have introduced. Major conclusions are marked by asterisks.
1. Value is agent-relative; things can only be valuable for particular entities.
premise
2. Something is valuable to an entity, only if the entity faces alternatives.
premise
3. No non-living things face any alternatives.
premise
4. Therefore, values exist only for living things.
from 1,2,3
5. Anything an entity acts to gain or keep is a value for that entity.
premise
6. Every living thing acts to maintain its life, for its own sake.
premise
(7. There is no other thing that they act to gain or keep for its own sake.)
implicit premise
8. Therefore, its own life, and nothing else, is valuable for its own sake, for any living thing.
from 5,6,7
9. Therefore, life and nothing else is valuable for its own sake.
from 4,8
(10. Everyone should always do whatever promotes what is valuable for himself.)
implicit premise
*11. Therefore, everyone should always do whatever promotes his own life.
from 8,10
12. A person can live only if he is rational.
premise
*13. Therefore, everyone should be 100% rational.
from 11,12 2. Problems with the argument:
The argument contains eight fatal flaws.
Objection (i):
The first is that premise 1 begs the question.
One of the central groups of opponents Rand is facing is people who believe in absolute value, and not just agent-relative value. The absolutist view is that it is possible for some things to be good, simply, or in an absolute sense; whereas agent-relativists think that things can only be good
for or relative to certain individuals, and that what is good relative to one individual need not be good relative to another. (N.B., this should not be confused with what are commonly called "moral relativism" and "cultural relativism.")
Another way to put the issue is this: absolutists think that value exists as a
property of something--most likely, as a property of certain states of affairs. For instance, if I say, "It is good that intelligent life exists on the Earth," I am saying that the state of
intelligent life existing on the Earth has a certain property: goodness. Agent-relativists think, instead, that value exists only as a
relationship between a thing and a person. For instance, an agent-relativist might say, "It is good
for me that intelligent life exists on the Earth," and this would mean: the state of
intelligent life existing on the Earth bears a certain relationship to me: it is good for me. But an agent relativist would not say it is good
simply.
Rand bases her ethics on the agent-relative position, but she offers no argument for it, only a bald assertion.
Objection (ii):
Premise 2 seems to be false. If I knew that I was inevitably going to get a million dollars tomorrow--there's no way I can avoid it--would that mean that the money will have no value? Again, Rand offers no defense of this assertion.
Perhaps her thought was that "good" is the same as "ought to be sought" or "ought to be chosen", and that since it makes no sense to say one should seek or choose what one either cannot get or cannot avoid, it follows that it makes no sense to say something one cannot get or cannot avoid is "good". But this simply illustrates why that definition of "good" is wrong. Nor does Rand offer any defense of this assumption (which she doesn't even explicitly state)--she seems simply not to have noticed that she was assuming it.
Objection (iii):
Premise 3 seems to be false. Rand claimed that living things face an alternative of existing or not existing but that non-living things do not. I can think of five interpretations of this, but all of them make it false:
First, it is not true that non-living things can't be destroyed. I once saw a house destroyed by flames, for example.
Second, it is true that the matter of which non-living things are composed can't be destroyed; but this is equally true of living things.
Third, it is not true that a non-living thing's continued existence never depends on its activities. If my computer ceases to function properly, this may cause me to destroy it.
Fourth, it is not true that positive action is never required to preserve a non-living thing's existence. A cloud, for instance, must absorb more water in order to continue to exist.
Fifth, it is true that non-living things do not possess free will. But this is equally true of almost all living things, and yet Rand claims that they (including plants, single-celled organisms, etc.) face an "alternative".
Thus, it seems there is no sense in which Rand's claim is true.
Objection (iv):
Either premise 5 is false, or the argument contains an equivocation. The word "value" has at least two different meanings.
First. Sometimes "value" is used as a verb. In this sense, it means approximately, "to believe to be valuable," or sometimes "to desire". Thus, if I say John values equality, I am saying John
thinks equality is good, or that John desires equality. Along the same lines, "value" is sometimes used as a noun, to refer to things which someone 'values' in this sense--i.e., things which someone regards as good. Thus, if I say equality is one of John's 'values', I mean equality is one of the things that John believes is good.
Second. Sometimes "value" is used to refer to things which
are good. So if I say, "equality is an important value," I am saying that equality is one of the important goods. Notice the difference, then: the difference between
believed to be good and
is good. No objectivist can afford to neglect this distinction, since if one does, one will be forced into extreme ethical subjectivism.
If Rand meant "value" in the first sense, then her premise was close to true. (Not exactly, since it is possible to act to gain something even if you don't believe it to be good, but let's overlook that.) However, in this case, it has no ethical significance. In particular, the later steps 8 and 9 would not follow, since they claim that life is
valuable--that is, good--whereas the premise from which they are derived is about what is
valued--that is,
held to be good.
If Rand meant "value" in the second sense, then her premise was false. It is perfectly possible, as Rand herself explains later on, for someone to value what is actually bad for them. Nor did she give any argument for thinking that whatever one acts to gain or keep must actually be good.
Objection (v):
Premise 6 is false.
If we read it in a teleological sense, as saying living things have inherent
goals or
purposes, then it is false because nature is not teleological--Aristotelian physics and biology have long since been refuted. In that sense, living things do not aim at anything (with the exception of conscious beings with intentions).
If we read (6), as Rand suggests (p. 16n), to mean merely that the actions of living things
result in the maintenance of their lives, then two problems appear. First, (7) will now be false. There are many things that living things' actions result in. For one thing, their actions result in the reproduction of their genes. For another, animals' actions result in production of body heat.
Second, it would follow, absurdly, that any object whose actions have results, has values. Thus, since when a rock rolls downhill, this results in its having greater kinetic energy, we must conclude that the rock acts to gain and/or keep kinetic energy, and therefore that kinetic energy is a value for the rock.
Objection (vi):
I have included 7, because it is necessary in order to get to 8. But 7 is false, however one reads it. If one interprets it as a claim merely about actual results of action, it is false as discussed above.
If one reads it as an observation about what organisms are evolutionarily 'programmed' for (that is, what traits are naturally selected for), it is false because the only trait that is selected for is that of producing more copies of one's genes. Thus, if anything is the ultimate 'value' for living things, it would be gene-reproduction (technically, 'inclusive fitness').
If one reads it as a claim about genuine teleology in nature, it is false because teleological physics is false.
If one reads it as a claim about the purposes or aims of living things, it is false because, for those living things that have purposes, they can often have other purposes. Rand frequently says that many human beings are aiming at self-destruction, for example. It is hard to believe that they are doing this
for the sake of promoting their lives.
Consequently, conclusions 8 and 9 are unsupported, and in fact they are false. Many people value happiness or pleasure for its own sake, and not simply for the sake of further prolonging their lives. Rand herself, inconsistently, later declared happiness to be an end in itself. According to her theory, she should have said it was good only because it helped maintain your life.
Objection (vii):
This is probably the most egregious error. Premise 10 begs the question. Rand claimed to have an argument, a proof even, for ethical egoism. Yet 10 is one of the required premises of that 'proof'--and 10 essentially just
is ethical egoism!
Some will dispute that this is really one of her
premises. The reason I say it is is that without 10, the subsequent steps 11 and 13 do not follow. All Rand established up to that point, even if we ignore all the above objections, was that there is one and only one thing that is
good for you, and that is your life. But obviously it does not follow that you should only serve your life
unless we assume that you should only serve what is
good for you. So, if 10 is not included as a premise, then Rand simply has a
non sequitur.
Obviously, someone who held a non-egoistic theory--an altruist, say--would respond to the news of 8 and 9 (assuming Rand had demonstrated them) by saying: "Ah, so therefore, we should promote all life" or, "I see, so that means I should serve everyone's
life. Thank you, Miss Rand; I previously thought I should serve other people's
pleasure or
desires (or whatever), because I thought that was what was good for them. But now that you've convinced me that life is the sole intrinsic value, I see that it was their
life that I should have been serving all along." What argument has Rand given against the altruist, then? None.
Objection (viii):
Either 12 is false, or the inference to 13 rests on equivocation.
Rand explains that reason is our basic tool of survival. If her thesis is that any person who is not
100% rational,
all the time, will die, then she certainly needs to provide argument for that. There seem to be lots of counter-examples, many of them pointed out by Rand herself.
If her thesis is something weaker, such as that any person who is not by and large rational will probably die, then 12 is plausible. But 13 does not follow. All that would follow would be, e.g., that one should be by and large rational.
3. General arguments against ethical egoism
Rand endorsed a version of 'ethical egoism': the view that a person should always do whatever best serves his own interests. I have discussed the following objections to this doctrine in my "Why I Am Not an Objectivist", so I will be brief here. Here is one general argument against egoism:
1. If ethical egoism is true, then if you could obtain a (net) benefit equal to a dime by torturing and killing 500 people, you should do it.
2. It is not the case that, if you could obtain a (net) benefit equal to a dime by torturing and killing 500 people, you should do it.
3. Therefore, egoism is not true.
This argument is very simple, but that should not fool us into thinking it is therefore illegitimate. It is true that an egoist
could simply deny 2, proclaiming that in that situation, the mass torture and killing would be morally virtuous. Any person can maintain any belief, provided he is willing to accept enough absurd consequences of it.
Here is a second argument against ethical egoism: it contradicts Rand's own claim that each individual is an end-in-himself and that it is therefore morally wrong to sacrifice one person to another. For either Rand meant that an individual life is an end-in-itself
in an absolute sense--as discussed in my objection (i) above; or she meant that an individual life is an end-in-itself
in a relative sense--i.e., for that individual.
Assume she meant it in a relative sense. In this case, Smith's life is an end-in-itself
for Smith. But since Smith's life is not an end-in-itself
for Jones, there has been given no reason why Jones should not use Smith or sacrifice Smith's life for Jones' benefit. In fact,
for Jones, Smith's life can
only have value as a means, if it has any value at all, since for Jones, only Jones' life is an end in itself.
Now, assume she meant it in an absolute sense. In that case, she contradicted her agent-relative conception of value. Furthermore, she generated a general problem for ethical egoism. If the life of my neighbor, Jones, is an end-in-itself
in an absolute sense, and not just relative to Jones, then why wouldn't it follow that I ought to promote the life of my neighbor, for its own sake? But this is not what Rand wants--she claims that my own life is the only thing I should promote for its own sake.
http://home.sprynet.com/~owl1/rand5.htm
