Karl

I know an entire political movement that would agree with you. Tell me Ralis how do you define what moral action to apply for the sake of the group ? Anything that works, regardless of the moral consequences ? Doesn't that sounds more like the actions of those who have no moral code and are selfish precisely in the way that you and supporters of this thesis appear to decry. If these people need to die so the group survives, then so be it. By which moral standard do you begin to execute ? Altruism says there is none. Don't worry, go ahead, do what's necessary. We cannot seperate moral from action. Every action has consequences.

Scientism has replaced science and reason has been banished. I wonder if any of you will wake from your deep slumber so before it's too late ? Hard to predict. Hope so, particularly for the young.

Interesting insight from an ex British trot Peter Hitchens which mentions the dangers of Gramscian leftism http://www.spectator.co.uk/2016/08/take-it-from-an-ex-trot-labour-neednt-worry-about-trotskyists/ Sent from my iPad

Oh not at all, the brick wall, is the shakes structure you have built in you mind and is now threatened by a single word. What if what I'm saying is true, what does it mean for your previous actions and how you must act in future. If I was a fire and brimstone preacher I would give it to you straight, I would put you in mind of brimstone and putrifying flesh, of aeons in the pit of hell, but I offer you the chance to redeem yourself without any fear of the pit, only fear the loss of your own morality if you do not. You aren't a robot so don't try and pretend you are, neither are you a cog in wheel that is deprived of the ability to think. You can and you must. What do you think of all those at the Nuremberg trials who stared into space, a vacant look of confusion on their faces as the sentence was handed down. Hadn't they only done what was best ? What they were told would make the world better ? That there was no need to think, they just carried out their duties as assigned and that they had no choice - but they did have a choice and they received judgement for their unfailing loyalty and unthinking altruism to the state. There are no unselfish acts, so the responsibility is on you to think. Once you realise what I'm saying it will come as a wrecking ball to your hastily built pile of ill conceived, cobbled together philosophical incongruence. You are a thinking, feeling person, a volitional being able to apply reason and you are responsible for ALL your actions and none of everybody else's. Acts of compassion, charity and kindness are a result of selfish volition, the ability to give and to know you are giving, it is the opposite of altruism which is to deny that you know you are taking. One action is the good in humanity, the other commands an unthinking, evil, cold robot who is equally at ease in taking or murdering. Choosing to think is what makes you human, choosing to be rationally selfish is what makes you good. Choose wisely.

You would be acting selfishly whatever you did or did not do. An act of compassion, kindness, charity is an entirely selfish act, were it not, then it would be an act of frivolous nothingness devoid of mind. A branch of a tree that saves the falling climber is not acting altruistically, this would be your assertion. That the tree sacrificed it's leaves to save the climber.

You have the choice to do that if you wish, but note that this is your choice, you decided what you would do and an act like that requires there be a self to make that decision. Selflessness removes that choice, altruism does not care one way or another who lives or dies except in the cause of some ideology. A free thinking individual can certainly take an action which might cause his own death if he does so freely, of his own accord. However this is not an altruistic act or it would mean nothing. It must mean something to you for you to take the decision and in that lies volitional free will and therefore rational selfishness.

@ Apech Which is why it must be and can only be a rationally selfish action. A selfless actor cannot act at all except by the authority of others, in effect he has surrendered his mind and will to another man. He must refuse to think and simply obey an order. If he is ordered to die, then he must die. Altruism is a tool of an ideology of power, in which duty to a cause overrides any sense of self compassion. Being 'selfish' is a term of admonishment, a way for someone else to help themselves to a value they did not earn. It is used as a bull whip to shame and cow people into giving away their property, minds and lives. It is the trick used by all dictators who push men to war with taunts of cowardice and spiteful selfishness in not standing up for their families and friends. It prompts the emotions, it causes women to berate their husbands, brothers to accuse one another of dishonour. It is a murderous sickness.

The power to oppose it, to speak out against it, that is free speech. It is not free speech if one group is allowed to speak whilst the other is dragged off and shot, or has his tongue metaphorically removed. Had free speech been possible then none of that need to have happened, a tyrant need not have come to power, but, political systems offer levers of force unless they are delimited. The first interview posted was by a Russian dissident, a defector. The point is not to listen to me, gratifying though it is to be thought of so highly ;-) but to listen to the video interview that was posted by Sionnach, discuss that interview and leave me alone to have my breakfast in peace ;-)

It's not my post. I didn't start this subject I merely commented on it. I don't ram anything down your throat. I have neither the power, or means to do it, neither would I attempt to do such a thing. You have the choice to read or not, that's free, no compulsion. However, you need to re-read your own words and note them well. "This book shouldn't be in this library, it's heretical, burn it". There are plenty of places for you in the mass of other forums, I do not seek your expulsion, I welcome you comments as long as they expand consciousness, but yours do not, they attempt to minimise. Ask yourself what you fear in your own philosophy, what makes it so weak that your only recourse denies argumentation, but instead requires banishment, silence and gagging of any philosophy which opposes it ? Whilst I will consistently argue for free speech and expression of ideas regardless of my acceptance or rejection of those ideas, your ideology requires a rejection of ideas and freedom.

What does 'unselfish' mean. Define it. Isn't it exactly the same as selfless ? If there is no self then there is no self to make a decision, to choose an action. I already had this discussion on altruism, there is no such thing as a selfless self anymore than there is a cause less cause. It's mental masturbation, imprecise language and essentially poetry. These words are the result of religious mysticism. Use them if you want but they mean nothing if you cannot define them, or understand them. Dictionary definitions aren't exact, they can be a useful starting point, but it's the user that must correctly define the word.

This is one such place. Stop acting like a dictator. This is in 'off topic' there are plenty of dedicated threads to specific practices and philosophical discussions. I think it adds immeasurably to an understanding of true equality. It's exactly what's needed to preserve free speech. One of the most beautiful things is that it survives at all. Strike one for the power of light over darkness.

No, produce the definition yourself. Dictionaries aren't infallible and are often woolly. If you cannot define it accurately then we see that it is a floating abstraction. It isn't possible. You can substitute acts of kindness, charity or compassion if you want, but selflessness is a logical impossibility. You are over complicating what is quite simple. I realise this is getting us nowhere. I have posted the piece on selfishness as defined by objectivism in the Ayn Rand lexicon. Subject is now closed for me.

You aren't doing that, you are just avoiding answering. It's like talking to a politician that refuses to give a straight reply.

Selfishness ¶ The Objectivist ethics proudly advocates and upholds rational selfishness—which means: the values required for man’s survival qua man—which means: the values required for human survival—not the values produced by the desires, the emotions, the “aspirations,” the feelings, the whims or the needs of irrational brutes, who have never outgrown the primordial practice of human sacrifices, have never discovered an industrial society and can conceive of no self-interest but that of grabbing the loot of the moment. The Objectivist ethics holds that human good does not require human sacrifices and cannot be achieved by the sacrifice of anyone to anyone. It holds that the rational interests of men do not clash—that there is no conflict of interests among men who do not desire the unearned, who do not make sacrifices nor accept them, who deal with one another as traders, giving value for value. The Virtue of Selfishness “The Objectivist Ethics,” The Virtue of Selfishness, 31 ¶ The meaning ascribed in popular usage to the word “selfishness” is not merely wrong: it represents a devastating intellectual “package-deal,” which is responsible, more than any other single factor, for the arrested moral development of mankind. In popular usage, the word “selfishness” is a synonym of evil; the image it conjures is of a murderous brute who tramples over piles of corpses to achieve his own ends, who cares for no living being and pursues nothing but the gratification of the mindless whims of any immediate moment. Yet the exact meaning and dictionary definition of the word “selfishness” is: concern with one’s own interests. This concept does not include a moral evaluation; it does not tell us whether concern with one’s own interests is good or evil; nor does it tell us what constitutes man’s actual interests. It is the task of ethics to answer such questions. The Virtue of Selfishness “Introduction,” The Virtue of Selfishness, vii ¶ There is a fundamental moral difference between a man who sees his self-interest in production and a man who sees it in robbery. The evil of a robber does not lie in the fact that he pursues his own interests, but in what he regards as to his own interest; not in the fact that he pursues his values, but in what he chose to value; not in the fact that he wants to live, but in the fact that he wants to live on a subhuman level (see “The Objectivist Ethics”). If it is true that what I mean by “selfishness” is not what is meant conventionally, then this is one of the worst indictments of altruism: it means that altruism permits no concept of a self-respecting, self-supporting man—a man who supports his life by his own effort and neither sacrifices himself nor others. It means that altruism permits no view of men except as sacrificial animals and profiteers-on-sacrifice, as victims and parasites—that it permits no concept of a benevolent co-existence among men—that it permits no concept of justice. The Virtue of Selfishness “Introduction,” The Virtue of Selfishness, ix ¶ To redeem both man and morality, it is the concept of “selfishness” that one has to redeem. The first step is to assert man’s right to a moral existence—that is: to recognize his need of a moral code to guide the course and the fulfillment of his own life . . . . The reasons why man needs a moral code will tell you that the purpose of morality is to define man’s proper values and interests, that concern with his own interests is the essence of a moral existence, and that man must be the beneficiary of his own moral actions. Since all values have to be gained and/or kept by men’s actions, any breach between actor and beneficiary necessitates an injustice: the sacrifice of some men to others, of the actors to the nonactors, of the moral to the immoral. Nothing could ever justify such a breach, and no one ever has. The choice of the beneficiary of moral values is merely a preliminary or introductory issue in the field of morality. It is not a substitute for morality nor a criterion of moral value, as altruism has made it. Neither is it a moral primary: it has to be derived from and validated by the fundamental premises of a moral system. The Objectivist ethics holds that the actor must always be the beneficiary of his action and that man must act for his own rational self-interest. But his right to do so is derived from his nature as man and from the function of moral values in human life—and, therefore, is applicable only in the context of a rational, objectively demonstrated and validated code of moral principles which define and determine his actual self-interest. It is not a license “to do as he pleases” and it is not applicable to the altruists’ image of a “selfish” brute nor to any man motivated by irrational emotions, feelings, urges, wishes or whims. This is said as a warning against the kind of “Nietzschean egoists” who, in fact, are a product of the altruist morality and represent the other side of the altruist coin: the men who believe that any action, regardless of its nature, is good if it is intended for one’s own benefit. Just as the satisfaction of the irrational desires of others is not a criterion of moral value, neither is the satisfaction of one’s own irrational desires. Morality is not a contest of whims . . . . A similar type of error is committed by the man who declares that since man must be guided by his own independent judgment, any action he chooses to take is moral if he chooses it. One’s own independent judgment is the means by which one must choose one’s actions, but it is not a moral criterion nor a moral validation: only reference to a demonstrable principle can validate one’s choices. Just as man cannot survive by any random means, but must discover and practice the principles which his survival requires, so man’s self-interest cannot be determined by blind desires or random whims, but must be discovered and achieved by the guidance of rational principles. This is why the Objectivist ethics is a morality of rational self-interest—or of rational selfishness. Since selfishness is “concern with one’s own interests,” the Objectivist ethics uses that concept in its exact and purest sense. It is not a concept that one can surrender to man’s enemies, nor to the unthinking misconceptions, distortions, prejudices and fears of the ignorant and the irrational. The attack on “selfishness” is an attack on man’s self-esteem; to surrender one, is to surrender the other. The Virtue of Selfishness “Introduction,” The Virtue of Selfishness, ix ¶ Do you ask what moral obligation I owe to my fellow men? None—except the obligation I owe to myself, to material objects and to all of existence: rationality. I deal with men as my nature and theirs demands: by means of reason. I seek or desire nothing from them except such relations as they care to enter of their own voluntary choice. It is only with their mind that I can deal and only for my own self-interest, when they see that my interest coincides with theirs. When they don’t, I enter no relationship; I let dissenters go their way and I do not swerve from mine. I win by means of nothing but logic and I surrender to nothing but logic. I do not surrender my reason or deal with men who surrender theirs. For the New Intellectual Galt’s Speech, For the New Intellectual, 133 ¶ Men have been taught that the ego is the synonym of evil, and selflessness the ideal of virtue. But the creator is the egoist in the absolute sense, and the selfless man is the one who does not think, feel, judge or act. These are functions of the self. Here the basic reversal is most deadly. The issue has been perverted and man has been left no alternative—and no freedom. As poles of good and evil, he was offered two conceptions: egoism and altruism. Egoism was held to mean the sacrifice of others to self. Altruism—the sacrifice of self to others. This tied man irrevocably to other men and left him nothing but a choice of pain: his own pain borne for the sake of others or pain inflicted upon others for the sake of self. When it was added that man must find joy in self-immolation, the trap was closed. Man was forced to accept masochism as his ideal—under the threat that sadism was his only alternative. This was the greatest fraud ever perpetrated on mankind. This was the device by which dependence and suffering were perpetuated as fundamentals of life. The choice is not self-sacrifice or domination. The choice is independence or dependence. The code of the creator or the code of the second-hander. This is the basic issue. It rests upon the alternative of life or death. The code of the creator is built on the needs of the reasoning mind which allows man to survive. The code of the second-hander is built on the needs of a mind incapable of survival. All that which proceeds from man’s independent ego is good. All that which proceeds from man’s dependence upon men is evil. The egoist in the absolute sense is not the man who sacrifices others. He is the man who stands above the need of using others in any manner. He does not function through them. He is not concerned with them in any primary matter. Not in his aim, not in his motive, not in his thinking, not in his desires, not in the source of his energy. He does not exist for any other man—and he asks no other man to exist for him. This is the only form of brotherhood and mutual respect possible between men. For the New Intellectual “The Soul of a Collectivist,” For the New Intellectual, 81 ¶ The moral purpose of a man’s life is the achievement of his own happiness. This does not mean that he is indifferent to all men, that human life is of no value to him and that he has no reason to help others in an emergency. But it does mean that he does not subordinate his life to the welfare of others, that he does not sacrifice himself to their needs, that the relief of their suffering is not his primary concern, that any help he gives is an exception, not a rule, an act of generosity, not of moral duty, that it is marginal and incidental—as disasters are marginal and incidental in the course of human existence—and that values, not disasters, are the goal, the first concern and the motive power of his life. The Virtue of Selfishness “The Ethics of Emergencies,” The Virtue of Selfishness, 49 ¶ Love, friendship, respect, admiration are the emotional response of one man to the virtues of another, the spiritual payment given in exchange for the personal, selfish pleasure which one man derives from the virtues of another man’s character. Only a brute or an altruist would claim that the appreciation of another person’s virtues is an act of selflessness, that as far as one’s own selfish interest and pleasure are concerned, it makes no difference whether one deals with a genius or a fool, whether one meets a hero or a thug, whether one marries an ideal woman or a slut. In spiritual issues, a trader is a man who does not seek to be loved for his weaknesses or flaws, only for his virtues, and who does not grant his love to the weaknesses or the flaws of others, only to their virtues. The Virtue of Selfishness “The Objectivist Ethics,” The Virtue of Selfishness, 31 ¶ The first right on earth is the right of the ego. Man’s first duty is to himself. His moral law is never to place his prime goal within the persons of others. His moral obligation is to do what he wishes, provided his wish does not depend primarily upon other men. This includes the whole sphere of his creative faculty, his thinking, his work. But it does not include the sphere of the gangster, the altruist and the dictator. A man thinks and works alone. A man cannot rob, exploit or rule—alone. Robbery, exploitation and ruling presuppose victims. They imply dependence. They are the province of the second-hander. Rulers of men are not egoists. They create nothing. They exist entirely through the persons of others. Their goal is in their subjects, in the activity of enslaving. They are as dependent as the beggar, the social worker and the bandit. The form of dependence does not matter.

Look again. Right on the first, wrong on the second. No one may put any mask on, not just there own. Everyone dies whether they put on the masks or not. They are either shot or suffocate. Let's take a third plane where there is no gun aimed at the head of the passengers at all, where the instructions advise you of the right course of action - this is moral principle by decree, but based on reality, the company doesn't want dozens of passengers dying on its flight, so it gives the correct instruction for maximising survival. It's in both passenger and company interests to follow the instructions. Here, where non coercive instruction and freedom to choose is invoked, the most people survive. This is why the use of coercive force is bad. In the first case even force applied for the right reason results in more deaths than no force. In the case of the altruistic plane, the evidence is clear. It always has been, history confirms it. Altruism is coercive force applied to another person in order to extract an unearned value.

No you didn't. You have repeatedly avoided answering questions on a broad range of subjects, you don't even try. Life isn't complicated at all, you either have it and are free to preserve it, or you are not free to preserve it and therefore don't have it. It's called survival. More survival = better. Less survival=worse anything that improves life is good, anything that destroys life is bad. Force is the antithesis of reason and reason is our only means of survival.

I'm trying to save them Ralis, you are going to condemn them to death. Objectivism let's them go free, communism/fascism takes away that freedom to choose and uses force to impose its will on them. There is no altruism, it's just a common thugs word for sacrifice, either property, or life it doesn't matter which. Who decides this altruism ? Come on you profess to be a critical thinker so it should be obvious that the decision is not made by the sacrifices as is the case with the death camps. If one should choose to die willingly, then one is doing so from the point of self choice (selfishness). The only way altruism can function is if an authority tells you that you must make a sacrifice and gives you no option about it. It is selfless, because someone else decides your fate, not you. Would you be pleased about that ?

It's not altruism, it's compassion, kindness, act of charity. It's so simple. Look, back to the aircraft. Let's do a thought experiment. I shall give you the scenario then you do the rest. Two aircraft. On one the stewardess holds guns to everyone's heads and demands that that the passengers put on their masks first before attending to others. Each mask has a sensor that detects that this has taken place, otherwise a light goes on which tells the stewardess who to shoot. Second aircraft, same deal, but the stewardess demands the passengers must not put on ANY mask at all until they have put on someone else's mask. On which aircraft are there likely to be more survivors ? The impossibility of altruism becomes clear.

Yet this is exactly the point. Sacrifice to whom. In this case it was the National Socialist Government that decreed it. They saw it that the Jews were serving the German nation by their sacrifice, the people were serving the nation by their enduring hardship, the soldiers were doing so by freely sacrificing their lives on the battlefield. The inherent element of collectivism is sacrifice of self to some greater good, be it spiritual ideal, emperor, nation or God. Does it seem like a good deal to you, that some authority takes away your freedom to choose and imposes selflessness upon you. That is communism, you have no choice. The irony is that each person, if we discount execution, must first act selfishly in order to provide whatever the state decrees as altruism to its demands.

Of course I read it. Altruism = sacrifice it's anti-life, anti-spiritual it is the cult of death and destruction. I shall post the entire piece on selfishness followed by the entire piece of selflessness. Compare and contrast.

No she promoted rational selfishness. None base their policies on Objectivism. Ron Paul might come closest, but he wasn't really a policy maker. Lots of people say they are objectivist, but they aren't, they haven't interpreted the philosophy correctly. Clearly that's not the fault of the philosopher, but of the reader. It's not possible to silo out small sections of the philosophy such as selfishness and then simply interpret it anyway you feel it works. Each part is grounded in reality like the branches of a tree form a trunk then the roots. It's not enough to talk about the leaves, you must know the entire thing back to the soil. Neither does it ignore the complexity of social exchange, it promotes it by first promoting freedom to act rationally. If you really don't want 'the world to burn' then promoting freedom is a good place to begin I would suggest. It's completely ridiculous to suggest Rand was a Neo liberal, she was a philosopher not a politician. The philosophy she espoused was the original US constitution. The thing is, I think your a nihilist. Your Avatar suggests you have an affinity with the Joker and your lack of argumentation when challenged only strengthens my view. You appear a dark shadow to me. I hope it's not true and that I have you wrong.

I don't know why this doesn't sink in. Look at extreme examples of altruism and it becomes clear that there is no such thing. The Jews sent to the death camps were selflessly serving the German people, the teeth and wealth that the guards took and sorted was for the glory of the third reich. The soldiers sent to die in the Russian winter were told to serve their country, to act selflessly, to sacrifice, to duty. Of course, if we look at the case of soldiers on the battlefield they must first act selfishly in order to survive long enough to be effective killers, then they must work as a team because each man depends on the other to protect each other's lives. They aren't acting altruistically, they are trading value, my life for his. The same goes for any kind of voluntary trade. I trade something I value less for something I value more. The same in reverse. Each person gain more value by the exchange, they are both wealthier.

Acts of kindness, compassion. Do you think Rand would sit and let a child die because they had nothing to trade ? FFS. Normal people take joy in saving the life of another human, it isn't difficult. However, if you fail to take that oxygen and fall unconscious then the child next to you might well die. The point of trading value for value is for those that have that capacity, you know the one I talked about, that they are free to trade and are alive first of all, then perform acts of kindness/charity/compassion as we judge it. I would let Stalin, or Ted Bundy die for sure as they are a threat to my and other life of people I depend on through free value/value trading.

'The purpose of' 'Altruism' Both of these things mean human sacrifice. Rational self interest hold that a mans life is an end in itself. That people act as traders who give value for value. This allows for acts of kindness and charitable giving, but those things cannot be the purpose of rational selfishness.

They took no notice of objectivism in the 1950s, they haven't changed their minds in the interceding period. They did take notice of Marx and millions upon millions died and suffered terrible deprivations, history does not convince people that this was evil and makes a philosophy no one cares about the focus of its full hatred :-/ Very few seem to grasp the simple fact that there are two options, freedom and the pursuit of happiness, or sacrifice and misery. It's a binary choice and we are always on the way towards one or the other. The biggest fantasy is believing that there can ever be a middle way. Freedom or sacrifice, people should weigh them carefully.