Here is the problem :
The problem is, you’re saying that no analysis of action is possible even when considering one individual and then you make a ridiculous generalization like this one :
I just wonder how you can spend so much time on something so fairly obvious even to me (I am honestly not being condecending)? And you are just here (on this earth) to observe, report, ponder? That is it? To be honest, a stupid hick just wanting to spread his genes as rapidly as plausible makes far more sense to me.
Well, the basic point may be obvious but so is materialism. Nonetheless I have at least 8 books on the subject. I suppose, first of all - it’s interesting to me. Second of all, it’s a constant war to seperate what is sensible (such as economics) from all the ideological pap that it’s buried under.
In regards to the second point - maybe if you’re a stupid hick. But I’m not. While I certainly don’t advocate ‘the examined life’ as somehow a wonderful thing, examination and systematizing is something I enjoy doing. And, given my generally low interest in romantic relationships, children and social status most of the things that motivate most people - IE, dumb animal drives - are greatly mitigated.
Also, you put up “thou shalt not kill”, because enough people value that notion to where it serves a practicle useful purpose in people living their lives, if it didn’t we would have evolved in a completly different. That is an idea you can market, because it gernerally works (not that you can’t market some awful ideas) to peoples advantage. Markting “all things are nothing to me”, kind of well…who cares?.
Apparently somebody, because there are several pages of responses attempting to refute the obvious. Sort of like when people defend free will - it’s not a rational position, but they certainly do care.
Suppose that there is a couple who is going to Europe for a vacation. Their desired end is to go to Europe. Also suppose they decide to take a cruise ship to Europe. However, the couple enjoys the cruise so much that it becomes an end in itself, even though the cruise is also a means to a more ulterior end (getting to Europe).
Yes, but looking for an ‘ultimate end’ is ontologically nonsensical and psychologically false. Dominant values and ideas about achieving them are what cause people to act, human beings are not aiming at some mysterious ultimate end. Value and action are self-contained and immediate; there is no continuity or comparison possible. No structure of values or actions, nor any organizing principle, is more ‘valuable’ than any other - though it may be more highly valued, in a specific case.
You are saying you have a recipe that would let the stupid masses carry their affairs in a more successful way.
No, I’m saying people form fallacious beliefs that cause them to act in ways they otherwise would not. As I indeed said earlier, you can not externally criticize this - people can only act on actual values and beliefs they hold.
The fact that you apparently can not differentiate between consequential reasoning/logical justification and moral claims/ethical justification astounds me.
Of course, no principle for action is more “valuable” than any other unless an individual actually values it higher than another. However, regardless of individual valuations, some means are objectively more appropriate than others to employ in the pursuit of a given end, no?
However, regardless of individual valuations, some means are objectively more appropriate than others to employ in the pursuit of a given end, no?
Yes, but that’s not how doxastic logic and motivation work. Basically, it’s this: An individual can only conceivably act on information which has been, consciously or unconsciously, accepted. And this individual can only act in accordance with actually felt values which are associated with the utilization of this information. Therefor, to say an individual would act differently if he had different information and had made different inferences is basically tautological - but, in a technical sense, this is a different person we’re talking about.
Because of the limited rationality of a person, what you and I know - that price controls will increase scarcity, for example - is of no meaning to the individual who does not share this knowledge. If he believes price controls would work for a desired end - lowering scarcity - and he did not use price controls he would be acting irrationally. And, as Mises says, an ‘irrational’ action is not an action at all.
It is non-controversial to say that some people choose ineffective means to reach certain ends. But the point is, those people choose those means precisely because they don’t know any better - it was the best method they knew of. Trying to tack the tack of objective mistakes falls to the same critique that Rothbard gives to the doctrine of ‘efficiency’. For all action is inefficient. If it weren’t, we would have perfect knowledge and thus would be making no choices at all.
Richard Joyce, in the Myth of Morality, deals with this in the following manner:
Hampton’s challenge amounts to this: “You claim that Jim has a reason
to φ if a fully informed, correctly deliberating counterpart of him would
want him to φ – so is that reason internal or external?” We are not asking
after Jim’s reason for φing – for that is an internal reason – rather,we are asking
after a conditional reason: Jim’s reason for φing-if-a-fully-informed-andcorrectly-
deliberating-counterpart-of-him-would-want-him-to-φ. And
the worry is that this is not an internal reason, for Jim cannot escape
it by altering his desires.
But according to you that’s materially determined. So it is pretty stupid to comment on it.
Oh, you just said it again. Stones just fall. What’s the point of your descriptions of falling stones ? Who cares ?
So.What.
Vichy,
I’m getting tired of having to wade through all these other conversations going on simultaneously in the same thread. Is it all right with you if we move this dialogue to your blog post (Summum Bonum)?
Absolutely. Let us seperate the wheat from the chaff.
“Dumb animal drive”: believe me, I can empathise with you on no real desire for kids (I just don’t get it) or social status, but please tell me you use the word "dumb animal drive in jest/half heartedly? Do you at least have a respect for how every species operates and survives as a species? Even if not, the word dumb (and you can not be using it in the literal sense) has a subjective meaning.
And I know you say you do like this just for the sake of liking it and may not care about the consequences of the thought, but what the hell I’ll ask anyway. Is there a correlation between high IQ people having a lower desire to reproduce than lower IQ people? If not do lower IQ people produce at a significantly faster rate than higher IQ people? If that is the case does that just not further marginilze purley academic thought to the realm of “doesn’t really matter on this planet”? I use IQ because high IQ’s tend to measure the personality type you seem to be in (from my very amature observations).
“Dumb animal drive”: believe me, I can empathise with you on no real desire for kids (I just don’t get it) or social status, but please tell me you use the word "dumb animal drive in jest/half heartedly?
I mean ‘dumb animal drive’ in a literal sense, it’s an extremely primal urge and most people have no idea why they are doing what they are doing - that is, there isn’t much cognitive connection going on when women dress up and men act tough. Even if they realise the connection, the certainly aren’t usually thinking about it. Unconscious might perhaps be a better term, but it does typically proceed unreflectively.
Do you at least have a respect for how every species operates and survives as a species?
I have ‘respect’ for nothing, and I don’t have any particular attachment to humans-as-a-species. Most of them are only worthwhile in a system they hate and don’t understand (that is, capitalism). They’re ignorant, conceited, parochial, herdish, submissive, violent, short-sighted, tunnel-vision twits. The fact that they are the only intelligent species occupying the planet with me may be an important one, but it’s not necessarily a pleasant one.
Is there a correlation between high IQ people having a lower desire to reproduce than lower IQ people? If not do lower IQ people produce at a significantly faster rate than higher IQ people?
There is a strong correlation between IQ, system-building/system-examining interests, ‘male’ brain types and Asperger’s syndrome. All show increased interest in system functions, decreased empathy, lowered social concerns. Likewise, Aspies tend to be above average in intelligence, and there are significantly more males on the high-end of the Bell Curve than women. You could, as Danny Shahar did, say that I am, “A thousand miles beyond masculine.”
As most mating-oriented behaviour is unreflective and based on social-empathic interests, naturally men, aspies and abstract-thinking types will tend to have a lower manifest interest in children and child rearing.
“Dumb” as in not able to speak, perhaps you meant it in a more poetic sense. Other than that calling humans “worthwhile”, “ignorant”, “submissive”, etc is completley subjectional or just a spook in your head if you think otherwise.
What is completely and totally objective however, is that they are worthwhile when I take money from them in Euchre or Pinochle, then it absolutely completely rationally sets the world in order, no argument
.
P.S. I read somwhere ( I think) that Max Stirner did some translations of Adam Smith, Say, and Bastiat. Do you know anything about this? Did he do a preface or anything that you know of? Also is there any legit biography of him that you know of, or at least a response to the gibberish that Marx put out about him?
P.P.S: The only reason why you or your egoism can exist is because of animal instinct and breeding. It is the only reason for life as we know it, it is the very structure and essence for the reason why sexual species exist.
The only writings we still have from Stirner, to my knowledge, are The Ego and Its Own and a couple of articles. They are all on non-serviam, along with several authors who were influenced by Stirner, and discussions of other philosophers compared to Stirner. You’ll find all the books etc. in the Egoism section. SE Parker is great. If you click on the ‘magazine’ section you can read their egoism magazine, which has several things along these lines.
There is an egoist reply/review of The German Ideology, but I am not sure where to find it - perhaps it is on non-serviam.
LSR (La Mettrie, Stirner & Reich) has some interesting stuff on Stirner, and discussions about ideas relating to his. Not all of it is in English, but what’s there is well worth reading - especially Max Stirner - A Durable Dissident
There is only one biography of Max Stirner I know of, which is by John Henry Mackay, and if you know where to find a copy you’re one step ahead of me.
Further, if you want to send me your email address, I have some PDF articles dealing with Stirner you might find interesting.
That’s a historical contingency, not a functional one.
I wanted to add two more links - Rudolf Steiner was influenced by Stirner, and mentions him in The Philosophy of Freedom and The Riddles of Philosophy.
I sent you my address by clicking on the “send email” button on your page, hopefully that works. If not, let me know.
sexual beings reproducing sexualy is compleley functional.
So? It’s not like you aren’t strongly wedded to your ideology. Simply my moral perspective on events.
Knowledgeable in objective political knowledge (e.g. How many Representatives in the U.S., name the Supreme Court Justices, etc.), Althaus then asked them about their political preferences (e.g. should taxes be higher or lower, should banks be bailed out, etc), and the pattern is very strong, higher knowledge → more libertarian.
That much is obvious and it’s amazing that some people think that’s an intellectual pattern for all your posts can be condensed down into you repeating this over and over again. Nothing much of quality, pre-conceptions and poor labeling at times, befalling to name calling, whining until somebody gives you attention, lots of lying for you switch positions from post to post, and I can see some others here thrive on such bruteness, but oh well…
Agreed.
Ditto.