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I feel I owe the wiki community an appology for my rash and almost childish edit of the Obj. Phil. page last December. I have recently included a comment above the Criticism section suggesting the readers to consider that the criticisms contain certain logical fallacies. Again, I appologise for my previously immature actions and I hope the recent edit is acceptable.
- psygnisfive at yahoo dot com; psygnisfive through aim
I just did a major edit on the page. I didn't address the factual error previously mentioned (it seemed perfectly Randian to me, although I don't recall reading that exact quote either. I'll do a Google search on it later.)
I also invited a few fellow students of Objectivism to clarify some of the rest of it. It appears a lot of the work here has been done by critics of Objectivism. While that's fine for purposes of NPOV, students of Objectivism, in my experience, usually know a lot more about the topic than the critics.
Edit: I can't find any match for the disputed quote other than the Wikipedia itself. It sounds Randian enough, but I'm taking it out until it can be verified. Philip L. Welch Feb. 15, 2004
I've been editing this page even more extensively, with Michael Hardy's help and clarification (thank you). I think all conflicts between my edits and his are resolved. Philwelch 00:18, 16 Feb 2004 (UTC)
I didn't get too far into the article and will have to read it more thouroughly later, but in the section -Mind and Body- There is a snippet after the description which states: Objectivism does not comment on or posit an explanation for the metaphysics of how the mind and body interact.
However, in the above paragraph the first line states: Objectivism rejects the mind-body dichotomy, holding that the mind and body are an integrated whole. This seems like a pretty clear statement to me. The follow-up snippet seems like an idle debunking comment that belongs in the criticisms section if anywhere.
In my opinion this entire section should be deleted on NPOV grounds. To begin with, "cult" is a loaded word that implies a value judgment. Secondly and most importantly, all the criticisms that appear in this section represent personal feelings and opinions about Objectivism (Nathaniel Branden's POV is no more valid here than anyone else's). Lastly, many of these feelings have to do with the interpersonal dynamics between Ayn Rand and those who follow her philosophy - they don't have much to do with Objectivism itself.
I'd also like to note that the perceived contradiction between following Ayn Rand's words dogmatically and the rational, individualist pursuit of truth on one's own have already been covered more than adequately in the introduction.
For these reasons, I'm deleting the section. Ubernetizen 21:34, 13 Mar 2004 (UTC)
I think the sentence in the introduction that reads: "Young people whose knowledge of philosophy comes primarily from her writings, under the emotional influence of her novels, sometimes are thought to behave like religious fanatics, and are sometimes pejoratively called "Randroids."" should also be removed, on the grounds that it is both unnecessary (has no bearing on the philosophy itself) and - though carefully couched in terms of what is "sometimes thought" to be the case - it smacks heavily of bias. Imagine applying this statement ("...are thought to behave like religious fanatics", etc.) to the article about Republicans or Democrats, for example. People can and should reach that judgment for themselves, without prodding.
I'm also moving the Nathaniel Branden criticism from the introduction to the appropriate section for criticisms. Ubernetizen 20:38, 19 Mar 2004 (UTC)
The following paragraph as it appears in the article is utter nonsense and should be removed or altered:
Octothorn 04:38, 1 Apr 2004 (UTC)
"In particular, Objectivism has been largely silent on the possibility that a rational agent may fulfill his or her own well-being by directly seeking the well-being of another"
No it hasn't. Objectivism directly recognizes that other people can be in and of themselves a value, often a greater value than anything else. Philwelch 01:15, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Scottryan seems to be adding a bunch of information mainly about how each particular part of Objectivism agrees or disagrees with other given philosophers. This is kind of silly and unnecessary. As you see above, he also added a somewhat erroneous statement, and skewed the POV. Upon fixing his edits he proceeded to start an edit war. Well, Scottryan, let's leave it as is and discuss it here.
Happy to discuss it as you like, but apart from possible POV issues in the presentation I don't think there's a lot of question about the point itself.
According to Objectivist ethics, an agent is supposed to be the sole beneficiary of his/her own actions, and although other people may benefit from the action, their benefit is not the _direct_ goal of the action. As I noted in my earlier edit, David Kelley has addressed this very point and tried to give an Objectivist account of benevolence that fills what he sees as a major gap in its ethics. Rephrase it, rewrite it, whatever, but it's a legitimate point.
I also don't see why you've removed my introductory account of the origin of the name 'Objectivism'. The name is indeed based on Rand's trichotomy 'intrinsic/subjective/objective'; I think this trichotomy is fundamental to Rand's outlook and should be mentioned fairly early on. I don't think I had any POV problems in my phrasing of the point, but if you disagree, I think the proper thing to do is to edit them, not to remove them.
I suspect much of the (my) difficulty here is simply that I'm trying to add to what's already there rather than edit it. I think the original article needs some editing for completeness and accuracy before _anything_ else. So if I spend any more time on this entry, that's where I'll plan to start.
As for the so-called 'edit war', what actually happened was that you saved an edit of your own while I was working on the page. I got a message to that effect when I tried to save one of my own updates. So before saving my edit, I merged your additions into the text (at least I didn't deliberately miss any; sorry if I overlooked something). Then I looked at the parts you'd excised, disagreed that they needed to be removed, but adjusted the phrasing of a couple of them to meet your criticism of the POV (apparently successfully, since you didn't remove those parts when you returned later). After that I haven't so much as touched a single one of your changes. So much for the 'edit war'. Sorry if I stepped on your toes, but it wasn't deliberate.
Scottryan 14:32, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Okay, by way of illustrating what I think this entry needs, I've done some expanding of the first section on "metaphysics". Have a look and see what you think. I've stuck entirely to exposition and been as careful as I can not to "load" any terms with any non-neutral POV. I've made no other changes anywhere else except to remove the notes referring me to this page.
I think something similar needs to be done with each of the later sections as well, but for the time being I'll refrain from doing it.
Comments?
Scottryan 15:03, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
And here, for reference, is the passage I had previously added explaining the significance of the name "Objectivism":
Objectivism takes its name from Rand's formulation of a trichotomy among the "intrinsic", the "subjective", and the "objective". According to Rand, neither concepts nor values are "intrinsic" to external or extramental reality, but neither are they merely "subjective" (by which Rand means "arbitrary" rather than "subject-dependent"). Rather, Rand contends that (when properly formed) they are objective in the sense that they meet the peculiar needs of human cognition: concepts meet the need for cognitive economy, and values meet the need for guidance in making decisions that genuinely promote survival and well-being.
I still don't see any POV problems in my formulation here and therefore don't know why it was removed. But at any rate I think an explanation along these lines -- whether with my phrasing or not -- should appear somewhere fairly early in the entry.
Scottryan 15:37, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Having heard no objections, I've just done a major upgrade on the 'epistemology' section. I also put the 'trichotomy' section back in and made some minor adjustments to the bit about the mind-body dichotomy.
Scottryan 20:58, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
OK, your edits were left mostly untouched this time, but for a little reformatting. I'm going to ask a couple people to look at it later, but it looks okay to me. Thanks for expanding the epistemology section. Philwelch 02:08, 5 Apr 2004 (UTC)
I just did likewise with the 'ethics' section (and, of course, had previously done so with the 'metaphysics' section). Since you made your edits while I was working on that section, I was careful to preserve them in my merge. (I also tweaked the phrasing in the opening paragraph a bit.)
I suppose I don't have any strong opinion about where to put that initial paragraph on the 'trichotomy' -- but is there some reason you think it doesn't belong in the 'tenets' section?
(By the way, the texts you adjusted in the 'politics' section weren't mine. Just FYI.)
Scottryan 02:23, 5 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Two remarks on your corrections:
"(To make such an assertion, it is said, relies upon the validity of the senses in order for the assertion to be understood by others.)"
This isn't Rand's (actually Branden's) argument. Their argument is that the speaker couldn't have _acquired_ any such knowledge other than through sensory perception and is therefore committing a stolen-concept fallacy.
"Animals can grasp both sensation (i.e. the raw sensory data) as well as perception (the ability to identify any particular concrete)."
This isn't really how Objectivism distinguishes between sensation and perception. For Rand, a "percept" is a group of sensations automatically retained by the mind; sensations as such, she says, aren't retained.
Scottryan 02:54, 5 Apr 2004 (UTC)
I finally had a few minutes to sit down and rewrite the section on political theory. I excised a few short bits and changed the section heading to reflect the fact that Objectivism speaks not of "natural" but of "individual" rights.
Here are the bits I cut out, in case somebody wants to try to figure out a way to reinsert them:
I think I'd like to see the point about negative rights worked in there somewhere, but with this proviso: Rand does suggest (at one point in "The Ethics of Emergencies") that we do have a positive obligation to maintain a society in which individual rights are respected. (The other excised bits repeat points I made in the part I wrote anew.)
I may get around to making that change myself, or I may not. At any rate, as far as I'm personally concerned, the expository portions of this page are in pretty good shape now.
Scottryan 22:11, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC)
I've folded the section of 'Objectivist terminology' into the preceding sections, because I think it makes better sense to define these terms on the fly in their proper context. The only 'Objectivist phrase' I haven't thus incorporated is 'Check your premises'.
Here's the part I cut:
Scottryan 11:43, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)
I removed the following chunk from the "criticisms" section since I allude to this dispute in the "politics" section:
Scottryan 22:20, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)
We lost the criticism in the last paragraph. It either has to be made explicit or be cut - I suspect there are editors familiar with the source and willing to make that chunk explicit? -- Karbinski ( talk) 21:06, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
Starting the criticism section with: "Rand's philosophy has been the object of criticism by prominent intellectuals" is obviously opinion based and biased. What defines a "prominent intellectual"? Stating the critics name and position (possibly title, degree, awards...) will provide the reader with enough information to decide where they are prominent, or posses any intellect. Linux Gang * ( talk) —Preceding undated comment added 22:14, 16 January 2010 (UTC).
Given that Rand/Peikoff are not silent on the choice to live, and in fact in OPAR and Viable Values, considerable space is devoted to this topic, should Nozick's criticism - ["[Rand] needs to explain why someone could not rationally prefer dying and having no values."] - go without response? The way I read the criticism, it is saying Objectivism has no answer to something which OPAR actually does respond to in detail. Any comments? — BRIAN 0918 • 2010-02-26 04:57Z