Alonzo Fyfe

In any sufficiently large body of literature it will always be possible to find quotes within it that can be interpreted to support whatever conclusion one wants to support. The question is whether those quotes fit into a coherent whole.


"Emergencies"

Starting with your quote concerning "emergencies", it is important to note that the example I drew is one in which the owner is present and refuses to provide life-sustaining aid except at a price that some people cannot afford. Your example was one in which the owner was absent and cannot be reached for the purpose of obtaining consent. I believe that this is a relevant difference that prevents an inference from what may do in an emergency with an absent owner to the use of force against a present but unwilling owner.

If you do want to force this implication, you end up with an argument that does widespread damage to Rand's overall position. You now have an argument that can be used as a foundation for governments obtaining from people who "have" such things as health-care, prescription drugs, food, and shelter for the "have nots" that Ayn Rand often writes against.


"Selfishness"

The same problem applies to the quote you provide about 'love'. It is a convoluted answer trying to cover up a contradiction in her view -- quite similar, I might add, to the convoluted explanations one gets when one points out contradictions in the Bible. One cannot answer a charge of inconsistency by saying, "here is a quote of Ayn Rand stating that she is not being inconsistent."

The favorite rhetorical trick of a person trying to save psychological egoism from counter-examples is to redefine "selfishness" so broadly (and "unselfishness" so narrowly) that their meaning is lost. Among my favorites are the claim that the person who threw himself on a grenade to save his friends obviously wanted this more than he wanted his friends to die, so he was being selfish.

Ayn Rand's attempt to describe love as "selfish" is as absurd as attempts at describing the person throwing himself on a grenade as "selfish."


"Capitalism"

Now, on to the quotes about capitalism, your statement If people suffered capitalism would not be to blame misses the point. I agree with this statement. But I am a utilitarian-capitalist; the type of capitalist that Rand rants against because a utilitarian-capitalist gives up on capitalism the instant it provides more misery than benefit.

Now, what it seems that you are doing is simply re-defining the concept of "capitalism" into something like "that economic institution that maximizes utility, whatever it is." In this way, anything that does not maximize utility is, by definition, not a 'capitalist' system. But this is just playing with words. It is like trying to save the thesis that the planets move because the angels are pushing them by redefining 'angels' so that it is just another word for 'gravity.'

Or, to redefine what it means for a medical procedure to "work" so that it is gramatically identical to "is consistent with what the doctor ordered."


"Charity."

On the issue of charity, it seems that a meaningful paraphrase of the quote you provide is, "If you have some extra money to throw away, and you decide to throw it in the direction of charity, I am not going to brow-beat you for it, so long as the recipieints of that charity are deserving."

But this is not what most people refer to as charity, and still leaves open the claim that charity is a character flaw.

Ultimately, a great deal depends on how you interpret the qualifiers used in the quote you provided, they are worth of the help and you can afford to help them. What does it mean to be "worth of the help" and or "you can afford to help them". Some would argue.

JERDOG

This fallacy is called,"Appeal to popularity". Just because something is held as a popular belief does not mean that it is the correct belief. If you use this logic structure you could claim that god exist because most people believe in some type of god.

I fail to see how you interpret this as being left open to a character flaw.

I think you are making a major "leap of logic" here. Just because something is one way in an emergency would not grant the government to do all the things you stated. This is called a fallacy of equivocation.

Rand did not change the definition of selfishness, the definition of selfishness changed in the dictionary over time because of the religious right influence in America. Rand pointed out the early definitions of the word and how it changed over time in AVOS I think. It's in one of her books.

Your question is flawed from the start because it is not based in reality. It is like asking."What if Santa Clause was real, would christmas,as be the same?" The premise of the question is not based in reality. Reality is that capitalism does not cause the things you state so it is a non sequitur.

Dr. Retard

Notice he's talking about what "charity" means. The meaning of a word, inasmuch as there is one, is decided by common usage. No fallacy there. (Of course you can have special stipulated meanings, or you can write your own little language. But I assume that's not what we're after here).

JERDOG

Is that what most people refer to charity as? Did he take a poll? He has not shown how it leaves open the assumption of a character flaw. All Rand is saying is that people should not be obligated to give anything they earn. This is all she is saying. But in order for this weak attempt at criticism to flourish he must make assumptions, speculation, and leaps of logic on the subject.
In other words, hes reading too much into it.

This is to be determined by the individual. After all only I know if my personal financial state is able to absorb the cost of what ever help I should decide to give. Why should this be determined by anyone else?
Being "worth the help" is also something that has to be taken on a case by case basis. If some guy outside of a liquor store ask for money for food, then more than likely common sense tells us he's not after food. If your neighbors house burns down then that may be a good chance to help, but there is no obligation here.

If you think the guy outside the liquor store is worth the dime, then no one is stopping you from giving him your dime. After all, it is your dime to give.

What Alonzo is saying is that it is looked down upon by Rand to give the dime to the beggar in front of the liquor store. And this is not what she is saying nor has alonzo shown this to be the case. He has only offered only speculation and his interpretation.
I on the other hand have offered a very outright and straight forward quote. In all fairness, the straight forward quote would be the hand the beats the one Alonzo has offered.

Like I said , who am I to tell Alonzo that he cannot give the dime to the guy in front of the liquor store? It is his dime, not mine.

Alonzo Fyfe

When I was emersed in the libertarian/Ayn Rand world, I knew several people who could quote Ayn Rand by chapter and verse. No matter what was said, they had a quote to come back with.

I never found merit in that way of arguing. Each quote is cut away from its context, like separate pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. If you have worked on jigsaw puzzles you know the experience of looking at a piece and saying, "It could not possibly go there," only it did. The image on the piece does not change, but the image looks different in context.

The problem with Ayn Rand's theory has nothing to do with the image on any particular piece. The problems emerge when one takes those pieces and tries to put them together into a coherent whole. When that happens, one notices that there are pieces that just do not fit -- that have to be set aside. It does not matter how clear the image is on that piece taken in isolation, what matters is the fact that the overall theory has no place in it for that piece.

At the same time you say that I offer only "speculation and his interpretation," you categorize your own remarks as "a very outright and straight forward quote." Yet, there is no such thing as "a very outright and straight forward quote." You cannot look at a single piece of a puzzle and, from that piece in isolation, derive from that what the whole image looks like.

Look at the theory as a whole, and you find a theory that continually confuses important distinctions, such as:

(a) the distinction between "is" and "ought".
(b) the distinction between "means" and "ends".
(c) the distinction between "doing what is in your own interest," and "doing what you want."

Taken out of context of the theory as a whole, your quotes contain no less measure of "speculation and interpretation". They are not representative, nor are they even consistent with, the overall theory.

It is more significant that in your case you offer a quote where Ayn Rand says that charity is permissible (never required) if one has money to spare and the recipient is worthy. Yet, the concepts of "money to spare" or "worthy recipient" are left open, allowing others to insert whatever interpretations they are most comfortable with. Is the beggar in front of the liquer store truly worthy of a dime?

Alonzo Fyfe

On the way to work, I thought of a way of illustrating the points that I raised above.

If one were to read through my writings, they would find places where I say explicitly, "Objective values do not exist." Somebody could easily offer this as a "very outright and straight forward quote."

At the same time, elsewhere, they will find places where I say, "Objective values are real; there are important parts of what we see going on in the world around us that do not make sense except in terms of these objective values."

Another clear statement.

But these two clear statements, cut from their context and placed side by side, give the appearance of a contradiction.

They do not, in fact, contradict each other. I use two different senses of the word "objective."

Where I make the distinction clear, I say that objective(3) values do not exist but that the existence of objective(2) values is obvious.

But a person looking at individual quotes without putting them into the context of an over-riding theory cannot make sense of them.

There is no such thing as a "very outright and straight forward quote."

JERDOG

This is where you and I separate Alonzo. Why would you offer "required" in here? Would you want required love, support or acceptance by anyone? How would you know who really and truly cared?

You have made it very clear that I quoted Ayn out of text as you say, but you have not shown how I have done such. The reason "if they are worthy", and "if you can spare it", are left open to interpretation is because it is up to the individual what he /she does with their own money.
So my question to you is, why should this be determined by anyone else other than the one who owns the money?

Alonzo Fyfe

(1) I like chocolate syrup on my ice cream. Yet, this does not imply that I should put it on my mashed potatos. That A fits with B does not imply that A should also fit with C, D, and E. What is true charity need not also be true of love, support, and acceptance.

(2) There are a great many ways to know who really and truly cared. By your argument, no wealthy person can have such knowledge -- not if knowing who really and truly cared requires voluntary charity. And if knowing who really and truly cared is of such great value, and voluntary charity is the only way to acquire this knowledge, then perhaps we do the wealthy a favor by putting them in a position where they, too, have the opportunity to discover who really and truly cares.


I am surprised that of all the points raised, you respond to the least important.

Your question is unimportant, and question-begging even if it is important.

First, you assume that I disagree with your end position. I have said nothing to indicate this, only that I disagree with the logical route that Ayn Rand took to this conclusion. One of the rules of logic is that, the fact that a chain of reasoning can be proved invalid does not at the same time prove that the conclusion is false. It only proves that the conclusion is unsupported.

Second, Ayn Rand's logical route travels through three logical fallacies; an is/ought fallacy (attempts to infer ought from is), a means/ends fallacy (an attempt to infer "X is an end" from premises that show only that "X is a means"), and a want/self-interest equivocation (confusing the distinction between what an agent wants and what is in his self-interest).

There may be a logically sound line of reasoning to reach the same conclusion. That is what I am waiting to see. Without such a path, then there is no foundation for concepts and institutions such as ownership.

JERDOG

No you miss what I am getting at. Pehaps I didn't quote you correctly.

I am asking you , why should she(Ayn) or anyone else designate any degree to the concept "money to spare"? After all who's money is it that is being spared?

And with the concept "worthy recipient" like I was trying to articulate earlier. If someone has to tell me who is a worthy recipient and I am basically forced to give or else be shunned by society,is this forced help really honorable? Like forced love or forced friends right along aside that would also not be honorable or even realy wanted, because how would you know who was realy your friend?

The equivocation you made regarding rich people does not apply to this scenario because the rich person has the power to terminate any friendship or relationship he has at the first hint of someone just after him for the money. Plus he would not be shunned by society for doing so. Unlike someone approached by a guy at a gas station asking for money. If it was considered by society for this guy to be a "worthy recipient" and he did not give to him, he would be shunned.

So to recap. If you, rand ,or anyone else places any degree of "money to spare" for beggers, then you are taking away the rights of the person that owns the money.

If you place any degree of "worthy recipient", then roughly the same thing happens where someone will be forced (because it happens to be the standard of "worthy recipient") in a way to give to someone in a certain situation that they may think really doesn't need it.

To apply a standard equates to freedom being taken away from the person that owns the, (in this case), money.

So I ask again. What should anyone besides the person who owns the money be the one who decides rather or not to give it out and who to give it out to?