We are Radicals for Reason
The past two shows have been focused on Egoism vs. Altruism (Show 084) & Arguments Against Philosophy (Show 085). I hope to get some show notes up on these shows shortly. Thanks for listening and we’ll see you next week!
Update: Arthur describes Show 085 as follows: “This episode addresses three arguments that are frequently given against being philosophical. They come primarily from the first half of the first lecture of Dr. Leonard Peikoff’s course, Understanding Objectivism.”
For Halloween weekend, Mosley and Arthur discuss various relevant topics starting with the supernatural then moving on to Halloween and the significance of the various activities surrounding it. Toward the end of the show, they discuss the election, which is almost here.
Being somewhat distracted in the chat room, I was not able to note all the topics, but they include: the supernatural; ghost stories for entertainment; philosophic significance of Halloween; dressing up and trick-or-treating; haunted houses; horror movies; fiction vs. non-fiction movies & TV shows; benevolent and malevolent universe premise; the election; Obama & religion; lesser of two evils; voting; and more.
We hope you enjoyed the show and will see you next week!
Last week on Show 081 Mosley and Arthur began to discuss their views on the nature of volition. Arthur presented a perspective, as he cautioned, that may not be in complete coherence with the Objectivist position. Dr. Paul Hsieh, of Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine (FIRM) and the NoodleFood blog, wrote us an email that offers his views from an Objectivist perspective and indicates where he differs with Arthur. After review, Arthur still maintains his position, but believes that Paul brings up several important points which he proceeds to discuss.
Topics include: TalkObjectivism blog and content; upcoming Objectivist events (see post below for more information); Paul’s email; choice and being able to do otherwise; the introspective evidence for volition; development of life compared to development of volition; volition and deliberation; determinism as an excuse; “could have done otherwise” as shorthand; determinism as necessary for understanding; genetic influences on behavior; what is under volitional control; sexual attractions; can choices be foreseen; volition and animals; consciousness as an action process; emotions; and much more.
Show 081 consists of a fantastic discussion among Mosley, Arthur, and the chat room participants regarding the nature of judgment, free will, and consciousness. After a brief recap and a few clarifying examples of applied judgment, the topic moves on to the relevant issue of free will. This then develops into a very interesting discussion on the nature of consciousness.
Topics include: follow-up on Pittsburgh smoking ban; review of judgment; examples of applied judgment; what free will is; the primary choice as the choice to focus or not; focus vs. being aware; determinism; policeman thought experiment; consciousness reduced to material processes as non-problematic; suspending judgment because of determinist view as erroneous; nature of consciousness; searching for causes of behavior; materialism; causality; and much more.
There was not enough time to discuss all the questions and so some of these issues will be discussed next week. If you have any questions and comments, feel free to post them here or join us next week!
Here are some relevant links to the Ayn Rand Lexicon on moral judgment, justice, free will, consciousness, the soul-body dichotomy, and causality.
The topic for Show 080 arose from a conversation between Mosley and regular listener iheartcells. Mosley made a comment about the status of homeless people, saying that they are lazy people who made bad decisions. iheartcells asked, “Are you sure that you have enough information to make that judgment?” In the show Mosley and Arthur discuss this.
Topics in the show include: Mosley and iheartcell’s discussion; making unwarranted judgments; judgments as not just for the bad, but for the good; today’s negative connotation with judging others; different types of judgment; justice as a virtue of making rational judgments and acting accordingly; judgments as requiring rational standards; the need for and evaluation of evidence; judging friends; moral agnosticism; the morality of being overweight; making assumptions; the source of the need of rational judgment as self-preservation; praising the good as of primary importance; rash judgments; judgment applied to the financial crisis.
In the end, Mosley concluded that he did not have enough information to make his judgment, with the understanding that judging others and making sure that one does so rationally is of crucial importance.
On this topic, Ayn Rand said:
One must never fail to pronounce moral judgment.
Nothing can corrupt and disintegrate a culture or a man’s character as thoroughly as does the precept of moral agnosticism, the idea that one must never pass moral judgment on others, that one must be morally tolerant of anything, that the good consists of never distinguishing good from evil.
To see more of what she had to say on this and other issues, feel free to check out The Ayn Rand Lexicon.
