the psychology of objectivism - one possible narrative

“If error is foreign to philosophy, if it cannot be that which philosophy strives to avoid, this is for no other reason than that philosophy is ill equipped to deliver us denotative truths about reality or the world. Philosophy is not an empirical practice, even among those who call themselves empiricists. It is never a matter of making true or false statements about states of affairs in the world, but rather a practice of creating and critiquing concepts. Philosophical claims pertain not to referential truths but rather to the medium of basic concepts that free a region of experience so that referential judgments might be made at all. Before one can discourse about the world, the sense of the world must have already announced itself.” –Levi Bryant: Difference and Giveness

One of things that is emerging for me in this study is the similarity between philosophy, as a form of conceptual play, and mathematics and even science. In the sense of conceptual play, philosophy, given the armchair discipline it is, must admittedly also work with the isolated systems of the abstractions we create. This, for instance, is why paradox is the field in which philosophy dominates. We use the concepts of space and the way distance breaks down into infinite digress in order to establish why it is Zeno’s arrow will never reach its target. But that doesn’t mean any one of us would go prancing around between an archer and their target. One would think us smart enough to recognize the difference between reality and conceptual play. But at the same time, doesn’t this suggest a similarity between what the mathematician and the philosopher does? Doesn’t the mathematician also play with numbers (quite often (simply for the sake of playing with numbers –that is with no regard to whether what they’re doing actually refers to reality or not? But it is this kind of play, a sort of brainstorming, that can lead to some very real implications.

(At the same time, some of the most dangerous people in this world are those who want to bypass the play, because it doesn’t serve their serious purposes, and get to the real implications. These people want to own reality.)

The last sentence:

“Before one can discourse about the world, the sense of the world must have already announced itself.”

:refers to the initial encounter with the object/event in which, for a split second, we are completely stupid and intuitive. This is the point at which the sensible is bombarded with information but hasn’t quite processed it. At this point, the mind/brain complex starts repeating the different singularities through the different faculties (in a sense similar to Dennett’s multiple draft theory) until it composes them into a coherent concept. At this point, the object/event is being passed back and forth between the sensible and thought. The important thing to recognize here is that, given this process, there is no hierarchy between the sensible (intuition) and thought (concept). There is only a relationship that produces our experience of reality. Our initial encounter with the object/event is naturally creative. This is reflected in language in the way we listen to what the other has to say and base our understanding of it on similar sentences we have heard, then proceed to answer it with a sentence unlike any we have spoken based on previous sentences we have uttered. Our encounters, like the language we use to describe them, are inherently creative.

It just seems like philosophy should reflect that.

And just to give you sense of the connection, Ambig, between my present study and what you’re doing here, to let you know I’m not just arbitrarily importing this stuff:

“Perspective is the structure wherein the subject unfolds and without which it would not be. In this respect, perspective is similar to Heidegger’s being-in-the-world [or Dasein as you like to put it]. Perspective is the inseparability of the subject from its world. In other words, the perspective is not in the subject; rather, the subject is in the perspective.” -Levi Bryant: Difference and Giveness

In this sense, we can see how misconceptions, such as objectivism, can result from assuming the subject/object dichotomy or the failure to recognize the truth of Dasein as you would put it. It is also behind Deleuze’s assertion of the truth of relativity (that is by virtue of the perspective of Dasein) as compared to the relativity of truth (which results from the dogma of the subject/object dichotomy).

That said, I would also note the role played by the moral dimension of repetition (or that which can be perfectly repeated) as pointed out in the original text:

“Moralists sometimes present the categories of Good and Evil in these terms: every time we try to repeat according to nature or as natural beings (repetition of a pleasure, of a past, of a passion) we throw ourselves into a demonic and already damned exercise [difference –my addition] which can only end in despair or boredom. The Good, by contrast, holds out the possibility of repetition, of successful repetition and the spirituality of repetition, because it depends not upon a law of nature but on a law of duty, of which, as moral beings, we cannot be subjects without also being legislators. What is Kant’s ‘highest test’ if not a criterion for what can, in principle, be reproduced –in other words, what can be repeated without contradiction in the form of moral law? The man of duty invented a ‘test’ of repetition; he decided what could be repeated.” -Difference and Repetition, pg. 4

If we really look at what the pseudo-objectivists are trying to do, we see how the moral imperative of perfect repeatability has bled, through a residual effect, into the assertions of those who would make claims concerning their adherence to the criteria of “objectivity”, “facts” (that is when they’re usually talking about data), and the “scientific method”. In effect, what they are asking us to do is to accept their conjectures and speculations based on their almost religious faith in these terms as a kind of moral imperative –much as we are suppose to accept the authority of a priest based on their commitment to Christianity or any religion for that matter.

This is one of the cool things about French philosophy to me: it doesn’t approach the authoritarian element from an us-and-them perspective; it looks, rather, to the core of the human predicament common to us all to find the source of the authoritarian perspective. In this sense, it has never been as important as it is now.

wrong thread – sorry

Why? Because it doesn’t make you the guru? Actually, I think everything I have said is perfectly pertinent:

You offered one narrative of the psychology of objectivism. I offered others via Delueze. And generally when I create strings like this, rather than snub down my nose at the input of others, I consider it my responsibility to bring it back on track.

Frankly, Ambig, I’m a little repulsed by you right now.

But you avoid this also. Sometimes you say you Believe it. Much of the time you write as if objetivists are wrong and silly and dangerous. What if you actually accepted it, in the World, on the ground? What if it affected your full range of actions, and not just metaconversations like this one?

This may also be true, though to be clear, it is not the Point I make above. Iambiguous, acting in the World, has been a progressive and still has progressive outbursts and will tend to be more critical of conservatives and warmongers and racists and so on. In this tendency a stand is taken that goes against the position. You do not toss a dime up in the air and choose political reactions. You act as if you know what is worse.

And then in your longest thread, you repeatedly mock and put down objectivists.

One could read your line about what others resisting a frame of mind AS implying or is it stating that you do not resist. But you resist all the time. You have a cake and eat it too set up.

Can you see how you implicitly, as rhetoric, imply it is clear which is worse?

(if by any chance you do not mean to imply the choice is obvious, you might possibly be able to see how it must come across to most readers)

It seems to me you have not really tried believing your position all the time. Mull over what this would be like and the reasons you do not actually do this.

Agreed. This is the closing of the mind.
Seek to know. Never believe in anything. Faith is the empty cup of knowledge.

Sorry, bro, but, just as with many intellectuals like Delueze, I now tend to pull back from them. Too abstract, too abstruse for what I am doing here. I am not NOT a serious philosopher. To me, it’s all about identity and value judgments and political economy “down here”.

I started out at ILP posting a lot in the philosophy forum. But it just didn’t seem to go over all that well. Folks didn’t seem to “get” me. Especially some of the…moderators. Kept getting “warned”. Or so it seemed.

So now I just hang out in the other forums. Waiting for godot as it were.

Nothing personal though. With me it never is. Not even tangling with the objectivists or the fucking Kids.

I do believe that many objectivists are wrong and silly. Also, that if they get into a position of power over others they can be quite dangerous. Often with the best of intentions.

But I don’t predicate that on Science or Philosophy or God. Or on something said to be Rationally or Metaphysically or Objectively true. Instead, I offer folks my own subjective understanding of myself “out in the world” from the perspective of dasein, conflicting goods and political economy.

Knowing full well that in the past I believed something other than I do now; and knowing that I might come upon a new experience or meet someone new or even read the next post here at ilp and come to believe something else.

But, in part, it is because I still believe what I do now that I have choosen to disengage from others by and large. In other words for the reason I noted above.

But I have no illusions about my “progressive” ideas. They are deeply embedded existentially in my past experiences, relationships, and sources of information. But others who embrace more conservative narratives think much the same of their own behaviors.

It then only comes down to the extent to which they think as they do because they are able to convince themselves that what they think necessarily conveys the most rational [ethical] manner in which to think about these things.

Well, I don’t have access to this point of view anymore.

And if someone thinks those who still do embrace it have the potential to be dangerous if they take their political values and reconfigure them into some sort of ideological Truth…then they think like I do.

What “in the world” does that mean though? I live what I believe by, in part, disengaging from the world of political interaction. I now often feel profoundly fractured and fragmented in reacting to the news from day to day. I see all the different arguments from all the different sides…and I filter them through dasein and conflicting goods.

Then [again] this:

How can I think like I do and interact with others at all? If I am always of the opinion that 1] my own values are rooted in dasein and 2] that there are no objective values “I” can reach, then everytime I make one particular moral/political leap, I am admitting that I might just as well have gone in the other direction instead…Then “I” begins to fracture and fragment to the point there is nothing able to actually keep it together at all. At least not with respect to choosing sides morally and politically.

This is what I believe here and now.

And this is what I believe others do not want to believe about themselves. They want some sort of objective moral and political Truth they can attach “I” to. Thus objectivism [to me] becomes more and more embodied in human psychology.

It seems like you do do this. You explain why one can know things in science but not about morals. To do this you present models of reality and what is possible for humans.

But my general Point was more like, if you really believed you could not know, then you wouldn’t waste time criticizing them, mocking them or trying to show they are being silly. I see below that you have pulled back from political activity. Well, THAT is consistant. But this is political activity online.

You would do what you want and avoid objective type discussions, like this one. That is what someone who actually believed there was no way to know what is moral or not would do. I mean, they might kill themselves. They might be hypocrits and enter these types of discussions - perhaps just to fuck with people. But if they actually believed there was no way to even know if objectivists are doing harm, which means if any possible moral position is detrimental or beneficial, then ONE MIGHT AS WELL DO WHAT ONE WANTS AND THERE IS NO REASON NOT TO. If you want to be kind to people, well, you might as well do that. If you want to hurt them, well do that, if the risks involved do not create counterdesires. If you want to go to a Movie, yuo would do that.

That is what is left when there are no morals, or when one Thinks one cannot know what is right, when it is mere guesswork.

Sure, but for all you know it might be a good thing. So you don’t know if challenging it, as you repeatedly do is doing more harm than good. It’s a coin toss. Seems like a waste of energy to me, given your perspective.

But you present this as if you have to solve this problem Before you could interact with people. Hardly. Most activities do not require working this out or even raising the issue.

And you can just say - oh, I don’t like that
if, for example your chess, bowling, book club, beer drinking partner
makes a racist remark.

Maybe they will want to defend the remark by appeals to what seem like objective arguments.
You can just repeat, Oh, but I don’t like that. But I am enjoying your Company, let’s talk about the book, the weather, bowling, the behavior of bees, how your wife’s cancer is doing and so on.

Yes, perhaps some people will find this odd enough to push on. And maybe in these instances you can’t interact with them. But I bet most don’t even notice. And you can just interact with those who tolerate it.

heck, sometimes you can even share your guess on a subject that rubs up on morals. they objective speak, you speak in I Think and want. But it seems like, in general, you would see no Point in either 1) Calling into question their objectivism - since for all you know this is you being bad and 2) discussing morals in general.

What is the psychology of repeatedly doing something that for all you know is bad and for all you Think is pointless?

Then we are stuck I guess. I don’t believe that I do.

And what scientifically can be communicated to folks from all the different sides of all the different conflicting value judgments such that it would be irrational not to believe it? That is basically my point. To make this distinction. And that seems [to me] to be as close as we can get to what is true objectively.

I believe this only “here and now” though. I don’t know how to explain that any better. And since I believed something other than what I believe now before I can only assume that I might believe something other than what I believe now later.

And my “mocking” style is rooted more in my online persona. I am a polemicist. I have always enjoyed dueling with others in places like this – using words as swords. Being provocative can often bring out the best arguments in others.

But, sure, who really knows what – subconsciously, unconsciuously – motivates me in turn. The subjunctive frame of mind is always beyond our grasping fully. Or mine always has been.

Yes, there is always that option. You can begin with the assumption that morality revolves solely around whatever it is that makes you feel good. You weigh the pros and the cons in regard to possible consequences and then you do whatever it is you think you can get away with.

But whatever it is you think makes you feel good is still rooted largely in dasein. And that approach to life as “good” is certainly going to come into conflict with others if what you perceive to be good for you is perceived to be bad for them.

Then it becomes either a dog eat dog, survival of the fittest, might makes right world or you agree to moderate your behaviors through negotiation and compromise. Through democracy, for example. And [always] within the context of political economy – taking into account the role that wealth and power will always play here.

My point is only this: that there does not seem to be an option whereby folks are able to determine [rationally, logically] what is fact the only truly objective moral truth to be had.

Sure, any particular objectivist doctrine may well in fact be the best of all possible worlds. But those who espouse them still have to present me with an argument that counters the points I make regarding dasein, conflicting goods and political economy.

After all, there are hundreds and hundreds of dogmas out there, right? Why should we believe that one rather than another is the true font for enlightenment? And yet the reasoning given by these folks seems to reflect more than just a flip of the coin to decide which way to go. But that’s what we do. From a particular subjective point of view we take our existential leaps along the moral and political continuum.

This makes sense [to me] only if you literally choose to live apart from all others. Then you don’t have to concern yourself with questions of “morality” at all. But as soon as others enter the picture there is the possibility of conflict. What choice then is there? You have to make an existential leap to one set of rules rather than another. It then comes down to the extent to which someone begins to argue that you should abandon moderation, negotiation and compromise and instead embrace a set of behaviours predicated [allegedly] on some religious or secular Truth.

The alleged objective truth. Again, always theirs.

I guess we are stuck. I didn’t really Think this part was controversial. It seems inherent in the distinctions you draw around the procedure of an abortion and the morals around the abortion.

WEll, sure. And if all you are doing is essentially playing chess with people, then it could be consistant. It doesn’t come across that way and frankly I don’t really Believe it is merely play for you, but, yes, if it is merely pointless play for you and you know this going in, then it is consistant.

I really don’t Think it is all that mysterious. You don’t like objectivism and you are arguing against it. This is not the stuff of depth psychology. The irony is that it is implicit in your position simulataneously that for all you know it might be a bad thing that you try to change people’s minds. But I will admit the very unlikely possibility that you are just playing. Note: I am not saying that is your only motivation; play, curiosity may also be motives. I couple this with your presentation of what to you seems an impossible situation: how can you interact with people when you are not an objectivist. I say, just do and suggest what you want. And state your opinions as preferences. You are on solid epistemological ground, in your system, and actually most of the time this will not lead to problems. Certainly less problems that telling people they are objectivists and you Think this is a problem.

I mean to me it is like I with a Group and one guy keeps arguing that we stop doing X. he says he Believes - but is not sure - that X is bad. He argues this way for years. I ask if he Thinks he has any way of knowing if it more likely that doing X as a Group leads to more problems than no longer doing X. He says, No, I have no way to know. Then he goes forward trying to convince the Group for Another few years that they should stop doing X.

A bit odd, n’est pas?

Imagine a doctor relating to his clients this way. OK, that’s an authority figure, but it should highlight the strange motivation seemingly invovled somewhere. And without the hierarchy: imagine telling someone that speaking to one’s spouse in way X is a bad idea. You then tell them that you have no way of knowing if they discontinue it will get better worse or the same. Then you go back to telling them you Think it is a bad idea.

Again: when it is suggested you shift to ‘I want’ speech and 'I dislike* speech, you do not find this a good solution, even though it is 1) probably accurate and 2) consistant with your epistemological beliefs about morals.

No, there is no need to make that assumption. I am talking about 1) being honest and 2) being consistant with your epistemology of morals. You claim you cannot know what the good is. You also claim, by extension, that you cannot know if the effects of objectivism are good or bad. So to speak about what you like and dislike remains as what you can communicate about as true.

Sure, but if you read what I wrote, I never said that doing this would solve all the problems. I was pointing out that I could not understand why you don’t do this and why you continue to write about what seems bad to you, GIVEN YOUR EPISTEMOLOGICAL BELIEFS. Why write sometimes like an objectivist when there is this simple, honest and clear way to communicate even about objectivism?

No, you are missing my Point. I am not defending objectivism, I am focused on you. When you argue against objectivists or objectivism, you, according to you, have no idea if the effects of doing this, if successful lead to a better World or not. (or if unsuccessful) Yet you continue. You put effort into an activity that you admit you have no idea if it is doing good or harm, while bemoaning the harm you Think, but have no way of knowing, the objectivists are doing.

I am responding to you. I am not defending objectivism. I am not saying that simply talking about what you want instead of making moral noises will save the World. I am pointing out your strange inconsistancy and then what I Think is a simple, elegant, consistant alternative.

This alternative will not make all the objectivists agree. It will not make the World perfect.

It is about you, based on what you claim you Believe about the epistemology of morals.

If I found a self-proclaimed pacifist hitting poeple with an ax, I might Point out that there is a more consitant behavior for a pacifist.

Imagine my surprise when I Point this out and the pacifist says

how will my not hitting people change the way X, Y and Z mistreat people?

I mean seriously Iamb.

Discussing the psychology of objectivism as it relates to conflicting value judgments could hardly be further removed from playing chess. Or do you equate playing chess with the calculations that go into the raging conflagration that revolves around aborting human babies?

My point [aside from the polemics] is to nudge folks away from believing one can approach abortion as though it were just a game of chess. Chess: where each piece can only be moved in particular ways on a particular board and where you either do or not not checkmate your opponent. With chess everything is [ultimately] predicated on what must happen given the particular moves that are made.

The OP offers up one particular subjective narrative for assessing and then evaluating the relationship between an objective moral/political dogma and human psychology. It makes sense to me. Here and now. And since it also makes sense to me here and now that moral objectivism can become dangerous when it takes the form of a political ideology, it makes sense to suggest this to others. But I never go beyond this. I do not insist that this is [in turn] the most rational manner in which to think about these things.

Yes, this is precisely my point when I note this:

How can I think like I do and interact with others at all? If I am always of the opinion that 1] my own values are rooted in dasein and 2] that there are no objective values “I” can reach, then everytime I make one particular moral/political leap, I am admitting that I might just as well have gone in the other direction instead…Then “I” begins to fracture and fragment to the point there is nothing able to actually keep it together at all. At least not with respect to choosing sides morally and politically.

That’s the paradox or the dilemma embedded in the irresistable force smashing into the immovable object.

But again: [u]What choice do we have if we do choose to intereact with others?[/u] One way or another one point of view will prevail. Re abortion, either babies will be killed or women will be forced to give birth. You can’t have a world in which both sides prevail.

This is the part I don’t think you really address. My own solution to it was [in part] to withdraw from interactions with others “out in the world”. Though there were other reasons for that as well. My health, mostly.

And there is always the possibility that my epistemological framework here is wrong. But how can I know this if I do not present my arguments in places like this.

But people DO make that assumption. How then do philosophers demonstrate to them that in fact there is no NEED to make it? They WANT to. It is how they have come [existentially as dasein] to construe morality out in the world. The real world that they live in.

No idea? But I do have some idea about all this. I offer a point of view regarding moral and political objectivism as a [possible] component of human psychological predispositions. Then I can note historical instances where moral and political objectivism have caused enormous human pain and suffering. It’s not like I am just completely making all of this up in my head – without making a number of references to the world of actual human interaction.

In my view, the pacifist is an objectivist if she insist that being a pacifist is the most rational and ethical manner in which a human being can interact with others out in the world.

Then she can either go in the James S. Saint/von rivers direction, i.e. that pacifism is applicable only one context at a time, or in the direction of the universalist, i.e. that pacifism is always the right thing to do.

She can either try to explain why hitting someone with an ax can be rationalized in this situation or, if she believes it is always irrational and immoral, then she is not a pacifist.

All I can do is to probe her life…to try to root out the existential factors that led her to become a pacifist [in a world where many do not] and to note how sets of circumstance might unfold that she had not really considered…sets of circumstanctes so dire that she may well change her mind about being a pacifist.

But what I don’t see possible is a philosophical argument able to demonstrate once and for all whether being a pacifist IS the right thing to do. Objectively.

What is it?

Is truth more true when it is vital? Yes I would day so so this is the way to make truth more true. And we need truth to be as true as it possibly can to survive it.

Yes this is true, we find people that agree with us more agreeable… and they us also. Life is a circle but it takes time.

Like God or a pet animal who is beloved by all. Who will feed the cat the most favorite dish is the priest.

Yes! We must do this also with the truth about truth. Vigorous vital truth.

Oh no. But no now you have killed truth.

Now i am depressed. I wanted to fight for truth but you have killed my hope.

Let’s not kill

Let’s watch the pain

And hope for truth!

Well, here is own subjective narrative:

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=176529

wrong thread

I can give “one particular rendition” of just about anything.

But unlike you, I do not make the leaping and lustful generalized conclusion that because I can imagine a bad scenario, all scenarios are necessarily bad and anyone saying different is a “dangerous trickster”.

In short, you are still merely preaching your dasein dilemma and ranting against anyone else.
And calling your ranting “psychology of”, doesn’t change what it is.

The only way this relates to psychology is in the question;
“Why do some people have a deep lingering lust to preach their dasein dilemma?”

Of course it is a sociology question as well because it has only arisen due to political warring, not rational thought.

Dasein dilemma is a contradiction in terms, anyway.

The whole point about Dasein is that it was Heidegger’s solution to the Sartrean angst. Dasein is a Germanic solution to a Gallic problem.
There is no Dasein Dilemma, and if it is presented as such the presenter is still stuck in an existential Nausea.

His view is that John wants the child to be born and Mary wants to abort it (the Dasein Dilemma). Then he asks, “Which is the moral solution?” Then answers it with;
“THERE SHALL BE NO MORAL SOLUTION TO THIS PROBLEM AND ANYONE SAYING OTHERWISE IS A DAMN, MALICIOUS, TRICKSTER, DICTATOR, OBJECTIVIST, LIAR!!!”

Thanks for, uh, clearing that up. Though I suspect our understanding of “dasein” may somewhat different.

Here is where I start:
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=176529

What’s your take on it?

And how do you relate it to morality? Morality and the “objective truth”. Abortion for example. Or choose your own moral conflagration.

James, please!!!

The last thing ILP needs is yet ANOTHER seemingly futile exchange between us about objective morality. Take this over to “our” thread okay? :wink: