Alice in Objectivist Land, part ten

[NickOtani]

“What’s all this stuff about ‘nothingness’ that Dr. P went on about awhile ago?” asked Dr. K.

“Ayn Rand also talked about nothingness, but in a different way,” said Alice. “She talked about how matter changes form but never ceases to exist, but life does cease to exist. It goes out of existence. It is the only fundamental alternative she knows. That’s why value can be understood in regard to life. That which promotes and protects it is good, and that which threatens and destroys it is evil. An indestructible robot can have nothing good or bad for it. It would have nothing to lose.”

“So, are you saying death is the non-existence of life, the nothingness to the somethingness of life?” asked Dr. K.

“Yes,” said Alice. “life is being, and death is non-being. It’s not such a profound concept that only philosophers can understand. It is a kind of something which makes being, existence, more substantial, more meaningful, more intrinsically valuable. And, by intrinsically valuable, I mean valuable as an end in itself, not instrumental to any further end. Sartre says it’s the hole that makes the doughnut possible.

“But also, Dr. P mixed in some stuff about how Sartre said he is what he is not and is not what he is. He put this in just to make Sartre look like he is violating the law of identity, which he is, but what he means is that man is in the process of becoming. It’s like when you asked the potential juror who he was. The correct answer should have been that he was who he was not and was not who he was. He was in a process of becoming, like the river into which one cannot step twice.”

“But you are not entirely an Existentialist, as you say, you are a NickOtani’sNeo-Objectivist. Can you explain that?” asked Dr. K

“Yes,” said Alice, “there are valuable things in both Existentialism and Objectivism, but both have problems in their pure forms. Pure Objectivism has a problem with freedom, but Existentialism has a problem with facts, with laws of nature which do pre-exist us and are external to us. There is an essence to humanness such that an Asian in Asia is no more or less human than an American in Spokane. Rand would recognize this and realize, as did Locke and Jefferson, that it follows from this that all men have natural rights to pursue life and happiness. However, reason does not reach all situations, so man must have some freedom to forge his own paths. The parameters in which he is free to do this, are generalizable, objective. Thus, NickOtani’sNeo-Objectivism combines Existentialism and Objectivism such that the strengths of both philosophies are augmented and the weaknesses of each are off-set.

“I realize that Rand would disapprove of me,” continued Alice, “but I admire Ayn Rand for her creativity and independence. I just can’t develop those virtues in myself if I am her complete follower.”

“Okay,” said Dr. K. “I have no further questions.”

Dr. K finally sat down, and Dr. P stood up to ask his questions.

“What do you mean that reason doesn’t reach all situations?” asked Dr. P.

“I mean that there are some situations where one cannot weigh all possible consequences of potential actions.” answered Alice. “Perhaps one may not know what will happen, or perhaps the consequences will be equal. One must still make a choice, and even not choosing is a choice. That’s what Sartre means when he says we are forced into freedom. It is paradoxical but true.”

“Can you give me examples of such choices?” asked Dr. P.

“Yes,” said Alice. “most easy choices are positive-negative choices. It wouldn’t be rational to choose the negative when one has the option to choose the positive. However, there can be positive-positive choices or negative-negative choices. If you are up to your neck in a pile of $hit and someone is dumping a bucket of rotting garbage on your head, would you duck? Sometimes, no amount of logic will help one make a decision. One just has to choose. And, sometimes, one doesn’t even paths to choose. One may be in the middle of a field and must forge his or her own path, and the choices one makes will impact one’s life. Some people may lean on a supernatural god. Some people look for support from others. Some people look to a dogma or something like logic and reason. Others, like me, just have to stand on our own two feet.”

“Do you know this Nick Otani you talk about is a loser?” asked Dr. P. “he got himself kicked off two Objectivist boards, not even allowed on some, and he was rejected when he applied for a graduate scholarship from the Atlas Society’s Graduate Scholarship Committee?”

“I would say that reflects poor judgment on the part of those other board administrators and the scholarship committee.” said Alice.

“People don’t like him,” said Dr. P. “He makes enemies all the time with people he debates.”

“I’d say that’s their problem,” said Alice, “not his.”

“I have no more questions,” said Dr. P.

“You may take your seat,” said the judge to Alice. “Do you have any more witnesses?” the judge asked Dr. K.

“Yes,” said Dr. K. “I’d like to call on Ms. Red Queen.”

The Red Queen got up as Alice passed her and sat down, and the Red Queen took her oath and took her seat near the judge.

“What are your views?” asked Dr. K.

“I still consider myself an Objectivist,” said the Red Queen, “although I am not an orthodox Objectivist like Leonard Peikoff and the later Rand. I am heterodox.”

“How exactly do you differ with orthodox Objectivists?” asked Dr. K.

“For one thing,” explained the Red Queen, “I’m much more tolerant of non-Objectivists like my colleagues here than are ARI type Objectivists. I am not threatened by them. I think I could live in harmony with them. I enjoy discussing issues with them, and, even when we disagree, it’s no big deal.”

“Are you the kind of relativist who thinks everybody is equally right?” asked Dr. K. “Would you be as equally cordial to Hitler as you would be to Gandhi?”

“Not at all!” said the Red Queen. “I begin having tolerance problems when people do not accept the equality of humans as humans and when people try to quash opposing views with non-persuasive force, like kicking people off of messageboards, sentencing them to death for not fitting in, like people did with Socrates, like burning them at the stake, like Christians did during the dark ages, like putting them in gas chambers, like Hitler did.”

“But orthodox Objectivists hate those people too,” said Dr. K. “That’s why they dislike irrational people. They think irrationality leads to people like Hitler.”

“Yes,” said the Red Queen, “but their conspiracy theory is a little off. They think Plato was a monument to the Witch Doctor and brought back by Descartes and Kant and Hegel to usher in Marx and Lenin and Stalin and Hitler, fighting off Aristotle and all his healthy influence through Aquinas and the American businessman and intellectual.”

“How do you see it?” asked Dr. K.

“I think if there had been someone around like Plato’s portrayal of Socrates to challenge Hitler, before he had the power to eliminate all his opponents, we wouldn’t have had a holocaust,” said the Red Queen. “Also, let’s not blame Stalin’s version of Marxism on Marx. He would not have approved of it. Let’s blame it on the people who forced fascism on people in the name of Marx.”

“All philosophers made mistakes,” said the Red Queen, “but they also had worthwhile things to say. It’s our job to sift through the good and bad and make up our minds about it, not just avoid anything which provokes thought. That’s what bigots and cowards do.”

“No more questions,” said Dr. K.

“I have just a few questions,” said Dr. P. “Ms. Red Queen, do you believe we here in Objectivist Land are all bigots and cowards?”

“I don’t know,” said the Red Queen.

“Would we be letting you tell your views here openly if we were really bigots and cowards?” asked Dr. P.

“No,” said the Red Queen, “but you are prosecuting us just for having thoughts which may be different than the permitted thoughts in orthodox Objectivism. If you punish us for that, you are doing the same thing intolerant Greeks did to Socrates, intolerant Christians did to heretics during the dark ages, and the same thing Stalin and Hitler did to dissidents.”

“How would you have us run our government?” asked Dr. P.

“I’d encourage open debate,” said the Red Queen. “Let people hear the issues and come to their own conclusions. Fight views with persuasion, not with physical force or threat of physical force. Don’t drive criticism underground. Bring it out in the open and deal with it. That’s the courageous thing to do.”

“No more questions,” said Dr. P.

“Your honor, the defense rests,” said Dr. K.

“Lawyers will now make closing statements,” said the judge. “Dr. K, please make your closing statement to the jury.”

“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury,” began Dr. K, “we thank you for hearing our case today. We thank the court for allowing our views to be spoken. We hope you will see that our views are not a threat to Objectivism but, rather, different perspectives that might help Objectivism grow and get stronger. It is true that reason does not reach all situations, and sometimes we must just choose. We may depend too much on axioms and omnibus terms like reason, making it a god to replace the one we rejected. Still, we are not trying to undermine the basic principles that all men are equal and deserving of equal rights. We are not opposed to rational egoism, trying to argue for the initiation of force or for dishonesty of any kind. We are not dishonest and immoral people. We are individuals. We wish to pursue happiness and respect the rights of others to do the same. Our different views only make us interesting and perhaps welcomed additions to this otherwise static community, not threats to rooted out. Let’s not be like Hitler or intolerant fundamentalist religious people. Let’s show that we are better than that. Let’s have debates where people are not afraid to speak their minds, where people will not be prosecuted or persecuted for wondering and doubting and thinking.”

“Dr. P,” said the judge, “please make your closing statement.”

“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury,” said Dr. P, “your role is easy. It is not to determine guilt or innocence, since these defendants already pleaded guilty. They are not orthodox Objectivists, and they proved that with their testimony. They have criticized Objectivism. They have arrogantly repudiated the fundamental principles of our theory of knowledge. They reject that existence exists, that A is A, that reason is our only means of knowledge. Listen to Ayn Rand, not the later Ayn Rand but the early one, the one before Peikoff. She said it in For the New Intellectual; “There is no way to turn morality into a weapon of enslavement except by divorcing it from man’s reason and from the goals of his existence. …There is no way to make him reject his own consciousness except by convincing him of its impotence.” Ladies and gentlemen, do not be taken in by these Attilas and witch doctors. They are threats to our very lives. Your own fate is in your hands. Thank you.”

“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury,” said the judge, “you may now depart for the jury room to discuss your verdict, not on the guilt or innocence of the defendants, but on their sentence, whether they deserve death, banishment, or freedom to continue as they will in Objectivist Land.”

Bis bald,

Nick