SoloHQ: Forum

Forum

Post 0

Tuesday, October 4 - 6:30pm

Link

Edit

Peikoff at his best is spot-on, so this quote is an anti-toast to all of the closet theists we have here, whether you be of the I.D. apologist type or the one-and-the-same mystic who says that "we just don't know" type.

Referring to agnosticism and other such issues, Peikoff said-
"He thinks he is avoiding any position that will antagonize anybody. In fact, he is taking a position which is much more irrational that that of a man who takes a definite but mistaken stand on a given issue., because the agnostic treats arbitrary claims as meriting cognitive consideration and epistemological respect. He treats the arbitrary as on a par with the rational and evidentially supported. So he is the ultimate epistemological egalitarian: he equates the groundless and the proved. As such, he is an epistemological destroyer. The agnostic thinks that he is not taking a stand at all and therefore that he is safe, secure, invulnerable to attack. The fact is that his view is one of the falsest-and most cowardly-stands there can be."-The Ayn Rand Lexicon

Post 1

Tuesday, October 4 - 6:32pm

Link

Edit

That is a great quote.

---Landon

Post 2

Tuesday, October 4 - 9:54pm

Link

Edit

"The fact is that his view is one of the falsest-and most cowardly-stands there can be."

I disagree with the former claim. If one does not make a claim then they cannot be false. Maybe what they do have is a false sense of security: security in not being wrong-- but the false sense comes in because they are less able to make the best decisions. When one fails to integrate experience into their knowledge, they are unable to perform inductive reasoning to their full potential.

Post 3

Tuesday, October 4 - 10:24pm

Link

Edit

I don't Dean, at least not for all of them. His point is to say that all these beliefs are there for the taking and its your problem for not deciding on one, even if it is false. In a way its even worse since if your agnostic

1. Your actually looking for the truth but can't see it when its in your face or
2. You don't know the truth and your too lazy to find it.

In the best case, being agnostic is a transisition. I sure as hell didn't go from devot Catholic to athiest overnight. Other then that, thats the only problem I have with the quote.

Post 4

Saturday, October 8 - 7:08pm

Link

Edit

Jody,

because the agnostic treats arbitrary claims as meriting cognitive consideration and epistemological respect.

'Arbitrary claims' proves to me that the prosecutor is prejudiced. What this author is saying is that he knows everything and takes the word of "experts" on what he doesn't know. His morality requires that he take a stand on every issue. He can not say "I don't know" or "I don't know yet" without being some evil betrayer of reality. Sounds like a megalomaniac to me.

Post 5

Saturday, October 8 - 7:19pm

Link

Edit

Robert-
Saying "I do not know" is saying nothing wrong. Saying "I do not know therefore I am going to insert my god-of-the-gaps here" is very wrong. Even worse is trying to cloak your motives by pretending agnosticism and claiming that you're "just keeping an open mind". There is no basis in reality for even entertaining the idea. It is nothing more than blowing out the candle on the metaphysical cake and making a wish.

Post 6

Saturday, October 8 - 9:34pm

Link

Edit

     What he says, if applied to opinion-makers/'teachers' of any level, I cannot dispute.

     But, if applied to non-professionals, this is like equating the Soviet oligarchy with the people it's secret police had to keep an eye on.

     Some 'independent thinking' plumbers (most are family-supporters, no?) really don't have the time, or energy, for sifting through the myriad arguments on theism, atheism, AND agnosticism (much less myriad-squared theories on metaphysics and epistemology), to thence conclude the worth of which. (True, if you 'know' the RIGHT argument, the rest is ignorable; IF...) And, short of discovering that a belief in a god has the same worthwhile basis as one in Santa, classing such with the Toohey's of the world is definitely over-generalizing. --- But, I suspect that Piekoff was not doing this.

LLAP
J:D

Post 7

Sunday, October 9 - 8:00am

Link

Edit

John Dailey wrote: "Some 'independent thinking' plumbers (most are family-supporters, no?) really don't have the time, or energy, for sifting through the myriad arguments on theism, atheism, AND agnosticism (much less myriad-squared theories on metaphysics and epistemology), to thence conclude the worth of which...

Nonsense. That is a phony elitism that Ayn Rand evolved for herself and her cult. She called it "the leisure of the theory class." The idea is that some things are so complicated that only specialists can figure them out and then they will tell the rest of us what to believe. In the mean time, these intellectuals argue among themselves over who should control the universities. Again, I say, "Nonsense!"

It took Einstein to discover relativity, but we teach it to college freshmen. The people of London circa 1850 AD were astounded at the plumbing of Knossos circa 1850 BC -- but the moderns figured out how to do it, eventually.

These fallacies of Objectivism run everywhere through the philosophy. You can read here the fears of professional atheists that if so-called "Intelligent Design" is taught in public schools that an entire generation will be lost to ignorance. How we ever got out of the Middle Ages is apparently an unsolvable riddle to these "new intellectuals."

Anyone who has a mind can use it -- and many people do. What worries Objectivists is that when some people think, they come up with answers different than the 1000 Truths found in the Books of Ayn Rand and Her Disciples.

Personally, I am an atheist because I do not know. I do not know any arguments for there to have been a creator to the universe. Jesus might still have fed the multitudes, raised the dead and come back to life after dying on the cross. Those are all separate questions -- and as much doubt as I harbor, ultimately, I confess, I do not know.

Post 8

Sunday, October 9 - 8:44am

Link

Edit

Jody,

You do the same thing Peikoff does, scornfully ascribe bad motives. It is wrong not to judge, we agreed, but there is nothing wrong in withholding judgement until the facts become available. A rush to judgement is worse, IMO, than delaying judgement.

Post 9

Sunday, October 9 - 9:23am

Link

Edit

To be fair, even though it is a whole paragraph, the Peikoff quote that started this thread was taken out of context. If you go to the entry "agnosticism" in The Ayn Rand Lexicon, you are told at the beginning by Peikoff that

"I mean this term [agnosticism] in a sense which applies to the question of God, but to many other issues also, such as extra-sensory perception or the claim that the stars influence man's destiny."

I take Peikoff to be criticizing agnosticism in the context of questions where the position of the opponent is not supported by evidence, and hence is an "arbitrary claim". This is the standard Objectivist argument and was discussed by Branden as well in the "Basic Principles of Objectivism" lectures.

In the examples given in the above quote, the claims (question of God, the existence of extra-sensory perception) are taken to be arbitrary, so that his subsequent discussion of agnosticism makes the claim that

"[The agnostic] treats the arbitrary as on a par with the rational and evidentially supported."

So, Peikoff is limiting the discussion to the cases where he considers the opposing position to consist of arbitrary statements, having no evidential support. And in those cases he insists that agnosticism is irrational.
Thanks,
Glenn

(Edited by Glenn Fletcher on 10/09, 9:27am)

Post 10

Sunday, October 9 - 1:17pm

Link

Edit

I take Peikoff to be criticizing agnosticism in the context of questions where the position of the opponent is not supported by evidence, and hence is an "arbitrary claim".

There can be no "position" by the opponent. If you are agnostic on a topic you have not yet made up your mind. Tangentially, most people do not make up their minds anyway, on way too many topics they accept the word of an expert.

Post 11

Sunday, October 9 - 3:25pm

Link

Edit

Robert-
George Smith writes eloquently about this in his book Atheism: The Case Against God. He appropriately points out that the term agnostic is not used properly as a noun. As it relates to god, one either believes in god or one does not. There is no middle ground. You can use the word as an adjective, to describe your theisim or atheism, i.e, an agnostic theist believes in god, but does not believe he can prove gods existence. The question, 'Do you believe in god?' can only be truly answered with an affirmative or a negative. One can speculate down any road they wish, but there ultimate answer to that speculation(concerning belief) is always 'yes' or 'no'. But why endeavor in idle speculation that is an evasion of reality as we know it.

Post 12

Sunday, October 9 - 5:48pm

Link

Edit

Michael Marotta wrote:

John Dailey wrote: "Some 'independent thinking' plumbers (most are family supporters, no?) really don't have the time, or energy, for sifting through the myriad arguments on theism, atheism, AND agnosticism (much less myriad-squared theories on metaphysics and epistemology), to thence conclude the worth of which.
(MM's response): Nonsense: That is a phony elitism that Ayn Rand evolved for herself and her cult. She called it "the leisure of the theory class." The idea is that some things are so complicated that only specialists can figure them out and then they will tell the rest of us what to believe...Again, I say, "Nonsense."

      O-o-o-ka-a-a-y...
       I stand corrected by your contradictory to what I said; ergo: "ALL 'independent thinking' plumbers (most are family supporters, no?) really DO have the time, or [and?] energy, for sifting...etc." is the opposite of 'nonsense;' it is 'sensible.'--- Question: why don't they show it?

      Ayn Rand 'evolved' something for 'her'...cult? Boy, have I missed something in ALL my readings (separating wheat from chaff, granted, but, apparently I mixed up one with the other somewhere.) Could you elaborate?

      "She called it 'the leisure of the theory class'"? I suspect that you meant 'the theory of the leisure class'. Either way, here's something else I missed in ALL my readings. Where did she ever even use that phrase (believe it or not, I AM familiar with the theory)?

     Re "The idea is that some things are so complicated that..." etc, uh, I never implied that in my reference to '...time or energy...', so, please drop that as being what I implied.

     In short, re what you argued as my argument being "Nonsense," I have only 2 words: "Nonsense, Mike."

LLAP
J:D

Post 13

Monday, October 10 - 6:47am

Link

Edit

Jody,

Agnostic is in the dictionary as a noun. George Smith can try to hold back the evolution of language if he likes but it is a losing proposition. Agnosticism, over the decades, has been liberated from it's strictly religious connotation. As an adjective it simply means uncommitted, not dogmatic. So we are really talking about two different things.

The question, 'Do you believe in god?' can only be truly answered with an affirmative or a negative.

I think any question which includes the word "belief" can only be answered yes or no.

Post 14

Monday, October 10 - 6:56am

Link

Edit

Robert-

Agnostic is in the dictionary as a noun. George Smith can try to hold back the evolution of language if he likes but it is a losing

Or the dictionary can try to hold back logic by positing that a thing can be both A and not A at the same time.

Post 15

Tuesday, October 11 - 6:32am

Link

Edit

Well, fall on sword as often as you like. I found that unproductive.

When I was your age, I too, smuggly objected to the changing fashions in language. My protests went no where. Maximum is has spun off an adjective maximize and the distinction between less and few has disappeared despite my objections. I wish you better luck.

Post 16

Tuesday, October 11 - 7:02am

Link

Edit

Robert-
I dont claim nor do I seek to be able to rid the world of incorrect usages, anti-concepts and the like, but I will always point out that something is an anti-concept, or that it violates the laws of logic. Especially here on an objectivist site. I'm making an argument, not petitioning the OED.

Post 17

Tuesday, October 11 - 1:33pm

Link

Edit

Well if that wasn't it, I'll be damned if I can figure out what is was.

An anti-toast