The Cold Voice of Reason

What's your favorite song right now?

2011-12-16T05:52:00.001-08:00

Tough question. If you force my hand I say: "Stone in Love" with Journey.

Why the iPhone Is Essential for Human Survival

2011-12-11T09:58:00.000-08:00

There is this view, in the culture, that there are "real" needs for survival and then there are "artificial" needs. What are the "real" needs? The need for food, water, clothes, shelter, etc. What are the "artificial" needs? The need for a new car, a bigger and better house, or an iPhone.

What makes these needs "artificial"? In part, the fact that we don't share the need for these things with the animals. This "proves" they are not natural. In part, the fact that some needs are more basic than others. We have to satisfy some needs before we can attend other. If we don't have enough water to survive, then there will be no need to even consider what dress we should be wearing on this New Years Eve Party. The difference between basic and non-basic needs is a difference in *urgency*. The need for, say, food or water is more urgent than the need for an iPhone. This "proves" the need for an iPhone is not real. The "need" for an iPhone is merely a "want" for an unnatural, unnecessary "luxury".

Why, then, do humans care about iPhones, while animals could never *conceive* such a thing, much less the need for it? When we understand that, then we will understand why the need for an iPhone is as real, natural and necessary, as the need for food or water.

How do we know that we need anything? How do we know that we need, for instance, food? We feel the pain of hunger. How do we discover the need for water? We feel thirst. How do we discover the need for sleep? We feel tired. How do we discover the need for clothes or shelter? We feel cold. We feel that food takes the hunger away. We feel that water takes our thirst away. We can feel that a cave is warm. The point is that we discover the need for food, sleep, clothes, shelter, etc., *perceptually*. (The need for such things as water and food, is *felt* here and now. That's precisely what makes them *feel* more urgent. Let me add, however, that a need is not less real, merely because it is less urgent.)

Since animals only function at the perceptual level of awareness, they cannot become aware of any needs *beyond* this level. But man can. It's reason which allows man to conceive of such things as a tools, which are useful if he wants to make weapons or build traps, so he can more efficiently hunt animals. The point is that we have to think to *discover* the *need* for such things as tools, weapons and traps. Once we discover that we can do something, to serve our lives, such as making a tool, we also discover a new need.

As long as we stay at the animal level of awareness, i.e., the perceptual level, we will never be able to discover the need for things such as a tool or a weapon, because we will never be able to even conceive of tools or weapons. The same is obviously true of millions of other things, such as various means of transportation: boats, trains, airplanes and cars; various means of communication: radios, TV:s, computers and phones; various sources of energy: coal, oil and natural gas. Notice, that to satisfy these needs, we also need *knowledge*, such as the need for various forms of sciences: mathematics, geometry, biology, chemistry, physics, economics, psychology, pedagogy, architecture, engineering, etc.

The more we know, the more we need. Before we knew oil could be a source of energy, we didn't need it as a source of energy. Man's ability to think conceptually, gives him the ability to *identify* needs animals cannot even conceive of. That's why man has many needs that we don't share with the animals.

Man can't live by bread alone. Man also has various psychological needs. Happiness, and pleasure, is the emotional reward of successful living, i.e., the successful pursuit of values. But happiness also make you more *motivated* to continue pursue life. Thus, man *needs* happiness and pleasure; happiness and pleasure are *survival* values. Man needs, for instance, friends, romantic love, sex, parties, music, movies, Xbox 360, Lindt chocolate, etc. These values are as essential for man's survival as water or food. (It is, of course, *optional* whether you, for example, prefer an Xbox 360 instead of a Playstation 3.)

These needs are not "created"; they are *identified* by reason. They are rooted in the nature of life. Life is *motion*: it *is* the pursuit and achievement of values. There is no end to how we can improve on life and the very pursuit of values. "There is no human life that is 'safe enough,' 'long enough,' 'knowledgeable enough,' 'affluent enough,' or 'enjoyable enough'-not if man's life is the *standard* of value" (Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, p. 292).

Besides, what gives rise to our "needs"? Our "wants". If you don't *want* to live, then you don't *need* anything. That's my answer to those who say that the need for the iPhone is merely a "want".

The need for more and better is inherent in life. To stop moving forward, is to reject life. Life is not a "state" we can achieve "once and for all", by satisfying our most basic needs of the day. If you reject the iPhone, on the premise that you don't need it since you have had your daily meal, then you are *not* choosing life. You are, actually, choosing death. Would you say that a business is out for profit, if it refuses to invest in new machinery that would cut its costs by 50%? No. Similarly, would you say that a human chooses life, if he *rejects* new and better ways of satisfying his survival needs? For example, new and better ways of producing food (e.g., genetically altered crops and animals), of living (bigger and better houses), of transporting ourselves (e.g., the flying cars of the future), communicating (e.g., the new iPhone 4S), of treating his illnesses and injuries (e.g., the cure for cancer), of entertaining himself (e.g., the upcoming Xbox 720)? No. To reject progress is, therefore, to reject life.

The need for the iPhone is, indeed, is real, natural and *necessary*. And to reject the next iPhone, is to reject life.

Any TED lectures compatible with objectivism ?

2011-12-01T04:08:00.001-08:00

I suppose there are many lectures that you could classify as "compatible" with Objectivism, in the sense they tell you something true. But I can't think of any particular lecture right now.

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What's your (brief) opinion on modern art, in general? (Compared to earlier epochs, in general)

2011-12-01T04:01:00.001-08:00

If you by "modern art" mean nonobjective art, then my opinion is that it isn't even art. Therefore, it can't even qualify as bad art.

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How popular is Ayn Rand in Sweden?

2011-11-17T05:22:00.001-08:00

I don't know, but I think she is quite popular. The translations of her books have sold quite well, I've been told. I don't know if they're in their second or third printing right now.

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What new tv series are worth watching? "Homeland" on Showtime is good but a bit too naturalistic - but what isn't this days :(

2011-11-17T05:19:00.001-08:00

Good question. I don't watch that much TV. If you don't mind a lot of gore and horror, then you might enjoy The Walking Dead. I *love* that show, but then again I am a big fan of zombie movies. If you want something less gory and horrifying, then you might want to check out Sherlock, which is about... Sherlock Holmes. It's a new BBC production and it is of a very high quality. The big difference from earlier TV adaptions is that the new show takes place in our time. Sherlock Holmes is an exciting concretization of intelligence in the pursuit of justice. The casting is *great*. The actor who play Sherlock Holmes, Benedict Cumberbatch, is doing such a great job that it is his face I see when I think of John Galt. Martin Freeman is also perfect as Doctor Watson.

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What do you think about the Israel prison exchange?

2011-10-23T19:45:00.001-07:00

I think it's a disgrace. It is amazing, and sad, to see how low Israel has fallen. They should not have released any terrorists in exchange for the soldier. This will only encourage the terrorists to kidnap more innocent civilians and soldiers. Israel appeases her enemies all the time and all they get in return is, as expected, more kidnappings and more attacks.

What should they have done instead? Well, I am not an expert on military tactics. But I think Israel would be completely justified in invading the Gaza strip and make life hell for *everybody* there until they *unconditionally* release the soldier. Yes, that includes the *civilian* population who, if you have forgotten, *voted* Hamas into power. There are virtually no innocents among "the Palestinians".

Today, not many remember or know about the "Operation Thunderbolt". Read about it, and you will see how utterly demoralized and weak Israel has become. Read about it and then tell me that Israel seriously had no military option available.

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Who inspires you?

2011-10-23T12:40:00.001-07:00

Great thinkers and creators whose ideas and accomplishments make my life happier, easier, more beautiful, richer, etc. People who by pursuing their own greatness, show me what's possible, how wonderful life can be. In other words, people like Ayn Rand and Steve Jobs. On a more *personal* level, it's my woman: Marja. Those who have had the pleasure to meet her and know her, know why.

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Are you training to do a podcast like Peikoff or Diana H?

2011-10-23T12:32:00.001-07:00

No. But having said that, I have long had plans to make podcasts in the future. Unfortunately, I have not found the time or the energy for it - yet. But it will come. And it will be in English.

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Will there be another Steve Jobs?

2011-10-21T16:00:00.000-07:00

When Steve Jobs died, the world lost an insanely great giant. When the world loses someone like Steve Jobs, it is only natural to pose the question: When will we see another Steve Jobs?

What makes the answer to this question even more urgent is the sorry state of our economy. The amazing success of Apple, for the last ten years, has made it painfully obvious that what the world needs more, now than ever, are more entrepreneurs like Steve Jobs.

With this in mind, I want to draw attention to a piece in the Wall Street Journal, October 8, entitled "China Frets: Innovators Stymied Here": "Millions of Chinese flooded the popular micro blogging site Sina Weibo to tweet their condolences on the death of Steve Jobs over the past two days. They also raised the question: Why isn't there a Steve Jobs in China?"

That's a very good question and, fortunately, the Chinese commentators are very perceptive: "Wang Wei, chairman of the Chinese Museum of Finance, tweeted, 'In a society with an authoritarian political system, monopolistic business environment, backward-looking culture and prevalent technology theft, talking about a master of innovation? Not a chance! Don't even think about it.'"

Here is another quote: "One of the most popular postings on Mr. Jobs' legacy came from scholar Wu Jiaxiang. 'If Apple is a fruit on a tree, its branches are the freedom to think and create, and its root is constitutional democracy,' he wrote. 'An authoritarian nation may be able to build huge projects collectively but will never be able to produce science and technology giants.'"

These Chinese commentators recognize something most people don't. They recognize that entrepreneurs, like Steve Jobs, need freedom. They need the freedom to think creatively, innovate and achieve. The Chinese understand that Steve Jobs cannot function in a (semi-)socialistic country like China; he can only function and flourish in a (semi-)capitalistic country like the United States.

While the Chinese are slowly grasping the need and value of freedom, the Obama administration and the intellectuals are busy telling us that "too much" freedom is the cause of our troubles, and arguing for more government controls, i.e., higher taxes and more rules and regulations, as the "solution".

So when the Chinese ask themselves: Why isn't there a Steve Jobs in China? The answer you may not want to hear is: For the same reason any future Steve Jobs may not have a chance in a future *America*. Why? Because the government is slowly starving the entrepreneurs of the very freedom they need to get their business out of their garage.

If you would raise a child, would you prefer the child being your own, genetically speaking? If so, why?

2011-10-20T09:04:00.001-07:00

I think I would prefer children who are *biologically* mine. Why? Because it provides the choice of having kids another context which gives the decision another meaning for the parents.

What is the context? They are your *creation*. They are the product of the both of you and your lover. You may also see parts of your lover in your child which will also be a constant reminder of your lover and the love between you; the love that brought you together and which might have motivated you to have children in the first place.

I'm not a woman, so it is hard for me to project this. But I can imagine that being pregnant is something which gives you, as a mother, another perspective. As a father, it can also add to the context.

The child is, in this sense, another way to celebrate your love for each other. Normally, is also great fun to make babies. This is part of the context which might explain why most want their own biological children, instead of adopted children.

That's not to say there is anything wrong with adopting children or that you can't love and enjoy them as much as your own biological children. But I still think there is some variables in the equation which may make you think of and evaluate your decision to have a child in a slightly different light.

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Favourite Economist?

2011-10-19T23:52:00.001-07:00

Ludwig von Mises.

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What's the deal with ARI / Atlas society split ? (where can I found good info about this?)

2011-10-19T23:47:00.001-07:00

In the late 1980s David Kelley, the founder of The Institute for Objectivist Studies (later The Objectivist Center, nowadays The Atlas Society) held several speeches at events organized by libertarians for libertarians. For reasons I will not go into right now, this was very controversial at the time. It did not make David Kelley popular among Objectivists. But what really got David Kelley into trouble was the justification he gave in "A Question of Tolerance".

In that article, Kelley argues that ideas are true or false, but not good or evil. Only actions are really good or evil. Therefore, we should be *tolerant* towards the people who promote bad ideas, such as Kant or Marxist professors, as if they were morally innocent of any wrongdoing.

This amounts to separating values from facts and mind from body. As such it represents a complete failure to grasp the concept of objectivity and, therefore, a total repudiation of Objectivism. So Kelley had to go.

If you do not agree with Objectivism and you are honest with yourself, then you would say so: "I don't agree with Objectivism. I agree with most of it but, unfortunately, it is wrong on point X. Therefore, I don't consider myself an Objectivist. Let's just say I am sympathetic".

That's not the path Kelley choose. He, instead, decided to pretend that he was an Objectivist. His rationalization was the notion that Objectivism is an "open system". Thus, you can add and subtract whatever you want to Objectivism and still call it Objectivism.

There is a lot more you can say about this topic, but I will stop here. If you want to know more I would recommend you to read "A Question of Sanction" by David Kelley and "Fact and Value" by Leonard Peikoff.

I could, if I wanted to, give a whole "lecture" on each point I have mentioned. If you have any follow up questions, then feel free to bring it up *after* you have read the articles by Kelley and Peikoff.

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Why didn't Ayn Rand appreciated Darwin? (she said in one lecture she's neither for or against theory of evolution)

2011-10-14T05:14:00.001-07:00

She did not say whether she was for or against the theory of evolution, because she was a *first-hander*, i.e., *objective*. She did not want to vouch for the theory of evolution without studying the *scientific* arguments for and against it first-hand. I do not know what she thought of Darwin as a scientist. I do know, however, that she rejected Creationism.

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What do you think about Time Enough For Love, thus far?

2011-10-13T17:13:00.001-07:00

I will have to finish it to know for sure what to think. So far, I have been introduced to some characters and the setting. Not much has happened. They have just talked, talked and talked. (I do not want to reveal what they have talked about, in case you decide to read it yourself.) I am waiting for something to happen. But I will continue to read it on the premise (and hope) that something, anything, will eventually happen and I will get "hooked" into the story and starting caring about the fate of these characters.

In any event, there is one aspect of the book I want to comment on. For some, so far, unknown reason, the characters like to spend what feels like hours to explain how various machines and tools function in their world. These paragraphs are very long and detailed. They seem to be completely out of place. They do not seem to add anything to the story. There is no reason for us to know most of these details. This is *bad* writing. And I do not mean that as my own subjective opinion, I mean that as an objective esthetic judgment.

The essence of a work of fiction is the plot and one aspect of good art is *integration*. Nothing is left to chance. There are no scenes or sequences unrelated to the plot. There are no unnecessary dialogues. What the characters say and do moves the plot forward in a logical fashion.

If you want to see an example of great integration, i.e., great writing, watch any season of Dexter. There is not a single episode, scene or line in that show which does not have a logical and brilliant pay-off at the end of each season. There are, of course, other examples of great writing, but Dexter is one of my favorite examples because well-written shows, like Dexter, are not that common these days. (The works of Ayn Rand are other obvious examples of great writing. Read The Fountainhead or Atlas Shrugged if you have not already done it!)

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Who are your top 3 favorite bloggers and why?

2011-10-13T16:45:00.001-07:00

If I have to choose, then I choose these:

Voices for Reason: http://blog.aynrandcenter.org/ - They either write or link to really good articles by Objectivist intellectuals.
Mengerian: http://mengerian.wordpress.com/ - My friend, Per Nilsson, is to my knowledge the sharpest and most reliable commentator on the economic state of the world. His comments on politics are usually also very good. ("Unfortunately" he only writes in Swedish.)
Psychology of Selfishness: http://ifat-glassman.blogspot.com/ - Ifat Glassman has written many great articles on how to apply Objectivism in your life. She knows how to write and how to apply philosophic ideas.

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Are you into paleo as well? What is your exercise and diet routine?

2011-10-13T15:54:00.001-07:00

Yes I am. I jog and do some high intensive training (Mike Mentzer style) once a week. My breakfast usually consists of some form of scrambled eggs; tomatoes, feta cheese, green olives, salt, pepper and various herbs. I have no problems with dairy products, so when I get hungry after some hours I have some yogurt with almonds. For dinner, it is some form of meat, chicken or fish and veggies. If I need to eat some more, then I have some more yogurt and almonds. I hope this answers your question.

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The Logical Leap says that a generalization is an identification of a causal connection. So is the phrase "All swans are white" not a generalization? Would it be a generalization based on the conceptual theory where the meaning is the definition?

2011-10-12T17:13:00.001-07:00

It is a generalization, but it is an *invalid* generalization. Why? Because unless you have a reason to believe that all swans *has to* be white, then you cannot justify the generalization. At the end of the day, you have to have identified the *causal* factor that justifies you in saying that all swans are white for it to be a *valid* generalization. You would have to identify, through observations and experiments, something that makes all swans white. Otherwise, you only have an assertion based on enumeration. Induction by enumeration is not valid.

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Reading right now?

2011-10-12T17:06:00.001-07:00

Time Enough for Love by Robert Heinlein. I am also re-reading Philosophy: Who Needs It by Ayn Rand.

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Does your adoration for Steve Jobs diminish somewhat knowing he actively donated money to campaigns by the democrats and was a Buddhist, both things not really in tune with Objectivism?

2011-10-12T17:01:00.001-07:00

No. The reason I admire Steve Jobs has nothing to do with the contradictions in his personal life and whatever vices he had, they were nothing when weighted against his virtues. Many great men suffer from various contradictions. Newton was, for instance, extremely religious. Compartmentalization is the cause of this phenomena: they do not logically integrate all of their ideas.

This is not necessarily a sign of evasion; it not self-evident that you can or should logically integrate all your ideas. Especially not when you, for decades, have been told by the intellectual establishment that integration is either impossible and/or undesirable (see, for instance, the philosophy of Pragmatism which is everywhere in the culture and the practical implementation of Pragmatism within the field of education: Progressive education).

It is, of course, not good that Steve Jobs had these contradictions but it is mainly his, not mine, problem. I judge and *admire* Steve Jobs (and Isaac Newton), for the great values their great discoveries or creations makes possible. I judge them, more specifically, on how they made *my life* better, more enjoyable, more productive, etc. His contradictions have had, to my knowledge, *no* impact on my life whatsoever. (I would, by the way, not take the fact that he donated money to the Democratic party as conclusive proof that he sympathetic to their cause. Many businessmen donate money to *both* parties in a desperate attempt to buy some freedom from the government. This is, in today's mixed economy, a totally accepted procedure, in my book.)

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Favourite movie, book, food, and work of art?

2011-10-08T09:43:00.001-07:00

"Off the cuff" I would answer: Dawn of the Dead (the original). Book? If you think about fiction, Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. If you think about nonfiction, Philosophy: Who Needs It by Ayn Rand. Food? That's a tough one. But the first thing that comes to my mind is: a New York Strip Steak, medium rare, with some salad, a sweet potato and butter. Work of art? Michelangelo's David.

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Do you like to be the center of attention?

2011-10-08T09:11:00.001-07:00

It depends, among other factors, on why I get the attention. If I have done something great, something for which I deserve some recognition, then I don't mind it. But it is not what motivates me to pursue great endeavors.

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Are you planning on having children in the future?

2011-10-07T19:41:00.001-07:00

It depends on my woman.

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They say that most Noble Prize winners have had their "big idea" before 30, thus indicating that creativity has more to do with age rather than thinking as such. Is there something to such a, IMHO; BIOLOGICALLY DETERMINISTICAL "age limit" for creativity?

2011-10-07T19:12:00.001-07:00

I don't think so. I think you can become a better, more creative thinker, with more and better ideas when you are 40 or older. I think there are many reasons for that.

First of all, I believe the brain is like muscle. The more you use it, the better it will be.

Second, creativity and intelligence depend, at least in part, on your thinking methods. If you have a good method, then it is more than possible that your thinking is better, faster, clearer at, say, the age of 60 than at 25.

Third, creative thinking also depend on your knowledge. As long as you are an active thinker, always eager to learn and increase your understanding, you will be able to see and understand much more when you are 70 than when you were 25.

Fourth, I think the reason it seems like many Nobel Prize winners have their "big idea" when they are 20-30 years old, is simply because The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences wait on purpose 10-20-30 years before they are willing to award you. The reason is that they want to see if your contribution to science will stand the test of time.

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Will you ever study for a master and what would that be? Is a univresity education worth it in your opinion? Is philosophy as it is taught in academics today worth the money and time invested?

2011-10-07T19:06:00.001-07:00

I started to study for a master's degree but I never completed it (I did earn a good grade on the course I completed). I might complete it in the future. But I don't know when that will come.

Is a university education worth it? That's impossible to answer, without a lot of qualifications.

It depends on, at least, two things: Can you afford it? And by that I don't mean for now but also after you are done with your studies. Will it, for example, land you a job that makes it possible for you to repay your student loans?

If it in fact is impossible (because you know there is no real market for people with your degree), then I think it would be self-destructive of you to get any university education. If it, on the other hand, is a question of taking a risk, then you have to judge the possible cost against the possible benefits. And, at the end of the day, only you can make that call.

But that's not the most important question. No, the most important question is: Is it *necessary* for your career? If not, then there is no need whatsoever to pursue a university education. If all you want is the knowledge, then you might as well just read on your own. Maybe find some friends, start a study group.

If you don't need a university education to get what you want out of life, then it is just a waste of time and money. The same principle applies to academic philosophy. If you choose to work as a philosopher, you will most likely end up in academia, in which case you'll need degrees. Therefore you'll have to study within academia. If you can get through it, then it is great.

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Why does Objectivism hold that 'sex is an end in itself' when there are clearly people, such as strict Catholics, who do not hold this view, and only have sex to produce offspring?

2011-10-06T14:57:00.001-07:00

The answer is a fundamentally different view on reality and man. Your approach to sex stems, ultimately, from your metaphysics and their estimate of man.

If you, like Catholics or other religious people, believe that there is a God, that he is your creator, that he owns you, why he's also entitled to rule you, then it follows that it is wrong to enjoy sex as an end in itself.

No, it is only "OK" to have sex, if and to the extent, God allows it. Apparently, God only allows you to have sex if you are in a marriage and the purpose is to procreate.

If you also believe, as most religious people do, that man is inherently evil from birth (see the doctrine of "origin sin"), then that obviously only make matters worse.

If you are a rotten thing, then you should not enjoy yourself. (You probably do not think, for instance, that Hitler, Stalin or Mao has a moral right to enjoy themselves.) No, you should feel bad about yourself, you should be ashamed, you should feel guilty if you enjoy yourself.

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An experiment in speaking up

2011-10-04T04:46:00.000-07:00

I rarely read the newspapers, but recently I have read some of the free papers such as Metro. In Metro I have paid attention to the letters to the editor. And for several days now there has been one letter after another where people openly argue for the outright violation of individual rights.

These people want to completely ban everything from candy to video games. They want to put people in jail for the crime of buying candy or playing video games. These people are clearly *totalitarians*.

I am not used to people arguing so openly for granting the government totalitarian powers, because my friends are also friends of freedom. I have therefore been both upset and shocked to read these horrible LTE:s.

Not all the LTE:s are promoting totalitarian control over our lives. Some are just plain bad. People argue for outrageous things with really awful arguments. Someone argued, for example, that we should save the old forests. It was very important to this guy that the forests where old. But why? Not a single reason was given. But he made it very clear that it is a shame that we do not protect them. So all we got was an assertion that there is a value at stake here, but not of to whom it is of value or for what. The solution? The government should take over these forests and thus stop humans from exploiting and enjoying them for their own needs and purposes.

On the premise that the sane people who are still left in this country have better things to do, why they have no time to write irrational LTE:s in Metro, I can only hope that these irrationalists and totalitarians only represent a small minority of loudmouths.

In any event, I will make an experiment. In the coming days and weeks, I will quote, to my co-workers, the most offensive LTE:s at work. I will make some comments on why I think these people are wrong and then morally condemn the authors. I will not mince my words; I will be myself. Then I will see how many people disagree with me and why. I will collect the reactions I get, if any, and come back with a report.

If I am lucky, most people will agree with me. But I would also consider the experiment a success if it turns out that most people say nothing, even though they disagree with me, simply because they have been demoralized by me.

Why is the Federal Reserve bad for the economy of the United States?

2011-10-01T13:08:00.001-07:00

The Fed is an example of government central planning and just like government central planning cannot does and doesn't work in any other field, it cannot and doesn't either work when it comes to money or banking.

The Federal Reserve tries to control on one of the most important prices in the economy: the interest rate. By manipulating the interest rate, the government either makes people save too much or too little. People will make a lot of mistakes in their economic calculations. Bubbles, wasteful spending and malinvesting is to be expected.

By driving down the interest rates it usually encourages people to not only save too little but also borrow too much. A great proportion of these loans will be not for production, but for consumption. People will buy houses, flat screen TV:s and iPads on credit, instead of saving their money which would fuel not only future production of wealth but also pay for their own future consumption.

Many businessmen will loan to make investmenst that only seem profitable for the moment, because the interest rate is so low. See for example the IT-bubble in the late 1990s. (But they would probably never loan for such investments, if the market were allowed to set the interest rates.)

The Federal Reserve is also the fundamental cause of money and price inflation. That is, the destruction of the value of the US dollar. The Fed helps to finance loans to the US government by indirectly paying for the US government bonds by printing more money. Inflation itself has many bad consequences for the economy as a whole: it drives up your cost of living and thus lower your standard of living, it eats up our savings (the same savings that functions as the fuel for the whole economy), it creates unemployment, it encourages people to spend and speculate, to borrow instead of saving, etc.

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Can "prestige" ever be a value or is it social metaphysics at all times?

2011-10-01T12:32:00.001-07:00

The dictionary defines "prestige" as "widespread respect and admiration felt for someone or something on the basis of a perception of their achievements or quality".

It is enjoyable when other people like you and what you do. Especially when they share the same standards and values as you do.

So why would it be improper for a rational individualist to be respected and admired by others, if these others respect and admire him for the same reasons he is proud over himself and his achievements?

It would only be second-handed if you try to derive your self-esteem through the standards and values of others. If you, for example, think you are a good person or that your work is great, *only* because others like it for reasons you may not understand or agree with, then it would be second-handed.

As long as other people is not what drives you and it is not your source of self-esteem, then there is nothing necessarily second-handed with "prestige".

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Elizabeth Warren's Assault on Justice

2011-10-01T08:00:00.000-07:00

Elizabeth Warren, a candidate for the Senate in Massachusetts, recently gave the following remarks in defense of Obama's proposed tax increases: "There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own. Nobody". How come? Warren: "You built a factory out there—good for you! But I want to be clear. You moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for". She concludes by saying: "Now look, you built a factory and it turned into something terrific, or a great idea—God bless. Keep a big hunk of it. But part of the underlying social contract is you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along".

Warren is not alone in making this argument. You encounter similar arguments all over the place. In fact, I first became aware of Elizabeth Warren's remarks when reading a column in the New York Times entitled "The Social Contract": "[W]e have the claim that the rich have the right to keep their money — which misses the point that all of us live in and benefit from being part of a larger society". Yes, that is the the arch-liberal of the New York Times: Paul Krugman. What does it mean? It means that since we are all "part of a larger society", from which we benefit, individual rights are out. Why? Because we "owe" society; therefore you should be *forced*, if necessary, to "give back".

In essence, this is just another version of John Rawls' argument for the welfare state. According to philosopher John Rawls you do not deserve the wealth you have created. Why? Because you have done nothing to earn your brain. Therefore, you have done nothing to deserve the wealth you could create thanks to your brain. In a similar fashion one can argue that since "the rest of us" created a society, you do not deserve the wealth that you created thanks to the benefits of society. (If you are rational, says Rawls, then you realize that it would be in your self-interest to sacrifice your wealth for the benefit of the worst off. Which means that you should, due to factors beyond your control (your brain), work and sacrifice for the sake of the weakest, the least intelligent, the least competent, the least ambitious. This you should do, believe it or not, in the name of justice!)

The concept of justice, or desert, is not applicable on factors that are beyond your control, whether it is your brain, family or what society you are born into. What facts give rise to the concept of "desert"? The fact that individuals under, more or less, similar conditions *choose* different values and actions. Some made more of an effort. Others did not. Some end up like Steve Jobs. Others end up like Barack Obama.

Contrary to what Dane Smith (from Growth and Justice) recently said in his debate with Yaron Brook (from the Ayn Rand Institute), you are *not* alive thanks to the tribe. No, you are, ultimately, alive because of your own effort. It is true that in a society we have to trade with other people to survive. It does, however, not follow that we do not deserve what we produce. Because to be able to trade we first have to produce something of value to offer, i.e., goods and services.

Remember that the government is not a productive enterprise. So how does the government pay for the government roads, government schools and various destructive regulatory agencies? By taxing those who *do* produce wealth. So Elizabeth Warren got it completely backwards; she puts the cart before the horse. (True enough, the top 10% income earners pay for more than 70% of the federal income taxes. The rich businessmen pay their own way, not "the rest of us".)

Thus, the argument from Warren et al., amounts to the following assault on logic and justice: The government forces you to pay for various government programs, then Warren takes the fact that you (were *forced* to) use some of these programs as proof that you owe society. Consequently you *should* be forced to "give back" (or "pay forward") to "the rest of us" who never earned it!

If you say: "But this is force! You are violating my rights!" They will answer: What are you talking about? You entered a "social contract" when we forced you to pay for and use various government programs. In other words: They held a gun against your head and reached a "forced agreement" with you, so now you better live up to the "agreement" otherwise they can put you in jail.

If you now say: "But this makes no sense!" Then you will be onto something. If you ask yourself: Why would anybody believe such nonsense? If you are fortunate some liberals will be honest and reply: "Don't be so *dogmatic* about individual rights. Sure, freedom is great, but so is government force. Let's have a vote!" When you hear that, then you will get a glimpse into the psycho-epistemological chaos that goes on in their minds and you will slowly begin to understand how modern philosophy, especially Pragmatism, is the fundamental cause of their hatred for individual rights and capitalism.

Almost everything the government does today is making it harder and harder for businessmen to function. For example: the antitrust laws turns virtually every businessman into a criminal once he starts an enterprise; financial regulations assumes all businessmen are guilty until proven innocent; high taxes makes it harder for businessmen to accumulate the capital necessary for investments in new businesses, factories and machines, all which would create new and better paying jobs. It is just laughable to suggest that businessmen became rich thanks to the government. Talk about adding insult to injury.

Elizabeth Warren had no qualms about adding such insult, when she said: "You didn't have to worry that marauding bands would come and seize everything at your factory, and hire someone to protect against this, because of the work the rest of us did".

This means: You pay for the police, the courts and the military and you benefit from these government institutions. So you "owe" society. Therefore, you should be forced to pay for the overbearing burden of the growing liabilities of the welfare state (e.g., social security, medicaid, medicare and soon Obamacare), including an army of regulatory government agencies which will control every single aspect of your life and business and thereby slowly drain you of your will to go on. You will, of course, also be forced to pay for the IRS, a government run "marauding band" whose purpose is to make sure you are slowly being taxed to death. This you are supposed to endure, says Elizabeth Warren, when "giving back" for "the work the rest of us did".

What could possibly be a greater assault on justice?

ObjectivistAnswers.com

2011-09-24T08:03:00.000-07:00

I have started to answer questions about Objectivism over at ObjectivistAnswers.com. Follow me here!

What psychological school do you think is the most compatible with objectivism?

2011-09-24T01:04:00.001-07:00

Based on what I know, I would say the cognitive school of psychology, because it seems to recognize that many of our psychological issues stem from bad thinking and that the solution, therefore, is to change what we think. But it probably has flaws. Since I am no expert, I googled it and I quickly discovered, for instance, that cognitive psychology rejects introspection. This is, of course, strange and contradictory, to say the least. How can we know that there are thoughts? emotions? and that there is a relationship between them, without introspection? Obviously, we cannot. The contradiction is blaring. But at least the cognitive school *seems* to recognizes that there is a consciousness, as opposed to behaviorism, and that man is essentially a rational being, as opposed to psychological analytical school. This is a fundamental requirement for any rational school of psychology.

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Do you think there will be peace in the middle east before World War III?

2011-09-21T09:01:00.001-07:00

I do not really know how to answer this question. Why do you think the option is either peace in the Middle East now or maybe after World War III? There does not have to be another "world war" to create peace in the Middle East. I think you offer me a false alternative.

It is *relatively* easy to achieve peace in the Middle East: elect principled leaders with a moral backbone; declare war on the enemy (Iran); do it with moral certainty; fight a real war without any altruistic restrictions (i.e., give the military free hands to use whatever they need to completely crush, as fast as possible Iran, nuclear weapons not excluded); demand their *unconditional* surrender and, then, declare victory. If done properly, I think it would be over within weeks or months. If not days.

I am sure that if America does this, then that would be the end of it. Because it would finally show the world that America actually means business, that if you threaten or attack America you will pay with the complete destruction of your own country, that America is not a paper tiger anymore, that the ideals of the Islamic totalitarians are false and, most importantly, utterly *hopeless*. It will break their *will to fight*, which is crucial to winning the war against the regimes in the Middle East who are promoting Islamic totalitarianism.

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Can money buy happiness?

2011-09-21T08:05:00.001-07:00

Yes - if you are a virtuous man who has *earned* his money honesty. To such a person, his money represents his ability to live, to succeed in his pursuit of the values which makes his life and happiness possible. To the virtuous man, the money is the material reward of his virtuous way of life which adds to his fundamental conviction that he is capable of achieving in this world. That he is fundamentally good.

Outside of this context, money cannot buy you any happiness. If you for instance think that you do not really deserve your money, or if you have self-esteem issues (stemming from some bad premises, or because you really are a bad person, unsuccessful in life), then money will never make you happy.

Observe all rich, famous people in Hollywood, who are depressed, who take drugs to numb themselves, etc. Observe the rich people who feel guilty over their wealth and their success, because they really think they just got a lucky break from their genes and/or society and that they now should "give back" to society; for them their money is just a reminder of a great injustice created by the universe. They will never be able to fully enjoy their money.

The same is true of criminals who steal their money from others: they know they are no good, they know they could not have earned this money on their own, they know that they have not earned any of it, they know that they are frauds. For them, their stolen money will only remind themselves of who they are. Look at Bernie Madoff, for instance.

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formspring.me

2011-09-17T12:30:00.001-07:00

Feel free to ask me anything about economics, politics, morality, epistemology or metaphysics!

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Stimulating the economy to death

2011-09-15T07:41:00.000-07:00

Let's say you are a storekeeper.* Let us assume that you have 6 dollars of capital. Normally you would invest 2 dollars of your capital in goods to sell for, say, 3 dollars, which earns you a profit of 1 dollar. You save the profit and you will at the end of the day have a capital of 7 dollars, which allows you to expand your business: hire new people, invest in a warehouse, invest in more goods than before, or whatever.

Let's now, as an alternative scenario, say that the demand for your goods goes down. So you think, if only demand would go up, then you would be back in business. Fortunately, you know some unemployed people who like to hang out outside your store. You tell them that you will give them some of your capital to spend in your store, say, 3 dollars. They are more than happy to help out. They spend like there is no tomorrow. At the end of the day your store has run out of goods.

At this point, you still have 6 dollars of capital, but an empty store. To keep your store open you now, again, have to invest 2 dollars in new goods to sell. But, alas, there is still no demand for your goods. You feel a need for more "stimulus".

The only problem is that if you continue with this policy, you will end with no capital. You will be forced to close your store. (Obviously, it makes no difference if you had a capital of $600 000 or $6 000 000 or $6 000 000 000; the principle is the same.)

Can you project what would happen if every business in the country did the same thing? The whole country would be broke and "out of business". Unfortunately, you do not have to project it. You can read about it, every day, in the newspaper. This is the *literal* meaning of Obama's Keynesian "stimulus" policies.

The Obama administration says, for instance, that a great way to "stimulate" the economy is by extending unemployment aid (or having people buy food with food stamp), because then the unemployed will create a demand for goods.

How does the Obama administration pay for this "stimulus"? Whether the government pays for it through taxation, loans or inflation, does not matter. The government will, in any event, "eat up" the savings, i.e., the capital, of the whole country.

If you understand the role of savings in the economy, then you will not be surprised at all. Savings is the lifeblood of the economy: it pays for the goods, the wages of the workers, the tools, the machines, the factories, etc. If you "eat up" your savings, then there will not be any money left to run your business. This is why Keynesian economics does not and cannot work.

*: This story is based on a letter to the editor written by Henrik Unné.

Laissez-faire Banking

2011-09-13T17:29:00.000-07:00

In the era of free banking in 19th century, the U.S. experienced one bank panic after another. These recurring panics proved, conclusively, what happens if we leave the banking industry free from the enlightened supervision of the government. Therefore, in an attempt to bring order and stability to the banking industry, the government had to step in, regulate and, finally, establish the Federal Reserve. You have probably heard some version of this story before. This is the "conventional wisdom". It is also a myth.

It is true that the U.S. suffered from many panics. But contrary to what you might think, it was not these panics that gave rise to the need of government interventions in the banking industry. On the contrary, it was government interventions in the banking industry which caused the panics. But why, then, do so many think the panics were caused by "too much" freedom? Because the banking industry operated under the so-called "Free Banking" system. It was called the "Free Banking" system because the laws made it easier to start a bank. Before you needed special permits or political pull to start a bank. It did, however, not make it any easier to run a bank once you started it. The U.S. banking industry is one of the most regulated industries in the world; this was also the true under the so-called "Free Banking" system.

Various regulations made it very difficult for bankers to act as rational businessmen. For example: They prohibited banks to have more than one office. They also prohibited interstate branch banking. This made banks dependent on the local business and, consequently, it became virtually impossible to diversify risks. As a result, banks became under-diversified and undercapitalized. Banks were, in addition, forced to back up their money stock with state bonds. The purpose was not to make the banking industry more "stable". No, the purpose was to simply force the banks to lend out money to the states.

The government virtually forced the banks to put all the eggs in one basket and they were bad eggs: these state bonds tended to fall in value because many were, with good reason, afraid that the states would go bankrupt. Accordingly, many banks became insolvent and insolvent banks were by law forced to declare bankruptcy. Destructive regulations such as these is why the U.S. banking industry had more banking crises than the rest of the world. ("Banking Crisis," Charles W. Calomiris, pp. 2-5. Fribanksskolan, Per Hortlund, pp. 134-136) Experts estimate that 80% of the banks that went bankrupt did so as a result of this type of regulation. (Ibid., p. 50.)

Making matters worse, the government also encouraged banks to operate in a short-sighted, irresponsible and irrational manner. Instead of letting the banks go bankrupt when they had made bad loans, government central banks such as The First Bank of America and The Second Bank of America, acting as "the lender of last resort", repeatedly bailed them out. Government sometimes also tacitly let them breach their contracts by suspending specie payments, whenever there was a run on the bank.

It is obvious that these policies create a "moral hazard": they encourage banks to continue to take greater and greater risks, to lend out more and more money, with less and less money in reserve. The smaller reserves, the greater liquidity risk. Thus, the banks were, at the same time, forced to take risks that they did not want and encouraged to take on more risks than they otherwise would. Government made it harder to engage in rational banking, while they at the same time encouraged to engage in irrational banking. It is no wonder, then, that the U.S. banking industry was unstable in the 19th century.

In Canada, Scotland and Sweden bankers were free from these regulations and thus also free to act as rational businessmen. Consequently they did not, to the same extent, suffer from any recurring banking panics. During Sweden's 70 years of free banking not a single bank failed. There were few bank failures in Scotland (about half as many as in England) and the losses were very small; between 1695-1841 the total loss for bank customers amounted to £32 000, which represents a figure half the size of the total losses in a single year, 1840, in London. Not a single bank went bankrupt in Canada in the Great Depression. Compare this to the U.S. where over 9,000 banks went bankrupt. The absence of many bad regulations was not the only reason; the absence of a central bank, i.e., a "lender of last resort", also discouraged banks from making many bad and risky loans.

The U.S. did not have a central bank in the late 1800s. Consequently, the panics of the 1800s were also milder and briefer compared to everything that came after the introduction of the central bank in the 1900s. (Elmus Wicker, "Banking Panic In The U.S.: 1873-1933".) Economist Charles W. Calomiris: "None of the U.S. banking panics of the pre-World War I era saw nationwide banking distress (measured by the negative net worth of failed banks relative to annual GDP) greater than the 0.1% loss of 1893" (p. 5). Compare this with The Great Depression: "U.S. Bank failures resulted in losses to depositors in the 1930s in excess of 3% of GDP". (Ibid.) What explains the difference? Calomiris:

Loss rates tended to be low because banks structured themselves to limit their risk of loss... Market discipline (the fear that depositors would withdraw their funds) provided incentives for banks to behave prudently. The picture of small depositors lining up around the block to withdraw funds has received much attention, but perhaps the more important source of market discipline was the threat of an informed (often 'silent') run by large depositors (often other banks). Banks maintained relationships with each other through interbank deposits and the clearing of public deposits, notes, and bankers’ bills. Banks often belonged to clearing houses that set regulations and monitored members’ behavior. A bank that lost the trust of its fellow bankers could not long survive. (Ibid.)

The cause of the banking panics in the U.S. was not "too much" freedom; it was the government forcing or encouraging bankers to act against their rational judgment. What we need is not more destructive government regulations. No, what we need is to leave the bankers free to act as rational businessmen. What we need is real free banking: laissez-faire banking.

9/11: Ten Years Later

2011-09-11T06:31:00.000-07:00

I remember what I was doing and where I was on this day, ten years ago. How can I forget? I had just gotten home from school when my mom called me from work, telling me to turn on the TV, because an airplane had hit one of towers of the World Trade Center. I turned on the TV and was told that a second airplane had hit the second tower; then I knew America was under attack. This was the beginning of the single worst day in my life.

After a while I called a friend of mine, André Assarsson. I raged and ranted about the attacks. I said that I thought Iraq was behind the attacks and if so, then if I were president I would turn the whole thing to dust.

Later that day my mom told me that they should make parking lots out of the whole Middle East; she was, in essence, right then and she is right now. Unfortunately, that is not what we got. Nothing even resembling this.

While most of us were psychologically ready for war, and morally demanded action, nothing happened for months, even though we all knew who was responsible. When something finally happened, it was a pathetic and immoral Christian excuse of war known as "Operation Enduring Freedom", only to be followed by an even more pathetic and immoral Christian excuse of a war called "Operation Iraqi Freedom".

I do not know what makes me more upset: the attacks on 9/11 or the pathetic, pretense of a retaliation.

I usually become very pessimistic about the state of the world, when I am reminded of September 11, 2001. It reminds me of the appeasement of Iran, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia; of the immoral evasions regarding Islam on part of the intelligentsia; of the self-imposed blindness and stupidity of the intellectuals who promote altruism, pragmatism, and multiculturalism, and of the cultural climate they have created, which is the fundamental cause of the weak non-retaliation we have witnessed since.

The only good thing I am reminded of on this day is that there is no "statute of limitations" on justice. Therefore, I hope I live long enough to finally see justice be done.

Bad thinking, bad economics

2011-09-09T06:10:00.000-07:00

Why do people find Keynesian economics plausible? Ignorance of history and basic economics is part of the answer. The fundamental cause, though, is not a lack of knowledge; it is bad thinking, due to bad epistemology. Let me give you an example. Jon Faraci, CEO of International Paper recently told CNBC that:

"[T]o create jobs what we need is demand. This economy is 70 percent consumer driven, so we need consumers spending some of their discretionary income if we're going to have demand that's gong to lead to more jobs."

"If we get demand, we’ll put more shifts on, our employees will be working more hours, and we’ll hire more people. Without demand we can have all the certainty in the world and all the clarity about regulation, but to me it’s not so much about confidence as it is about demand," explained Faraci.

Everybody who run a business knows that they need customers. The greater the demand for your goods and services, the better. Unfortunately, it does not follow from the fact that you need more demand for your goods and services to prosper, that the economy as a whole also needs more demand.

The premise here is that there is either too much supply relative to demand or too little demand relative to supply. Or, in other words: "overproduction" or "underconsumption".

In fact, there is no such thing as a *general* "overproduction" (or "underconsumption"). How come? Well, there is virtually no limit to our desire to spend more money. Just imagine what would happen if your income doubled? Would you have a hard time figuring out how to spend your money? No. What if you won a million on the lottery? Again, you would hardly have any trouble of thinking of how to spend it.

This doesn't mean that the problem is that we lack the money to buy all the goods and services out there. If just the price of goods and services are low enough, then you can always afford to buy more goods and services. What happens if supply of a good is greater than demand? Prices fall. If prices fall, we can afford to buy more of it and/or other goods. This is why a *general* "overproduction" (or "underconsumption") is impossible.

What is possible is a *relative* overproduction. That is, there might be a more of eggs than people demand relative to milk. But this is not a problem. The *relative* overproduction of eggs will only drive down the price of eggs, which means people will either be able to buy more eggs and/or to buy as many eggs as today but also have more money left to buy more milk or more of something else.

That *general* overproduction is impossible has been known among rational economists for at least 200 years. See, for instance, Jean-Baptiste Say. But this is deeper than bad economics: this is an example of the composition fallacy. Since some businesses might need more demand to survive and prosper, some people draw the conclusion that the economy as a whole need more demand. But it simply doesn't follow. Yet, this is the kind of illogical thinking that what makes Keynesian economics seem plausible to many people.

It is a great tragedy that not more people bother to study history, economics and logic.

No room for skepticism

2011-09-07T13:33:00.000-07:00

For decades people like James Randi, Carl Sagan and Michael Shermer have been fighting conspiracy theories, alien abductions, astrology, ESP, ghosts, communication with the dead, "alternative medicine", creationism and religion in general. These people represent the modern skeptic movement. It may seem like these people are the perfect allies in our fight for a more rational culture. Should we associate with them? No.

One of the most prominent representative of this movement is Michael Shermer, the founder and director of the Skeptic Society. As one of the chief ideologists I will let him speak for the basic philosophy of the modern skeptics.

What is skepticism? Michael Shermer says: "Skepticism is a *provisional* approach to claims. *It is the application of reason to any and all ideas*… In other words, skepticism is a method, not a position. Ideally, skeptics do not go into an investigation *closed* to the *possibility* that *a phenomenon might be real or that a claim might be true*. When we say we are 'skeptical,' we mean that we must see compelling evidence before we believe." (My emphasis.)

This statement is quite revealing. It might sound reasonable, but once you start to scratch the surface you will notice that this approach leads to an epistemological disaster.

Shermer says that we should be "open" to "any and all ideas"; you must be open to the *possibility* that there *might* be something to astrology, ESP, ghosts or God. Shermer elaborates: "A claim becomes factual when it is *confirmed to such an extent* it would be reasonable to offer *temporary* agreement. But all facts in science are *provisional* and subject to challenge, and therefore skepticism is a method leading to *provisional* conclusions. Some claims, such as water dowsing, ESP, and creationism, have been tested (and failed the tests) often enough that we can *provisionally* conclude that they are false. (My emphasis.)

This means that the man of reason starts with an "open" mind to the arbitrary, i.e., the groundless, and then "provisionally" believe in what you can only "temporarily" prove. Since what you believe in today can turn out to be false tomorrow, and vice versa (!), you have to settle for "provisional" beliefs. Therefore, you cannot be certain about anything.

Shermer denies that skepticism means skepticism, i.e., that we cannot really know anything. He claims that he is merely offering us a "compromise": "The key to skepticism is to continuously and vigorously apply the methods of science to navigate the treacherous straits between 'know nothing' skepticism and 'anything goes' credulity". But the logical implication of his reasoning is, nevertheless, total skepticism.

The implicit underlying premise behind Shermer's argument is a false dilemma: either we are all-knowing, i.e., omniscient, or we have to settle for "provisional" truths. The problem with this approach is that it opens up the door for the arbitrary, i.e., the groundless. Once you open the door for the arbitrary you undermine all knowledge and, via implication, reason.

You cannot compromise with the arbitrary. If you think you are entitled to question any conclusions, on the premise that you are not omniscient, why you might be wrong tomorrow, then there is no limit to what you may question. It is a matter of principle: it is either-or. Since we are not all-knowing, one would always be justified in raising the question: "What if you are wrong?" All you have to do is to remind people is that they are not omniscient: "How do you know your you will not be proven wrong tomorrow?" Contrary to what Shermer says, this does lead to total and perpetual skepticism.

It is irrational to uphold the impossible, namely omniscience, as the standard for certainty. You do not have to be omniscient to be certain. Certainty is contextual. Philosopher Leonard Peikoff explains: "Idea X is 'certain' if, in a given context of knowledge, the evidence for X is conclusive. In such a context, all the evidence supports X and there is no evidence to support any alternative…" A conclusion is, in other words, certain if you end up in a contradiction by denying it. Knowledge is contextual. To deny the conclusion would also contradict everything it rest on. Study, for example, the O.J. Simpson case. Study the overwhelming evidence pointing to O.J. Simpson being the murderer. If you deny that O.J. Simpson is the murderer, then you will end up in a contradiction because you will contradict everything we know about this case in particular and everything we know about forensic science in general.

For the same reason we should not consider David Hume, the arch-skeptic, as an ally in our fight for reason, we should not consider people like Michael Shermer as an ally. These skeptics are, in fact, doing more harm than good because their implicit philosophical principles are false and therefore destructive and dangerous. They are undermining reason because they are, like David Hume, actually entrenching the arbitrary.

Another day, another rationalization

2011-09-02T18:15:00.000-07:00

One day after I published my article "The Failure of Keynesianism", I found a piece on CNN Opinion written by Anne Thompson, "a policy analyst for the National Employment Law Project, a nonprofit group that promotes policies and programs for lower-wage workers":

"It's time to raise the minimum wage." It may sound surprising, but it's exactly what our economy needs. On the campaign trail, Obama called for raising the minimum wage to $9.50 by 2011; now is the time deliver on that pledge.

Raising the minimum wage would not only help working families, it also would help power the economic recovery. As the economy has sputtered, wages have stagnated, and even folks with jobs are having trouble meeting their families' basic needs...

Raising the minimum wage puts a little more money in pockets of the lowest-paid workers, who have little choice but to spend that additional income immediately, helping restore the consumer spending that businesses need to grow. Preliminary estimates suggest that restoring the minimum wage to $10 per hour by 2014 could generate as many as 160,000 new jobs.

Observe that Anne Thompson first claims that this would be good for the poor and then, relying on the Keynesian premise that it is consumption that drives the economy, she makes a case for raising the minimum wage, arguing it would even create jobs (!).

Then she writes: "Opponents are likely to be put on the defensive, struggling to explain why they oppose a modest raise for Main Street as Wall Street enjoys record profits". What is the implicit premise here? The idea that Wall Street should give up some of its profits for the benefit of the poor and needy.

What more do you need to know that Keynesianism is nothing but a rationalization for the welfare state, the "redistribution" of wealth?

She concludes her argument by answering those who would argue that the minimum wage will do nothing to raise the standard of living for anybody or create jobs:

They will also resurrect the tired old canard that raising the minimum wage leads to job loss, but that theory was first shot to pieces in the 1990s by Alan Krueger, Obama's nominee to head the Council of Economic Advisers, when he and economist David Card published a groundbreaking study finding that raising the minimum wage boosts incomes of low-paid workers without reducing employment. Nearly two decades of rigorous academic research has confirmed these findings.

The research of Alan Krueger and David Card is laughably bad. The actual data points to the exact opposite conclusion. This should come as no surprise; it defies common sense and decades, if not centuries, of experience. Economists have, by the way, done hundreds of studies which all reach the same conclusion: minimum wage laws create unemployment.

I cannot help to mention that one reason we ended up with mass unemployment in the 1930s was because the Hoover administration persuaded corporate America to keep wages and employment up. The idea was that this would keep demand up. It would be one of many government interventions that would deepen and extend the recession, turning it into the Great Depression. Not what you would expect if keeping wages up is good for the economy or jobs.

Also, in 1937 unemployment jumped from 14% to 19% because the unionization, made possible through the Wagner Act, drove up the wages. Again not something you would have expected if there was something to the idea that higher wages are good for the economy.

In the end there is only one question you have to ask these people: If you really believed that raising the minimum wage would be good for the economy and would create plenty of new jobs, then why do you not suggest we raise it to 100 dollars per hour or, for that matter, 1000 dollars per hour?

When you have refuted these people about a thousand times, you have to realize that the issue is deeper than economics. If these people were intellectually honest, they would admit that the real issue is not economics; the real issue is morality: As long as people think that the "right" thing to do is to sacrifice the profits of the affluent of Wall Street, to the poor and needy of Main Street, people will continue to promote such things as increased government spending, tax hikes, minimum wage increases, etc., no matter what the facts are. (As long as they believe that morality has nothing to do with the facts of reality, they will if necessary distort or invent facts that will justify their moral "instincts", "feelings" or "intuitions".)

Once you realize that the issue is really about morality, not economics, then you realize you should ask these people: Why should we sacrifice ourselves for others? Why should we give up the values that make our lives and happiness possible? *Why*? The lack of a *rational* answer to this question is precisely why *this* is the debate we need.

The Failure of Keynesianism

2011-09-01T14:40:00.000-07:00

Now when the economy seems to be taking a "double-dip", the "liberal" establishment insist that what we need is a second, greater "stimulus" package. This argument is, of course, based on Keynesian economics.

The basic premise of Keynesian economics is that consumption, not production, drives the economy. But what is consumption? It is the using up of resources. For example: eating food, driving your car, using your computer, etc. Consumption is therefore the destruction of wealth. Thus, in essence, Keynesian economics amounts to saying that the destruction of wealth is the road to prosperity. If you think this makes no sense, then you are not mistaken; it makes no sense, because Keynesian economics is false.

What is the source of wealth? Production. Consumption presuppose production; you cannot consume without first producing something. Trade presuppose production; "supply creates its own demand". The use of money makes no difference whatsoever; money is nothing but a good everybody demands and it would, ultimately, be worthless if it did not, directly or indirectly, represent wealth.

What, then, is the source of economic progress? Investments. What makes investments possible? Savings. Savings presuppose you produce more than you consume. Investing is the use of goods for purpose of producing more goods. For example: you invest in computers to make computer games. Consumption is the use of goods as an end in itself. For example: you buy a computer to play computer games. Savings not only pay for the investments, they also pay the wages of the workers; if people had to wait until the finished product has been sold for you to get paid, then most of us would have to wait for weeks, months or sometimes even years before getting paid.

The basic idea of Keynesian economics is that if the economy is bad, then the government is supposed to "stimulate" the economy by increasing the aggregate demand in the economy by under balancing the budget more. If the economy is good, then the government is supposed to decrease the aggregate demand in the economy by under balancing the budget less, this in order to avoid "overheating" the economy.

The more the government spends, whether it is through taxation, borrowing or inflation, the less there will be left for the rest of us to spend productively, i.e., to invest. Government consumption is, like private consumption, inherently destructive. Therefore, to increase government spending in order to "stimulate" the economy is a contradiction. (In fact, government spending is actually worse than private spending, because it presupposes the government force you to use your own money against your own will and rational judgment. Thus, you cannot value the government spending.)

You may now say that this is merely theory. But the fact is that we do not have to speculate on whether Keynesian economics does or does not work. Historical facts speak for themselves. Let us, therefore, consider four historical episodes which conclusively refute Keynesianism. (Let me add that you can probably write a whole article or book on each of these historical episodes. Here I will only indicate, in essence, what happened.)

Let us begin with the recession of 1920-21 in America. In 1920 GNP declined by 17% and unemployment went from 4% to about 12%. Now, according to Keynesian economics, you are supposed to "stimulate" the economy by increasing aggregate spending by under balancing the budget. This is not what happened. Instead, the government drastically cut spending by 65% from 18.5 billion dollars to 6.5 billion dollars. If Keynesian economics is true, then you should expect a disaster. Yet in 1921 the economy started to recover and we saw the beginning of the Roaring Twenties.

During the Great Depression the Roosevelt administration did everything it could to increase aggregate demand. It drastically increased government spending from 3% of GNP to 10% or from 3 billion dollars to 9 billion dollars in 1939. Unemployment was, in average, at 18% during the 1930s. The only thing that was growing, due to massive budget deficits, was the government debt. If there were anything to Keynesian economics, you would expect this "stimulus" to get America out of the Great Depression. Instead by 1937 the economy "double dipped".

Keynesian economists will make the case that what finally brought America out of the Great Depression was the Second World War. The war demanded massive spending on military weapons, ammunition and equipment. The budget deficits reached record levels during the war and since mass unemployment virtually disappeared, the war itself has been described, by some Keynesians, as the ultimate "make work program". Thus, many Keynesians have taken the "success" of the Second World War as proof that Keynesian economics works. The fact is that if you conscript 10 million Americans, unemployment go down regardless of government spending. (To suggest, that being forced against your own will, to risk your life on the battle field is equal to taking a low paid job is just ridiculous.) Furthermore, since the government was spending so much resources to produce military weapons and equipment, there were less resources left to produce food, clothes and other consumer goods. As a result, the standard of living went down during the war.

After the war, Keynesian economists were terrified that the economy would enter a new recession. Since the need for massive government spending on the military and since millions of conscripted Americans would deployed, Keynesian economists predicted a mass unemployment of 12-35%. What happened? The economy absorbed the millions who returned to civilian life. Unemployment remained below 5%. Civilian production boomed; in 1946 it increased by 30% alone. Again, not what you would expect if there was something to Keynesian economics. What finally got America out of the Great Depression was a combination of large tax cuts, the abolishing of various regulations and price controls. In other words: more freedom, more capitalism.

What about the stagflation of the 1970s? Remember that if the economy is bad, then you are, according to Keynesian economics, supposed to increase the aggregate demand to stimulate the economy. If the economy is good, you are supposed to decrease the aggregate demand so as to avoid inflation. Yet, in the 1970s we simultaneously experienced high unemployment, stagnation and high inflation. This is supposed to be impossible according to Keynesian economics, since that would imply that we at the same time have too much and too little aggregate demand. If you, however, understand the role of savings in the economy, then the stagflation of the 1970s makes perfect sense.

Let us now skip forward to Japan in the 1990s. During the 1990s Japan tried ten stimulus packages amounting to more than 100 trillion yen. What did they end up with? "The Lost Decade" and one of the highest public debts in the world. Again, not exactly what you would expect if there was something to Keynesian economics.

Finally consider America since 2009. Since Obama took over the government has "stimulated" the economy with 4 trillion dollars - and still counting. This means, if you want to get some perspective on this, that the public debt increased more during the first 19 months of the Obama administration than during all the presidents since George Washington to Ronald Reagan put together! What has the Obama administration to show for? Well look around you.

If Keynesian economics is false, why is it still around? Well, who is predominantly relying on Keynesian economics these days? The Left.

Free market economists say that we can get rid of mass unemployment if the wages are just allowed to fall. But this is not a solution that the Left would accept, because they would argue it is "cruel". Further, relying on Keynesian economics, they can make the case that is bad for the economy because it will result in a drop of the total demand in the economy, and that will make our problems worse.

The Tea Party movement want the government to cut spending, to get the government debt problem under control. But we cannot do that, say the Left. Why not? Because that, again, would be "heartless". Think of the people who depend on the government? The poor and the needy. And, once again relying on Keynesian economics, they can make the case that it would be bad for the economy to cut spending. Don't you know that an extension of unemployment aid is "good" for the economy? It helps unemployed people to consume and keep the economy going.

Why don't they trust the free market to solve the problems (caused by government interventions in the economy)? Because the capitalists are greedy, selfish and "animalistic". As proof, they point to the fact that the banks and businesses are "sitting on their money". The banks are not lending it out and the businesses are not investing it. (Capitalists don't invest because they live under the constant threat of Obama administration suddenly forcing them to pay for costly programs such as ObamaCare.) If the "fat cats" at Wall Street are not willing to do the right thing, then the government should step in. This is where Keynesian economics provides them with the perfect economic justification for government "stimulus". What the economy urgently need now is, believe it or not, ObamaCare.

The reason Keynesian economics is still popular, even though it has been refuted, should now be obvious; it's because it serves as the perfect rationalization for welfare statism.

A welfare state for welfare states

2011-08-26T07:54:00.000-07:00

In 2003 Sweden had a referendum on the euro. I was among the few on the Right who voted "No". Why? I argued that it would encourage the more ambitious welfare states of Europe to continue to borrow and spend irresponsibly and then force the more responsible members of the eurozone to pick up the bills.

Why? Well, if for instance the social democrats want to pay for the welfare state with loans and inflation, then the market will eventually punish Sweden by depreciating the value of the Krona. This will lead to higher interest rates which make it more expensive for the government to lend money. The social democrats will then be forced to make cuts in the welfare state.

This was a major reason the social democrats in Sweden were in favor of the euro. They reminded their voters how Sweden's economic problems in the 1990s forced them to cut spending. The social democrats even argued that the democracy of Sweden was seriously threatened, because we were "forced" by "the market" to do these things against the will of the people.

If we join the euro, then Sweden cannot be penalized because the value of the euro depends on the economic conditions of the eurozone as a whole. They can take loans to keep financing their generous welfare states at a low interest rate and the value of the currency will not be threatened. The euro will liberate us from "the tyranny of the market", social democrats said.

We are now witnessing what happens when you liberate social democrats from the "tyranny of the market".

We are all familiar with the fate of Greece. Greece has put itself into bankruptcy through years of reckless spending paid through massive lending. What made it possible? Greece was implicitly backed up by the strength of the monetary union; the other members would never allow Greece to go bankrupt because that would undermine the whole monetary union. Thus, instead of punishing Greece for its irresponsible behavior, more responsible members such as Germany is forced to bail them out. Greece is, unfortunately, just the tip of the ice berg; similar problems also face Spain, Portugal and Italy.

At this point, we should ask ourselves why so many on the Right was in favor of the euro. The best argument for the euro is that it creates a fixed exchange rate within the eurozone. Since no single member can inflate their way out of their problems, they will be forced to cut government spending. (The unions cannot hope for their currency to depreciate. Instead, they will have to accept wage reductions.) The euro is, in a sense, suppose emulate the gold standard. Just like the gold standard makes it virtually impossible for social democrats to maintain, through loans and inflation, a growing and generous welfare state, the euro was supposed to make it harder as well.

Someone made a serious miscalculation. Instead of undermining the welfare state, they helped to promote and create a monetary system that serves as a welfare state for welfare states. Just as the welfare state allows the poor and needy to slowly drag us all down with them, the poor and needy welfare states of Europe are now slowly dragging us all down with them via the eurozone. For the same reason most people think the needs of the poor morally justifies the welfare state, they think that the needs of the poor and needy members of the eurozone morally justified bailing out countries like Greece.

The case of the euro is another tragic illustration of the complete and utter futility of the non-ideological and non-intellectual, i.e., pragmatic approach of the Right. What we can indirectly detect here is the power of philosophy; a power that the pragmatic Right has little or no respect for. Why does the Right insist on fooling or forcing the public to take small steps in the right direction, using some international agreement or monetary union as an excuse? Why is the Right not willing to fight for capitalism or anything resembling it, on explicit intellectual grounds? Because it is unable to put up a real fight. Why? Because they know on some level that they cannot provide capitalism with a moral defense.

Yet, as history and current events clearly show, economical problems will not convince people that we need capitalism. If that were the case, we would have ended up with capitalism a long time ago. Economic crisis do not determine how people will respond to them. What determines that? Their basic ideas and values, i.e., their philosophy. A gold standard or a monetary union will do little to stop them reacting habitually on their basic premises. As long as people regarded the welfare state as the moral ideal, it was an easy choice to abandon the gold standard when forced to choose. People want to do "the right thing", even if it does not make any economic sense.

Do not make the same mistake as the pragmatic Right. Do not underestimate the power of ideas. The battle for freedom is a philosophical battle. If you want to get rid of the welfare state, then you have to attack and reject the morality of altruism. If you want to establish a free, capitalistic society, based on the principle of individual rights, then you have to promote a rational philosophy. So, educate yourself: study Objectivism, the philosophy of Ayn Rand. Then get out there and fight for your rights!

In the name of the best within you

2011-08-24T16:18:00.000-07:00

Steve Jobs has resigned from Apple as CEO. Tim Cook will take his place. Steve Jobs will instead continue as chairman of the board of directors. This is bad and sad news.

Steve Jobs is not easy to replace. It is not obvious what this will mean for the future of Apple.

Tim Cook is a fantastic manager, a great CFO. He knows how to run a business; in fact he has run Apple for some months now and has done it in the past as well. He will probably be a great CEO, but he is not the vision type.

Since Jobs' letter clearly implies that he is in bad shape, I think this is very sad news.

I do not think that Apple has a bleak future, at least not in the near future. But it is hard to know for sure what it will mean in terms of innovation and direction.

It is possible the basic ideas, values, and standards that Steve Jobs established has been internalized to the company culture of Apple. If so, then it will probably not mean much, if and to the extent the spirit of Steve Jobs lives on.

On a more personal note, Steve Jobs is one of my heroes. Steve Jobs is one of the greatest businessmen of our time: Apple's amazing achievements since his return in the late 1990s speak for themselves.

The technology and innovation Apple has brought to the world for more than thirty years, thanks to the vision of this one man, is too long to list here. Few people have done more to make our lives better.

Steve Jobs is, in terms of essentials, a true Ayn Rand hero:

The Randian innovator’s life purpose is not some do-gooder vision of altruism or charity, but a core drive to work hard, produce value, and follow an inner vision with supreme self-reliance. Steve Wozniak once said about his Apple co-founder, Steve Jobs, "He’s not concerned with what contribution he’s making. He wants to astound himself, for himself."

Let me therefore say, in the name of the best within you: Thank you, Steve Jobs!

Can Animals Think?

2011-08-19T08:11:00.001-07:00

Can animals think? That is an important question with many ethical and political implications. Supposedly, science answers: Yes.

Why? Let me give you a couple of clues: "Increasingly scientists believe we are merely at the top of *a spectrum of intelligence* across the animal kingdom, rather than standing apart from it. We may be better at thinking and more able to articulate our feelings — but animals can do all the same things." (The Times. My emphasis.) Psychology professor William A. Mason wrote: "[T]here is no unequivocal evidence at this point of a grand abyss separating the cognitive processes of ape from man". And: "Although it is true that the contrast between ape and man seems greatest in the ability for creative reconstruction of experience--to display foresight, to imagine, to plan ahead--even here *the differences may be more in degree than in kind*". ("Environmental models and mental modes: Representational processes in the great apes and man", William A. Mason, American Psychologist, Vol 31(4), Apr 1976, pp. 284-294. My emphasis.)

The premise here rests on a conceptual confusion circulating around the concept "intelligence". What is "intelligence"? The dictionary defines it as: "the ability to acquire and apply knowledge and skills". It should not come as a surprise, given this definition, that the difference in intelligence between humans and animals seems to be one in degree.

If the difference in intelligence is one in degree, then there is no reason to argue that only humans have rights because we alone can think. Consequently, Peter Singer says: "If possessing a higher *degree* of intelligence does not entitle one human to use another for his own ends, how can it entitle humans to exploit nonhumans?" (My emphasis.)

Nevertheless, it is obvious that there is a *real* difference between human and animal cognition. Helene Guldberg gives us a great contrast:

While apes are still struggling to crack open nuts, or retrieve honey from beehives, humans have made life-changing inventions such as the internal combustion engine, the harnessing of electricity, the creation of life-saving vaccines and x-rays, and much, much more. While apes are still struggling to communicate in the here and now, humans have invented the alphabet and other forms of written symbols and ever-more impressive means to disseminate the written word, from the invention of paper and ink to the typewriter and the internet. While apes are living in groups the same size as the ones they lived in several million years ago, human beings have created cities, nation states, governments and global economic institutions.

The main problem with the common definition of intelligence is that it does not recognize the essential distinction between perceptual and conceptual knowledge. Yet this is the very difference - not in degree but in kind - that, among other things, put man on the moon, while chimps were struggling to figure out how to crack open a nut.

Most people, including many psychologists, lack a clear grasp of the difference between the perceptual and conceptual level of awareness. As a result, they consider all sorts of feats of animals as sign of intelligence equal *in kind*, albeit not in degree, to that of humans: some animals can make and use tools, some can solve some problems and, allegedly, some of them can even communicate with us using sign language.

Under critical scrutiny, one will quickly notice that the alleged evidence of some animal's intelligence is most certainly not equal in kind. The fact is that these "feats" only presuppose awareness on the perceptual level.

The higher organisms possess a much more potent form of consciousness: they possess the faculty of retaining sensations, which is the faculty of perception. A "perception" is a group of sensations automatically retained and integrated by the brain of a living organism, which gives it the ability to be aware, not of single stimuli, but of entities, of things. An animal is guided, not merely by immediate sensations, but by percepts. Its actions are not single, discrete responses to single, separate stimuli, but are directed by an integrated awareness of the perceptual reality confronting it. It is able to grasp the perceptual concretes immediately present and it is able to form automatic perceptual associations, but it can go no further. ("The Objectivist Ethics", Ayn Rand, The Virtue of Selfishness.)

What are we aware of at the perceptual level? We see there is a stone, we see it is gray, we see it has a certain size. We feel it is cold and rugged when we touch it. We feel it is heavy when we lift it. A percept is an integration of sensations and once these sensations have been retained as a percept of an entity, such as a stone, we do not need to touch it again to know it is cold, hard, heavy, etc. We will be aware of it by looking at it. We are also aware of causal connections at the perceptual level; we see that nuts can break if they fall to the ground, or that nuts float on water. (Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, Leonard Peikoff, pp. 52-53.)

Consider now, with this in mind, the chimps who spend years to figure out how to crack a nut. How do they figure it out? Through trial and error they become perceptually aware of certain qualities of stones and nuts as well as certain causal connections. They are able to make perceptual associations. Animals have to learn perceptual associations to survive. They have to learn to associate good things with pleasure and bad things with pain. Cats can, for instance, become afraid of the spray bottle you used to punish them with, when they have been bad, or cats can become excited because they associate the sound of the can opener with food. There is no conceptual thought process going on when they hear the sound of the can opener, they just associate the sound to food.

It is by perceptual associations they can be trained to do tricks and tasks or learn how to hunt by their parents. In this respect the feats of chimps using stones as tools, is cognitively not more demanding than teaching your dog to roll around or fetch a ball. In both cases they are the result of perceptual associations. Thus, when we observe animals solve problems, or use a tool, this does not indicate or presuppose that they can function on the conceptual level of awareness.

What, then, about all the apes that have been taught to communicate with us using sign language? What about apes such as Nim Chimpsky or Kanzi? The fact is that none of these examples prove that these apes have the intelligence of a toddler (as we are sometimes being told). The truth is that these apes do not really know what they are "talking" about. They only use the signs randomly to get food. Do not take my words for it. I will let Nim Chimpsky "speak" for himself: "Give orange me give eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you".

Psychologist professor Dr. Clive Wynne made the following observation about Kanzi: "Next time you see Kanzi or one of his kind on a television documentary, turn down the sound so you can just watch what he is doing without interpretation from the ape’s trainers. See if that really appears to be language. Somewhere in the history of our kind there must have been the first beings who could rearrange tokens to create new meanings, to distinguish Me Banana from Banana Me. But the evidence from many years of training apes to press buttons or sign in ASL, is that this must have happened sometime after we split off from chimps, bonobos, and gorillas. Since then we have been talking to ourselves".

There is no evidence that animals can think conceptually. What would count as evidence that an animal, such as a chimp, is capable of conceptual thought? Let me quote psychologist Edwin A. Locke:

Here is a simple test that would prove once and for all whether chimps really grasp concepts. Place a pile of objects varying in size, shape and color in front of a chimp and sign: Bring me ten green triangles. Such a test would require that chimps count above seven (seven objects can be directly perceived without counting) and that they abstract the attributes of color and shape, as well as of number, from objects. No chimp has ever come close to such a feat.

There is, indeed, a difference in kind between the human and animal awareness (i.e., the difference between the perceptual and conceptual level of awareness). Since the common definition of intelligence easily gives rise to a dangerous conceptual confusion, I therefore suggest that a proper definition, in terms of essentials, should be: "the capacity to acquire and apply conceptual knowledge".

The Rights of Children

2011-08-18T06:43:00.001-07:00

Some confused libertarians believe parents have the right to neglect the welfare of their children. They end up with this impression because they have read somewhere that the right to life does not imply any positive obligations.

It is true that the right to life does not mean that you have the right to the things you need to survive (such as food, clothes, housing, etc.), because that would, indeed, imply that others are forced to provide you with these things. Which means: slavery. The right to life means "the freedom to take all the actions required by the nature of a rational being for the support, the furtherance, the fulfillment and the enjoyment of his own life" (Ayn Rand, "Man's Rights", The Virtue of Selfishness.)

It does, however, not follow from that parents have a right to neglect the lives and welfare of their children.

All principles are contextual. In the normal adult context, the right to life does not mean that you have the right to make claims on others to take care of you. In the context of children, the right to life means the right to be taken cared of by their parents (or some other legal guardian).

Parents assume the responsibility for their children's lives and welfare, when they choose to become parents. You cannot create small helpless human beings who, in addition, are legally prohibited from taking care of themselves (to the extent they are able to), and then claim that you have no responsibility to care for them.

If you do not want to be a mother then you need to have an abortion or, if it is too late, the parents must make sure the child has someone else who can and want to take care of the child. If the parents instead abandon the child or neglect it, and it dies as a result, then they are guilty of murder and should be sentenced for life (or death).

The situation is comparable to me taking you on a boat and then throwing you out somewhere in the middle of the ocean, leaving you there with a rationalistic, context-dropping argument: "Well, the right to life does not imply that I have an obligation to look after your life or welfare, therefore your fate is not my responsibility". If I do that, and you die, then I am a murderer.

Since children cannot take care of themselves and because the parents are responsible for their existence and for finding themselves in this (temporary) state of helplessness, they must, acting as the children's guardian, exercise the right to life. Which means that they must take care of them: provide them with food, clothing, housing, education, etc. That is what children's rights to life actually means.

The Entitlement Mentality

2011-08-11T18:01:00.000-07:00

What is the cause of the riots in London? Many commentators have pointed out that the cause of this criminal behavior can be traced back to the entitlement mentality created and nurtured by the welfare state. Theodore Dalrymple explains:

A population thinks (because it has often been told so by intellectuals and the political class) that it is entitled to a high standard of consumption, irrespective of its personal efforts; and therefore it regards the fact that it does not receive that high standard, by comparison with the rest of society, as a sign of injustice. It believes itself deprived (because it has often been told so by intellectuals and the political class), even though each member of it has received an education costing $80,000, toward which neither he nor—quite likely—any member of his family has made much of a contribution; indeed, he may well have lived his entire life at others’ expense, such that every mouthful of food he has ever eaten, every shirt he has ever worn, every television he has ever watched, has been provided by others. Even if he were to recognize this, he would not be grateful, for dependency does not promote gratitude. On the contrary, he would simply feel that the subventions were not sufficient to allow him to live as he would have liked.

The rioters have explicitly made it clear that their purpose is to show the government and "the rich", that they can do whatever they want. What makes them think they have a right to do "whatever they want" with other people's property?

A clue is given by intellectuals on the Left, in their attempts to understand and explain the riots. Apparently, the main cause for the riots are the cuts in the welfare state by the conservative government. These welfare parasites sincerely believe they are victims of an injustice, because the government cuts welfare spending. What makes them view themselves as victims of an injustice? The fact that they think they are entitled to all sorts of welfare benefits: an income, housing, medicine, healthcare, education, "investments" in their community, etc. What gives them the impression they are entitled to these things? The morality of need; the morality of altruism.

Altruism is the moral idea that you should sacrifice your values for others, that others should morally be the primary benefactor of your (self-sacrificial) actions. To sacrifice your values mean to give up a greater value for a lesser value. One example here is a person who gives up his dreams to become an artist to please his mother's wish of him to become an architect, even though he loves to paint and is, at best, indifferent to the field of architecture. Another example is a businessman who sells his goods at a loss because others need the goods.

If altruism is right, then if you refuse to sacrifice for others, then you are wrong and evil. Why, then, not force you to sacrifice? If the poor need it, then the good government should "spread the wealth around", for the benefit of the poor and needy. The moral ideal is, therefore, the welfare state. If the government fails in its moral task of "redistributing" the wealth, then the people can feel justified in taking matters in their own hands, so to speak. Thus, criminals can engage in robberies and the looting of stores and feel that they have the right on their side, because they are doing it in the name of "social justice".

Leonard Peikoff:

A man is morally the property of others—of those others it is his duty to serve—argue Fichte, Hegel, and the rest, explicitly or by implication. As such, a man has no moral right to refuse to make the requisite sacrifices for others. If he attempts it, he is depriving men of what is properly theirs, he is violating men’s rights, their right to his service—and it is, therefore, an assertion of morality if others intervene forcibly and compel him to fulfill his obligations. “Social justice” in this view not only allows but demands the use of force against the non-sacrificial individual.

Observe how the same entitlement mentality lead to similar violent riots all over the world, including the bankrupt welfare state of Greece.

Observe that many intellectuals defends (de facto) dictators such as Fidel Castro, Kim Jong-Il and Hugo Chavez, because they put the morality of altruism into practice when they implement socialism.

Observe that every dictatorship rely on altruism to justify its existence. Note in this connection that it is the criminals who "take over" in a dictatorship.

Observe that philosophy students are daily introduced to this classical dilemma: Your wife is dying from a horrible disease. Fortunately, there is a cure. Unfortunately, the pharmacy demands a steep price for it. Thus, you cannot afford it. What do you do? Do you repect the rights of the pharmacy owner or do you simply steal it?

In the same manner, and for the same reason, the same intellectuals try to "contextualize", i.e., explain and understand, i.e., justify, the actions of the criminal rioters. Some even attempt to "contextualize" Hitler, Stalin and Mao.

Criminals are not a major threat in a free and civilized society. What makes them a major threat? The ideas that arm them morally and, simultaneously, disarm those who does not demand the unearned. Altruism provides the seekers of the unearned, whether through mooching or looting, with all the rationalizations necessary to get away with it.

Altruism paved the way for criminals to take over Russia, Germany and China. Today it paves the way for criminals to take over the streets of London and Athens. Some "merely" demand a greater "redistribution" of wealth. Some, however, enslaved and slaughtered millions of people, all in the name of "the common good". Altruism is what rationalizes it all and for that very reason it is, truly, the morality of brutes, thugs and criminals.

Stolen values

2011-08-09T05:17:00.001-07:00

In "The Objectivist Ethics" Ayn Rand says: "Epistemologically, the concept of 'value' is genetically dependent upon and derived from the antecedent concept of 'life.' To speak of 'value' as apart from 'life' is worse than a contradiction in terms." What does it mean to say that it is a contradiction to speak of values apart from life?

The premise in Ayn Rand's argument is that all knowledge is hierarchical. The simplest way to concretize this point, is to ask yourself whether you can understand what it means to walk without having any knowledge of the things that walk? No. You know what it means to walk by observing the things that are moving with their legs. It is on the basis of such observations that you form the concept of "walking". The principle is the same of all knowledge. What do you, for example, need to know, to know that everything consists of atoms? You need to know a whole context of generalizations, each and every one of them ultimately derived, step by step, from observations. (See The Logical Leap by David Harriman.)

In her essay, "The Objectivist Ethics", Ayn Rand proves that life is what makes values possible and necessary, by asking: What facts give rise to the concept of value? A "value" is "that which one act to gain or keep". For whom is something a value? Who is acting to achieve something? Observation says: living entities. For what? Why do they act to gain or keep values? Every living entity confronts a basic alternative: life or death.

Life is what is ultimately at stake for them and their lives are conditional on them acting to gain or keep the values that their survival demands. It is, consequently, only living entities who has a need (and a reason) to pursue values, if survival is their (chosen) goal. Life is, therefore, the ultimate value.

Why does man need ethics? Plants and animals are programmed to pursue their own survival. Man is not: man lacks an innate desire to live as well as the "instincts" (i.e., innate behavior) which automatically makes us act to gain or keep the proper values, i.e., the values which promote human life. If man chooses to live, then he will need to discover the principles of human survival. The science which discovers and defines the principles of human survival is ethics.

A rational ethics says that life is the ultimate value and that man's life is the standard of value (or: that which is required for long-term, rational human survival is the good), and that your own life, and happiness, is your moral purpose.

Let us now, with this in mind, consider four ethical theories: utilitarianism, environmentalism, Kant's ethics and Christian ethics.

Utilitarianism says that the good is the "greatest good for the greatest number". This amounts to the idea that the standard of the good is the good of society or the group. Therefore you should pursue the good of society or the group, even if it means that you have to sacrifice your own life and happiness.

Environmentalism says that nature has an intrinsic value, i.e., that it is good in and of itself. What is good is that which is good for nature or: all living entities out there, plants, bugs and animals, except man. Therefore you should pursue the good of nature, even if it means that you have to sacrifice your own life and happiness.

Kant's ethics says that you should do your duty, because you should, because it is good, in and of itself, because reason as it really is, in another dimension, says so. Therefore you should do your duty and obey the categorical imperatives of the noumenal self, even if it means that you have to sacrifice your own life and happiness.

Now, if you look at Kant's ethics in terms of essentials, you can easily see that this amounts to the Christian ethics: God's will is the good and therefore you should obey his commandments, even if it means that you have to sacrifice your own life and happiness.

It is no wonder that, according to conventional wisdom, the idea that you should sacrifice yourself for others, i.e., altruism, represents the very essence of morality.

These theories are all riddled with contradictions. But there is one contradiction that is fundamental: the fallacy of "the stolen concept". The fallacy of "the stolen concept" amounts to using a concept while denying the facts that give rise to them. Since they deny what makes them valid, they are using a concept without a logical right to use it. In this case they are denying the facts that give rise to our need of values and ethics.

Consider utilitarianism. Since "the greatest good for the greatest number" amounts to speaking of the society or some group which, in reality, means the majority but not necessarily any individual. Thus, utilitarians speak of the good as something divorced from the individual. In reality there is no such thing as society or the group; there are only individuals. Consequently, there is no such thing as "the good" for society or some group apart from the good of *every single* individual that constitutes it.

Consider Kant. It is obvious that Kant uses concepts such as "value", "good" and "should" as completely divorced from life (as well as reality and reason). He explicitly says that you should do your duty, *not* because it serves any Earthly ends whatsoever, but as *an end in itself*. He explicitly denies that you can derive any values from the facts of reality. He claims that the source of the moral law is reason, not reason as you know it but "pure" reason which resides in another unknowable (noumenal) dimension. He thus divorces reason and values from reality and life.

I do not think it should be hard to see why Christian ethics and environmentalism divorce "values" and "shoulds" from life. It is, in any event, blatantly obvious in the case of altruism: life is what gives rise to the need to pursue values, yet altruism says that the pursuit of values as such is evil and that what you should instead give up your values (for others). This is a glaring contradiction.

There is, as Ayn Rand's account shows, no reason to care about values or ethics, unless you choose to live. If you choose to live then you also implicitly choose to hold your own life as the ultimate value and man's life as the standard of value, or: that which is required for long-term human survival. If so, then you should pursue the values that make *your* own life and happiness possible.

Thus, contrary to the conventional view, *morality is, at the root, inherently egoistic*: the only *rational* reason for you to care about "values" or "shoulds" is because *you* want it and need it, to make the best out of your life.

The right to wait

2011-06-25T03:56:00.000-07:00

Sweden's socialized healthcare is sometimes used as an example that America should follow. It proves that you can get good care for everybody. Does it?

In the Swedish media there has been one report after another of people not getting any healthcare at all. In fact, they do not even get an ambulance.

Let me give you one example:

"Help me," 23-year-old Emil Linnell can be heard saying repeatedly in recordings of his January 30th call to SOS Alarm, Sweden's emergency response service...

The transcript of the communication between the nurse and the man shows that he pleaded ‘help me’ repeatedly on the phone to SOS Alarm but was ignored.

According to the transcript the nurse said he couldn’t really understand what Linnell’s problem was. He said that Linnell was ‘running about the flat’ with no ‘apparent problem breathing or speaking’.

But Linnell persisted in saying he couldn’t breathe.

“I know, but I have been sitting here listening to you. You are breathing fine now,“ the nurse answered.

“No, I am fainting! I’m fainting,” he said.

“Take a deep breath now,” the nurse urged.

“I can’t! Please help me! Please! Help me,“ pleaded Linnell.

A little later he said, “I can’t breathe” again.

“You are breathing fine. I promise you,” the nurse then answered him.

The call then finished with a wheezing noise followed by a crash. Two hours later a neighbour found Linnell dead by the open door.

No ambulance was ever sent, and it was later determined Linnell died from a ruptured spleen.

This is not an isolated event. We read about these things all the time:

A Swedish woman died in hospital after being forced to call for an ambulance four times, according to a report filed with the National Board of Health and Welfare... Sweden's emergency response service SOS Alarm has recently been put under review by the health board following a man's death after he was refused an ambulance and a series of other recent cases deemed to endanger the welfare of patients.

One more:

After sustaining an open chest wound of 10cm long while trimming her horse’s mane, Sweden’s emergency response services refused to send an ambulance, suggesting the 11-year-old girl take aspirin instead...

The mother phoned SOS Alarm, the government-backed primary emergency response service, and described the child as shaking because she was in so much pain. She requested an ambulance because she did not have immediate access to a car.

The responding nurse refused the dispatch.

Instead she advised the mother to clean the wound, apply pressure and give her daughter aspirin which would give them eight hours to get to the nearest hospital, according to SvD.

Another one:

A woman from northern Sweden died after four calls placed over a four day period requesting to have an ambulance sent to her home in Timrå were ignored.

"She was having trouble breathing. She was instructed to call the healthcare information hotline and there they thought she sounded irritated," the young woman's mother told the local Sundsvalls Tidningen.

Following her daughter's death, the mother has had the transcripts of her daughter's conversations with emergency service operator SOS Alarm read to her.

The mother told the newspaper that healthcare representatives have since told her that her daughter's first call for an ambulance was denied because she "was still communicating verbally".

"That's totally insane. If you can't communicate verbally, you can't call for an ambulance anyway," another close relative told the newspaper.

Let us say you actually get an ambulance. Now everything will be fine, right? Wrong:

Around 3,000 people die every year in Sweden because of deficient patient safety, according to two leading doctors...

The authors argue that medical mistakes cost Swedish society between 60 and 100 billion kronor per year ($9.6 – 16 billion).

Engkvist and Ljungblad highlight several recent cases, including the death of an infant to an overdose of painkillers, two elderly patients who died after their blood poisoning was misdiagnosed as the stomach flu, as well as the case of ambulance drivers who took a lunch break instead of responding to a call.

The patient, who was having trouble breathing, died.

"Unfortunately, these cases are probably just the tip of the iceberg," according the authors, who lament that individual cases rarely lead to any widespread debate about patient safety because it takes so long for the National Board of Health and Welfare (Social Styrelsen) to process the cases.

Considering that 355 Swedes died in car accidents in 2009, this suggests that if you survive a car accident, you might want to stay away from the hospital.

What is the cause of these stories? The cause is the rationing. Why the rationing? Since the healthcare is "free", there are no incentives for people to think about the cost of healthcare. To keep the costs under control, to make sure they stay within the collective healthcare budget, they have to ration.

In Sweden our politicians brag about the public healthcare system. It is, allegedly, one of the best in the world. They also know that socialists, such as Michael Moore in the USA, greatly admires the European model that Sweden represent. Yet the same politicians do their very best to keep people from ever entering a hospital. Why? Because even though healthcare is a "right" and is "free", it costs a great deal of money.

So if you have a problem you will be advised by the politicians to call a nurse on the healthcare "hotline". Why bother showing up at the hospital if you really do not need any care, right?

The nurse is now suppose to diagnose and advise you over the phone. If you, however, fail to describe your concerns clearly enough then you might actually help her to misdiagnose yourself (or a loved one). The joke will be on you, the next day when you call for an ambulance. Which might never show up. If it ever does show up, or you somehow manage to get to the hospital on your own, then baffled doctors at the hospital will tell you that you should have come to the hospital the first day. Believe it or not. They might even ask you: "Why didn't you call for an ambulance?"

Now your condition is very critical. Will you make it through the night? Nobody knows.

The right to healthcare does not mean you will ever get any healthcare. That is a myth. In the immoral attempt to make healthcare a "right", to make it "free" for everybody, it has instead become less and less available for everybody.

This is not a "coincidence". This is the logical consequence of the very nature of socialized healthcare, just as the lack of food, housing, energy, cars, clothes - as well as anything remotely resembling a human life - is the logical consequence of socialism in general.

There is a small but growing minority who can get past the worst waiting lines for healthcare, namely those who can afford a private healthcare insurance - in addition to the taxes you have to pay for the public healthcare system.

While you are laying there, in the hospital bed, unable to get some sleep you tell yourself: "It isn't fair". You have paid insanely high taxes all your life to get access to this "free" healthcare that you allegedly have a "right" to. Then you suddenly remember somebody telling you that "Everyone is equal before death". You start to feel a bit better. You can finally sleep. Unfortunately the doctors are unable to wake you up the next day. The overworked night staff failed to notice that your ECG machine did not work properly.

Is this how you want to end up? Yet this can be your fate. Socialized medicine is, after all, the moral ideal according to the left. Obamacare is merely the first step.

The leftists used to deny that socialized healthcare would result in rationing. Nowadays they admit it does and has to. But it does not seem to bother them. On the contrary. Now, believe it or not, the rationing is a moral "selling point", since it means that the healthcare access - or, rather, the lack of it - will be more equal.

The "Social Contract"

2011-06-01T18:06:00.000-07:00

Many leftist commentators say that if you use public roads or get your education in the public schools or get some health care at public hospitals, then you give the welfare state your (implicit) consent. Therefore there is no "force" to talk about. Taxation is a part of the "social contract", i.e., an (implicit) agreement among the members of an organized society or between the governed and the government defining and limiting the rights and duties of each. All this talk about the welfare state violating your rights by taxing you, is therefore just nonsense.

How does one respond to this type of argument?

Whether it is legitimate or not, the government gets its power from the explicit or implicit consent of the majority. Ludwig von Mises observed:

[T]he rulers, who are always a minority, cannot lastingly remain in office if not supported by the consent of the majority of those ruled. Whatever the system of government may be, the foundation upon which it is built and rests is always the opinion of those ruled that to obey and to be loyal to this government better serves their own interests than insurrection and the establishment of another regime. The majority has the power to do away with an unpopular government and uses this power whenever it becomes convinced that its own welfare requires it.

The minority reluctantly obeys the laws as they are forced. That they pay taxes, abide by the law and use public roads as well as public hospitals, does not mean that they sanction the welfare state or that it is legitimate.

From the fact that the government gets its power from the consent of the majority it does not follow that the majority has a right to sanction any type of government. You cannot sanction, by your consent, something you have no right to - and nobody has the right to initiate the use of physical force.

Philosopher Leonard Peikoff:

The "consent of the governed" is the source of a government's power, since government is an agent of its citizens. But this does not mean that the citizens can delegate powers they do not possess. It does not mean that anything to which the governed consent is thereby proper or a proper function of government - which would mean pure subjectivism and collectivism. In a republic, the governed ma not rightfully strike down an innocent fellow-citizen, not in any form, even if the nation consents to it without a dissenting voice.

The source of a government's power is not arbitrary consent, but *rational* consent, based on an objective principle. The principle is the rights of man. (Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand.)

The individual has a right to life. A corollary to the right to life is the right to self defense. The individual has a right to delegate the right to self defense to the state. The individual, therefore, has a right to form and maintain a government whose only purpose is to protect the rights of the individual. (See for details "The Nature of Government" by Ayn Rand.) But there is no right to delegate non-existent rights to education or health care or infrastructure or the taxes needed to fund it all. (See for details "Man's Rights" and "Collectivized 'Rights'" by Ayn Rand.)

Many reject the whole idea of a "social contract", including the idea that the source of the government's power is the "consent of the governed", because they fear the implication that they morally sanction their own enslavement by reluctantly obeying bad laws (because of the threat of the initiation of physical force). But this fear is unwarranted. To reluctantly obey bad laws, because we are forced to, is not tantamount to sanctioning them or the system. Ayn Rand is here talking about the draft, but the principle is the same for all bad laws and institutions:

Some young men seem to labor under the misapprehension that since the draft is a violation of their rights, compliance with the draft law would constitute a moral sanction of that violation. This is a serious error. A forced compliance is not a sanction. All of us are forced to comply with many laws that violate our rights, but so long as we advocate the repeal of such laws, our compliance does not constitute a sanction. ("The Wreckage of the Consensus", Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal.)

To speak of a "social contract" to justify the violate individual rights is, therefore, nothing but an *immoral contradiction*; there is no such thing as a "forced agreement" and there is no right to enslave others.

*Only* a government whose purpose is to protect the rights of the individual is legitimate and, if you want to speak in such terms, only a "social contract" that authorize such a government is legitimate.

In Defense of The Logical Leap

2011-04-03T12:32:00.000-07:00

Ever since John McCaskey published his critical review of David Harriman's book, _The Logical Leap_, on Amazon's website, there has been a heated discussion about what implications it has for Leonard Peikoff's theory of induction.

McCaskey's criticism is basically about two things. He supposes that Harriman's historical account is, at least in some respects, inaccurate and that the theory is difficult to reconcile with a more accurate account of history. A theory which does not conform with the facts is a false theory. The theory is thus, according to McCaskey, false. In turn, he figures that it might be possible to save the theory if one, in part, applies Ayn Rand's spiral theory of knowledge and, in part, combines it with the insights of the Kantian philosopher William Whewells. The spiral theory says, for those who are not familiar with it, that we first learn a bit about one thing, then we learn more about something else, then we go back to where we began and see everything in light of our new knowledge which gives us a better understanding. A simple example is how your understanding of history is enhanced by studying economics. McCaskey says that the discoveries of scientists went into such a spiral. The journey of discovery was therefore not "linear".

The implication is not only that Peikoff's theory of induction is false but also that McCaskey knows how to apply Objectivism to the problem of induction better than Peikoff and Harriman would. Or that Objectivism is not sufficient to solve the problem of induction. (This contention is, by the way, precisely what Peikoff indicates is a misrepresentation in his email to the Ayn Rand Institute, where he demands that McCaskey leave the board.)*

I will here defend Peikoff's theory of induction against McCaskey's criticism. I will not discuss the details of Harriman's historical account. Partly because it is beyond my expertise and partly because the details do not have any negative implications for Peikoff's theory of induction. Instead, I will discuss what I regard as the fundamental disagreement between Harriman and McCaskey, namely the view of the relationship between concepts and induction. This discussion assumes that you have read Harriman's book The Logical Leap and that you are familiar with Objectivist epistemology.

Harriman's position is that valid concepts make induction possible. (See The Logical Leap, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology and Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand.) True generalizations presuppose valid concepts. He provides us with many examples of this from the history of science. One example is the concept of "friction" which made it possible for Galileo to discover his laws of motion. Invalid concepts, on the other hand, make induction impossible. One example is how concepts such as "natural" and "violent" motion held back progress in physics for almost 2000 years. Thus valid concepts constitute a "green light" for induction and invalid concepts constitute a "red light" for induction.

McCaskey’s position is that many scientists lacked some of the concepts Harriman claims they had or they only had rudimentary versions of the concepts. McCaskey also says that these rudimentary concepts should be invalid according to Harriman. Newton is, for example, supposed to have lacked the concept of acceleration (as we understand it today). Galileo is, to take another example, supposed to at least initially have had only a rudimentary (and therefore "invalid") concept of friction. Nevertheless, they somehow managed to get very far. This supposition undermines the idea that valid concepts are necessary for induction to be possible (and vice versa). McCaskey says that if one studies the history of science then one will see that it is often only later when the "complete" versions of the concepts are formed. Therefore, the process of induction ends, rather than begins, with the formation of the "complete" concept.

Apparently, there is a big difference between Harriman’s and McCaskey’s positions. Who is right? And what does it imply?

Let me start with the most fundamental issue, namely the relationship between concepts and induction. If you do not have certain concepts, then you cannot understand your observations, design your experiments, or interpret the results. That this is such is not difficult to see. If you, for example, lack basic concepts of economics such as "supply", "demand" and "price", then you cannot understand economic phenomena such as rising or falling prices. Without the (valid) concepts, you cannot conceptualize your observations either. This type of conceptualization is what generates a (true) generalization. Concepts which do not refer to reality cannot produce generalizations that refer to reality. I think this is incontestable if you understand Objectivist epistemology.

If so, then how could some scientists make progress if they are lacking some concepts as McCaskey claims? The answer is that even if Newton lacked the concept of acceleration, it does not alter the fact that he needed valid concepts in order to induce generalizations. So regardless of what concepts he had, they are nevertheless necessary for him to understand and conceptualize his observations. Therefore, this has no negative implications for Peikoff's basic point that we need concepts to induce.

Now one might wonder: If they lacked some concepts, then how could they understand their observations, design experiments, interpret them and generalize? The answer comes from the use of implicit concepts. Implicit concepts are what you have when you have the knowledge necessary to, at any moment, be able to form the concept. Take, as an example, Newton's law of acceleration. In Newton's own formulation and elaboration he never mentions, to my knowledge, the word "acceleration". Yet, it is obvious that this is exactly what he is talking about. Newton thus had the knowledge that the concept of acceleration presupposes and would condense in its definition.

(Another example for those who know nothing about physics: A person holds a long and impassioned speech about the evil of common ownership, state ownership, collective ownership, public ownership of means of production, etc. Not once does he use the word "socialism". Yet, it is clear that the person knows what socialism is. He has the implicit concept of "socialism" and can therefore take this knowledge into account when he interprets his observations. A more dramatic example, which provides us with a good illustration of how far one can get while only using an implicit concept, is Ayn Rand's _Anthem_ in which the hero rediscovers the forbidden word "I". When you read the novelette, it becomes clear that the hero, after a while, knows what the word "I" means even though he lacks it. It is also clear that one can talk about what the word "I" refers to, without ever using the word. It's just that it’s much harder. This is by the way not my own example.)

So even if Newton had no (modern) concept of acceleration, he nevertheless had the implicit concept which made it possible for him to do his experiments, make interpretations and form generalizations. Without these explicit and/or implicit concepts, the scientists would only "stumble in the dark" as Harriman puts it. Just as they actually did stumble in the dark for much of the history of science.

But how could scientists make progress if they had only rudimentary, "invalid" concepts? A rudimentary concept is, to begin with, not invalid. Yet, this is a view that McCaskey for some reason ascribes to Harriman. McCaskey writes: "I express reservation about the principle that an inchoate concept provides a 'red light' to induction...". Where McCaskey got this “straw man" argument from, I do not know, but it is not from Harriman's book.

Harriman has an explicit discussion of how our context of knowledge determines the definition of our concepts. He shows, for instance, how Galileo defined the concept of "temperature" and then compares it to how Einstein defined it. The concept is the same, and the referents are the same even though the definition changed because Einstein knows much more about temperature than Galileo. We can also consider Ayn Rand's example of a rudimentary definition of "man" that a child might hold implicitly: "a thing that moves and make noises". This definition is indeed rudimentary. But does that render the concept invalid? No.

The fact that a child will discover many similarities and differences between men and everything else that exists, why he must change his definition, does not change anything. Rudimentary concepts do not become any less valid because of that definitional development. The same principle applies with McCaskey's own example above in regards to the concept of friction. (McCaskey admits that even if Galileo initially defined friction too broadly, he apparently realized this because he later talks about friction as we now understand it.) So if it is true that many scientists only had rudimentary concepts, then that’s inconsequential because it does not mean that those concepts are invalid. Therefore, it does not matter when the "complete" version of the concept is formed since you never needed it to generate (true) generalizations.

McCaskey says that one can possibly save Peikoff's theory of induction by applying Ayn Rand's spiral theory. There are two premises here. One is that Harriman's historical account is "linear" while the history of science was anything but linear. The second is that Harriman did not apply the spiral theory. Both premises are false.

Although Harriman never explicitly mentions the "spiral", it is clear that scientists in his account are going back and forth. Some examples from the Harriman historical account: Kepler used Brahe's observations to make his calculations. Newton made new observations and discoveries, then he went back to Kepler's calculations and could now see them in a whole new light. Galileo discovered the law of inertia but since he lacked the concept of gravity, he did not consider how it could affect his experiments. Later, scientists using the concept of gravity, as well as new mathematical concepts and methods, could correct and refine Galileo's conclusions. There are more examples in the book. So, in addition to the historical account not being "linear", he does in fact apply the spiral theory, even if he does not mention it explicitly.

We have no reason to believe that Peikoff and Harriman are not familiar with the spiral theory. Peikoff has lectured and written about it on several occasions. In fact, the entire book is one giant illustration of the spiral theory as Peikoff presented it in Unity in Epistemology and Ethics. Peikoff's theory of induction would, in accordance with the logic of the spiral theory, not have been possible without Ayn Rand's concept theory. Also, it would not have been possible without a history of science to induce from. (It is possible to get the impression that the historical account is "linear" in a manner that _is_ consistent with reality because Harriman has simplified and essentialized his presentation. Indeed, he does not go through every single step. Rather, he goes through the key steps and he illustrates, when necessary, how the scientists had to go back and forth to be able to take another step up in the knowledge spiral.)

This brings us back to the question about the relationship between concepts and induction. According to McCaskey, the formation of concepts does not constitute the first step in the inductive process. Rather, he contends that the formation of the "complete" version of the valid concept constitutes the end of the inductive process. His evidence for this is that many concepts in the history of science are said to have been formed explicitly after the laws were induced and first formulated. This is also William Whewell's position and McCaskey openly sympathizes with him.

This reasoning is completely backwards. Generalizations are propositions, and propositions consist of concepts. Thus, concepts comes first. If you observe how children learn to speak you can see that that is exactly what happens. Before they can formulate sentences they must first learn many words. (Implicitly, they have much more knowledge, namely knowledge that corresponds to a number of propositions. Still, since they lack the requisite explicit concepts, they cannot conceptualize that knowledge.) So McCaskey's reasoning contradicts reality. And since this is Ayn Rand's explicit position, it also contradicts Objectivism. It should now seem clear that McCaskey's criticism is not merely about some details of Harriman's historical account, but also about philosophical principles. (The only thing you can say in defense of McCaskey's position is that there is a reciprocal interaction between concepts and generalizations. Concepts make generalizations possible. Generalizations comprise knowledge which is placed into conceptual form. Generalizations can in turn lead us to form new concepts. And so on. But note that this chain starts with concepts.)

I am writing this article because I think that _The Logical Leap_ is a very good book. I think it is a historic achievement. I have said before that I think it is the most important book since Ayn Rand's _Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology_. I believe that McCaskey's criticism, at best, is an expression of misunderstanding and ignorance. It is, at worst, an expression of false philosophical premises. And that's all I have to say about this right now.

* McCaskey published his review after he resigned as a member of the board of directors for the Ayn Rand Institute, but he also says that this is the essence of the criticism he has put forward earlier to Harriman and others unofficially. If so, then I am not a bit surprised that Peikoff believes that there are philosophical disagreements between McCaskey’s views and Objectivism. Those circumstances make him unqualified as a member of the Ayn Rand Institute’s board of directors. I am not particularly surprised that Peikoff does not like that, either directly or indirectly, he be lectured on Objectivism (or its alleged inadequacy) by McCaskey.

The Logical Leap

2010-10-23T04:54:00.000-07:00

I have read The Logical Leap: Induction In Physics by David Harriman. The book is about Leonard Peikoff's solution to the so-called problem of induction. (This review assumes that you are reasonably familiar with Objectivist epistemology.) What is the problem of induction? And why does it matter? I quote Peikoff:

A generalization is a proposition that ascribes a characteristic to every member of an unlimited class, however it is positioned in space or time. In formal terms, it states: All S is P. This kind of claim, on any subject, goes beyond all possible observation.

But man is neither omniscient nor infallible. His generalizations, therefore, are not automatically correct. Thus the questions: How can man know, across the whole scale of space and time, facts which he does not and can never perceive? When and why is the inference from "some" to "all" legitimate? What is the method of valid induction that can prove the generalization to which it leads? In short, how can man determine which generalizations are true (correspond to reality), and which ones are false (contradict reality)?

The answer is crucial. If a man accepts a true generalization, his mental contents (to that extent) are consistent with one another, and his action, other things being equal, will succeed. But if a man accepts a false generalization, it introduces in his mind a contradiction with his authentic knowledge and a clash with reality, leading unavoidably to frustration and failure in his actions. Therefore the “problem of induction” is not merely a puzzle for academics — it is the problem of human survival.

In one respect there is no problem of induction. There is really no need to validate induction because it is through induction (and deduction) we validate and prove everything. In another respect, however, there is a problem of induction. What we need to know is why generalizations are possible (and necessary). We also need to know the rules of induction. The reason philosophers are not busy dealing with "the problem of deduction", although people fail to deduce properly all the time, is because Aristotle has already identified the rules of deduction.

Peikoff and Harriman will answer both questions in part by applying the epistemology of Objectivism and in part by studying the history of physics. The reason they study the history of physics is because it is the most successful science. It is the most successful because most of the major physicists have, it turns out, implicitly induced "according to the rules". Thus they will induce the rules of induction from the history of physics.

Peikoff argues that without Ayn Rand's theory of concepts there would be no way to solve the problem of induction. To see why, I shall briefly remind the reader of Ayn Rand's theory of concepts.

How do we form concepts? We form concepts by observing the similarities and differences between things. By uniting all the things that are similar, in the relevant respect, we form a new mental unit (which can be understood as a "mental folder"): a concept . The referents, of the concept, are similar but not identical. The concept "man" refers to all men even though everyone is different in virtually any respect you can imagine. The difference between men consist of specific measurements: height, weight, intelligence, color, etc. What makes it possible for us to treat them all as "the same but not identical" is that we omit the specific measurements when we form the concept. That is why the concept "man" refers to all men who have been, are and will be.

It should now be clear why the Objectivist theory of concepts is needed to answer some of the most basic issues of induction: What makes generalizations possible? What makes inductive inferences logically necessary?

So what is it that makes generalizations possible? It is the application of concepts. Example: By observing a fire burning a piece of paper and then applying concepts such as "fire", "burn" and "paper" we immediately omit all the specific measurements in our observation. We go beyond this particular fire, this particular combustion, and this particular paper. We go beyond here and now. The result is thus the generalization "fire burn paper".

If an inductive inference does not follow by necessity then it is not logical. Everything we can imagine without ending in a contradiction is not logically necessary. Valid deductions give us the necessary conclusions because it "only" gives us the implications of what we already know. So what is it then that makes inductive inferences logically necessary? The answer is provided by observing what a generalization presuppose: an observation and the application of concepts (and everything else you know). The necessity of a valid inductive inference follows from the fact that we either have to deny what we actually observe (e.g., that a fire burns a piece of paper), which results in a contradiction. Or we have to deny everything else we know (e.g., that there is fire, combustion, paper and everything else), which also results in a contradiction.

There is, of course, much more to Peikoff's theory of induction. I have only indicated the essence of the solution. For example I have not said anything about the idea that valid concepts constitute a "green light" for induction (and that invalid concepts constitute a "red light" for induction), that there are many interesting parallels between forming concepts and generalizing, that induction is a self-correcting process, the rules of induction, the most common mistakes when inducing, that philosophy is an inductive science just like physics, why math is essential in physics but not in philosophy, why philosophy is not in any way less scientific because of that. And much more.

Harriman presents, in terms of essentials, the history of physics and thereby gives the reader many instructive examples of every aspect of Peikoff's theory of induction. The reader will learn how scientists such as Galileo and Newton went about to derive inductively all their important discoveries. You therefore also get a solid lesson in physics. (If I have to give some criticism, then I will say that even though I think Harriman has done his utmost to make sure laymen such as me can follow his reasoning, I must admit that I more than once found it really hard to understand what he was talking about. I think more illustrations would have helped readers like me.)

I believe The Logical Leap answers all the essential questions concerning the problem of induction. Since the book intends to solve the problem of induction, this will also be the standard for my judgment. And considering that a solution to the problem of induction is the last, crucial step to completely validate reason, I think the book is a historic achievement. This is probably the most important book since Ayn Rand's Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology.

Welcome

2010-10-22T09:20:00.000-07:00

My name is Carl Svanberg. I am a Swedish Objectivist, writer, philosopher, salesman and drummer. On this blog I will publish translations of my Swedish articles. I will write about all sorts of things: current events, the state of the culture, economics, politics, philosophy in general, Objectivism in particular, and more. I hope you enjoy my writing and look forward to your comments.

Cheers!