Ham had said: As for the "basics" of reality, as you will see from my Value Page this week, perhaps the most fundamental is: The "common good" originates with the individual self. Or, as Ayn Rand put it, "No man can think for another." Social conventions such as morality "have value" only to the extent that this value is realized by individuals.
Ron remarks: Keeping in mind that the individual originates from The "common good" as well. This is the tangle you face in your explanation. One may not "be" without the other out of necessity. Rand is Often criticized for neglecting that aspect, as if she defined a Quarter dollar in terms of one face of the coin and placed all its meaning and value on the "heads" side and neglected the "tail" which causes one to suspect that Rands objectivism and cult of individual selfishness is primarilarly a reactionary response to social reform at the beginning of the 20th century. Which explains your reactionary attack of Ants explanation of the necessity of social values and their consequences to an individual. Ham rhetorialy casts a cloud over Ants explanation with a polically charged: "Ant seizes the opportunity to inject his collectivist worldview:" > For instance, subjects and objects leave no room for society. > I'm afraid - unlike the recently departed Wicked Witch of the > West(minster) - that I think it is a high quality idea to assume > that there is a society that intellectual patterns are embedded in; > that there are social rules/norms to be followed and consequences > to be had if there are not followed e.g it's bit like driving through > red lights in New York or London. It will be only a matter of > a few minutes before - if you're lucky, that the police and/or > ambulance people pick you up - you discover that this specific > social convention is worth (i..e has value) in following. > > In other words, you need to address such basics first before > moving on to such things as "Ultimate Reality". Ron comments: I think Ant is simply pointing out the same tangle in meaning when the assertion of the Pimacy of the individual good over the common good is brought to task and it hints at the broader conflict in which our explanations conflict in that MoQ accounts for the theory of evolution in it's explanation. Something that a typical reactionary baulks at. Enough difference so that one would give question as to why you would want to exhibit those particular tastes here. Why would you when this difference is almost certain to end in negetivly charged dischord on most subjects. . .. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
