If my last response seems far more than a bit 'out there', in Objectivist terms, then let me state, for full disclosure, that your senses do not deceive you.
Last night, I sat down in front of my computer and started re-reading a number of threads on these forums. My project was simple one - understand why Olek, Tolthar, and myself always seem to get into an argument, no matter what the subject we are writing about.
I've said that I am a sort of 'pseudo-Popperian' empiricist - a 'scientific philosopher', if you like. Several of the foundational axioms of my personal world view are not completely dissimilar from those of Rand (and, one assume, subsequently Olek and Tolthar), so why the constant 'loggerheads'? Somewhere, there was a fundamental contradiction present - an irreconcilable difference that caused all rational discussion to degenerate to hopeless 'point-scoring', snide comments, and 'philosophical name-calling'.
And I realized, late last night, that it was completely my fault.
I'm not an Objectivist. Whatever similarities exist, the differences are all that matter. They are all that are sufficient to cause the problem.
Popper considered philosophy, and science, to be an 'on-going' process - something that never arrived at an absolute truth, but evolved, slowly, over time, as concepts were created, tested, falsified, and discarded. He was deeply skeptical of 'absolute truths'.
Objectivism, however, is quite comfortable with 'absolute truths'. There is one and only one way to 'be human', and it is already known as a certainty. Popperian philosophy might eventually arrive at the same conclusion, but because there is uncertainty in my world view, it will never be acceptable to an Objectivist. Uncertainty is simply not possible in Rand's formulation. Things necessarily have to be a certain way.
That's why I've routinely used the word 'dogmatic' in my conversations. Unconsciously, I was connecting Rand's pronouncements to the same level as religious dogma - truths that were absolutes in and of themselves. That's why I blew up and called Olek a 'fundamentalist' - his is a philosophy of literal truth, of undeniable axioms. Mine is not. Mine is a world of testable theories, of doubt, of necessary conditions for falsification. I can honestly believe that capitalism is the best theory going these days, but still harbor the possibility that something better might present itself. Such a though is impossible for Rand - it's practically heresy.
It's that doubt, that questioning, that has led to the arguments. While Olek is correct that I haven't read all of Rand's non-fiction, it isn't the case that I don't understand a rational foundationalist point of view. Her philosophy is founded on Aristotelian principles, which I have read and absorbed extensively (you can't be a Physics Major and 'escape' Aristotle). The problem is not understanding the exact concept - it's not accepting its certitude. That is very unlikely to change just because I read 'Selfishness' or 'The Unknown Ideal'.
So Olek, Tolthar, Petter, and anyone else whose put up with my ranting and occasional 'evasion' - I am sorry. I was blind to the cause of the argument, but I think I understand it a little better now. Hopefully, this little aside with supply you with context, even if you still consider me dead wrong for holding it
AT
