The Objectivist Ethics and Individual Rights (1 of 3)

[Twiggy269]

I've been waiting patiently for parts 2 and 3 Dan!! I know these vids take a lot of time, effort, and hard work and I appreciate what you do, but I'm dyin over here! LoL.

Hope you are doing well,

-Tyler.

[StudentOfObjectivism]

@Twiggy269 I'm stoked that you are so appreciative; I've broken the backbone of the work I need to do for part 2 but still have to work out how to explain Justice, Integrity, Productiveness and Pride... I may even make this as a 4 part series (Parts 1, 2.1, 2.2, 3) because explaining and concretizing the virtues takes so much work.

Anyway, be patient: it's gonna be worth the wait.

[legendre007]

The blue background with the white text reminds me of how every episode of *Doogie Howser, M.D..* ends, with Doogie Howser typing in his journal on his 1980s computer. :-P

Your explanation is excellent. More free-marketers need to understand that individual rights do exist, and that their justification is not deontological, but is something logically induced from man's nature as a volitinal, rational, conceptual being. :-)

[StudentOfObjectivism]

@legendre007 Doogie Howser, M.D. is not familiar to me, I'm afraid. I remember the 1980s computers though, just.

Thanks for the props on my explanation!

[qtutoringhelps]

I sent you an email about this without realizing you uploaded it ;-0

[lashkaretoiba]

Have you been reading the biological basis for teleogical concepts?

[StudentOfObjectivism]

@lashkaretoiba is that the name of a book?

[lashkaretoiba]

Yes. @StudentOfObjectivism 

[StudentOfObjectivism]

No. @lashkaretoiba

[lashkaretoiba]

You should give it a read. I think you'll really enjoy it. @StudentOfObjectivism 

[StudentOfObjectivism]

@lashkaretoiba Thanks for the recommendation.

[lashkaretoiba]

You're welcome. @StudentOfObjectivism

[Jazzper79]

Great video and you are a good speaker

[StudentOfObjectivism]

@Jazzper79 Thanks a lot.

[Dhorpatan]

You did a really good job on the video. I appreciate the work you put into it.

I strongly disagree with what was said around 17:06. Consciousness is not what enables man to invent a wheel, or create fire. If that were the case, then cockroaches and pigs should be able to irrigate farmland too, since they are conscious as well.

What enables man to do all those things is his ability to utilize logic, reason, and because man possesses a brain that's complex enough to entail conceptualization.

[StudentOfObjectivism]

@Dhorpatan It's our particular kind of consciousness that enables us to do that. I think I made clear that animals have only percept level consciousness.

[StudentOfObjectivism]

@Dhorpatan Also, thanks again for your help and I'm glad you appreciated the rest of the video.

[177SCmaro]

@StudentOfObjectivism I'd be curious to know how artificial intelligence fits into all this.

[StudentOfObjectivism]

@177SCmaro Hypothetically, I think that if someone were to invent a robot that took self-generated, self-sustaining action then you would have to describe it as 'alive' and it would have values. If it's software were to enable it to form concepts then it would have moral values and would be morally equal to humans... but I doubt it is even possible.

The artificial intelligence that exists now is nothing more than a series of algorithms reaching a solution to a pre-programmed task.

[177SCmaro]

@StudentOfObjectivism 1000 years ago a lap top was impossible. I'm not so doubtful an AI could exist one day.

And what if it's moral values where to drink beer and kill all humans? lol

What do you mean by self-generated action? Do you mean an action someone generates (does)? Isn't every action I take a self-generated action? In fact, isn't "self-generated" implied in the word "action"? Redundancy or am off the mark?

[StudentOfObjectivism]

@177SCmaro

1) 'I'm not so doubtful an AI could exist one day.' Possibly 'doubtful' was the wrong word. I think that if someone claims that true, human-like AI were possible then that person is making an arbitrary claim. Yes, it might be the case that AI could be achieved, just like it could be true that there were once unicorns and we just haven't found the fossils... until someone suggests a way to make it happen that can be scientifically tested, the claim is arbitrary.

[177SCmaro]

@StudentOfObjectivism

1) I guess we'll have to wait and see.

2) The correct answer was, "We're boned." I also would have excepted, "We're doomed! DOOOOOOoooooomed!!"

3)lol at "necessary redundancy." Isn't that an oxymoron?

[StudentOfObjectivism]

@177SCmaro No. If I describe a man as an 'unmarried bachelor' then that's a complete redundancy and totally unnecessary. However, observe that when an Objectivist says that selfishness is virtuous, most people react with horror and assume you are talking about hedonism. The fact that hedonism is not selfish doesn't occur to them so it's necessary to state that we are talking about 'rational selfishness'... even though it is a redundancy because if an action isn't rational then it isn't selfish.

[177SCmaro]

@StudentOfObjectivism Can't you tell when someone is not being totally serious? Sheesh, I just thought "necessary redundancy" sounded an awful lot like an oxymoron, you know, since redundancy means something that isn't necessary. I didn't need a lessen how people react to whatever. Or maybe you're trying to be funny by writing out an unnecessary reply to my comment about something unnecessary? That'd be clever. 

[StudentOfObjectivism]

@177SCmaro 'Can't you tell when someone is not being totally serious?'

Apparently not. In my defense, I would say that even if you are joking, it is quite possible that someone else viewing this could see your question and think that I had been unable to answer... as though I'd just been pwned. I regularly encounter questions much more ridiculous than your joke question that are, apparently, meant in all seriousness (eg 'why shouldn't I value death?')

[177SCmaro]

@StudentOfObjectivism If you care that much about what other people MIGHT think I'd say you're talking yourself a bit too seriously. It's a video sharing website, not the Spanish inquisition.

[StudentOfObjectivism]

@177SCmaro lol. I do take my channel very seriously but I do try to slip a little humor into my videos from time to time. I do worry a little about what people see on this channel though because I'm trying to spread my viewpoint.

[StudentOfObjectivism]

2) 'what if it's moral values where to drink beer and kill all humans?' lol! What an entity is determines what it ought to do. The AI's 'life' would be its highest value and the requirements of its life would be its standard. If it is to have a conceptual faculty - necessary as I explained for the existence of *moral* values - then its moral values would not include negating its consciousness with robo-beer(!) or destroying other conceptual entities with which it could trade.

[StudentOfObjectivism]

3) on self-generated. An action originated by an entity. Yes, in a sense it is a redundancy, i think. However it is a necessary redundancy in the context of establishing ethical principles because we need to explicitly differentiate the things that 'just happen' like a rock rolling down a hill from the things that happen because a living entity does them.

[Twiggy269]

@Dhorpatan

An easy way to fix this (Minor) error in the video would be to add the word "Conceptual" in front of the word "Consciousness" @ 17:06 in the video.

[Twiggy269]

I wouldn't bother trying to modify the vid just to add this little word in right at the end though Dan....It is very heavily implied if you actually listen and watch the video that this is what you mean...to nitpick that you didn't put the word "Conceptual" in the last slide would be silly.