Reason vs. Faith, Question 6 of 8 - Ayn Rand Institute

[oiytouy]

The human being Piekoff seems to misunderstand: God did not command humans to be ignorant of Good and Evil. Rather, God explained the consequences of knowing Good and Evil, that humans would indeed be FREE MORAL AGENTS. and face death, for which God also established a Remedy. But, connecting such dots are beyond the Volition on the human named Piekoff. By the way, I like Atlas Shrugged.

[Fritz451]

Religious morality destroyed in 50 seconds. The first time I saw this I was overcome by the simplicity and power of it.

[TimeWarp66]

I like Yaron brook the best. He's the most polite and persuasive.

[MrChirpsky]

To one who is so completely ensconced in Judeo-Christian civilization this seems self-evident. But to anyone coming from outside, even the most fervent atheist brought up in the west (such as myself) still lives, and will hopelessly go on living in a Judeo-Christian Universe. And the novels rest on (while arguing against) that same world view.

[chansetwo]

Great clip. It's hard to believe that even today with all the great moral ethicists (Kant Rawls, etc) that have come along, some people still want to cling to a moral source as backwards as the bible.

[e46bud]

morality is based on culture...we see this with the foundation of civ. so if morality was the leading "belief" we would all have to agree on simple knowns like dont kill, steal...whats the difference between morality and the bible? the 1st covenant...lol love this clip 5 stars!

[Philosopher2087]

Great clip.

[socksumi]

Why was the question cut out of this clip? I would have liked to know what was asked.

[KajiCarson]

Anyone know where I can find the full video this was taken from?

[InFromTheVoid]

That was awesome!

[Sam26100]

I mean, people go to jail for things like theft, murder, rape,

[Sam26100]

Well said Peikoff

[IpkisStanley]

The liberated super-atheist's morality is to do whatever the fuck they want (but not get caught). That's the only way an atheist can truly realise themself and if they don't know that or are too scared to do it then they're pathetic.

[Sam26100]

Is that why atheists are 0.2% of the US prison population, while being 17% of the country?

Christians are over 80% of the prison population btw

[IpkisStanley]

no that's because atheists are either too stupid or scared to do what they should do

[Sam26100]

You'll have to explain that. What exactly do you think atheists "should do"?

[IpkisStanley]

isn't it obvious if the only morality is human morality then it doesn't matter if I follow it or not. All I have to do is avoid getting caught! but atheists are pussies so they follow the law and do what our society deems to be "moral"

[Sam26100]

so murder and rape aren't really immoral?

[BlackWolf4830]

@IpkisStanley Hahaha, it must be so wonderful to believe everything your pastor tells you.

It's nice to know that you don't go around killing people, not because you recognize it as a wrong, but because Jesus said so. I personally don't murder because if I can decide that someone else's life is insignificant, someone can decide the same for me.

[Roannepur]

Leonard just destoryed whomever asked that question.

[12stepfailure]

awesome!!!

[jordanowen42]

AMEN!

[WarVideo]

Not enough Leonard Peikoff on ARI's youtube channel.

[LegalizeCapitalism]

agreed

[fomastephanovitch]

handsome guy

[sweetsweatyfeet]

Brilliant commentary. We cannot be moral unless we understand what is moral and why. This is what Peikoff is endorsing in contrast to religious dogma which removes morality from our understanding by replacing it with inexplicable commandments from an undefinable god.

Biblical morality summarized is "just do as your told and do not question the rules because you have no ability to know right from wrong without god's law". To live like this is not being moral; it is being obedient.

[2xtrbo]

Good point. When Adam and Eve ate from the "Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil" they acquired only the ability to know the difference between good and evil. Yahweh was a bit jealous of this because he wanted to retain this power. Now man has the power and should use it to determine what is right and wrong based on man's life as the standard and not edicts from a terrorist of the skies.

[jetta230]

Bull*@#t Man's utimate folly is his wanting to be as wise a God. that's arrogance. that's Obama. that's everyone at ARI

[Kurtyoungblood]

...

[cwclemons2007]

Beautiful. Peikoff for President!!

[ForOrAgainstUs]

Have you seen the video of Peikoff and Bill O'Reilly? Messed up stuff. Unless you agree with him in that vid, of course.

[hypnolinks]

Post more of Pope Lenny the Fucked, I want to laugh at that face more.

[reneekatz]

Peikoff is kicking ass!!!

[philosophyarchitect]

It's entertaining how much more angry Leonard Peikoff sounds than Brook.

I don't mean that as an insult to Dr. Peikoff, by the way.

[Sarrisan98]

I think that may be one reason people dislike him so much (Besides his ideas, of course). He has a tone of voice that is always on the offensive - always condemning ideas he sees as evil. That is not a bad thing, mind you, but it often puts people on the defensive before they even hear his words. It is the reason, I think, that Mr. Brook is probably better PR person then Mr. Peikoff.

[Sarrisan98]

Ugh, sorry. Youtube really needs to fix this comment system. My last comment was in response to philosophyarchitect.

[wychweapons]

@Sarrisan98 He's a tired, old man who is fed up with the decaying altruistic culture he's lived in for so long. He, unfortunately, never had the advantage of a massively growing Objectivist movement behind him during most of his years.

[dduppie]

Dr. Peikoff is probably bored out of his wits answering the same questions over and over.

[Bigturns33]

I disagree, I think he loves doing it!

[1337melee]

Nor to Dr. Brook I'm sure

LOL

[dduppie]

Whenever someone says that objectivism leads to a split between reason and emotion, I just remind myself of Dr. Peikoff.

[sumfamousperson17]

That was awesome.

[TheAtheistChrist]

Thank you Dr. Peikoff!

[basspig]

Nice to see LP on YouTube. I used to attend his lectures when he and AR were in NYC, all the way back to when NBI was in vogue. No ideas so clear an self-evident as Objectivist principles. It pains me to live in a world where the irrational wield power over the rational. Maybe the YT generation will have the chance to wake up from the Socialist/Environmentalist stupor. Keep up the good work, ARI!

[lakeviewviking]

Peikoff is still feeding off the work of Nathaniel Branden, not to mention Rand; a second-hander incarnate!!

[basspig]

You need to study your history, son. NB learned from AR, but by the end of the '60s, made some terrible mistakes and got called out by AR. The two split and went separate ways and NB has been trying to smear AR and LP ever since. Who is the real second-hander here?

[lakeviewviking]

Branden got "called out" by Rand for ending an affair that neither of them should've gotten involved in; in A Sense Of Life, Peikoff says "one thing or another" caused the break, not wanting to admit what really happened(or admit he was introduced to Rand by his cousin Barbara Branden).I've actually read Branden's bio; a book Peikoff claimed to never read, and insisted that "real" objectivists would never read either...condemning books is the action of a religious cult.

[shovelcharge]

Peikoff didn't stray around the affair, he talks about it explicitly. In any case, that isn't that important in the grand scheme of things. Only people who hate Ayn Rand and love the Brandens/libertarians/TOC bring that up.

The fact of the matter is that Ayn Rand broke with the Brandens for their acts of immorality, dishonesty, etc, which some of them openly admitted to according to Ayn Rand. Read her actual condemnation of them in The Objectivist.

[lakeviewviking]

"Only people who hate Ayn Rand and love the Brandens/libertarians/TOC bring that up."

So one can't like both Rand, and the Brandens and libertarianism? That sounds a little like having no-other-gods-before-me!

[shovelcharge]

Of course not. Libertarianism is akin to a personal insult to Ayn Rand/Objectivism. Don't you know that Objectivists are not libertarians? It is you either follow reason and rational principles fully, or you become a libertarian. Take your pick.

[lakeviewviking]

Rand's problems with libertarians were fueled by her falling out with Murry Rothbard. I don't accept Rothbard's word as the be-all-and-end-all of libertarianism, and I don't except that one can only be inflenced by Rand if you swallow the partyline of a personality-cult lead by true-believer who has had no life of his own (aka:Peikoff). If leonard's so great, why wasn't Atlas Shrugged dedicated to him?

[shovelcharge]

You are a real joke, pal. Rand didn't like libertarians because they are anarchists, and because they stole her ideas and/or didn't give her credit (Rothbard, Hospers, Block, and others). Rothbard fell from Ayn Rand.

Why in the hell would Ayn Rand dedicate her greatest work to a teenager she just met (LP) and not to her husband and Branden, a man she greatly admired? That's totally obvious.

Give me evidence of how LP leads a "personality-cult".

[lakeviewviking]

libertarians give Rand credit all the time, they just don't accept her as the only philsopher on the planet.

Rand was inluenced by Mencken, Patterson, Aquinas, and others; I guess she didn't "give them credit".

LP runs Rand's estate, because he won the tontine, period. His being a teenager when he met Rand ment he has had no adult life of his own, and could withstand her abuse when everyboy else jumped ship; he simply knows nothing else4.

[shovelcharge]

But Rand was the only one to give a full philosophy behind capitalism, and that is why she is far far better than others. Patterson, Aquinas, and Mencken didn't help derive rational selfishness or her theory of concepts.

What abuse? You assume that Peikoff just blindly accepted Ayn Rand without effort.

[shovelcharge]

LP has had no life of his own? What do you mean? Does the fact that he wrote two books (with two more on the way, one of which is totally original), many lectures, many radio shows, has been married multiple times, has a child, oversees an estate, etc., and this all adds up to "no life of his own"?

Rothbard is a monster. He is nothing compared to AR. To be influenced by him is to be totally opposed to AR.

[lakeviewviking]

ARI's defense of the Bush admin.'s policy in Iraq is what is monsterous; the blood is on YOUr hands, not mine.

[shovelcharge]

...have you ever read *anything* from ARI? They are against Bush's policies.

[shovelcharge]

Branden's refusal to continue his relationship with AR (which may have involved cheating with another woman) was just one of many reasons to break with him.

I personally think the affair was moral. Ayn saw legitimate value and acted on it, with Branden, with permission.

Also, Peikoff was a central figure in the whole conflict. He knows the issue better than we can possibly know, and it is a very personal issue for him. You can't blame him for never wanting to read the books.

[shovelcharge]

under that logic, we are all second handers because we say 2+2=4.

Learning isn't second handed. Peikoff knows his stuff first hand, and has gone to many lengths to make sure others follow suit, e.g. his Understanding Objectivism and Objectivism Through Induction lectures.

[lakeviewviking]

Rans specifically stated she wanted no org. claiming to spread her ideas after her death, ala NBI; Peikoff's starting ARI (and implying she was involved in its founding in ari's literature) runs counter to what she wanted.

[shovelcharge]

ARI has never claimed Ayn Rand was involved in ARI's founding especially because...Ayn Rand was dead for years when ARI was founded! I know Ayn Rand wasn't too keen on the idea of her leading the movement or setting up a lecture organization, but I'd like to see her actual words say that she firmly did not want an org spreading her philosophy after her death. I have never heard or seen that.

Besides that ARI is doing a great job, especially with their books to high schools program.

[lakeviewviking]

On the cover of THE AYN RAND READER, it clains that ARI was founded by Rand; That would be news to her!

[shovelcharge]

That makes absolutely no sense, and is absolutely false.

[1337melee]

From a purely epistemological standpoint, I would not say they are self evident, but they are certainly clear.

What bothers me more sometimes is when people try to argue that self-evident things, like free will, are illusions...

[CrazyHorseInvincible]

People reject free will because their definition of it is mystical and flawed. They think that the "free" means "free from causality" or "free from the laws of physics" rather than "free from coercion."

[socksumi]

Yes, good point. Too many people equate free will with being omniscient.

[MetaMorphy]

Thank you all so much, I am glad to see that the objectivist message is getting out there.

[grantsinmypants2]

You gotta love the fallacy of the frozen abstraction.

[shovelcharge]

so powerful. I love it.

[ArrogantEgoist]

As ususal, excellent point by Dr. Peikoff.

[Jocke1776]

Dr. Peikoff is a phenomenon. That guy can debate and lecture! I recently watched the capitalism vs. socialism debate from 1984 with Peikoff and Ridpath. I sat with a big smile all the time Peikoff was speaking and crushing the socialists intellectually. I wish Peikoff would debate Chomsky!

[shovelcharge]

Ya, that debate turned into a joke. The socialists didn't address the issues and appealed to feelings. LP was awesome. I'd like LP to debate D'Souza or whaever

[shrynakesavan]

can u please tell me where can i watch that debate... i would be really great full...

[Jocke1776]

It's available for purchase, at:

aynrandbookstore2 . com / prodinfo . asp?number =CP01DV

(remove spaces)

Like the other guy said, the socialists mostly are ridiculous in the debate, but it's funny.

[akinobjectivist]

Dr. Peikoff and Dr. Brook, you are prime movers!

[dunkelhaven]

Dr. Peikoff has always been one of my absolute favourites. :-)