 Productiveness. Why is productiveness a virtue? And we might as well review for a second, what makes a virtue a virtue? Why are these things that we are articulating virtues? Well the first one was easy in a sense, right? Because the first one was that which is required for human survival. It's required and we can see that. It's not, I wouldn't say it's obvious, but it's once you think about it, the thing that is required for human beings to survive is to think. It's to be rational. It's the use one's reason. So the first virtue is directly comes from reality, directly comes from the nature of man. It directly comes from the fact that we do not have automatically programmed in us the ability to survive the knowledge of what to do, as in a sense other animals do. We have to discover it. We have to think. We have to use our mind. That is why rationality is the first virtue and really the integrating virtue. In a sense the only virtue, everything else is an application of. But we'll see that. When we talk about pride we'll also talk about what Einwand calls the unity of the virtues. Maybe it's Lenna. Peacock actually talks about it. I can't remember if it's if Einwand directly talks about the unity of the virtues. But certainly Lenna does. That the unity of the virtues they're all basically united around this idea of rationality. Now every one of the virtues is a principle to guide our actions in pursuit of our life. And every one of them is an important essential application of the virtue of rationality. So honesty, well you have to be honest to be rational. Independence, well there's nobody else to do the thinking. You're it. And to do good thinking you have to do it yourself. Every one of them is an application in that sense. Now productiveness is more than an application of rationality because it's not enough to think. It's not enough to think. As Kelsey mentions, Lenna Peacock's course Unity in Ethics and Epistemology, which is another one of the kind of required lecture courses for anybody who really wants to dig deep into the objectivist ethics or into the objectivist philosophy. There are a lot of those Lenna Peacock courses that are required. And they're all gems. They're all fun. They're all deep. They're all really really important and worth listening to. Again Unity in Ethics and Epistemology is this idea that it's all one. It's all about man's life and it's all about survival and happiness and it's all about being rational. But to think is not enough. We're not beings that can move the world just from our thoughts. Action is required to act based on those thoughts in order to survive is to be productive. And in order to survive the kind of action we must engage in is the production of material values. We're a material being in a material world which requires material values to survive. The very basics from food, clothing, shelter, Ferraris, you know, all the material iPhones obviously, all the material values that are necessary for human survival, for human flourishing, for human happiness. So productiveness is the recognition that we must use our mind to create the material values necessary for us to survive. That those material values are not given. You remember a few shows ago I talked about the Garden of Eden, right? In the Garden of Eden all the material values necessary for human survival just are there. They just appear. No effort, no work, no thought, therefore, is actually needed in order to produce the material values necessary for human survival. And arguably Adam and Eve are not human. Is this, I wonder if this is sacrilegious and I'm now an apostate. Adam and Eve are not human. If what makes human being human is their rational faculty. In a sense of what makes human being human is the need to think and produce in order to survive. Then Adam and Eve are not human until they kicked out of the Garden of Eden. Think about Marx's utopia. In Marx's utopia we go back to the Garden of Eden. In Marx's utopia no effort is required, no thought is required for all of your needs to be met. They're just met. It's a completely mystical place. So it's sad because it seems like the Judeo-Christian tradition through the Garden of Eden myth then embedded into Marxism have implanted in our culture a certain mythology that says that the ideal for human beings is that condition where you don't have to think, you don't have to work, you don't have to produce. Productiveness is not necessary. The stuff you need in order to survive, to thrive, to live as a human being is just appears and therefore we view work as burdensome thinking as hard and an effort and why do I need to do this? Instead of embracing thinking and working and being productive as the means to a successful happy prosperous flourishing fulfilling life towards an ideal indeed viewing thinking and working as an ideal as the ideal for human beings given their nature we are set up with a context with a mythology with an ideal that is no work no thinking just lay around all day and stuff you just get your stuff and you can see that in in young people who say why do I have to go to work? I had a kid ask me this question at the University of Texas in Austin last year why do I need to go to work I want to just pursue my hobbies I mean isn't that the promised land isn't that the ideal isn't the Garden of Eden the ideal and this is why in many respects communism is a secularization of Christianity and this is why in many respects communism sorry Marxism and Christianity and Judaism because it really comes from Judaism precondition us in a sense culturally to have a very negative attitude towards being productive towards work towards this world I mean in do you think anybody goes to work in heaven do you think anybody has to be productive in heaven is there's a profit motive in heaven no we're told heaven is a return to the Garden of Eden that is the ideal condition for mankind and you can see how dangerous and damaging that is no mankind is a particular being and this particular being needs must has to both for material reasons and for spiritual reason has to work has to be productive has to engage in the activity that shapes his environment to fit his needs so in in Opa Objectivism the philosophy of vine Rand by Lana Peacoff the subheading under productiveness is productiveness as the adjustment of nature to man that's a great formulation productiveness as the adjustment of nature to man as we talked about when we talked about rationality man is not born with the knowledge with the ability to know automatically what to do how to do it how to survive not only when he's discovered the knowledge but he must also change his environment to fit his needs other animals other animals are adapted to an environment through evolution and if that environment changes if it changes dramatically enough they die out they die out human beings don't die out this is the whole point about you know the panic about climate change we don't die out we change our environment to fit our needs if things get warm we invent air conditioning if oceans rise we build dykes if things get cold we come up with fire or burning natural gas electricity we change our environment to fit our needs we adapt through the productive process we don't just sit back and let the environment dictate our lives we change it and therefore we cannot hold the environment as it is as some kind of given a kind of static thing no the environment is there for us to use for the purpose of our survival and notice that this completely turns around upside down the environmentalists claim that there's an environment out there it's the good it's pristine or staying pristine is the good and we must adapt to it so if what we're doing makes it warmer we should stop doing that well maybe maybe we should do something else to offset what we're doing or maybe we should just adapt to the fact that it's gonna be warmer I mean that's a lot of options but they take for granted that nature the environment mother earth however you want to call it is the good and just like any other animal if it changes we're just supposed to roll over and die no so productiveness is the recognition that we must work to create physical values and the work that is required to create physical values involves changing our environment to fit our needs changing our environment to fit our needs everything everything we need from clothes shelter requires changing the environment whether it's killing animals and and and skinning them to use their skin which requires knowledge by the way you try it sometime kill an animal and skin it both those require skill which requires thought which requires effort which requires you know tools weapons strategies all things of the mind every every material values requires thinking requires action requires effort the values that are required for our survival as a species as individuals have to be conceived before they create and and then they have to be created somebody has to think of them as somebody has act to make them a reality think and make it a reality that's what productiveness is productive this is the process of making them a reality to block productiveness is the process as a definition of creating material values whether goods or services and who says objectivism's connection of productivity to morality is integral to making life a spiritual experience well yes productiveness I would say is necessary to making life a spiritual experience because I think we get our spiritual values from the purpose we have and we'll get to purpose is connected directly to productiveness purpose of central purpose is going to be our productive purpose and notice that how unique objectivism is in making productiveness a virtue I mean other ethical systems yeah you got to go to work you got you know you got to make a living you know maybe personal responsibility but there's no emphasis on this idea of using a mind to change reality to create the values necessary for you in production and this is why objectivism is so unique in its view of the producer its view of the producer objectivism use the producer as in his actions as a producer moral and good because he is producing his creating material values necessary for his and our survival so we know that to be a producer requires knowledge requires thinking requires action requires the creation of something new productiveness is defined as the creation our material values and you have to create you have to think you have to imagine you have to then have a plan you have to actually put the resources together it's it's not obvious so it's not enough somebody asked early on somebody asked not in the super chat he said is listening to your own book show a productive activity only if you turn it into action only if you apply it to your own life and apply it to how you live and apply the knowledge you get from it to your life otherwise it's just entertainment if it's just listening and enjoying it and or learning for the sake of learning but there is no learning for the sake of learning knowledge is to be applied to be productive knowledge must be applied in one in some way to some way to make your life better so for objectivism you know a scientist is productive when he takes his discoveries and writes them down and publishes a book but the fact that he's a scientist doesn't make him more productive than the person that takes his scientific discovery and turns it into call it a gadget let it cause it a gadget it's not the economy between pure science and its products the gadgets the tools the technology the things that we use it for the purpose of knowledge is a better life and a better life is achieved by to partially at least through material values and here I consider material values also I mean music is material right it needs to be I mean somebody having a tune in his head is not productive he has to play it and in the modern era turn into record or CD or streaming that's when it becomes productive of course so for objectivism unique among all moral codes productive ability as such as such deserves the highest accolades and this is why putting aside everything else I'm such a fan of Silicon Valley because it is a place of immense productive achievement productive ability they produce values which I benefit from but even if I don't somebody is benefiting from and these people are living the life because what is the life the life is a life of value production you cannot be happy you cannot make a happy life without being engaged in some form of productive activity in some form using your knowledge using your mind for your own betterment so productive ability is a value by the standard of man's life Leonard Picofrights and because like all values a course of virtue is required in order to gain and keep it and what is the course to gain and keep productive ability well it's knowledge and development of skill it's having ideas and then putting them into practice you have to acquire you have to use all right all through a volitional process you have to be committed to reality I mean imagine you have great ideas and it's completely detached from the real world and you're not gonna get anywhere you're not gonna be able to produce anything you're not gonna be able to create any kind of values it's gonna be completely detached and floating and think about all the virtues that we've talked about right reason independence honesty all of those have to be there have to be applied if you're going to be productive you're not gonna create any values if you're not rational if you can't think if you refuse to think if you evade if you go by your emotions nothing gets produced how are you going to produce if you're constantly worried about other people and what they think if you're not independent if you're a second-hander I mean there's no iPhone if Steve Jobs is a second-hander there's no anything of value nothing of value is built no progress is made from somebody who is not an independent thinker who is completely dependent on others you have to be in focus you have to think you have to be independent and of course you must be honest garbage in garbage out we talked about this and if you're gonna create something that's not garbage you better be honest with yourself you better be focused on fact you better be focused on reality you better not be just floating out there detached from all of that every job every work engages the human mind if you choose to engage and if you want to do a good job you can have to engage your mind the fact is particularly in the modern world there's very little work that actually requires pure physical labor most of it requires mental labor and some requires physical labor but is enhanced if you think about it and you discover better ways to do it now because productive work requires the application of all the other virtues by the way justice is huge in productive work particularly if you work with other people but even if you don't even if you're an independent who do you take on as a client you have to judge people you have to come to conclusions about them who is worthy as a client who's worthy as an employee who's worthy as a boss how should you judge your co-workers who should do what constantly every aspect of productive activity requires the application of every one of the other virtues this is what makes it so important this is what makes it spiritually required for happiness and for having a complete life not only does it provide you with a knowledge that you can take care of yourself the knowledge that you can supply the things that are necessary for you to survive and to thrive the material requirements of your own life but it also engages you in all the activities that are life-enhancing focus thinking independence honesty justice you have to engage with all the virtues all the time it is intense it is demanding it is requires massive effort and that's why it's so central to human life you know for the virtues are geared ultimately towards our values reason purpose self-esteem and all the virtues are geared to all the values so it's not like a one-to-one relationship that the seven virtues the three values all of them all of them are directly related but if you think about productiveness productiveness is directly related to purpose why now I did a whole show on purpose I encourage you to go and review that show if you're interested in this but purposes is a requirement for human life we we need a reason for this value versus value why this fight there has to be a purpose for what we're doing otherwise we're just drifting we have no clue this value that we have to have a hierarchy of values we have to build a hierarchy of values and for that there has to be a purpose to all of these values there has to be a goal something we're trying to achieve with this and to achieve that integration to achieve the integration of all your values into a hierarchy and a hierarchy means priorities what's more important than what what would I rather do than this other thing how do I choose between a and b well how do they fit into my hierarchy but how do I create a hierarchy and it's too broad and floating in abstract to say created based on happiness it's too removed happiness the effect or survival survival how you know to so you need a central purpose you need something that will integrate all these other values so that you can prioritize based on the central purpose it's not the only purpose it's not in our context texts the overarching the overruling purpose but it's the integrating purpose you don't want things that conflict with it and what can serve as a central purpose what can serve as such a massive integration well there really is only one activity that we engage in and that is our productive activity because it engages all the other virtues because it requires so much focus and energy and time and because it requires so much energy and focus and time we want to choose it based on what we love doing what we enjoy doing what we get satisfaction from doing it's so career your work your productive activity become your integrating central purpose become the most important thing that you do I mean the fact is you know even in the culture people say oh most important thing to me is family well many other things but the fact is that they spend most of their time working so in terms of their choice in how to spend their time they're telling you that working is more important to them you know everybody can probably work less and still do fine we live in a pretty rich society but people want to get richer because they want to pursue more values they want to get richer because the wealth is an indication a sign from reality that you are actually being productive I think that's primarily why very wealthy people continue to work for money because working for money continues to give them an indication that they are producing values if they stop working for money how do they know if what they're producing is valuable how do you measure that well the best measure of value in that context is money it's not that they're gonna consume it some of them are because they're gonna go to Mars but most of them are not most of it it's a sign it's a symbol it's an indication from reality that they are being productive so your central purpose is your career your central purpose is the work that you do and a work that you do is not just work it shouldn't be just work you should love it you should find something that you love and you should spend most of your focused energy on it you should have long-term plans with regard to it it should be a career now some people's career is not like that let's say you're an artist and to do the art you have to do things on the side you have to work as a waiter or whatever and then it's work and then your real career is this other thing right but for most of us our career is our productive activity is our work and to be happy to be truly happy as a human being you need to be creative I mean you need to create not be creative in the sense artistic sense but you need to create you need to make build something you need to have that that productive activity be a central purpose you need to enjoy it thrive in it I mean that doesn't mean it's not hard by the way the fact that you enjoy it doesn't mean it's not hard doesn't mean it's not agonizing sometimes doesn't mean it's not difficult all of those things can be true but it still should excite you it still should thrill you and it's still when you're successful should be one of the best feelings in the world think of reed and in Atlas shrug think of the pain the suffering the difficulty the hardship of discovering reed and metal of creating reed and metal it's not discovered it's created but the satisfaction the deep deep satisfaction that comes from actually achieving it and the value of purpose that that gave him and the self-esteem that that provided him and of course the only way he could get is by using his mind so achieved all three of the values reason purpose and self-esteem in that one activity and that's what a good job should do it should engage your mind give you a central purpose and provide you with a boost a constant ongoing boost to your self-esteem what we need today what I called a new intellectual would be any man or woman who is willing to think meaning any man or woman who knows that man's life must be guided by reason by the intellect not by feelings wishes women's or mystic revelations any man or woman who values his life and who does not want to give in to today's cult of despair cynicism and impotence and does not intend to give up the world to the dark ages and to the role of the collectivist brought all right before we go on reminder please like the show we've got 163 live listeners right now 30 likes that should be at least a hundred I figure at least a hundred of you actually like the show maybe they're like 60 of the Matthews out there who hate it but but at least the 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