 Hey everyone, welcome back to the 21 convention. Please give him a welcoming round of applause Stand up if you feel like it and work on your posture for him. James steal the second ladies and gentlemen here he comes Am I good cool Okay guys and the first talk I'm gonna do for you today I'm gonna do a talk tomorrow as well going into a bit of specifics around my research and my One thing that Anthony's asked me to talk about is specifically philosophy I'm Rand's philosophy, which is objectivism I'm a big proponent of I'm Rand's philosophies I first got introduced to Atlas shrugged through reading kind of Mike Menza's work So then if any of you familiar with Mike Menza heavy-duty high-intensity training Coming from an exercise physiology background I first got involved with that after getting involved with Arthur Jones moving through all that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, and Realized that he applied a very sort of philosophical approach to his pursuit of knowledge in that specific area and I kind of got it got more involved learn the name. I'm Rand found her works read out with shrugged for the first time year or a year and a half or so ago and It really kind of resounded with me the message in it and the underlying philosophy Maybe want to learn more about it and learn about how to apply in my life and you know Essentially how to live my life So what I'm gonna do today is kind of go through if you can see the slides Hopefully if not, then just have to rely on me speaking and hopefully hopefully it will go for go through fine And I ended up caught writing a bit of an essay for my notes because I didn't want to leave any kind of like stone unturned I felt that there was so much depth that needs to kind of be go gone into with the specifics of the philosophy and learning how the fundamentals all affect each other that I Needed quite a lot of detail in it So I apologize if it looks like I'm kind of relying on my notes a lot I was kind of hoping for a podium or something to kind of maybe you know speak from but I'm gonna have to kind of rely on Just just holding it here now. So so excuse excuse that anyway Yeah, with that working cool. I don't know. I'll hold it and see how I go actually I'll try not to wave it around too much. Oh, I think I have been already Okay, so like I said, I'm a PhD student my specific area is exercise for the geology lower back pain and how the two are related But philosophy for me is a is a big interest. So this talk is Just clarify. I have no academic training in philosophy at all. Everything I've learned is self-taught So that's why I've kind of made the clarification. This is this is an arm chairs Philosophers perspective. I'm self-taught taught in this and I've went out and sought the information much like you guys are Come to this convention learning about the various topics that the speakers are talking on So I'm gonna kind of share that with you okay, so Just to kind of give you a brief outline I'm I tend to do academic conferences just because of PhD stuff. So everything has a as an outline So excuse the formatting if it's a bit sort of like bland Okay, so so first of all, we're gonna clarify like what it what is philosophy and you know, why is it even important? You know, why do we need to know about philosophy? You know, is it self-evident or is it kind of subconscious or do we need a conscious awareness of it and how it pertains to our lives? Then we're gonna go through and actually introduce objectivism as a philosophy in itself and we're gonna go through all the various different areas of Objectivism through a kind of logical approach and we're going to discuss what logic is and how it kind of like works into the philosophy as well So we're gonna go through the main sort of areas metaphysics epistemology Ethics and politics and we're gonna see how they kind of all interrelate and build what I am ran called a philosophy for Life on earth and like Anthony said life on earth as a man is what this conference conference is about I'm just gonna quickly sit my glasses on because I can't I'm sure sorry. I can't read the screen I'd like to be able to sit That's not gonna affect the lights at all. Is it gonna reflect too much? That's better. I can see it and I can see all you know everything was blurry before and then we're gonna kind of conclude just by looking at the kind of simple choices that we face in our lives and the very sort of like prominent conflicts that have a philosophical origin and how we can use this structure of philosophy to kind of like This kind of figure out what choices we need to make when it comes to these conflicts and what choices are most appropriate Okay, so first of all What is philosophy and why is it important? Philosophy pertains to everything and and this this quote from our Iran sums it up very well Philosophy studies the fundamental nature of existence and of man and of man and of man's relationship to existence So fundamentally Philosophy deals with how you live your life and how how you relate to the world around around you as a man or as an individual You know, if you wish to live your life, you can't avoid the necessity of philosophy philosophy underpins everything Man's life relies upon philosophy If he's to know how he should live it You know everything you do every action you take assumes some underlying principles by which you take those actions Some fundamental principles and that's what philosophy predominantly deals with it deals with fundamentals The basic irreducible primary concepts that kind of dictate how we live our lives Like I said the choices we make what we do how we think how we act how we live You know some examples could pertain to you guys come into this conference here You want to learn something you want to learn something about the nature of reality You want to learn something about particular subjects particular topics? You want to know how to apply it? You know, it could be anything success with women starting successful business entrepreneurship exercise nutrition What philosophy deals with is what that subject is how it relates to you and how you actually find out that information Know what's true and what actually works, you know, how reality it works It essentially it's how to live. Yeah, briefly that then what I'm round is predominantly an author and She had this vision of like Anthony said of man as a hero man as an individual man living his life as he deems by his own standards and for his own pursuit of happiness and She ripped several novels including at the shrug which is my personal favorite and I was so you know I've got such a conviction about the philosophy that I went as far as having the tattoo of Atlas on my arm Fountainhead which I know is Anthony's personal favorite. There's actually a film about it. I haven't seen it But it's supposed to be really good And other various novels which she wrote before then delving into will people saw read her novels And they were aware that the heroes she kind of had no novels at the end of the businessman the successful people were Different to what predominant sort of like doctrine and dogma and conventional wisdom whatever that is that we all kind of like Try and combat by coming to this thing she kind of like showed this kind of like completely completely independent hero and People wanted to know well, you know what what under what philosophy, you know It can you explain it in more detail what philosophy underlies your stories and what philosophy underlies your heroes What philosophy underlies man in your vision? So that's what I'm around in and she built upon that by writing more philosophical texts to explain her philosophy And that's what I'm going to try and do justice to today. So there'll be a few quotes by around Some of them from her novels and some of them from her her philosophical works Okay, so like I was saying philosophy and the pins life essentially now for most of you you know, you may not have a You know real deep interest in understanding particular philosophical constructs and philosophical Frameworks, you know, you may not have an interest in going out of your way yourself to kind of like search the literature Read the books and that sort of thing But regardless of whether you want to go out of your way and learn it You've got to appreciate that it underpins everything you do every action you take every action that anyone else takes Your perspective on reality is dictated by your philosophical principles whether you're consciously aware of them or not this quote by the economist John Maynard Keynes, I think despite his Touchy economic theories, I think it quite quite well sums up That kind of situation he says and I quote the ideas of economists and political philosophers both when they're right and when they're wrong I'm more powerful than is commonly understood indeed the world is ruled by little else practical men who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence are usually the slaves of some defunct economists and Economists there is synonymous with with philosopher economy is dictated by philosophical principles much like everything else I'm round had her own quote as well, which she used who sets the tone of a culture a small handful of men the philosophers Others follow their lead either by conviction or by default So where I present the philosophical framework today I want you guys to understand it and either accept or reject it based on your own convictions Hopefully I'll do a good enough job to persuade you So introducing objectivism Most people who kind of have any sort of like perception of philosophy have a very sort of like superficial one They don't really go into the details of it They know the conflicts that are that exist in this kind of world But they don't really kind of like reduce it down to what the base principles are and how that affects things They see these various conceptual conflicts and never really work it out now Dr. Onkar Gattay, I don't know if any of you have heard of him, but that's irrelevant But he's a fellow at the I'm round Institute, which is an educational establishment for Helping portray I'm Rand's philosophical ideas He did it did a lecture similar to what I'm doing now on introducing objectivism and he used the kind of format where he Reduced the latter conflicts that we see in today's world which will discuss in more detail as we go through back to their Irreducible fundamentals the kind of primaries the fundamentals that the philosophy deals with now in the structure of his lecture there was a kind of contextual Series of lectures that discuss these topics in in detail beforehand So it was very easy to kind of do that But what I wanted to do will show you that there's actually a logical process By which we can start at the beginning and move towards the end and figure out how to how to make the choices That come up in these later conflicts so Use the example in 1962 at the shrugged sales conference I'm Ram was asked to stand on one foot and give the basics of her philosophy and so she did as follows She said metaphysics is objective reality Epistemology reason Ethics self-interest or rational self-interest to be more appropriate And politics is capitalism or individualism now, I think she was acutely aware of The order in which she mentioned those because that was the exact order in which she mentioned the metaphysics epistemology ethics politics and I think although she didn't explicitly state it. She was acutely aware of this process of logic by which each proceeding branch of Sorry philosophy Actually linked in to the next branch of philosophy and created this framework by which we can answer all of these questions So what I want to do is go through it in this logical process starting with Metaphysics working through to epistemology ethics and ending on politics and showing you how the answers we get from each proceeding branch dictates the answers we should get in the next branch of philosophy So we'll discuss each of the conflicts that kind of arises in so starting with metaphysics Any discussion of philosophy has to start with metaphysics if you will it's the most fundamental of fundamentals if that kind of makes sense metaphysics deals with The fundamental nature of reality, you know the universe as a whole as it as it exists as we perceive it Basically reality, you know, it's no simpler way to dictate to express it than that And what it deals with most specifically is axioms or axiomatic concepts now Those axioms are usually considered self-evident truths. That is that they're obvious We don't need any clarification from them But the problem with that is it kind of dictates it or presumes that there's some sort of Omniscience or omnipotence that gives us knowledge without our perception of it without our actual creation of it The thing is axioms are graphs conceptually as is all of our knowledge, which we'll discuss at some point You can perceive reality, but to understand it you have to conceptualize it now the basic Concepts that we deal with deal with when setting up this philosophical framework the axiomatic concepts of existence identity and consciousness Now our perception of reality as it exists is Is fundamentally dictated by these concepts? That existence exists and it has an identity and that you're conscious of its existence The combination of the concepts leads to the following statement Something exists of which I am conscious and I must discover its identity now some other philosophers I don't know if any of you are aware of René Descartes No, I'm sure you've probably all heard the phrase I think therefore I am Yeah Bullshit fundamentally wrong the problem with it is is That statement suggests that our act of being conscious of perceiving reality is what creates reality That's fundamentally wrong consciousness is an attribute. It's an identity We are an existent with man and we have consciousness as a characteristic We exist independent of consciousness. Some people aren't conscious yet. They still exist We don't create consciousness through our perception of reality And so these axioms are explicit in any states of awareness the statement I am therefore I think it's probably more appropriate Now some some people would argue that These concepts are arbitrary in themselves much like like Descartes statement that reality is created by our consciousness But the problem is anyone who tries to disprove these concepts has to by necessity invoke them to disprove them You can't disprove existence from non-existence. You can't disprove consciousness from unconsciousness. There's it's a logical contradiction So you can't logically argue against these axioms They're self-evident in the respect that existence exists and we're conscious of it So what is logic logic is non contradictory? identification if you try and argue that consciousness doesn't exist you have to argue it from a state of consciousness You can't and that's a contradiction because you're invoking that you yourself don't exist or your consciousness doesn't exist It just doesn't make sense anyway So I'm ran kind of use this statement or Aristotle originally use this statement that a is a or existence exists Something is what it is and it can't be nothing else It may have a specific identity and that you may be able to find out by that it's its characteristics We are man. We exist. We have consciousness as an identity so The primary conflict in any philosophical framework metaphysically is always whether we accept the original axiom that existence exists Or whether we accept non-existence its existence versus non-existence and really there's only one choice that we can make So fundamentally all philosophical frameworks have to be dictated by the fact that existence exists and we're conscious of it So I'm ran some summed it up in layman's terms is nature to be commanded must be obeyed That's and simple Doesn't matter what your wishes whims feelings are existence exists independent of those you can't Wish that something's gonna fall from the sky or wish that you're gonna be be successful You have to adhere to the principles of reality You have to do things that you know and you can learn are gonna make a difference And you know that are gonna have exert an effect based upon the fundamental nature of reality and your relationship to it Just a quote from Atlas shrug then my favorite book Existence exists and the act of grasping that statement implies two corollary axioms But something exists which one perceives and that one exists possessing consciousness Consciousness being the faculty of possessing that which exists. I think that sums it up very well Well, I've hopefully summed up quite well anyway. We'll see Right moving on from metaphysics and and that fundamental conflict of existence versus non-existence We can move on to epistemology First of all, what is epistemology? Epistemology is quite literally the study of knowledge and it asks various questions such as what is knowledge What you know Not what you believe or what you wish but what you actually know what you know is true How we acquire knowledge, you know, what process do we utilize? That actually results in us knowing something knowing that something is true knowing that something is correct knowing a fact of reality and How do we know what we know? Where does our knowledge actually come from does it come from reality or does it come from some omniscient some omnipotent being who knows all independent of reality To know something is true is to be certain in the context of existing information that something is true One thing to accept first of all is or even though we can accept that existence exists The fact that our perception of it is correct is by no means a Given we we're infallible. Unfortunately, you know, we could perceive things incorrectly So it's interesting to it's important to understand that the knowledge we have is based in concepts But those concepts could be based on flawed perceptions So to say something is true is always in the basis of existing knowledge the current context of your knowledge the extent of your knowledge Also to say something that is knowledge implies that you can prove it that you've got evidence in reality of that existing Okay, so like I said knowledge is conceptual and its validity depends on concepts so What is our knowledge based on then? Initially all concert all knowledge is based on percept our perceptual level of awareness our consciousness our awareness of reality We perceive reality for our consciousness and we get information from reality about the nature of something existing and And of its identity of its characteristics So how do we perceive reality? We use two forms of forms. We have our senses, which is our cognition and we have measurements as well now measurements are important Because at perceptual level, we can only perceive so much, you know, you can see the pillars walls You can see everyone next to you But we know from measurement and from the application of science that things exist on a smaller level than we can actually directly perceive and Things exist on a larger scale than we can directly bear witness to and perceive as well but we can still know about them because we can apply process of mathematics and science and Use a process of measurement to understand our relationship to the very small and very big as well so to assume that all knowledge is based on our senses is incorrect, it's based upon Cognition our senses and measurement our application of a method of mathematics and science to it Next stage of knowledge is always how we form concepts. So we perceive reality as existence. We perceive individuals we perceive individual parts of reality Then what we do is we learn its identity i.e. its characteristics and we draw relationships between it So for example all of you out there, you're all men and I can see that but you're all individuals as well You're all individual existence, but there are various characteristics that are related between you all that I can draw links from and Form the concept of man. You're all men yet. You're all individuals at the same time This is how we kind of like integrate further knowledge into our minds instead of just looking at you all and individually picking out each individual person I can create the concept in my mind of man And understand that that incorporates everyone in this room. There's no other women in this room as a So that's kind of how we can build upon our knowledge and it's how our knowledge works existent Learning its identity forming it into a unit and extrapolating from that into a concept And we create our concepts via those means now If anyone wants to learn more about epistemology, I understand it's not exactly the most exciting concept Of subject rather then I would recommend reading iron rands book and introduction to objective is to epistemology This is a basic kind of glazing over it, but it highlights the main point that our knowledge is based in reality Our knowledge is based on what exists rather than what doesn't exist or what we want to exist to what we wish exists So the primary conflict in epistemology Always comes down to reason and faith Another quote to kind of highlight that reason integrates man's perceptions by means of forming abstractions or conceptions Thus raising man's knowledge from perceptual level which he shares with other animals to the conceptual level which he alone can reach The method which reason employs in this process is called logic and logic is the art of non contradictory identification So like we said, it's about the ability to perceive reality and draw relationships between objects and not to contradict yourself in the process Faith is not based in reality. Unfortunately, faith can never claim to hold knowledge. I don't want to piss anyone off who holds faith as some sort of value, but This is my my perception and Logic The problem is is coming back to what we base epistemology on What we base how we gain knowledge on so we go back to the original metaphysics of existence versus nonexistence The state that faith is faith is knowledge independent of existence So that implies that the initial choice that we've made metaphysically is that existence doesn't exist The existence is is in constant flux that we can't know anything about it or that we can know Independent of our relationship to existence. We can just know without seeing without Perceiving without measuring we can just have knowledge like that without any means of actually obtaining it. It just comes to us. So Like I said said though that initial conflict to disagree with it or to try and disprove it is to contradict in itself you can't Prove that existence doesn't exist from a position of nonexistence or that consciousness doesn't exist from a position of Unconsciousness it's like the the inherent ability and from a quote from Anthony's blogger or paraphrasing You know, it's like trying to argue against the inherent ability to argue It's a contradiction in itself and that's why it comes comes down to there's no really two ways about it If you try and prove otherwise then the burden of proof is on on you But you can't do so unless you've got unless you choose that platform from which to prove it from Cool Where was that right? Yeah, so conflict epistemology epistemologically then is always reason versus faith and how you obtain your knowledge Do you obtain your knowledge by means of? Perceiving existence and learning about the real the true nature the facts of reality or do you just assume that knowledge is just Going to come to you independent of what you do or by your wishes whims feelings, etc now Moving on then to potentially some touchy subjects, but we'll we'll see Predominantly in today's world the philosophical conflicts most people would deal with and not going to be metaphysics or epistemological But like I said, they perform the process of determining logically what choices we should make in latter conflicts and those latter conflicts usually end up being Ethical or political or they're certainly the ones that people are consciously aware of So we'll discuss ethics then and we'll kind of move on to the conflicts that predominantly perfuse today's society, so First of all, we're talking about ethics. We're talking about morality and we first need to Identify what morality is And also what ethics is because the two are intertwined And the morality as it states is a code of values to guide man's choices and actions Now if we think about it logically that implies that we've made a certain set of choices Metaphysically and epistemologically first, which we'll then move into as well They necessarily dictate the choices will make ethically and then politically as well and ethics is essentially the process of Learning what those value values are and trying to set that code of values what our morality is and what we hold Is valuable to our own lives So you might think that primarily ethics deals with asking the question what values are, you know What should those values be but before that? that presupposes that there's an answer to the question of Value to whom and why and Like I said that draws on the earlier concept conflicts of existence versus non-existence and reason versus faith So first then why why does man need a code of values? Why does he need a moral compass to guide his life? To know what's good. What's evil? Is that arbitrary or is it based in reality if we accept that we've chosen reality as an absolute and existence exists? We can hopefully try and determine what a rational code of ethics is So in the realm of ethics, we've got something called meta ethics and it's kind of like metaphysics But it deals with the nature of where ethics come from where our code of morals come from where our code of values Come from and the ethics we choose now Historically and predominantly most people would consider that ethics came from either God some omniscient omnipotent being that could just dictate What we should do and what we shouldn't do? Or from society So-called normative ethics the collective ethics the ethics which society thinks you should do the values Which society determines you should have not the values which you choose yourself Now I don't necessarily want to kind of like focus on the specific mysticism involved and faith involved with religion I don't want to touch on any Touchy areas like religion if you want to come talk to me after after about it Then that's fine, but I'm not going to stand there and talk about it now But I will point out the arbitrariness of the construct society If society is necessarily the source of ethics and therefore the source of values that which is good is determined by what? Society wants to be good or thinks is good or votes is good. What the majority think is good But the problem is society is only a collection of individuals. There's no collective mind. There's no collective Person, there's no collective man. There's only you me him her whatever. There's no collective mind There's only individual minds. There's only individual men The problem with society as a source of ethics is that the majority are generally entitled to Determine what is good and it's moral for them to determine what is good regardless of its content and the minority are usually Obliged to follow and that's considered moral that's considered valuable regardless of the content regardless of what the values chosen are regardless of what whether it conflicts with your existence So if we want to change the predominant kind of pattern of four It's these issues that we need to tackle what we need to base them in existence We need to base them in metaphysics and epistemology So we should start again by asking the question. Well, what are values? You know, why does man need them? So what are values in another quote like quotes Value is that which one acts to gain and or keep the concept value is not a primary It presupposes an answer to the question of value to whom and for what it presupposes an entity capable of acting to achieve a Goal in the face of an alternative where no alternative exists no goals and no values are possible So I'm Rand always used a good quote that an indestructible killer robot not a serial killer, but an indestructible robot is Never has to face the choice of whether it's going to live or die. It's indestructible. So therefore it can't hold any values Why should man even need values? There's it can everyone kind of read that it's a bit small. I'll read out anyway There is only one fundamental alternative in the universe. This is kind of coming back to the idea of the indestructible robot Existence or non-existence and it pertains to a single class of entities to living organisms The existence of inanimate matter is unconditional. The existence of life is not It depends upon a specific course of action Matter isn't destructible. It changes forms, but it cannot cease to exist It is only a living organism that faces a constant alternative The issue of life or death life is a process of self-sustaining and self-generating action If organ if an organism fails in that action, it dies It's chemical elements remain, but it's life goes out of existence. It is only the concept of life That makes the concept of value possible. It is only to a living entity that things can be good or evil Indestructible robot can't die. You guys can And then that's the reason why man needs values because man's values only come from the fact that you're alive That is your highest value It's the source of all your values your life man's life Man's life is the ultimate standard of value is this it's the goalpost All this the the measuring post by which you judge all other values because it makes all others possible Man's life or man is an end in itself in himself Now if we kind of think epistemologically about ethics, then we can consider how we come to those concepts Initially knowledge always starts perceptually and for man that might be pleasure or pain Suffering or happiness. So perceptually whatever actions we take may either be happy may create happiness sadness whatever We know whether something's good or evil or we perceive whether something's good or evil Romantly for our senses by those means But as we've seen that's never an automatic process. It has to be based in reality We can't just accept that our perceptions are necessarily correct either Like we said said we need to use a method of reason a method of measurement. We need to know know whether or not they're right so if man's life is the Highest value he can hold Then he has to figure out a way of maintaining that life. He has to answer questions such as how do I get food? How do I get shelter? How do I survive on the most basic level? I know that doesn't necessarily apply in today's society. Some of those things are kind of they just kind of Are there but you still have to act upon them. So the principles are the same Now the problem is does he choose reason or faith to try and achieve those goals? Does he choose to accept that existence exists and he can learn about it and learn how to manipulate it and learn? How to act upon it to get the goals he to achieve the goals he wants and to achieve the sustainment of his life and Therefore of all his other values. Well, does he choose faith? Does he just hope that things will happen somehow? now I've got a quote which is kind of usually uses a bit of a dig at religion, but it kind of Appropriately highlights this I think So I forget the word religion just put the mysticism or faith wherever you want to put it in there Now I'm going to read this out to you because I kind of read along a little bit The man who gets gets given a fish never learns where that fish comes from how he can obtain it He never gains any knowledge past the extent of a man gave me a fish And so we'll be left with the answer with the answer to the question of where or how do I get more fish as somewhere somehow This man is living his life through the means of another waiting for more fish He will die when no one attempts to give him more fish the man who accepts mysticism Religions mystic, but Too touchy the man who accepts mysticism does not attempt it does attempt to gain more fish Sorry, but he chooses to ignore the facts of reality and it instead presumes to ask something or someone Whom he can never know exists to provide him with fish He will die when the consequences of reality catch up with him And he finds that fish don't rain from the sky or appear in his hands because he wants it to or wishes it to or praise To someone to give it to him praise the God or society or whatever The man who learns to fish however, whether he's taught or he seeks that knowledge himself. It's irrelevant He gains knowledge He learns about the fundamental nature of reality. He learns where to catch fish. He learns where to How to catch fish and where to catch them. He learns that by using his knowledge and applying the facts of reality He can provide himself with food and importantly actively be productive in sustaining his life And therefore sustaining all the values that stem from his life So if life is a standard and if knowledge is power And if reason is man's only means of obtaining knowledge and therefore of survival that which is proper to a rational Reasonable human being is what's good and that which goes against that is what's evil fundamentally The man has to has a choice. He has to choose whether to use reason or faith or whether to accept existence or non-existence as his fundamentals The problem is some men don't choose to do that and it's pretty prevalent in society nowadays Now I'm round had a good sort of two words. She used to denote these men. She called them the moochers and And the looters the survival of the moochers and looters is dependent on reason But only indirectly They use force or act as parasites to steal the knowledge of other men To force other men to think for them to provide for them to sustain their lives. They never live through their own lives They always live through the means of other men So even their survival is indirectly Necessitated by reason They try and live independently of it, but they can't it's impossible. You can't deny existence and then try and live in reality The problem is though they try and live on a whim They try and live on this faith-based reality that somehow Somewhere someone will provide for them someone will sustain their life The problem is the range of their survival is always dictated by the range of their victims The more and more they suck the more and more they steal the more and more they take from other people without any Value and return eventually those victims die and as soon as reason stops they die too They always live on the range of a moment They never project they never view their own goals and view the means of how to obtain them in reality themselves by gaining knowledge About it and learning how to achieve those goals I was gonna use a kind of quote for or paraphrase what Matt Hussie said in that video you put on the convention The moochers and looters they're the destroyers The men of reason you guys hopefully you're the creators you create your own lives you create the means of sustaining your own lives Fuck yeah This destroys choose death you guys choose life the men of reason choose life and how to sustain it They choose life and they choose its corresponding values the values which make life possible in which stem from life reason purpose and self-esteem if man desires to live He has to be purposely productive. He has to purposely sustain his own life achieve his own goals So productiveness is his central purpose. His purpose is to sustain his own life Reason is the means of doing that learning about the nature of reality and how to manipulate how to dictate it how to Apply it and how to achieve your goals and prides the result Feeling good about yourself feeling good that you achieved your goals feeling good that you lived your own life Feeling good that you achieved values that you Necessitate as value Now these values have corresponding virtues as well For reason rationality is the virtue of reason It's the recognition that reason is man's only source of knowledge And it's the application of that consistently purpose Productiveness is the recognition that productive work is the process by which man sustains his life whether great or modest Is any rational pursuit any pursuit that is dependent upon your knowledge of existence your reason and self-esteem pride Pride is the recognition that man's life is worth sustaining its moral ambition Never accepting irrational values Never practicing irrational virtues never failing to hold rational values and practicing their virtues Never accepting unearned guilt if one doesn't and if one does earn it never leaving it uncorrected Never resigning passively to one's flaws of character Never placing any concern over one's own self-esteem one's own life And most importantly never accepting the role of a slave or sacrificial animal Like the moochers and looters would want you to live for your own life don't live for theirs Psychologically though We don't tend to face those problems We don't face life and death all the time unless you're like Anthony and you walk in front cars Instead man faces the problem of happiness or suffering and I always like this quote Achieving life is not the equivalent of avoiding death See the moochers they achieve life. Well, sorry, they avoid death rather To a degree until their victims die until the men of reason decide to run away go and strike John Galt But let me kind of clarify that Man's happiness is his own proper is the proper state of his existence You know that you're living your life correctly if you're happy like Anthony said you don't have to necessarily Express that unless you think it's valuable to express that to other people and you express it in the presence of people who are worthy of that happiness You know, I'm really happy to be here with you guys I'm really happy to be here presenting at the convention. I may not necessarily be jumping around doing dances and backflips and smiling and whatnot So to create happiness is to create a life that's worth that you deem is worth living It's to stand there doing what you do doing what's productive to you and to say This is worth living for this is why I'm living. This is what I enjoy. This what's makes me happy This is what sustains my life. This is valuable to me and this is what is worth living for so When man's consider when you consider the fact that Logically existence exists reason is our means of perceiving it and Happiness is man's proper goal in life. We have to consider that the the only sort of Rational code of morality is our own long-term rational self-interest We have to project view our goals know what's going to make us happy What's going to succeed what's going to help us succeed how we can achieve the goals and how we can live our own life and achieve our own happiness so Long-term rational self-interest projecting viewing goals that sort of things. What's important? I was going to make a clarification. So one of the things That some philosophers use as an counter-arguments this idea of self-interest or selfishness because it's got such a dogma associated with the word is Some people view hedonism as being Selfish hedonism is is living for the purpose of pleasure living for the purpose of happiness But only on the range of a moment it considers that any anything that produces acute happiness You know happiness on a short scale is good and anything that doesn't is bad The problem is it doesn't consider the long-term impact of things, you know drawing a kind of example Nutritionally because it's quite easy to do some things taste good and they feel good and they make you feel happy when you eat them But you might know that that they're shit for your health So should that necessarily dictate, you know, whether or not you choose to eat those things wherever on it You choose that as a goal whether or not you choose your health as a goal your life as a goal Being hedonistic and just gorging on pizza and shit, you know, you might enjoy it But it's going to catch up with you and eventually you're going to be unhappy It's failing to see a long-term happiness and long-term success in your life and it applies to anything But that's just the example that I could think of at the time So it's avoiding living on the range of them of the moment It's considering it's projecting seeing where you're going having a vision of the future like Anthony mentioned for the conference You guys should have a vision of your own future You should have an ideal that you can project and try and create in reality by accepting the nature of reality and learning about it and applying it I thought it was quite appropriate in dealing with ethics and it being a bit of a pickup convention No, I didn't mean to say that And that you know, you guys are probably here for the kind of like pick up and Relationships and that's what we're gonna obviously a lot of the speakers speakers. I thought ethically it would be It would be inappropriate to avoid the issue of love and what what love really is as a kind as a concept So ethically what of love Lovely picture there Fundamentally to love is to value now I go into a bit of a debate over whether or not love is an emotional whether or not love is a Concept that we've created to denote our value of something And I think it's a latter and I think if you guys are familiar with any of Nathaniel Brandon's works As far as I'm aware, he kind of has the same sort of line of thought love is is to value and I think that's actually his own quote Yeah, yeah so Only a man with an unyielding uncompromised standard value can even begin to consider love if love is to value You have to have that measuring post by which you deem what is valuable And if that's your own life and you've got the self-esteem to be able to say that your own life is that standard of value Then you've got the means by which to judge whether or not something is valuable to yourself and whether or not you truly love it If a man does not value himself, how can you value anything else? Love is a judgment of value It's to say in your mind that what you love is valuable to you and your life and your happiness To love without condition is to not love at all by loving everyone equally without any judgment of the value to your life They represent you effectively love no one it makes love it inflates love as a concept. It makes it Unvaluable how am I doing for time? Okay, should be good. I feel like this is going on for ages Okay, so Yeah, well Okay, so moving on from love love talking about relationships Necessarily we have to move on to the idea of rights and what are rights? Socially they're how man recognizes morality in other men If man's life is an end in itself He has to recognize that fact in every man because every man is a man every man is an existent every man necessarily has the same code of values or should have the same code of values in the same moral value measuring post so to attempt to Not recognize that or to not recognize that in another man is to contradict that exists in yourself and that that's your standard of value So like I say rights are the means of recognizing the unavoidable fact in man's dealings with each other Excuse me so The primary conflict then when it comes to ethics and what determines rights and what determines how you should Live your life and make your choices ethically and what is moral? What is valuable? Is your own rational self-interest whether you live for the sake of your own life? Whether you live for your own goals and your own happiness or whether you live for the sake of others which is altruism now Just to clarify usually people use to look at the conflict of egoism versus altruism but and I was actually talking to someone I can't remember who about I think it was actually is not here and about this idea of Nietzsche egoism and I like to Kind of keep that separate and I'll go into the into the reasons why and just a moment just because Egoism from Nietzsche's point of view is irrational And I'll explain why in just a moment So the conflict from rational self-interest to altruism is is asked the question You know is man a rational animal does man have a right to his own life and his own interests You know or is he obligated to live for the sake of others as? A slave to any dictator any Omnipotent being that some arbitrary construct or to society itself to the majority of others to the mob rule of Democracy ethics should be distinct from a mock democracy. It doesn't have a rightful place in there because That holds that whatever the majority says is good is moral and whatever the minority say Yep, I think there is a proper purpose for it in but it definitely doesn't relate to any form of ethical system So things that aren't optional things are useful It's useful and then and the nature of man's Code of values Unfortunately certainly from my perspective and from hopefully the way I've presented it to you guys today It's not a matter of choice. It is a necessity of reality and when it comes to a government and we'll I'll briefly go into politics or I don't want to kind of dwell on it too much in this talk Is it should should only? Pertain to things that are purely optional things that don't have an impact on Directly on whether or not man can achieve his own life is his own liberty and his own happiness So and in fact, I was going to suggest that any of you guys haven't read it You should read Anthony's blog post Liberty Unlocked Declarationism I was going to go on to suggesting that anyway because he does it does a great job of Kind of debunking the whole bullshit that is government that exists nowadays Yeah, cool Okay Okay, yeah, so like I said, I wanted to clarify Nietzsche and selfie self-interest or egoism to Rand's concept of egoism you know selfishness is quite literally concerned with your own interests and One of the reasons that I'm around uses that is because she likes to be quite concrete She liked to be quite controversial and she liked the fact that it did stay the stigma that was attached to it did stir this kind of like response in people But and and you know the proponents of of altruism people who say that you are your brother's key keeper that you should live for Are others have tried to sort of like demonize the term and create this imagery of a brute who goes around metaphorically even not metaphorically with a club to basically just take what he wants Irrespective of his recognition of anyone else's rights or to their own life and liberty and happiness and essentially that's Nietzsche's form of egoism he He suggests that anything that's Good for yourself is good just because you deem it good for yourself regardless of whether or not you can accept that fact in another person it comes back to this I Dear dear of rights Nietzsche recognizes that Life is your own standard of living and anything that is good to you Is good rather than evil regardless of the means of getting that he ignores the means of getting that and he ignores the means of the fact That it's a contradiction if he fails to recognize the fact that my life is my own your life is your own your life is your own He fails to recognize the fact that that is Evident in every man So I try to avoid using the word egoism just because some people relate that to Nietzsche's concept of it It's either of a guy going around with a gun or a club and just taking whatever he wants and that being good Also wanted to clarify that some people see benevolence and self-interest as independent from each other You know a lot of the the altruists and the people who follow those sorts of doctrines and the government officials and Leaders and stuff who tell you these sorts of things kind of try and make it clear that You know that the business leaders and whatnot there They're only out for themselves and that's all they do that You know they can't do anything good for each other for another person But you know they've got no, you know Apple or whatever or Microsoft or whatever everything they do They're doing it for themselves, but there's an act of benevolence there as well when making a product available Making you know providing value to other people as well So one thing to understand is that self-interest is not independent of benevolence you know By standing here today I'm doing a kind of like active benevolence by providing you guys hopefully with some interesting information and something useful But I do it out of purely self-interest. It's not a contradiction You know it's in my interest to see young men like you educated on these sorts of topics and these sorts of principles because you guys Myself and people here, you know with the next generation with the guys who're going to shape the world with the next set of philosophers who are going to dictate You know the patterns of culture and and what people accept is right and what people accept is wrong What people accept is good and evil and what choices they make in their lives and how they fundamentally perceive reality and make choices So selfishness and benevolence and not mutually exclusive Interestingly, I think altruism benevolence are mutually exclusive, you know, just try and live Consistently altruistically to just serve everyone else other than yourself Because if you manage to do it then you've achieved the impossible Because the proponents of altruism say that You should only that your happiness is dictated by the happiness you provide to others And it's still selfish if you do something for others and get a sense of happiness out of it It's an impossible doctrine to hold up to you can't be consistently altruistic because even if you do something for someone else You have to take no pleasure no happiness nothing out of it for you to be consistently altruistic. It's impossible I'd love to see anyone trying to All they'll achieve is death Anyway, right moving on from ethics over the last last topic is politics Now I'm gonna kind of try and kind of breeze over this just because Like I said say you'll get a lot more information than I can provide it in the next or 10 minutes or so from Anthony's Blog essay on declarationism So we've got a nice picture of what I think I don't know if that's an accurate picture or not There were several on there. That's declaration of independence Yeah, sorry Anyway Right, so that that's what that what the picture is and necessarily any political system has to be logically dictated by the morality which underpins it the ethics which underpins it So what I'm round proposed was that the only political system that's consistently ethical was laissez faire capitalism that Government only existed to secure the rights of man now without going into any kind of like like Economical theories whether it's capitalism versus, you know government stimulus or anything like that, you know I personally I couldn't give a shit whether or not one particular economic system or government intervention in an economy was More beneficial to the economy and more beneficial to everyone than the other the problem I've got is whether or not it's it's ethical whether it's moral or not for government to do anything other than just protect Our rights to hold the monopoly on force and remove force from man's relationships with each other so that we can just deal with each Other as traders as individuals so another quote then to kind of explain that and Summarize it if physical force is to be barred from social relationships men need an institution charged with the task of protecting their rights under an Objective code of rules. This is the task of government of a proper government. It's basic task It's only moral justification and the reason why men do need a government a government is the means of placing the retaliatory use of physical force under objective control i.e. under objectively defined laws now I used to when I first got into kind of like objectivism used to think that Anarchy with that there wasn't necessarily a role for government I was a bit maybe naive thinking that every man is going to be completely rational and hold a completely rational set of set of morals and We'd all be able to live in this wonderful perfect world where everyone adhered to all of that But unfortunately that doesn't happen So this is the reason why man necessarily needs government because man has to choose to be rational has to choose reason has to Choose existence has to choose all these absolutes and some men don't choose it They're the moochers and looters and the only reason government should exist is to protect our rights protect our life from those people so the main political Conflict then is capitalism or individualism or whatever word you want to use to kind of say it versus collectivism or socialism or whatever word you want to use again, I thought this picture was just quite funny, but You've got socialism or collectivism. That's basically where you live for your own life and you Gain all your goals and you achieve all your values and then someone comes along and gets government or themselves with a gun to say Actually, no, we need that so we're going to take it from you So that's a bit odd considering what code of morals. We've just dictated capitalism on the other hand Means that you can achieve all your values and they belong to you and whether or not this represents you as an individual and you can protect You know your property in your own life or whether this is metaphorically representing government protecting, you know The moochers from stealing your values is irrelevant, but that's basically the general gist of the two conflicts It's either you get to live for your own life and gain your own values or you have to do it for someone else We either by force or you know fraud or whatever So we end on these simple choices in existence versus non-existence reason versus faith self-interest versus altruism capitalism versus collectivism and hopefully I've shown that Logically, we can answer these latter questions by understanding the basis of these former fundamental conflicts And I think that's it Any questions? So basically what what so what do you know Neil what Neil was asking is and you know at what point? should government play a role in in regulating is that good in regulating you know essentially what is man's relationships with each other like You were talking on the level of sort of like like businesses and corporate things But it's irrelevant whether or not it's a business or whether or not it's two individual men dealing with each other I think the problem is as soon as we start to get government to regulate things We're removing the personal responsibility if for example, I'm a customer and I come in to buy a product There's responsibility on both ends of the trade involved There's a responsibility of me of not being a naive dumbass and finding out exactly what it is that I'm giving my money for And there's a responsibility on the client to provide me with the correct information About the product and not try and defraud me and give me something that I think I'm paying for and yet I've received something different Now that this is one of the reasons why why government should have a court system to deal with these types of things an objective set of Laws to say that you know basically, you know fraud is is no different than any kind of force It's just you know semantics really in sort of like practice. It's different But the end result is the same and I think that You know as long as soon as government starts interfering those sorts of things. It removes personal responsibility and You know and personal choice, you know You may what you met some people may learn that something in a product is bad for them But it still should be their choice whether or not they you know Dean that a product is still being valuable to them or whether or not they want that, you know For example, like with the joy of us. We're out having a few drinks last night I'm under no sort of impression that alcohol is good for me. It is good for my health But I enjoyed it and I think the the choice should be my own to to buy that. I was just showing Anthony in the Metro this morning. There's been some calls to legalize All for all forms of drugs and and you know, I think that that that's what should what should happen It you know, the personal choice should be made by the person who is making that you know It should be individual Well, this I don't think is is by any means a role for for government because the problem with government is is To perform those sorts of actions. It has to have money or something from somewhere else. Now if it's not generating Yeah, yes. Yeah, absolutely You know if if if the person who's an abusing drugs or whatever initiates physical force or any kind of kind of Force into into a relationship with whoever then, you know, that is Would be deemed evil legal and government should step in but in terms of helping that person to Get away from their drug dependence, you know, that has to be on sort of various levels It has to be their own personal choice. It has to be And then outside of that it should be, you know The benevolence of whoever they're personally related related with either their family or friends It has to be their choice as well to decide to help them Government shouldn't be able to turn, you know, it'd be no different than There was a brilliant video and I can't remember what it the name of the video, but I'll try and remember it and I'll try and say but basically it was the extent of similar sorts of scenario so and so's neighbor couldn't afford to go to college or whatever so You know to two friends one of them decided to be benevolent give him some money because you know Obviously thought it was valuable to help him put him through college. The other friend didn't want to So instead the friend that gave him money Decided to go and get a group of people to sign some forms and have a vote to see whether or not the other person Had to give him money or not. It's the same role with government. It's basically Instead of you for one person forcing another person It's just getting another organization to take money or force that person to perform an action Which they may not necessarily want to do themselves And I think those sorts of relationships we brought down to a more sort of like individual level They should be dictated by the person in person involved and the person people around them their personal choices Rather than being forced to do something by by government or any other kind of like organization or individuals Is that answer your question? Anything else? So anyone can come speak to me afterwards