…Reason (the faculty which identifies and integrates the material provided by man’s senses) is man’s only means of perceiving reality, his only source of knowledge, his only guide to action, and his basic means of survival.
[/quote]
**
[/QUOTE]
I thought you said Reason was Logic. Now you seem to be saying Reason is the mind itself. I don’t need logic to see. There is no congitive process with occurs when I see a bottle in front of me – I just look and see. Now, sure, on some “sub-processing” level my mind identifies it as a bottle because it has the contours of a certain bi-nomial curve rotated vertically around a point. It has the sheen of glass illuminated. It emits the color brown, except where there is a label saying “Samuel Adams” and many other things which are words, comprised of symbols which make certain sounds, and I can read them. All of these assumptions are of course based on others, but what it comes down to is:
The koinous kosmos is.
Or, it is not. Or perhaps it is an illusion, like the gnostics believe.
Please do not assume that I quoted Ayn Rand for any reason other than the reason I specified: as a counter-example that reason had never been identified as an epistemology.
Dang it Lib. I say X has never been given as an epistemology and you provide a counterexample that Y has been given as an epistimology, and then say that though X and Y are completely different it is still a valid argument, I’m sure you are aware of a good latin term for this!
[quote]
Please do not assume that I quoted Ayn Rand for any reason other than the reason I specified: as a counter-example that reason had never been identified as an epistemology
[quote]
This is getting embarrasing. Have you read the material you quoted?
What is reason? It is a faculty. What does the faculty do? It identifies and integrates the material provided by man’s senses? Is the faculty at issue limited to identifying and integrating material provided by senses, or can it also be used to identify and integrate material provided by the imagination? Lets look to the rest of the quote with the paranthetical information removed:
Can the “faculty” encompass imagined materials? If it is the only source of knowledge, and I know about things that I have not perceived by my senses, then reason must affect more than what I have perceived with my senses.
Stop being disingenous (I give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume you are not just stupid). No reasonable person would define reason as “an epistemology of extrapolation from axioms or experiences accepted on faith.” Reason is defined by the rest of the English-speaking world as “the power of comprehending, inferring, or thinking especially in orderly rational ways” (from Webster’s). Reason is a tool, not an epistemology. As a tool, reason has been used for mathematics, philosophy (including epistemology), particle physics, and even religion.
Libertarian: May I add a little to RM Mentoc’s comment? (I’m sure he doesn’t need my help, but I kinda like short simple words, being in some repects a short simple person:)
“This 747 has rigid aluminum wings and big jet engines; therefore it can fly.”
Notice that this doesn’t say anything about whether or not bats, Piper Cubs, pink unicorns or warthogs can fly.
Next: you suggest that since neither faith nor reason can ultimately be proven, your experience of a god is as valid as mine of 2 + 2 = 4. Do you give equal value to the conclusions of others who claim to have experienced alien abductions, Elvis at the supermarket, and Invisible Pink Unicorns? If not, why not?
As far as purple ravens go, gEEk had it right: we can’t truthfully say that we know they don’t exist. But: if you say they do, and then you describe them as breathing air, surviving only in a temperature range of 0-120 deg F, and living on the planet Mercury, we can definitely say that they don’t. In the same way, if you want to describe the Xian god as being absolutely good, and then say that this god is the same one described in the Xian Bible (maybe you don’t), we can legitimately say that no being that orders or causes the slaughter of thousands of children because it doesn’t approve of their parents’ behaviour is good, and therefore that particular god doesn’t exist. If you want to argue that murdering babies under some circumstances is compatible with perfect goodness and mercy, then I suggest that we don’t have a common vocabulary with which to communicate.
Finally (slight topic hijack here) in another thread you commented that in Libertia “stupid people” would be dirt poor. Since you seem to include Descartes in the ranks of morons, if I may coin a phrase “Which of us shall 'scape hanging?” or at least dirt poverty…
Will you please calm down? The term you are searching for is “equivocation”. However, I was not responding to you. I was responding to Morgan. That’s why it had Morgan in bold letters at the top.
I was responding to his or her assertion that “Reason has never been defined as an epistemology…”. I offerered a counter-example, that Ayn Rand had in fact done exactly that, citing reason as the epistemology of Objectivism, the philosophy she developed.
You are shadow-boxing.
Morgan
Despite your Mack truck diplomacy, I will attempt one last time to engage you in civil debate.
Whether you like it or not, Ayn Rand stood up on one foot and said “Epistemology: Reason”. Websters gives several definitions of reason, including this one: a sufficient ground of explanation or of logical defense; especially : something (as a principle or law) that supports a conclusion or explains a fact which is harmonious with the definition I gave.
Besides, the definition you cherry picked calls reason a “power”, not a “tool”.
Lib, I think you’re responding here to jmullaney’s charge. I, of course, never looked at your link (because I decided long ago never again to willingly subject myself to Ayn Rand ).
).