Today's soundtrack is Alessia Cara: Know-It-All.
This morning, I'm reading chapter three of Ayn Rand's Philosophy: Who Needs It, "The Metaphysical Versus the Man-Made."
Rand observes that modern theories see emotional deficits as the reason why humans suffer; Rand asserts that it is in fact intellectual needs that cause human suffering. She says that "Most men spend their lives in futile rebellion against things they cannot change, in passive resignation to the things they can, and--never attempting to learn the difference--in chronic guilt and self-doubt on both counts" (p. 32).
When examining Reinhold Niebuhr's "serenity prayer," Rand believes it addresses good philosophical viewpoints. If man can change the state of a thing through his choices, he has the power of volition. If man cannot change the state of a thing through his choices, that thing is an example of "the primacy of existence or the primacy of consciousness" (p. 32).
We call the fact that "the universe exists independent of consciousness" the primacy of existence. Each thing has an identity whether or not it has yet been discovered, whether or not it is currently being observed - this is the Law of Identity. If we reverse this, we get the primacy of consciousness, which says that the universe "is the product of a consciousness" (p. 32).
To survive, man must recognize that he has the ability to modify the world through his actions by rearranging the existing elements around him. Man does not create; he cannot make something out of nothing. Man can only rearrange and modify that which already exists. Rand quotes Francis Bacon: "'Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed'" (p. 34). We must work within the guidelines of existing natural laws to work within our universe.
As man's mind is a part of nature, we must work within the limits of our consciousness. We have the power to observe our environment, and to think of ways to change it, but we cannot change it by thinking of changing it. We can make changes, but we cannot avoid the consequences of the changes. Each man must judge the rightness of his decisions based on the facts of reality, the metaphysically given, the things that cannot be changed, the natural events that happen without human intervention. "Serenity comes from the ability to say 'Yes' to existence. Courage comes from the ability to say 'No' to the wrong choices made by others" (p. 37).
Rand says that modern philosophy wants to "rob men of serenity and courage" (p. 38) by telling men that they cannot predict, cannot plan, cannot command nature. But modern philosophers are wrong to do so. Man can predict, can plan, and can command nature - if he works within its the guidelines of the metaphysically given - things like gravity, changing seasons, physics, etcetera. A system based on the primacy of existence says that man has rights and an identity; a system based on the primacy of consciousness leads to attributing traits such as flexibility and disposability to man. To undermine the primacy of existence, philosophers say that nothing has to be the way it is. But that statement is only true when applied to the man-made. If anything were different in the universe, in the metaphysically given realm, then reality would be altered.
A crippling mental barrier that many face when trying to accomplish something is not asking whether it can be done, but asking whether they can do it. We need not question our innate ability to do something first, but must first ask what must be done to accomplish the thing. Whether or not we feel a thing to be achievable or unachievable or true or false does not change the identity of the thing. It exists separately from our consciousness.
The Law of Identity applies to everything, both metaphysically given and man-made, for even though a man-made thing did not once exist in its current form, it exists now; though once an action had not been performed, it has now been performed. Nothing that has come into being can be removed from time, even if the thing itself is destroyed; at one point it did exist, it was created, it was performed.
Things that a man makes become facts: "A skyscrapter is a man-made fact, a mountain is a metaphysically given fact" (p. 42). If a man chooses to be "a worthless scoundrel" (p. 42) then the fact is that he is a worthless scoundrel, and will be treated thus by society. If he chooses to change his character through his personal volition, then he can change this fact, but he cannot change the fact that he was once a terrible person.
Rand identifies two special characteristics of man's volition: first, man's choices can be evaluated and criticized; second, a man's choices cannot be made by other men without his consent. Nobody can make a man think; he "is neither to be obeyed nor to be commanded" (p. 43) if he tries to force someone to think something, or if someone else tries to make him think in a certain way. Man is not a means to another man's end.
So when it comes to the things around us, we must accept the metaphysically given, and we can rearrange our entironment to change things for our purposes, but our fellow men are in another category. Yes, we must accept what they do, for it cannot be changed, but we do not have to agree with what they've done; we may attempt to change someone's mind in a matter, but we cannot force them to think or act in a certain way. We need not submit voluntarily to "man-made evils (there are no others)" (p. 43). If man wishes to change man, he must persuade man to change; if man wishes to change nature, he must force nature to change. The opposite will not work.
