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Post 160

Thursday, July 6, 2006 - 11:20pmSanction this postReply
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Jon, no.

The difference has to do with something more than intellect. A criminal can be awful cunning -- but lacks the character to live well. Built character comes from habitual action (Aristotle). There is no replacement -- no dispensation -- from that fact of reality.

You can be cunning, and you can be moral -- but these 2 things don't 'necessarily' coincide. By the way, here are some other molecules that can 'change who you are' (ie. that can make you smarter than you are right now) ...

=================
The effect of vincamine, hydergine and piracetam on the firing rate of locus coeruleus neurons. J Neural Transm. 1982;55(2):101-9.

All three compounds, when administered intraperitoneally, increased the firing rate of noradrenergic neurons in the chloral hydrate anaesthetized animals. Vincamine and hydergine had a similar potency producing a maximal mean increase of about 70% at a dose of 1 mg/kg.

Likewise, piracetam was significantly less potent eliciting a 30 to 40% increase in firing at doses of 300 and 1000 mg/kg, respectively.
=================


=================
[On the meaning of psychometrically operationalized therapeutic effects in the treatment of brain insufficiency phenomena caused by old age demonstrated by the "Nurnberger-Alters-Inventar" (author's transl)] Arzneimittelforschung. 1982;32(5):584-90.

The drug effects of dihydroergotoxine (Hydergin) and piracetam were examined in a sample of 44 old-age home residents, 76 years average age, using performance tests, nurse-ratings for the need of care and self-evaluation measures of the "Nurnberger Alters-Inventar" (NAI).

Within a subsample of 18 patients, selected according to certain EEG-criteria, EEG day profiles were assessed. The medication lasted for 6 weeks. 2 mg dihydroergotoxine or 0.8 g piracetam, respectively, were applied three times a day.

Initial effects were observed for both medications after 3 weeks in terms of improvements in the cognitive performance, for the activities of daily living and need of care, respectively, and for subjective, physical, functional and social self-evaluations.

After 6 weeks, at the end of the study, these effects were confirmed only for dihydroergotoxine, whereas the piracetam subjects could not stabilize these improvements. The psychometric results were corroberated by the EEG-data.

=================


=================
The impairment of long-term potentiation in rats with medial septal lesion and its restoration by cognition enhancers. Neurobiology (Bp). 1994;2(3):255-66.

The effect of medial septal lesion on long-term potentiation (LTP) and the action of four cognition enhancers were studied in rat dentate gyrus, in vivo.

The medial septum was partially lesioned by a radiofrequency lesion generator. The effect of lesion was studied on hippocampal function measuring two parameters; the amplitude of the maximal population spikes and the increase in population spikes evoked by high frequency stimulation of the perforant path (LTP).

Both parameters were found to be significantly lower in the lesioned group than in the non-lesioned one. Four drugs (physostigmine, piracetam, vinpocetine and Hydergine), known to be effective in dementia and/or in cognitive impairments, were administered 1 h after the lesion procedure and thereafter once a day for 6 days after the operation.

LTP was induced and measured at day 7. All drugs produced a complete restoration of the measured parameters affected by the lesion.

=================

Ed


Post 161

Thursday, July 6, 2006 - 11:36pmSanction this postReply
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... and more ...

=====================
Perinatal choline influences brain structure and function. Nutr Rev. 2006 Apr;64(4):197-203.

Choline is critical during fetal development, when it influences stem cell proliferation and apoptosis, thereby altering brain structure and function (memory is permanently enhanced in rodents exposed to choline during the latter part of gestation).
=====================


=====================
Vinpocetine enhances retrieval of a step-through passive avoidance response in rats. Pharmacol Biochem Behav. 1987 Jan;26(1):183-6.

Vinpocetine administered 60 minutes prior to testing for retention significantly increased the number of rats performing the passive avoidance response. Retrieval enhancement was dose-related in an inverted U-shaped function with the effective doses at 18 and 30 mg/kg PO.

These data support the view that vinpocetine has cognition-activating abilities as defined in an animal model of memory retrieval.
=====================


=====================
Vinpocetine: nootropic effects on scopolamine-induced and hypoxia-induced retrieval deficits of a step-through passive avoidance response in rats. Pharmacol Biochem Behav. 1986 Apr;24(4):1123-8.

Vinpocetine (peak effect dose [PED]= 200 mg/kg PO), aniracetam (PED = 100 mg/kg PO), vincamine (PED = 30 mg/kg PO), and Hydergine (PED = 1 mg/kg PO) prevented memory disruption by scopolamine.

Vinpocetine (PED = 3 mg/kg PO) and aniracetam (PED = 30 mg/kg PO) were also effective in preventing disruption of passive avoidance retention impaired by 7% oxygen hypoxia.

These data support the view that vinpocetine, a compound chemically distinct from the pyrrolidinones, has a cognitive activating ability as defined in models of both scopolamine-induced and hypoxia-induced memory impairment in rats.
=====================

Ed

Post 162

Friday, July 7, 2006 - 11:10amSanction this postReply
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Note:

Vinpocetine and choline [CDP-Choline** (Citicholine) is best] are available at health food stores. A 'natural' product called Memory Formula*** (by Country Life) contains both.

Hydergine, centrophenoxine, selegiline, and piracetam are some core, prescription smart drugs.


**
http://www.naturdoctor.com/Chapters/Research/CDP_Choline.html


***
http://www.country-life.com/moreinfo.cfm?Category=19&Product_ID=319

Ed

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Post 163

Friday, July 7, 2006 - 1:26pmSanction this postReply
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Jon:
Do you think it a problem for your line of argument that there are millions of coke addicts, but only a couple of Freuds, Williams and Rands?
Not to mention the fact that many really great minds very probably are/were no coke users (Einstein, Bohr, Heisenberg, Pauli, Dirac, Schrödinger, Fermi, Feynman, Yukawa, Weinberg, Wiles etc. etc.)

Ed thinks that snowing us under with pages of quotes constitutes some proof, while these only mention some effects of certain chemicals on the brain. Well, that can of course also be used as evidence for the importance of genetics. The human body is an extremely complex chemical factory, and it comes of course as no surprise that tampering with those chemical processes may have some effects on the brain. But the "blueprint" of the factory is in the genes, and it is also highly probably that no two "factories" will be exactly the same, and so some of them will be better suited to some tasks than other ones.

Rand seems to have thought it was possible to raise your IQ from 110 to 150. Where is the evidence that this is possible? Certainly not in those quotes. Moreover, Rand was no doubt not thinking of taking smart pills, she thought you could just do it by making the right choices. After all this is a forum for a discussion of Rand's ideas, so let us not get sidetracked by diverting the attention away from her error.

Anyway, if creating geniuses is just a question of creating the right environment, why don't we see more geniuses? Where are the new Mozarts and the Einsteins? Among the children of Objectivists who know how to create them? By feeding them smart pills? With nicotine, coke and Dexatrim? I wonder what all those geniuses must have swallowed.

There is even a recipe for creating geniuses:
There are 3 key things required, in order to create a genius:

1) being born without a restrictive brain disorder (e.g. microcephaly -- something maternal fish oil prevents)
2) abundant mental stimulation in the first decade of life (when canalization occurs)
3) abundant mental stimulation thereafter (because you have to use it or lose it)
That doesn't explain those people whose geniality was already obvious at a very early age, especially in the case of musical and mathematical genius. That doesn't mean that those people won't develop their abilities in the course of time or that some of them may fail later in life for some reason, but the geniality of for example the young Mozart was undeniable.

The difference has to do with something more than intellect. A criminal can be awful cunning -- but lacks the character to live well. Built character comes from habitual action (Aristotle). There is no replacement -- no dispensation -- from that fact of reality.
And why do some people build their character by habitual action and others not? Perhaps while some of them may not have been born with the tendency to habitual action?





Post 164

Friday, July 7, 2006 - 1:44pmSanction this postReply
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How well-established is this stuff about "abundant mental stimulation in the first decade of life (when canalization occurs)"?  I.e. what full-dress controlled, peer-reviewed, randomized, statistically significant studies do we have to support this finding?   I ask because I just read an article in the July/August Atlantic Monthly that maintains pretty convincingly that the notion is junk science whose main function is to pry money out of anxious parents.  This is how they sold home computers twenty years ago and encyclopedias thirty or forty years before that.

Peter


Post 165

Saturday, July 8, 2006 - 2:31amSanction this postReply
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Cal,

Earlier, you complained that I didn't have enough research to marshall. Now, you complain that I marshall too much research. ???

;-)


Peter,

=========================
How well-established is this stuff about "abundant mental stimulation in the first decade of life (when canalization occurs)"?

=========================

Here's more (of the same) ...


=========================
Extensive enriched environments protect old rats from the aging dependent impairment of spatial cognition, synaptic plasticity and nitric oxide production. Behav Brain Res. 2006 May 15;169(2):294-302. Epub 2006 Feb 28.

In aged rodents, neuronal plasticity decreases while spatial learning and working memory (WM) deficits increase. As it is well known, rats reared in enriched environments (EE) show better cognitive performances and an increased neuronal plasticity than rats reared in standard environments (SE).

We hypothesized that EE could preserve the aged animals from cognitive impairment through NO dependent mechanisms of neuronal plasticity. WM performance and plasticity were measured in 27-month-old rats from EE and SE.

EE animals showed a better spatial WM performance (66% increase) than SE ones. Cytosolic NOS activity was 128 and 155% higher in EE male and female rats, respectively. Mitochondrial NOS activity and expression were also significantly higher in EE male and female rats.

Mitochondrial NOS protein expression was higher in brain submitochondrial membranes from EE reared rats. Complex I activity was 70-80% increased in EE as compared to SE rats.
=========================

=========================
Gene expression profiling in the hippocampus of rats subjected to focal cerebral ischemia and enriched environment housing. Restor Neurol Neurosci. 2006;24(1):17-23.

PURPOSE: Enriched environment housing enhances brain plasticity and improves recovery of impaired sensorimotor and cognitive functions of rats subjected to transient middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO).

The present study applied microarray technique to investigate the molecular basis through which enriched environment might improve spatial learning in MCAO rats.

METHODS: MCAO rats were housed in enriched environment or in standard single cages, and sham-operated rats were housed in standard single cages. Spatial learning was assessed using the Morris water-maze on postoperative days 22 to 24. Total RNA from the ipsilateral hippocampus was extracted for microarray analysis after the follow-up period.

RESULTS: Water-maze performance on postoperative days 22 to 24 showed that rats subjected to transient MCAO were impaired in the hippocampus-dependent Morris water-maze test.

Enriched environment housing reversed the spatial learning impairment on postoperative day 23. Gene expression in the hippocampus was not affected by MCAO or following enriched environment housing.
=========================

=========================
Long-term administration of green tea catechins improves spatial cognition learning ability in rats. J Nutr. 2006 Apr;136(4):1043-7.

Green tea catechins confer potent biological properties including antioxidation and free-radical scavenging. We investigated the effect of long-term oral administration of green tea catechins (Polyphenon E, PE: EGCG 63%; EC 11%; EGC 6%; ECG 6%) mixed with water on the spatial cognition learning ability of young rats.

The learning ability of rats administered PE (0%, 0.1%, 0.5%) for 26 wk was assessed in the partially baited 8-arm radial maze. Relative to controls, those administered PE had improved reference and working memory-related learning ability.

=========================

=========================
Environmental enrichment promotes neurogenesis and changes the extracellular concentrations of glutamate and GABA in the hippocampus of aged rats. Brain Res Bull. 2006 Jun 15;70(1):8-14. Epub 2005 Dec 5.

The aim of the present study was to investigate the effects of environmental enrichment on the neurogenesis and the extracellular concentrations of glutamate and GABA in the hippocampus of freely moving young and aged rats.

Male Wistar rats of 2 (young) and 25 (old) months of age were housed during 8 weeks in an enriched environment; control rats were kept in individual plastic cages during that same period of time.

Rats were injected intraperitoneally with bromodeoxyuridine (BrdU; 40mg/kg; 7 days) during the fourth week of the housing period to detect neurogenesis in the dentate gyrus (DG) of the hippocampus.

Rats were sacrified 6 weeks after the last injection of BrdU. During the last week of housing, rats were tested in the water maze for the evaluation of spatial learning.

After the housing period, rats were stereotaxically implanted with guide-cannulas to accommodate microdialysis probes in the CA3 area of the hippocampus and the extracellular concentrations of glutamate and GABA were determined.

Aged rats showed a decrease in the number of BrdU positive cells in the dentate gyrus compared to young rats. However, neurogenesis in the dentate gyrus of both young and old rats was increased in animals housed in an enriched environment.

Microdialysis experiments in the CA3 area of the hippocampus showed that enriched housing conditions increased basal extracellular concentrations of glutamate in aged rats.

Perfusion of KCl 100mM produced a higher increase of extracellular glutamate and GABA in aged rats but not in young rats housed in an enriched environment compared to control rats.

These results suggest that enriched housing conditions change both neurogenesis in the dentate gyrus and glutamate and GABA levels in the CA3 area of the hippocampus of aged rats.
=========================

=========================
Enriched environment experience overcomes the memory deficits and depressive-like behavior induced by early life stress. Neurosci Lett. 2006 Jun 19; [Epub ahead of print]

Stress in early life is believed to cause cognitive and affective disorders, and to disrupt hippocampal synaptic plasticity in adolescence into adult, but it is unclear whether exposure to enriched environment (EE) can overcome these effects.

Here, we reported that housing rats in cages with limited nesting/bedding materials on postnatal days 2-21 reduced body weight gain, and this type of early life stress impaired spatial learning and memory of the Morris water maze and increased depressive-like behavior of the forced swim test in young adult rats (postnatal days 53-57).

Early life stress also impaired long-term potentiation in hippocampal CA1 area of slices of young adult rats.

Remarkably, EE experience on postnatal days 22-52 had no effect on spatial learning/memory and depressive-like behavior, but it significantly facilitated LTP in control rats, and completely overcame the effects of early life stress on young adult rats.

These findings suggest that EE experience may be useful for clinical intervention in preventing cognitive and affective disorders during development.
=========================

Recap:
Environment is key.

Ed

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Post 166

Saturday, July 8, 2006 - 3:15amSanction this postReply
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Ed:
Earlier, you complained that I didn't have enough research to marshall. Now, you complain that I marshall too much research. ???
It is not so much the sheer number of quotes that is important, but the relevance of those quotes. Irrelevant quotes don't become relevant by increasing their number.
Environment is key.
Non sequitur.

Post 167

Saturday, July 8, 2006 - 3:28amSanction this postReply
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Cal,

After I marshall a series of evidences -- that environment is the predominant factor in outcomes -- you write: "non sequitur."

Tell me, non-friend, what is it that WOULD BE a "sequitur."

Ed


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Post 168

Saturday, July 8, 2006 - 12:16pmSanction this postReply
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Ed, the contention under debate is Rand's view that any child who chose and persistently pursued X values (whatever she thought those values might be) could achieve the same level of musical skill as Mozart achieved, and that any child who chose and persistently pursued Y values (whatever she thought those values might be) could achieve a level of literary attainment comparable to writing *Atlas Shrugged*, and that any person as "honest" as she considered herself could have formulated the same philosophy she did. Those are the claims she made, claims the correctness of which is under question. How are you seeing the studies you cite as proving the correctness of these claims?

Ellen


___

(Edited by Ellen Stuttle
on 7/08, 12:28pm)


Post 169

Saturday, July 8, 2006 - 12:46pmSanction this postReply
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Ellen,

The reason we seem to be talking past each other is that I have never assumed true this equal-potentiality notion of man ascribed to Rand.

As I said to Jon earlier in the thread, I am not required to defend this notion about Rand (because it's most-likely false). It would be extremely difficult to square this notion with other things that Rand had said on intelligence, for instance ...

===================
Intelligence is not a exclusive monopoly of genius; it is an attribute of all men, and the differences are only a matter of degree. --CUI, 306
===================

There it is, acknowledged differences in degree of intelligence. This is a notion nearly impossible to square with the equal-potentiality notion. That's why I don't bother defending it.

And earlier you had even brought up good research into her novel characters, indicating that she ONCE believed in non-equal potentiality, only to then move to assume that she had dropped the view later for some (unknown!) reason.

I think that that's much less likely true than the interpretation that squares best with other things she wrote that are relevant to this matter.

Ed



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Post 170

Saturday, July 8, 2006 - 4:30pmSanction this postReply
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Ed, if you aren't trying to demonstrate the "equal-potentiality notion," then what is it you are trying to demonstrate? Could you state whatever it is in the form of a brief, precise postulate? If all you're trying to demonstrate is that environment is more important to "outcomes" than heredity, my opinion is that this is true with many "outcomes," though not with all; but I then have to ask, "So what?" I don't understand what you're arguing about if you're not attempting to support "equal-potentiality."

BTW, I see no difficulty squaring the quote you picked up from CUI with the hypothesis that the differences in degree of intelligence are self-made. But let's leave that aside for the nonce and try to get clear what you believe the debate is about.

Ellen


___
(Edited by Ellen Stuttle
on 7/08, 4:37pm)


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Post 171

Saturday, July 8, 2006 - 8:23pmSanction this postReply
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Ed,

“There it is, acknowledged differences in degree of intelligence. This is a notion nearly impossible to square with the equal-potentiality notion.”

Nearly impossible!? It squares just fine. Her viewpoint responds to all examples of high intelligence/achievement/competence with: “Ruthlessly honest, just like me, with the same start everyone gets.” How do you see the quotes you’ve provided as being counter to this, her explicit viewpoint? I can’t see how they are.

You can’t dig up just any old quote where differences in intelligence are acknowledged. You have to find something where her explicit viewpoint as sourced from Blumenthal, Branden and Peikoff is contradicted. Something at least as strong as what Ellen found about someone (was it Wynand?) 'not having been born to be ruled.’ Something explicit—where she is addressing her actual viewpoint, not just some implication from the way she developed this or that character in a novel—would be even better.

You call it “this notion about Rand,” as though we haven’t documented it well, from several sources. Or as though she said it once, quoted out of context. Peikoff’s story squares with the others, and he said, “…her ruthless honesty…that’s what she often said.”

I asked before and you haven’t answered: If she denied adult possession of an intellect greater than “most people” (which she did, “often”) then how do you make room for her to hold that she was born with a greater potential than she actualized?


Post 172

Saturday, July 8, 2006 - 11:36pmSanction this postReply
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Jon,

======================
I asked before and you haven’t answered: If she denied adult possession of an intellect greater than “most people” (which she did, “often”) then how do you make room for her to hold that she was born with a greater potential than she actualized?
======================

Rand didn't have to be 'smarter' than other folks to do what she did, because what she did only involved extensive integration -- and an excommunication of all thought that led to a contradiction.

What professional philosophers have so much trouble with -- is the thick muck of expanded-upon errors that they deal with. To expand upon an error is still to commit an error.

Rand saw this simple fact of reality, and altered her thinking because of it (but most professional philosophers don't perform similar excommunications -- likely because they'd feel bad about dismissing the majority of historical philosophy, as it deserves to be).

And another thing, EVERYONE is born with a greater potential than they actually actualize. This is merely because of the kind of creature we are (we never rid ourselves of every suboptimality -- we don't ever achieve a synoptic "perfection").

Folks have it in them to recognize contradictions. The primary reason they overlook contradictions when they do -- is intellectual dishonesty. That was Rand's main point.

Ed


Post 173

Saturday, July 8, 2006 - 11:51pmSanction this postReply
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Ellen, in post 88, you make the following observation ...

=================
... Mozart had significant early training from his father and grew up in a music-rich environment ...
=================

And while you had gone on to say that Mozart's sister received similar training -- it is fair (and reasonable) to dismiss her contrasting non-popularity (relative to her brother's) as a product of the sexism of the time.

In my contributions to this thread, I have highlighted the pivotal importance of enriched environments in the first decade of life. You have observed that Mozart received a "music-rich environment." That is all that is actually necessary to explain Mozart's exceptionality.

That is my point.

Ed

Post 174

Sunday, July 9, 2006 - 12:05amSanction this postReply
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A closer look at Mozart -- primarily genetics, or primarily environment? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfgang_Amadeus_Mozart) ...


=================
Mozart's father Leopold (1719–1787) was one of Europe's leading musical teachers.
=================

His dad, a leading musical teacher -- something of great consequence.



=================
Leopold gave up composing when his son's outstanding musical talents became evident.
=================

His dad, giving up his own personal career (for the sake of exceptionalizing his son) -- something of great consequence.



=================
They first came to light when Wolfgang was about three years old, and Leopold, proud of Wolfgang's achievements, gave him intensive musical training, including instruction in clavier, violin, and organ.
=================

Extensive training before age 10 -- something of great consequence.

Recap:
Mozart was "made" -- not "born."

Ed

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Post 175

Sunday, July 9, 2006 - 4:34amSanction this postReply
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Quoth Ed:

--"Rand didn't have to be 'smarter' than other folks to do what she did, because what she did only involved extensive integration -- and an excommunication of all thought that led to a contradiction."--

Dear me, and you accuse me of putting Rand down. At my most critical of Rand, I credit her with being smarter than the large majority of "other folks."

Re your uni-factored explanation of Mozart's attainments: "Extensive training before age 10 -- something of great consequence," you say. Then what, e.g., about Beethoven's nephew, who had extensive training before age 10 and showed no musical ability whatsoever?

Your sole point all along has only been "the pivotal importance of enriched environments in the first decade of life"? (And AR had that, do you claim? Her feeling as a child was that she happened to be trapped in dull circumstances.)

Ah, well. Not with a bang but a fizzle.

Cheers,

Ellen

___

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Post 176

Sunday, July 9, 2006 - 8:34amSanction this postReply
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Ellen, by continually not sticking to the points I that I do bring up -- but rather, re-interpreting them in a manner that would make it appear that you're more right than me -- you will perpetuate this dynamic of us talking past each other (is that phrase getting old yet?).

There are 3 points of contention here, which you've been taking from one context, and pulling into the other (for that "more right than Ed" appearance mentioned above). And while this is good rhetoric, it is not discussion aimed at understanding (ie. it is substandard discussion). Here are the 3 points ...

======================
(1) Whether we're all -- including those with learning disorders -- born with exactly equal potentiality (simply because of the fact that we're human)

(2) Whether Rand promoted (1)

(3) Whether environment in fact matters more than genetics does -- when it comes to human progress, growth, or flourishing
======================

Please refer specifically to one of these when addressing me, so that I will be able to answer within the context that you mean.

Ed


Post 177

Sunday, July 9, 2006 - 4:47pmSanction this postReply
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Jon, I acknowledge your point about the source of the differences in degree of things in man. But even that criticism doesn't integrate with what Rand wrote about some of these self-same differences being irrelevant to ethics.

Here are other Rand quotes that make it increasingly improbable (and therefore, unreasonable to assume) that Rand held an equal-potential view of man (caps for italics) ...

===============
In this sense, a man of limited ability who rises by his own purposeful effort from unskilled laborer to shop-foreman ...
===============

===============
It is not the degree of a man's ability that is ethically relevant in the issue, but the full, purposeful use of his ability.
===============

===============
... works of Victor Hugo are OBJECTIVELY of immeasurably greater value than true-confession magazines. But if a given man's intellectual potential can barely manage to enjoy true confessions, there is no reason why his meager earnings, the product of HIS effort, should be spent on books he cannot read ...
===============

===============
(Nor is there any reason why the rest of mankind should be held down to the level of his ... engineering capacity ...)
===============

Ed



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Post 178

Sunday, July 9, 2006 - 5:49pmSanction this postReply
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Excellent!

The good one is this: “It is not the degree of a man's ability that is ethically relevant in the issue, but the full, purposeful use of his ability.”

Here she explicitly separates “ability” from ethics, as opposed to insisting that ability is purely the result of choices, a matter of honesty.

(Of course the other statements she made must be accounted for—we can’t pretend she didn’t say those other things just because we find her making more sense elsewhere.)

Could you please provide the source for this quote? I am curious about the context, as she refers to “the issue,” I wonder what was the issue.


Post 179

Sunday, July 9, 2006 - 8:19pmSanction this postReply
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Jon, do you have the Lexicon (I'm grabbing snippets from IT)?

If you do, then the first 2 quotes: "In this sense, the man ..." are on page 63 (under Career).

The original is: "From my 'Future File,'" The Ayn Rand Letter, III, 26, 3.

The last 2 quotes (Victor Hugo) are on p 280 of the Lexicon (under Market Value). The original is on p 24 (What is Capitalism?) of: Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal.

Ed





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