A glimpse of the analysis in Dr. Leonard Peikoff's forthcoming book, The DIM Hypothesis. Posted on 07/23/2010 7:13:58 PM PDT by HorowitzianConservative
A glimpse of the analysis in Dr. Leonard Peikoff's forthcoming book, The DIM Hypothesis.
At the 2010 Objectivist conference/OCON, Dr. Leonard Peikoff was presenting material from his forthcoming book, The DIM Hypothesis, in which he analyzes Western culture and history from the perspective of the epistemological process of integration. I was surprised to learn that, according to Peikoff’s analysis, Barack Obama is not, as I and others have been saying, a socialist or communist. Socialists or communists are examples of what Peikoff calls “misintegration,” or integration by non-rational means. Obama, Peikoff thinks, is anti-ideological, and as such has no long-range guiding values or theory of society. He does not integrate his thoughts and actions by any means, valid or invalid. Rather, Peikoff describes Obama as an almost-but-not-yet-fully consistent egalitarian nihilist, and thus a manifestation of the same trend which Peikoff calls D2, i.e., the form of Kantianism that gave us non-objective art, quantum mechanics, and progressive education. Because I am no expert on philosophy, for more on Peikoff’s views, I refer you to his forthcoming book.
See my post #11.
brilliant reply
That’s one opinion.
“Keep stupid.”
You’re doing a great job of that on your own.
Long ago, in 1984, in a letter to Christina Hoff Summers, I pointed out that the left is no longer Marxist, but Nietzschean. Radical feminism, multiculturalism (back then anti-racism hadn’t yet been called that—and I really want to know whether adopting the Canadian neologism first happened in the U.S. at around that time, beginning at the University of Pennsylvania, because if it did, I was the critic who force them to change names, but I digress) and the lot all operate by a transvaluation of values: women are more intuitive and less rational, but that good, black folk really do have rhythm, but that makes them better than white folk, and so forth.
The completion of that trend is nihilism, since one can’t really transvalue the values of traditional morality. Calling evil “good” ends with valuing the nothingness, the privation of good that evil really is. It is either the abyss, or the pursuit of power for no purpose other than the pursuit of power.
Nope, it’s not an opinion. It’s the result of the EPR experiment actually being carried out, toss on the quantum-eraser experiment for good measure: Einstein was wrong, Bohr was right.
Ah, that explains it then: a Randian clinging to Rand’s crabbed version of rationalism. Wants to hide the fact that the EPR experiment has actually been carried out and local determinism overthrown, rather like Pythagoras wanting to hide the fact that the square root of two can’t be written as a fraction, so quantum mechanics is tossed into a list of disfavored things. (Odd, that, I personally suspect that quantum effects are the way free will actually gets implemented in the material world, but I guess Randians would rather live in Newton’s non-existent clockwork world than the real one we actually inhabit with all its weirdness.)
Well, I’ll confirm my judgment that Peikoff is an idiot, though I repent of my judgment that he is a post-modernist.
I’m sure it will be much easier to classify our Affirmative Action Kenyan Muslim Pres__ent by means of an “autopsy” of his political behavior after he’s out of office....
BTTT!
“Barack [Obama] and Hasan showed up at the house in a BMW, and then we went to a restaurant together,” Drew says. “We had a nice meal, and then we came back to the house and smoked cigarettes and drank and argued politics.”
For the next several hours, they discussed Marxism.
“He [Obama] was arguing a straightforward Marxist-Leninist class-struggle point of view, which anticipated that there would be a revolution of the working class, led by revolutionaries, who would overthrow the capitalist system and institute a new socialist government that would redistribute the wealth,” says Drew, who says he himself was then a Marxist.
“The idea was basically that wealthy people were exploiting others,” Drew says. “That this was the secret of their wealth, that they weren’t paying others enough for their work, and they were using and taking advantage of other people. He was convinced that a revolution would take place, and it would be a good thing.”
Drew concluded that Obama thought of himself as “part of an intelligent, radical vanguard that was leading the way towards this revolution and towards this new society.” ..."
No Christmas celebrations
No birthday presents for kids
no church
G -Damn America
Hmmmmmmmm
wonder what all that could mean???
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Look at this
Obama Espoused Radical Views in College [advocated revolution]
Dr. John Drew PhD : --- who knew him very well as a gay passionate Marxist.
http://www.breitbart.tv/the-b-cast-interview-was-obama-a-committed-marxist-in-college/
Dr. John C. Drew, a grant writing consultant in Laguna Niguel, Calif., tells Newsmax he met Obama in 1980
Absolutely.
Power for its own sake will end in the abyss. Once there, they will fight each other. The -isms proliferate endlessly. Nothing is ever enough. Once one particular meme (”Women are intuitive and that is good”) is prevalent, the bar is re-set (”Men need to regain their feminine qualities”.) As you imply, once a critic calls them on some article of faith, they will change the label.
There is no arguing with this crowd. You need to stand your ground, resist, utilize passive aggression and drive them into a self-destructive frothing rage, preferably in front of witnesses, from which it is difficult to recover.
Of course, you run the risk of being hurt, physically, economically, professionally and socially, but I have yet to find a nihilist who can be persuaded by logic and reason or with a better nature to which you can appeal.
My personal experience with the political left was 15-20 years (different venues) earlier than yours. By the mid-eighties, they became the media and academic establishment. They had re-entered society for the Long March Through The Institutions. They were wealthy. In my time, they really were radicals. They really aren’t about any goal, just the constant process that leads to ever-increasing control. They are addicted to the process and, as they have succeeded, they have become dependent upon garnering more and more control.
This cannot end well.
This one's better.
Just saw your comment checking “latest comments”.
Excellent observations and exactly in accordance with my experiences with liberals.
Placemark to read this thread tomorrow.
Thanks.
Right . . . like he’s not bi-racial; not a foreigner; not a Muslim; not a traitor; not a globalist; not a narcissist; . . .
gag.
>> NOT for the annoying, abusive freepers who have had nothing more meaningful to do with their lives
I’m inclined to call you an ass. But I won’t. To say you’re unnecessarily inconsiderate would be understatement. But you’re certainly being petulant.
Egalitarian, sure in the Communistic sense. Nihilist? Obama is the furthest thing from a nihilist. He’s a Socialist.
“They speak of an egalitarian society yet they have little regard for their fellow citizen.”
Everyone is equal, it’s just that some are more equal than others.
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