Ambrose2007 Forum Posts (8,881)

RE: Love is selfish

I don't know, A. Sounds awfully egoistic for me!

Though I am curious...what would those "forces" be, and why would they be superior to your "little selfish self"?

RE: Love is selfish

MOTHER OF GOD!!!

It's what I cry out every time I pass the Mother of God monastery on the way to see my love.

RE: Love is selfish

Sorry but I think you are simple minded when it comes to this discussion. How's your relationship with your mother[/quote

I have the strangest feeling when I look at your profile and listen to you, A. I keep thinking "Monastery."

RE: Love is selfish

Sounds like Voltaire: Through appreciation we make the virtues of others are own. Except sort of in reverse.

RE: Love is selfish

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Well, perhaps you'd be transcending ignorance, then? Being able to recognize one's own motivations and to be able to step back and view them dispassionately - particularly when your own interests are being opposed by others (or you think they are) - does, in my experience, allow you better appreciate and value the welfare of others. (This may not be your point, but it's what came to mind).

Maybe transcendence would involve that "stepping back" and "viewing the bigger" picture, which involves interests beyond your own? That would strike me as highly meaningful, and not logically opposed at all to the premise that all actions are basically "selfish."

RE: Love is selfish

I think that all of us want to be powerfully valued by other people, and that many of us - quite mistakenly, if understandably - take selfishness to be opposed to that.

That's why I asked the question: Would you wish to be loved as an act of charity? If you say "God, No!" - which I believe virtually everyone would say - then you ought to obtain some reassurance that selfishness is not the enemy of love.

To love someone is to intensely, selfishly, value them for what they are. Imagine being told "I love you not for any particular quality or appeal but because I'm noble." Errrch!!

RE: Love is selfish

A further question might be: Why would you suppose that reducing selfish motivations would lead to something ideal(depends on what you take those to mean, of course, but you seem to be linking selfishness to the very core of human nature)?

I once wrote a short story about a civilization where the "people" were innately "selfless." As I worked out the logical implications of that, it soon became apparent that I was not describing any form of paradise. What do you think? What would making all actions about serving others reduce to?

RE: Love is selfish

Well, it was interesting - and perhaps this whole discussion points to some of the power of the linguistic influence hypothesized by Sapir and Whorf?

"Transcendent"? Of what - human nature itself? Not possible, nor even desirable, I would think.

My point - I hope this was obvious - is that you would not want to be loved as a charity case, would you, A?

RE: Love is selfish

I offered a similar argument to a philosophy professor years ago. His reply: 1) You've essentially univeralized the meaning of selfishness so that's all-inclusive, rendering it effectively meaningless; 2) your definition is idiosyncratic - that is, is widely opposed by common parlance (and that is usually something to be avoided).

I still believe I'm - we are - fundamentally correct: there exist no "selfless" actions. Selflessness is a metaphor used to designate actions which involve self-sacrifice of one sort of another, even though such actions are based on a person's selfish valuing of certain actions. I think his second point was better.

RE: Love is selfish

Then you agree that romantic love should consist primarily (if not solely) of charitable, altruistic motivations? That is, one should love another person because it's "noble" or "altruistic" to do so?

Is that the kind of romantic love you'd want, A?

RE: Sommer and Captain starring in "Love is Selfish"

Reminded me of that Ayn Rand thread started by the sunglassed philosopher a couple days back. Sommer and Captain's dialogue was reminiscent to me of Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead.

RE: Sommer and Captain starring in "Love is Selfish"

Well done, T.

RE: Love is selfish

Just wanted to add that was one of the most interesting threads ever for me.

Thanks to Mr. T for reviving it with his movie!

RE: Love is selfish

Surely all pure, true love should be an act of kindness, chivalry, altruism, and charity, no? Doesn't that describe the core of what romantic love is all about - an act of charity?

RE: How long has it been?

True, Praire, true. I shouldn't be complaining, eh?

RE: How long has it been?

Thanks, Joanne. I know you understand.

RE: How long has it been?

Just missing a certain Canadian today, J.

RE: How long has it been?

Or perhaps, J, I should've said "nothing," and that's "the problem."

Not much, Joanne. Working on my commercial building. Getting a crown installed on a broken tooth. Working on a novel. Lifting weights. The usual.

RE: How long has it been?

What happens to up is definitely part of my current problem...

RE: alone in sioux falls

Or is that just the feeling that comes from living in South Dakota? To that, I can relate (and my son says the same thing!).

RE: alone in sioux falls

Interesting profile. You're in a long-term relationship but looking for intimate encounters. In addition, you say you're "lonely and trapped"? Doesn't sound like a particularly satisfying relationship.

RE: How long has it been?

(envy)

RE: America's male version of Susan Boyle?

Hey, L, GG and I happened to see this guy - she hates country, btw! - and we both turned to each other after he sang and agreed he was surprisingly good. And I don't like country, either!

RE: House Burned Down Best Friend Inside Dog Exploded!

That was cruel! You had me all in a lather to see an exploded dog!

RE: Dedicated to the Regulars of CS

"Shy" seems not quite fitting somehow...

RE: AYN RAND

Appropriate to someone who's never actually read Rand - that is, the polar opposite of being accurate with respect to her.

She wrote THE FOUNTAINHEAD, a basically optimistic piece, largely during the Great Depression; she wrote ATLAS SHRUGGED, a dystopian warning of social degeneration, largely during one of the great financial upswings experienced by the U.S.

RE: AYN RAND

Logic is my god, and I worship freely at its reason-filled feet.

RE: AYN RAND

RE: Moral Propositions

Individual rights/liberty - a "failed ideology"?

Perhaps it's gone out of fashion, but should it have?

"Green environmentalism" is not a fundamental politico-philosophic position, any more than liking organic produce or gas-efficient cars is one. Those views reside at the end of a very looooonnnngg chain of philosophic assumptions and analysis. To get to "environmentalism," in other words, requires belief in several philosophic premises. Eventually, if you trace them back, you'll come to its root premises. What are they? Are they opposed to individual rights, for instance? Is it possible to base a just social system on something besides our right to own our lives and property?

RE: AYN RAND

You're right. What's happened and is happening here and in other mixed economies has "nothing to do with a free-market economy" - and even less to do with Platonic Essences. The differences between a free market economy and the ones presently in effect are legion in very concrete ways. For example, in a free market economy people can't print money on demand to cover debts/expense - the means through which every financial disaster of modern times has occurred.

If you wish to reject "stupid revelations of the 'truth," you ought to begin by rejecting the notion that "capitalism" as presently conceived has anything to do with individual liberty and social justice - followed by a rejection of the idea that the solution to social injustice/ills consists of finding the right group of people to wield power over others.