# Actual Freedom – Selected Correspondence by Topic

Richard’s Selected Correspondence ## On Ethics GARY: You say ‘equity and parity is the key to success’. RICHARD: Yes, the ‘theory of mind’ signifies both equity and parity to be involuntarily automatic in any social situation. [Dictionary Definition]: equity: even-handed dealing; fairness, impartiality; unbiased. [Dictionary Definition]: parity: on a par; equivalence; similarity; correspondence. The question is: what is preventing this spontaneous recognition of being fellow human beings from flowing-on into all areas in common? GARY: The notions of equity and parity are seemingly at the core of democratic institutions, with the idea that ‘all men are created equal’ and that there are certain ‘natural’ rights of human beings, stemming from the thinking of philosophers like John Locke. RICHARD: I questioned whether all humans are born equal ... there are talents one has which leads to an ease in the acquisition of skills that another has to struggle to master and vice versa. The rapid shuffling of the DNA at conception (before the doubling takes place) leads to a difference betwixt one foetus and another. The same applies to physical stature (muscularity, stamina and so on) which all combine to produce a staggering array of differences ... and none of this I have detailed so far has anything to do with where one is born (climate) or in what era (progress) let alone social inequality such as what class of society one is born into (educational and career opportunities) and so on. As for ‘natural rights’ ... without question there are none: there is only ‘human rights’. And ‘human rights’ are a human construct – an agreement between human beings to conduct themselves in a certain way in relation to other human beings – and are designed to counter the insalubrious effects of the instinctual passions bestowed upon all sentient beings by blind nature via genetic inheritance. A ‘right’ is a legal entitlement ascribed to a person or persons with a reasonable or just claim to the terms of that agreement. A ‘right’ is therefore something ‘given’ by humans to humans – and to a certain extent to other animals – but what is given can be taken away ... at the point of a gun. There are no ‘rights’, in actuality, other than what human beings agree on ... and ‘rights’ have to be enforced at the point of a gun, anyway. Any philosophical thinking (such as that of Mr. John Locke) which starts with a false premise is going to produce an elaborately false outcome (the falseness of which is concealed in the mass of concepts required to prop up the entire edifice). That there is some useful notions scattered hither and thither gives the thesis an air of respectability. GARY: Equity. Parity. Are these just high-minded ideals, political theories divorced from the reality of everyday life in human societies? RICHARD: Yes and no (and I am not being tricky here) in that yes, they are ‘just high-minded ideals’ when applied as a discipline, a practice, a duty ... and no, they are not ‘divorced from the reality of everyday life’ when they come spontaneously, involuntarily, of their own accord. In a word: artlessly. * GARY: Just because there are differences between people, in strengths, abilities, aptitudes, etc., it doesn’t have to become the basis of a thorough-going inequality and mistreatment of others. RICHARD: It is important to remember, that when one questions a principle (such as equality) and its opposite (inequality) becomes obvious as a result of the question, that nothing has changed except that a belief has disappeared ... inequality was always happening anyway. GARY: I could never understand, for instance, why we want to rule others and have power over others. Sometimes my musing on this question leads to the following question: ‘what gives another the ‘right’ to tell one what to do’? But then, this may be a wrong question, because the concept of ‘right’ is embodied into the question, and as you pointed out, what is given can be taken away. RICHARD: Yes ... ‘might is right’ in the real world. RESPONDENT: The main point I have been driving at all along is this: outside actualist circles, the feeling of being someone is not regarded as having a spiritual belief/ outlook/ viewpoint. RICHARD: If I may point out? This is the first time you have even mentioned the word ‘outlook’ (or ‘viewpoint’) in this exchange ... let alone what you do not regard it as being. Moreover, you are further compounding the problem you have created by now lumping ‘belief’ and ‘outlook’ together (along with ‘viewpoint’) as I have already explained what Peter is not saying in an earlier e-mail. Viz.: • [Co-Respondent]: ‘So even though most everyone on the planet is ‘spiritual’ in the sense of being under the illusion of being an identity – thus metaphysical, not everyone is ‘spiritual’ in the sense of believing in somebody or something supernatural. Correct? • [Richard]: ‘What Peter realised very early in the piece was that, as long as the flesh and blood body hosted an affective ‘being’, an intuitive ‘presence’ which is the instinctual passions in action, there was no way that anyone – and he means anyone – can actually be non-spiritual ... *even though they do not believe either in a god or truth (by whatever name) or a post-mortem soul or spirit (by whatever name)*. [emphasis added]. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 27h, 2 April 2004). This may be an apt moment to remind you of something I often warn about: • [Co-Respondent]: ‘As I don’t care to end up like U.G. Krishnamurti, or some other way I realize it’s risky and I need pure intent from the PCE’s to keep it in the right direction. • [Richard]: ‘Ah, yes ... the only danger on the wide and wondrous path to an actual freedom from the human condition is that one may inadvertently become enlightened along the way. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 50, 5 October 2003). Has it never occurred to you how come Richard, a reasonably intelligent and well-read person with a tertiary education – and agnostic if not atheistic from early childhood into the bargain – could inadvertently become enlightened along the way to an actual freedom from the human condition? Here is a clue: • [Richard]: ‘As I was educated in a state-run school I cannot know by personal experience what it is to be receiving an education in a religion-based school ... although as all secular schools are embedded in a society’s religious milieu anyway I can make a fairly good guess that it is but a more extreme version. It is surprising just how deep a disguised religiosity/ spiritually runs. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 42, 16 February 2003). Put briefly: I was staggered as to how deep the Judaic/ Christian environment I was raised in was embedded ... to the point that I then realised that humanism was the secular religion, so to speak, that British/ European Colonialism had foisted onto the world at large (via countries like the USA for instance) as it underpins the UN Charter and the UN Declaration of Human Rights. Breaking free from the tenacious grip of their humanitarian principles was difficult to say the least. RESPONDENT: I know that everyone is hideously unhappy really, all in the same boat. RICHARD: And therein lies the clue to the lack of enjoyment and appreciation for what has been achieved physically despite the human condition (aka the human folly): nothing, but nothing, can satisfy the discontent of an hubristic identity ... and more than a few identities suffer from an insolent contempt for the universe. People generally resent having to be here; they could be given whatever they demanded and they would still be not satisfied. Nothing, but nothing, can assuage the troubled identity, the psychological/ psychic entity having parasitical residence within the body of virtually all the peoples inhabiting this planet. That alien entity – both ego and soul (spirit) – will spoil any enterprise, sabotage every endeavour and breed discontent and misery throughout its domain. It is the central or core reason for the human condition, sometimes more sardonically referred to as the human folly. Almost every person I meet, nearly every printed word I read, states in one way or another that ‘you can’t change human nature’ and sets about fiddling with the levers and controls in an ultimately useless attempt to ameliorate the human situation within the human condition ... with, of course, less than perfect results. RESPONDENT: But children and really helpless people ... isn’t it particularly wrong that they are shat upon? RICHARD: Not unless you consider it is not particularly wrong that adults and unreally helpful people be defecated upon RESPONDENT: I don’t know. I mean, I realise that when you do help out these people they just end up in the same boat, the same cruelty and misery. RICHARD: Indeed so ... and, given that you all-inclusively say everyone is hideously unhappy anyway, it is high time then, surely, that somebody came up with something new (rather than just try and ameliorate the cruelty and misery with variations on a familiar theme), eh? RESPONDENT: So perhaps it is pointless spending a second’s thought on them. RICHARD: Not at all ... what *is* pointless, however, is to spend time thinking on them in terms of bandaid solutions (there are already more than enough people doing just that). RESPONDENT: Unfortunately the nature of my query is still not obvious. RICHARD: Okay ... to go looking for a particular victim amongst 6.0+ billion victims is like looking for a specific needle in a haystack of needles is it not? And for what ... as a sop to a (presumably) middle-class conscience? Re: Moral cap and Authority RICHARD to Claudiu: (...). Also, something I wrote in 1998 will help set the scene for what else the term ‘peasant-mentality’ meant to the identity inhabiting this flesh-and-blood body circa 1978-1988 (a ‘turning-point’ decade in which ‘he’ sussed-out much of what has been going down for millennia). Viz.: [...snip discussion about Ms. Ayn Rand’s use of the word ‘parasites’ (as in her ‘parasites incapable of survival’ phrasing) to depict any people who ‘attempt to survive’ by defrauding/ looting/ robbing/ cheating/ enslaving the ‘men who produce’ – specifically, those who ‘choose to think and to produce the goods’, that is – whom she otherwise characterises as those ‘who are capable’ and who pursue ‘a course of action proper to man’ in an essay on Objectivist Ethics...]. The main point to get about the mechanisation/ robotisation/ computerisation of productive work is the work which the now-made-redundant workers once carried out still gets done – indeed productivity increases many-fold due solely to such ingenious ‘labour-saving’ devices – yet the dispossessed workers are castigated just as the peasants of yore were (way back when peasants not working meant the work did not get done). The made-redundant person (or a person unable to gain paid employment in the first place) who buys into such epithets a ‘dole-bludger’ and the ilk – and dutifully self-castigates – is thus another example of a person with a ‘peasant-mentality’. (...). (Richard, List D, Claudiu3, 18 May 2015) ANDREW: Hi Richard, that’s a great read indeed! Thanks for taking the time to put it together. It helps to hear also of the work you did during the late 70s through to mid 80s looking into these issues. RICHARD: G’day Andrew, Yes, the resolution of the above issue (the implications and ramifications of the mechanisation/ robotisation/ computerisation of productive work) came to a head in the late 1970’s whilst listening to a Parliamentary Broadcast, on the National Radio, of the then-Prime Minister’s speech about the necessity of importing the latest electronics technology – despite it putting tens of thousands of current and future employees out of work – in order for the nation to remain competitive on the world market. In other words, it was a deliberate Government Policy to add even more hapless citizens to the rising double-digit pool of unemployed – the days of full employment, in developed countries, had ended during the early 1970’s world-wide economic crises – and yet, despite this remarkably frank public admission, disparaging epithets such as ‘dole-bludgers’ and similar continued unabated. Obviously, for him and his ilk such ingenious labour-saving devices were not designed to release peoples from having to ‘earn their (daily) bread by the sweat of the brow’ – even though productive work not only still got done but productivity increased many-fold as well – but were avariciously arrogated to serve as saving-labour costs instead and, thus, increase their profits many-fold. Howsoever, those words from that wealthy pastoralist – a man infamous for forcing the nation into a constitutional crisis, so he could gain such political power he was then liberally exercising, and notorious for saying that ‘life wasn’t meant to be easy’ (despite a privileged Grammar School education and an Oxford degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics) – were the final straw in regards the hallowed ‘Protestant Work-Ethic’ which had been thoroughly inculcated, from early childhood onward, into the identity then-inhabiting this flesh-and-blood body, such as to occasion ‘him’ to work 12-14 hours a day 6-7 days a week. Now, whilst ‘he’ did not have an Economics Degree (let alone from a prestigious university) ‘his’ egalitarian far-sightedness enabled ‘him’ to see that unless productive workers – including those displaced by the ingenious mechanisation, robotisation, and computerisation of productive work – receive monies sufficient enough to purchase those goods produced then any such increased productivity decreases accordingly, with the economy correspondingly going into slow-down, whereupon workers are laid-off, and the economy goes into melt-down. Evidentially, however, avaritia leads to short-sightedness. ANDREW: In retrospect, the work of breaking down the social identity preceded your recall of a pure consciousness experience ... RICHARD: As the remembrance of numerous pure consciousness experiences (PCE’s) occurred in the winter of 1980 then the major part of that circa 1978-1988 ‘turning-point’ decade – in which the identity then inhabiting this flesh-and-blood body sussed-out much of what has been going down for millennia – came afterwards. In fact, the bulk of the sussing-out took place whilst ‘he’ was egoless – and especially so during the years whilst single, celibate, itinerant and homeless (in what I have earlier reported as being ‘his’ puritan period) – as ‘his’ release from being ego-centric enabled considerable insight to take place. ANDREW: ... which helps put in perspective my own efforts. Something you wrote about struck me the other day and that was the process of realization to actualization. Actualizing insights into practical ways of behaving, in this case, working for a living, has seen me stuck many times. At the moment I liken my efforts to a pilot pulling out of a steep dive, there is only so much one can do, and only time will tell if is enough, financially speaking! I mentioned on this list a few weeks ago that it seemed to me that I was daring myself to go broke. Not by choice as such, more so in a rebellious, almost automatic way. I have read about ‘peasant resistance’ before, the universal ‘go slow’ that is the only resort of dispossessed. RICHARD: Ha ... that which you read about is a classic example of the ‘peasant-mentality’ in action (you obviously missed my final words – ‘no need to rebel at all’ – written just above my signature/ sign-off). ANDREW: Anyway, perfect timing to have a closer look at these concepts. RICHARD: Whilst you are having a closer look at those concepts – especially the ‘rebellious’ ones – it may very well be in your interest to also examine those other concepts you explicated in your next post, some thirteen hours or so later, entitled ‘Infinitude and meaning’. Viz.: • [Andrew]: ‘I have long been a fan of Spinoza. My avatar name, <identifier deleted>, isn’t a reference to a type of glass bead, or an obscure machine part code, but his initials and birth date. Going back around 8 years, I had a profound insight into his book ‘Ethics, the emendation of the intellect’. The core of it was that choice is an illusion born out of ignorance of causes, and that an infinite and eternal substance/ nature was the only thing going on. The reason I say this is lately, having been able to look at these realizations again with less affect and more intelllect, I can see that what is needed is a direct experience of the infinitude and ‘meaning of life laying open all around’ to actualize this idea’. (Message No. 194xx). Given that variations on such phrasings as ‘the meaning of life lays open all around’ feature on my portion of The Actual Freedom Trust website – when referring to life here in this actual world, as a flesh-and-blood body only (i.e., sans identity in toto/ the entire affective faculty), where the infinitude of this temporal, spatial, and phenomenal universe is directly experienceable – it is pertinent to point out that what Mr. Benedict de Spinoza refers to (conveyed accurately enough by your ‘infinite and eternal substance/ nature’ phrasing) is something other entirely. However, there is no need to just take my word for it as more than a few peoples have studied his writings extensively. For instance: • [Mr. Max Müller]: (...) the Brahman, as conceived in the Upanishads and defined by Śaṅkara, is clearly the same as Spinoza’s ‘Substantia’. Spinoza defines it as that which is in itself and is conceived by itself (in se est and per se concipitur). It is according to him infinite, indivisible, one, free and eternal, just as Śaṅkara’s Bráhman is called in the Upanishads ‘unborn, undecaying, undying, without parts, without action, tranquil, without fault or taint’. (p. 123, ‘Three Lectures On The Vedanta Philosophy’; delivered at The Royal Institution in March, 1894 by The Right Hon. F. Max Müller, K.M. First Edition, 8vo, May, 1894. Reprinted in the Collected Edition of Prof. Max Müller’s Works, April, 1901, and August, 1904. Longmans, Green, and Co., 39 Paternoster Row, London. New York and Bombay; 1904). Viz.: (https://archive.org/stream/threelecturesont00meuluoft#page/123/mode/1up). From the above text alone it can be comprehended that what Mr. Benedict de Spinoza refers to (conveyed accurately enough by your ‘infinite and eternal substance/ nature’ phrasing) is of a religio-spiritual/ mystico-metaphysical determination ... or, in a word, spiritual. There also is, of course, a much-quoted headline from the New York Times, dated April 25, 1929, to contemplate. Viz.: • Einstein Believes In ‘Spinoza’s God’; Scientist Defines His Faith in Reply, to Cablegram From Rabbi Here. Sees a Divine Order But Says Its Ruler Is Not Concerned ‘Wit Fates and Actions of Human Beings’. [Displaying Abstract] Professor Albert Einstein, the author of the theory of relativity, professed belief in ‘Spinoza’s God’ in a radiogram received here yesterday from Dusseldorf, Germany, by Rabbi Herbert S. Goldstein of the Institutional Synagogue, 37 West 116th Street. The message came in response to a cablegram to the scientist asking him in German: ‘Do you believe in God?’ (http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9E01EFDD1530E33ABC4D51DFB2668382639EDE). RESPONDENT: When I feel righteously angry I consciously want to go back to ‘feeling good’, but since I feel justified in my anger, it feels good to be angry, making it difficult to get back to ‘feeling good’. RICHARD: One of the major issues the identity inhabiting this flesh and blood body all those years ago attended to very early in the piece was the indignation – ‘anger excited by a sense of wrong, or by injustice, wickedness, or misconduct; righteous anger’ (Oxford Dictionary) – which had dogged him from almost as early as ‘he’ could remember (‘he’ was often moved to indignancy because of injustice/ unfairness whilst still in grade school for instance) as righteousness, being oh-so-readily justifiable, is such an insidious feeling. RESPONDENT: To me, corrupt has always meant, by definition, being evil. But how do I see this anger as corrupt when I accept that there is no good and evil? RICHARD: Just for starters: try seeing how the (readily justifiable) righteous anger, with all its feel-good virtuosity, precludes one from enjoying and appreciating this moment of being alive – the only moment one is ever alive – through being as happy and as harmless as is humanly possible via felicitously/ innocuously feeling good (rather than virtuously feeling good) ... instead of seeing righteousness as corrupt (and therefore, by a definition, evil) which depravity is further complicated by choosing to accept there is no good and evil even though the real-world, the world that maybe 6.0 billion peoples live in, is rife with it. RESPONDENT: Most things that are corrupt can be seen as survival strategies, which means they could be seen as neither good or evil. RICHARD: Indeed they could ... yet it is undeniable that maybe 6.0 billion peoples nurse malice and sorrow – and thus the antidotal pacifiers love and compassion – in their bosom. RESPONDENT: How can I make myself see corruption when I don’t see things as good or evil? RICHARD: Perhaps if I were to put it this way? Now that you have neatly solved the existential dilemma which has bothered theologians/ metaphysicians for centuries (simply by redefining good and evil out of existence) ... where are you at? Here is a clue: • [Respondent]: ‘... I feel righteously angry (...). RESPONDENT: What I am interested is in that you say anger disappeared for you after 3 weeks. RICHARD: You are, presumably, referring to the following text: • [Richard]: ‘Speaking personally, the first thing I did in 1981 was to put an end to anger once and for all ... then I was freed enough to live in virtual freedom. It took me about three weeks and I have never experienced anger since then. The first step was to say ‘YES’ to being here on earth, for I located and identified that basic resentment that all people that I have spoken to have. To wit: ‘I didn’t ask to be born!’ This is why remembering a PCE is so important for success for it shows one, first hand, that freedom is already always here ... now. With the memory of that crystal-clear perfection held firmly in mind ... that basic resentment goes. Then it is a relatively easy task to eliminate anger forever. One does this by neither expressing or repressing anger when an event happens that would previously trigger an outbreak. Anger is thus put into a bind ... and the third alternative hoves into view’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, Irene, 11 October 1998). RESPONDENT: So this time period or rather the culmination of it in, say, that last moment in that 3rd week is what interests/ puzzles me. Was it one final time of doing above (your quote above) and then it just never came back again? RICHARD: Yes ... it is very easy to break a habit once the very reason for its existence, its underlying cause, is exposed in the bright light of awareness. RESPONDENT: Ok. If I understand correctly from that paragraph, your reason for getting angry was ‘I didn’t ask to be born’? RICHARD: No, the very reason, the underlying cause, for the existence of anger amongst the whole suite of affective feelings was the basic resentment at having to be alive in the first place (as expressed in popular phrases such as ‘I didn’t ask to be born!’ and ‘Life’s a bitch and then you die!’ and so forth) ... whereas the reason, the trigger, for getting angry varied according to a range of situations and circumstances. Here is what some dictionaries have to say about the word ‘resentment’: • ‘resentment: an indignant sense of injury or insult received or perceived, a sense of grievance; (a feeling of) ill will, bitterness, or anger against a person or thing; spec. a negative attitude towards society or authority arising, often unconsciously, from aggressive envy and hostility, frustrated by a feeling of inferiority or impotence’. (Oxford Dictionary). • ‘resentment: a feeling of indignant displeasure or persistent ill will at something regarded as a wrong, insult, or injury [offence implies hurt displeasure; resentment suggests a longer lasting indignation or smouldering ill will]’. (Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary). • ‘resentment: indignation [righteous anger at something wrongful, unjust, or evil] or ill will felt as a result of a real or imagined grievance; indignant smouldering anger generated by a sense of grievance’. (American Heritage® Dictionary). RESPONDENT: My reasons seem to be different ... RICHARD: If I may interject? Do you not see there is a distinction between me saying ‘the very reason for its existence ...’ (as in the underlying cause of anger itself) and you saying ‘my reasons ...’ (as in the triggers for getting angry)? RESPONDENT: ... stuff like righteous anger or other person feeling superior and acting cocky and insulting/ castigating/ ignoring me, my point of view opposed, etc., or I feeling superior to the other and doing the same. RICHARD: Sure, there is a whole rage of reasons for getting angry (which vary according to different situations and circumstances) ... maybe the following will be of assistance in regards righteous anger (aka indignation): • [Richard]: ‘One of the major issues the identity inhabiting this flesh and blood body all those years ago attended to very early in the piece was the indignation – ‘anger excited by a sense of wrong, or by injustice, wickedness, or misconduct; righteous anger’ (Oxford Dictionary) – which had dogged him from almost as early as ‘he’ could remember (‘he’ was often moved to indignancy because of injustice/ unfairness whilst still in grade school for instance) as righteousness, being oh-so-readily justifiable, is such an insidious feeling’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 79, 9 February 2005). • [Richard]: ‘... one of the most persistent forms of anger is indignation (or righteous anger/ justifiable anger): it can be eradicated rather simply by the realisation that its raison d’être – a guardian against injustice, unjustness, unfairness, inequality (partiality, discrimination, and so on) – is as much a human invention as those concepts it defends ... justice, justness, fairness, equality (impartiality, indiscrimination, and so on). I have touched upon this elsewhere: • [Richard]: ‘There is no ‘chaos’ and ‘order’ as a ‘sub-stratum of the universe’ ... they are but human inventions and do not exist in actuality. The same applies to fairness/ unfairness, justice/ injustice and any other human concepts that, whilst being useful for human-to-human interaction, are futility in action when applied to the universe. Male logic is as useless as female intuition when it comes to being free: the everyday reality of the ‘real-world’ is a veneer ‘I’ paste over the top of the pristine actual world by ‘my’ very being ... and ‘being’ is the savage/ tender instinctual passions (giving rise to feelings of malice/ love and sorrow/ compassion etc., with the resultant concepts of bad/ good and evil/ god and so on) which cripples intelligence by invariably producing dualistic concepts. ‘Tis all a fantasy ... feelings rule in the human world’. (Richard, List B, No. 33c, 3 August 2000). (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 66, 27 April 2005). Put simply: nature is neither fair nor just – a volcanic eruption (for just one instance) does not discriminate between who or what it obliterates/ destroys – and thus coupled with the basic resentment at having to be alive in the first place is the further grievance that life is inequitable/ iniquitous. IRENE: I cannot subscribe to Richard’s statement that right and wrong are of no concern. They are of importance in the capacity to distinguish and make our choices. We do share a plot of earth together and therefore we must come to some sort of basic agreement in order to be able to live in peace and harmony and not kill each other. For this to be possible, all involved must be able to count on some basic rules: this is what we consider right and this is wrong. It’s not only impossible to live with other human beings without knowing the difference, but it is putting your head in the sand if you deny it altogether as being of concern. RICHARD: Goodness me ... ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ are not merely a matter of ‘no concern’ to me. I am vitally concerned about ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ and seek to see them banished forever from the face of this otherwise fair earth of ours. I long ago abandoned ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ because far too many of my fellow human beings have been killed because of what is ‘right’ ... or savagely punished because they were ‘wrong’. To say that ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ are of importance because we will then be able to ‘live in peace and harmony and not kill each other’ rather belies the evidence of history, does it not? I would say that failing to learn the lessons of history is what qualifies for the phrase ‘putting your head in the sand’ ... rather than what I have done to simplify the issue. It is far better – and much more understandable – to appraise one’s actions being either ‘silly’ or ‘sensible’. It is simply silly to drive on the wrong side of the road, for example, because of the obvious danger to one’s own life and limb and others ... not ‘wrong’ with all its judgemental condemnations of one’s implicit wickedness and badness. It is sensible to find out why one is driven to perform socially unacceptable acts, for instance, rather than to refrain from committing these deeds because such restraint is the ‘right’ thing to do. Because ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ are emotive words loaded with reward and punishment connotations ... which is poor motivation for salubrious action anyway. Then one has dignity for the first time in one’s life. RESPONDENT: ... rules that govern the actions of the psyche, e.g. unresolved hurt will beget problems. Then it makes sense to say self-knowledge is the precondition of innocence. RICHARD: ... would it be helpful to draw a distinction between two common uses of the word ‘principle’? (a) principles as rules or laws of cause and effect and (b) principles as rules or laws of moral and/or ethical values? <snip> RESPONDENT: The rules that society has invented to control human behaviour may be as much an expression of how low we have sunk as a necessity to regulate human conduct. RICHARD: Okay ... so rules (moral and/or ethical principles) are indeed human rules that human society has invented to control human behaviour ... which means that the ‘ground of reality’ they are embedded in (the ‘miracle of love’) is human love after all? RESPONDENT: Here I have a number of problems. First I would like to differentiate your ‘(b) principles as rules or laws of moral and/or ethical values?’ I see that there is something behind those rules, which I described as a psychological principle of hurt begetting all the problems of the ego. RICHARD: Aye, I got that the first time you said it (further above) and I responded: (a) principles as rules or laws of cause and effect. RESPONDENT: The ‘rules of conduct’ are society’s response to a misreading of the principle. If we are sensitive to the reality of the principle we don’t need rules. In this view love is not human. Not a human invention. RICHARD: I am not suggesting that love is a ‘human invention’ (as are morals and/or ethics) ... I am saying that if love is not a natural principle (as is the law of gravity) and not supernatural principle (as we have dismissed ‘the fantasy of God’ ) then love is human love. An affective feeling, in other words ... as is hatred, for example. KONRAD: Principles do not contain information. They are rules, that tell how to evaluate information, but they are themselves devoid of any informational content. RESPONDENT No. 25: Could you provide a simple example? KONRAD: Okay. Let us take an ethical principle, like ‘thou shalt not kill’. Does it tell that no killing is going on? No, of course not. Then does it tell, that killing IS going on? Again, the answer is: no. What, then, does it tell about the world? If you think about it, it says NOTHING about the world, nor about the human beings in it. Therefore, because it says nothing in terms of what is, or what is happening, it does not contain any information. RICHARD: Sometimes it is helpful to take a less-emotive example so as to be able to see with the clarity that the absence of a vested interest brings. I would propose the ubiquitous ‘Keep Of The Grass’ injunction, to be found in Public Parks and Gardens anywhere I have been in the world, as being a suitable example. The information implicit in the command is (a.) that people have been and are currently prone to be walking/ lying/ sitting/ running/ jumping/ and in all other ways conceivable doing things on the grass; (b.) that unless such a sign is displayed they will continue to do so; (c.) that such activity is considered (by some people) as being detrimental to what the grass is for; (d.) that what the grass is for is a visual effect (look but do not touch); (e.) that other peoples allegedly more thoughtful than the average park user (the ‘authorities’) have considered the implications and ramifications and/or had experience of an ‘user knows best’ approach to grass usage and are directing a different usage; (f.) that some (unnamed) penalty will be incurred for transgressions (an order is pointless if not enforced); (g.) that such penalty-enforcers have the biggest guns (the requisite ‘might is right’ force) necessary to back-up the order ‘Keep Off The Grass’; (h.) that the average park-user can read (is at least somewhat educated) and therefore has a socialised concept of ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ (implicit in the education process) and also in that there are no armed guards standing next to the sign for on-the-spot active retaliation of infringements. ... and ... well (a.) to (h.) is just for starters. Therefore, contrary to what you say (above) I cannot comprehend that the injunction is devoid of informational content. It seems to be loaded with information. Anyway, the injunction ‘thou shalt not kill’ implicitly provides the information that there is (and has been) killing going on ... or else there would be no need for the commandment in the first place. KONRAD: But this does NOT mean, that the ethical principle has no meaning. The meaning this principle has is as a criterion of evaluation. What it says, is that WHEN killing is going on, you should condemn it. And when somebody stops killing, you should welcome it. This ethical principle is therefore something to use to EVALUATE facts, but, as an ethical principle, it is ITSELF not a fact. RICHARD: Likewise I cannot comprehend that contained in the injunction is the evaluative meaning in that one should condemn walking etc. on the grass and that one should welcome abstaining from doing so ... it may only imply that other peoples with the requisite ‘might is right’ force (those with the biggest guns) have decided it be so. In fact, the use of brute force to enable the so-called desired result shows that the evaluative power of the principle is not universal after all ... and may only reflect the dominant group’s particular mind-set. If what you are saying is that a principle does not provide particular information about precisely what is going on – where, when, how and by who – then I agree. But if that were to be the case, as there is the hourly news up-dates to do that, then all that is being discussed is a trivial and obvious point. KONRAD: It is interesting to see, that whenever somebody has accepted an ethical principle, he has, at the same time, created a source of emotions. RICHARD: I would demur about principles ‘creating emotions’ (genetically-inherited emotions have been demonstrated to exist both in animals and in the infant human animal prior to cognition) and suggest instead that principles trigger these already existing genetically-inherited emotions. You may very well be confusing the effect with the cause (and thus making it into the cause in your mind) because, although principles do not create emotions, it is obvious that principles cultivate and refine the already existing genetically-inherited emotions. Indeed, there is a name for this process: socialisation. KONRAD: For, whenever somebody has accepted this principle, he has a negative emotional response when he sees killing going on, and a positive one when a war ends. RICHARD: Indeed ... constant application of reward and punishment provide the necessary positive and negative emotional responses. However, this negates your proposal that it is the principle as being the source of the positive and negative emotional responses. The principle simply supplies the conceptual framework needed to justify the application of reward and punishment. Once again, it may very well be the dominant group that sets the criteria. It would appear to me that the principle appeals to ‘something’ for its effect ... which means it must contain information of some nature. KONRAD: But this response only occurs when killing is either observed, or imagined, (or the stopping of it). RICHARD: Is there some other instance when this response can occur, then? When else can it occur? In the actual doing of the killing? If so, does it work to stop the killing ... as it is happening (before it is too late)? The ‘thou shalt not kill’ principle has presided over a lot of killing this century. KONRAD: In both cases, the ethical principle forms a RESPONSE to something, be it an observed fact or a thought. But this does not mean, that it has itself informational contents. For it needs something that consists of information, before it can generate an emotion. RICHARD: Now this is puzzling, Konrad, because you wrote (above): 1. ‘Principles do not contain information’ 2. ‘The meaning the principle has is as a criterion of evaluation’. 3. ???????????????? 4. ‘Whenever somebody has accepted an ethical principle, he has, at the same time, created a source of emotions’. 5. ‘The ethical principle forms a RESPONSE to something’. 6. It [the principle] needs something that consists of information, before it can generate an emotion’. Could you fill in No. 3 so as to explicate how something that contains no information (a principle) can evaluate something so as to create a source of emotions? Or, to put it another way: with what is the principle evaluating in order to cause someone to accept it – and on what basis – if there be no information in the principle? And, secondly, can the principle evaluate itself for inherent surety if it contains no information? If so – given that it contains no information – how does it do this self-referent appraisal? Thirdly, what happens in the jump that is appearing to happen between No. 2 and No. 4? For example: If a principle contains no information yet serves as a responsive mechanism (creating emotions in the process) how is it responding? Emotionally? And with what desired result? And what determines the appropriate result anyway if the principle contains no information? Which means, to what end (what result) does the principle aspire to? Does the principle not contain information about what it is assumed/ predicted life would be like ... if only all peoples accepted it? I still see loads of information. KONRAD: This is an ethical principle. But there are more kinds of principles than ethical principles alone. For example, there exist, in physics, the laws of mechanics. You can ask the same questions. <SNIP>. RICHARD: As I am not a physicist or mathematician, I would appreciate it if you could flesh this out before moving on to principles of physics in the laws of mechanics. And, as I personally have no need for morals, ethics, values, principles and so on, I have no expertise in ethics whatsoever and am very intrigued by the workings of your ethical system. Is it a fail-safe system? * KONRAD: Most people are completely ignorant about ethics, and questions pertaining to the distinction between good and evil. Not everybody is aware of the fact, that Ayn Rand has given an objective basis to ethics, and therefore for an objective distinction between good and evil. I connect an explanation of her ethics which basically shows clearly that the difference between good and evil is grounded in the objectively existing difference between life and death. Life and death also connect ‘Is’ and ‘Ought’. Read it, and you will receive an introduction to questions pertaining to human conditioning. RICHARD: I have eliminated the need for conditioning. I have no need for ethics whatsoever. KONRAD: Ayn Rand was also a novelist. Her two best books are ‘The Fountainhead’, and ‘Atlas Shrugged’. Especially ‘Atlas Shrugged’ is a very fascinating, although rather thick novel. RICHARD: Back in 1985 I read every book that I could lay my hands on that Ms. Ayn Rand had written. I started with ‘Atlas Shrugged’. Her hero, Mr. John Galt, was personified as the archetype industrialist/ capitalist and Ms. Ayn Rand’s personal dislike of welfare recipients (possibly from her experience in the USSR) was patently obvious. She exemplified what is nowadays called an ‘economic rationalist’ of the ‘user pays’ ilk. With personal prejudices like that it would be difficult for her to think clearly ... as is evidenced by her complete ignorance of the fact that Mr. John Galt’s money to fund his community comes from a pool of millions of consumers desiring his invention. That is, not all of the 5.8 billion people in the world can invent something so desirable that other people’s buy it to the extent that vast amounts of money pours into their coffers. Capitalism is based upon some people being rich at other people’s expense. Her bigotry is particularly evident towards the end of the book in the fanciful scenes of the parasitical nature of welfare recipients. The book was an emotional appeal to what is currently evident in the world as ‘white male supremacy’ ... but only of the favoured few. It is an elitist position. Hence I have little regard for her further philosophising as you present it below. MS. AYN RAND: ‘The first question is not: What particular code of values should man accept? The first question is: does man need values at all – and why?’ KONRAD: I see from your mail that this is exactly what you do and defend. You do not ask this question. Neither did I in the past, by the way. It is exactly this point that was so revolutionary about the understanding of the term ‘ethics’ as brought forward by Ayn Rand. I think that she was the first who had a clear understanding of the concept of ‘ethics’ in general. At least, she was the first who distinguished ‘ethics’ from ‘an ethics’. RICHARD: This is because she needs ethics. Like you, she would presumably still get infuriated and have to have emotion-backed principles in order to manage to operate and function in a socially acceptable manner even when driven by the instinctual animal urges of fear and aggression that blind nature endows all sentient beings with. In other words: her writing shows that she is still a victim of the human condition ... like you she is encumbered by an affective ‘being’ that needs to be controlled. MS. AYN RAND: ‘Most philosophers have now decided to declare that reason has failed, that ethics is outside the power of reason, that no rational ethics can ever be defined, and that in the field of ethics – in the choice of his values, of his actions, of his pursuits, of his life’s goals – man must be guided by something other than reason. By what? Faith / instinct / intuition / revelation / feeling / taste / urge / wish / whim. Today, as in the past, most philosophers agree that the ultimate standard of ethics is whim (they call it ‘arbitrary postulate’ or ‘subjective choice’ or ‘emotional commitment’)-and the battle is only over the question of whose whim: one’s own or society’s or the dictator’s or God’s. Whatever else they may disagree about, today’s moralists agree that ethics is a subjective issue and that the three things barred from its field are: reason-mind-reality. If you now wonder why the world is now collapsing to a lower and ever lower rung of hell, this is the reason. If you want to save civilization, it is this premise of modern ethics-and of all ethical history-that you must challenge’. KONRAD: So Ayn Rand sees the ‘human condition’ as the result of taking rationality not seriously enough, and confusing certain irrational decisions for rational ones. RICHARD: Nevertheless, like you, she would presumably still get infuriated and have to have emotion-backed principles in order to manage to operate and function in a socially acceptable manner even when driven by the instinctual animal urges of fear and aggression that blind nature endows all sentient beings with. In other words: her writing shows that she is still a victim of the human condition ... like you she is encumbered by an affective ‘being’ that needs to be controlled. MS. AYN RAND: ‘To challenge the basic premise of any discipline, one must begin at the beginning. In ethics, one must begin by asking: What are values? Why does man need them? ‘Value’ is that which one acts to gain and/or keep. The concept ‘value’ is not a primary; it presupposes an answer to the question: of value to whom and for what? It presupposes an entity capable of acting to achieve a goal in the face of an alternative. Where no alternative exists, no goals and no values are possible’. KONRAD: So the term ‘value’ can only have meaning for a being that is free to decide between different alternatives, and therefore is not automatically bound by any of them. Another aspect of value is that it presupposes both a particular aim and a particular individual pursuing that aim. This makes that a particular ‘value’ is not an absolute, for it depends on the individual, who chooses to pursue it. But it is also not completely relativistic, for it depends on what can be realized in existence. For, obviously, not every wish people have can be realized. Nature puts restrictions, because there are laws of nature, on what we can accomplish. This means, that Ayn Rand opposes both the absolutists, who assert that values should apply to everyone, and the relativists, who assert that values do not differ from the choices people make, because, according to them, it are only these choices that determine values. RICHARD: This is because, like you, she would presumably still get infuriated and have to have emotion-backed principles in order to manage to operate and function in a socially acceptable manner even when driven by the instinctual animal urges of fear and aggression that blind nature endows all sentient beings with. In other words: her writing shows that she is still a victim of the human condition ... like you she is encumbered by an affective ‘being’ that needs to be controlled. MS. AYN RAND: ‘An animal is able to learn certain skills to deal with specific situations, such as hunting or hiding, which the parents of the higher animals teach their young. But an animal has no choice in the knowledge and the skills that it acquires; it can only repeat them generation after generation’. KONRAD: This is the level of Richard’s metaphysics. This is why I continued to say, that he has rediscovered ‘animal-hood’, and that he is ‘teaching’ us how to revert to the animal state. So I do not deny what he has found, but I deny that it is an improvement. RICHARD: To think that humans are not animals is because, like you, she would presumably still get infuriated and have to have emotion-backed principles in order to manage to operate and function in a socially acceptable manner even when driven by the instinctual animal urges of fear and aggression that blind nature endows all sentient beings with. In other words: her writing shows that she is still a victim of the human condition ... like you she is encumbered by an affective ‘being’ that needs to be controlled. MS. AYN RAND: ‘The existence of inanimate matter is unconditional, the existence of life is not: it depends on a specific course of action. Matter is indestructible, it changes its forms, but it cannot cease to exist. It is only a living organism that faces a constant alternative: the issue of life or death. Life faces a constant alternative: the issue of life or death. Life is a process of self-sustaining and self-generated action. If an organism fails in that action, it dies; its chemical elements remain, but its life goes out of existence. It is only the concept of ‘Life’ that makes the concept of ‘Value’ possible. It is only to a living entity that things can be good or evil’. KONRAD: This is the point I was making too. Only I worded it differently. I said: ‘Natural laws as such are not enough for life to uphold it into existence’. More is required, namely action, purposeful behaviour. In general an ‘action’ is a process that is not directed by natural laws, but by the information present in the information carrier, also called the goal of the life form. In primitive life forms this action stems from the DNA molecule, while in us it finds its source in our brains, and the information in it. Mammals obtain part of their actions from the DNA molecule, and part from that what they have learnt individually. RICHARD: This denial of the real origin of ‘good’ and ‘evil’ is because, like you, she would presumably still get infuriated and have to have emotion-backed principles in order to manage to operate and function in a socially acceptable manner even when driven by the instinctual animal urges of fear and aggression that blind nature endows all sentient beings with. In other words: her writing shows that she is still a victim of the human condition ... like you she is encumbered by an affective ‘being’ that needs to be controlled. MS. AYN RAND: ‘Try to imagine an immortal, indestructible robot, an entity which moves and acts, but which cannot be affected by anything, which cannot be changed in any respect, which cannot be damaged, injured or destroyed. Such an entity would not be able to have any values; it would have nothing to gain or to lose; it could not regard anything as for or against it, as serving or threatening its welfare, as fulfilling or frustrating its interests. It could have no interests and no goals’. KONRAD: The important point of this example is, that such an entity does not have to undertake any actions to remain in existence. For the natural laws are enough for such an entity to enable it to exist. Life, however always requires some action to remain in existence as a life form. And this makes that every life form has to make use of its environment, that has either the things in it that make it possible for it to execute this action, or it has not. Therefore every life form is confronted with an environment that is either for it or against it. This does not apply to the above mentioned robot. RICHARD: This is because a robot, unlike you, cannot get infuriated and have to have emotion-backed principles in order to manage to operate and function in a socially acceptable manner because they are not driven by the instinctual animal urges of fear and aggression that blind nature endows all sentient beings with. In other words: a robot is not a victim of the human condition ... unlike you a robot is not encumbered by an identity that needs to be controlled. RESPONDENT: I can never be the judge of another’s behaviour. It’s questionable whether I should even judge my own. Isn’t that what traps us? RICHARD: Shall I put it this way (about not being judgmental)? Do you personally: Condone rape and child abuse? Approve of rape and child abuse? Have no opinion about rape and child abuse? Disapprove of rape and child abuse? Proscribe rape and child abuse? Is it not simply a fact that one makes appraisals of situations and circumstances each moment again in one’s daily life ... this judging is called making a decision regarding personal and communal salubrity. RESPONDENT: I’m not sure of your use of language here. RICHARD: I was responding to your statement that you ‘can never be the judge of another’s behaviour’. When a person rapes someone, or when a person abuses a child, that activity is called ‘behaviour’. As it is not your behaviour in the scenario I sketch then from your point of view that person’s behaviour (raping and abusing) is called ‘another’s behaviour’. What I am asking you this: • Do you personally condone that person’s behaviour? (Condone: overlook, disregard, ignore, close the eyes to, excuse, forgive, pardon). Or: • Do you personally approve of that person’s behaviour? (Approve: endorse, support, agree, commend, back up, grant, consent). Or: • Do you personally have no opinion about that person’s behaviour? (Opinion: view, estimation, judgment, attitude, belief, outlook). Or: • Do you personally disapprove of that person’s behaviour? (Disapprove: object to, frown on, censure, dislike, criticize, condemn, reject). Or: • Do you personally proscribe that person’s behaviour? (Proscribe: ban, bar, forbid, exclude, make illegal, veto, rule out). Put simply: if you are 100% genuine where you say that you ‘can never be the judge of another’s behaviour’ then you are relying upon other people (police, magistrates, jurors and so on) to do your ‘dirty work’ for you so that you will be (somewhat) safe from criminals or banditry in general. And if these police, magistrates, jurors and so on adopted your principle of never judging another’s behaviour as well as you then the bully-boys and feisty-femmes would soon rule the world. Perhaps, in hindsight, it was but an unliveable ideal? RESPONDENT: I also doubt that the person who is unhurt (innocent) needs rules to proscribe ‘rape and child abuse’. RICHARD: Ahh ... good. This is what I was asking (further above): is it possible to live without the need for ‘principles’; without the need to ‘obey these principles’; without the need to ‘accept them’ (so that one may obey them)? For is this not what ‘innocence’ means? RESPONDENT: The rules that society has invented to control human behaviour may be as much an expression of how low we have sunk as a necessity to regulate human conduct. RICHARD: Okay ... so rules (moral and/or ethical principles) are indeed human rules that human society has invented to control human behaviour ... (Richard, List B, No. 42, 14 November 2000). RESPONDENT: I would ask you a question: In your post-enlightened state, is there a source of morality and ethics in the individual, or are they all artificial? RICHARD: All morality and ethics (externally reinforced internal control systems) are artificial ... and are only necessary for those who still nurse the malice and sorrow (born of the instinctual passions of fear and aggression and nurture and desire) to their bosom. When one is free from the human condition there is nothing that needs to be controlled by any society’s artificial mores. RESPONDENT: What is the basis of ‘right action’? RICHARD: Twenty four hour a day happiness and harmlessness ... which condition is the result of the total eradication of ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul (the entire identity who is the product of the instinctual passions of fear and aggression and nurture and desire). * RESPONDENT: You said that all ethics are artificial ... RICHARD: Indeed ... eliminate the identity in its totality and all its instinctual fear and aggression and nurture and desire vanish along with its demise. Hence no more malice and sorrow, therefore no need for ethics or morals or values or principles and so on. There is no one and no thing to need controls (either internal controls or external controls). RESPONDENT: ... and by your seeming endorsement of situational killing you appear to be opening the door to a thousand shades of grey regarding human life that ultimately leads to an Auschwitz. RICHARD: Not so ... it is just that, not only do I not ‘value another person’s life over my own’ but that I do not value their life over mine. Or to put it another way: I experience all people as equal and no one has more value than another ... and that includes me. Therefore ... if they then choose to bop me on the nose I am free to bop them back (or not). * RICHARD: I am intrigued by your reasoning and wish to explore with you the implications and ramifications of a moral system that kills off those with ‘no fundamental character flaws’ and populates the planet with those who have a demonstrated ‘fundamental character flaw’. RESPONDENT: Why do you keep omitting from the discussion the aspect of people working to right the wrongs in this world that lead to violence – are you purposely trying to skew the conversation? RICHARD: No ... I am waiting for you to detail what these actions are that these peoples are busy doing. Viz.: • [Respondent]: ‘A man of character would not do nothing while the world falls apart, that would be antithetical to his very nature’. • [Richard]: ‘What would a person of character be doing while the world falls apart?’ And you never did tell me ... and again: • [Respondent]: ‘True character manifests in action, and it is typically inaction and apathy that gives rein to the ‘bully boys’. • [Richard]: ‘What kind of action do you propose that ‘true character’ manifests as?’ Still no reply ... and once more: • [Respondent]: ‘We would probably all be amazed if we knew how little effort it would actually take to put an end to things such as state terror, ‘bully boys’ and the likes’. • [Richard]: ‘Once again ... what ‘little effort’ are you talking of? So far this morality and/or ethics of yours is full of rhetoric and devoid of substance’. I simply cannot have a discussion with you about ‘the aspect of people working to right the wrongs’ if you will not tell me what these workings are. RESPONDENT: The actions that would lead to the destruction of those with ‘no fundamental character flaws’ are at the ending of the cycle of violence, not the beginning. RICHARD: As the ‘cycle of violence’ has a 5,000 year recorded history (and maybe 50,000 – 1,000,000 years prehistory) I really do wonder where you imagine the beginning of the cycle was. Therefore, the ‘actions that would lead to the destruction of those with no fundamental character flaws’ is going on all the time – and has been going on all the time – and is not ‘at the ending of the cycle of violence’ at all. Consequently, those who you say have ‘no fundamental character flaws’ and who ‘will not pick up a weapon with the intent to kill another’ are going to continue to get killed off by those who you say do have ‘a fundamental character flaw’ like those martyrs at any given point in time in history. Therefore, you do seem to be promoting a moral system that kills off those with ‘no fundamental character flaws’ and populates the planet with those who have a demonstrated ‘fundamental character flaw’. I am interested to know why? RESPONDENT: If people were to work toward righting the wrongs that lead to violence in the first place, there would be no need to resort to killing in the name of self defence in the last. RICHARD: Once again you do not provide any information as to what theses people are doing – or should be doing – to ‘right the wrongs’. And neither do you provide any information as to how they came to not have any ‘fundamental character flaws’ anyway ... other than that they ‘will not pick up a weapon with the intent to kill another’. What did they do to eliminate their ‘fundamental character flaws’ and how does it work? And when? RESPONDENT: When we go against what we know in our heart and stomach is the wrong thing to do; when we choose to do it anyway, we will suffer the guilt (some may not). It is certainly not a ‘belief’, as you suggest, that I am the initiator of a wrong or right action. It is a fact. How do I know I know it is a fact? I can only know that by listening to the feelings I get when I do it. It is wrong because it ‘feels’ wrong. It is not just something that I have to be told. This is the essence of right and wrong. Are you suggesting that there is no right and wrong, that right and wrong exist only by judgement brought on by conditioning? Surely not! RICHARD: After all your years of sincere self-investigation are you really going to go on record as saying that feelings are to be relied upon as the final arbiter for living a salubrious and sociable life? Feelings are notoriously unreliable ... people have been living according to their feelings for millennia ... just look at the mess the world is in. Calenture is no better than the conditioned judgement you rightly put aside. ‘Right and Wrong’ is nothing but a socially-conditioned affective and cognitive conscience instilled by well-meaning adults through reward and punishment (love and hate) in a fatally-flawed attempt to control the wayward self that all sentient beings are born with. RESPONDENT: Did I really say all that, or did I actually say all that? Actually, I said that when one goes against what one feels is the wrong thing to do, one will feel guilt. I said that it is not a belief that I am the initiator of a ‘wrong’ action or guilt. That is a fact. I actually do it – I do not believe that I do it. It is the feeling that it is wrong that brings on the guilt. If I didn’t feel it to be wrong, there would be no guilt. Then, I went a little further to suggest that there is wrong because it ‘feels’ wrong. ‘Feels’ wrong was put into parentheses because it was meant to be ‘feel’ from the heart, from the real heart, not the actual heart, you know? RICHARD: Oh yes, I understand only too well that you were referring to ‘the real heart’ ... and therein lies the problem. If something did not ‘feel wrong’ then there would be no guilt feelings, now, would there? I was suggesting that the conversation on guilt would be better served if one examined the underlying cause – the ‘feeling’ of Right and Wrong – rather than the effect ... which is guilt. RESPONDENT: That which is alive can hardly breathe without bringing harm or destruction to some aspect of the environment, yes? The whole exercise of personal existence must be a heavy measure on the side of silliness when a larger view is taken toward its effect. Does it not seem silly that this body should eat while another starves? RICHARD: The very fact that one is alive means consuming nutrients ... and staying alive means that something, somewhere, must die in order to supply these nutrients. This is a fact of life ... and the marvellous thing about a fact is that one can not argue with it. One can argue about a belief, an opinion, a theory, an ideal and so on ... but a fact: never. One can deny a fact – pretend that it is not there – but once seen, a fact brings freedom from choice and decision. Most people think and feel that choice implies freedom – having the freedom to choose – but this is not the case. Freedom lies in seeing the obvious, and in seeing the obvious there is no choice, no deliberation, no agonising over the ‘Right’ and ‘Wrong’ judgement. In the freedom of seeing the fact there is only action. When it comes to the consumption of nutrients there are many and various beliefs one can hold dearly to. There are people who will not eat red meat at all ... only white meat and fish. Then there are people who will not eat any flesh of warm-blooded animals at all ... only fish and reptiles. Then there are people (vegetarians) who will not eat any meat at all, but will consume eggs and dairy products. Then there are people (vegans) who will eat only vegetables, grain and seed. Then there are people (fruitarians) who will only eat fruit. Then – as we go into myth and fantasy – there are those who live on water and air ... and finally those who live on air only. Some vegetarians maintain that as a carrot (for example) does not scream audibly when it is pulled from the ground there is no distress caused by the consumption of vegetables. Yet the carrot indubitably dies slowly by being extracted from its life-support system – the ground is its home – and is this not distressing on some level of a living, growing organism? It all depends upon the level, or degree, of ‘aliveness’ that one ascribes to things. Vegans, for instance, will not consume eggs as this prevents an incipient life from being born. Fruitarians go one step further and say that, as the consumption of carrots prevents them from going to seed and sprouting new life, vegetables are to be eschewed entirely. Then, as the eating of grain and seeds also prevent potential life-forms from growing, they will eat only the flesh of the fruit that surrounds the kernel and plant out the embryo plant-form. (I have been a fruitarian so I know full well what I am speaking of.) The obvious fact is clearly demonstrated by taking all this to its ultimate consideration. What will one do – as a fruitarian causing no pain or the taking of life of anyone or anything – about those pesky things like mosquitoes, sand-flies, cockroaches, rats, mice and other ‘vermin’ that invade my house? Put up screens? What about outside? Will I slap them dead ... or just shoo them away? What will one do if attacked by a snake, a crocodile, a shark, a lion and so on? Do as the Revered Scriptures say and turn the other cheek? Will I humbly submit to my fate and be mauled severely myself – or even killed – simply because of a religious injunction, a moral scruple, a noble ideal, a virtuous belief, a passionate opinion, a deeply held ethical theory? In other words, have animals and insects been given the right, by some inscrutable god, to do with me whatsoever they wish? Is my survival dependent upon the non-existent benevolence of all those sentient beings that I am not going to cause distress to? What then about germs, bacteria, bacillus, microbes, pathogens, phages, viruses and so on? Are they not entitled to remain alive and pain free? If one takes medication for disease, one is – possibly painfully – killing off the microscopic creatures that one’s body is the host too. Some religions – the Jain religion in India, for example – has its devout members wearing gauze over their nose and mouths to prevent insects from flying in and they even carry small brooms to sweep the path as they walk so that they will not accidentally step on some creature. It can really get out of hand. For instance, small-pox has been eradicated from the world by scientists as a means of saving countless human lives ... is this somehow ‘Wrong’? What is ‘Right’ in regards to what I do in order to stay alive? If I do none of these things then I will be causing pain and suffering to myself – and I am a sentient being too. It is an impossible scenario, when pursued to its ultimate conclusion. And then there is the matter of one’s fellow human beings. Some of them – in fact at times a lot of them – are desirous of invading the country that one is living peacefully in, with the avowed intent of killing, torturing, raping, pillaging and subjugating oneself and one’s fellow citizens. If one holds a strong and passionate belief in not causing any pain and suffering to other sentient beings then one must be more than a fruitarian ... one must be a pacifist as well. This amounts to hanging out a sign – if everybody else in the country one lives in adopts this specific belief – which says, in effect: ‘Please feel free to invade us, we will not fight back, for we hold firmly to the principle of not causing pain and suffering to any sentient being whatsoever’ (the Tibetan situation is a particular case in point.) Thus anarchy would rule the world – all because of a belief system handed down by the Saints and the Sages, the Messiahs and the Avatars, the Redeemers and the Saviours, the Prophets and the Priests, century after century. All this is predicated upon there being an enduring ‘I’ that is going to survive the death of the body and go on into the paradisiacal After-Life that is ‘my’ post-mortem reward for being a ‘good’ person during ‘my’ sojourn on this planet earth. It is ‘I’ who is the ‘believer’, it is ‘I’ who will cause this flesh-and-blood body to go into all manner of contorted and convoluted emotion-backed thoughts as to what is ‘Right’ and what is ‘Wrong’, what is ‘Good’ and what is ‘Bad’. If it were not for the serious consequences of all this passionate dreaming it would be immensely humorous, for ‘I’ am not actual ... ‘I’ am an illusion. And any grand ‘I’ that supposedly survives death by being ‘Timeless and Spaceless’, ‘Unborn and Undying’, ‘Immortal and Eternal’ am but a delusion born out of that illusion. Thus any After-Life is a fantasy spun out of a delusion born out of an illusion ... as I am so fond of saying. When ‘I’ am no longer extant there is no ‘believer’ inside the mind and heart to have any beliefs or disbeliefs. As there is no ‘believer’, there is no ‘I’ to be harmful ... and one is harmless only when one has eliminated malice – what is commonly called evil – from oneself in its entirety. That is, the ‘dark side’ of human nature which requires the maintenance of a ‘good side’ to eternally combat it. By doing the ‘impossible’ – everybody tells me that you can’t change human nature – then one is automatically harmless ... which does not mean abstaining from killing. It means that no act is malicious, spiteful, hateful, revengeful and so on. It is a most estimable condition to be in. One is then free to kill or not kill something or someone, as the circumstances require. Eating meat, for example, is an act of freedom, based upon purely practical considerations such as the taste bud’s predilection, or the body’s ability to digest the food eaten, or meeting the standards of hygiene necessary for the preservation of decaying flesh, or the availability of sufficient resources on this planet to provide the acreage necessary to support the conversion of vegetation into animal protein. It has nothing whatsoever with sparing sentient beings any distress. Thus ‘Right and Wrong’ is nothing but a socially-conditioned affective and cognitive conscience instilled by well-meaning adults through reward and punishment (love and hate) in a fatally-flawed attempt to control the wayward self that all sentient beings are born with. The feeling of ‘Right and Wrong’ is born out of holding on to a belief system that is impossible to live ... as all belief systems are. I am not trying to persuade anyone to eat meat or not eat meat ... I leave it entirely up to the individual as to what they do regarding what they eat. It is the belief about being ‘Right or Wrong’ that is insidious, for this is how you are manipulated by those who seek to control you ... they are effectively beating you with a psychological stick. And the particularly crafty way they go about it is that they get you to do the beating to yourself. Such self-abasement is the hall-mark of any religious humility ... a brow-beaten soul earns its way into some god’s good graces by self-castigating acts of redemption. Holding fervently to any belief is a sure sign that there is a wayward ‘I’ that needs to be controlled. Give me ‘silly’ and ‘sensible’ any day. * RESPONDENT: Which act is sillier, to risk limb by driving against the tradition or putting that child on a bike around the next blind corner at risk by driving at all? RICHARD: Being alive is a risk ... that is what makes it thrilling. As for cycling ... knowing that there are some drivers who hate cyclists, and consider that they should not even be on ‘their’ road, I look out on blind corners. I passed this kind of information onto my children – and anyone else who wants to listen – so I would recommend that this child that you refer to be advised likewise. Somewhere along the line, each person takes amenability for their own life and actions. Do you see how you have taken a straight-forward matter-of-fact way of appraising a situation and attempted to turn it into morality? It is not a matter of merely substituting ‘silly’ and ‘sensible’ for ‘Right’ and ‘Wrong’ ... it requires a paradigm shift born out of the sincere endeavour to enable the already always perfect moment apparent via elimination of identity in its totality. As you are busy trying to foolishly prove that it does not work by fudging the issue – rather than seeing how it does work in delivering the goods – then you obviously have no interest in playing a part in bringing about peace-on-earth. * RICHARD: It is the belief about being ‘Right or Wrong’ that is insidious, for this is how you are manipulated by those who seek to control you ... they are effectively beating you with a psychological stick. And the particularly crafty way they go about it is that they get you to do the beating to yourself. Such self-abasement is the hall-mark of any religious humility ... a brow-beaten soul earns its way into some god’s good graces by self-castigating acts of redemption. Holding fervently to any belief is a sure sign that there is a wayward ‘I’ that needs to be controlled. RESPONDENT: Controlled by what? RICHARD: A socially constructed conscience. RESPONDENT: Controlled how? RICHARD: By reward and punishment ... and by awe and dread. RESPONDENT: Have we not elsewhere in your post eliminated the good me bad me duality? RICHARD: What is with this < we > business? I have ... but you have not. RICHARD: This is a truly remarkable freedom. RESPONDENT: Only if it is the right kind of freedom. RICHARD: Goodness me ... I long ago abandoned ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ because far too many of my fellow human beings have been killed because of what is ‘right’ ... or savagely punished because they were ‘wrong’. It is far better – and much more understandable – to appraise one’s feelings, thoughts and actions as being either ‘silly’ or ‘sensible’. It is simply silly to drive on the wrong side of the road, for example, because of the obvious danger to one’s own life and limb and to others ... not ‘wrong’ with all its judgemental condemnations of one’s implicit wickedness and badness. It is sensible to find out why one is driven to perform socially unacceptable acts, for instance, rather than to refrain from committing these deeds because such restraint is the ‘right’ thing to do. Because ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ are emotive words loaded with reward and punishment connotations – which is poor motivation for salubrious action anyway – then one has dignity for the first time in one’s life. So, the question is: Is an actual freedom a silly freedom ... or a sensible freedom? RESPONDENT: You were criticising the seemingly mild areas of morality I was asking about in comparison to the more serious ones that exist in the world. Now, speaking in a generality, you advise that we look upon our feelings, thoughts and actions simply being ‘silly’ or ‘sensible’. I was looking back on an action of rape performed yesterday, would I consider it to be ‘silly’?? RICHARD: Well, I consider it silly, of course ... but then again I wanted to be free form the Human Condition with all of my being. Therefore, I did not come up with silly intellectual objections. So, tell me: do you consider rape sensible then? RESPONDENT: Wouldn’t you say that there are some things you might be able to call ‘silly’ and other things that you would not because they do not fit in that category no matter how much you try to fit them in. RICHARD: Well, I would not, of course ... but then again I saw the utter necessity of becoming free of malice and sorrow. So, tell me: what things would you want to exclude from this category? Wars? Rapes? Murders? Tortures? Domestic violence? Child abuse? Sadness? Loneliness Grief? Depression? Suicide? Am I to gather that, according to you, these things are not silly? So tell me: do you consider wars and rapes and murders and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicide to be sensible then? RESPONDENT: If I were to kill someone in a fit of anger, should I say to myself ‘darn! ... what a silly thing I just did’? ‘Should I clean up now or later?’ RICHARD: Well, only if you wish to remain a sorrowful and malicious psychological and psychic identity living a parasitical existence inside this flesh and blood body ... busily perpetuating all the wars and rapes and murders and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicide. So, tell me: do you consider murder sensible then? RESPONDENT: I do agree with you that self condemnation is another way of playing god with ourselves. RICHARD: Who are you agreeing with? I never said anything like that ... all gods are figments of a fertile imagination – an imagination fuelled by dread and awe – and it is therefore a meaningless statement. Is this an example of you being sensible? RESPONDENT: And self-condemnation will not accomplish anything, but your statement is a little on the enabling side, don’t you think? RICHARD: No, not at all ... it is particularly effective if your number one priority is to dig into the depths of your psyche and root out everything that is standing in the way of peace-on-earth, as this body, in this life-time. May I ask you a question? Do you consider yourself to be a rational and mature adult? * RICHARD: It is sensible to find out why one is driven to perform socially unacceptable acts, for instance, rather than to refrain from committing these deeds because such restraint is the ‘right’ thing to do. Because ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ are emotive words loaded with reward and punishment connotations – which is poor motivation for salubrious action anyway – then one has dignity for the first time in one’s life. So, the question is: Is an actual freedom a silly freedom ... or a sensible freedom? RESPONDENT: It is very sensible to refrain from doing what should not be done, regardless of the inclination. Then the question of ‘why’ can be looked at. RICHARD: Yes ... do you see now how effective ‘silly’ and ‘sensible’ are? Because with ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ being absolute dictates from high ... you are not to question. You must obey. And how on earth can some one who lived 2,000 years ago know how to deal with modern-day life? RESPONDENT: And does your freedom entail the total and complete erasure of the human consciousness that moves the common herd or just only the moral conditioning – the sense of right and wrong, good and evil? RICHARD: Yes, the total and complete erasure of the ‘human’ consciousness ... not just conditioning. The moral conditioning – the sense of right and wrong and what you called the knowledge of good and evil – are well-meant endeavours by countless peoples over countless aeons to seek to curb the instinctual passions. By and large this enterprise has proved to be relatively effective ... only a minority of citizens fail to behave in a socially acceptable manner. And although well-meant, it is but an ultimately short-sighted effort to prevent gaols from being filled to over-flowing, because people are irked by the restraints imposed upon what they indulgently imagine is the freedom of the natural state. Now, while most people paddle around on the surface and re-arrange the conditioning to ease their lot somewhat, some people – seeking to be free of all human conditioning – fondly imagine that by putting on a face-mask and snorkel that they have gone deep-sea diving with a scuba outfit ... deep into the human condition. They have not ... they have gone deep only into the human conditioning. When they tip upon the instincts – which are both savage (fear and aggression) and tender (nurture and desire) – they grab for the tender (the ‘good’ side) and blow them up all out of proportion. If they succeed in this self-aggrandising hallucination they start talking twaddle dressed up as sagacity such as: ‘There is a good that knows no evil’ or ‘There is a love that knows no opposite’ or ‘There is a compassion that sorrow has never touched’ and so on. This is because it takes nerves of steel to don such an aqua-lung and plunge deep in the stygian depths of the human psyche ... it is not for the faint of heart or the weak of knee. For the deletion of the software package is the extinction of ‘me’ at the core of ‘being’. That is, ‘being’ itself expires. The reward for so doing is immeasurable, however. RESPONDENT: I have known for years that believing in god, soul, afterlife, and free will are all becoming increasingly suspect, but I would always think: hey what’s the alternative – to live a godless, nihilistic, unhappy life? Now I know from personal experience that removing superstition from life can clear the way to a abundantly happy life if one has a good secular philosophy(ies). I’m loving life as it is right now, and having a blast trying to leave a positive impact on this world right now and hopefully this effect will even pass on to the next generation. Actualism has been helpful in this journey, but I have serious doubts about it as a well rounded, all embracing philosophy. It is very sensible in some areas, but seems very narrow. RICHARD: As actualism – the direct experience that matter is not merely passive – is not a philosophy then the question as to whether or not it is well-rounded and/or all-embracing and/or sensible and/or narrow one is irrelevant. For example: • [Co-Respondent]: ‘You represent the ultimate step of a philosophy that is totally existence oriented. • [Richard]: ‘It is not a philosophy ... it is an accurate description of an on-going and fully-lived experiencing of life ... complete with consciousness operating perfectly well as apperceptive awareness. (Richard, List B, No. 17a, 8 September 1998). RESPONDENT: I meant by philosophy the ‘love of wisdom’ ... RICHARD: I am only too happy to re-phrase my response so as to be in accord with what you mean by saying that actualism is a philosophy: as actualism – the direct experience that matter is not merely passive – is not ‘the love of wisdom’ then the question as to whether or not it is well-rounded and/or all-embracing and/or sensible and/or narrow love of wisdom is irrelevant. And just so that there is no misunderstanding: actualism is not the love of an ideology either ... or of an idea, an ideal, a belief, a concept, an opinion, a conjecture, a speculation, an assumption, a presumption, a supposition, a surmise, an inference, a judgement, an intellectualisation, an imagination, a posit, an image, an analysis, a viewpoint, a view, a stance, a perspective, a standpoint, a position, a world-view, a mind-set, a state-of-mind, a frame-of-mind, a metaphysics or any other of the 101 ways of down-playing/ dismissing a direct report of what it is to be actually free from the human condition and living the utter peace of the perfection of the purity welling endlessly as the infinitude this eternal, infinite and perpetual universe actually is. RESPONDENT: [I meant by philosophy the ‘love of wisdom’] which is an experiential knowledge, application, and living of wisdom. RICHARD: I am only too happy to re-phrase my response so as to be in accord with what you mean by saying that actualism is a love of wisdom: as actualism – the direct experience that matter is not merely passive – is not ‘an experiential knowledge, application, and living of wisdom’ then the question as to whether or not it is well-rounded and/or all-embracing and/or sensible and/or narrow experiential knowledge, application, and living of wisdom is irrelevant. And just so that there is no misunderstanding: actualism is not an experiential knowledge, application, and living of an ideology either ... or of an idea, an ideal, a belief, a concept, an opinion, a conjecture, a speculation, an assumption, a presumption, a supposition, a surmise, an inference, a judgement, an intellectualisation, an imagination, a posit, an image, an analysis, a viewpoint, a view, a stance, a perspective, a standpoint, a position, a world-view, a mind-set, a state-of-mind, a frame-of-mind, a metaphysics or any other of the 101 ways of down-playing/ dismissing a direct report of what it is to be actually free from the human condition and living the utter peace of the perfection of the purity welling endlessly as the infinitude this eternal, infinite and perpetual universe actually is. RESPONDENT: Actualism’s living w/o ego/ soul falls under this description. RICHARD: Au contraire ... it does no such thing. RESPONDENT: Ok. One can call a philosophy of life simply empirical things like its healthy to get enough sleep, get movement in (i.e. reasonable exercise), eat a well balanced diet of foods, learn a language, play music, play chess (if one enjoys it of course), engage the mind in mathematics and science, learn to think, feel one’s feelings, etc. RICHARD: As you have increasingly down-played actualism – the direct experience that matter is not merely passive – to the point of now equating it to vague generalisations, which you say can constitute a philosophy of life, about some unspecified health benefits of enough sleep, reasonable exercise, well-balanced diet, learning language, playing music, playing chess (provided it be enjoyable), mind-engagement in mathematics and science, learning to think, feeling one’s emotions and passions, and so on, there is obviously no point in me continuing to report/ describe/ explain what actualism actually is ... and what it is not. Especially so in view of the fact that your very next e-mail (to another) after this one espouses the virtues of materialism. * RESPONDENT: OK Richard, could you just answer the only question I was really asking in the first place which is: this is the MAIN question I have here that you did not answer. RICHARD: I did answer your question. Viz.: • [Respondent]: ‘I’m sorry, being selfless cannot answer a complex ethical situation with multiple parties where some of the parties happiness must be sacrificed because of limited resources. • [Richard]: ‘Being ‘self’-less in toto renders any ‘complex ethical situation’ (and any complex ethical solution) null and void. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 68, 13 July 2004a). Just because it is (presumably) not the answer you expected/ wanted/ whatever does not mean that I did not answer it. * RESPONDENT: Maybe, I’m not writing well. RICHARD: You have been abundantly clear all along ... and you are not the first to have taken the report/ description/ explanation of life here in this actual world and endeavoured to turn it into, and/or relate it to, ethicalistic/ moralistic principles and/or values and/or virtues and/or standards and/or models and/or systems and/or conventions and/or norms and/or mores and/or maxims and/or axioms and/or postulates and/or dictums and/or directives and/or tenets and/or doctrines and/or policies and/or codes and/or canons and/or rules and/or regulations and/or laws, and so on, and you probably will not be the last. see also Formation and Persistence of Social Identity RETURN TO RICHARD’S SELECTED CORRESPONDENCE INDEX RICHARD’S HOME PAGE The Third Alternative (Peace On Earth In This Life Time As This Flesh And Blood Body) Here is an actual freedom from the Human Condition, surpassing Spiritual Enlightenment and any other Altered State Of Consciousness, and challenging all philosophy, psychiatry, metaphysics (including quantum physics with its mystic cosmogony), anthropology, sociology ... and any religion along with its paranormal theology. Discarding all of the beliefs that have held humankind in thralldom for aeons, the way has now been discovered that cuts through the ‘Tried and True’ and enables anyone to be, for the first time, a fully free and autonomous individual living in utter peace and tranquillity, beholden to no-one. Richard’s Text ©The Actual Freedom Trust: 1997- . All Rights Reserved. Disclaimer and Use Restrictions and Guarantee of Authenticity