philosophy monthly

...from A Guide to the Philosophy of Objectivism
David King

Chapter 1: Ayn Rand and Objectivism - Philosophy and Science

Randism vs Objectivism
When Nathaniel Branden was asked (in 1971) if he were an Objectivist, he
replied:
“If you mean, do I agree with the broad fundamentals of the philosophy of
Objectivism, I would answer, ‘Yes.’ But if you mean, as Miss Rand might very
well wish you to mean, do I agree with every position that Miss Rand has taken
and do I regard the sum total of Miss Rand’s intellectual pronouncements as
being equal to what is meant by the philosophy of Objectivism, then I am not
an Objectivist.”
I would like to introduce these two terms:
A Randite is a disciple of Ayn Rand.
Randism is the set of ideas that were Rand’s personal beliefs. (This
includes, of course, some - but not all - of the precepts of Objectivism.)
There is a very important distinction to be made between Randism and
Objectivism. Randism asserts the congruency of Rand’s statements with the
principles of Objectivism: “what Rand says and only what Rand says is
Objectivism.” (Or, as Peikoff puts it: “Objectivism is a closed system.”) The
fact that Rand has made incalculably valuable identifications of certain
philosophical principles does by no means convey upon her exclusive or
infallible domain in the further identification or application of those
principles; nor, on the other hand, do Rand’s incorrect identifications or
improper applications in the least diminish the truth or usefulness of the
principles of Objectivism.
A big difference between the Objectivists and the Randites is that the
Objectivists do not view Objectivism as a dogma i.e., a set of ideas to be
accepted without question. We see it as an intellectual tool that is useful in
helping us to understand the world, in much the same way that the Scientific
Method is. From this point of view, the idea that someone can be “an enemy of
Objectivism” (one of Leonard Peikoff’s favorite denunciations) is as
ridiculous as the idea that someone can be “an enemy of the Integral
Calculus.”
There are many parallels to be drawn between Rand/Objectivism and
Newton/The Calculus. In each case an immensly powerful, beautiful and useful
intellectual tool was derived by a human being who possessed some of the
foibles of humanity. In each case the tool was jealously clung to and
possessively circumscribed by its creator. In each case the tool was rejected
and reviled by some reactionary people. And in each case (as time will
eventually demonstrate) the power and utility of the tool will outlast the
small-minded people who criticize it. Alongside these parallels there is a
significant difference: it would be rather farfetched to regard a set of
mathematical principles as a religion, but it is quite possible (and is indeed
the practice of some people) to regard a set of philosophical principles as a
religion. There are those who adulate Rand almost as if she were a deity and
who regard Objectivism as a sacred dogma.
I believe the important aspects of her life are the philosophical
achievements, not her personal attributes. Her personal foibles will
eventually fade into the oblivion of historical forgetfulness - like
Aristotle’s male chauvinism, or Newton’s alchemy, or Einstein’s socks - and
what will be left for future generations are the valuable philosophical
identifications she made.
I would say this to the Randites: Abandon the attitude that the principles
of Objectivism and the pronouncements of Ayn Rand are congruent sets. Realize
that Objectivism, like the Scientific Method, is an open-ended set of
principles rather than a closed and rigidly defined dogma. Recognize the
importance of the work being done by those scholars who are trying to develop
the ethical and political implications of the Objectivist Ethics. Until you do
this, you will only be ostracizing yourselves from the living and powerful
body of philosophy that is growing on the foundation of Ayn Rand’s magnificent
achievements.

Rand’s incorrect definition of selfish
You will observe that in my essays I do not use the term “selfish,” but use
instead “self-interested.” Here is why.
From the introduction to THE VIRTUE OF SELFISHNESS, by Ayn Rand:
The title of this book may evoke the kind of question that I hear once in a
while: “Why do you use the word ‘selfishness’ to denote virtuous qualities of
character, when that word antagonizes so many people to whom it does not mean
the things you mean?”.... there are others, who would not ask that question,
sensing the moral cowardice it implies....
There are, roughly speaking, three classes of people:
1. Those concerned with their own advantage without any regard for others.
2. Those having no concern for self at all.
3. Those who are concerned with their own self-benefit and who are also
aware of and concerned with their social context.
Rand makes a good case for altruism’s having falsely divided humanity into
just two classes - the first and the second - leaving no room for the third
category, the “self-respecting, self-supporting man - a man who supports his
life by his own effort and neither sacrifices himself nor others.” But if you
consult the Oxford English Dictionary, you will find that Rand’s use of the
term “selfish” to designate the third category is not conclusively justified
etymologically.
Historically, the terms most often used to designate these three categories
are:
1. Selfish: concerned with one’s own advantage without regard for others.
This has almost always been described as wicked.
2. Selfless: having no concern for self. This has always been described as
being ethically laudable.
3. Self-interested: concerned with one’s own well-being. This has only
sometimes been described as a vice.
These three usages are quite sensible terms of classification, enabling us
to distinguish clearly among the three categories. Rand’s insistence on using
the term “selfish” to designate that third category is a mistake, both a
cognitive mistake and a communications mistake.
It is a cognitive mistake because when she usurps the term “selfish” she
does not provide an alternative term for the first category. Thus she commits
the same cognitive error for which she upbraids the altruist mentality:
providing convenient terms for only two out of the three categories.
It is a communications mistake because the three terms enumerated above are
distinctly specified also in Webster’s Ninth Collegiate dictionary, and thus
are the terms most likely to be considered by educated Americans.
It is certainly true that there are many people to whom “selfish” does not
mean the things Rand means, and to question her usage of the term is not, as
she so stridently claims, an act of “moral cowardice” but merely an attempt to
preserve cognitive clarity and communications utility.
Perhaps it is no coincidence that in THE VIRTUE OF SELFISHNESS, Rand places
at the very last her essay on “The Argument From Intimidation.”

Rand’s personal statist views
In the realm of politics we must make a careful distinction between Rand’s
personal views and the implications of the Objectivist ethics.
The Objectivist stand is quite clear:
“The basic political principle of the Objectivist ethics is: no man may
INITIATE the use of physical force against others. No man - or group or
society or government - has the right to assume the role of a criminal and
initiate the use of physical compulsion against any man.” (From “The
Objectivist Ethics,” in THE VIRTUE OF SELFISHNESS.)
But Rand’s personal stand is fundamentally different. We can best see this
in her answers to two questions put to her during her appearance at the Ford
Hall Forum in 1972.
Question: Have you heard of the Libertarian Party and would you consider
endorsing John Hospers and Tonie Nathan as presidential candidates?
Rand: Look, I would rather vote for Bob Hope or the Marx brothers, if they
still exist, or Jerry Lewis - I don’t know who is the funniest today, rather
than something like professor Hospers and the Libertarian Party. Look, I don’t
think Henry Wallace is a great thinker but even he - he’s pretty much of a
demagogue, though with some courage - even he had the good sense to stay home
this time if he wanted to some extent - if he had one ounce of sincerity and
wanted some freedom for his country. To choose this year to start after
personal publicity - and if Hospers and whoever the rest are get ten votes
away from Nixon, which I doubt, but if they do it is a moral crime.
Question: Will you comment on the issue of should amnesty be granted to
draft dodgers?
Rand: I think it is an improper question to be discussed while there is a
war going on. It is a very complex question but you cannot, when men are dying
in a war, say that you promise amnesty to those who refused. On the other hand
I do not blame those who refused to be drafted if they did so out of general
conviction, not necessarily religious, but if they oppose the state’s right to
draft them. They would have a case, and they would go to jail. And they would
be willing to take that penalty.
Both Rand and her disciples have continually asserted this strong
opposition to the political implementation of libertarianism. And her
acceptance of the legitimacy of government authority was repeatedly expressed
both in word and deed.

Rand’s failure to distinguish between politics and economics
The last criticism I wish to present against Ayn Rand involves a failure
that was expressed not just in her personal behavior but which also shows up
in her philosophical writings. It is that she never made a distinction between
Politics and Economics. She almost always referred to capitalism as “laissez-
faire capitalism” or “free-market capitalism,” thus inexorably integrating
this primary economic concept with a political institution.
In my writings I will try to make a clear distinction between the two
realms of human activity, and provide definitions that will make it easier to
think about them.

What is Objectivism?
In considering the most fundamental ideas about the nature of the universe,
there are two basically distinct ideas:
One, known as subjectivity, asserts fundamentally that existence is created
by consciousness.
The other idea, known as objectivity, asserts fundamentally that there is
indeed a real world that has its own existence, independent of any perceiving
consciousness. Perhaps the best statement of this idea was made by Albert
Einstein:
“Out yonder there is this huge world, which exists independently of us
human beings and which stands before us like a great, eternal riddle, at least
partially accessible to our inspection and thinking.”
In the realm of scientific endeavor, objectivity (in the form of the
Scientific Method) has predominated. But in other realms of human endeavor,
such as Psychology, Ethics, and Politics, objectivity has had much less
influence in human history, mainly because the lack of a solution to the
Problem of the Universals precluded the sort of firm and direct linkage
between concepts of consciousness and reality as exists between scientific
concepts and reality (where truth prevails in a much more immediate and direct
manner).
But in the late 1960s the Problem of the Universals was solved by Ayn Rand.
She showed that Definitions Are Not Arbitrary, and she demonstrated how to
derive them directly from observations of reality. The same cognitive process
that enables you to construct a correct definition also enables you to think
in principles: to identify and classify things by reference to their
fundamental distinguishing characteristics.
This epistemological breakthrough enabled objectivity to be applied to ALL
areas of human activity. The work of Rand and other philosophers who have
taken up this effort has produced a set of principles now known as the
Philosophy of Objectivism. These principles stand in distinct contrast to most
of traditional philosophy and are, by and large, rather unpopular. (But that
is to be expected of any set of ideas that is new and challenges the existing
state of affairs. It has always been this way.)
Objectivism is the only philosophy that is completely consistent with
Physics. The ideas of Objectivism are founded upon a set of (Aristotelian)
Axiomatic Concepts: Existence, Identity, and Consciousness, and are derived
from those concepts by the intellectual procedure set forth in the Objectivist
Epistemology. This is a scientific, rationalist method which subsumes the
Scientific Method of determining truth. It extends the Scientific Method to
include areas of inquiry not usually thought to be amenable to scientific
analysis. In her essay “The Objectivist Ethics,” Rand applies this
intellectual procedure to identifying a rational basis for ethics and
morality. Nathaniel Branden, in his book “The Psychology of Self-Esteem,”
applies the procedure to identifying the bases of human psychology. Harry
Browne gives us a rational explanation of the nature of economics. Hospers and
Rothbard carry the procedure into the field of politics.

It is objectivity that is my area of interest, and Objectivism is the
philosophical context within which I write.
A philosophy is a set of principles which provides a consistent and
comprehensive frame of reference from which to judge man and his environment.
If a philosophy is to be a comprehensive frame of reference it must
encompass the full scope of man’s thoughts and activities. Especially must it
include Metaphysics, Epistemology, Ethics, Morality, Psychology, Politics,
Economics and Esthetics - since all of man’s activities are founded on one or
more of these fields of study. I will give a brief exposition of the
Objectivist principles as they apply to each of these fields. In order to
clarify my presentation I will in each case contrast the Objectivist position
with its contrary or opposite. The general schema looks like this:
Metaphysics objectivity vs subjectivity
Epistemology reason vs faith
Ethics egoism vs altruism
Morality self-interest vs degeneracy
Psychology free will vs determinism
Politics libertarianism vs statism
Economics free enterprise vs socialism
Esthetics romanticism vs anti-romanticism
Let us consider each of these terms and see what they mean.
Metaphysics is the science that deals with the fundamental nature of
reality. As I pointed out above, there are basically only two viewpoints in
this matter. One, objectivity, maintains that there is a real, factual world
which exists independently of the consciousness of any perceiving entity. This
is not to say that there is no interrelationship between consciousness and
reality, or that an acting conscious entity cannot alter and transform the
entities of reality by acting in accord with the physical laws that describe
reality, but rather that the facts of reality have their own existence whether
we are aware of them or not. Subjectivity, on the other hand, maintains that
reality, in its fundamental essense, is not a firm absolute but is instead
somehow dependent on, or a function of, consciousness. The basis of
subjectivity is a denial of the Law of Identity.
(There is another, quite different, sense in which the term subjective is
used: it refers to choices or decisions which are generated by reference to
internal states of consciousness rather than by assessment of external
factors. For example: the choice between chocolate or vanilla ice cream is a
subjective choice. But the choice between an ice cream cone for me or a bottle
of milk for my hungry baby should be an objective choice.)
Epistemology is the study of the source, nature and validity of human
knowledge. Here the Objectivist says that since there is a real world “out
there” (outside myself) it is the job of my consciousness to identify it. To
do this I make use of my faculty of reason - the ability to perceive, identify
and integrate the evidence of reality provided by my senses. The source of all
my knowledge lies in the rigorous adherence to logic, the art of non-
contradictory identification of the facts of reality. The subjectivist,
however, is bound to no such procedure. Since for him there is no firm,
absolute “out there,” his knowledge has its source in some form or another of
introspection (revelation) and its validity is accepted on faith - that is,
accepted without evidence or proof, or in spite of evidence to the contrary.
Concerning Ethics and Morality I make this distinction: Morality describes
intra-personal actions whereas Ethics describes inter-personal actions. For
example: dope addiction is immoral (it is self-destructive) but it is not
unethical. Stealing to support one’s habit is, however, unethical. Drunkenness
is merely immoral; blocking the sidewalk with your stupefied body is
unethical. Refusing to think is immoral, but failing, through this
intellectual laziness, to fulfil your obligations as a husband/father or
wife/mother is unethical. As you probably infer, I believe that most unethical
actions have their basis in immorality. I will save you the trouble of
consulting your dictionary by telling you that this distinction is
etymologically unjustifiable. Cicero was the first to use the term “morals”
and as he did so he noted that he meant this term to have precisely the same
meaning as the Greek term “ethics.” Since that time the two terms have been
used synonymously, but I think it clear that there is a distinction to be made
between two kinds of behavior, and the most appropriate terms to use in
labeling this distinction are Ethics and Morality.
In the field of Ethics the Objectivist position is egoism: that man is an
end in himself, not a means to the ends of others, and that each man should
live his own life for his own sake. The contrary position, altruism, holds
that man must make the welfare of others the primary goal of his social
relationships and that self-sacrifice is the highest virtue.
At this point I am sometimes beset with an argument that starts out: “Do
you mean to say that you’re the sort of wretched brute who tramples all over
other people to gain your ends?” and continues by proposing a kind of false
dichotomy which divides all human intercourse into two categories: sadism and
masochism, and then tries to sell me masochism on the grounds that sadism is
my only alternative. Most people posing this argument refuse to recognize the
existence of a third type of man - the independent, self-supporting, profit-
making trader, who neither sacrifices others to himself nor himself to others.
Morally, this sort of independently existing man is a self-interested
person. That is to say, he is a man who is CONCERNED WITH HIS OWN BENEFIT.
This implies, of course, that he knows what his own interests actually are. Is
it in my own physical self-interest to be a drunkard or a dope fiend? Hardly,
for these activities are clearly self-destructive. Is it in my own
psychological self-interest to be a liar or a thief? Again, no, because these
actions, although not as obviously self-destructive as alcoholism or other
drug addiction, are saboteurs of the mind’s most basic function: integration.
You cannot integrate a contradiction and both lies and thefts are
contradictions. (My second examples - liar/thief - are not merely immoral but
unethical as well, and you can see from considering them that unethical
actions are associated with immoral conditions.) What I’m trying to point out
is that many actions which are usually called “selfish” (lies, thefts, or the
wretched brute trampling on his poor fellow creatures) are not IN FACT in
one’s self-interest at all, and that the truly self-interested man is one who
has carefully examined and rationally analysed his nature as a proper human
being and thereby determined just what is IN FACT in his self-interest. The
liar, thief and brute are not self-interested, they are actually self-
destructive - they are degenerate.
Objectivist morality has two fundamental bases: acceptance of life itself
as the standard of values; and identification of the actions that are causally
required by our nature to achieve that end - to sustain life. The primary task
of morality is to identify the needs that must be satisfied to live
successfully, and the capacities that we have for satisfying those needs. We
prove that something is a proper value by showing that we need it; and we
prove that some course of action is a virtue by showing that it is required
for the proper exercise of our capacities.

In the realm of Psychology, Objectivism holds that man is a creature of
free will. This is to say that he is capable of making choices which are
causal primaries. Determinism, on the other hand, is the principle that all of
man’s choices and actions are determined by forces (heredity, environment,
etc.) which are outside of his control.
In political issues Objectivists are promoters of the libertarian ideal.
Their political goals are based on the ethical principle that no man or group
of men has the right to initiate the use of force against the person or
property of other people. We hold that there are only three proper functions
of a governing agency: the military, to protect men against aggression by
foreign criminals, the police, to protect men against aggression by domestic
criminals, and the courts, to resolve disputes and disagreements, which even
among just and rational men can at times arise. We hold that a governing
agency has no right to restrict a person’s activities in the moral area (thus
we oppose drug laws, laws forbidding sex acts between consenting adults, and
all other “victimless crime” laws) and that it can rightfully act in the
ethical area only when force (or its derivative, fraud) have been initiated
(thus we oppose all subsidies to business - or farmers - all tariffs and
import/export restrictions, licensing laws, and all other laws restricting the
freedom of production, transportation and trade). In brief, we advocate a
political system wherein each individual has the right to do anything
whatsoever which does not initiate force or fraud against anyone else, and in
which the role of a governing agency is strictly restrained to the protection
of that right. This is contrasted to the statist system, which is widespread
and becoming ever more prevalent today, in which the State exercises
predominant control over the actions of individuals, continually increasing
the scope and intensity of its regimentation and by “a long train of abuses
and usurpations, pursuing invariable the same Object, evinces a design to
reduce them under absolute Despotism.”
Corresponding to its political system, a society has an associated economic
system. Considering the nature of libertarianism, it is clear that its
associated economic system must have a strong foundation in the individual’s
right to own, control, use and dispose of his private property. Libertarians
advocate a capitalist economic organization in which the means of production -
land, capital, etc. - are owned and controlled by individuals (or voluntarily
associated groups of individuals), and in which there are no restrictions on
the freedom of production, transportation and trade. The opposite form of
economic organization, socialism (of which fascism and communism are
variants), is a system in which the economic resources are controlled by the
State and in which individuals have little, if any, economic freedom.
The last philosophical category I will consider is that of art forms. Here,
as before, I divide the field into two major domains. One, subsumed by the
term romanticism, includes all those works which are based on the recognition
that man is a volitional creature - that he has the power to make choices and
that those choices are major determinators of his life. The greatest portrayal
of romantic heroism can be found in the novels of Ayn Rand. The major task of
a romantic work of art is, as Aristotle said, “to show things as they might be
and ought to be.” The other esthetic domain (which, for lack of a suitable
general label, I will simply call “anti-romanticism”) shows things as they
“must be” (or are seen to be) and depicts man as a creature who has,
essentially, no power over his destiny. Anti-romanticism began with
classicism, evolved into naturalism, and is in turn evolving into absurdism.
The best such work of great classical literature is the Greek drama “Oedipus
Rex.” A good example of naturalism is “Death of a Salesman” and a typical
representative of absurdism is “Waiting for Godot.”
If I were asked to express the essence of Objectivism in one short
statement I could do no better than to quote Ayn Rand, the foremost identifier
and expounder of these principles:
“Man is a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his
life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his
only absolute.”

The Relationship Between Philosophy and Science
Scientists are very devoted to the scientific method, and they find that
the scientific method is to be applied most successfully in the world that can
be observed. That is not the world of moral values or the world of
philosophical thought, but in the laboratory where ideas can be tested. So
they regard science as the only really genuine form of knowledge. This leaves
them with an empty spot in their lives. They’re not practiced in applying
logic and reason to questions of value or philosophy. So they move this area
of thought over to the realm of faith. Their very devotion to the world of
fact leaves them hungry for some sort of clear guidance as to their conduct
for the rest of their lives.
On the other hand, philosophers spend their entire lives dealing with a
world of imaginings, conjectures, and fantasies, NOT with the physical facts
of reality - at least not beyond the tap in the sink and the switch on the
wall. They look with disdain upon the world of the physicist and the engineer
as being one of “crass materialism” - beneath the dignity of their lofty
intellectual position and not worthy of any serious consideration. The result
is that their ideas are usually entirely separated from reality and produce a
distortion when applied to the real physical world.
Consider Immanuel Kant, for example. He went to school, then he was a
tutor, then he was a professor at university for the rest of his life. As far
as I know he never even did so much physics as to draw a bucket of water up
out of a well. Thus whereas Thales (who was a bridge-builder) gave us
Aristotle, John Locke, and the United States of America - Kant (who was a pure
philosopher) gave us Fichte and Nazi Germany, Karl Marx and the Soviet Union.
But I cannot place all the blame on the shoulders of the philosophers.
After all, the philosopher does only half the job - he just conceives the
ideas. It is the scientist who creates the means of implementing those ideas.
Both men are equally responsible for the effects of their joint product.
Just as the philosophers are guilty of not knowing science - and thereby of
failing to test their ideas against reality, so the scientists are guilty of
ignoring philosophy - and thereby failing to understand the principles
underlying their actions.
How Scientists Can Build Bombs
Interviewer: “You must feel good, working for peace like that.” [on the
Manhattan Project]
Richard Feynman: “No, that never enters my head, whether it is for peace or
otherwise. We don’t know. You see, what happened to me - what happened to the
rest of us - is we STARTED for a good reason, then you’re working very hard to
accomplish something and it’s a pleasure, it’s excitement. And you stop
thinking [about principles], you know; you just STOP.”
Years ago in Los Alamos I had a hero, Enrico Fermi. He designed and
supervised the first nuclear reaction in the history of the world - in that
squash court at the University of Chicago. Then he built the first nuclear
bomb that was used - the Hiroshima bomb. I worshiped that man. He was dapper.
Jaunty. My God, he even had a sense of humor! And he started this whole
nuclear misery. You expect him to look and act like Mephistopheles, but here
was a marvelous little guy making jokes, while doing everything better than
everyone else. I loved that guy back then. I wanted to be like him. But I
couldn’t. Because I didn’t have whatever it takes for a man to enjoy himself
while perfecting these weapons.
When I first interviewed the scientists and first heard them tell of their
work on weapons, I wondered if it were possible to be so divorced from the
consequences of one’s work. It seemed to me that no matter how subtle the
problem a given weapon presented or how challenging its contemplation might
be, the ashes and the bones in the end would be the same.
Most scientists will, quite unthinkingly, sell their souls in exchange for
a laboratory supplied by loot.

The primary obstacle in developing any ethical philosophy is the lack of a
starting point. The analyst sees a set of “ought” terms: good, well, right,
proper, virtue, should, bad, wrong, etc. - each of which can evidently be
defined in terms of the others, but none of which has an independent, non-
relative existence. Rand’s genius was to identify the connection between the
“ought” of volitional judgement and the “is” of reality.
It is no accident that many of the early Greek philosophers were practicing
engineers, architects, bridge-builders, harbor designers. They were men whose
minds were intimately tied directly to the facts of reality, and that’s why so
many of their philosophical notions are so profound. In an attempt to link
science and philosophy, a reasonable question to ask is “Where can we find a
starting point - a foundation stone of certitude as the ultimate basis of
human knowledge? A place where we can stand in unquestionable certainty and
from whence we can build a structure of sure knowledge?” For a mathematician
this is no problem - he starts by looking at his fingers and counting them,
each symbol in his mathematical system representing an identifiable quantity
that is directly observed by his senses of sight and touch. For the physicist
also this is no problem - he merely refers to the broadest and most universal
concept known to science: the First Law of Thermodynamics (the notion that the
sum total of mass/energy in the universe is constant; that you can’t create
the stuff and you can’t destroy the stuff).
You can see that the physicist’s notion is fundamental to that of the
mathematician: the mathematician quantifies the entities that are composed of
mass/energy, but the physicist deals with the mass/energy directly. Is there
something that is fundamental to the notion of the physicist? Yes, there is,
and we can approach it through such questions as “What is the essential nature
of the mass/energy?” “What is the fundamental nature of the Universe?” “What
laws or principles underly all things - and all the behavior of all the
things?” There is an answer to these questions. An answer which subsumes both
the mathematician’s notion and the physicist’s notion. We might well call it
the Philosopher’s Notion. It was given to us by Aristotle, and it is the Law
of Identity.
The Law of Identity is one of the fundamental, axiomatic concepts
identified by Aristotle. In his Metaphysics, Book 4, Part 3, he observes:
“...for these truths hold good for everything that is.... And all men use
them, because they are true of being qua being.... For a principle which
everyone must have who understands anything that is, is not a hypothesis....
Evidently then such a principle is the most certain of all; which principle
this is, let us proceed to say. It is, that the same attribute cannot at the
same time belong and not belong to the same subject in the same respect.”
Stated as a tautology: A is A. A thing (ANY thing and EVERY thing) is what
it is. This idea is the foundation stone of all human knowledge. It serves to
tie human consciousness to the facts of reality. That it is indeed fundamental
can be seen when you observe that it cannot be escaped, that it is implicit in
all knowledge, that it has to be accepted and used even in any attempt to deny
it. For example, suppose you say “The Law of Identity is invalid.” Observe
that you have made a specific statement and that it has a specific meaning.
(Even within your own mind, you do NOT intend it to have the opposite
meaning!) Therefore your statement is what it is - it complies with the Law of
Identity - in spite of its own contention to the contrary. This is a situation
which you cannot escape, no matter how cleverly you might attempt to rephrase
your contention. The Law of Identity always prevails, in everything that you
think, that you say, and that you do. It is truly fundamental. It is, as
Aristotle said, “the most certain of all” - it is the foundation of certainty.
The Law of Identity is a foundation of objectivity. Any scientist who
probes beneath the First Law of Thermodynamics will soon encounter the Law of
Identity, and there he will find the doorway into the philosophy of
Objectivism. That doorway is the link between science and philosophy.
When you find, in the Objectivist Ethics, the TANSTAAFL principle (There
Ain’t No Such Thing As A Free Lunch): the idea that “You can’t get something
for nothing, unless someone, somewhere, sometime, is getting nothing for
something”, you see the direct link between Ethics and the First Law of
Thermodynamics.
Objectivism is the only philosophy that is completely consistent with
Physics. Indeed, Physics is a subset of Objectivism, for the fundamental
principles of Physics (the Laws of Thermodynamics) are themselves founded upon
the Axiomatic Concepts identified by the Objectivist Epistemology.
Objectivism starts with fundamentals and builds knowledge on a solid
foundation, from the ground up. Adherents of many modern philosophical
perspectives hate this very approach, and eschew the need for “foundations” of
knowledge altogether. They point out that thinkers have been trying to do this
for centuries and cannot agree on anything. Therefore, they argue, what’s the
use? And so THEY start in midair, with some supposedly common point of
reference allegedly agreed upon, but which is in fact controversial,
derivative, and even arbitrary. The result is usually a ramshackle mess which
presupposes an enormous amount that is never discussed, leads nowhere, and
solves nothing. What Objectivism has is a consistent, comprehensive
philosophical framework from which to ask questions about reality, and a
consistent, comprehensive scientific framework in which to seek answers to
those questions. Only this scenario can lead to a full understanding of
reality.

The Scientific Attitude of Mind
Science is not a body of knowledge but a way of thinking - a process - a
method. The body of knowledge is what results from that process. And a
Scientist is not necessarily someone who has a PhD in physics, but is anyone
who practices that way of thinking. It is characterized primarily by being
reality-oriented and flexible. A scientist assumes, as Einstein put it, that
“Out yonder there is this huge world, which exists independently of us
human beings and which stands before us like a great, eternal riddle, at least
partially accessible to our inspection and thinking.”
This is the fundamental premise of science.
The other element of scientific thought - flexibility - is the ability and
willingness to alter one’s ideas so as to bring them into correspondence with
that “independently existing world.” Nature does not necessarily comply with
the arbitrary boundaries established by human conjectures, and when she does
not, we must accept the necessity of modifying the conjectures.

Some History of Science
In the seventeenth century, there arose a mode of scientific procedure
usually associated with the names of Galileo and Francis Bacon. It was based
upon observation, reason, and experiment. Galileo’s work established the
priority of experiment over the Greek deductive science (which was itself a
great advance over the use of myth and religion to explain natural phenomena).
Galileo’s conclusions could not be ignored as a mere intellectual oddity, for
they had to be used in the practical business of pointing cannons at the
correct angle to compensate for the fall of cannonballs in flight.
By insisting on the experimental verification of scientific conjectures,
Galileo and his successors established a general test of scientific truth
which enabled scientists specializing in widely different disciplines to
accept and use each other’s results. The shared method created an organized
scientific community, with a division of labor among scientists in numerous
specialized fields, all contributing to the accumulation of a valid body of
knowledge. By the close of the seventeenth century, the scale of Europe’s
scientific effort was already overwhelmingly greater than that of any
contemporary or earlier culture, and so too was the European civilization’s
progress in understanding natural phenomena.
It has sometimes been maintained that Galileo’s greatest contribution was
his way of thinking about the physical universe. Unfortunately the great
majority of philosophers were (and remain) unable to understand his methods.
They still possess the Greek habit of reasoning from what seem to be valid
basic assumptions and rarely believe it necessary to check their conclusions
against the real universe.
We are so far accustomed to think of organizations solely in terms of
hierarchical bureaucracies like armies, governments, or corporations that it
is difficult to realize that an enterprise so individualistic and
nonhierarchical as modern science can properly be said to be highly organized.
But such a narrow impression of organization would have to be dismissed as
misleading on the basis of the history of science. Without a hierarchy,
Western scientists formed a scientific community within which they pursued
shared goals of understanding natural phenomena with dedication, cooperation,
competition, collective conflict resolution, division of labor,
specialization, and information generation and exchange at a level of
organizational efficiency rarely matched among large groups, hierarchical or
nonhierarchical. Western science had another advantage over contemporary and
antecedent sciences: it arose at a time when political and religious
authorities lacked the power to suppress new ideas incompatible with
conventional explanations of natural phenomena, though they often tried to.

Miscellaneous Comments on the Nature of Science
Goethe: “Nature understands no jesting; she is always true, always serious,
always severe; she is always right, and the errors and faults are always those
of man. The man incapable of appreciating her she despises and only to the
apt, the pure, and the true, does she resign herself and reveal her secrets.”
T.H. Huxley: “Suppose it were perfectly certain that the life and fortune
of evey one of us would, one day or other, depend upon his winning or losing a
game at chess. Don’t you think that we should all consider it to be a primary
duty to learn at least the names and the moves of the pieces; to have a notion
of a gambit, and a keen eye for all the means of giving and getting out of
check? Yet it is a very plain and elementary truth, that the life, the
fortune, and the happiness of every one of us, and, more or less, of those who
are connected with us, do depend upon our knowing something of the rules of a
game infinitely more difficult and complicated than chess. It is a game which
has been played for untold ages, every man and woman of us being one of the
two players in a game of his or her own. The chess-board is the world, the
pieces are the phenomena of the universe, the rules of the game are what we
call the laws of Nature. The player on the other side is hidden from us. We
know that his play is always fair, just and patient. But also we know, to our
cost, that he never overlooks a mistake, or makes the smallest allowance for
ignorance. To the man who plays well, the highest stakes are paid, with that
sort of overlflowing generosity with which the strong shows delight in
strength. And one who plays ill is checkmated - without haste, but without
remorse.”
If you learn what this world is, how it works, you automatically start
getting miracles - what will be called miracles. But of course nothing is
miraculous. Learn what the magician knows and it’s not magic anymore. But it
does no good to try to explain something as being a product of science, rather
than magic, in speaking to people who have no idea what is meant by “science.”
This is not necessarily the fault of the ignorant person. Although there is a
vast untapped popular interest in the deepest scientific questions, for many
people the shoddily thought out doctrines of borderline science are the
closest approximation to comprehensible science readily available. The
popularity of junk science should be a rebuke to the schools, the press and
commercial television for their sparse, unimaginative and ineffective efforts
at science education. This unfortunate situation is compounded by the popular
media’s obsession with controversy and sensationalism. In their rush to expose
“dangers” to the public health, the distortions and outright falsehoods they
present as “science” serve only to corrupt what little factual knowledge the
public does possess. To top it off, we are beset by the quantum mystics, whose
dim comprehension of physics, and abysmal ignorance of philosophy, do not in
any way inhibit their subjectivist metaphysical pronouncements. In fact
however, the ideas of quantum mechanics do not contain any reasons whatsoever
for giving up the concept of a reality that is independent of the mind.

Examples of the Scientific Attitude applied
Nearly four centuries of experience since Galileo’s time has shown that it
is frequently useful to depart from the real and to construct a model of the
system being studied. Some of the complications are stripped away, so a simple
and generalized mathematical structure can be built up out of what is left.
Once that is done, the complicating factors can be restored one by one, and
the model suitably modified. To try to achieve the comlexities of reality at
one bound, without working through a simplified model first, is so difficult
that it is rarely attempted, and usually does not succeed when it is.
Newton started with a mathematical construct that represents nature
simplified: a point mass moving around a center of force. Because he did not
assume that the construct was an exact reperesentation of the physical
universe he was free to explore the properties and effects of a mathematical
attractive force even though he found the concept of a grasping force “acting
at a distance” to be abhorrent and not admissable in the realm of good
physics. Next he compared the consequences of his mathematical construct with
the observed principles and laws of the external world, such as Kepler’s law
of areas and law of elliptical orbits. Where the mathematical construct fell
short Newton modified it. He made the center of force not a mathematical
entity but a point mass. From the modified mathematical construct Newton
concluded that a set of point masses circling the central point mass attract
one another and perturb one another’s orbits. Again he compared the construct
with the physical world. Of all the planets, Jupiter and Saturn are the most
massive, and so he sought orbital perturbations in their motions. With the
help of John Flamsteed, Newton found that the orbital motion of Saturn is
perturbed when the two planets are closest together. The process of repeatedly
comparing the mathematical construct with reality and then suitably modifying
it led eventually to the treatment of the planets as physical bodies with
definite shapes and sizes. After Newton had modified the construct many times
he applied it to the entirety of nature. He asserted that the force of
attraction, which he had derived mathematically, is universal gravity. Since
the mathematical force of attraction works well in explaining and predicting
the observed phenomena of the world, Newton decided that the force must “truly
exist” even though the philosophy to which he adhered did not and could not
allow such a force to be part of a system of nature. And so he called for an
inquiry into how the effects of universal gravity might arise.

In 1830, the Swedish chemist Jakob Berzelius, who didn’t believe that
molecules with equal structures but different properties were possible,
examined both tartaric acid and racemic acid in detail. With considerable
chagrin, he decided that even though he didn’t believe it, it was nevertheless
so.
Charles Darwin: “In October 1838, fifteen months after I had begun my
systematic enquiry (into the mutability of species), I happened to read
‘Malthus on Population,’ and being well prepared to appreciate the struggle
for existence which everywhere goes on from long-continued observation of the
habits of animals and plants, it at once struck me that under these
circumstances favourable variations would tend to be preserved, and
unfavourable ones to be destroyed. The result of this would be the formation
of new species. Here then I had at last got a theory by which to work.”

Some Critiques of Science
“There is no poetry in science.”
“Not all the soaring genius of Shakespeare sufficed to lift him to such
empyrean heights as to reveal to him the vision of the universe that bursts in
upon the dullest scientist who now lives. In every branch of science
fascinations lurk, ready to burst out upon even the most plodding soul.
Peeping from behind the symbols of the mathematician are formulas, such as the
Mandelbrot Set, so beautiful in their subtle symmetry that no artist could
improve on them. Where can one come across forms of things not only so
thoroughly unknown but so majestically unknowable as in the quantum world
within the atom? All the dictates of “common sense” - based upon the ordinary
world about us - break down in the face of the ultimately tiny. Imagine the
poetry of a science that calmly abandons common sense in order to preserve
sense; a science that admits into its fold an ineluctable uncertainty in order
to be more nearly certain. What mysteries, what clanking chains, what dim
ghosts of Gothic romance can compare with the mysterious muon-neutrino? There
is poetry everywhere and in everything, and it is most clearly present in the
world that scientists dwell in.” .... Isaac Asimov

“I question the accuracy and validity of the Scientific Method - Science is
young and clumsy - still too gross to truly measure some things.”
Let us examine the accuracy, validity, and gross clumsiness of science by
taking a look at just a few of its actual accomplishments.
To begin with, here is a measure of the accuracy between a theoretical
prediction and its corresponding experimental measurements:
Experiments measure the electron’s magnetic moment at 1.00115965221. The
theory of Quantum Electrodynamics puts it at 1.00115965246. To give you a
feeling for the accuracy of these numbers, look at them this way: If you were
to measure the distance from Los Angeles to New York to this accuracy, it
would be exact to the thickness of a human hair. I believe we can conclude
that the theory is reasonably close to reality.
As for the validity of scientific hypotheses - surely the most outrageously
unbelievable hypothesis of modern physics is the Quantum Mechanics, and yet a
clever application of the uncertainty principle (which places a limit on the
precision with which position can be known) yields very fine-tuned control
over a type of electron flow known as quantum tunneling. The resulting device
(the Scanning Tunneling Microscope, manufactured by Digital Instruments, Inc.)
uses the quantum tunneling effect both to view, and to perform mechanical
operations on, very tiny objects. Right down to the level of individual atoms.
In its practical application (where the validity of the Quantum Mechanics
can be measured by its commercial utility), an STM is used to monitor the
production quality of an optical-disk stamping machine.
And as for gross clumsiness, these three examples should suffice to dispel
that erroneous view:
The optical telescope on Palomar Mountain can detect a 10-watt light bulb
on the moon. This telescope could also measure the width of a needle - at a
distance of 5 miles. The best infrared telescopes could record the heat from a
rabbit on the moon - were it alive and hopping.
At the IBM Zurich lab, researchers used a Scanning Tunneling Microscope to
cleave a single benzene ring off of a dimethyl phthalate molecule.
Workers at the National Bureau of Standards used a Paul electromagnetic
trap to detect a single quantum jump of the outermost electron on a mercury
ion from its ground state to an intermediate state. That’s one single quantum
jump of one single electron! Not quite the sort of thing you could reach in
and fondle with your finger.
Look again at the criticism - and consider the principle underlying it:
She really should not “question the accuracy and validity of the Scientific
Method” while she is writing with a ball-point pen on a sheet of paper,
probably supported by the plastic surface of a desktop, and illuminated by an
electric light bulb. You see what’s happening - the author is using the very
thing she denies, in the act of denying it. This is an excellent example of
the Stolen Concept Fallacy: she is using the thing while she is rejecting the thing.

If you have difficulty grasping the Uncertainty Principle, consider this:
It is easily possible to construct a square, having specified exactly the
length of a side. When you have done so, you will find that you cannot measure
the diagonal with exactness (because it is a function of the square root of 2).
It is equally easy to construct a square having specified exactly the
length of the diagonal. But in this case you will be just as unable to measure
the exact length of the side.
Thus we are in the position of being able to specify one or the other of
two quantities - but not both simultaneously.
This exercise in simple geometry is a good example of the Uncertainty
Principle in action: the universe is built in such a fashion that we humans
are not omniscient - we can’t know everything.

If you have difficulty with the notion of “mere chance being the instrument
of creation” try this experiment:
Take about a dozen teaspoons and drop them (randomly but with handles up)
into a soda glass. Tilt the glass to about a 45 degree angle and shake it. You
will see the spoons begin to nest together. This nesting is the inevitable
consequence of energy dissipation - of the interplay of the laws of physics -
as the spoons settle into a “least energy content” configuration. When you
consider that the fundamental morsels of matter (atoms and molecules) are sets
of identical objects (every water molecule, for example, is exactly identical
to every other) just like the spoons - then it is not too hard to realize that
they would fit together in certain ways. Just like the spoons. This fitting
together - on a larger and larger scale - can account for many aspects of the
world of living things we see around us.
Always remember this: the words “chance” and “random” do not really
describe the world of Reality. What they DO describe is the state of human
knowledge. To be precise, they are terms that describe a state of human
ignorance. When I say that an event happens by “mere chance” all I am really
saying is that I do not precisely know what are the causal factors of that
event. Personally, I would much rather admit to my own ignorance of the world
than to invent, as an absolution for that ignorance, a Divinity to account for
things I cannot yet explain.

A commonly encountered criticism is “How can you believe in something -
like an electron - which you can’t possibly see?”
No one has ever seen the inside of a brick. Every time you break the brick,
you see only the surface. That the brick has an inside is a simple assumption
which helps us understand things better. The theory of electrons is analogous.
The ultimate justification is that logical conclusions drawn from some
assumptions have led to useful and effective solutions to real-life problems.
From science have flowed all those great inventions by means of which mankind
in general is able to subsist with more ease and in greater numbers upon the
face of the earth. Hence arise the great advantages of men above brutes, and
of civilization above barbarity. The acre of ripe wheat that once took 12 men
with a dozen horses, mules or oxen all day to cut and thresh, is now gathered
up in six minutes as the combine rolls, one person at the controls.
How can we achieve fantastic things in regard to the material world and yet
suppose for one minute that what we are doing is arbitrary and has no
absolute, unquestionable relationship to the facts of reality? If what we do
works, how is that possible if it doesn’t correspond to reality?

peta news

Leather: Beauty Isn’t Only Skin Deep

Every year, the $1.5 billion U.S. leather industry tans approximately 100 million animal skins.(1)
Many animals from whom these skins are taken suffer all the horrors of factory farming, including extreme crowding and confinement, deprivation, unanesthetized castration, branding, tail-docking and de-horning, and cruel treatment during transport and slaughter.

Everything but the Moo
Meat producers joke that they make money from “every part of a cow but the moo,” and indeed, since red meat consumption has been dropping since the late 1970s, the profits of the meat industry are largely dependent on the sale of animal hides.
Skin accounts for approximately 50 percent of the total byproduct value of cattle.(4) When dairy cows’ production declines, their skin is also made into leather; the hides of their offspring, “veal” calves, are made into high-priced calfskin. Thus, the economic success of the slaughterhouse (and the dairy farm) is directly linked to the sale of leather goods.

The Whole Ark
Most leather produced and sold in the United States is made from the skins of cattle and calves, but leather is also made from horses, sheep, lambs, goats, and pigs who are slaughtered for meat. Other species are hunted and killed specifically for their skins, including zebras, bison, water buffaloes, boars, deer, kangaroos, elephants, eels, sharks, dolphins, seals, walruses, frogs, crocodiles, lizards, and snakes. Thousands of endangered olive ridley sea turtles are captured and butchered illegally in Mexico, solely for their skins.(5) It is estimated that 25-30 percent of imported crocodile shoe leather and other wildlife items are made from endangered, illegally poached animals.(6)
Other “exotic” animals, such as alligators, are “factory farmed” for their skins. Ranched alligators are kept in half-sunken tin-sided structures of cinder blocks on concrete slabs.(7) As many as 600 young alligators may inhabit one building, which reeks of rancid meat, alligator waste, and stagnant water. Although alligators may naturally live 40 to 60 years, on farms they are usually butchered before their fourth birthday.(8)
Humaneness is not a priority of those who poach and hunt animals to obtain their skin or those who transform skin into leather. Alligators on farms may be beaten to death with hammers and axes, sometimes remaining conscious and in agony for 1 1/2 to 2 hours.(9) Crocodiles are often caught with huge hooks and wires and reeled in when they become weakened from blood loss or drown. Poachers sometimes kill one species of animal to use as bait to capture another.(10) Snakes and lizards are often skinned alive because of the widespread belief that live flaying imparts suppleness to the finished leather. Flayed snakes have been observed to take more than four days to die.(11) Kid goats may be boiled alive to make kid gloves, and the skins of unborn calves and lambs--some purposely aborted, others from slaughtered pregnant cows and ewes--are considered especially “luxurious.”

Tannery Toxins
Although leathermakers like to tout their products as “biodegradable” and “eco-friendly,” the process of tanning stabilizes the collagen or protein fibers so that they actually stop biodegrading. Until the late 1800s, animal skin was air- or salt-dried and tanned with vegetable tannins or oil, but today animal skin is turned into finished leather with a variety of much more dangerous substances, including mineral salts, formaldehyde, coal tar derivatives, and various oils, dyes, and finishes, some of them cyanide-based.
More than 95 percent of leather produced in the U.S. is chrome-tanned. All wastes containing chromium are considered hazardous by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).(12) In addition to the toxic substances mentioned above, tannery effluent also contains large amounts of other pollutants, such as proteins, hair, salt, lime sludge, sulfides, and acids.
Among the disastrous consequences of this noxious waste is the threat to human health from the highly elevated levels of lead, cyanide, and formaldehyde in the ground water near tanneries. The Centers for Disease Control found that the incidence of leukemia among residents in an area surrounding one tannery in Kentucky was five times the national average.(13) People who work in tanneries are dying from cancer caused by exposure to dimethylformamide and other toxic chemicals used to process and dye the leather.(14) The coal tar derivatives used are extremely potent cancer-causing agents. According to a study released by the New York State Department of Health, more than half of all testicular cancer victims work in tanneries.(15) The leather industry also uses a tremendous amount of energy. The Kirk-Othmer Encyclopedia of Chemical Technology states, “On the basis of quantity of energy consumed per unit of product produced, the leather-manufacturing industry would be categorized with the aluminum, paper, steel, cement, and petroleum-manufacturing industries as a gross consumer of energy.”(16) This does not even take into account the waste and pollution involved in raising the animals whose skins eventually become leather. Huge amounts of fossil fuels are consumed in livestock production. (By contrast, plastic wearables account for only a fraction of one percent of the petroleum used in the U.S.)(17) Trees are cleared to create pastureland, vast quantities of water are used, and feedlot and dairy farm runoff are a major source of water pollution.

Alternatives
As evidenced by a May 1990 poll in Parents magazine--in which 69 percent of those polled said they were against killing animals for leather--more and more people are realizing that leather is something we can do without. There are many alternatives, including cotton, linen, rubber, ramie, canvas, and synthetics. Chlorenol (called Hydrolite by Avia and Durabuck by Nike), used in athletic and hiking shoes, is an exciting new material that’s perforated for breathability, will stretch around the foot with the same “give” as leather, gives good support, and is machine washable.
Vegan shoes and accessories are inexpensive--up to 60 to 75 percent less than leather. Some, like Deja Shoes (call 503-598-9171 for retailers near you), are even made from recycled materials.

Where to Shop
Leather alternatives can be found just about anywhere you might shop. But some places, such as discount shoe and variety stores like Payless Shoe Source, Fayva, Kmart, J.C. Penney and Wal-Mart, offer larger selections. Designers like Liz Claiborne, Capezio, Sam & Libby, Unlisted, and Nike (call 1-800-344-NIKE for a current list of vegan styles) offer an array of nonleather handbags, wallets, and shoes.
For more shopping tips, send for The Compassionate Shopper (Beauty Without Cruelty, 175 W. 12th St., #16G, New York, NY 10011-8275) or “A Shopper’s Guide to Leather Alternatives” (The Vegetarian Resource Group, P.O. Box 1463, Baltimore, MD 21203).

References
1.Wolfson, Elissa, “Toward Sustainable Shoes,” E Magazine, November/December 1990.
2.Moll, Lucy, “Is There Such a Thing as a Humane Pair of Shoes?,” Vegetarian Times, January 1989, pp. 42-48.
3.Macauley, Dave, “From Craft to Commodity: Leather and the Leather Industry,” The Animals’ Agenda, September/October 1988, pp. 14-21.
4.Reilly, Lee, “Whether Leather?,” Vegetarian Times, Oct. 1994.
5.Steiner, Todd, “Banned Sea Turtle Products Still Exported From Mexico,” Earth Island Journal, Summer 1994.
6.Macauley, op. cit.
7.Robichaux, Mark, “Alligator Farming Shows There’s a Lot to Be Said for Cows,” The Wall Street Journal, August 2, 1989.”
8.Bencivenga, Jim, “Recession Bites the Gator Trade,” The Christian Science Monitor, February 3, 1992, p. 9.
9.Feral, Priscilla, “Skinning Reptiles for Fashion,” Friends of Animals News, March 1991, p. 12.
10.Macauley, op cit.
11.Reptile Defense Fund, Striking Back.
12.Clinton, Sally, “A Shopper’s Guide to Leather Alternatives,” The Vegetarian Journal, Nov./Dec. 1991, pp. 8-13.
13.Macauley, op.cit.
14.The Lancet, Nov. 14, 1987.
15.Rochester Democrat-Chronicle, June 19, 1988.
16.Clinton, op. cit.
17.Moran, Victoria, “Going Non-leather,” The Animals’ Agenda, March 1992.
From People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

Chimpanzees at Buckshire Corporation
A Case Report from PETA’s Research, Investigations and Rescue Department

The Case
PETA conducted an undercover investigation of Buckshire Corporation, a U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)-licensed animal dealer in Pennsylvania with a miserable history of animal care violations. We discovered 42 chimpanzees in a windowless basement, isolated in cages measuring three feet by five feet.
The chimpanzees, some used in show business, some “retired” from New York University (NYU) Medical Center’s Laboratory for Experimental Medicine and Surgery in Primates (LEMSIP), and others caged for future experiments, exhibit behavior indicating extreme psychological deprivation--hair pulling, rocking, and self-clasping. PETA’s investigator carefully noted each animal’s name and videotaped the animals in August 1994, hoping to find something in their individual histories to help them out of their misery at Buckshire. Here are some of their stories:

Bold, Seetee, Lindsey, Charlie Brown, Chas, and Ray
These older chimpanzees, the “Buckshire Six,” belong to LEMSIP, a laboratory with a long history of business with Buckshire. All of them were born in the wild as much as 35 years ago--torn from their mothers and their jungle homes to be caged and experimented on for decades.
Filmmaker Oliver Stone, an NYU graduate, wrote to NYU president Jay Oliva and insisted that LEMSIP stop its dealings with Buckshire. His involvement and PETA’s protest at NYU’s 1995 graduation resulted in a May 19, 1995, agreement to let PETA find sanctuary for these chimpanzees. Even though NYU refused to contribute money for their lifetime care, a California sanctuary agreed to build them an indoor-outdoor enclosure and try to socialize them. As of November 1995, the six chimpanzees have made progress in group living. Bold is fascinated with birds landing in his enclosure and all can now see blue sky and smell fresh air!

Walter-B, Navy Bob, and Little Guy
PETA learned these three older chimpanzees at Buckshire were “owned” by the U.S. Army. Walter, Bob, and L.G. were to have been used in an Army HIV experiment at LEMSIP. In violation of the Army contract, the director of LEMSIP switched Walter, Bob and L.G. with other chimpanzees and put the Army chimpanzees in “storage” at Buckshire until he could use them. Those plans soured when PETA presented its undercover video of the animals to the Army, which ordered LEMSIP to remove the chimpanzees from Buckshire’s substandard facility immediately. Despite PETA’s offer to find homes for Walter, Bob, and L.G. at no cost to taxpayers, the Army transferred them to a chimpanzee laboratory in New Iberia, Louisiana.

Julian
PETA learned that Julian’s misery at Buckshire began in 1988, when the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo (CMZ) in Colorado Springs, Colorado, leased him to a roadside exhibitor for breeding. The exhibitor turned Julian over to Buckshire in a deal that called for every other one of Julian’s offspring to be given to the exhibitor. PETA contacted CMZ, but got a cold reception. The zoo did not want Julian back, having placed all of its chimpanzees in a “conservation barn” out of view of the public. Constant pressure on the zoo resulted in Julian’s being flown back to Colorado in March 1995. Julian’s status as a “prolific breeder” meant Buckshire used him to produce as many baby chimpanzees as possible, consigning them to a life in captivity for experimentation or amusement. PETA discovered several of Julian’s children at Buckshire--Bubba, Otis, and Flash. (See Bubba, below.) CMZ has refused to help Julian’s children get out of Buckshire!

Annie, Bucky, and Bubba
Annie, born at LEMSIP February 6, 1988, “lives” in a cage that measures three feet by three feet, inside a shed at Buckshire. She has been isolated from all other living beings since July 1993, when Buckshire’s owner, Sharon Hursh, claimed Annie had tested positive for tuberculosis and reclaimed her (along with Bucky and Bubba) from a Florida couple to whom all three chimpanzees had been leased for a roadside act. Annie’s tuberculosis tests are, in fact, inconclusive. Buckshire may have wanted to call in all of its leased chimpanzees because LEMSIP wanted to purchase them for experiments. Bucky, born at LEMSIP, will be three years old on October 15, 1995. He was only seven months old when he was removed from his mother and sent to Florida with Annie and Bubba. After Buckshire confiscated the three friends, Buckshire threw Bucky into a bleak, tiny cage, alone. Previously, he had spent his days playing with Annie and Bubba and being reared by human “parents.” USDA reports note Bucky’s attempts to comfort himself by self-clasping and rocking behavior--signs of mental illness. At this time, Annie, Bucky, and Bubba are subjects of a lawsuit filed against Buckshire by the Florida entertainer who leased them. Whether this will result in their release from Buckshire remains to be seen.

Sammy
Sammy, also known as “Woodrow,” was born in 1978 at Oklahoma State University and bought at the age of three by the same Florida couple who had Bubba, Bucky, and Annie. They used Sammy in their act for four years until leaving him at Buckshire when he became too “difficult.” Sammy spent the next ten years caged alone in Buckshire’s dismal basement and now self-mutilates to try to ease the pain of loneliness. As a result of negotiations between the Florida entertainer and Buckshire, PETA was able to arrange for Sammy’s release in November 1995 to the California sanctuary where the Buckshire Six now live, and efforts to rehabilitate Sammy are underway.

Hope for the Future
PETA’s complaint to the USDA about Buckshire is under review by the agency’s Office of General Counsel. PETA has written to over 100 pharmaceutical companies and the National Institutes of Health to ask that a proper sanctuary for chimpanzees be funded and built by those who exploit the animals.
From People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

Animal Experimentation: Sadistic Scandal

Vivisection, the practice of experimenting on animals, began because of religious prohibitions against the dissection of human corpses. When religious leaders finally lifted these prohibitions, it was too late - vivisection was already entrenched in medical and educational institutions.
Estimates of the number of animals tortured and killed annually in U.S. laboratories diverge widely - from 17 to 70 million animals.(1) The Animal Welfare Act requires laboratories to report the number of animals used in experiments, but the Act does not cover mice, rats, and birds (used in some 80 to 90 percent of all experiments).(2) Because these animals are not covered by the Act, they remain uncounted and we can only guess at how many actually suffer and die each year.
The largest breeding company in the United States is Charles River Breeding Laboratories (CRBL) headquartered in Massachusetts and owned by Bausch and Lomb. It commands 40-50 percent of the market for mice, rats, guinea pigs, hamsters, gerbils, rhesus monkeys, imported primates, and miniature swine. (3)
Since mice and rats are not protected under Animal Welfare Act regulations, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) does not require that commercial breeders of these rodents be registered or that the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) inspect such
establishments. (4)
Dogs and cats are also used in experiments. They come from breeders like CRBL, some animal shelters and pounds, and organized “bunchers” who pick up strays, purchase litters from unsuspecting people who allow their companion animals to become pregnant, obtain animals from “Free to a Good Home” advertisements, or trap and steal the animals. Birds, frogs, pigs, sheep, cattle, and many naturally free-roaming animals (e.g., prairie dogs and owls) are also common victims of experimentation. At this writing, animals traditionally raised for food are covered by Animal Welfare Act regulations only minimally, and on a temporary basis, when used in, for example, heart transplant experiments; but they are not covered at all when used in agriculture studies. Unfortunately, vivisectors are using more and more animals whom they consider less “cute,” because, although they know these animals suffer just as much, they believe people won’t object as strenuously to the torture of a pig or a rat as they will to that of a dog or a rabbit.

Paying for Pain
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) in the United States is the world’s largest funder of animal experiments. It dispenses seven billion tax dollars in grants annually, of which about $5 billion goes toward studies involving animals.(5) The Department of Defense spent about $180 million on experiments using 553,000 animals in 1993. Although this figure represents a 36% increase in the number of animals used over the past decade, the military offered no detailed rationale in its own reports or at Congressional hearings.(6) Examples of torturous taxpayer-funded experiments at military facilities include wound experiments, radiation experiments, studies on the effects of chemical warfare, and other deadly and maiming procedures.
Private institutions and companies also invest in the vivisection industry. Many household product and cosmetics companies still pump their products into animals’ stomachs, rub them onto their shaved, abraded skin, squirt them into their eyes, and force them to inhale aerosol products. Charities, such as the American Cancer Society and the March of Dimes, use donations from private citizens to fund experiments on animals.
Agricultural experiments are carried out on cattle, sheep, pigs, chickens, and turkeys to find ways in which to make cows produce more milk, sheep produce more wool, and all animals produce more offspring and grow “meatier.”

Bad Science
There are many reasons to oppose vivisection. For example, enormous physiological variations exist among rats, rabbits, dogs, pigs, and human beings. A 1989 study to determine the carcinogenicity of fluoride illustrated this fact. Approximately 520 rats and 520 mice were given daily doses of the mineral for two years. Not one mouse was adversely affected by the fluoride, but the rats experienced health problems including cancer of the mouth and bone. As test data cannot accurately be extrapolated from a mouse to a rat, it can’t be argued that data can accurately be extrapolated from either species to a human. In many cases, animal studies do not just hurt animals and waste money; they harm and kill people, too. The drugs thalidomide, Zomax, and DES were all tested on animals and judged safe but had devastating consequences for the humans who used them. A General Accounting Office report, released in May 1990, found that more than half of the prescription drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration between 1976 and 1985 caused side effects that were serious enough to cause the drugs to be withdrawn from the market or relabeled. All of these drugs had been tested on animals.
Animal experimentation also misleads researchers in their studies. Dr. Albert Sabin, who developed the oral polio vaccine, cited in testimony at a congressional hearing this example of the dangers of animal-based research: “[p]aralytic polio could be dealt with only by preventing the irreversible destruction of the large number of motor nerve cells, and the work on prevention was delayed by an erroneous conception of the nature of the human disease based on misleading experimental models of the disease in monkeys.” (7)

Healing Without Hurting
The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine reports that sophisticated non-animal research methods are more accurate, less expensive, and less time-consuming than traditional animal-based research methods. Patients waiting for helpful drugs and treatments could be spared years of suffering if companies and government agencies would implement the efficient alternatives to animal studies. Fewer accidental deaths caused by drugs and treatments would occur if stubborn bureaucrats and wealthy vivisectors would use the more accurate alternatives. And tax dollars would be better spent preventing human suffering in the first place through education programs and medical assistance programs for low-income individuals--helping the more than 30 million U.S. citizens who cannot afford health insurance--rather than making animals sick. Most killer diseases in this country (heart disease, cancer, and stroke) can be prevented by eating a low-fat, vegetarian diet, refraining from smoking and alcohol abuse, and exercising regularly. These simple lifestyle changes can also help prevent arthritis, adult-onset diabetes, ulcers, and a long list of other illnesses.It is not surprising that those who make money experimenting on animals or supplying vivisectors with cages, restraining devices, food for caged animals (like the Lab Chow made by Purina Mills), and tiny guillotines to destroy animals whose lives are no longer considered useful insist that nearly every medical advance has been made through the use of animals. Although every drug and procedure must now be tested on animals before hitting the market, this does not mean that animal studies are invaluable, irreplaceable, or even of minor importance or that alternative methods could not have been used.
Dr. Charles Mayo, founder of the Mayo Clinic, explains, “I abhor vivisection. It should at least be curbed. Better, it should be abolished. I know of no achievement through vivisection, no scientific discovery, that could not have been obtained without such barbarism and cruelty. The whole thing is evil.” (8) Dr. Edward Kass, of the Harvard Medical School, said in a speech he gave to the Infectious Disease Society of America: “[I]t was not medical research that had stamped out tuberculosis, diphtheria, pneumonia and puerperal sepsis; the primary credit for those monumental accomplishments must go to public health, sanitation and the general improvement in the standard of living brought about by industrialization.”(9)

Changing the System
Write to your legislators today to express your concern for animals used in experiments. Urge them to do everything in their power to push researchers out of the Dark Ages where animals are still butchered in the name of science.
Write to People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals for a free factsheet detailing the many humane alternatives to vivisection.
References
1.Orlans, F. Barbara, “Data on Animal Experimentation in the United States: What They Do and Do Not Show,” Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 37, 2. Winter 1994.
2.Ibid.
3.Reddy, Kal, THETA Corporation, Research Animal Markets Report, No. 982, September 1989.
4.Soos, Troy, “Charles River Breeding Labs,” The Animals’ Agenda, Dec. 1986, p. 10.
5.Stoller, Kenneth, M.D., “Animal Testing: Why a Doctor Opposes It,” The Orlando Sentinel, June 25, 1990.
6.Krizmanic, Judy, “Military Increases Animal Experiments,” Vegetarian Times, August 1994.
7.Stoller, op. cit.
8.Quoted by William H. Hendrix, New York Daily News, Mar. 13, 1961.
9.Prouix, Lawrence, “A History of Progress,” Washington Post, Feb. 21, 1995.
From People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

Big Cats Beaten at Animal Training “School”

A Case Report from PETA’s Research, Investigations and Rescue Department

In July 1993, a PETA caseworker received a call from a former student of a big-cat training course at Tiger’s Eye Productions in Oviedo, Florida. The caller said he had witnessed owner/”instructor” David McMillan and his students abusing tigers, leopards, and a lion. A PETA undercover investigator enrolled in McMillan’s “school,” where he documented daily incidents of animal abuse and neglect with videotape, photographs and detailed log notes made over a period of nine months.
PETA’s investigator witnessed and documented many alleged violations of the federal Animal Welfare Act at the compound. While in “class,” McMillan and his students hit tigers in the face with PVC pipes, jabbed a lion with wooden sticks, screamed at the big cats, and dragged them by the neck with shackles and chains to teach them to “behave” and “perform.” Inexperienced “students” confused and provoked the animals who often fell from the perches and barrels used as performance props.
Here is one of many sad incidents PETA’s investigator described in his daily log:
“I watched David hit [a Bengal tiger named] Sampson on the head repeatedly with the large metal ring on the end of the chain. He also hit Sampson on the head with a wooden axe handle at least five times.... It sounded like a wooden bat slamming into a baseball. Sampson was breathing heavily, ... eyes dilated, foaming at the mouth and defecating everywhere....”
Virginia McKenna, Founder Trustee of the Born Free Foundation and star of the film Born Free, wrote the following statement after viewing a videotape of McMillan and his students tormenting the animals at TEP:
“[On the video] I saw men and women hitting, beating, poking lions and tigers--reducing them to trembling, snarling, flinching, pathetic victims.... [W]hat I witnessed in the video breaks [the Animal Welfare Act regulations] on all counts.... Prostrate leopards were forcibly dragged along the ground.... “Students” were instructed to stick a lion hard in the shoulder.... all those concerned with this disgraceful organization [TEP] should be barred from owning any animal,
ever again.”
Tigers in the wild like to find shelter in hollow trees and caves, but the animals at McMillan’s compound are often left outside for hours without shelter against searing heat and raging thunderstorms. Leopards and other strong animals who are natural-born hunters often go for days without food under McMillan’s orders. When not being “handled,” the big cats are kept in cement and steel cages that offer nothing close to their natural habitat. When he sees no more use for them, McMillan sends the used big cats to seedy roadside attractions.
PETA has filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Agriculture under the Animal Welfare Act.
From People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

WHAT YOU OUGHT TO DO
VERSUS WHAT YOU HAVE TO DO

Moral judgments often arrive to the conclusion that one person (the subject in a particular situation) ought to do something in a given situation. However, it has also been said in certain cases that a person had to do what he or she did (note the word had, as opposed to the word ought, is the word that makes the difference in the two statements). The question then arises:
Some moral judgments are to the effect that a certain personhad to do what he or she did. How does this differ from thecase where what a person ought to have done was whathe or she did?
To fully understand the question at hand, the question must be appropriately analyzed - what exactly is the intent of the question? What is the question asking? Generally, it can be said that the question is asking for the comparison of two slightly different statements, and these statements are:
a person had to do what he or she did, and
a person ought to have donewhat he or she did.
The differences, then, between these two statements, are the differences between the two concepts of having to do something and of doing what ought to have been done. To then fully understand the differences between these two concepts or cases (if there actually are and differences in the first place), the full understanding of these two phrases or words (had, in the context of “having to do something”, and ought, in the context of “having ought done something”) have to be understood, for the differences in the two parts to the question only boil down to (if any) the differences between the two different words that must be examined.
The definition of the word “had” is as follows:
had: to be compelled, obliged, or required
(considering that “having to do something” can only be applied to the concept of “having to do something” in a specific framework.)
And the word “ought” even has the same words used to describe it, for the definition is as follows:
ought: used to express obligation (ought to pay your debts), advisability (ought to take care of yourself), natural expectation (ought to be here by now), or logical consequence (the result ought to be infinity). Moral obligation, duty.
(the preceding definitions of the word “ought”, particularly visible considering the definition as a moral obligation, can only be considered as, for example, a moral obligation or a duty in a certain framework or society, much in the same way as the definition of the word “had”.)
Even in their definition they share the same words, denoting their similarity in their meanings.
Upon further investigation of each of the singular words being compared, yet more enlightening information arises. In considering the word “ought” as a moral obligation (as one of the definitions of the word implies), the concept of having “ought” do something transfers into having “ought” to do the right thing. The word “right” must then be further examined, for one of the definitions that can be accepted for the word right is
Acting in the most desirable way in a given situation or society
...which is very similar to the definition of the word “conform”, for the meaning of conformity is
Action in accordance to some specified standard or authority. To be obedient or compliant.
The concept of being compelled or required in a given situation to accomplish a specific action (which entails the majority of the definition of the word “had”) is very similar in it’s meaning to the definition of the word “conform” (which has just been defined above). Obligation, which is a word that has been used in the definitions of both the word “had” (in the sense of “had to do”) and of the word “ought” (in the sense of “ought to do”), can also be directly related to the said definitions of the words “conformity” and “conform”. Because of these notes on the meanings of the two words, it can be said that in a number of cases (leaving out cases for the case where this line of reasoning may not apply; however, it does not seem that this safeguarding action necessarily needs to be taken), the word “had” has a similar meaning to the word “ought”, and in some instances the only reason that a person had to do something in a specific setting is because that person ought to have done or accomplished that something in that particular situation.
Put in variable terms, the following statements that have been made as the premise for this argument,
1) X had to do Y in S, therefore X did Y in S. and
2) X ought to have done Y in S, therefore X did Y in S.
(where X is the subject, Y is the action that had to be done or ought to have been done, and S is the specific situation or particular framework that the actions by the subject apply to.)
...are the same statements because of the fact that the definitions of the phrases “had to do” and “ought to have done” are often applied in the same fashion and have generally the same meaning.
In this light, and according to the preceding line of reasoning, it can then be stated that the only reason that a person had or has to do any certain specific action in a particular situation is because according to the standards of morality in the specific framework that they are in, they were acting in a certain way because they OUGHT to have acted in that certain way. In other words, the only way that a person HAS to do something is because they feel that they OUGHT to do that particular something.
The only possible difference in the two different phrases or statements (considering every possible difference in the definitions between the two words) is in the fact that the word “had” doesn’t on the surface seem to entail a sense of a moral obligation (although the true reason for the subject feeling as if they “had” to do something may actually be because of a moral obligation and simply not stated), where the word “ought” has the concept of a moral obligation in it’s meaning and automatically seems to imply it more when that particular term is used.
Therefore, a conclusion can then be drawn about the original question at hand, for now all of the evidence has been thoroughly examined. The question asked what the difference was between the following two cases:
1) a certain person had to do what he or she did in a certain situation.
2) what a certain person ought to have done in a certain situation is what he or she did in that certain situation.
The conclusion drawn from the information gathered is that there are not many differences at all. How do they differ? In most, or even in all cases, they really don’t.
And the only possible difference between the two cases is the fact that the use of the word “had” doesn’t imply the sense of a moral obligation (although there may still be that sense of a moral obligation, even if it is not said) in the same way that the word “ought” does. In any other respect of the definitions or meanings of these words, the phrases or even the entire statements, they two different cases have the same meaning. It is also possible that when the majority of the average people use the word “had” (in the sense that someone had to something), they may not be taking into consideration the fact that the reason that the person “had” to do that specific action was because that that particular person felt the moral obligation within themselves to actually do that certain something, or, in other words, that person may not have realized that they felt that they OUGHT to have done that particular action.
This train of thought not only states that these two cases are extremely similar, but it also states that these two cases or examples my even be more similar than can be described, for the sense of ought may underlie everything that a person does.