The concept of an "invalid question" in the Objectivist religion.

[Boojatta]

I think that I figured it out. Any question initially is considered to be potentially invalid. However, if an Objectivist thinks of an answer, then the question might be valid. Until an Objectivist thinks of an answer, the question remains potentially invalid.

If a number of Objectivists who are in communication with each other and form a sufficiently large collective are all unable to answer the question, then they have the option of declaring that the question is in fact invalid.

Objectivism doesn't claim that there exists a God, so some people might say that Objectivism isn't a religion, but if that reasoning is legitimate, then are we also forced to conclude that Buddhism isn't a religion?

[Fredda Weinberg]

1. Philosophy can co-exist w/religion. Plato presumably believed in

the proper gods, but still sought knowledge.

[cosmik debris]

2. Huh?

How can a question be invalid. A question merely expresses lack of knowledge or understanding. How can that have the property of being invalid?

[endarkenment]

3. Consider that the founder is Ayn Rand. nt.

[cosmik debris]

4. That doesn't explain anything.

Can you give me an example of a question that is not valid and explain why it is not valid?

You might also want to include a definition of "question" and "invalid" because the definitions I find in the on-line dictionaries don't make sense in the context of "invalid question".

[endarkenment]

5. Actually it does.

But if you know nothing about Rand, her politics, or her 'philosophy' of objectivism, perhaps you ought to hie thee to the googler.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objectivism_(Ayn_Rand)

Think L Ron Hubbard.

[cosmik debris]

7. I'm speaking of the English language.

There is no construction in English(that I am aware of)where the term "invalid question" has a coherent meaning. It is gibberish. It is like saying "invalid tire" or "puce question".

Validity is not a property of questions.

[endarkenment]

9. Um... that is just plain silly.

An invalid question is a question that is outside some predefined and generally arbitrary parameters for validity. For example, in the game of 20 questions an invalid question is one that cannot be answered by either 'yes' or 'no'.

[cosmik debris]

11. So the OP is playing twenty questions?

He did not tell us that.

Whatever game he is playing, I'd like to know the rules. That is why I asked for definitions--and didn't get them.

You are aware, I hope, that the rules of English usage are not the same as rules for Twenty Questions.

[endarkenment]

14. No, Ayn Rand was playing a game when she made up objectivism

So getting all wound up with questions like the OPs are generally a waste of time, objectively speaking.

[cosmik debris]

16. I don't know the rules to the game so I'm not going to play. n/t

[Jim__]

6. From an Objectivist website (soon to be a book)

You can decide whether or not his explanation validates the statement:

Now the most fundamental law of existence is "Existence exists." There is no more fundamental law than this, and, because it is implicit in the affirmation of any proposition, it is often taken to be tautologous, and therefore, empty of cognitive significance. However, such a view flows from the acceptance of the analytic/synthetic-dichotomy. But, as I have already argued, the theory of the analytic/synthetic-dichotomy is false. All valid concepts are empirical in nature, and thus dependent upon experience for their existence.

Now if this applies to all valid concepts, it necessarily applies to the concept of existence. Thus the concept of existence has empirical content. But what content? Anything which one ever has, is, or will know by means of experience. As such, the proposition "Existence exists" has empirical content: the very same empirical content as the concept of "existence" itself. But if the proposition "Existence exists" has empirical content, it cannot be empty of cognitive significance.

And in fact, it is by reference to this law that one may identify the invalidity of the question "Why does existence exist?": to explain existence as such would be to explain existence by reference to something which is not an aspect of existence, that is, by means of non-existence. But existence exists, and only existence exists. Therefore the question is invalid.

Likewise, it is invalid to ask "What created the universe?" For by the universe, one means everything which existed, exists, or will ever exist. Or in short, one means existence. But existence can only be explained by means of existence. Thus the question of "What created the universe?" asked one to identify that which was before existence which explains the existence of existence. But nothing can preceed existence, otherwise it would be non-existent, and therefore would not be.

and even more...

[cosmik debris]

8. Answers may be valid or invalid.

Questions do not possess that property.

[Jim__]

10. According to the Encarta Dictionary

And others have similar definitions, but, Encarta has an interesting example under definition 2:

val·id < vállid >


adjective

Definition:

1. unexpired: usable or acceptable until a fixed expiration date or under specific conditions of use
a valid passport


2. justifiable: reasonable or justifiable in the circumstances
That's a valid question.


3. effective: bringing about the results or ends intended
regards the test as a valid measure of student performance


4. law legally binding: having binding force in law


5. logic logical: having premises from which the conclusion follows logically
It's a perfectly valid argument.

[cosmik debris]

12. OK, I would never use it that way, but if Ayn Rand wants to...

There is no statement so absurd that no philosopher will make it. ~Cicero

[maxsolomon]

13. buddhism isn't a religion

it is a science of happiness.

there are no gods. buddha is a guide, not a diety.

[edhopper]

15. What experiments

does this "science" perform?
Of course Buddhism is a religion. It holds to supernatural ideas such as reincarnation. It just isn't deistic. Ancestor worship, animism, spiritulism, all religions.

[maxsolomon]

18. 2500 years of experimentation on the brain & emotions

[heidler1]

17. If everyone is allowed the same spin rules, then if a religion can say this or that god has always

been, then I get to say all gods died in the big bang. Neither view has any proof, but likewise neither can be disproved.

It would be quite simple to have some body find some tablets either stone or gold, but this time they were made of frozen bull shit in a supposedly never inhabited part of the Arctic exactly one inch from the location of the Magnetic North Pole in the year 1,008 with a whole set of new rules and a whole bunch of people would believe it. Part of the wish was proof follows. A yong boy who was lost, at the time, one year earlier found 7 Frozen black tablets made of ice that had came to the surface inside of a cave due to global warming. These tablets prophesied the location of the other bull shit tablets, but unfortunately the black Ice Tablets melted before the boy was found, but luckily he had studied the old Nor sk Language and did write down the words soon after being found. He said he'd found the black Ice tablets in a cave. Many attempt were made to relocate the cave with no success. The boy said that he had slept in the cave and had strange dreams all night. The location of the Cave had to be on Greenland and many thought the ice tablets were left by Vikings. However many expeditions looked for the cave as far away as Minnesota.