Ethics

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Revision as of 22:44, 26 October 2005 by GreedyCapitalist (talk | contribs) (Reverted edit of Peta76, changed back to last version by GreedyCapitalist)
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"To live, man must hold three things as the supreme and ruling values of his life: Reason, Purpose, Self-esteem."

Morality is the recognition of the fact that as mortal beings with a rational, volitional consciousness, we need to adopt and practice certain principles in order to live.

Like all living organisms, man can be distinguished from non-living matter by the fact that in order to remain alive, he must act to attain the values needed for his survival (such as food, water, shelter, clothes.) For animals, which operate entirely on the perceptual level, this guidance comes automatically through their facility of instinct. Man does not have any automatic means of attaining the values needed for his life. He may have urges (hunger, thirst, etc) â€" but he has no automatic means of fulfilling them. Unlike animals, human beings lack any kind of innate ideas or instinct - we learn our values and ideas from your experience of reality. We are the creators of our own mental nature - but we have no power over our metaphysical nature - we can refuse to recognize that we need food to live - but that does not change the fact that we are mortal beings who need food to live.

As a conceptual being, his survival depends on correctly using reason to identify and attain the values necessary for his life. As a volitional being, his thinking is neither automatic nor infallible, but is an active process that requires a constant focus on correctly identifying the facts of reality and applying them to achieve the values needed for his well-being. Unlike the automatic function of animal instinct, man must choose to think, â€" and his thoughts will determine his actions, his values, his emotions, and his character. The primary choice of every individual â€" to think or notâ€" corresponds to his primary alternative â€" to live or not. His own life is the primary moral value of each individualâ€" whether he chooses to accept it or not.

Rational self-interest, or egoism is therefore the proper morality each man must adopt if he wishes to live â€" the application of his reason to achieve the values needed for his survival. A man may choose not to think or to reject his life, but to the extent he does so, he chooses to act towards his death.