Are the connections clear between Hume, Objectivism and Curtis Edward Clark'

Question:in this Yahoo Q&A thesis? I mean, did I chohesively put the pieces together to answer the Questioner's question; OR was I off base? Where could I have been more clear in my approach?

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: in this Yahoo Q&A thesis? I mean, did I chohesively put the pieces together to answer the Questioner's question; OR was I off base? Where could I have been more clear in my approach?

With all due respect, I think your answer was not very intelligible. I think I see where you were going with your argument, but it was neither clearly and succinctly stated as a logical one might nor even written out as you might verbally present such an argument.

For example... I know you like quotes, but putting even one in almost always slows things down. Different people have different ways of saying even the same things... especially when we're dealing with people from different eras and cultures (as is often the case with philosophy). If I were you, I would restrict the use of direct quotations to no more than one quote of a sentance or two to underscore a critical point. Otherwise your message looks like a series of links turned up by a search engine. Further, if you cite people who are not directly relevant to the discussion and are not considered to be authorities, it doesn't really matter who they are much of the time.

I've also noticed your fondness for terminology that is well beyond the run-of-the-mill. Which is not a problem if you are writing for a journal where everyone can be assumed to be familiar with such terms, but is a problem almost everywhere else. Even if they are asking about Hume - people get introduced in odd ways sometimes. "If you can't explain it to your grandmother, you don't know what you are doing." (The was Einstein, by the way. Heh.)

If I were to summarize your arguments as they appeared to me, it would be something along the lines of:
- All things have a nature.
- It is the nature of some things to cause other things.
- Therefore effect is linked to cause in a thing's nature.
If this was not meant to be the main thrust of your argument, there are even more problems.

As it stands I don't find it even very persuasive. I think Hume would ask how it is that you know a particular object's nature is to cause a particular effect. Because you see one and then the other? This is only experience talking and not necessarily a mandatory connection. He addresses that point specifically in his writings.

Nor is drawing any kind of cause-effect conclusion from experiential observation ever logical - the classic 'problem of induction'. Perhaps tomorrow it will turn out that all green things divide into things that are really green and things that were the eighth colour but were lying low for a couple millennia for a previously unobserved scientific reason. And how would you know about a phenomenon that has yet to manifest?

I'm not sure, either, that I understand your section about human volition. You seem to be saying that if we were not able to reliably predict effect from causes, we would be incapable of acting reasonably. The person who asked that question had the same problem with the idea of a cause that was not linked to effect. You do not seem to solve that question, however... perhaps you mean to make the argument that because we do seem to act reasonably they must be linked (a rather spurious argument, if that's the case). Or perhaps you are agreeing with her that it is a difficult - perhaps impossible - aspect of the question to resolve. I can't tell from what you've got.

That was my impression of what you've got there, anyway. Confusingly written, strangely organized, and not too persuasive. Hopefully, you don't feel the same about THIS answer (heh). Though it sounds negative, I'm not trying to troll you or anything... I wouldn't critique you at all if I didn't think you were really interested in how other people received your work. Perhaps even me.

You did a good job, although I'm not sure what asker was looking for. Was the asker writing a paper on philosophers or trying to get a better understanding of how things work?

I also answered, perhaps somewhere between the two the asker will find a path.

I like your answers because they teach me a lot about objectivism, I'm one of your fans.

However, I think it would be more useful for people who read you if you used your own voice a little more. Quoting is good, and improves the quality of the answer, but your own voice is what really answers.

I use quotes, and this are things I care about when using them:

1. I always limit them with the " sign

2. I always introduce them or make a comment about them, in order to establish the relation between the question and the quote.

Good Luck!