11 November 1999 · Essay — written a minute after the one above.

People tend to agree that the way to solve a problem is to find out what’s wrong with it. Well, that’s quite right…to an extent.

What I mean, is that, in order to correct an error, you have to find the mistake’s origin. Everything begins with philosophy–metaphysics and epistemology–and that’s where most people find themselves lost. They choose to go against the things that make sense and hopelessly wander about, further losing themselves in the maze of their irrational falsesophy.

First of all, at the bottom of things are the axioms: “irreducible principles of cognition” as Ayn Rand once put it. These are the truths we accept to be absolute, and so build our concepts upon them. Axioms are the foundations of everything we perceive: technology, life, communication, physics…everything. When our foundations are weak, they collapse, taking along everything above them. Some axioms work for some things, others for other things, but the result is the same: when the wrong thing is put on the table, the legs break. Sensible people would discard the worthless table, but, it seems, sensible people are hard to come by.

I have lived by many fundamental principles, but discarded them when they proved false. Christianity was one such principle, and when Objectivism entered my life, I discovered a table that sustained the weight of the world and disproved every theory I had ever heard of.

Existence. Consciousness. Identity.

These three axioms alone are the legs of the Objectivist table. Unlike other philosophies, whose tables might use ten to twenty to ten thousand legs, Objectevism needs only three. And because each leg can carry the weight of the world alone, the table will not fall to one side.

I encourage people to reject the senseless lies they live by. I advocate the rational views Objectivism is based on, and further encourage you, my readers, to discover the truth. With the foundations of our concepts indestructible, the road is clear.

Composed 1999 · part of the Essays collection · authorship documented on the Provenance page.