steve ditko speaks
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 5 ม.ค. 2012
- this is a section of the 1989 vhs from rhino home video " masters of comic book art " ..
the great steve ditko speaks about his own work,as well as that of aristotle and ayn rand.--as an admirer of all three, i have uploaded this section.
i' m afraid i do not own the rights to this video..however, since it is UNAVAILABLE in any other format i have chosen to upload it for EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES ..if you enjoy it,please look up " static " and " the mocker ", two exemplary comic books,which deserve all the attention of mr. ditko 's other creations... - เพลง
R.I.P Steve Ditko 😢 (1928-2018)
R.I.P. Stan Martin Lieber (1922-2018)
May his legacy that he helped build with his friends and colleagues live on for future generations.
RIP Steve ditko
Rest In Peace, Steve Ditko.
Only Ditko can draw 20 parallel lines and make it look epic
One of the finest American artists of the 20th century.
After hearing this, I'd say Steve Ditko was a pretty sharp guy. A good speaker too. He had to be a well read person to talk like this in his recording here.
Wasn't this from the video Comic Book Masters, which also had Jack Kirby, Neal Adams, Will Eisner, Harvey Kurtsman ?
The reason why there are no recent photo's of Steve Ditko is because he leads a very private life. He rejects all pleads for an interview, public appearance, or even blog. The way he puts it, he doesn't like to show off his personality, only his product.
Pity qe can't be like that in this day and age... everyone wants to know the person.
REST IN PEACE, STEVE DITKO--I LOVED YOUR WORK!
ditko has a good strong intelligent voice.my favourite artist of all.
Ditko have a beautiful voice :)
Thank you for Spiderman RIP great creator of Spiderman, Steve Ditko
Very interesting. I hope Ditko will go on TV soon some day. Miss him.
RIP I LOVE THIS MAN! HE WAS THE PRIME MOVER OF COMICS. A is A. 🙏🙏🙏
Rest in peace Steve Ditko thanks for crediting all those wonderful characters!
Spider-Man may have been able to go on without Ditko but it did lose something. None of the villains created by Lee after were as interesting as the ones created with Ditko. The Kingpin maybe, but he became a greater villain years later under Frank Miller in DAREDEVIL.
That's how I feel about the situation.
The great Spider-villains were created during the Ditko era along with the most important supporting characters. Even Mary Jane Watson technically "appeared" in a Ditko Spider-Man issue!
I didn't read these comics until the mid-1980s but by that time Marvel was reprinting the Spider-Man run IN ORDER from Amazing Fantasy #15 in the reprint series, "Marvel Tales." They got up into the 50's or 60's issue-wise of Amazing Spider-Man, well into the Romita, Sr. era. Romita had clean art -- VERY clean lines -- but it lacked a grittiness Ditko's art had and besides the Kingpin I think the only major villain introduced was The Rhino (?) maybe.
No, the most important Spidey run and the one that holds up best is Ditko's. I don't think there's a single bad issue in those 38 and the first two ASM annuals were great, too! The origin in AF#15 is still one of the best superhero origins and one of the most complete, too. It was just utterly perfect word-for-word and not a panel was wasted..
You say; The Kingpin to anybody? And they immediately think of Daredevil's number #1 villain. Only a comic book purest can tell you that; The Kingpin originally started out being a Spider-Man archvillain however!
Stan definitely came up with a weaker lineup of a rogue's gallery after Ditko departed. Kingpin was great, but Hammerhead, Man-Mountain Marko, Silvermane, not so much. Maybe The Shocker was notable. and The Prowler was weak .. .and in between these weaker miss-and-hit characters he recycled and revisited the Ditko rogues.
Ditko's stories were realistic and iconic, the world of Spider-Man just made more sense when he was working on it
I think Spider-man has been really lucky with his regular comics, for decades, but none of those compare to the original Ditko run
Well I mean he created the character, not Stan Lee, so it’s no wonder Spider-Man didn’t work after he left.
This is wonderful. Thanks so much for posting this. It gives so much of this great man's work context and perspective.
I did like the Ditko-ism in 'Django Unchained'. Whether intentional or unintentional.
Instead of ignoring the odious acts of Candie 'for the greater good' of his mission The Dr. just kills his ass right there. Even though he knows it will screw everything up. Candie is just such an offense to humanity that deeds can't go unpunished.
How much of the real world could be better if somebody decided that tolerating evil men 'for the greater good' is bullshit. Some people need to go in a hole.
Well if that were to be acted upon the world would be insanity inducing. It's weird to say but we run on challenge so having bad people kinda makes things work. But they *do* do that in certain countries, law in those countries state of someone kills a person intentionally they get given the death sentence
@@crimzoda6624 Bad People make things work because Good people who can do the same refuse to do so out of laziness or fear. Bad People will always exist as long as People exist but they must be curbed and controlled or they'll curb and control everyone else.
Evil is a point of view- Senator Palpatine
I mean, that's not really a "Ditko-ism" it's just an example of the philosophy he followed.
Tell that to communists, socialists and Ditko haters in the comic book industry who find it easier to shit all over his legacy because he dared to have a clean cut principle.
Really enjoy this video hearing the great artist speak.
Spiderman, Dr Strange, and Mr A are all wonderful to be sure but, I love Ditko's horror comics the best. All the seemingly hundreds of great ghost & monster stories he did for Atlas/Marvel in the 50's ['WHERE WALKS THE GHOST is great. THE HULK/THE GLOP from TALES TO ASTONISH #21 is another standout] the few stories of THE INCREDIBLE HULK that he did,and then later for Charlton comics. Can't get enough of it all. One could pass a day day admiring his work in that genre and not know it.
The one story he did for Charlton Comics' THE MANY GHOSTS OF DR GRAVES entitled 'THE HANGED MAN, concerning the aftermath of The Holocaust, is really haunting.
This was extremely profound.
R.I.P Steve Ditko. Thank you.
A is A.
Thank you. Illuminating.
For those of you complaining about Ditko's Mr. A stories, Read his Shade, the Changing Man series, recently collected in hardback Ditko Collection by DC Comics. There's plenty of good, dramatic storytelling in this series, and it's All-Ditko. Or look up "The Safest Place", a one-shot story published by Dark Horse.
Safest Place is an amazing piece of self contained art.
Mr. A is dope anyway, comic guys are just pussies
R.I.P Steve Ditko.
Rest in peace, mr. Ditko...
RIP Steve Ditko
"Without a measuring standard, nothing can be identified or judged..." Yes, judge. And standards. Something lacking in our society now.
My bad, I meant "belief system" in the previous post. To continue, Steves work forces one to think and consider the nature of good,evil, compromise. These are big issues, cosmic ones which don't have easy answers, but one must choose a point if view to argue from to even enter the conversation. This is the part of sequential story telling most comic creators like to avoid, and then complain that they "have no voice". The problem is that most have never stopped long enough to develop one.
God Bless.
so this is actually seve ditko talking,
Is it?
Pedro Viloria yes, it is.
@@pedroviloria5147 that’s *the question*
I disagree with Ditko on many things, but I agree with him on the concept of what a hero should be. A hero should be a measuring standard. An ideal to look up to. When you corrupt a hero to make them too relatable or messed up, you are trying to validate such flaws to the reader and readers who want to feel they can be so flawed but still a proper hero. That is a folly. Flaws are inevitable, but people should always strive improvement and betterment, not settling on flaws as unchangeable and still claiming to be righteous. That's insanity. Especially when you want to condemn villains for being just as flawed.
This is absolutely brilliant. Ditko makes total sense here and I notice the people who criticize him almost always resort to personal attacks while offering no specific arguments against any of the points he makes -- which pretty much proves he's right.
+JohnnyS001 You mean to say that an moral philosophy that has only one intrinsic value and would most likely have you let a grenade in a room kill you than to sacrifice your own life or someone else's to save others is consistent and makes other actions meaningless?
+CosmoShidan Reframe the statement...
Jaesen Tamele 'Eh?
CosmoShidan
Rephrase "you let a grenade in a room kill you than to sacrifice your own life or someone else's to save others is consistent and makes other actions meaningless?". No one understands what you said there^
Jaesen Tamele Then let me ask again. If you where in a room with 3 other people, and there is a grenade that will go off in three seconds, and with little time to react, would you:
1. Jump on the grenade and save the 3 other persons in the room?
2. Throw 1 of the 3 persons on the grenade, thus saving yourself and 2 others?
3. Do nothing and let the 3 persons in the room and yourself die?
amazing voice of amazing steve ditko
Rest in paradise
Looking at this, I have to wonder if Ditko ever had to draw dominatrixes...
Artist is a god and so the game designer
Thanks for sharing your- opinion -Finky.
RIP Steve
What's so cool about Ditko is that the characters And tge stories he creates flow from an underlying principle, Helene system, point of view. Whether one agrees r disagrees with it is irrelevant, IMO, the fact that it gets a reaction out of you is evidence of the power of the storytelling. This is a lesson all serious creators of sequential art should learn. Too much emphasis is put on making a cool character with a great cost ad powers, and neglecting the point of view you're taking.
Now we need to see a recent photo
Kevin Tran Good luck with that.
I honestly wanna see that too
his nephew released one taken a year or two before he died.
Wonderful! I would love to get a copy of this. Who owns the rights? Anyway to get permission to upload the whole thing?
The 90s couldn't have been worse for Ditko.
quote3000 lol
Holy smokes, this whole little spiel by Ditko is like a giant critique of post-modernist philosophy and thoroughly rebukes it in a short, concise, and precise series of statements.
I think I really like this guy. For the longest time, I always hated the use of the term "gray morality", as it implies the person saying it does not have a moral compass and is incapable of distinguishing good from evil. We know this is not true, because the same people can identify morally positive traits and wicked traits in people, which implies they understand the average human is more a patchwork of black and white like the pattern of a Holstein cow and not an indistinguishable monotone mass. It tends to be the wicked that love to make that argument and rely on it, because it allows them to hide and camouflage themselves and their actions among the average people, using them as a shield.
Gray morality doesn't mean someone is incapable of morality, but that you simply can't distinguish good from evil by looking at it. Rather, morality depends on what actions are deemed good or bad. Imagine X gives to a charity, but then that charity is a front for the KKK to buy weapons. Then you have a person X who helps an elderly person cross the road, but that X turns out to be a narcissist who wants to help elderly people so they can be front page news. One more example I will use here is, imagine if someone has a moral dilemma, in which a plane is about to crash into building, and that a fighter pilot X decides to either shoot down the plane killing all the passengers aboard, thus saving the people in the building; or that X lets the plane crash because it is their duty to protect civilians, by killing civilians.
So the examples I have given display that morality depends on duty, character, and what is the greater good. And it's not as easy as Ditko or Ayn Rand would have you describe. Also, Objectivism actally borrows heavily from post-modernist philosopher Friederick Nietzsche, but without the moral relativism.
Black and white thinking is simple minded and incredibly flawed.
".do you know what the ayn rand foundation thought of ditko?" I doubt ARI would say anything. Not something they would make a statement on. Piekoff is a fan of hero worshiping comic books, and was an avid collector while growing up. Piekoff was talking about the value of comic books in his most recent podcast. If you have not, checked out Bosch Fawstin's work.
Steve Ditko was a better Objectivist than Ayn Rand was in his daily life. I am not an Objectivist, but I do respect Ditko and hate seeing people who don't really understand his philosophy, like Alan Moore, making a broad, incorrect analysis of it. If you think Objectivism is the same thing as fascism, as Moore apparently does, you've missed the bus.
Moore's analysis is correct; that is insofar as Mr. A, being the embodiemnt of Objectivism, is a fascist, which is what Objectivism entails. A fascist is someone who sees only in absolutes, particularly moral ones and has no empathy for others.
@@CosmoShidan By your definition, hardcore Stalinist and Maoist communists would be "fascists" as well as Islamists and Puritan witchhunters. Of course, that's absurd. Fascism has a very particular political definition, i.e., with a dictator in charge, autocratic, highly hierarchical socially, often (but not always) with a belief in racial or ethnic inferiority of certain groups, and very anti-individualistic, with a belief in the ultimate supremacy of the state. It's also considered a far-right ideology. The only thing Objectivism shares with fascism is it tends to be considered a far-right ideology. The two are almost diametrical opposites, as the Objectivist is the ultimate individualist with a baked-in dislike of arbitrary hierarchies. You're so complete wrong (and Moore), that it's actually funny. You seem to go with the modern left's definition of "anyone I don't like on the right of the political spectum is a FASCIST!" But fascists believe and do certain things that an Objectivist does not. If you're going to critique Objectivism, don't create a straw man to do it. The MAGA crowd? Could be sort of fascist, because they definitely have some of the traits. LOL
@@CosmoShidanthere are some people undeserving of sympathy. Would you give John Wayne gacy sympathy?
@@julianhermanubis6800and which traits would those be?
@@julianhermanubis6800 Fascism is capitalism, when liberals abandon the machinery of electoral democracy and turn to dictatorship. Objectivism would most likely accept this, since they only care about the rights of the rich.
Has Aristotle been expressed in comics form other than Ditko? Would anyone else even be capable of trying? Ditko was a genius.
If you go by Aristotle's ethics specifically, then yes, he has in the character of Robin the boy wonder. Specifically the Dick Grayson Robin, learns to be a detective and crime-fighter like Batman/Bruce Wayne, and does his best to excel at being a superhero. Bruce Wayne is what Aristotle would call a moral exemplar, as he acts a role model for Dick Grayson to be the best at what he does. Also this aspect of Aristotle's ethics, called Virtue Ethics is about the development of moral character or critical thinking by following an example from a mentor. What comes next is the mechanism Aristotle employs called the Means Table, where one has to balance the good against a lesser evil and greater evil. In Grayson's case, he tries to not get brash, and at the same time, avoid fear as Batman does. Also, when it comes to reflecting on mistakes, Dick Grayson looks back to what he could do better to be Batman's sidekick or become his own hero, a la Nightwing when he reflects on years following the Batman and finally leaving the cave.
Now for the record, Aristotle's ethics are not what Ditko describes, as Aristotle did not see the world as black and white, or morally absolute. While Aristotle claimed that morals are a natural feature of the physical world, his actual practice and theory of ethics are far more complicated. Hence, I doubt Ditko read Aristotle's ethics.
Good point in Robin. As to Ditko, I believe over the last 20 years of his life he gradually emphasized Rand less and Aristotle more. Mister A himself, though, is obviously a direct Randian hero.
Ditko sure has Aristotle's aesthetic theory correctly, though he still kept Rand's ethics emphasized in Mr. A, especially in the last issue in 2016.
CosmoShidan This is why I think reporters did Ditko a disservice at his death when they constantly referred to him as a straight objectivist. He was much more complicated than that. Though he agreed with Rand, in his own work he would bring in other influences like Aristotle and even his own, more grounded sensibility. He had a way of bringing things to an intimate level that made him unique. He was no robot simply spewing Rand. Dissecting his evolving influences is one if the things which makes late Ditko especially interesting. He was his own category
Well if you want a more nuance view of Ditko, here's a good one: th-cam.com/video/xe21fi7wAxw/w-d-xo.html
But in honesty, it's not Ditko's view of art that's critiqued, it's his view of ethics as described in the video.
thank--i dont know the law of identity or atomism but will look them both up. im not a philosophy student, -i like plato, aristotle, nietzsche for pretty shallow aesthetic reasons..people tell me they are always being disproved and refuted ..Right or wrong, wouldnt a comic by aristotle or plato or wittgenstein be amazing? i often wish alan moore had done the artwork for watchmen himself--it would have been hilarious! Philosophical Comics, right or wrong, by the Philosophers themselves, Please!
Only 3 or 4 are known to exist. However you can do a google image search and find them easily enough.
Interesting.
I don't follow your question. All of the philosophers and schools of thought that you mentioned are great. I certainly did not say ONLY Aristotle matters. Plato, Confucius, and the others you mention were immensely important. If I praise the films of Martin Scorsese it doesn't mean I'm despairing Akira Kurosawa.
I only wanted to point out that Aristotle had his good points, and saying "messed up" human thinking kind of sells him short.
4:09
Preach!
steve ditko is a messiah for Ayn rand movement.
Indeed. His Law of Non-Contradiction and Law of Identity does not allow for evolution to be pursued.
What abot what he wrote for the horror anthology Creepy?
And now we have a superhero movie trying to portray a genocidal maniac in a sympathetic light because of his “noble environmental intentions.” If only Mr. A were the hero in that morally bankrupt film.
2023 Edit:
I thought that Thanos was a well written villain, but I hated the fact that none of the heroes challenged his ethics beyond his daughter telling him “you don’t know that.” Thanos would have probably been a good Star Trek villain, because Kirk would have challenged him philosophically. I think Ditko is right about heroes nowadays no longer being portrayed as embodiments of virtue and integrity.
Who? Thanos?
Avid Film Buff, You and Armond White need to talk. I mean that as a compliment btw.
You're mistaking empathy with sympathy. Sympathy entails to take Thanos' side, while empathy means to understand Thanos' motivations but to not endorse his acts or goals. Ergo we are to be critical of his motives, acts and goals. In other words, the recent Avengers films deal with moral neutrality in a nuanced and complex manner, compared to the overly simplistic, if not juvenile moral absolutist ideals of Mr. A. If you ask me, Mr. A is the one who is morally bankrupt as it only looks at morality from his point of view alone.
@@CosmoShidan Honestly it's hard to see any superhero or supervillain who doesn't do the same. Mr. A is just blatant about and more overbearing when it comes to enforcing his moral views.
@@EmptyMan000 I would say that Mr. A is an outright fascist who is in line with Thanos, or perhaps any other superhero or supervillain.
I totally disagree with Ditko's moral views that he presents in Mr. A, but I can't help but admire its genius artistry and its thoughtful unique narrative.
Great stuff. And it's always amusing how any mention of Ayn Rand induces in some people the apoplectic urge to signal their virtue by means of ritual condemnation. Where's my garlic and silver bullets? ;)
Rand's philosophy is actually fairly tight, but I think that, apart from the flaw in her moral philosophy that's been canvassed by Nozick and several other thinkers, the more central flaw (or rather elision) is this:-
Sure, a thing is what it is, and justice would certainly be treating it as it is. The difficulty though, is figuring out what the hell it actually is - that's where the slip 'twixt cup and lip is perennially possible, and that's why we must admit the "grey", not as a mixture of black and white, but rather as a canny, circumspect awareness that we may not have actually identified the thing correctly, with the concomitant realization that the vehemence of our commitment and action must comport to the degree of our certainty that we've identified the thing correctly.
Which is why Bayesian reasoning is da bomb.
A reasonable, thought-out objection to Objectivism. So much better than people who say things like "Objectivism is poison" without bothering to explain how they came to that conclusion.
Most people hate rand because she breaks their psychotic view of communism. She red pills people on the evil nature of Marxism
@@billytheconqueror5803 Many just hate her for being a self-righteous hypocrite whose actions in life contradicted the philosophy she became known for.
why can't i find a photo of Steve Ditko
In terms of how Ditko states that, when presented with the truth, a person should behave in the most mutually beneficial manner to all others (Utilitarianism), I believe Ditko is 'correct' so to speak, or I mean that I agree with his view. When a person is presented with a truth, they SHOULD become a moral upstander and SHOULD speak up against actions that will harm others and promote the actions that will do less harm.
However, the problem with his philosophy is that it states the 'hero' will always be presented with the 'truth' or 'right/correct-view'.
And while certain views carry more utilitarian merit than others (as in they benefit more people or inflict less harm than the alternative option), IT'S RIDICULOUS TO ASSUME A PERSON, NO MATTTER HOW VIRTOUS THEY MAY TRY TO ACT, WILL ALWAYS KNOW WHAT THE RIGHT DECISION FOR EACH SITUATION IS.
You can study the needs of others and be a social upstander to the best of your abilities, but you're not Ominiscient. You can't truly know it all. You can make calculated decision off what you know and earnestly believe what you're doing is correct, but you only occupy one experience out of millions in the world, and you surely had to have overlooked something or unintentionally dismissed some potential consequence.
Otherwise, yes, if you are presented with evidence that enables you to recognize that a specific behavior, for example - using disrespectful language in public, is harmful, then YES, YOU SHOULD CHANGE YOUR BEHAVIOR, so in that respect, in which the ideological person is always expected to make the noble or integrous decision, yes, I agree with Mr. Ditko.
But I disagree in that, while a person should STRIVE to be virtous, that they won't necessarily always make the right call in every situation.
Take abortion for example. As Mr. Ditko said, 'A is A', and the removing of an innocent life is murder, regardless of whatever reasons are offered. Therefore Roe v. Wade should be repealed and abortion be made thereby illegal.
Yet that dismisses a whole slew of important details.
What if the Mother was going to die if she progressed through the preganancy? What if the Fetus would have died as well? What if the kid and the mother may have both lived, but the child was conceived during a time when the mother nor father could financially support the child? What if they couldn't afford to feed him proper nourishment or clothe him sufficiently or etc.? What about adoption, surely they can set the child up for adoption, right? But who's going to adopt the child? The number of couples willing to adopt children has a ceiling, and what if the child ends up being one of the unlucky few who doesn't get 'claimed'? Or worse, what if they get adopted....by the 'WRONG' sort of person...(you fill in the details)....so to speak?
Will this person be able to function as a respectable member of society, or will decades of rejection or social alienation impede the child's ability to grow into a high-functioning man/woman/adult? What if THEY, with the lack of proper guidance, choose to disrespect the laws and moral notions that keep society afloat, and become one of the very criminals or scoundrels that Ditko draws and speaks about? (And why SHOULDN'T they? Such laws and notions never brought THEM any benefit. The word kicked them around for nothing. In their mind they're completely justified in turning to unlawful behavior, in a world that inflicted THEM harm, they merely see it as shoving back.)
So maybe, at the expense of a life that is potentially doomed to misery anyway, an abortion IS called for, especially when it enables that mother TIME to reorganize and access a better financial situation that will benefit her NEXT attempted child, or maybe even save her life, or potentially the life of a person who was never going to be presented a fair shot at existing peacefully anyways.
Or maybe this is all wrong, the kid can totally exist in a proper environment, the couple's finances are above accetable, and the parents are just making this decision to stop an eventuality that would otherwise inconvience themselves, and they're just beng selfish.
Circumstances play a CRUCIAL ROLE in ANY decision or choice, and the merit of an action varies from situation to situation.
As one can gather, one just simply CAN'T be expected to FORESEE all of the consequences of an action. Else, the world really WOULD be perfect. But while 'Man is a rational animal,' man is not perfect, and I completely and 100% agree that a person should STRIVE for excellence, STRIVE for fair treatment for all and STRIVE to inspire others to do the same, I can't help but respectfully disagree with the notion that a man, even a virtous one, will ALWAYS make the right decision and ALWAYS foresee the consequences to every potential action and make the 'right' or socially benefical choice.
(And while one can argue, 'A hero is a concept, a piece of art, not a real reflection on humanity,' I will agree, creators ARE given freedom there. A work of fiction CAN display a higher level of competency or virtue than regualr humans.
However, regardless of the superficial nature of heroic characters, their creators are flawed, and the people who will view them in print and try to emulate their high standards are still, no less, flawed. So while excused from being a reflection on humanity, its a decision entirely up to the artist however 'flawed' the creator will design the character to be, and there's no right or wrong answer to how to portray a character or particularly heroic one. Everyone has their preferences, and Mr. Ditko's in this case is that heroes should definitively be virtous, and that's okay.)
I agree we all should Try to be virtous, but acknowledge that failure is not only an option, but an inevitability at some point, but rather than condemning such realization and writing ourselves off as imperfect and therefore incompetent human beings, we should instead recognize that, the mere fact that we tried, and will continue to try, despite facing unbeatable chances (absurdism), displays our competence. :)
That's why Ditko mentioned ideals and heroes as they are in fiction. A perfect, idealize hero or man needs to exist for us to be able to measure the degree of imperfection and faults in reality.
Your questions are good, but common and facile. They’ve all been asked (and answered) before you were born. Read Ayn Rand.
What does that make the pre-Socratics, Sophists, Plato, Cynics, Cyreneanics, and Confucians then?
man is man and not and animal. an animal is an animal and is not man.
Perfect heroes and villains aren't always interesting.
He's not asking for perfection, but setting a standard and not making superheroes indistinguishable from the assholes villains they are meant to fight.
@@EmptyMan000 But his heroes WERE essentially villains unless you agreed with his political views, or someone else was writing them.
@@PurpleColonel Yes, and that's where much of his points fell flat. They focused more on politics than doing good.
@@EmptyMan000 It's not that his heroes were focused on politics, but that his politics were bad in that they were fascistic.
Madness. Eloquent madness.
This is uncommonly sensical. Please elaborate if you really disagree.
I first read Spider-Man comics during the Ditko era. I always wondered why he disappeared from that mag and Marvel generally. Recently I found out. After learning of his obsession with Ayn Rand and Aristotelian essentialism and all that libertarian gibberish - I now feel like I dodged a bullet aimed at my young intellect.
Who is John Galt?
A loser.
Ayn rand
How curious. I feel exactly the same way about Alan Moore.
This triggers my Autonomous Sensory Meridian response. Rest in peace.
I think that's true of Kirby too. There was some great concepts he created for DC like the New Gods but the characters didn't connect on a human level without Lee.
Mokkari77 For me the ‘Turpin’s death wish’ story in New Gods resonated far more than some of the Lee/Kirby stories that came out earlier,
It for me is one of Kirby’s most personal stories right up there with anything he did at Marvel.
A is A-OK in my book!
While objective moral imperatives are more justified than, say, the morally bankrupt ideology of relativism, Rand's objectivism fails to ontologically ground them. Laws of logic alone cannot ground objective moral duty. Even Kant's 'rational imperative' failed (it amounted to question begging and already assumed moral realism as a hidden premises).
In the sense that Kant's view and Rand's view of moral imperatives are morally absolute, as opposed to naturalistic morality, divine command theory or moral non-naturalism, in the sense that it fails? What of the other types moral objectivity then? How do they not work? And if laws of logic are not what ground objective moral duty, would that entail empathy is what is also required to ground it?
Hearing Ditko explain himself is fascinating and I do want to check this character out as a author avatar for a legendary and very aloof figure. But I have to respectfully disagree. No human being has the ability to know the 100% right thing in 100% of situations. Anyone who thinks they do is very dangerous to be in power.
Sorry but I think you’ve missed the point.
By that reasoning, then no one can become good after being evil and not one can become evil after being good. Change is consent in the Universe, there for there can be a grey area that is made up of peoples experiences, achievements, social involvements, and acquired knowledge. All of which leads the person down the path of good or evil, it is the intent of the person that makes the action good or evil. To say that the world is only black and white is ignoring all the different colors of the rainbow.
"By that reasoning, then no one can become good after being evil and not one can become evil after being good. "
I'm not sure what reasoning you're referring to, but Ditko himself addressed this in one of his Mr. A stories. A criminal that Mr. A captured was released from prison after serving his time. Mr. A then considered that he was all white, not a speck of grey, even though the criminal himself thought that Mr. A would think he was still evil.
So, Ditko himself didn't think that people couldn't change, or that they couldn't become good after being evil.
That is not rational, we are humans, we make mistakes and some of us learn from our mistakes. By your reasoning, no one can learn which is why it is wrong. Now facts change when things become clearer or that new items are found out, but humans change and they are not left or right or this or that, but human's consciousness grows from experience and we become either better or worse than before. We never stay the same, we change with our times and with education as well as the opportunities we take advantage of or don't take advantage of. We are what we think we are, and there are times in life when we go through a muddle or a limbo where we don't know the right of the situation, and then there are times when there is not right in a situation. That is the grey area or the middle ground. The mud that we have to wade through in life where we try to weigh the pros and the cons to find the best outcome. Mr. Ditko may be right about many things, but he is wrong here. To say that humans can't change is to say we can never learn and that is contradictory to everything here.
I don't think you understand what I said. My point was that Ditko himself thought that humans can change, because he expressed just that in a Mr. A story.
I have to say that Ditko's evaluation in the Mr. A story is too simple a meter to be practice. I mean it ignores character flaws that people have, such as fear and obsession. Also, morality is not absolute, especially when you consider that there are other definitions of objective morality, such as Divine Command Theory, Moral Naturalism and Moral non-naturalism. I wish Ditko read more on the field of ethics, especially since moral absolutism has been retired.
Actually, a lot of moral objectivity/absolutism can be 'salvaged' with a contextualist view. That is, they can be true with a certain, limited context. And the broader and more naturalistic the context is, the more applicable it is to real-life.
So if you read Rand and Ditko carefully, I think you'll see that they are in fact placing their morality within a certain context, even if it's not explicitly stated.
Yes, even though I would probably disagree with Ditko on politics and Ayn Rand you've got to respect the man's convictions, there's quite a few artists I respect that I would probably not see eye to eye with on everything, ranging from Robert Crumb and Steve Ditko all the way to Picasso and others. Thank you for this upload.
But you’ve never read Rand...
sybo59 Not true, I tried reading The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged but it was about like chewing on tinfoil for me, However Ditko was a devoted Randian and he had every right to his opinion.
is that Ditko's actual voice?
doomed huh ditko sounds like professor Utonium from powderpuff girls series
Well, you just threw that statement out there with no context or examples. Care to elaborate on how Aristotle "messed up human thinking" ??
Objectivism breaks the rule of metaphysics and epistemology by creating close-ended answers and oversimplifies ethics.
It does no such thing. Could you provide a single example, so I can make a fool of you? (Hint: Actually READ the Objectivist Ethics before pretending to know anything on the subject)
@@sybo59 When one states existence exists then one cannot state how something can exist or how one can know something exists. Also, boiling ethics down to self-interest, you have a choice of either jumping on a grenade to save X, throwing X on a grenade or do nothing and both you and X die. Objectivist ethics chooses the simple answer by doing nothing because jumping on a grenade and sacrificing someone else to save your skin is in conflict with Objectivism's two principles altruism is evil and the nonaggression principle. Ergo, there are no arguments to be made from objectivism.
CosmoShidan I responded to you elsewhere tonight on this very issue. In case you didn’t get it, I pointed out that Rand addressed this exact issue. Objectivism absolutely doesn’t say you must not jump on the grenade. I also referred to examples of Rand’s fictional heroes being willing to die for others. You simply don’t know what you’re talking about. Are you prepared to admit that, perhaps, you haven’t done the requisite research? Read “The Ethics of Emergencies” if you actually give a shit.
CosmoShidan Also, your first sentence is gibberish, and similarly betrays a deep ignorance of what Rand said, and more importantly, why she said it. Have you even read her book on epistemology? Do you understand what is meant by the laws of existence and identity? You don’t seem to, yet you make use of them in your very comment.
@@sybo59I've read the objectivist ethics and it does NOT hold up. If Rand states that the negation of your life is evil, then it must follow that you do not jump on the grenade. Hence, it has no ground to stand on. Even her ethics of emergencies is unfounded as the grenade-in-the-room thought experiment ultimately refutes it, especially as what I stated above as the opposite of your life. Also, that would entail that Rand would have to adopt exceptions, but this is impossible since she claimed her meta-ethics are absolutist. It does not help that she has a compatibalist model of free will, which is in contradiction of an absolutist stance, as that is an ethical naturalist stance, which makes exceptions. All-in-all, you can't have it both ways meta-ethically.
Ayn Rand herself did not measure up to her philosophy; she said and done things that contradicted what supposed to believe in . When this was pointed out to her , she was quite nasty in her response. Fortunately Mr Ditko was consistent in his belief.
His Mr. A comics showcase his ideology, which is creepy.
@@CosmoShidan Why because you don't agree with it? Do you not think all hero comics are an expression of an ideology of one sort or another, whether for relative good or bad? Is craze for diversity in comics not also ideology at work?
@@kcl4364 It's creepy because Mr. A is pretty much a fascist.
@@CosmoShidan Randian Objectivism is pretty far from fascism my friend.
Right wing, certainly.
@@kcl4364 There's correlation between anti-communism and racism though, since POC are more likely to adopt communism. Plus, Fascism and Capitalism are pretty much the same ideology, especially in that fascism has no economic ideology and is really authoritarian capitalism. If Rand weren't so keen on keeping the military and the police to protect the rich, I'd say Objectivism is fascist.
I really do want to understand what you're trying to say. On the surface your statement makes no sense and I don't know if you're foolish or if you have an insight I haven't been exposed to. I mean, you're taking a philosophy that says "the state should have supremacy over the individual" and a philosophy that says "the individual should have primacy over any group consensus" and claiming they're the same thing. That doesn't seem like it makes sense
Yeah, Alan Moore's a bit of a loon, too.
Aristotle was one of the greatest thinkers in all of human history...it was unfortunate that people were so dazzled by his brilliance that , for centuries, they were "trapped" by some of his mistakes, but this is not Aristotle's fault; it s ours. He was a titan of rationality, a beacon of systematic thinking, that paved the way for the scientific thinking. Civilization benefited IMMENSELY from the ideas of Aristotle.
Rand took the good parts and went beyond him.
He destroyed his mind by buying into Objectivism too.
No he didn't. Just stop. It's a pathetic attempt to hate on Objectivism
The problem is that human nature is anything but pure. Actual heroes are a specific level of evil, but with boundaries.
It's a story. Heroes can be pure good such as Superman
If human nature is impure, let it try to live up to a model of ideal and purity. To try instead of saying "fuck it, I'm flawed, and I don't care to improve or try to be better and that's a good thing"
Mr popo from tfs dbza is black which means he is evil.
Is that actually Steve Ditko's voice!
So your trying to defend Ditko's involvement with a philosopher who never contributed to the field then?
Is this Ditko's actual speaking voice, or is this some narrator?
I understand reason and I understand where Ayn Rand and people like Ditko come from. Their ideas are pretty one dimensional. Very linear and very absolute. Almost robotic and unyielding. The thing that always got to me was that if you are going to be completely rational than rationality itself teaches you that most is uncertain. It is objectively measured by the circumstances. Most circumstances are relative. But not to these guys. It does not exist in a piece of paper or in a vacuum. He talks about these binary ideas which only exist in their own values and possibly their own culture but they consider them universal, or a certainty for everyone. A fact. But the reality is that just like left wing utopian idealists that they stand against, it all works in theory but not in execution in the real world on the massive scale for you to consider it fact. Most people are not rational. They are not linear. They are unpredictable and most actually don't know what to do about most things and that does not make them anything. But I just hate the absolute certainty in which they pass judgments.
Rand's objectivism has six tenets, of which I agree wholeheartedly with three, am so-do about a couple, and utterly reject one. Though died-the-wool objectivists sometimes don't like to hear this, the appeal of Rand is this modular nature. It's easy to take what you agree with and reject the rest.
Specifically, I agree with her embrace of classical liberalism (also encompassing capitalism), as it has given us the very concept of human rights and individuals the power to control their own destiny. I agree with her embrace of Aristotelian standards of art and beauty, as they have defined beauty for literally millennia.
The one area of disagreement is atheism. As a Christian, I utterly reject this aspect of her ideology. Modern objectivists roll atheism and reason together, but Rand herself separated them. I embrace reason, but reject atheism. I've always found it ironic that this would be the one piece of Soviet dogma she held onto when fleeing her homeland.
Ultimately, she didn't create a lot of ideas. I call her an aggregator and interpreter of existing philosophies. She borrowed freely from (and properly gave credit to) John Locke, Adam Smith, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and others, as well as Aristotle. Even "A is A" was not new. It's a modernization of the old truism, "call a spade a spade", and it's ultimately an appeal to common sense rather than overthinking simple things. Whichever old-timer originated that long ago was a brilliant man.
So, in summary, Rand honestly didn't originate much , but I share in her admiration of a lot of men who were truly great philosophers, arguably the most brilliant men who ever lived.
And Ditko, he was his own thing again. If you read his work, it's not fair to call him a pure objectivist. Mister A as based on objectivism, yes, but Ditko's ideology was much more complicated than merely copying Rand, and it makes him an interesting and complicated figure. Definitely a person who marched to his own personal drum.
The point is not to be swayed by the UNCERTAIN. Every true thing has an uncertain analog. You dont need to waste your time on those. When I see discussions about the law, LEGAL vs LEGITIMATE is a reflection of that struggle with concepts. Like is Marijuana possession really a legitimate danger to soceity meriting strong policing? In the pursuit of JUSTICE are we going to settle for merely LEGAL?
Actually, most people are very rational in one sense. as Ludwig von Mises said, man acts to remove some felt uneasiness. If you're hungry, you act to feed yourself. If you're cold, you act to warm yourself. Those are highly rational actions.
The problem most people face is in using their rational facilities to decide what the best way to act is to resolve their situation. It is here that many people fail to act rationally, or only partially so. If you don't like the "absolutist" view, then simply recognize that acting rationally is an ideal that one attempts to live up to, not that one is always going to do the best, most rational thing. It was Dashiell Hammett who said, or had one of his characters say, in The Glass Key, that thinking is hard. That doesn't mean we should avoid it.
That's funny coming from democrats and commies. You people the most dimensional people on earth
No, his thought did not bring equal detriment to humanity. Sorry. Aristotle was a brilliant light of logical thinking. Sweeping statements like accusing like 'they were all pedos' don't make for a strong argument. Ask one thousand scholars about Aristotle, I promise you; one thousand will tell you he was one of the great philosophers, an immense benefactor to humankind. Not trying to pick a fight here, just telling the truth. This isn't like arguing whether the last Batman movie was any good.
Only a Sith deals in absolutes.
Is that an absolute? Think about it....
mughat Steve ditko was a comic book genius who sadly was robbed of his credit and fair share of the profits for his part in the creation of a pop cultural icon. Now with that out of the way, objectivism pushes a black-and-white simplistic view of morality, most humans, myself included see morality as black and white with slivers of grey in between. My great-grandfather during the Depression would supplement his income as a migrant worker by bootlegging to provide for his family of 4, under the tenants of objectivism my great-grandfather was a bad person because he broke the law in order to provide for his family during extremely lean times. Now I'm not saying what he did was good or bad, but I don't see the point in embracing a philosophy like that.
Objectivism is not against breaking the law as long as there is no violation of individual rights. Victimless "crimes" are perfectly moral. Read up on Objectivism.
P.S. You don't answer my question. Hopefully you see the contradiction.
Actually, so did Jesus Christ.
The relativism is strong with this one.
Aristotle kinda messed up human thinking for millenniums.
i agree with you,but i think one can admire mr.ditko's moral stance without agreeing with it unreservedly..- how many objectivist comics are there? i get a completely different buzz to ayn rand from ditko..i wish more people would read static and the mocker--and i wish shade would come out in a cheap paperback! must we agree with artists we admire? 'the destroyer of heroes' is one of the five most moving comics ive ever read-- you are certainly not a moral midget to me, sir...
it is incredibly arrogant to believe your own personal morality and beliefs is the only correct way
Are you a feminist m
@Stix N' Stones He's not saying his beliefs are the only correct way, just that it's pretty arrogant to do so. Which it is.
Looks like someone needs to read less Aristotle and more Stoic, Epicurean, Skeptic, Kantian, Lockean, Hobbesian and Cartesian, and Pragmatic, and Eastern philosophy. The gray area is the pretty much the big picture of the world. Especially in the realm of particles.
oh yeah, kant is a brilliant mind. after all, he's the one who came up with the gem saul alinsky liked to say: "Accuse others of what you do."
The main reason for reading philosophers is to figure out what they got wrong! Practically every one of them has some point where they go off the rails. ;-) Leaps of logic, unwarranted assumptions, unrecognized biases, or even just plain, old irrational and unjustifiable assertions.
Fuck off. Rand is cool
Tbh i respect steve ditkos work but by god can i not hate the mans views more. Ayn rands philosophy is not taken seriously academically not publically, as it should be. I like his work on spiderman and others but his views are just bad on the grounds of normalising
What's worst is that it's pretty much a fascistic ideology pretending to be philosophy.
Steve is a "flawed hero". That is the problem with assuming your morality is correct and others wrong. I love the man's work, but objectivism is poison.
+Caitlin McQuade Thanks for that. You summed up my feelings exactly in a few sentences.
"That is the problem with assuming your morality is correct and others wrong. I love the man's work, but objectivism is poison."
Does anyone here besides me notice that the first sentence is in direct logical contradiction to the second?
Miss McQuade, you, yourself, when you say Dikto's morality is poison are making a moral statement that assumes your morality is correct and his is wrong.
Well, he's a great artist and he has the right to believe what he wishes.
Not harming anyone.
I do have to admit, after reading a stack of 'Ditkomania' I ordered: he seems a bit fanatical and his current output amounts to the same thing as those Christian tracts you find in bathrooms. Both are asserting a point of view that we have a right to ignore or learn more.
Ditko's just have better art.
Fanatical can be inspirational.
If you claim Ditko's morality "may be wrong" then you base on the fact thatthere is moral wrongness. A notion that something is wrong comes from a thought process, therefore if you can have a notion of wrongness you can as well shape a full and objectively right opinion on any issue. If you deny the existence of pure good and pure evil, as white and black, then you betray good and accept evil.
Ditko's art is beautiful and unique. His philosophy (or attempts at such) are hideous and morally bankrupt.
Ayn Rand ruined my favorite artist!
Totally nut job propaganda speech, lol
But just from the camera passing over the artwork, you can see how good it is. The pacing and the storytelling is fantastic.
let me give you something more 'sane' then: every single communist/collectivist state throughout has ended in horrific collapse and has taken more lives than any war has
Thank-you! That's why collectivism is a morally bankrupt philosophy.
@@illuminatioracle the heck as talked about comunism?
Yeah communism is bad,it doesn't meab it's good in comparison your thing
Really depressing to learn that Ditko was into Ayn Rand.
Well.. it's not like he was hiding it.. and without her, I don't think we'd have got the Spiderman Shrug..