The requirement to gain the knowledge you need isn't a "flaw with reason". Reason is the only way to attain knowledge and must be consistently exercised over time throughout your life. Emotions are not not primaries as a 'default position', they are automatic reactions to values you have already accepted, rationally or not. Whatever may occur to you automatically based on prior experience and knowledge is not infallible and must be validated. That becomes easier by habit when performed consistently but is never automatic.

It means thinking in principles based on logic, with valid concepts and in full focus. In this context it means evaluating choices in accordance with a rational code of ethics applied to the values of your life. For the meaning of rational stands in a code of ethics see Ayn Rand's article on "The Objectivist Ethics". It isn't semantics. It isn't just predicting what will or will probably happen with a 'willingness' to accept consequences without regard to rational standards. You have to evaluate goals in a hierarchy of values and the means used to attain them, and engage in the mental effort necessary to think of what you need and possible means to get it, from the particular actions to the full principles of ethics to your own hierarchy of values.

From "The Objectivist Ethics":

"Rationality is man’s basic virtue, the source of all his other virtues. Man’s basic vice, the source of all his evils, is the act of unfocusing his mind, the suspension of his consciousness, which is not blindness, but the refusal to see, not ignorance, but the refusal to know. Irrationality is the rejection of man’s means of survival and, therefore, a commitment to a course of blind destruction; that which is anti-mind, is anti-life.

"The virtue of Rationality means the recognition and acceptance of reason as one’s only source of knowledge, one’s only judge of values and one’s only guide to action. It means one’s total commitment to a state of full, conscious awareness, to the maintenance of a full mental focus in all issues, in all choices, in all of one’s waking hours. It means a commitment to the fullest perception of reality within one’s power and to the constant, active expansion of one’s perception, i.e., of one’s knowledge. It means a commitment to the reality of one’s own existence, i.e., to the principle that all of one’s goals, values and actions take place in reality and, therefore, that one must never place any value or consideration whatsoever above one’s perception of reality. It means a commitment to the principle that all of one’s convictions, values, goals, desires and actions must be based on, derived from, chosen and validated by a process of thought—as precise and scrupulous a process of thought, directed by as ruthlessly strict an application of logic, as one’s fullest capacity permits. It means one’s acceptance of the responsibility of forming one’s own judgments and of living by the work of one’s own mind (which is the virtue of Independence). It means that one must never sacrifice one’s convictions to the opinions or wishes of others (which is the virtue of Integrity)—that one must never attempt to fake reality in any manner (which is the virtue of Honesty)—that one must never seek or grant the unearned and undeserved, neither in matter nor in spirit (which is the virtue of Justice). It means that one must never desire effects without causes, and that one must never enact a cause without assuming full responsibility for its effects—that one must never act like a zombie, i.e., without knowing one’s own purposes and motives—that one must never make any decisions, form any convictions or seek any values out of context, i.e., apart from or against the total, integrated sum of one’s knowledge—and, above all, that one must never seek to get away with contradictions. It means the rejection of any form of mysticism, i.e., any claim to some nonsensory, nonrational, nondefinable, supernatural source of knowledge. It means a commitment to reason, not in sporadic fits or on selected issues or in special emergencies, but as a permanent way of life."

Yes

I think we are going around on semantics. What's rational?

You wrote that "being aware of the consequences" is sufficient to be rational. It isn't. You have to make judgments about choices, consequences and goals in accordance with rational principles.

Morality is not based on 'not initiating force'. You have it backwards. Morality is based on reason. The principle of not using force against others is a fundamental social consequence. Moral principles primarily concern choices in your own life. There are a lot of irrational, immoral things you could do to yourself that would not be initiating force against others.

There was no "ad hominem attack". You are misrepresenting people with belligerent false attacks and have said nothing else. There is no rational content to your posts attacking people. They are not "civil". Rejecting it is not "ad hominem", not "vituperation", not "barking" and not "uncivil". You are spreading malicious gossip misrepresenting people.

The point was: not if against reason. Reason can lead you to accepting consequences but so can pure emotions.

This started with a decision about ice cream.
Is that a moral decision? you are wrong.

Like the famous television detective Lieutenant Colombo, I don’t make assumptions---well, I try not to.

When once the forms of civility are violated by the discussion participants resorting to name-calling there remains little hope of return to kindness or decency. Your ad hominem attack upon me was impolite, but consistent with the attacks I have received on this post from other true “Objectivists.” I suggest you wag more and bark less. I don't usually engage in too much back-and-forth blogging, since this rarely results in more light than heat, as the case here illustrates.

I never saw "every". Everything I and others have said refers to moral decisions.

My daughter-in-law is not an Objectivist, though she has read Atlas.She is a child of the 70s and has trouble understanding the nature of freedom. Her philosophy can be summed up simply, although applied with difficulty. It goes like this: live, smile, live, smile, live, smile DIE!

tdechaine:
RIGHT!

I do believe you suffer from a case of moral superiority.

Any decision that does not initiate force or fraud is a moral decision. Anything that gives me an excuse (not reason) to eat ice cream and bacon is fine with me. By the way, no, I am not fat.

Rejecting your mudslinging for what it is is not "vituperation" and not what your mudslinging described in its misrepresentations.

But there are also complicated decisions where the risk/reward ratio is not always known. That is why I say that if you are willing to accept the consequences based on what you know now, its an acceptable rational decision

That was not incorporated in the question. The question said EVERY. Perhaps more precision in the question would help the discussion.

We've been talking about principled/moral decisions. Your example does not apply. Nor would that be dogmatism.

Yes, I should have use a better word than real. :) I've checked out the Virtue of Selfishness. It is excellent and agree, on point.

The question asks if EVERY decision must be based upon reason. The answer, as illustrated by my ice cream example, is no.

Get serious.

I prefer vanilla to strawberry ice cream.

Exactly the vituperation all too common here.