So... what's the big deal with Ayn Rand??

Peregrin Toker · Post by **Peregrin Toker** » 2003-06-14 02:11pm

I must confess that I barely know who Ayn Rand was, but from what I've gathered, she was a libertarian who argued that capitalism has prevailed because it's the only economical system that works. She's also the mother of objectivism. For some reason, I've often heard her described as a "crackpot".

But to me, she seems not very different from your average right-wing libertarian. So - what's so unusual about Ayn Rand's philosophy?? And why is she often described as a crackpot?

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-06-14 02:24pm

Go to aynrand.org and read.

Peregrin Toker · Post by **Peregrin Toker** » 2003-06-14 02:41pm

kojikun wrote:Go to aynrand.org and read.

Hmmm... now she appears somewhat weird....

Peregrin Toker · Post by **Peregrin Toker** » 2003-06-14 02:44pm

OK, to be fair, she's not that much of an oddball to me - I understand some of her ideas and arguments, but I still have trouble grasping the way she equated libertarianism with anarchism.

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-06-14 03:25pm

I dont think she was anarchistic at all, quite the contrary I think.

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-06-14 03:28pm

aha, here look

"Above all, do not join the wrong ideological groups or movements, in order to ?do something.? By ?ideological? (in this context), I mean groups or movements proclaiming some vaguely generalized, undefined (and, usually, contradictory) political goals. (E.g., the Conservative Party, which subordinates reason to faith, and substitutes theocracy for capitalism; or the ?libertarian? hippies, who subordinate reason to whims, and substitute anarchism for capitalism.)"

Note the quotation of libertarian, and the inclusion of hippies. She means to say that she dislikes SUPPOSED libertarians who dont actually want liberty and freedom but silly whimsical garbage like anarchy.

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-06-14 03:31pm

also:

"I disapprove of, disagree with and have no connection with, the latest aberration of some conservatives, the so-called 'hippies of the right,' who attempt to snare the younger or more careless ones of my readers by claiming simultaneously to be followers of my philosophy and advocates of anarchism. "

Shes talking about the nutzos not libertarian in general.

Peter Scwartz says this, however:

"IS LIBERTARIANISM AN EVIL DOCTRINE? Yes, if evil is the irrational and the destructive. Libertarianism belligerently rejects the very need for any justification for its belief in something called ?liberty.? It repudiates the need for any intellectual foundation to explain why ?liberty? is desirable and what ?liberty? means. Anyone from a gay-rights activist to a criminal counterfeiter to an overt anarchist can declare that he is merely asserting his ?liberty? ? and no Libertarian (even those who happen to disagree) can objectively refute his definition. Subjectivism, amoralism and anarchism are not merely present in certain ?wings? of the Libertarian movement; they are integral to it. In the absence of any intellectual framework, the zealous advocacy of ?liberty? can represent only the mindless quest to eliminate all restraints on human behavior ? political, moral, metaphysical. And since reality is the fundamental ?restraint? upon men?s actions, its is nihilism ? the desire to obliterate reality ? that is the very essence of Libertarianism. If the Libertarian movement were ever to come to power, widespread death would be the consequence. (For elaboration, see my essay ?Libertarianism: The Perversion of Liberty.?)"

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 2003-06-14 04:31pm

Schwartz is attacking a strawman. Libertarianism does not reject any need to justify liberty or establish that it works; if Schwartz would trouble himself to read anything by libertarian authors, including Rand, he would find that much of it is in fact devoted to this very cause.

Nor does libertarianism advocate any "mindless quest to eliminate all restraints on human behavior," something you will likely not hear any libertarian, even the anarchists, advocate. Most libertarians actually subscribe to a school of though similar to classical liberalism.

My guess is that Peter Schwartz is a conservative critic of the ideology, since his objections differ from what the left usually objects to in libertarianism, and there is also the whining about "amoralism" and the "metaphysical" schlock.

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-06-14 04:56pm

yeah. im guessing the scwartz is not too good a representative of the objectivist community.

Peregrin Toker · Post by **Peregrin Toker** » 2003-06-15 10:53am

BTW, I'm starting to see a possible flaw in Ayn Rand's logic - her unswerving devotion to egoism seems a little disturbing.

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2003-06-15 11:25am

Ayn Rand is hopelessly conceited; she concocted a scheme of morality which claimed to be based solely on objective facts and logic, yet arbitrarily included subjective values such as the sanctity of human life, etc. She called it "enlightened self-interest", with no justification of where the "enlightened" part comes from. If she would simply admit that it was a subjective injection into an otherwise rational and objective system, that would be fine. But she won't admit that, so she spins in circles trying to make it seem as if it follows naturally from something else ... which follows from something else ... which follows from something else ... which follows from something else ...

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-06-15 01:19pm

Thats why I'm an objectivist with utilitarian morals.

My whole moral philosophy comes from a kind of live-and-let-live idea that you should be allowed to do to yourself what you please but not force anything on anyone else. The founding fathers had a good way of putting it when they said someones rights "ended where another mans rights begin".

Patrick Ogaard · Post by **Patrick Ogaard** » 2003-06-15 03:29pm

kojikun wrote:Thats why I'm an objectivist with utilitarian morals. My whole moral philosophy comes from a kind of live-and-let-live idea that you should be allowed to do to yourself what you please but not force anything on anyone else. The founding fathers had a good way of putting it when they said someones rights "ended where another mans rights begin".

It might be the following quote, from former Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, dead for some 78 years:
"The right to swing my fist ends where the other man's nose begins."

Patrick Ogaard · Post by **Patrick Ogaard** » 2003-06-15 03:33pm

Make that 68 years.

PrinceofLowLight · Post by **PrinceofLowLight** » 2003-06-15 05:46pm

Let's not forget the whole cult aspect of Objectivism.

In the words of her right hand man, Nethaniel Branden in his book Judgement Day:

Ayn Rand is the greatest human being who has ever lived.
Atlas Shrugged is the greatest human achievement in the history of the world.
Ayn Rand, by virtue of her philosophical genius, is the supreme arbiter in any issue pertaining to what is rational, moral, or appropriate to man's life on earth.
Once one is acquainted with Ayn Rand and/or her work, the measure of one's virtue is intrinsically tied to the position one takes regarding her and/or it.
No one can be a good Objectivist who does not admire what Ayn Rand admires and condemn what Ayn Rand condemns.
No one can be a fully consistent individualist who disagrees with Ayn Rand on any fundamental issue.
Since Ayn Rand has designated Nathaniel Branden as her "intellectual heir," and has repeatedly proclaimed him to be an ideal exponent of her philosophy, he is to be accorded only marginally less reverence than Ayn Rand herself.
But it is best not to say most of these things explicitly (excepting, perhaps, the first two items). One must always maintain that one arrives at one's beliefs solely by reason.

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-06-15 08:07pm

ok that guy i think rand would like killed.

Patrick Degan · Post by **Patrick Degan** » 2003-06-15 09:33pm

Darth Wong wrote:Ayn Rand is hopelessly conceited; she concocted a scheme of morality which claimed to be based solely on objective facts and logic, yet arbitrarily included subjective values such as the sanctity of human life, etc. She called it "enlightened self-interest", with no justification of where the "enlightened" part comes from.

Wholly out of her own ass, it seems. Because I have never been able to glean anything out of the mishmash of Randian doctrine which amounts to anything other than a prolonged skippy-whip justifying utter self-interest as a virtue in and of itself.

In her novel The Fountainhead (later turned into the equally ridiculous movie starring Gary Cooper), Rand's protagonist Howard Roarke sets his own standards for life and artistic integrity at such an arbitrarily high and absolutist premium that he claims the unadulterated right to blow up the Cortland Towers building when his designs for it are altered to satisfy the requirements of his clients. He and his girlfriend carry out the bombing regardless of the possible risk to life and the certain financial ruin of the building's owners. Rand attempts to bury under the mountain of a ludicrous plot involving a gigantic conspiracy by the Forces of Mediocrity™ to destroy the Last Real Individual what is a glaringly fatal defect in her logic. Namely that a collection of Absolute Individuals guided primarily if not wholly by self-interest will never be able to advance any interest absent the cooperative enterprise known as civilisation. To illustrate: Free market economics, which Rand so worshipped, is not possible with an ideology such as Howard Roarke's. To succesfully participate, it is you who has to accomodate the customer, not the other way 'round. In the Real World, Howard Roarke would be an utter failure as a commercial architect not because of his design style but because he just fucking doesn't get the First Commandment of the Marketplace: the customer is always right. And the reason he doesn't get it is because he thinks the world exists to shape itself to his vision.

The principle of enlightened self-interest involves recognising how one's own selfish interests are best advanced in the larger context of the world one has to live in. Making tradeoffs which may involve some sacrifice now in exchange for overall advantage later. For example, enlightened self-interest may lead one to support social altruism in the form of general assistance for the poor, free education, and universal health care because, despite the taxation which would be required, it is generally in one's best interest to have a stable, well-functioning society in which the sort of disparities in wealth and well-being which could lead to class-resentment, social unrest, and at the extreme revolutionary chaos, are held in check and thus a society in which one may pursue his enterprise successfully and securely.

In the end, Ayn Rand is the ultimate solipsist: holding subjective values as the sole definition of Truth, and assuming that if the rest of the world fails to see reality in those terms, then it is the rest of the world that's wrong. "Objectivism" merely asserts Absolute Self-Intrest to be the only valid truth and supports its suspect claim as an objective philosophy through a massive False Dilemma argument that its either Total Individuality or Mindless Conformity as the condition of man.

Andrew J. · Post by **Andrew J.** » 2003-06-15 09:44pm

Also, her books were kinda boring.

Peregrin Toker · Post by **Peregrin Toker** » 2003-06-16 10:18am

Darth Wong wrote:Ayn Rand is hopelessly conceited; she concocted a scheme of morality which claimed to be based solely on objective facts and logic, yet arbitrarily included subjective values such as the sanctity of human life, etc.

How is the sanctity of human life a subjective value? I consider it an universal value above all, and I think we all can agree on that. To me, writing the sanctity of life off as a "subjective value" smells like moral relativism, or a cop-out justification for murder.

She called it "enlightened self-interest", with no justification of where the "enlightened" part comes from. If she would simply admit that it was a subjective injection into an otherwise rational and objective system, that would be fine.

Good point - self-interest is not automatically enlightened.

BTW, I've discovered some satire on Ayn Rand:

Villainsupply.com, describing the Robotic Ayn Rand wrote:software tends to be rather buggy. For instance, your Randroid may oppose immigration, yet be an immigrant herself. She may oppose infidelity, yet cheat on her husband. She may espouse individuality, yet believe that only those who follow her are individuals. She may oppose the control of individuals by organizations, yet laud corporate power. These bugs can not be repaired.

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-06-16 11:06am

Simon, there is no sanctity of human life that humans do no give. From a purely scientific point of view, we don't kill one another when it would be disadvantageous to the species to do so, and we do kill one another when it is advantageous to do so. If you watched Walking With Cavemen last night you'd realize that its our murderous instincts that helped us evolve. We are actually bred to fight one another. Doesn't mean we have to, evolutionarilly speaking the memetics of humanity has becoming a larger driving force then the genetics which means that we choose not to because we believe it is in our best interest, and continue ourselves that way, overcoming our natural urges to kill.

But there is nothing sacred or invioable about human life. That's like any moral code, derived from the human mind not.

Peregrin Toker · Post by **Peregrin Toker** » 2003-06-16 01:22pm

kojikun wrote:If you watched Walking With Cavemen last night you'd realize that its our murderous instincts that helped us evolve.

Sorry, missed that. But if it's a series like "Walking With Beasts", I'm going to see the rest of it.

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-06-16 01:51pm

i dont think WWC is a series, i think its just the one episode. I hope not tho.

Straha · Post by **Straha** » 2003-06-16 01:57pm

kojikun wrote:ok that guy i think rand would like killed.

No, they had an affair with each other, until she heard he was having a second affair with another woman at which point she all but excomunicated him.

I believe in Objectivism, but not in the crap that the ARI spews out. (My first thread was actually on this)

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-06-16 02:25pm

Straha wrote:I believe in Objectivism, but not in the crap that the ARI spews out. (My first thread was actually on this)

Objectivism makes sense up until they start advocating wanton destruction of other peoples stuff, etc just because you want it. Thats stupid.

Master of Ossus · Post by **Master of Ossus** » 2003-06-16 02:34pm

kojikun wrote:
Straha wrote:I believe in Objectivism, but not in the crap that the ARI spews out. (My first thread was actually on this)
Objectivism makes sense up until they start advocating wanton destruction of other peoples stuff, etc just because you want it. Thats stupid.

That's not even properly objective. Anyone who's put any amount of thought into such a thing ought to recognize that the other person's going to be pissed, and is liable to take steps to harm you in the future if you destroy their things. Thus, you should not destroy their things if only to safeguard yourself against potentially negative repercussions.