vixstile

I was watching The Simpsons the other day, and it was the episode were Marge joins a play, so she throws Maggie into the Ayn Rand School for Tots. And when Homer goes to pick up Maggie, there is a big poster on the wall that says "A is A". LOL!

Cain

Objections of this sort depend, I think, on how one wishes to define Objectivism. On the USENET, for instance, there are primarily two warring factions. The "ARIans", or those who closely identify with the Ayn Rand Institute, and the "tolerationists," far more independent-minded people, many of whom despise Leonard Piekoff.

The vast majority of people I've encountered who closely identify with Rand call themselves Objectivists, and hail from the Orthodox church (ARIans). They believe Objecitivism is a closed system and Ayn Rand, the greatest human being in the history of the world, solved most of the major problems in philosophy (Piekoff and his clones are free to fill in the details). I'm not exaggerating either-- they literally believe Ayn Rand represents the pinnacle of human thought. Rand the person plays a profoundly important role here. Just to use an example, when Nathaniel Branden was giving a lecture (while still in good favor, obviously), one audience member said Rand's characters appeared to be ideals of fiction, utterly impossible and without counterpart in the real world. Rand was in attendence and stood up to rhetorically ask something to the effect, "I don't exist?" as if to say she embodied those characters and values. Many Objectivists would readily agree. She didn't, of course, but that fact does not negate the ideas themselves. However, Rand explicitly welcomed this interpretation, and followers have picked it up in stride.


I do take issue with the "opus of her ideas" comment. What original ideas of merit are contained in her writings? Let's use the example of Kant here. Rand despised Kant more than anyone, including Marx. Rand's followers adopt this hatred as their own despite ever reading a single word Kant has written (following Rand's intellectual habits as evidenced by the Rawls article). One part of Rand's ethics, emphasized over and over again by herself and many adherents, is the idea that man is an end in himself. Go ahead and perform a Google search http://www.google.com/search?q=%22ma...n%20himself%22
and you'll get nothing but Objectivist websites. Now here's a very basic philosophy question: who first developed this idea? Who is it most closely associated with, at least in academic circles? That's right, Immanual Kant.

Go ahead and confront an Objectivist with this startling fact and she will express the most hardened disbelief and request original quotations to the page number. (Any remotely serious egoist with the faintest concern for elementary consistency should immediately dismiss this Kantian idea.)

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I believe Maggie gets her pacifier taken away after entering the Ayn Rand school for taughts. Notice how the kids work together to retrieve it.

xoc

A passing thought occurs to me here about the distinction between Rand and Kant over this point.

Rand's "end" is the end of self, the "I", and so is basically "selfish" in it's intent and focus.

Kant however sees the "ends" to be our fellow humans; it is the moral thing to treat other people as "ends-in-themselves" rather than just means to our own ends, in a kind of "Golden Rule" type moral philosophy. I do believe Kant's philosophy is therefore more beneficial socially and perhaps elevates man to a greater degree as it applies to all people rather than the "elite."

Maybe too simple an analysis, but it's my impression that this seems to represent the different "spirits" of these philosophies in a most basic way. It might also help to explain why Rand hated Kant, I'm not really familiar with her basis for hating the guy though. Seems like a reasonable guess.

Bill Snedden

I've usually heard the former referred to as "Randians". The latter would be David Kelley's Institute for Objectivist Studies. Many do appear to despise Leonard Piekoff and, from what I've seen, for good reason.

I recall from my first reading of The Fountainhead, that in the middle of the book (it was a paperback edition) there was a little postcard that one could tear out and mail in for more information about "Objectivism: the philosophy of Ayn Rand". I remember how odd it seemed to me at the time; quite like the little Knights of Columbus postcards I was used to seeing in my grandmother's Catholic magazines. Little did I know at the time how apt the comparison was.

Well, you'll note that the emphasis on "her" was yours, not mine. It probably would have been more appropriate for me to simply say "her writings" since, as you allude, there's not a lot of original ideas in there.

My intent was merely to point out that noting an instance where Rand acted hypocritically and then dismissing her writings tout court is an example of ad hominem reasoning. Rand's writings should sink or swim on their own, irrespective of her character flaws.

I've no doubt that many will indeed behave that way. I'm curious, though, as to what you meant by your final sentence. Do you mean to say that no ethical egoist should acknowledge Kant's idea that men are ends unto themselves? Or by "egoist" did you mean "Objectivist?"

Now THAT'S funny!


Regards,

Bill Snedden

Cain

Yes, they're often called "Randians" and sometimes even "Randroids," but I think the ARIan term sticks because many of these associations are institutional.


Well, Objectivism is a subdivision of egoism. It's difficult to draw a tree, but under egoism you have psychological egoism and ethical egoism. Then under ethical egoism you have Objectivism.

If you want to get really picky there's an intermediate step dividing individualistic egoism and universal egoism. But the categorization and sub-categorization is no different than socialism versus, say, Fabian Socialism.

I'm saying anyone who claims to be (ethical) egoist ought reject Kant immediately. Rand's hatred of him is not completely irrational because he did, after all, tell us to ignore self-interest out of duty. One of his examples was the merchant who uses a fair balance to weigh fruit. According to Kant we use a fair balance because of our respect for other human beings as rational creatures. An egoist only uses a fair balance because she's more likely to reap greater profits in the long run.


You can spin this example out into a full-fledged argument against egoism. The person who murders 10 people for instance, according to egoism, has only failed to act in her rational self-interest. That's the only thing she has done that's morally wrong -- not acted in her own best interests.

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XOC
Rand has a stilted interpretation of everything (the words "sacrifice" and "altruism" come to mind):

One of the sites clarifies her position:

Keith Russell

Kantian:

The thinking that has led me away from Objectivism isn't based on the notion that some other 'ism' is 'better' than Objectivism. Instead, it is based on the notion that 'isms'--in general--are quite possible inherently flawed.

K