Atlas Shrugged, Part II

Nathaniel Branden Answers

Nathaniel Branden answers a question of two of my post Of Any Given Age. The idea of efficacy, self-esteem and pleasure are timeless. While the tools and stage of where we live change, these truths hold true. Thank you to Chuck Jines for the education. This is true Objectivism. This essay was written 46 years ago. No wonder Ayn Rand had such respect for him at one time.





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Ayn Rand, William Hickman and other idiots

Yes folks, I am back. After taking a hiatus to refresh my mind, if that is possible, I am back at the keyboard again.

Last Wednesday night I co-hosted Libertarian Politics Live with Andre Traversa. We had some great guests, which is the usual case, one that didn't show up (shame on you  Jonathan Narcisse) and Joe Carter, a blogger with First Things.

The subject was Ayn Rand and her alleged infatuation with William Hickman. I want to start out by saying that this isn't a all out defence of Rand or a blow by blow critique of Mr. Carter's assertions, although there will some, but rather a revelation of my observations in regards to Rand and those that try to marginalize her.

Ayn Rand was a screen writer in Hollywood and an author of books. She also founded a philosophy called Objectivism. It has it's adherents and detractors. Ayn Rand was a rationalist. Described as Aristotelean and at times, almost virulently anti-Kantian. For a little clarification and elucidation, I will include here a very short outline from AynRand.org or what Objectivism is:

"My philosophy, Objectivism, holds that:

1. Reality exists as an objective absolute—facts are facts, independent of man’s feelings, wishes, hopes or fears.
2. Reason (the faculty which identifies and integrates the material provided by man’s senses) is man’s only means of perceiving reality, his only source of knowledge, his only guide to action, and his basic means of survival.
3. Man—every man—is an end in himself, not the means to the ends of others. He must exist for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself. The pursuit of his own rational self-interest and of his own happiness is the highest moral purpose of his life.
4. The ideal political-economic system is laissez-faire capitalism. It is a system where men deal with one another, not as victims and executioners, nor as masters and slaves, but as traders, by free, voluntary exchange to mutual benefit. It is a system where no man may obtain any values from others by resorting to physical force, and no man may initiate the use of physical force against others. The government acts only as a policeman that protects man’s rights; it uses physical force only in retaliation and only against those who initiate its use, such as criminals or foreign invaders. In a system of full capitalism, there should be (but, historically, has not yet been) a complete separation of state and economics, in the same way and for the same reasons as the separation of state and church."

Anyone that reads this might infer some conclusions without working too hard. Objectivism is, in many ways, anti-thetical to most organized religions, specifically Christianity, Judaism and Islam. While Religions and Objectivism may strive to help people achieve completeness, the route in which they take to such ends is quite different. Moreover, They are opposites in many aspects, but also fall short in their goal for some common reasons. 


Religion in and of itself is a belief system, possibly a philosophical system, but none the less, it requires faith as opposed to knowledge from experience, scientific method or even what could be agreed up through consensus as being true in a provable way, like the sky is blue. In that respect, Objectivism strives to deal with what we know. As she said, facts are facts. Secondly, religions in general put a deity at the highest order in a hierarchy. In the case of the Abrahamic faiths, god is the creator of all things, man is less than god and born imperfect, born into sin. With these faiths, man spends or should spend his entire life trying to become less sinful, less imperfect, and always under the authority of the creator, of god. 


With Objectivism, Man is at the top of this hierarchy, not god. In an objective sense, Rand is saying that god is not provable, and she has a point. If we go on pure rationalism, god can't be proven, neither can a life in a hereafter. Those types of beliefs require faith, not factual or provable thesis's. With objectivism, man should also strive for some sort of perfection, but instead of using faith, to use rationalism. 


The problem with both approaches is that they both can and often do, lead to failure by setting standards that do no reflect man as he really is: an imperfect being in an imperfect world where spiritual and rational exist in the same beings. Neither side recognizes the value of the other, and thinks it is the correct path in attaining some sort of human perfection. May be the real problem is the idea that perfection is attainable. I would assert it is not, so why bother with perfection. Improvement on the other hand is, but that is another topic. 


In my opinion, the greatest fear people have is death and the realization that this is all there is. In my opinion, religions serve as a way to deal with this and also help people keep on some sort of moral path that in some way protects us from ourselves. Rand basically says to heck with fairytales, one has to live solely by the power of one's faculties. In some ways this is much more difficult that blind faith in what some would call fairy fairytales. 


All this being said, Ayn Rand's greatest failure was her own ego. I think the core of her philosophy is largely correct. If you want to look deeper into a rationalist's type of though, I would suggest reading Robert Nozick, who was a philosophy professor at Harvard and he took such things to a much greater and more detailed and scholarly level. Anyway, Rand fell victim to her own ego, and in the strivance, and this is my opinion, for the divorcement of man from the tribe, she created her own tribe that was just as petty as any other. She ignored her own flaws and humanity and in my opinion, served to hurt her philosophy more than help it. 


As far as altruism goes, I would assert that people aren't altruistic for the sake of who they are helping, but rather themselves. To me it's a form of self-serving narcissism that at best is a mutualistic experience. At worst, someone is collecting on that debt, often through the use of guilt. I find less fault with the honest man who says up front he is doing anything for himself. Sacrifice for anyone outside of one's family is illogical, and any religion that would require it or even promote it, is devious at best. In that way, I agree with Rand. If someone is going to sacrifice, it should be done for rational reasons. If you do it to make yourself feel good, what is the difference between that, masturbation or even getting drunk? It's all self-serving. The best rational exercise in sacrifice I have seen on film was Gran Torino, and in that movie, the protagonist was basically an atheist at worst and agnostic at best. 


Now, as far as William Hickman goes, Joe Carter was trying to disparage and dismiss Rand based on some infatuation she had with a sociopath when she was very young. We all do stupid things, and if Mr. Carter is the christian he says he is, may be he could find some compassion in his heart for her, instead of using it as an a priori argument against Objectivism, in my opinion, primarily because it is at opposition to many belief systems, including his own. I can also tell you that while I have tried to integrate rational and objectivist systems with christian beliefs. So far I have to say it's a no go. one of them is incorrect. Ayn Rand herself said there are no contradictions, only incorrect premises. So which one is incorrect? The one where we know what we know, or the fairytale? Thomas Jefferson wrangled with the same arguments and came to some interesting conclusions with which I tend to agree. 


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Obama and his Swipe at the "Virtue of Selfishness"

Only a loser like Obama would take a swipe at a dead woman, and one that I may add is probably the greatest philosopher of the twentieth century (warts and all), but I digress. Ayn Rand was born in Russia and left there when communism was in full swing. If anyone could make a case against Marxism, it would have been Ayn Rand and I would have loved to see her cut Obama down in a head to head debate. Obama seems to think that categorizing people that disagree with him as Objectivists in a pejorative way boosts his position as a socialist. This clearly shows his facile understanding of Ayn Rand and Objectivism. Ayn Rand believed in using reason, and to that extent that rational self-interest was a virtue. It doesn't proscribe that you would never help others outside of your family, but never as a sacrifice of yourself or anyone else. She didn't believe in altruism as it isn't rational. She was right of course. I do have issues with some of the results of her philosophy, but she brings more to the table in a positive way than negative. 

Article

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Bona Fides, Beliefs and Values

Several entries ago I said I would outline and discuss my values, beliefs and bona fides. For those of you across the river, the definition of bona fides is “a person’s honesty and sincerity of intentions” and/or a person’s legitimacy, I.E. credentials. Outside of my profile and blog header, those that read my blog entries may not know where I stand, or what values I have. At this point, I think I have to make them known so there is an understanding, particularly in regards to issues I discuss.


Life – Pro Life.
My view is that a fetus is a unique human being, with it's own unique DNA, different from either parent. It is an individual and because it is not anything other than a human being, not a frog, fruit fly nor a meat loaf, it deserves the right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of property.

What pro-choice and pro-abortion types will say is that it's foray into the human realm does not begin until it is breached into the world. I would retort it is just one instance of potentialities in a humans life, just as is puberty, pregnancy, physical growth throughout childhood, and even death. It is not the defining moment of creation, but conception is, as this is when the potentiality of being human happens. Actually, if you want to get philosophical, that moment is the instant of intent on the part of the parents, but we are getting off track here...

To believe that the right of abortion is a right for a woman to control her reproductive rights is a fallacy. If that were true, why didn't she control it before she was pregnant? And even in cases of rape, how does that lessen the fetus status as a human being? It does not. It still is a unique individual.

In order for one to believe that they have the right to abort a fetus, they must believe in slavery of a sort, or hubris such that they have dominion over another human being in terms of that individual's very existence. Such dominion and ownership reduces a fetuses status to something less than human in their eyes. It has to...If it didn't it would be murder, to them. They must reduce the fetus to less than human for them to be comfortable with that dastardly act.

Just as no matter where you go the sky is blue, there are inescapable facts about our reality. In their case, they deny it, and in most cases, they put their very convenience before the life of another.

Another related retort relates to their convenience somewhat is they will assert, who will pay to feed this person? My retort it is the responsibility of the parent(s). Such is the case any and everywhere. I will also add that if that is the only condition of one being allowed to exist, why stop at killing the not yet born, why not the poor, why not the aged (or any other human potentiality that might be an inconvenience)? They can be an inconvenience too. Such false thinking on their part leads to a materialism that communists use to reduce us to our basic components chemically (basically our physical life form) and nothing more, so as to be able to do anything the state wants against us. Anything can be justified and usually is.

I usually leave these misanthropes with one question: If humans laid eggs like a bird, would they still believe that abortion is morally correct if they wanted to destroy their eggs?


Marriage – Marriage licenses by the government should not be called marriage licenses, but rather civil union licenses. Marriage is a rite and sacrament before god, and the government should keep out of it. The purpose of the government license is for property rights and other legal affairs that do not pertain to marriage as prescribed by the church. To that extent, the government of any state may decide to grant civil union licenses to whomever they chose (and some do) based on the sensibilities of their population, but churches are free to decide who gets married in their respective religion without regard to what the state does, and without interference by those (or the state) that oppose the churches views and doctrine.

Government – As small as possible, as low taxes as possible. I’d settle for the abolition of the IRS, and institute a consumption tax, so long as all other federal taxes go away.

Guns – Any law abiding citizen has the right to keep and bear arms if they chose, for whatever reason they choose.

Foreign Policy - Let’s see: We dole out foreign aid to people that hate us (a panoply of pan-arabic countries), support countries where only our economic interests are served (Saudi Arabia, China), but whose governments we abhor, we try to democratize countries where it either will not work, or there are not the necessary forces to make it happen by itself, and we allow politics to influence military decisions, as well as policy decisions, and in either case it leads to disaster. For instance, we pander to the Saudis because of their oil reserves, even when they personally finance terrorists that kill our citizens and soldiers. They are the epitome of back stabbing SOBs, and if we were both moral and smart, we’d divest ourselves of these people by developing our own oil reserves in ANWR, off shore and anywhere else here. Can’t do that. The enviro-terrorists in this country won’t let that happen. In fact, they hate any idea that involves current technology, instead promulgating windmills and non-existent means of energy, whereby putting us back 100 years because they don’t want the intention of polluting our environment to exist. I will continue this later with Energy, but you get the idea. Our values that we bring to politics and foreign policy lack a moral backbone. I think it is ok to help countries where the people are unduly suffering, but even there we get it wrong. While it is ok to invade Iraq because Saddam was a despot, it is not ok to invade the Sudan because of a despot. More people got shit hammered in Africa than in Iraq, Afghanistan, or Iran, combined. The shame of it is that Kofi “the feckless wonder” Annan, did next to nothing for his home continent. Of course that is de rigueur for the UN, which is the Organization of Feckless Peoples or OFP. It is more important to have good intentions than to accomplish anything. So, after our great Middle East democratization tour, what do we do now? We need someone in charge that has a strong moral compass. That does not start trouble, but does back down from it necessarily. We need someone where actions and results matter more than intentions by themselves, and results matter more than anything. Passing the same cup of piss around and calling it chardonnay doesn’t work anymore.

Immigration – Legal immigration is good, illegal immigration is bad. We need to punish the companies that hire illegal immigrants, deport when we can, and change the process of immigration to streamline it, and enforce it better.

Energy – For electricity, go nuclear, for transportation, drill here, drill well, and drill all the time. In spare time, look for other energy sources.

Religion – First, everyone has the right to believe as they wish, at least in this country, for now. For me, there is one truth and that is we are god’s creation and in that context, there are things you can do, and things you should not do. There is absolute right and wrong, and having opinions is fine. Judgement comes with the final exam.

Philosophy – I have always believed in an objective philosophy that there is right and wrong, and that facts are facts. I think this is why I like objectivism so much. From Ayn Rand:

Reality exists as an objective absolute—facts are facts, independent of man’s feelings, wishes, hopes or fears.

Reason (the faculty which identifies and integrates the material provided by man’s senses) is man’s only means of perceiving reality, his only source of knowledge, his only guide to action, and his basic means of survival.

Man—every man—is an end in himself, not the means to the ends of others. He must exist for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself. The pursuit of his own rational self-interest and of his own happiness is the highest moral purpose of his life.

The ideal political-economic system is laissez-faire capitalism. It is a system where men deal with one another, not as victims and executioners, nor as masters and slaves, but as traders, by free, voluntary exchange to mutual benefit. It is a system where no man may obtain any values from others by resorting to physical force, and no man may initiate the use of physical force against others. The government acts only as a policeman that protects man’s rights; it uses physical force only in retaliation and only against those who initiate its use, such as criminals or foreign invaders. In a system of full capitalism, there should be (but, historically, has not yet been) a complete separation of state and economics, in the same way and for the same reasons as the separation of state and church.

In my heart, her arguments and statements ring true as anything I have read. Even so, she and I would disagree on a couple things. One, she was pro-choice. I am not. Two, she was an atheist. I am not. For me, my goal on a philosophical level has been to try to combine and rationalize Objectivism with Christianity. The problems I have had with Christianity, particularly my Anglican and Catholic background, is that it tends to be collectivist in it’s interpretations, and has become suitable to those whose philosophies are what I would call theo-socialist. Part of this is that both Anglicanism and Catholicism are steeped in tradition and orthodoxy. To quote Barbara Tober, “Traditions are group efforts to keep the unexpected from happening.” Emphasis on group, as it implies collectivism. To be part of a group, you have to give up something. I have yet to find a group where I agree with everything, but I find it difficult to follow doctrine in any group if I do not believe it or in it. I liken it to having to eat a shit sandwich. In Collectivism, everyone has to take a bite, some more than others. So in a sense, my beliefs in libertarian and objectivist ideals are to minimize the shit sandwich eating escapades, particularly from the culinary expertise of those outside myself. So, in the context of Ayn Rand’s statements of Objectivist ideals, I try to exercise them with the moral rules set forth through my religion, for which there are but three commandments: Love your god with all your heart, all your soul and all your mind, love your neighbor as yourself, and honor your father and your mother. A reduction of the original 10, but it covers everything just the same.

Background – Born and raise on Long Island, lived there until 2002. My father was the son of Italian immigrants, and my mother’s family background was much more diverse, with immigrants from England and Ireland in the 19th century and Danish and French Huguenot immigrants from the 17th century. There even is some native american thrown in along the way. Culturally, I grew up being exposed to an Italian-American experience. My father was fluent in Italian, but only spoke it when spoken to in Italian. Up until the 8th grade I attended Episcopal parochial school. Do not compare this with the current iteration of the Episcopal and Anglican Church, but more like Anglican Catholic. High Mass once a week, The Book of Common Prayer of 1928 and the Hymnal of 1940. Very strict, but without brothers or nuns. I attended W.C. Mepham HS after this, and went on to get a B.A. In American History and minor in Biology. In between then and now, I have had many different kinds of jobs and work, and it’s too much to list and discuss, but only to say that I have a lot of experience in different things, and an eclecticism that serves me better now than then. For the last 16 plus years I have worked in the information technology field, and I have since received a M.S. In Information Systems. I am Married, and I have 5 children. Outside of that, I like to ride my motorcycle, lift weights, and some point soon, start practicing Aikido again. I also like to Blog...

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