I've gotten the impression that the women who gravitated into Rand cultism early on viewed Rand as a cool romance novelist, and they wanted to live out her vision of sexual freedom, like the pretty Jewish girl who gentilized her name to Vivian Grant.
However, human biology has this thing called "pregnancy" which reality-checked these women when they hooked up with Objectivist men:
Searching for Answers in the 1961 Death of an Ayn Rand Follower
I am most struck by the somewhat puzzling fact that the New York Times would devote a full article to this.
Vivian Grant's is a tragic story but not an uncommon one. And it has very, very little to do with Ayn Rand: lots of starry-eyed girls travel to the big city and come to a bad end. Reading Atlas Shrugged not required.
I suspect that this story shows that you can get plenty of people to read a newspaper story if you use Ayn Rand's name as a hook. . .
But it does fit with Greg's hypothesis that Rand was primarily driven by romanticism. That would make her likely to appeal to romanticism in readers and especially in female readers since Rand's form of romanticism was arguably a form more common in women than in men. I think this was the point Mark was trying to make.
I don't know of any demographic study of Rand fans. However, my own observation, shared by many others, is that those bowled over by Atlas tend to be in their teens or very early 20's. And most (but not all) of them are male. The same group that gets into SF and sometimes (God help them) Scientology. People who assume that personal and emotional isolation is a sure sign of unregarded genius.
When I attended NBI lectures in Toronto in the 1960's, men outnumbered women by about 3 to 1.
Gordon, I grant your points about a lot of male readers though there are other things as well. Mark was talking about her appeal to female readers. There are less of them than there are of male readers but will their reasons tend to be the same as those of male readers?
"Mark was talking about her appeal to female readers. There are less of them than there are of male readers but will their reasons tend to be the same as those of male readers?"
I suspect not - but I really don't have a definite opinion about it.
Every now and then, an issue arises which spotlights the problems involved in laissez-faire. One especially pointed one which has been making headlines lately: preventive government measures to protect public health.
I did a little checking on Objectivist websites, including Objectivist Living. There does not seem to be an objection to forcibly confining Typhoid Mary types – on the ground (a little questionable, perhaps?) that their actions constitute an initiation of force.
However, this is a narrow case indeed. What about neighbourhood quarantines ? What about travel restrictions? What about compulsory vaccinations? And of course there’s the concept of “herd immunity “: I’d not be surprised if the Objectivist response to that one is simply to deny the scientific evidence.
Yes, you can make a case that all this stuff can be handled by a free market. But anyone who is not severely constrained ideologically is not likely to be impressed by such arguments.
I don't know just how Objectivists will be handling this. From the difficulty you have had finding information I think they probably have not discussed this much. Which means that either they believe something that they know people will howl down or their opinions are not that different from that of the majority. But I think the potential for irresponsible positions on this is greater in some other libertarians, especially those influenced by Rothbard and other anarcho-capitalists.
I recall reading somewhere that Rand's lung cancer proved awkward for her because she said that cancer derives from "bad premises." (I guess we can add freedom from cancer to the list of the superpowers of the Operating Objectivist.)
Perhaps infectious diseases like measles afflict children because their minds haven't developed sufficiently to adopt prophylactic good premises, hence the desirability of vaccinating them.
There tends to be a funny contradiction in objectivists but also with a a lot of libertarians. They claim to be atheists but refuse to believe that the Universe will put limits on human activity. That it does not matter how large the World's population is, that we do not have to worry about resource depletion or climate change. In other words nature is set up in a way that allows unlimited growth. But why should anyone expect this to be so. It only makes sense if you have God looking out for you.
I've noticed that the gold standard and the cornucopianism of natural resources make contradictory assumptions. Rand didn't seem to pick up on that despite the propaganda about her deep thinking. In Atlas the Operating Objectivists in a proper political order could produce mountains of copper, steel, coal, oil, wheat, etc. But they couldn't do this trick with gold for some reason, and Rand doesn't seem to see the need to explain the difference.
"(Libertarian types) claim to be atheists but refuse to believe that the Universe will put limits on human activity. That it does not matter how large the World's population is, that we do not have to worry about resource depletion or climate change. In other words nature is set up in a way that allows unlimited growth. But why should anyone expect this to be so."
You forgot immigration. Here's Harry:
http://www.hblist.com/immigr.htm
Here are the real-world results (unless India's Evil Government has Evil Government Laws forbidding The Men of the Mind from building indoor toilets, or laws making indoor toilets prohibitively expensive to contemplate, or universal public schooling indoctrinating the masses with the nefarious Squat-Shit method of elimination, analogous to the Look-Say method of teaching reading):
A billion + people can fit into one county in Texas, the loons are fond of repeating, citing India's population density.
Capitalism is like magic. It will fix all; it alone circumvents the law of identity. Wisdom be damned, growth full speed ahead. For the way to avoid drowning in our own excreta is to shrink regulation and attenuate the relevant laws, and stack the deck in court in favor of the "do-ers" (or "do-do-ers," in this case), and the John Galts will build toilets to the moon, etc.
Harry Binswanger is the most rabid of the "open immigration" Objectivists.
He believes that there should be no border controls and entering the US from Mexico (or any other country) should be like traveling from Connecticut to New York. You see a sign that says "welcome to the US" and that's it.
There was a poll that said something like 30% of Mexicans would move to the US if they could. That's at least 40 million people. Any reasonable person would have to admit that even the legitimate functions of government would be overwhelmed, but not Harry Binswanger.
I've asked him several times if he thinks Israel should adopt such a policy, and he refuses to answer.
Ask Binswanger if Galt's Gulch should have had open borders.
Oh, speaking of the Men of the Mind, I've trolled Objectivists and similar cranks by saying that the Paul family should stop threatening the Federal Reserve's governors with state violence. Instead we should deregulate the Fed and let Janet Yellen use her uncoerced mind to the best of her ability. How can she make rational decisions if Ron Paul, and now his son Rand, keep waving guns in her direction?
I wonder when Yaron Brook will announce that he has made reparations to the taxpayers in Israel and in the state of Texas for the education they supplied him, which they paid for under coercion.
Followers of ARCHN will be eager to hear the latest Good News: allegedly, "The Atlas Shrugged television series is coming!"
Given the quality of the film trilogy, this is a bit like a jubilant announcement from a clone of Ed Wood that he's begun a remake of Citizen Kane.
While you're eagerly waiting for the series to come to your television screen, you can invest your cash in "some new KILLER gear" (their emphasis) - including a nifty Rearden Steel t-shirt!
As Daniel said last year, they seem to be doing okay with the merch. . .
Oh hell. And here I was, getting all set to plant myself in front of the tube every week while wearing my 20th Century Motors baseball cap and my Dannaskjold Repossessions t-shirt. . . :)
I was making a joke. I hope you are doing the same.
Remember: everyone knows what kind of a flop the movies were. I don't think that many television stations - or any networks! - are going to line up to give Aglialoro a new chance to blow their money.
In this regard, I should mention that about 18 months ago, I asked The Numbers why they hadn't reported on DVD sales of Atlas Shrugged II. I got the following reply:
"Thank you for your email. The DVD for Atlas Shrugged: Part 2 did not sell in sufficient quantities to be covered by our tracking."
Latest from the AS Movie site: the Ayn Rand Tax Day t-shirt - decorated with a photo of the lady and a suitable quote. Available in 6 colors, so there's only one day per week when you have to figure out what to wear.
Aglialoro is certainly not afraid of being laughed at. . .
Personally, I just went "Wow..." when I read it. I mean, Ed 'T-1000' Cline has written some awful things before, but this was just horrifying. I'm surprised that even an orthodox objectivist site would allow a thing like this on their site.
Incidentally, Cline added the "(Satire)" to the title shortly after he posted it, because an article that sounds like it could come straight from the Stormfront forums is apparently okay as long as you just call it a "satire".
I mean, that piece isn't even faintly amusing or witty, it's just dimwitted and weird. Watching Cline try to write satire is like watching a vending machine try to sing an aria.
Calling that piece a satire is like calling the Protocols of Zion a satire. Apparently you can excuse anything by adding: "Just kidding, folks!"
However, it's not fair to most Objectivists to lump them in with someone like Cline. What is more concerning is the spectacle of philosopher David Kelley lending intellectual support to the Atlas Shrugged movie trilogy - movies so comically bad that they should be a profound embarrassment to anyone who has ever liked Rand's work.
David Kelley reportedly got his undergrad degree philosophy from Brown University around 1970. Didn't he receive any exposure to real literature there as part of his general education?
I would like you all to know about my sequel/rebuttal to Atlas Shrugged, entitled Sisyphus Shrugged. What if labor went on strike? Who is truly indispensable here?
Interesting. Have you run into any copyright problems from Peikoff and crew? I would have thought that they would object to your using Rand's novel this way. The first thing that most, probably all, of the regulars here would be concerned about is does the point that you are trying to make get in the way of the story? Still I like the idea of exploring what would probably really happen after the events of Atlas Shrugged. You say and a review said that there would be a labour strike in this book. Do you have what I thought would be t That is do you have any examples of some one that Galt tried and failed to recruit. An industrialist that told him to bugger off.
Readers of ARCHN should check out all the Rand-related items on this blog. They are uniformly interesting and intelligent. Above all - which is far rarer - they display real civility.
"As Patrick O’Neil has argued, Rand’s ethics can be summed up in the following syllogism:
The adoption of value system x is necessary for the survival of any human being. You are a human being. Therefore, you should adopt value system x."
I don't see how this is invalid. It may be unsound, depending on what value system x is, but it still seems valid. There is reference to a value in the premise and the conclusion.
This doesn't go to say that Hume wasn't his usual brilliant self in pointing out the fallacy of 'is/ought' conclusions in logic. It's just that I don't see this example to be one of deriving a value from a fact. Else, I'm missing something.
@RWL, You are missing something. It is invalid. Note "should" is introduced in the conclusion. We are no longer dealing with a matter of deductive, but a matter of personal decision. cheers Daniel
For a laugh out loud moment, suggest you read Bertrand Russell's commentary on Hume's solution to the problem of universals in The History of Western Philosophy (pp., 660-661 in the Kindle edition). There you will find something that looks suspiciously like 'measurement omission.' Only Russell states it in so many words as a minor detail that Hume overlooked.
It seems one person's insightful criticism became another's epic achievement.
I've gotten the impression that the women who gravitated into Rand cultism early on viewed Rand as a cool romance novelist, and they wanted to live out her vision of sexual freedom, like the pretty Jewish girl who gentilized her name to Vivian Grant.
ReplyDeleteHowever, human biology has this thing called "pregnancy" which reality-checked these women when they hooked up with Objectivist men:
Searching for Answers in the 1961 Death of an Ayn Rand Follower
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/25/nyregion/searching-for-answers-in-the-1961-death-of-an-ayn-rand-follower.html
@ Mark Plus:
ReplyDeleteThanks for the link.
I am most struck by the somewhat puzzling fact that the New York Times would devote a full article to this.
Vivian Grant's is a tragic story but not an uncommon one. And it has very, very little to do with Ayn Rand: lots of starry-eyed girls travel to the big city and come to a bad end. Reading Atlas Shrugged not required.
I suspect that this story shows that you can get plenty of people to read a newspaper story if you use Ayn Rand's name as a hook. . .
But it does fit with Greg's hypothesis that Rand was primarily driven by romanticism. That would make her likely to appeal to romanticism in readers and especially in female readers since Rand's form of romanticism was arguably a form more common in women than in men. I think this was the point Mark was trying to make.
ReplyDeleteSorry Lloyd, but I just don't see this.
ReplyDeleteI don't know of any demographic study of Rand fans. However, my own observation, shared by many others, is that those bowled over by Atlas tend to be in their teens or very early 20's. And most (but not all) of them are male. The same group that gets into SF and sometimes (God help them) Scientology. People who assume that personal and emotional isolation is a sure sign of unregarded genius.
When I attended NBI lectures in Toronto in the 1960's, men outnumbered women by about 3 to 1.
Gordon, I grant your points about a lot of male readers though there are other things as well. Mark was talking about her appeal to female readers. There are less of them than there are of male readers but will their reasons tend to be the same as those of male readers?
ReplyDelete"Mark was talking about her appeal to female readers. There are less of them than there are of male readers but will their reasons tend to be the same as those of male readers?"
ReplyDeleteI suspect not - but I really don't have a definite opinion about it.
Re: Vaccinations etc.
ReplyDeleteEvery now and then, an issue arises which spotlights the problems involved in laissez-faire. One especially pointed one which has been making headlines lately: preventive government measures to protect public health.
I did a little checking on Objectivist websites, including Objectivist Living. There does not seem to be an objection to forcibly confining Typhoid Mary types – on the ground (a little questionable, perhaps?) that their actions constitute an initiation of force.
However, this is a narrow case indeed. What about neighbourhood quarantines ? What about travel restrictions? What about compulsory vaccinations? And of course there’s the concept of “herd immunity “: I’d not be surprised if the Objectivist response to that one is simply to deny the scientific evidence.
Yes, you can make a case that all this stuff can be handled by a free market. But anyone who is not severely constrained ideologically is not likely to be impressed by such arguments.
I don't know just how Objectivists will be handling this. From the difficulty you have had finding information I think they probably have not discussed this much. Which means that either they believe something that they know people will howl down or their opinions are not that different from that of the majority.
ReplyDeleteBut I think the potential for irresponsible positions on this is greater in some other libertarians, especially those influenced by Rothbard and other anarcho-capitalists.
My review of Ayn Rand Nation is now on the web.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.scribd.com/doc/255012779/Ayn-Rand-Nation
I recall reading somewhere that Rand's lung cancer proved awkward for her because she said that cancer derives from "bad premises." (I guess we can add freedom from cancer to the list of the superpowers of the Operating Objectivist.)
ReplyDeletePerhaps infectious diseases like measles afflict children because their minds haven't developed sufficiently to adopt prophylactic good premises, hence the desirability of vaccinating them.
There tends to be a funny contradiction in objectivists but also with a a lot of libertarians. They claim to be atheists but refuse to believe that the Universe will put limits on human activity. That it does not matter how large the World's population is, that we do not have to worry about resource depletion or climate change. In other words nature is set up in a way that allows unlimited growth. But why should anyone expect this to be so. It only makes sense if you have God looking out for you.
ReplyDelete@Lloyd Flack:
ReplyDeleteI've noticed that the gold standard and the cornucopianism of natural resources make contradictory assumptions. Rand didn't seem to pick up on that despite the propaganda about her deep thinking. In Atlas the Operating Objectivists in a proper political order could produce mountains of copper, steel, coal, oil, wheat, etc. But they couldn't do this trick with gold for some reason, and Rand doesn't seem to see the need to explain the difference.
Female fans of Ayn Rand?
ReplyDeleteGoogle: Borderline Personality Disorder Ayn Rand Sociopath
Lloyd Flack said:
ReplyDelete"(Libertarian types) claim to be atheists but refuse to believe that the Universe will put limits on human activity. That it does not matter how large the World's population is, that we do not have to worry about resource depletion or climate change. In other words nature is set up in a way that allows unlimited growth. But why should anyone expect this to be so."
You forgot immigration. Here's Harry:
http://www.hblist.com/immigr.htm
Here are the real-world results (unless India's Evil Government has Evil Government Laws forbidding The Men of the Mind from building indoor toilets, or laws making indoor toilets prohibitively expensive to contemplate, or universal public schooling indoctrinating the masses with the nefarious Squat-Shit method of elimination, analogous to the Look-Say method of teaching reading):
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/NH04Df01.html
A billion + people can fit into one county in Texas, the loons are fond of repeating, citing India's population density.
ReplyDeleteCapitalism is like magic. It will fix all; it alone circumvents the law of identity. Wisdom be damned, growth full speed ahead. For the way to avoid drowning in our own excreta is to shrink regulation and attenuate the relevant laws, and stack the deck in court in favor of the "do-ers" (or "do-do-ers," in this case), and the John Galts will build toilets to the moon, etc.
Harry Binswanger is the most rabid of the "open immigration" Objectivists.
ReplyDeleteHe believes that there should be no border controls and entering the US from Mexico (or any other country) should be like traveling from Connecticut to New York. You see a sign that says "welcome to the US" and that's it.
There was a poll that said something like 30% of Mexicans would move to the US if they could. That's at least 40 million people. Any reasonable person would have to admit that even the legitimate functions of government would be overwhelmed, but not Harry Binswanger.
I've asked him several times if he thinks Israel should adopt such a policy, and he refuses to answer.
I get the impression that Harry Binswanger is one of the most rabid Objectivists.
ReplyDeleteNeil Parille:
ReplyDeleteAsk Binswanger if Galt's Gulch should have had open borders.
Oh, speaking of the Men of the Mind, I've trolled Objectivists and similar cranks by saying that the Paul family should stop threatening the Federal Reserve's governors with state violence. Instead we should deregulate the Fed and let Janet Yellen use her uncoerced mind to the best of her ability. How can she make rational decisions if Ron Paul, and now his son Rand, keep waving guns in her direction?
I wonder when Yaron Brook will announce that he has made reparations to the taxpayers in Israel and in the state of Texas for the education they supplied him, which they paid for under coercion.
ReplyDeleteFollowers of ARCHN will be eager to hear the latest Good News: allegedly, "The Atlas Shrugged television series is coming!"
ReplyDeleteGiven the quality of the film trilogy, this is a bit like a jubilant announcement from a clone of Ed Wood that he's begun a remake of Citizen Kane.
While you're eagerly waiting for the series to come to your television screen, you can invest your cash in "some new KILLER gear" (their emphasis) - including a nifty Rearden Steel t-shirt!
As Daniel said last year, they seem to be doing okay with the merch. . .
Prediction: This will never happen.
ReplyDelete"Prediction: This will never happen."
ReplyDeleteOh hell. And here I was, getting all set to plant myself in front of the tube every week while wearing my 20th Century Motors baseball cap and my Dannaskjold Repossessions t-shirt. . . :)
Dan,
ReplyDeleteI think you said the same thing about the AS movie.
NP
Neil,
ReplyDeleteI was making a joke. I hope you are doing the same.
Remember: everyone knows what kind of a flop the movies were. I don't think that many television stations - or any networks! - are going to line up to give Aglialoro a new chance to blow their money.
In this regard, I should mention that about 18 months ago, I asked The Numbers why they hadn't reported on DVD sales of Atlas Shrugged II. I got the following reply:
"Thank you for your email. The DVD for Atlas Shrugged: Part 2 did not sell in sufficient quantities to be covered by our tracking."
Latest from the AS Movie site: the Ayn Rand Tax Day t-shirt - decorated with a photo of the lady and a suitable quote. Available in 6 colors, so there's only one day per week when you have to figure out what to wear.
ReplyDeleteAglialoro is certainly not afraid of being laughed at. . .
Making that $50m back, one dollar at a time.
ReplyDeleteNot sure if anyone else has noticed this, but I thought I'd link to this new article on the Capitalism Magazine website:
ReplyDeletehttp://capitalismmagazine.com/2015/04/obamas-dreams-of-texas-and-beyond-2/
...
Personally, I just went "Wow..." when I read it. I mean, Ed 'T-1000' Cline has written some awful things before, but this was just horrifying. I'm surprised that even an orthodox objectivist site would allow a thing like this on their site.
Incidentally, Cline added the "(Satire)" to the title shortly after he posted it, because an article that sounds like it could come straight from the Stormfront forums is apparently okay as long as you just call it a "satire".
Clearly even T-1000 Randroids cannot be programmed for a sense of humour.
ReplyDeleteI mean, that piece isn't even faintly amusing or witty, it's just dimwitted and weird. Watching Cline try to write satire is like watching a vending machine try to sing an aria.
ReplyDeleteCalling that piece a satire is like calling the Protocols of Zion a satire. Apparently you can excuse anything by adding: "Just kidding, folks!"
ReplyDeleteHowever, it's not fair to most Objectivists to lump them in with someone like Cline. What is more concerning is the spectacle of philosopher David Kelley lending intellectual support to the Atlas Shrugged movie trilogy - movies so comically bad that they should be a profound embarrassment to anyone who has ever liked Rand's work.
If Kelley had any taste or judgement he wouldn't be a Randian.
ReplyDeleteDavid Kelley reportedly got his undergrad degree philosophy from Brown University around 1970. Didn't he receive any exposure to real literature there as part of his general education?
ReplyDeleteI would like you all to know about my sequel/rebuttal to Atlas Shrugged, entitled Sisyphus Shrugged. What if labor went on strike? Who is truly indispensable here?
ReplyDeletehttp://www.sisyphusshruggedbook.com
Interesting. Have you run into any copyright problems from Peikoff and crew? I would have thought that they would object to your using Rand's novel this way.
ReplyDeleteThe first thing that most, probably all, of the regulars here would be concerned about is does the point that you are trying to make get in the way of the story?
Still I like the idea of exploring what would probably really happen after the events of Atlas Shrugged. You say and a review said that there would be a labour strike in this book. Do you have what I thought would be t That is do you have any examples of some one that Galt tried and failed to recruit. An industrialist that told him to bugger off.
Better yet, some power mad would be despot who has a large highly armed mob and no sence of moral restraint.
ReplyDeleteHere is a new blog by Bryan Register: From Rand to Reason.
ReplyDeleteHe was an O'ist.
https://bregister.wordpress.com/
-Neil Parille
Thanks for the link, Neil.
ReplyDeleteReaders of ARCHN should check out all the Rand-related items on this blog. They are uniformly interesting and intelligent. Above all - which is far rarer - they display real civility.
Thanks for the link!
ReplyDelete- Bryan Register
This blog appears to be inactive of late.
ReplyDeleteGreg Nyquist has many interesting ideas in his own right.
Why doesn't he start a new blog?
The horse is so dead...
ReplyDelete(and the new captcha is a disaster...)
Dragonfly
Sidney Hook's review of For the New Intellectual is on-line.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.scribd.com/doc/35622950/Each-Man-for-Himself
-Neil
As per the Ethics 6 post...
ReplyDelete"As Patrick O’Neil has argued, Rand’s ethics can be summed up in the following syllogism:
The adoption of value system x is necessary for the survival of any human being.
You are a human being.
Therefore, you should adopt value system x."
I don't see how this is invalid. It may be unsound, depending on what value system x is, but it still seems valid. There is reference to a value in the premise and the conclusion.
This doesn't go to say that Hume wasn't his usual brilliant self in pointing out the fallacy of 'is/ought' conclusions in logic. It's just that I don't see this example to be one of deriving a value from a fact. Else, I'm missing something.
@RWL,
ReplyDeleteYou are missing something. It is invalid. Note "should" is introduced in the conclusion. We are no longer dealing with a matter of deductive, but a matter of personal decision.
cheers
Daniel
Daniel,
ReplyDeleteGotcha!
Thanks, RWL
Daniel et al,
ReplyDeleteFor a laugh out loud moment, suggest you read Bertrand Russell's commentary on Hume's solution to the problem of universals in The History of Western Philosophy (pp., 660-661 in the Kindle edition). There you will find something that looks suspiciously like 'measurement omission.' Only Russell states it in so many words as a minor detail that Hume overlooked.
It seems one person's insightful criticism became another's epic achievement.
Interesting observation RWL I will take a look.
ReplyDeleteThanks,
Daniel