Taking Ideas Seriously

[Neil Parille continues where he left off in 2009.]

Ayn Rand was quite explicit that ideas are what matter and, in particular, it’s abstract philosophical ideas which guide human history.  Because of this, Objectivists usually blame the sorry state of the world on “intellectuals” and professors of philosophy.  Leonard Peikoff once said that we’d know the world is on the right track when the philosophy department of UC Berkeley was Objectivist.

Objectivists talk about the history of philosophy as a battle between Plato and Aristotle.  According to Objectivists, a society or culture succeeds to the extent it adopts Aristotelian ideas.  For example, they argue that the Renaissance began and flourished because Thomas Aquinas supposedly reintroduced Aristotle’s works to the West.  In the main Objectivist work of historiography, Peikoff’s The Ominous Parallels, he argued that Nazism and the gas chambers were the direct result of the influence of Immanuel Kant on German intellectual life.  Christianity, to them, is as foolish as one can get.

History paints on a large canvas.  One can find examples and counterexamples to prove or disprove any broad historical narrative.  For example, contrary to Rand, many scholars argue that the most important Renaissance thinkers were Platonists.  Germany’s leading Kantian philosopher was Ernst Cassirer.  It’s said that upon hearing a Nazi say “truth is what the Fuhrer says it is,” he responded, “if that’s the case, there is no hope for Germany.”  He promptly left for England.  I recently heard Yaron Brook claim that the Roman Empire fell because it adopted Christianity.  Yet the Eastern half of the Empire - which was more Christian – lasted until 1453.

How I Became a Critic of Objectivism 2

The issue of philosophical literacy is a troubling one for Objectivism on multiple levels. To begin with, many of Rand’s most ardent followers became Objectivists when they were teenagers or young adults. They discovered The Fountainhead or Atlas Shrugged knowing little if anything about philosophy (or anything else for that matter). For this reason, they were not equipped with the necessary tools—which is to say, the philosophical literacy—from which to evaluate the contentions that at the bottom of Rand’s Objectivist philosophy. Yaron Brook, in his conversation with Michael Malice, admits as much. Teenagers and twenty-somethings rarely have neither the philosophical literacy nor the worldly knowledge to evaluate Rand’s contentions about human nature, morality, and the role of ideas in history. Swept away by Rand’s charismatic vision of a world populated by individualistic heroes like Howard Road and Hank Rearden, they end up taking everything Rand says on trust, without asking the necessary questions or demanding appropriate evidence.

This matter is further complicated by Rand’s own philosophical shortcomings. Rand had her own issues with philosophical illiteracy—although for very different reasons than we find among her youngest admirers. Rand’s philosophical illiteracy stemmed from her innate dogmatism and her intractable hubris about her own mind which made it very difficult for her to accept criticism and learn from those whom she disagreed with. Rand  rarely if ever entertained the possibility that she might be wrong. In any dispute with an individual who held rival views, she was right and they were wrong—end of issue. This attitude rendered it inconceivable for her to appreciate the possible merits of viewpoints and philosophies that conflicted with her own. 

There is also the issue of Rand’s education to consider. We know little, for example, about what Rand imbibed during her years attending Petrograd State University in the Soviet Union. According to biographical data accumulated about Rand, the most formative philosophical influence on her thinking was Isabel Paterson. From Paterson Rand developed her obsession for “reason,” her over-fondness for the phrase “A is A,”  her admiration of Aristotle, and her enmity to Kant and Hegel. Paterson, who was widely read, presumably had acquired at least some of her views through first-hand sources. She wasn’t merely repeating what had been told to her by another person. She had done the hard work for herself, coming to an understanding of philosophy through her extensive reading. Rand, on the other hand, seems to have relied far too much on brief abstracts provided her by Paterson, the Branden’s, Peikoff, and others. Rand was hardly a voluminous reader. She was impatient with detail and nuance. She did not read to understand; she read to demolish. When confronted with texts she disagreed with, she would begin with what she called the art of “philosophical detection,” which in practice meant putting the worst possible interpretation on anything she ran across that inspired her loathing.

Rand and Empirical Responsibility 13

“[Intellectual appeasement] is an attempt to apologize for his intellectual concerns and to escape from the loneliness of a thinker by professing that his thinking is dedicated to some social-altruistic goal.” Rand, despite her cluelessness about human nature, nevertheless couldn't help tossing off wildly speculative remarks about the more obscure motivations of the human animal. Where she comes up with some of this stuff is anyone's guess. How, for example, does she know that intellectual appeasement is merely an attempt to apologize for being concerned about intellectual matters? Where would she get such a notion? Where on earth does she come up with the idea that intellectual appeasement involves an "escape from loneliness"? What evidence does she have that such is the case?

Even as a mere conjecture or hypothesis, Rand's remark is not very plausible; yet she emits it as if it were a palpable certainty. On the face of it, Rand is merely indulging in psychological speculation about matters she knows little, if anything, about. The causes of intellectual appeasement, whatever they might be, probably vary from one individual to another. Whether loneliness or self-contempt is the main cause can only be determined (if it can be determined at all) on a case by case basis. In the meantime, a more plausible explanation for intellectual appeasement is to note that most intellectuals, being accustomed to a mode of living that eschews violence, simply either don't have or have never developed any special aptitude for violence, and are therefore prone to cowardice and appeasement.

“Tribalism is … a logical consequence of modern philosophy.” This is a specific application of Rand's theory of history. The trouble with such statements is that, because they are so broad and sweeping, they can neither be corroborated or refuted by empirical evidence. They are merely highly speculative hypotheses, and the question is whether they are plausible in relation to such facts that are known.

Rand makes no attempt to bring any kind of facts in to support her statement, beyond what she gleans from her distorted view of modern philosophy. Despite Rand's tendency to blur distinctions between views that she disagrees with, it would be mistake to regard so-called "modern" philosophy as a mere homogenuous mass. Modern philosophy includes many different positions, often virulently at odds with other positions. It is implausible to suppose that so many disparate views could all lead to tribalism.

But even more to the point is to reflect on the fact that tribalism, historically, has been the default position for the human race. For hundreds of thousands of years, human beings have existed in tribes; whereas the extended order leading to freedom and civilization only began to develop very recently, in the last ten thousands years or so. Since modern philosophy did not exist during mankind's long tutelage in the hunter-gatherer stage of development, it can't be regarded as a cause of whatever form of tribalism may have been prevalent during those tedious millenia. Indeed, it is far more plausible to suppose that tribalism is a hard-wired feature of human nature, prominent in many human beings, and only weaker or non-existent within the exceptional few. After all, we find its dominance, not only throughout mankind's history, but even in the present, in much of the 3rd world and even among 1st world minorities and ethnic groups. Most of the people in these groups are utterly innocent of so-called "modern" philosophy and would probably be incapable of understanding it were it introduced to them. Whatever strains of tribalism may be found in this or that species of modern philosophy probably has its roots in human psychological tendencies. Philosophy, as Nietzsche noticed more than hundred years ago and which cognitive science and experimental psychology continues to corroborate, often degenerates into a mere rationalization of the the desires, sentiments, and interests that afflict various strains of human nature. In the face of everything we know, Rand's conviction that the causation runs the other way, so that philosophy determines human nature, is rather implausible.

Rand and Empirical Responsibility 12

“The process of forming a concept is not complete until its constituent units have been integrated into a single mental unit by means of a specific word.” This assertion reflects Rand's bias against tacit knowledge. Rand was always mistrustful of anything that smacked of "just knowing." She shared the rationalist's contempt for non-explicated knowledge. The problem with this attitude is that does not square with what is known as the "cognitive unconscious," which plays a much larger role in cognition than Rand could have ever imagined. Hence the pressing need for Objectivists to come up with a large body of compelling, scientifically validated evidence to back Rand's extraordinary assertion about the necessity of words for the "completion" of a concept. The fact is, there are far more meanings (i.e., concepts) than there are words to stand for them. To declare that these unworded meanings are incomplete is sheer prejudice. Indeed, Rand herself seems to have thought better of it; for her notion of "implicit concept" contradicts her view that concepts require explicit words.

“The battle of human history is fought and determined by those who are predominantly consistent, those who … are committed to and motivated by their chosen psycho-epistemology and its corollary view of existence.” Leonard Peikoff, Rand's most orthodox disciple, has attempted to provide evidence for this view in his book Ominous Parallels. Unfortunately, that book cannot be taken very seriously. It suffers from an extreme case of confirmation bias. It has eyes for only that evidence which supports Rand's view, while ignoring the large body of evidence that goes against it. Worse, it even distorts and mauls such evidence that is brought forth to support the Objectivist position.

Consider, as one example, Peikoff's treatment of Kant, who is regarded, by both Rand and Peikoff, as a "predominantly consistent" advocate of all that they deplore. This, however, is not a very compelling position, for a whole host of reasons. In the first place, hardly anyone outside of Objectivism regards Rand's view of Kant as fair or accurate. But even if it were, questions arise over Kant's supposed consistency. Kant, for example, believed in the ideality of time, space, and causality; which means, if he had been "predominantly consistent", he would have been forced to regard all multiple and successive experiences as purely mental and imaginary. Nonetheless, Kant had no difficulty squaring these bizarre speculative allegiances with his work on astronomy and in his comforting postulates about immortality. Kant was also one of the principle figures of the so-called "Enlightenment," and gave voice to many things esteemed by Rand and her disciples. This aspect of Kant, while acknowledged by Peikoff, is dismissed as "inessential" and inconsequential. Why so? Even on Objectivist assumptions, Kant's advocacy of Enlightenment ideals must be regarded as a deep and abiding inconsistency.



“Only three brief periods of history were culturally dominated by a philosophy of reason: ancient Greece, the Renaissance, the nineteenth century.” This statement is so vague it's not clear its empirically testable. But to the extent that any meaning can be drawn from it, it is largely false. If by "reason" we mean something logical, we find the same examples of illogic and non-logic governing all periods of history. The human being is not a logical animal, but a sentimental animal. Ancient Greece, for example, was still rife with superstition; and Plato, Socrates, and even Aristotle, despite all their fine words about "reason," were hardly shining exemplars of scientific thinking. The Renaissance was the age of Luther and Savronola; it featured a revival of interest in the mysticism of Plato. The 19th Century, on the other hand, was "philosophically" dominated, in Germany, England, and America, by the horrors of neo-Hegelianism (although this so-called domination played hardly any influence outside of academia).

The assault on man’s conceptual faculty has been accelerating since Kant, widening the breach between man’s mind and reality. Given the immense progress made in science and medicine made since the 18th century, this is a grossly implausible view. In the 18th century, doctors bled people. Men rode around on horses. Plows were drawn by ox or mules. The majority of people in the West believed in the literal truth of Genesis. Anti-semitism and various forms of racism were rife. Blacks were bought in Africa and sold to colonists in the New World. It's not clear, given everything that has been learned in the interval, how anyone with even a rudimentary of history can believe that the breach between man's mind and reality has been "widening" since the 18th century.

Rand and Empirical Responsibility 10

“To live, man must hold three things as the supreme and ruling values of his life: Reason—Purpose—Self-esteem.” It is not surprising that neither Rand nor any of her followers ever tried to provide evidence for this statement. Taken literally, the statement is palpably false. For it suggests anyone who does in fact "live" must hold reason, purpose, and self-esteem as his ruling values. Do Objectivists really believe that? Probably not. Here we have an example of Objectivists refusing to face up to the empirical implications of one of Rand's assertions.

“There has never been a philosophy, a theory or a doctrine that attacked (or 'limited') reason, which did not also preach submission to the power of some authority.” Given that Rand was not exactly very well read and had huge gaps in her knowledge, how could she know whether this assertion is true? As a matter of fact, it is not true. Even worse, Rand was probably should have known it not to be true, since she read two writers who attacked (or ridiculed the pretensions of) "reason" and authority: namely, Friedrich Nietzsche and H. L. Mencken. And if there be any doubts on the score of these two radical individualists, one need only add Vilfredo Pareto to the list, who remained, even in his late anti-ideological phase, a radical libertarian at heart who explicitly attacked "reason" in his sociological treatise, The Mind and Society.

None of the traditional theories of concepts regards concepts as objective. Rand never made any serious attempt to demonstrate this assertion. In fact, it's not even clear that she understood any of the "traditional" theories of concepts, or that she deeply read and studied any of the philosophers espousing them. Her interpretations of Hume and Kant are so distorted and eccentric (see Seddon and Walsh for more info) that, in the absence of clear, exhaustive, documented evidence, she is not to be trusted on such issues.

Intellectual Sources of Latest Objectischism 1

Since the McCaskey schism is (as Daniel Barnes has noted) largely arose from "philosophical" issues, it might be illuminating to go over the sources of this particular intellectual imbroglio. There are, as far I can ascertain, three main sources:

(1) The Objectivist theory of history
(2) The Objectivist concept of "reason"
(3) The Problem of Induction

Since Daniel has already covered No. 3, that leaves us with the first two. In this post I'll cover No. 1.

The Objectivist theory of history. Since the past cannot be changed, factual claims about the motive forces in history cannot be tested experimentally. Without experimental tests, history becomes a breeding ground for dubious theories. Individuals lacking detailed knowledge of history and insight into human nature can make assertions which, however implausible they may appear to the wise, cannot be decisively refuted. One such theory is the Objectivist "philosophy of history," which claims that the course of history is largely governed by broad philosophical abstractions devised by mankind's "greatest" philosophers (namely, Plato, Aristotle, Kant, and Rand). Rand's theory serves two main purposes: (1) to explain why Rand's philosophy (or the equivalent thereof) did not prevail in the past; and (2) to explain why Rand's philosophy will likely prevail (i.e., dominate the culture) in the future. Explaining these things is important for a palpably simple reason. The very fact that Rand's political and ethical preferences have not fared well in the past would seem to constitute evidence that they are not likely to fare well in the future. Throughout human history, selfishness has usually been regarded with suspicion, whereas sacrificing oneself for the good of the community has always received the highest encomiums. Nor have we ever seen, on any significant scale, Rand's "laissez-faire" capitalism. Given these uninspiring facts, what reason could a sane person possibly entertain for believing that "rational" selfishness and laissez-faire capitalism will take hold at any time in the future?


Rand tries to solve these problems by asserting that the failure of self-interest and laissez-faire ultimately stems from a "concerted attack on man's conceptual faculty," itself a product of the failure of modern philosphers to solve the "problem of universals." Now there happens to be virtually no credible reasons (or evidence) for believing any of this to be true. Historically, the problem of universals was a metaphysical rather than an epistemological problem, and most modern (i.e., post-scholastic) philosophers paid little attention to it. Nor is it quite accurate to claim that modern philosophers were engaged in a "concerted attack on man's conceptual faculty." A great deal of fudging, distortion, and outright malicious interpretation were required to make Hume, Hegel, and Kant the great villians of the Objectivist narrative. While such intellectual malfeasance would hardly stir the conscience of the typical diehard orthodox Objectivist (who, after all, was largely ignorant of philosophy and whose concern about matters of fact and fair play had long ago been debauched by his commitment to to the Randian creed), with men of greater knowledge and integrity, things would fare otherwise. The Objectivist caricatures of great philosophers constituted a major intellectual embarrassment which made Rand's philosophy a tough sell, even among those scholars who might otherwise have been inclined to give it a place at the academic trough. Typical, in this regard, is Gary Merrill's take on Rand:

These sorts of things [i.e., examples of Rand's shoddy scholarship] would not be so bad, though they are bad, were it not for the fact that she so frequently gets things wrong. There is the business above concerning Russell [about "kinda" of knowing the concept of number], for example. There is the claim (p. 59) that “modern philosophers declare that axioms are a matter of arbitrary choice.” (no substantiation or reference is provided). There is the claim (p. 52) that “It is Aristotle who identified the fact that only concretes exist”. (Any of you Aristotle scholars want to wade in here with a brief account of particulars vs. concretes?) And none of this comes with even a hint of specific attribution that would allow a reader to evaluate it. The closest she gets is along the lines of (p. 60) “For example, see the works of Kant and Hegel.” Now that really narrows it down.

So what is it that differentiates the writing of Rand from those of classic academics and professional philosophers? It is simply that her work has every appearance of an extended and multi-faceted straw man argument that fails to meet even the minimum standards of scholarship. It has all the marks of what in science would be pseudo-science. If there is such a thing as pseudo-philosophy, this is it.

Now fortunately for orthodox Objectivism, academic philosophers are so busy arguing among themselves that it is still possible for the stray Objectivist to scatch and claw his way into a professorship. But matters fare otherwise within the hard sciences, where experiment and exacting scholarship still hold sway and a consensus based on tried and true methods is still possible. All sorts of eccentricities may be ignored or even tolerated within philosophy and the "philosophy of history," but in physics more exacting standards are applied. Objectivism's shoddy scholarship -- its egregious tendency to make extravagently controversial claims based either on bad evidence or no evidence -- is bound to attract unfavorable attention.

Now one of the principle doctrines of the Objectivist theory of history is that the influence of Kant, as long as it remains unchallenged, must eventually eat away like a cancer nearly everything within the culture, including science. Rand and her disciples, afflicted with the sort of monomaniacal confirmation bias that tends to govern most ideologues, were ever vigilant for even the most negligible "evidence" of Kant's irrationality nibbling away at the host organism. Because 20th century physics didn't exactly line up into neat and tidy categories suggested by common sense and the Objectivist axioms, Rand viewed it with suspicion. Many of the leading theories and concepts in physics were couched in terms calculated to arouse Rand's ire, such as Theory of Relativity, Uncertainty Principle, observer effect, wave-particle duality, etc. Such terms suggested a discipline awash in the horrors of Kantian subjectivity. An exorcism, involving rigorous Objectivist criticism, seemed called for. But there were no Objectivists up to the task, none having the requisite "expertise" in physics -- none, that is, until David Harriman arrived on the scene. Harriman was everything Peikoff, now occupying the Objectivist throne, could have wished for. Harriman (allegedly) had worked as a physicist for the U.S. Department of Defense and taught philosophy at California State University San Bernadino. He was a clever and amusing lecturer. To people ignorant of physics, he seemed to know what he was talking about. And even better, he eagerly embraced Rand's and Peikoff's suspicions about physics and began formulating specious rationalizations for them. It was a match made in Objectivist heaven. It would now be possible to devise an Objectivist philosophy of science to do battle for truth, justice, and the Randian way. The Kantian demons could at last be excorcised from physics. Relativity and quantum mechanics could be made safe for an Objectivist metaphysics, and the Objectivist salvation of the world could proceed without concerns about a rearguard action from academic physicists. But alas, it was not to be. There were vipers in the very bosom of ARI uttering heretical murmurs concerning Harriman's shoddy scholarship. Someone would have to go; and that someone wasn't going to be either Harriman or Peikoff.

At the core of Objectivism there has long been a tension between Rand's pretense to rationality and reason and some of her fundamental beliefs, which are neither rational nor in line with the best scientific evidence. Among the Objectivist faithful, there exists a genuine admiration of hard science, which is regarded as an exemplar of "reason," that holy of holies within the Objectivist ideology. There even existed a few (though not many) Objectivists qualified to pronounce on experimental science, including a member of the ARI board, Dr. John P. McCaskey of Stanford's History and Philosophy of Science Program. McCaskey could not help noticing errors in Harriman's scholarship, and, perhaps fearing the scorn which such errors would evoke among his academic colleagues, he tried to bring them to Harriman's attention. But Harriman, secure in his position with Peikoff, would have none of it. McCaskey's minor grumblings were exaggerated, in the usual molehills-into-mountains Objectivist fashion, into one of the great intellectual crimes of the century.

Now all of this could have been contained within the discreet boundaries of a minor scandal were it not for one extraordinary oversight. As part of McCaskey's agreement to resign, Peikoff consented to release the email containing his infamous "someone has to go" ultimatum to ARI's legal department. Nothing demonstrates more vividly the gargantuan size of Peikoff's hubris then the carelessness by which this incendiary missive was allowed to see the light of public scrutiny. In releasing the email, Peikoff placed ARI and it's band of loyal followers in a terribly awkward position. What makes the email particularly hard to swallow for the Objectivist faithful was its blatantly irrational appeal to naked authority and its contempt for rational discourse. Peikoff expected to be obeyed unconditionally because of his "status" within the Objectivist community. "I hope you still know who I am and what my intellectual status is in Objectivism," he complained in the email. "If only we could forget who Peikoff is!" many an Objectivist undoubtedly sighed on reading that email. Peikoff had become an embarrassment difficult to ignore or evade, like the eccentric relative who comes bolting out of the attic at the most inopportune moments.

Yet although most of the consternation arising among the rank and file is over Peikoff's email, the real problem is more intractable. It is a deep rooted conflict between Objectivism and science. Objectivists have for years been sedulously evading this conflict with one ideological makeshift or another. But as a consequence of the Objectivist mania for infiltrating academia, at some point open conflict was inevitable.

In 1982, Leonard Peikoff, responding to a question about what it would take for Objectivism win, responded: "The teaching of courses on Objectivism at Harvard and Yale. After that, it is just a matter of more courses in other places. But that is the end of the battle. From that point on, it's a process of enjoying the triumph and seeing it take hold in art and in politics." With Rand's death, placing Objectivists in academic positions became Objectivism's grand strategy for taking over the culture. But the problem is that once an Objectivist manages (often against great odds) to secure an academic position, he finds himself beholden to two masters. On the one hand, he must remain ideological pure in the eyes of the Objectivist cognescenti over at ARI, and on the other, he must maintain a facade of professorial respectability among his colleagues within academia. In disciplines where no strict consensus holds sway, this may not be so very difficult; but in the hard sciences, challenging the consensus on the basis of poor or non-existent scholarship is rarely tolerated.

We see this dynamic in full play in Alan Gotthelf's five star review of Harriman's The Logical Leap over at amazon.com. "Though I can't speak personally for the full accuracy of the historical accounts," Gotthelf writes, "they are essentialized with great skill, and lucidly presented." Note how Gotthelf hedges his bets: he refuses to endorse the "full accuracy" of Harriman's historical "evidence." Gotthelf finds himself in the unenviable position of being beholden to two masters with conflicting agendas. How can he serve both without alienating one or the other?

As long as Objectivism continues to hold to its bosom positions about human nature and history that run foul of experimental psychology and historical scholarship, these rifts will continue to widen. There's no escaping it. Yet there is another problem that may prove, in the end, even more intractable. Objectivism has no way of rationally settling conflicts that arise among its denizens. This subject I will explore in my next post.

Objectivism & Politics, Part 57

Ayn Rand contra Libertarianism 2. In my last post I summed up Rand’s allegations against Libertarianism as follows:

Libertarians are bad and evil because:

1. Libertarians are a “monstrous, disgusting bunch of people.”
2. Libertarians are “plagiarists” who stole Rand’s ideas without giving credit.
3. Libertarians are anarchists.
4. Libertarians are anti-intellectual collectivists, worse than Marxists.
5. Libertarians are hippies and scum and intellectual cranks.
6. Libertarians are worse than the New Left, because they want to combine anarchism with capitalism.
7. Libertarians are led by men of various persuasions, including “religious conservatives and anarchists.”
8. Libertarianism is based, in part, on “borrowed ideas.”
9. Libertarians denounce Rand when it fits their purpose.
10. Libertarians would like to have an amoral politics.
11. Libertarianism is a cheap attempt at publicity.

I examined the first five in the previous post; now let’s tackle the final six.




6. Libertarians are worse than the New Left, because they want to combine anarchism with capitalism. As with many of her allegations against Libertarianism, this one is guilty of painting a brush a mile wide. Yes, some Libertarians want to combine libertarianism with anarchism, but not all do.

Does wishing to combine capitalism with anarchism make Libertarians worse than the New Left? Why? Because, according to Rand, it is better to be consistent in a bad cause than inconsistent in a good one. This has it's basis in one of Rand's oddest prejudices—namely, that human beings are the mere pawns of the logical deductions of their most basic premises. Why this is so, Rand never explained. It is a tacit assumption, rarely recognized, let alone questioned.

To impotent ideologues whose ideas are incapable of finding realization in the world of fact, there exists no empirical consequences to serve as a check to their wildest, fact impoverished speculations. Without empirical checks, one's practical sense of things gradually dissolves away. The imagination, guided by wishful thinking, becomes king.

To practical individuals rooted in the world of fact, what is important is the empirical fruits or consequences of a specific ideology. The fact that one ideology is more consistent with its so-called "basic" premises is of little importance. What is important is the actual consequences, as read from the book of fact, of the ideology in question. On this standard, Libertarianism can hardly be considered as "worse than the New Left," even from an Objectivist viewpoint. The bad effects of Libertarianism are limited by the very fact that, beyond providing rationalizations for free trade and deregulation, the effects of Libertarianism have been negligible. The New Left, on the other hand, has been enormously influential in schools, universities, city and state government, and, since President Obama's election, in Federal government. Policies influenced by New Left ideals have led to a serious demoralization of American society that grossly outweighs whatever mischief has resulted from the Libertarian rationalizations put forth on behalf of free trade and deregulation. So the notion that Libertarians are "worse" than the New Left is not terribly plausible from the empirical point of view.

7. Libertarians are led by men of various persuasions, including “religious conservatives and anarchists.” This is a strange and even troubling allegation for Rand to make, particularly in light of all the virtuous noise she makes on behalf of individualism. Rand is upset that Libertarians (who, after all, are individualists of one stripe or another), are not, as she apparently wants them to be, merely a horde of indistinguishable ideologues, alike in all "essential" respects. There exists a central paradox at the core of Objectivism. On the one hand, Objectivism is supposed to be a philosophy of extreme, uncompromising individualism; yet on the other, it preaches an equally extreme, uncompromising form of “rational” morality, which demands a moral uniformity far more rigid and exacting than found in the worst sort of secular or theocratic totalitarian states. Even worse, Rand extended her totalitarian “rationality” to the psychological and aesthetic spheres. According to the example set by Rand, Objectivists not only had to accept all the same moral injunctions, but they also had to experience the same emotional and aesthetic reactions. And all this was done under the pretense of individualism and excused because it was voluntary!

Would Rand really have felt better about Libertarianism if it were made up of men of a single persuasion? Hardly likely. She was merely searching for any pretext at all that she could give herself for hating Libertarianism, and this was merely one that she ran across. Yet it does reveal something about her psychology that she would object to an ideological movement being made up of individuals of “various persuasions.”

8. Libertarianism is based, in part, on “borrowed ideas.” What movement isn’t based “in part,” on “borrowed ideas”? Even more troubling here, however, is the whole notion of “borrowed ideas”—as if ideas are like private property and can only be “loaned out” to those who don’t “own” the ideas. There are a very few narrowly technical or aesthetic “ideas” that may be patented or copyrighted—e.g., a poem, a software program, an industrial formula. Beyond that, no ideas can be owned or copyrighted. Philosophical and political ideas are not “owned” by their originators (and if they were, they would long ago have fallen out of copyright, since most of our philosophical and political notions were originated long ago). Once a philosopher releases an idea to the world, others may take it up and use it as they see fit. There is no question of borrowing or stealing or plagiarism or any of that kind of nonsense.

9. Libertarians denounce Rand when it fits their purpose. And why shouldn’t they denounce Rand? After all, who start the denunciations, Rand or the Libertarians? Rand despised the Libertarians right from the beginning, so there’s no point at being indignant because some libertarians despised her back. It’s little more than reciprocity.

Even more troubling is Rand's narcissistic assumption under which it is entirely appropriate for her to denounce anyone she likes yet not appropriate for anyone to denounce her in return. Rand allows herself to ignore various rules of fair play and decency, while expecting everyone to abide by these rules in their conduct toward her. Heads Rand wins, tails everyone else loses. Anyone have a problem with this? Or is this what it means to follow one's “rational” self-interest?

10. Libertarians would like to have an amoral politics. This is a rather confusing allegation. What Rand is really saying is: Libertarians do not base their political convictions, or argue on behalf of those convictions, on the basis of my morality. Rand had convinced herself that capitalism, freedom, and individualism could only be nurtured and defended on the basis of a moral system. Yet Rand’s own belief on this issue is based merely on her own say-so. Nearly everything we know from history, sociology, experimental psychology, and cognitive science testifies against it. A moral base, in practical terms, is merely those rationalizations that people put forth to spread a veneer of logic over whatever political ideology suits their economic interests and their sentimental proclivities. Since just about any rationalization will do, the specific rationalization is of little moment. Whether one defends a specific political idea on the basis of “natural” law, “right reason,” “A is A,” “divine” right,” or the thunderbolts of Zeus, it is all the same and hence makes hardly one jot of difference. To charge Libertarians with wanting an “amoral politics” is merely another way of saying Libertarians don’t care which rationalizations you put forth to defend the specific political order that Libertarians fancy. Why should a group bicker or divide over obscure doctrinal matters, when all their members ultimately want the same thing?

11. Libertarianism is a cheap attempt at publicity. And why is this a bad thing? Libertarians wish to spread ideas about liberty. How are they to do so without publicity? Or is the crux of Rand’s complaint that the publicity is “cheap”? But isn’t it rather snobbish to make such a complaint? After all, Libertarians are a mere fringe political faction, without much access to the corporate cash of the two big players in the political scene, the Republicans and the Democrats? So why shouldn’t they try get their publicity as inexpensively as possible?

As can easily be appreciated from the last two posts, Rand’s criticism of Libertarianism is grossly unfair, illogical, unmeasured and confused—mere ranting and raving with hardly a scintilla of dispassionate rational analysis over the whole course of it. How could someone as intelligent as Rand—someone, moreover, who prided herself on “reason” and not allowing one's emotions to infect one's cognition—sink so low? I shall address this question in my next post.

Objectivism & Politics, Part 43

Individual Rights 2: Rand’s theory examined. Rand introduces her theory of individual rights as follows:

The source of man’s rights is not divine law or congressional law, but the law of identity. A is A—and Man is Man. Rights are conditions of existence required by man’s nature for his proper survival. If man is to live on earth, it is right for him to use his mind, it is right to act on his own free judgment, it is right to work for his values and to keep the product of his work. If life on earth is his purpose, he has a right to live as a rational being: nature forbids him the irrational. Any group, any gang, any nation that attempts to negate man’s rights, is wrong, which means: is evil, which means: is anti-life.

Rand gets off to rather poor start in her argument. She claims that the source of rights is “the law of identity.” “A is A—and Man is Man.” She might as well have just said The source of rights is the way things are, for that’s what all this pretentious talk about rights stemming from the law of identity amounts to in the end. Rand here commits the error of begging the question. What we need is compelling evidence that man’s rights do in fact stem from the way things are, not merely the assertion that this is so!

Next we are confronted with an even more mystifying assertion: “Rights are conditions of existence required by man’s nature for his proper survival.” Now what could Rand possibly mean by this? She comes perilously close to suggesting that rights are requisites of man’s survival, but she evades this palpably absurd conclusion by specifying merely that rights are necessary for a “proper” survival. Now what is this “proper” survival, and how is it distinguished from an improper survival? She intentionally says nothing about this, leaving plenty of wiggle room so that she can easily use the ambiguity to equivocate to any conclusion she pleases.

In the next sentence, Rand merely repeats what she said before, except now she has placed it in a conditional: if man is to live on earth, then, she claims, it is right for him to use his mind, act on his free judgment, work for his values, and keep the product of his work. Yet again, this is not an argument, it’s a merely a vague assertion. Even worse, Rand is once again implying the absurd conclusion that rights are necessary to life.

She offers a second conditional which again implies an absurdity: “if life is man’s purpose,” she argues, “he has a right to live as rational being.” The argument, among other things, seems (perhaps unwittingly) to suggest that a purpose bestows a right. It is not clear at all how this can be so. The fact that I have a purpose in no way grants me a right. Not in the least; I only have those rights which have arisen in the society I live in, regardless of what I might wish or purpose. Most individuals, taken on their own resources alone, have no control over the legal structures that exist where they are born. If you are born in North Korea, you have no rights, regardless of what purposes you might have.

Although Rand’s rhetoric is confusing, what she seems to be attempting to argue is something along the following lines: (1) that in order to live, men must be “rational”; (2) that rights are necessary in order to be rational; (3) that, therefore, rights are necessary in order to live.

If by rationality we mean deliberate, conscious thinking guided by “logic,” premise (1) is almost certainly false. Human beings, as cognitive science has shown, are governed to a considerable extent by the cognitive unconscious, which can hardly be described as “rational.” Premise (2) is deeply problematic. The rationale behind it is the idea that, unless an individual is free, he cannot follow the dictates of his mind. But this assumes that the political alternatives facing mankind are either a complete and total subjugation of the individual on the one side or a complete freedom on the other side. In the real world, it doesn’t work like that. Even a slave has some room for initiative and rationality, and a citizen in a welfare state has a great deal more. So Rand’s argument breaks down completely, which is just as well, because the conclusion is, as I have already noted, absurd. Sorry, but rights are not necessary for life. If men could not survive without rights, the human race would have disappeared long ago.

We next find Rand repeating her oft-stated maxim that “nature forbids [man] the irrational.” What does Rand mean by the “irrational.” Can any Objectivist describe what she means without begging the question? For it clearly won’t do to say: “the irrational is anything contrary reason,” because that just leaves us with the difficulty of describing what “reason” is. To the extent that any empirical meaning can be drawn from this statement at all, it appears to be, at the very best, an exaggeration. If by “irrational” we include “non-logical conduct,” the statement is clearly false, as human beings have been practicing non-logical conduct for centuries without Dame Nature once stepping in to forbid it. Indeed, it would be impossible to bring every aspect of human existence under the exclusive domain of logical conduct, since logic breaks down whenever faced with any great complexity or uncertainty. In a pinch, intuition or trial and error or following an established usage may prove more useful than “reason.”

Rand concludes by asserting, again without offering a shred of evidence or proof, that any group that denies man’s rights “is wrong, which means: is evil, which means: is anti-life.” Once more, we are confronted with a frustrating vagueness in which Rand seems to equivocate between saying something that is clearly contrary to the facts or that is banal. Does she really want us to believe that a denial of “man’s rights” leads to death? Throughout most of human history, most human beings have had virtually no rights at all. Many have been little better than slaves or peasants. Yet somehow the human race has managed to survive, in the very teeth of Rand’s anathema. So what does Rand mean by claiming that a denial of rights is anti-life? She means only this: that she doesn’t like it! Sorry, but that’s not a good argument. Even if you could (per impossible) change society through argumentation, you would never get anywhere with arguments as bad as these!

Objectivism & Politics, Part 37

Politics of Human Nature 21: Conclusion. What can be gathered from this long series of posts on politics and human nature? Mainly, three major points: (1) Human nature is heterogeneous, that is to say, the innate propensities influencing political behavior vary from individual to individual; (2) An individual's vocation often accentuates these propensities, so that, for example, an individual with innate talents for using force will become even better at using force if he joins the military, an individual with an innate talent for manipulation will become even better at manipulation if he becomes a politician, etc. etc.; (3) These innate differences and the intensification that comes about through the division of labor in society accentuates a tendency towards faction.


Why is faction important? Because the presence of faction in political society will effectively prevent Objectivist political ideals from ever being implemented under a representative system of government. What I have sought to show in the "Politics of Human Nature" series of posts is how various psychological, vocational, and social types are biased against laissez-faire, so that they could never be counted on to support such a policy. They may be biased by reason of innate personal inclination, by reason of vocational interests and sentiments, or by reason of social interests and proclivities. This rooted bias against laissez-faire is widespread, intractable, and incurable. The overwhelming majority in both the ruling elite and the masses don't want laissez-faire—they have no use for it. Nor does there appear any convincing evidence that this can change without a prior change in human nature. Having a government that interferes in economic affairs, sometimes less so, sometimes more so, is merely part of the human condition.

Objectivism seeks to attain its political goals through persuasion. Let's see how this is likely to work in practice. In order to for Rand's political ideals to be implemented as part of public policy, it is not enough that the 50%+1 of the nation support laissez-faire. To have any chance of having "real" or "legitimate" laissez-faire, Rand's so-called "separation of the state and economics" would have to be written into the Constitution, via amendments. (Even this would not be enough, but we will ignore what else would be needed for the time being.) Now getting a Constitutional amendment passed is very difficult. It would require very large majorities--at least as high as 80%. There will be powerful, entrenched interests (i.e., all those who have a stake in the present "mixed-economy" system) that will fight any movement toward laissez-faire with every means at their considerable disposal. This being so, where are you going to get your 80%? Which psychological type, which social type, which vocational type would likely support laissez-faire in large numbers? We know which types will oppose it in large numbers: bureaucrats, intellectuals, welfare recipients, the homeless, the uncreative, the unfortunate, the poor, the incompetent, etc. This group is probably large enough by itself to prevent the political implementation of laissez-faire. But when we look at other types, at other factions in society, the prospect becomes even bleaker. Will military personnel likely support laissez-faire? Not likely. There might be a few exceptions, but these are people who get paychecks from the government and live by force. Why would Objectivism’s variant of laissez-faire, with its moralistic disapproval of the initiation of force (including the force required for the taxation necessary to support a military), ever appeal to the typical militaristic mind-set? What about religious people? Well, Rand regarded such people as enemies to her political ideals (because religion is "irrational"); even if Rand were wrong about why religion people are enemies of her political ideals (the fact that someone is irrational about religion doesn’t necessitate that they will be irrational in other spheres of life), she is probably correct about the final result—i.e., the majority of religious people will likely oppose laissez-faire. What about businessmen--entrepreneurs and capitalists? Here is one class in which Objectivists could hope to find allies. But even among businessmen, there will be significant opposition (for reasons explicated in an earlier post). In short, by the time one goes through all of society, one would be lucky to find 10% of the population amenable to persuasion on the issue of laissez-faire. The biases against it run deep, into the very core of human nature and the institutional incentives embedded in society.

Back in the early sixties, Rand wrote to a fan: "We will only have to wait decades [for Objectivism to win] " [AR Letters, 596] Those words were penned almost 50 years ago. What has happened in the interval? Has Objectivism won? Not even close. Support for laissez-faire remains a fringe phenomenon. While there are many supporters of market Capitalism, few believe in the extreme version of Capitalism preached by Rand. They recognize it as being political unfeasible, legally incoherent, and economically undesirable. To desire it and think it the "ideal" system is to lapse into utopianism.

Objectivism versus Western Civilization

For nearly every critic of Objectivism there is usually one or two things in Rand’s philosophy that he finds particularly objectionable. For some, it is Rand’s attack against altruism; for others it is her uncompromising defense of laissez-faire; for still others it may be Rand’s essentialism and the empirical irresponsibility that follows in its train. For my stead, what I find most objectionable is the view, held by at least one prominent Objectivist, that some ideas are not merely wrong and unsound, but, even worse, are dangerous: they represent a threat to one’s “psycho-epistemology.” Harry Binswanger expresses this position quite well in his recent post about Jennifer Burns’ Goddess of the Market:

I advise you to stay away from [Burns' book], for the reason I gave in an earlier post: it is almost impossible to keep all the false and slanted "facts" out of your subconscious "file folders." Not only would reading it, quite unjustly, tend to diminish your admiration for Ayn Rand, you are very likely, years later, to treat as fact that which is false or arbitrary.

This view is entirely consistent with the Rand’s view of human nature as exemplified in the Objectivist “Philosophy of History.” If the view contradicts the Objectivist take on volition and rationality, well, that is a contradiction that exists in the philosophy itself. Between Rand’s extreme view of free will (human beings as self-creators) and her view of history (where most human beings are seen as pawns in a philosophical, history-determining “duel” between Plato and Aristotle, Kant and Rand) there exists in obvious tension, little appreciated by the Objectivist brethren. Human beings are seen as the mere products or manifestations of their “premises.” Objectivism tacitly assumes that human beings tend to be influenced by the premises they are exposed to. Hence Binswanger’s view that it is “almost impossible to keep all the false and slanted ‘facts’ out of your subconscious ‘file folders.’” This “almost” impossibility necessitates avoiding any works that contain “false” or “slanted” facts. In other words, the Objectivist is well advised to stay clear of works that are deemed “hostile” to Objectivism.

What evidence Binswanger and other Objectivists have for believing this extraordinary doctrine? The answer to this question is simple: Binswanger provides no evidence.

There is a very good reason for this: no such evidence exists. Human beings are not the products of their premises; nor is it, as Binswanger suggests, “almost impossible” for human beings to avoid being influenced by the premises (or “false facts”) they are exposed to. The only danger that Objectivists who read Burns’ book face is the possibility that the evidence Burns presents may change their minds. But that is something different than having one’s subconscious file folders contaminated.

There is, however, a more sinister aspect to this belief that bad premises and "false" and "slanted" facts can somehow seep into one’s subconscious when one is not looking and corrupt one’s psycho-epistemology. It serves as a convenient rationalization for avoiding any book or idea or fact that challenges one’s beliefs. Even worse, it prevents Objectivists from learning from that vast array of knowledge and wisdom stored in the works of thinkers, writers, intellectuals, scientists, philosophers whom Objectivism condemns or ignores. Since this group contains most of the major thinkers making up the literary, scientific, and philosophic canon of Western Civilization, Binswanger’s view, at least by implication, encourages his readers to shut their minds to the lion’s share of what passes for Western Culture. And indeed, we get further confirmation that this is what Binswanger has in mind when we read the various assessments that he and other Objectivists (including Rand herself) have made of important figures in Western Culture. With a few exceptions (e.g., Aristotle, Aquinas, Locke, the Founding Fathers), this assessment is overwhelmingly negative. Objectivists are on record as despising Hume, Kant, Burke, Schopenhauer, J. S. Mill Tolstoy, Nietzsche, William James, Thomas Mann, Frank Knight, and Friedrich Hayek; and that list undoubtedly would be much longer if Objectivists were better read.

Now if, as Matthew Arnold once suggested, the aim of culture is “to know ourselves and the world,” then one of the necessary means of attaining that knowledge is (again to quote Arnold) “to know the best which has been thought and said in the world.” Objectivists (at least by implication) believe that knowing Rand is equivalent to knowing the best that has been thought and said. But how can they know this to be true if they have neither read nor understood the great thinkers of Western Civilization? If, following the implications embedded in Binswanger’s advice, they avoid all those thinkers who might corrupt their subconsious file folders, then they clearly are in no position to judge. They are merely taking the Objectivist view of Western Culture on faith.

No one thinker could possibly have all (or even most) of the answers. To think such a thing is to betray a naivete about the world that makes most children seem masters of sapience in comparison. Intimate familiarity with “the best that has been thought and said” is therefore necessary for the development of a cultured intelligence. Anyone who therefore discourages, either explicitly or implicitly, such familiarity, is an enemy of both culture and intelligence.

Binswanger’s conviction that it’s “almost impossible” to keep “false” facts (and, presumably, “corrupt” premises) out of one’s subconscious is, to the extent that it is acted upon, a pernicious notion. How is one to know whether an alleged fact is “false” or a given premise is corrupt unless one has confronted, grappled with it, and tested it? “He that wrestles with us,” wrote Burke, “sharpens our skill. Our antagonist is our helper.” Burke’s view is foreign to Objectivism, which believes instead that he who wrestles with us imperils our psycho-epistemology by exposing our subconscious to "false facts" and corrupt or "evil" premises!

Objectivism & Politics, Part 33

Politics of Human Nature 17: Vanity and “social metaphysics.” Closely related to the obsession with preeminence and status is vanity. The pervasiveness of this emotion in human nature was satirized to good effect in a bit of amusing doggerel by an unnamed poet as follows:

I am hungry for praise:
I would to God it were not so—
That I must live through all my days
Yearning for what I’ll never know.
I even hope that when I’m dead
The worms won’t find me wholly vicious,
But as they masticate my head
Will smack their lips and cry “delicious!”

The view that vanity is a dominant motive in human nature was fairly common among writers and poets in the 17th and 18th centuries. Pascal is representative in this respect:



Vanity is so anchored in man’s heart that a soldier, a camp-follower, a cook, a porter, boast and wish to have admirers; and the philosophers wish the same; and those who write against the desire for glory, glory in having written well; and those who read it, desire to have glory for having read it; and I who write this have perhaps the same desire; and also those who will read what I write.

While Rand did not address vanity per se, her disciple Nathaniel Branden formulated a concept that dealt with one of the manifestations of vanity, “social metaphysics.” Rand describes social metaphysics as follows:

A social metaphysician is one who regards the consciousness of other men as superior to his own and to the facts of reality. It is to a social metaphysician that the moral appraisal of himself by others is a primary concern which supersedes truth, facts, reason, logic. The disapproval of others is so shatteringly terrifying to him that nothing can withstand its impact within his consciousness; thus he would deny the evidence of his own eyes and invalidate his own consciousness for the sake of any stray charlatan's moral sanction. It is only a social metaphysician who could conceive of such absurdity as hoping to win an intellectual argument by hinting: "But people won't like you!"

Now while some people may be overly concerned with the opinion of others, it is not clear that this concern involves regarding “the consciousness of other men as superior … to the facts of reality.” That is a caricature. Many human beings wish to be admired by others. This may cause them, for example, to try to say things they don’t really believe or pretend to admire things they don’t like. It may even cause them to defer to another persons judgment on particular issues, like Objectivists frequently defer to Rand’s or Peikoff’s judgment. But this merely means the individual trusts another person’s judgment more than his own—a view not at all inconsistent with being an Objectivist, as the facts attest. To describe this trust as invalidating one’s own consciousness or denying the evidence of one’s own eyes is clearly to engage in gross hyperbole.

Yet the exaggerations in the doctrine are not what’s most critical for the current discussion. Even more important is the implication that “social metaphysics”—and indeed any of the manifestations of vanity—are merely the consequences some stray premise that has been integrated in the individual’s subconscious. There is nothing innate about it. The fact that vanity has been a preponderant motive throughout human history is a sheer coincidence. Why so many human beings throughout the ages have held this premise is not explained but is evaded. Apparently, Rand wished to believed that things could be different, that social metaphysics, vanity, the desire for status—that all these troublesome emotions could be abolished; that human beings did not have to be dominated by them. The desire to be rid of these emotions is understandable, particularly for a philosopher advocating laissez-faire capitalism: because these emotions serve as an important obstacle to the implementation of that system.

John Adams, the most psychologically astute of the Founding Fathers, described vanity (which he called the “passion for distinction”) as “the great leading passion of the soul”:

This propensity, in all its branches, is a principal source of the virtues and vices, the happiness and misery of human life; and … the history of mankind is little more than a simple narration of its operation and effects… The desire of esteem is as real a want of nature as hunger; and the neglect and contempt of the world as severe a pain as gout and stone. It sooner and oftener produces despair and detestation of existence… Every personal quality, every blessing of fortune, is cherished in proportion to its capacity of gratifying this universal affection for the esteem, the sympathy, the admiration and congratulations of the public. [Life and Works of John Adams, 232ff]

Now it is often argued by advocates of laissez-faire that one of the chief merits of that system is that it is not a zero-sum game. Peter can get rich without harming Paul. In Objectivism, this characteristic of laissez-faire is exemplified in Rand’s contention that “there are no conflicts of interests between rational men.” But if Pascal, Adams, and most other observers of human nature through history are right about the psychological importance and predominance of vanity, then the obvious retort to Rand’s contention is that most men simply are not rational in the sense meant by Rand. Conflicts of interest between men are ingrained in the very nature of things, because men compete for esteem, status, approbation, fame, etc, and this competition will inevitably breed conflict between various human beings.

Furthermore, these conflicts, as well as the emotions that inspire them, will continue to predispose individuals against laissez-faire. Every form of society tends to favor some abilities at the expense of others. A capitalist society favors those well-endowed with commercial virtues; a military society favors those well-endowed with martial virtues; a monarchal society favors those well-endowed with the gifts of the courtier. Even if it is true, as is not implausible, that individuals short in commercial virtues and the talents necessary to thrive under free market competition will nevertheless be better off, in terms of economic well-being, under a free market system, it doesn’t follow that they can be persuaded to favor that system. For at the end of the day, many individuals will prefer distinction to wealth, and will hence prefer the system in which they expect to gain the most distinction. As Steven Pinker notes, “ People go hungry, risk their lives, and exhaust their wealth in pursuit of bits of ribbon and metal [i.e., for vanity].” Despite attempts to denigrate and caricature these emotions as “social metaphysics,” they nevertheless exist and cannot be changed or eliminated merely by refuting Kant and Plato and preaching Rand.

Objectivism & Politics, Part 32

Politics of Human Nature 16: Struggle for preeminence. Social darwinists use to argue that within society there existed a brutal “struggle for existence” in which stronger types “eliminate” weaker types. Although we now know this theory to be erroneous, at one time it seemed plausible; and the reason it did so is because there really does exist a kind of struggle or competition in society. This struggle, however, is not a struggle of life and death; it is, rather, a struggle for preeminence. As the Italian political scientist Gaetano Mosca put it:

If we consider … the inner ferment that goes on with the body of every society, we see at once that the struggle for preeminence is far more conspicuous there than the struggle for existence. Competition between individuals of every social unit is focused upon higher position, wealth, authority, control of the means and instruments that enable a person to direct many human activities, many human wills, as he sees fit. The losers, who are of course the majority in that sort of struggle, are not devoured, destroyed or even kept from reproducing their kind, as is basically characteristic of the struggle for life. They merely enjoy fewer material satisfactions and, especially, less freedom and independence. [The Ruling Class, 30]

The tendency in Objectivism is to ascribe the struggle for preeminence as a mere manifestation of “power lust,” which is itself “only a corollary or aspect of dependence.”

Basically, the power-luster holds the premise that men live either by ruling or by being ruled. The dictator is just as dependent, just as unsure, as his followers; he merely chooses a variant—and, in fact, a lower—mode of expressing it. When you find a great many power-lusters in a nation, the explanation is still the psychology of dependence, and the philosophy that gives rise to it. [Leonard Peikoff, “Philosophy and Psychology in History”]

In other words, the struggle for preeminence, which has characterized every society known to history, is brought about by a “psychology of dependence” and “the philosophy that gives rise to it,” particularly the premises “that men live either by ruling or being ruled.” Here we have the typical strategy deployed by orthodox Objectivists whenever they find themselves confronted by an unpleasant fact: they seek to evade the fact by making it appear weak and pathetic. It may be comforting to think of Hitler and Stalin and Mao as suffering from a “psychology of dependence”; but it is not clear that such “dependence,” whether “psychological” or not, accounts for what is objectionable in these mass murderers. Nearly all human beings depend on other human beings to some extent. The businessman depends on his customers; the stay-at-home wife on her husband; children depend on their parents, etc. etc. A ruler depends on his sources of power: his army, his police, his supporters among the elite; but why this dependence constitutes a “psychology of dependence” is not explained and seems to be a product of wishful thinking. It’s a rationalization aimed at making evil appear less threatening, and therefore easier to accept and live with. It ignores the real issue, however: the fact, for example, that the worst “power lusters,” the most dangerous men who struggle for preeminence, are those who use terror to achieve their dominance. It also, and even more critically, ignores the pervasiveness of this struggle through history: the fact that it involves not merely blood soaked dictators, but even ordinary folks, who, although they don’t necessarily lust for political power, nonetheless experience an obsession with status that leads to irrational outcomes and threatens the achievement of Rand’s laissez-faire. Consider Steven Pinker’s summary of the work done by economist Robert Frank on this issue:

Frank has appealed to the evolutionary psychology of status to point out … shortcomings of the rational-actor theory and, by extension, laissez-faire economics. Rational actors should eschew not only forced retirement savings but other policies that ostensibly protect them, such as mandatory health benefits, workplace safety regulations, unemployment insurance, and union dues. All of these cost money that would otherwise go into their paychecks, and workers could decide for themselves whether to take a pay cut to work for a company with the most paternalistic policies or go for the biggest salary and take higher risks on the job….

The rub, Frank points out, is that people are endowed with a craving for status. Their first impulse is to spend money in ways that put themselves ahead of the Joneses (houses, cars, clothing, prestigious educations), rather than in ways that only they know about (health care, job safety, retirement savings). Unfortunately, status is a zero-sum game, so when everyone has more money to spend on cars and houses, the houses and cars get bigger but people are no happier than they were before. [Blank Slate, 303]

The inborn craving for status doesn’t merely cause people to behave irrationally in the economic realm, it makes them ripe targets for the politics of envy. In an earlier post, I have discussed Rand’s take on egalitarian envy: she saw envy as a manifestation of nihilism arising out of the influence of Immanual Kant. But a far more plausible explanation for this envy is the craving for status, which inspires various individuals to act against their economic self-interest in order to inflict an injury on those who have attained a higher position in the social scale than themselves. Since this obsession with status is at least partially influenced by innate factors, it cannot be cured or gotten rid of through refuting the premises through which this obsession is expressed. People don’t crave status because they have accepted this or that premise; rather, the craving predisposes these individuals to accept premises which encourage hostility toward free market outcomes.

Objectivism & Politics, Part 31

Politics of Human Nature 15: Sociology of the Intellectual. In the essay “For the New Intellectual,” we find Rand insisting that “the need for intellectual leadership was never as great as now.” Where is this “intellectual” leadership to come from? Rand imagines a “New Intellectual” who “will be the man who lives up to the exact meaning of his title: a man who is guided by his intellect.” The “New Intellectual,” Rand promises, will end “the rule of Attila and the Witch Doctor.” How will intellectuals do this? According to Rand, they have to do a number of things, such as: (1) Adopt a philosophy of “reason”; (2) reunite and become a champion of businessmen; (3) understand the nature and the function of the free market; (4) discover the theory and the actual history of capitalism; (5) prove and accept two principles: a.”that emotions are not tools of cognition”; and b. “that no man has the right to initiate the use of physical force against others.” [FNI, 59-64]

Now anyone who understands human motivation will recognize immediately that Rand’s views about the power of intellectuals are little more than wishful thinking. For the purposes of this post, however, I’m not interested in analyzing that side of Rand’s view. I would prefer, instead, to focus on Rand’s assumption that any significant number of intellectuals can be expected to do the things Rand wants them to do. Those of us who understand the “sociology of the intellectual,” as Joseph Schumpeter described it, regard intellectuals as one of the very last groups in society which we would wish to trust our fortunes to. "Beware intellectuals," warned historian Paul Johnson in his incendiary exposé, Intellectuals (Harper Perennial, 1990). "Not only should they be kept well away from the levers of power, they should also be objects of particular suspicion when they seek to offer collective advice."

Let us now examine the “sociology of the intellectual,” as limned by Joseph Schumpeter:

Intellectuals are in fact people who wield the power of the spoken and the written word, and one of the touches that distinguish them from other people who do the same is the absence of direct responsibility for practical affairs. This touch in general accounts for another—the absence of first-hand knowledge of them which only actual experience can give. The critical attitude, arising no less from the intellectual’s situation as an onlooker—in most cases also as an outsider—than from the fact that his main chance of asserting himself lies in his actual or potential nuisance value, should add a third touch.

Note particularly Schumpeter’s remark about “absence of direct responsibility.” When discussing intellectuals, this is critical in several senses. As I have stated in previous posts (for example, here), there are some domains of knowledge that can only be mastered by intensive experience. Intellectuals often have little, if any, appreciation for this fact. They often think they can attain mastery in a subject merely through reading or rationalistic speculation (i.e., “reason”), when, as a matter of fact, nothing less than experience will do. And since most intellectuals lack the requisite experience, they are not in a position, nor are they in the least qualified, to judge on matters relating to politics, social policy, and economics.

But there is another potentially serious problem: what happens when society produces too many intellectuals? What happens to all the intellectuals who cannot earn a living through their intellectual skills? As Schumpeter explains:

The man who has gone through a college or university easily becomes psychically unemployable in manual occupations without necessarily acquiring employability in, say, professional work. His failure to do so may be due either to lack of natural ability—perfectly compatible with passing academic tests—or to inadequate teaching; and both cases will, absolutely and relatively, occur more frequently as ever larger numbers are drafted into higher education and as the required amount of teaching increase irrespective of how many teachers and scholars nature chooses to turn out. The results of neglecting this and acting on the theory that schools, colleges, and universities are just a matter of money, are too obvious to insist upon….

All those who are unemployable or unsatisfactorily employed or unemployable drift into the vocations in which standards are least definite or in which aptitudes and acquirements of a different order count. They swell the host of intellectuals in the strict sense of the term whose numbers hence increase disproportionately. They enter it in a thoroughly discontented frame of mind. Discontent breeds resentment. And it often rationalizes itself into social criticism which as we have seen before is in any case the intellectual spectator’s typical attitude toward men, classes, and institutions… Well, here we have numbers; a well-defined group situation of proletarian hue; and a group interest shaping a group attitude that will much more realistically account for hostility to the capitalist order than could the theory—itself a rationalization in the psychological sense—according to which the intellectual’s righteous indignation about the wrongs of capitalism simply represents the logical inference from outrageous facts and which is no better than the theory of lovers that their feelings represent nothing but the logical inference from the virtues of the beloved. [Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy, 147-153]

There are other considerations that also have to be broached. If you examine the works of intellectuals through history, the results are not always terribly edifying. Indeed, the more an individual devotes himself exclusively to an intellectual life, the greater the chances that he will champion ideas based on irresponsible speculation and wishful thinking. Plato, one of the earliest men to devote himself almost exclusively to intellectual pursuits, is typical in this respect. We also see something along these lines in the Pythagorean cult, in the mania for abstruse theology among the Christians, in the pre-Kantian rationalist philosophers (particularly Leibniz and Wolff), in the idealist and Hegelian philosophers, and in the deconstructionists. Whole forests have been destroyed to promulgate views contrary to good sense and the facts of life.

Rand wished to place the lion’s share of the blame for all this rationalistic wishful thinking on Plato and Kant. Yet even if it were true that Plato and Kant are the primary culprits, we would still have to ask ourselves why so many intellectuals are attracted to rationalistic, wishful thinking. Could it be that the very type of individual most attracted to an intellectual life is, generally speaking, also the type of individual most alienated towards reality? Or could it be that the intellectual life tends to attract weak people, who look at a life of irresponsible speculation as a convenient escape from the rigors of a more active existence? Realism about the world requires strength; yet strength cannot be acquired merely by thinking. Strength is not, as the logic of Objectivism implies, a product of an individual’s premise. Changing a person’s premises will not transform the coward into a hero. The life of the mind may prove a poor and shoddy breeding ground for developing strong individuals. Perhaps only the exceptional individual can develop both strength and intellect, so that the number of strong, reality-orientated intellectuals will be too small to count in any significant way. If so, then Rand’s hopes for a new intellectual appear doomed from the start. The intellectual, by his lack of experience and practical responsibilty, by his unemployability and rationalized resentment, and by his tendency toward weakness and wishful thinking, will tend, by the very nature of his vocation, to entertain an intractable bias against capitalism; and no amount of arguments or premises can alter this fact.

Objectivism & Politics, Part 28

Politics of Human Nature 12: Humanitarianism and nihilism. Humanitarianism, when it becomes extreme, desperate, belligerently utopian, and revolutionary, begins to merge into nihilism. A clear example of this is the revolutionary version of Marxism. As the economist Frank Knight wrote:

The [Marxian] doctrine itself—that all that need be done in order to awake the next morning in, or on the way toward, an idealistic Utopia is to destroy the admittedly crude and imperfect civilization which the race has developed through history thus far, by destroying its institutions and power relations and turning over all power to the promoters of the destruction for the purposes of reconstruction—has an evident if mysterious appeal to elemental human nature. How such propaganda and the romantic appeal of destruction in general, is to be effectively combated, is perhaps the most serious of practical social problems. And the most serious as well as the most puzzling phase of this situation is that in their manners and conscious intentions the promoters are for the most part “nice people,” and “honorable men,” and will readily, and often artistically, “with reasons answer you.” Not only that; they are morally earnest, even to a fault—in fact, to a degree which makes it a serious ethical problem whether moral earnestness can be assumed a virtue at all [a statement that can be applied to Objectivism as well]. For in plain factual appraisal, what they are doing is more catastrophically evil than treason, or poisoning wells, or other acts commonly placed at the head of the list of crimes. The moralisation of destruction, and of combat with a view to destruction, goes with the kind of hero-worship that merges into devil-worship. [Freedom and Reform, 118-119]

Knight’s phrase “moralisation of destruction” goes to the very heart of the nihilistic pathology. On a superficial level, Rand’s view is not necessarily all that different. Nihilism, for Rand, is “hatred of the good for being good.” Okay, someone who hates the good for being good will probably be attracted to destruction, so Rand's speculation here at least has plausibility on its side, if not truth. Where Rand goes seriously off the reservation is when she speculates about the source of this hatred. Consider Rand’s analysis of the infamous streaker at the academy awards as related by Peikoff:

Having grasped the streaker’s nihilism … [Rand] was eager to point out some different examples of the same attitude. [Peikoff goes on to relate how Rand observes the presence of nihilism in modern literature, progressive education, and “avant-garde physics.”] That streaker, in short, was the very opposite of an isolated phenomenon. He was a microcosm of the principle ruling modern culture, a fleeting representative of that corrupt motivation which Ayn Rand has described so eloquently as “hatred of the good for being the good.” And what accounts for such widespread hatred? she asked at the end. Her answer brings us back to the philosophy [Rand opposed], the one that attacks reason and reality wholesale and thus makes all values impossible: the philosophy of Immanuel Kant. [Voice of Reason, 344]

Here is a good example of Rand’s typical mode of proceeding on such questions. She starts out promising enough by identifying the streaker with nihilism. That’s a bit over the top, but interesting nonetheless. She goes on to relate the streaker’s attitude to modern literature, progressive education, and “avant-garde physics” (what on earth could that be?). Again, it’s over the top; and Rand also leaves herself open to accusations of painting with too broad a brush. Still, with a bit of overly generous interpretation, we might be able to extract something resembling plausibility out of it. The very worst aspects of modern literature and progressive education do have a strong nihilistic stench to them. And Rand’s phrase “hatred of the good for being good” also shows promise as a fascinating conjecture. Of course, it may also be possible that nihilists simply have a different idea of the good; still, it’s an eloquent phrase and Rand may really be on to something. But having gotten this far without making any serious blunders, she could not, alas, leave well enough alone, but has to reduce her entire analysis to raving absurdity by bringing up her long-established bête noire, the old wizened pedant of Königsberg, Herr Kant. It appears that Kant’s philosophy is the source and cause of nihilism! If only Kant had been smothered in his cradle, we would have been spared the combined horrors of James Joyce’s Ulysses and the Look-Say method of pedagogy!

Rand’s philosophy of history (like her view of human nature upon which it is based) is a millstone around the neck of her social and political views. It drains her social analysis of whatever aura of plausibility her skill as a propagandist can attach to it, and renders her political objectives unreal and impractical.

Objectivism & Politics, Part 27

Politics of Human Nature 11: Humanitarianism and tribalism. In an earlier post, I quoted Rand characterizing “ the morality of altruism” as ”a tribal phenomenon.” Here we find an example of Rand being right for the wrong reasons. Yes, it is likely that the altruist-humanitarian syndrome has its roots in our tribal process; but it is not, as Rand suggests, a “psycho-epistemological” issue deriving from “self-arrested, perceptual mentality.” On the contrary, it is probably an evolutionary phenomenon. Those beliefs that Rand associates with “altruism” (e.g., socialism, collectivism, tribalism, coercive humanitarianism) were nurtured in the crucible of evolution, in that long period when human beings foraged and hunted for food in small bands of warring tribes. As Hayek, in The Fatal Conceit puts it:

… man’s instincts … were not made for the kind of surroundings, and for the numbers, in which he now lives. They were adapted to life in the small roving bands or troops in which the human race and its immediate ancestors evolved during the few million years while the biological constitution of homo sapiens was formed. These genetically inherited instincts served to to steer the cooperation of the members of the troop, a cooperation that was, necessarily, a narrowly circumscribed interaction of fellows known to and trusted by one another…

Although longer experience may have lent some older members of these bands some authority, it was mainly shared aims and perceptions that coordinated the activities of their members. These modes of coordination depended decisively on instincts of solidarity and altruism… The members of these small groups could thus exist only as such: an isolated man would soon have been a dead man. [11-12]

Now if, as nearly all of science concedes, human beings are largely (if not entirely) the product of evolution, Hayek’s view would seem to be, at the very least, highly probable. In any case, it explains a great deal of what we find in the altruist-humanitarian complex of motivations that animating much of the non-revolutionary left. Combine Hayek’s insight with those of Pareto and Sowell, and we can begin to form a psychopathology of left-wing humanitarianism. This psychopathology provides a far more convincing explanation of the “democratic” forms of socialism, collectivism, and leftist “progressivism” than Rand provides us, with her emphasis on philosophical premises and other will-of-the-wisp abstractions that are too topical to mean anything definite.

Rand seems to have sensed the danger that an evolutionary explanation of social attitudes posed to her philosophy, for she created several rather inept strategies to combat it. Her favorite was her rather absurd definition of “instinct.” Rand held that instincts are an unerring and automatic form of knowledge. This is obviously a definition Rand invented for the purposes of debate. No natural scientist has ever defined instinct in that way. Instincts can refer to any unlearned behavior or emotional propensity, whether in animals or human beings. The assumption that human beings don’t have any such instincts, that their minds are “blank slates” at birth, is not supported by science. Nor does the evidence support Rand’s notion that emotions are the product of ideas. Ideas may influence emotions, but they don’t produce them, as anyone familiar with the most basis psychological evidence regarding infants knows. Human beings do in fact have innate tendencies. The strength and intensity of these tendencies may differ between individuals. But the fact of these tendencies soon becomes obvious to anyone who observes human behavior.

In some people, these tendencies cause them to wish to see their altruistic instincts writ on society at large. Recall what the good people over altruists.org wrote: “We believe that [altruistic modes of behavior] can represent a more stable, sustainable solution than the money-focused, model of competitive capitalism.” Why do altruists, humanitarians, and other so-called do-gooders believe in such a thing? It is neither a rational nor an evidence-based conviction. All logic and fact point to the inescapable conclusion, as Hayek puts it, that to follow the altruist-socialist path “would destroy much of present humankind and impoverish much of the rest.” So it should be obvious that these altruists, these humanitarians, these socialists (call them what you will: the name’s not important, only the thing in reality that the name represents) are animated by a non-rational source—that is, by (again to quote Hayek) “an atavistic longing after the life of the noble savage”—a life which is, after all, more more gratifying to innate human instincts and tendencies. These instincts and tendencies are not implanted in the minds of men by intellectuals following the pedant of Königsberg. Thousands of years of evolution put them there. Bad arguments against Kant in the manner of Rand will do little to mitigate their pernicious influence.

Objectivism & Politics, Part 13

An Objectivist fairy tale. In previous posts, I have brought forth compelling evidence for the the view that neither "reason" nor abstract thought plays much of a role in politics. Leonard Peikoff's contention that “philosophy shapes a nation’s political system” must therefore be regarded as a gross exaggeration. Yet Objectivism has one more arrow in its quiver. In Peikoff’s Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, we find the following extraordinary assertion:

As long as men remain ignorant of their basic mental process, they have no answer to the charge, leveled by mysticism and skepticism alike, that their mental content is some form of revelation or invention detached from reality. This kind of viewpoint can go into remission for a while,…however if it is not burned out of men’s souls completely by an explicit philosophical theory, it becomes the most virulent of cancers; it metastasizes to every branch of philosophy and every department of culture, as is now evident throughout the world. Then the best among men become paralyzed by doubt; while the others turn into mindless hordes that march in any irrationalist era looking for someone to rule them. [88]

In other words, the reason why people allow themselves to be directed by their sentiments and interests, rather than by “reason” and “reality,” is because they are ignorant of their basic mental processes. In particular, they are ignorant of a “full answer to the problem [of universals].” “Most philosophers did not intend to invalidate conceptual knowledge,” contended Rand, “but its defenders did more to destroy it than did its enemies. They were unable to offer a solution to the ‘problem of universals,’ that is: to define the nature and source of abstractions, to determine the relationship of concepts to perceptual data—and to prove the validity of scientific induction.” [FTNI, 30]

So our knowledge, according to Rand, must be “validated.” We must actually know how we know. Our beliefs, our knowledge claims must have a foundation or justification. And not just any kind of justification will do. We can’t just assume that we are right, on the basis of a kind of pragmatic feeling or intuitive sense, based on experience and tradition. We must know the precise reasons why we know what we know. Nothing less will do.

What we are confronted with here is a particularly extreme and intense version of foundationalism, coupled with an equally extreme version of justificationism. All beliefs must be “validated” (which in Objectivism seems to mean: justified on the basis of “self-evident” axioms). Everything not proved is dismissed as “arbitrary”; and any protests that this demand is itself arbitrary are dismissed as the most hateful and nihilistic skepticism.

Ayn Rand is not alone in having this mania for proving impossible and unnecessary contentions. Many other philosophers throughout civilized human history (most of them, thankfully, forgotten) have been afflicted by various forms of this sickness. Charles Augustus Strong, an American philosopher (remembered today, if he is remembered at all, as the son-in-law of the great monopolist, John D. Rockerfeller), was obsessed with demonstrating how consciousness could originate within an unconscious world, and made himself unpleasant to anyone who, like his friend George Santayana, were never troubled by such trivialities. Another obscure philosopher, Pierre-Louis Moreau de Maupertuis, once famous for formulating the “principle of least action,” was obsessed with explaining the darker mysteries of Motion. The historian Thomas Carlyle has some trenchant criticisms to make concerning Maupertuis’ unfortunate obsession with Motion:

It is well known there have been, to the metaphysical head, difficulties almost insuperable as to How, in the System of Nature, Motion is? How, in the name of wonder, it can be; and even, Whether it is at all? Difficulties to the metaphysical head, sticking its nose into the gutter there;—not difficult to my readers and me, who can at all times walk across the room, and triumphantly get over them. But stick your nose into any gutter, entity, or object, this of Motion or another, with obstinacy,—you will easily drown, if that be your determination!

Carlyle here gets it exactly right. It is not in the least important for us to “solve” the metaphysical or epistemological difficulties presented by these so-call “problems,” whether of Maupertuis’ motion, Strong’s origin of consciousness, or Rand’s universals. Each and every one of us triumphs over the problem of motion when we go to the bathroom; we triumph over the problem of the origin of consciousness when we wake up in the morning; and we triumph over the problem of universals every time we use a general term to cover multiple instances. These problems, in short, are entirely contrived and artificial, arising out of false ideals concerning knowledge and propagated by philosophers suffering from being far too anal about trivial matters.

Yet in Rand, it is even worse. She is attempting to use the problem of universals as a kind of scapegoat to blame everything she dislikes in the world. I suppose we can give Rand credit for not choosing a race or an ethnicity or a religious culture for her scapegoat. This shows in improvement and refinement in scapegoat theorizing, just as rearing of domestic animals is an improvement and refinement on hunting wild animals. But that’s all that can be said for it. For in the end, Rand’s contention that most of the moral, political, and social problems of the world ultimately stem from the failure to solve the problem of universals is mere wishful thinking on an epic scale. It places Rand in the role of the great heroine who, in the words of Peikoff, “overturn[s] the reign of the evil and save[s] the world.” Anyone who could actually believe such a fairy tale clearly has no head for reality.