Orthodox Objectivism: An Autopsy, Part 2

Orthodox Objectivism may have been doomed from the start, simply because it was a dogmatic philosophy that prided itself on rationality and self-interest yet which, in its specific doctrines and in the behavior of its adherents, often betrayed these stated objectives. Rand's contention that human beings are born "blank slates" is about as rational as the belief that the earth is flat. And as for self-interest: is it really in anyone's self-interest to embrace orthodox Objectivism? Doubts persist on this score. Some years ago Barbara Branden noted that far too many Objectivists came off as bitter and angry. Is it really in your self-interest to be angry all the time? Is it really in your self-interest to continually distort and/or misunderstand the views of people you disagree with, while at the same time being hyper-sensitive to alleged distortions of your own views? Is it really in your self-interest to remain an adherent of a philosophy which has no viable track record of making its adherents smarter, wiser, happier, or more fulfilled? Orthodox Objectivism had so much going against it right from the start. But the dim prospects of the philosophy were made many times worse by Rand's choice for the heir to her literary estate, namely, Dr. Leonard Peikoff.

Brief Re-visitation of Is-Ought Problem

Below is a response to an email request concerning an answer to Patrick Neil's essay on Rand's morality:

 Neil's article refutes the view expounded in Rand's article "Objectivist Ethics." In that article, Rand attempted to refute the is-ought gap by claiming that Hume denies that morality has anything to do with facts. This is just wrong. In a later article, Rand pursued a different tactic. She suggested that ethics is conditional on choosing life. Now logically this does allow Rand to skirt around Hume's is-ought gap, because instead of reasoning from "is" premises to an "ought" conclusion, the line of reasoning goes, "if x, then y," or: "if life, then the ultimate value is life."

While this mode of procedure may solve, or at least mitigate, the logical problem presented by the is-ought gap, it is questionable that it provides an "objective" code of values. The argument is so vague and abstract that it's difficult to logically generate a specific moral code that can guide everyday decisions. How does saying that life is the ultimate value help a person choose their career, or their life-mate, or how to spend their free time? Well, it doesn't help with any of these things. It's not even clear what it means, in terms of practical decision making. If life is the ultimate value, does that mean you should act to survive as long as possible? But that's not the principle Objectivists follow in their own decision making. Objectivists make use of the argument to "prove" the objectivity of their morality. Then they ignore the argument and follow their natural hard-wired and socially fine-tuned proclivities like everyone else. As a point of fact, human beings don't follow articulated moral systems derived from abstract philosophical reasoning. Everyday decision-making involves too much complexity for articulated systems of morality to work and be effective. Our brains have evolved complex motivational systems that help us survive and breed. These systems are hardly perfect and can perhaps be improved here or there through conscious reasoning (although that's not always the case), but it's impossible to entirely replace them with a "code of morality" based on a philosophical system of ethics like Objectivism. The Objectivist Ethics is little more than an ex post facto rationalization scheme to justify behavior Rand and her followers approve of and to provide a moral rationalization for the Objectivist politics. It doesn't provide a guide for how people should behave; it provides tools to rationalize types of behavior approved of by the broader Objectivist community.

For info (and scientific evidence) on how morality works in the real world of fact, see James Q. Wilson's The Moral Sense, Jonathan Haidt's The Righteous Mind, and/or Jordan Peterson's YouTube lectures on "Personality" and "Maps of Meaning."

Orthodox Objectivism: an Autopsy, Part 1

While it may be an exaggeration to say that orthodox Objectivism, since ARI continues to exists and apologists for that organization still exist. But as an intellectual force, it is dead --- and probably not revivable. Some might argue it's been dead, or close to death, for several decades. But there was always a hope, however dim and unlikely, that the corpse might be resusitated. Indeed, in 2008, orthodox Objectivism showed a brief flicker of life. Sales of Atlas Shrugged surged, and Rand once again became a favorite target of the left. But in the end, nothing came of it. In 2010, Leonard Peikoff conspired with ARI executive director Yaron Brook to force John McCaskey, a lucrative donor, to resign from the ARI board of directors for the sin of challenging then Peikoff protege, David Harriman. In retrospect, that unsavory episode appears to have been orthodox Objectivism's last gasp. While ARI will undoubtedly persist for many decades to come, perhaps even longer, in terms of intellectual significance, it's impact on the culture will be so close to zero that it might as well be zero.

Haidt versus Rand

Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt is a leading researcher and writer on what could be described as the scientific view of human nature --- a view, in other words, based on research and experimentation rather than armchair speculation and/or wishful thinking. If Haidt's views on human psychology, motivation, reason and morality are largely right, than Rand's views must be largely wrong. As it turns out, Rand's epistemological, moral, and political views all rest, at least in part, on her views on human nature; so that if she's wrong about human nature, she must also be wrong, at least in part, on human knowledge, ethics, and political theory.

Recently Sam Harris made a curious wager. He offered to pay $10,000 to anyone who could disprove his arguments about morality. Haidt decided to make a counter-wager. He bet $10,000 that Harris would not change his mind. And then he went on to explain why he made the bet. What Haidt wrote provides an excellent brief on what is wrong with the view of reason and morality which both Harris and Rand share.

Ayn Rand as Word-Thinker and Persuader

Scott Adams, the creator of "Dilbert," has recently gained a bit of notoriety for claiming that there is a method behind all the Donald Trump madness. Trump, Adams insists, will probably win the Presidential election "in a landslide" because The Donald is a "master persuader." As bewildering and counter-intuitive as this assertion may seem at first blush, Adam's claims are, at least in part, based on a scientific understanding of human nature. That doesn't mean, of course, that Adams is right about Trump. He may be guilty of reading into Trump what isn't there. But Adams' view of human nature, nonetheless, remains largely sound. And for this reason, it might be illustrative to view Ayn Rand through the lens of Adam's own views on human nature and persuasion.

Rand's Novels 4: Atlas Shrugged

Rand's Atlas Shrugged is easily her most polarizing novel. It's hard to be neutral about it. You either love it or you deplore it. When I first read the work some thirty years ago, I wanted to like it, but it just would not go down. Whereas it only took me two or three days to read We the Living and The Fountainhead, Atlas required more than a month to finish, and even then, it was a tedious slog. I found the story preposterous, the characters flat and uninspiring, and the work's message shrill and one-sided. In Atlas, Rand seems to go out of her way to avoid subtle, nuance, and verisimilitude. She simply wants to preach, in parable form, her newly minted Objectivist philosophy. She does not shrink from hammering the same point over and over. Throughout the book there is the same hectoring tone, unrelenting and bristling with contempt, which she uses to try to beat the reader into submission. Even when I found myself largely in agreement with some point she kept making over and over, the shrillness of her tone and the insistent dogmatism of the presentation were off-putting and patronizing.

Objectivist Roundup

Barely a pulse:

Austrian economist Richard Ebeling describes his meeting with Ayn Rand

Leonard Peikoff in his old age still finds it necessary to remind the world that he is the leading expert on Objectivism.  Is another Objectischism brewing?

- Neil Parille

Objectivist Roundup

Neil Parille notes the latest ripples in the Objectivist doldrums:

One-time supporter of the Ayn Rand Institute (then later of David Kelley’s Atlas Society) businessman Ed Snider has passed away.

Someone just “published” an 11 page biography of Ayn Rand.

“Ayn Rand Myths” says it’s a myth that Ayn Rand disapproved of homosexuality (because Leonard Peikoff allegedly doesn’t) and that Alan Greenspan didn’t admire Rand.

Yaron Brook, president of the Ayn Rand Institute, has just published “Equal is Unfair.”  A lecture by Brook on the topic is here.

Rand's Novels 3: The Fountainhead

Rand's second major novel, although a deeply flawed book, nevertheless is a work of genius and contains some of her most powerful writing. Although I would contend that We the Living is a better all-round novel (more realistic, containing less flaws), The Fountainhead is more ambitious and reaches greater heights (as well as much greater lows). Regardless of the flaws of The Fountainhead, I would not hesitate to rank it above the over-written and preposterous Atlas Shrugged. While both novels suffer from more than a fair share of unrealistic characters, situations, and eccentric, often counter-intuitive, if not perverse, analysis of the human condition, The Fountainhead at least makes an attempt to engage the reader's sympathies. Rand had not yet formulated her Objectivist philosophy when she wrote the novel, and she does not attempt to place everything within the strict confines of an ideological straight jacket. In The Fountainhead, she gives free rein to her imagination. And while this doesn't always work out for the best, at least it provides a source of entertainment. In this post, I will give a quick glance to the good, the bad, and the ugly of Rand's second major novel.

Objectivist Roundup March

Neil Parille notes what is notable this month:

Scott Ryan, author of Objectivism and the Corruption of Rationality  has passed away. See Ed Feser’s tribute here.

Check Your Premises (the blog of the pro-ARI Ayn Rand Society) has published Harry Binswanger’s 1977 response to Robert Nozick concerning his “On the Randian Argument.”

The Huffington Post wonders if Donald Trump is an Objectivist.

The snoozefest known as The Objective Standard has published a collection of writings about Ayn Rand.

Was Bowe Bergdahl Going Galt?

The latest edition of Serial highlights the influence of Atlas Shrugged in Bowe Bergdahl's decision to quit his post. This older article adds further detail.

Rand's Novels 2 - Anthem

Anthem is a dystopian novella written in 1937. It is unique in Rand's ouvre in a number of ways. It is largely plotless (as Rand herself admitted) and it's much shorter than her other published fiction. It's more a parable than a story, and while it lacks the portentousness of her last novels, honestly, it's little more than a trifle. It's a short piece of fiction which has its basis, initially, in Rand's experiences during the early years of Soviet Russia. In Anthem, Rand took some of the high moral rhetoric that was used to defend communism in Russia and took these scraps of incoherent sentimentality to its logical extreme.

Objectivist Roundup - January

Neil Parille rounds up some recent Objectivist news from around the interwebs: 

• There are forty-nine countries where Muslims are in the majority and Craig Biddle can’t wait to nuke ‘em all.

• You’re 50 years young Objectivism – and it’s time for a reboot.

• The Gotthelf and Salmieri Companion to Ayn Rand is out.  I have a preliminary review.

• The increasingly ARI-dominated Ayn Rand Society has a new blog, Check Your Premises (not to be confused with the anti-Diana Hsieh web site).

• This is a little older, but former Ayn Rand associates Allan Blumenthal and Joan Mitchell Blumenthal self-published some books in 2013.

Rand's Novels 1: We the Living

Of all of Ayn Rand's published fiction — and, indeed, of nearly all her writing, published or otherwise — We the Living is the easiest for the non-Objectivist to appreciate. Most of her chief faults as a novelist are absent from the book. The characters and situations of novel are more or less real, (and all the more vivid and powerful for being so). The prose is largely straightforward, direct, unadorned. It may be the best Russian novel written in English. I wish Rand had written more novels like We the Living. But, alas, that was not to be.

Oddly enough, We the Living was the most reviewed of any of Rand's books, receiving more positive than negative notices. H. L. Mencken, who, in the twenties, had been one of the leading literary critics in America, described Rand's first novel as "a really excellent piece of work." The novel, however, struggled to gain an audience in the 1930's, and Rand's publisher, Macmillan, destroyed the plates after a modest print run of 3,000 copies. In 1959, Rand issued a second, revised edition of the work. Rand insisted that "all the changes [she made] are merely editorial line changes." This view has been challenged. It seems that Rand indulged in a little more than mere line changes, that she sought to edit her former self in order to conceal some of the views she had flirted with in her youth.

A Brief Post on Haylock's "Contra Rand"

During the last year and a half, I have been preoccupied in writing a comic novel, Normal Madness, and did not have the time to post here at ARCHNBlog. Now that I have finished the novel, I can resume, at least for the nonce, posting here. And we do have some unfinished business to take care of. To begin with, there's Rand's novels. We've had some discussions about Atlas Shrugged (in relation to the horrible movies and to Chamber's review), but we've never really discussed We the Living or The Fountainhead. I also would like to provide a series of posts providing a summary of the main points against Rand's Objectivist philosophy that I've made in more detail in earlier posts.

Objectivist Roundup November

Neil Parille heads 'em out and rounds 'em up:

Sean Haylock in Crisis Magazine has an interesting essay, Contra Rand

Isaac Lewis reviews Leonard Peikoff’s The DIM Hypothesis

The long-awaited Salmieri and Gotthelef,  A Companion to Ayn Rand will be out in January.  You can read an excerpt here.

Philosophy In Action Becomes Inactive.

Diana Brickell (Hsieh) has announced her intention "to withdraw from the very public online life that I’ve lead for so many years" and is mothballing her Philosophy In Action site, where she was developing a kind of Ayn Rand Agony Aunt service.

Brickell (Hsieh) has been a human weathervane for the various political currents blowing through Objectivism over the years,her position fluctuating wildly between apparatchik orthodoxy and so called "open" Objectivism. Perhaps this is another signal that the movement is, as it has appeared to be for the past few years, in the doldrums.

Tara Smith: Reality Is Not Objective

Hilarious. John Allison forked out $2m for Tara Smith to sit around playing word games like this all day.

Objectivist Roundup October

A whole lot of not a lot happening in Objectivism right now. Neil Parille rounds it up:

1.         Objectivist philosopher Tara Smith recently published Judicial Review in an Objective Legal System.  Here is an interview with Smith

2.         The Ayn Rand Institute has an extensive You Tube channel.  For those of you who have trouble sleeping, here are some videos from previous Objectivism Conferences.

3.         Dustin Byrd recently published A Critique of Ayn Rand’s Philosophy of Religion: The Gospel According to John Galt.  The book is expensive ($85) but there is a generous preview available on Amazon.
- Neil Parille