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Summary: This is Virtue?
Review: One thing I've discovered from the reader reviews about Ayn Rand is that you either love her or hate her (both are too strong words, but you know what I mean). If you buy into her objectivism philosophy of minimialist government then you will enjoy this. If not, it's time to move on. That being said, a lot of what Rand writes makes sense. If altruism is taken to its logical extremes, then altruism does fail as an approach to life. However, if objectivism is taken to its logical extremes, then it fails just as miserably. It is absurd to suggest that government is necessary solely for protection againsy physical and economic violence. Modern society requires infrastructures that are dependent on more than private whim (even if that private whim is Rand's holy dollar). Also, Rand argues incessantly (both here and in "Atlas Shrugged") that objectivism is our escape from the animals. I cannot agree that a philosophy that justifies the survival and advancement of the strong (in Rand's world that means wealthy) over that of the weak (poor and disadvantaged) rises us above the level of the animal. In fact, I am convinced that this philosophy keeps us firmly entrenched at that level. Finally, how is it that laws that tax corporations are bad, but laws that allow the formation of corporations in the first place and allow owners/shareholders to escape personal liability in the first place are bad? Just curious. Actually, don't fool yourself. Rand's philosophy is not about advancing the individual spirit; it's all about being rich and feeling good about it, no matter who gets stepped on.
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Summary: Hierarchy of Values
Review: I don't want to turn this into a discussion forum on Greg Nyquist's "soldier dilemma", but I feel a response is warranted.Objectivist ethics are based on one's hierarchy of values. It is only evil to sacrifice a greater value for a lesser one, Or a value for a non-value. For instance, if I give up my life to save my son's, that is not a sacrifice. I hold his life to be a higher value than my continued existence without him. Therefore, in the soldier example, an objectivist soldier would throw himself on the grenade if 1), he had become friends with the other soldiers, and held them in very high value and did not want to continue his existence without them or 2) he believed that by doing this he was serving the cause of the greater war effort of freedom, and did not want to live his life in serfdom. It can even be argued that it is not evil to give up one's life for a stranger, since it is your life that is at stake, and your life is yours to do with what you please. It IS evil, however to expect or require that someone else do so.
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Summary: A Brilliant Conceptual Challenge
Review: "The Virtue of Selfishness" is perhaps one of the most intriguing ethics books I have ever read. It promotes Rand's philosophy of Objectivsm throught ideals that the altruists would consider "selfish". This book is an excellent read.
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Summary: Is enlightened selfishness really possible?
Review: There seem to be some misunderstandings concerning my example of the soldier who fell presented in an earlier review. It has been suggested that, as long as we're talking about a volunteer army, the soldier who fell on the grenade was acting in his "rational" (or "enlightened") self-interest because he "signed a contract" acknowledging that he might be called upon to give up his life. I am very pleased to learn that rational self-interest does not preclude throwing oneself on a grenade, and I'm sure many hard-core altruists (whom I also criticized in my example) will also be relieved to know this. Unfortunately, this view of the matter entirely misses the point I was trying to make. My point was simply that there exist certain circumstances in which self-interest, whether of an enlightened variety or not, is useless as a guide to action. If all five soldiers took the attitude that throwing themselves on a grenade was merely part of signing up, then why didn't all dive on the device? "To follow through on their own selfish objective, the soldier throws himself on the grenade," we are told. But this involves a misconception of the whole scenario. The act of the soldier is purely spontaneous. It's not premeditated. Moreover, the soldier acts alone. He is not acting on "their...objective," as is suggested. The others have nothing to do with the soldier's decision. The question is: why would any soldier do such thing? Would he do it out of rational selfishness? Most people innocent of the strange way Objectivists interpret such matters would say, "Of course not." (And if enlightened self interest is all that counts, why would anyone volunteer to be part of an army and go to war in the first place? Wouldn't it be more rational to try to persuade other people to go in one's place? But no, according to Objectivism, someone who is really enlightened about their selfishness will have no qualms about signing up, as long as it was a volunteer army and nobody compelled him to go!) Unfortunately, in the real world, things don't work that way. Most people interpret selfishness as looking out for number one. That is not an attitude that is compatible with defending a country against its enemies. Randian selfishness is not something that could ever work in real life. Whether we like it or not, any nation, in order to survive, must occasional ask its citizens to perform certain obligations, the most tragic of which is serving in the military during war. No reasonable person likes this fact. Undoubtedly, it would be much better if things weren't that way and we could all follow our rational self-interest without anyone getting hurt. But that's not the way things are. The non-coercive society imagined by Rand is a pipe-dream. The ethical theories presented in this book could never be followed consistently in the real world. They are, among other problems, far too vague. What does it mean, precisely, to say that life is the standard of value? Doesn't that make survival the summum bonum? But no, not at all; "there is more to life than survival," we are told: we also "desire to live better." But wait a minute. Where did this "desire" come from? I thought morality is supposed to be based on "reason." But, of course, it cannot be based on reason. Desire (or sentiment) has to come in somewhere along the line. But because of the vagueness of the principles, this is rarely noticed. Instead, the Randian goes about his business, naively imagining that he follows certain rational principles in practice when, in point of fact, he merely follows his own private sentiments and desires. This is how Rand behaved in her own life, and it is how her orthodox disciples behave as well. This is how Peikoff behaved when he booted George Riesman out of the Objectivist movement and it is how Ellen Plasil's Objectivist brethren behaved when they ostracized her after she terminated her therapy with her sexually exploitative psychiatrist, Dr. Lonnie Leonard. Such are the fruits of individuals trying to practice enlightened selfishness! But are most human beings really enlightened enough to be selfish? If even Objectivists fail by this standard, what are the chances for the rest of us?
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Summary: "Selfishness" is not what you thinl it is
Review: This book is a collection of articles that appeared in the "Objectivist" in the early 1960s. Most were written by Rand but a few were written by her then, "intellectual heir" Nathaniel Branden. Barnden, who was 25 years younger than Rand had a torrid affair with her and when they broke it off, Rand added an interesting postcript to the introduction of this book that the two were no longer associated with each other. OK, enough of my gossip ... getting back to the point; this book is a clear cut introduction to Rand's philosophy. "Selfishness" does not mean a self centeredness where you act as though the world revolves around you. Rather, you do not ask anyone to sacrifice himself/herself to you but you ask that no one expect that you sacrifice yourself either. Rand views most governmental programs as asking one group to sacrifice for others. Selfishness is not brutishness if we act rationally. Rather, it causes each of us to act in our rational self interest while expecting others to do the same. In a free society, we all can do this, in a collectivist society we cannot. Rand forsaw the concept of "affirmative action" and therefore was one of the minority who opposed the 1964 civil rights act even though she abhorred rascism. However, she did not believe a curbing of our freedoms was the remedy to rascism. Each of these articles are illuminating and are as applicable today as they were nearly 40 years ago.
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Summary: Rand's ethics without her epistemology?
Review: "[F]ortunately, her epistemological theories are not required to be the foundation of her ethical and political ideas (despite many allegations to the contrary)." One of those allegations is mine, and actually Rand herself was the one who made the original allegation on which mine was based. She always maintained that anyone who rejected her epistemology had to reject the rest of her philosophy too. She was not, she said, _primarily_ an advocate of capitalism, but of egoism; and not _primarily_ an advocate of egoism, but of reason. And to this day, the boys at the Ayn Rand Institute insist that libertarians are whim-worshippers because they think they can keep "her" political ideas (they're not) without keeping her epistemological theories too. In _For The New Intellectual_ she castigated "modern" philosophers for having failed to solve the "problem of universals" and therefore having left the world helpless against the onslaught of the forces of unreason. Her _Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology_ was her attempt to solve that problem (and she failed; she didn't even state the problem correctly, let alone stick consistently to her own proposed "solution"). But it was from her epistemology, and in particular its famous trichotomy -- "intrinsicism" vs. "subjectivism" vs. "objectivism" -- that her philosophy took its name. That trichotomy is supposed to apply to values just as surely as to concepts, and it fails in ethical theory just as it fails in epistemology. One reason (not by any means the only one) is that Rand maintained roundly that _all_ one's moral "obligations" are hypothetical imperatives in the service of one's _own_ life, strictly dependent on one's own "choice to live," a pre- and a-moral decision about which Objectivism can give no ethical guidance at all. In strict consistency, that means that if you are committing suicide by driving into a brick wall, you are under no moral obligation whatsoever to swerve in order to miss the little girl who wanders out in front of your car. That an ethical theory with this consequence has been able to pass itself off as "objective" is more than a little strange. Anyway, in some ways this is one of Rand's better books. As I mentioned in one of my earlier reviews, I've deducted some stars since I examined her arguments more closely; in particular, her odd attempt to define immoral people as literally _subhuman_ doesn't exactly strike me as a great advance. But on the whole this is probably her second-best book, _Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal_ being the best (and, thankfully, least original).
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Summary: Contextual Criticism Only, Please.
Review: "An example can illustrate the difficulties involved in the subject. Suppose five soldiers are standing around and a grenade lands between them. One of the soldiers dives on the grenade and, though instantly killed, saves the other four. According to the logic of Rand's philosophy, the soldier who dove on the grenade is evil and the other four are also evil for benefiting from the self-sacrifice of another. A perfectly consistent altruist, however, would say that only the sacrificial soldier is good and that the other four are evil: for the altruist would have all five pile on the grenade and get killed!" Such is an example of the Falsehoods taken up by those who disagree with Rand. They fail, consistently, repeatedly, to understand what Enlightened Self Interest, or Virtuous Selfishness, consists of. To follow through on the above example, if it is an all volunteer army (nobody is compelled to be there) then they knew the conditions of army life, and signed a contract agreeing to certain requirements in exchange for certain rewards. They also know that the overall objective of the military is to win the war. So, it logically follows, their objective is to win the war as well. Thus, to follow through on their own selfish objective, the soldier throws himself on the grenade. QED, and not even Greg Nyquist can disagree with that. She does not advocate a survivalist mentality when she says that the object of our morality should be our own life. There is more to life than survival, and that is why she advocates Rational Self Interest. It is logically coherent to advocate such, as we are more than mere animals, we desire to live better. I would rather have a house than a cave, and therefore would rather interact with my fellow man, for my own personal individual benefit. People object, based on the fallacy perpetuated by Kant, that morality isn't rational, it's based on emotions, or gods, or society. True, what most people think of as morality isn't based on reason, I have to give that much. Then in return, I ask the objectors to note that their morality isn't the only morality in the world, and that other moralities exist. Once that is accomplished, once you break the false connection between "my morality" and "morality as a whole" they can then see that it IS entirely possible to have a reason based morality. The final objection comes from some people who then find it troubling that actions that are not approved in one morality and are approved in another, claim that the second is a false morality due to said actions. That is a false judgement, saying, for example, that apples are bad on the citrus scale.
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Summary: Selfishness a virtue, you say?
Review: Here is the discourse on Ayn Rand's moral philosophy. On several issues she is clearly myopic. For example, her claim that no philosopher has tackled the question of _why_ man need ethics is obviously false. I can pull my old moral philosophy textbook out of its dusty box and name plenty. But I won't get too critical of her book. Instead, let me explain what it's about. In more conventional terms, Rand's Objectivism -- in an ethical sense -- roughly corresponds to ethical egoism. She holds that selfishness is the ultimate good and altruism is the ultimate evil. Now, we all know she defines 'selfishness' and 'altruism' in very unconventional ways, but it's important to note that she was trying to establish new concepts of egoism, because the original theory isn't new. To her, selfishness is "concern for one's own interests."; altruism is the act of sacrificing oneself (to whatever degree) for another. Of course, it probably seems strange to most people that altruism is not "concern for _another's_ interest," but whatever. Her idea of benevolence is very similar to that of a psychological egoist, which obviously raises some problems. After some epistemological talk, Rand goes on from this foundation to form right-wing libertarian ideas. According to Objectivist ethics, what should be the role of government? What does it mean to use force upon another? What is a society of free men? What are the rights of man? What kind of evil is racism? What does religion mean for the rational man? What is moral grayness? Most of it is pretty interesting, although some of the conclusions are obviously questionable. Her statist view of government -- where the State controls the use of force -- doesn't seem to gel with her premises, for instance. I really enjoy Nathaniel Branden's essay "The Psychology of Pleasure", which describes how the rational man would derive joy through work and art. Rand's prose is aggressive and usually pretty entertaining. I myself am not an Objectivist and I think the philosophy is mostly pretty bad. On a normative level, I agree with her on many points, but I believe her metaethics are weak. Still, I like this little book. It's easy to read and a bit interesting.
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Summary: "Fie! Thou Rand-hating Hecklers!"
Review: "Fie!, Thou Rand-Hating Hecklers..." I just finished reading The Virtue of Selfishness and found Ayn Rand's ideas to be insightful and meaningful. Rand's concept of "rational selfishness" is quite new and unique, and it certainly is not "satanic." (Myth or not, Satan was certainly not rational since he believed himself to be superior to his Creator. And he was certainly not selfish, because if he HAD been, he would have quickly repented to save his "self" from eternal damnation in the lake of fire). I don't find Objectivism to be incompatible with Christianity: Jesus himself said to "love thy neighbor as thyself," the Self being the primary and most natural standard of reference....
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Summary: Rand's confused defense of "rational moral absolutes"
Review: I will grant this much to Rand: there is an element of truth in her praise of selfishness and condemnation of altruism. There are a lot of confusions in the way people use these terms--confusions which have given Rand's ideas on the subject greater plausibility than they deserve.
An example can illustrate the difficulties involved in the subject. Suppose five soldiers are standing around and a grenade lands between them. One of the soldiers dives on the grenade and, though instantly killed, saves the other four. According to the logic of Rand's philosophy, the soldier who dove on the grenade is evil and the other four are also evil for benefiting from the self-sacrifice of another. A perfectly consistent altruist, however, would say that only the sacrificial soldier is good and that the other four are evil: for the altruist would have all five pile on the grenade and get killed! Obviously, something is wrong with both positions. Randian selfishness may be perfectly acceptable in the ordinary course of life, but there are situations (in war, for instance) in which it suddenly becomes much less compelling. Rand's ethics, as presented in this book, has at least one serious problem: it lacks logical coherence on the question of moral ends. Rand actually advocates three different moral ends. She begins by saying that life is the ultimate value--or, in other words, that survival is the ultimate end. But, perhaps realizing that a survivalist morality is absurd (survival is an impossible moral standard: the best we can hope for is to live and die well), she qualifies her position by declaring that only a "rational" survival is "proper to a human being." According to this view of the matter, "rationality" becomes the ultimate end. But since reason is a means, a tool, and not an end in itself, it seems ridiculous to adopt it as one's ultimate moral value: and so we find Rand claiming that happiness is man's "highest moral purpose." The reason for Rand's incoherence on this issue stems from her mistaken belief that you can rationally derive absolute moral values from facts. (Her treatment of the is-ought problem is extremely inadequate.) She failed to realize that morality is a product, not of "reason," but of sentiment and desire. The trouble with all such "rational" systems of ethics like Rand's is that, at bottom, they are insincere: a rational ethics is contradiction in terms: it is mere casuistry. Am I exaggerating? Consider this: Rand, despite all her rhetoric about moral absolutes, had little trouble justifying her adulterous affair with a man half her age! If this is not casuistry, then what is?
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