5. In For the New Intellectual, Ayn Rand flip-flops: "The New Intellectual will be the man who lives up to the exact meaning of his title: a man who is guided by his intellect--not a zombie guided by feelings, instincts, urges, wishes, whims, or revelations." (1961b). Later, in the same paragraph, she says that people will know that they need philosophy for the purpose of living on earth. Then, she asks: "Who--in this damned universe--who can tell me why I should live for anything but for that which I want?"
Here again we have the basic contradiction between Rand and Branden's divergent views on thought and emotion. On the one hand, they admit that emotion springs from human thinking and imply that you can virtually always be happy, if you think straight, no matter what are the circumstances of your life. But when you do this, you'd better acknowledge the fact that many people seem to be quite happy when they think thoughts that are clearly anti-Randian--if, for example, they are orthodox followers of conventional religious sects, or if they believe in collectivism rather than in capitalism.
Consequently, Rand and Branden demand that the happy and un-neurotic individual think the right thoughts, and not be guided by the wrong thoughts--that which lead to feelings, instincts, urges, wishes, whims, or revelations which the objectivists cannot go along with. They state that "a rational, self-confident man is motivated by a love of values and by a desire to achieve them," (Branden, 1964b); but they really mean that he is motivated by a love of objectivist-approved values. Nothing else will do!
Again, objectivism states that "emotions and desires are not causeless, irreducible primaries: they are the product of the premises one has accepted," (Branden, 1964c). But then Rand insists that "desires (or feelings or emotions or wishes or whims) are not tools of cognition; they are not a valid standard of value," (1964). The problem here, as I pointed out in the first chapter of this book, is that Rand first claims that all emotions only spring from human values; then contends that some emotions--particularly desires and whims--have an independent existence. If she recognized that emotions also spring from physical, biologically based urges as well as from values, she would not be so inconsistent. But her need to have people possess only proper, objectivist-inspired values leads her astray.
6. Rand claims to be ultra-rational and utterly logical--but continually uses shoulds, oughts, and musts to describe the proper behavior of men. She talks incessantly about the necessity of accepting reality (which itself is a contradiction, since it's highly desirable, but certainly not necessary that we accept the world around us)--but she abjures probability and demands absolute certainty, which does not appear to exist in this universe. She says she is not religious--but she deifies much of human behavior (e.g., pure capitalism and unadulterated selfishness) and vilifies other behavior (e.g., collectivism and adulterated selfishness). Conventional religionists similarly deify what they like and vilify what they dislike.
"I win by means of nothing but logic and I surrender to nothing but logic," John Galt proclaims. "When I disagree with a rational man, I let reality be our final arbiter." Yet, in the same paragraph, he insists: "I deal with men as my nature and theirs demands: by means of reason." (Rand, 1957.) Demands? Reality does not demand; it merely is. It is unrealistic humans--and especially Randian humans--who demand--and who whine, and cry, and rant, and hate, when reality does not give them exactly what they demand.
7. Rand inveighs against the Judeo-Christian-Islam concept of sin. Says John Galt : "Damnation is the start of your morality, destruction is its purpose, means and end. Your code begins by damning man as evil, and then demands that he practice a good, which it defines as impossible for him to practice.... The name of this monstrous absurdity is Original Sin." (1957). Good comment! But Rand and objectivism start their morality by damnation--by damning all non-capitalistic, un-achieving, imperfectly thinking individuals. They demand that people practice a good, which is probably impossible for them to practice--pure capitalism, pure selfishness, and pure reason. It consequently begins--and ends--with Original Sin: human fallibility and anti-objectivism!
8. One Randian absolute often tends to contradict another. Thus, in Atlas Shrugged, John Galt thunders: "This greatest of countries was built on my morality--on the inviolate supremacy of man's right to exist." Then, he uses absolutes again: "Rights are conditions of existence required by man's nature for his proper survival." If people are to live on earth, it is right for them to use their mind, it is right to act on their own free judgment, it is right to work for their values and to keep the product of their work. If life on earth is their purpose, they have a right to live as rational humans. Nature forbids them the irrational.
What Rand seems to be saying here is that (a) you have an inviolate right to exist, provided that (b) you do as I say you should do and use your mind, act on your free judgment, work for your values, and keep the product of your work according to orthodox objectivist principles. Otherwise! --You presumably have no right to exist.
9. Nathaniel Branden tells us that in Atlas Shrugged "Ayn Rand brings an inexhaustible richness and originality or perception and analysis," (1965b). She treats all issues in a fresh and startlingly illuminating way. Her slogan in Atlas Shrugged is "Check your premises." She demands of her readers: to check, to re-examine, and to rethink the most fundamental premises at the root of their convictions and of their culture. Fine! But unfortunately Rand and her associates spent virtually no time checking her premises. If they would do so, the rational ones among them would see that these premises are almost entirely definitional and tautological. They exist because they exist--because Ayn Rand has proposed them. Any empirical evidence does not back them; and they frequently lead to pernicious results for the people who hold them. It is ironic that the originator of the sensible "Check your premises" slogan so rarely follows her own advice.
Objectivist ethics. A special system of ethical postulates underlies the entire Randian position. We have been examining some of these postulates under other headings in this book; now is the time to look at them more systematically. Here are some of the major errors in Rand's ethical theories.
1. Ayn Rand begins her discussion of ethics with this statement: "Is the concept of value, of "good or evil' an arbitrary human invention, unrelated to, underived from, and unsupported by any facts of reality?" (1964). Or, she continues, is the concept based on a metaphysical fact, on an unchangeable condition of people's existence? Does arbitrary human convention, a mere custom, decree that people must guide their actions by a set of principles? Or does reality demand it? Is ethics the province of whims: of personal emotions, social edicts and mystical revelations? Or is it the province of reason? Is it a subjective luxury--or is it an objective necessity? Among the several mistakes Rand makes in this declaration are these:
a. Although value and ethics may be based on reality, how can they be based on "an unalterable condition of man's existence"? How does Ms. Rand know whether man's existence is unalterable or what is unchangeable about it? All of human history tends to show the opposite: that the condition of human existence is highly alterable; and modern sociological thinking tends to heavily espouse the view that utopia will probably never exist because it implies a perfect, changeless society, while all human societies do change.
b. The facts of reality do not demand anything--including the point "that man must guide his actions by a set of principles." (1964). If man wants to survive and if he wants to live in a reasonably stable and happy manner, then it seems much wiser that he have a set of ethical principles than to live without such principles. But people do not have to survive, they need not be happy, and even reality must not exist. Consequently, ethics is neither a subjective luxury nor an objective necessity. It is a set of rules that people had better establish and guide themselves by (and keep revising!) if they want to attain reasonable security and order.
2. Rand continues: It is only the concept of "Life" that makes the concept of "value" possible. It is only to a living person that things can be good or evil. This statement is true--but tautological. A human evaluates because he is alive; and value, or good and evil, is meaningful only to a living being. For a human to live means for him to perceive, think, evaluate, and act.
3. "Let me stress the fact that living entities exist and function necessitates the existence of values and of an ultimate value which for any given living entity is its own life." (Rand, 1964.) Thus we achieve the validation of value judgments by referring to the facts of reality. The fact that a living entity is, determines what it ought to do. What "is" is the same as what "ought" to be.
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