Guardians of Ayn Rand

Eliezer: "As far as I know, [Rand] wasn't particularly good at math."

A relevant passage from Barbara Branden's biography of Rand:

"The subject [Rand] most enjoyed during her high school years, the one subject of which she never tired, was mathematics. 'My mathematics teacher was delighted with me. When I graduated, he said, "It will be a crime if you don't go into mathematics." I said only, "That's not enough of a career." I felt that it was too abstract, it had nothing to do with real life. I loved it, but I didn't intend to be an engineer or to go into any applied profession, and to study mathematics as such seemed too ivory tower, too purposeless---and I would say so today.' Mathematics, she thought, was a method. Like logic, it was an invaluable tool, but it was a means to an end, not an end in itself. She wanted an activity that, while drawing on her theoretical capacity, would unite theory and its practical application. That desire was an essential element in the continuing appeal that fiction held for her: fiction made possible the integration of wide abstract principles and their direct expression in and application to man's life." (Barbara Branden, The Passion of Ayn Rand, page 35 of my edition)

And that's why people should follow Saint Max instead.

No fixed ideas! No fixed ideas! No fixed ideas!

i really enjoyed this essay. Thank-you!!

Great essay!

But, how can a set of ideas be a closed system? It's ridiculous. If someone were to tell me that Objectivism is closed, I would say, Ha! I just reopened it. Ha! Try and stop me from calling myself an Objectivist if I feel like it! Oh, they can trademark it, I supposed, but if they do, I could rename my system as Reasonablism and explain it as an improved form of what-Ayn-Rand-was-talking-about.

A community of people can close itself off, but ideas are helpless to resist whatever buccaneering minds may prey upon them. This harkens to Buckminster Fuller's cry that "true wealth only increases", because true wealth is knowledge and knowledge is infinitely replicable and shareable.

But what if the source of much of your material in this essay on Ayn Rand's life is itself inaccurate and untrue? Another author--James Valliant--who wrote on Ayn Rand's life studied her private journals (that were unavailable to Barbara Branden and Nathaniel Brandon). According to him, the air of cultishness was initiated and encouraged by Nathaniel Brandon, who monitored all of Rand's guests, visitors, and letters, to ensure that they were not antagonistic to Rand. Apparently, all this was done without Rand's knowledge until much later she found out, including Branden's continued deception of her.

And of course, Eleizer has already quoted the scripture of the prophet Brian, who sayeth:

"Look. You've got it all wrong. You don't need to follow me. You don't need to follow anybody! You've got to think for yourselves. You're all individuals! You're all different! You've all got to work it out for yourselves! Don't let anyone tell you what to do!" (Life of Brian, scene 19)

She's not the Messiah. She's a very naughty girl.

Great essay.

'...Marx wrote a letter to the French workers' leader [...], accusing them of "revolutionary phrase-mongering" and of denying the value of reformist struggles; "if that is Marxism" — paraphrasing what Marx wrote — "then I am not a Marxist".'

From Wiki. It must take a lot of balls to say 'you have strayed from my original Idea, I want none of this', and risk marginalisation. Much easier to just be the idol.

Regarding Shermer on science being uncertain: I listen to a lot of skeptics, and I think he's merely saying that science cannot be literally 100% absolute in its certainty. Sure, a theory can explain all the existing evidence (known cases) and make accurate predictions its scope about unexamined cases. But empirical test of it can only ever approach 100% certainty and can never really achieve it.

Thats just my take on it.

But what if the source of much of your material in this essay on Ayn Rand's life is itself inaccurate and untrue? Another author--James Valliant--who wrote on Ayn Rand's life studied her private journals (that were unavailable to Barbara Branden and Nathaniel Brandon). According to him, the air of cultishness was initiated and encouraged by Nathaniel Brandon, who monitored all of Rand's guests, visitors, and letters, to ensure that they were not antagonistic to Rand.

A single anecdote should throw enough light on Rand's character to disprove this hypothesis. The libertarian economist Murray Rothbard was for a time part of Rand's circle of friends. But when Rand learned that Rothbard's wife was a Christian, she gave Rothbard six months to convert her to atheism, or else divorce her. Rothbard of course did neither, and was, accordingly, excommunicated soon thereafter.

The atomic theory of chemistry is pretty damned certain.

There is a world of difference between "pretty damned" and "completely".

The problem is not being willing to assign confidence values so close to one that our brains can no longer tell the difference. The problem is doing so improperly.

I love the repeated metaphor of milestones, roads, and journeys. Ah, progress! The bliss that comes from the belief that the destination is known and inevitable!

That is one great blog post.

On a lighter note, this sordid affair did give us the excellent term "randroid".

Interesting stuff about Rand, but about Aristotle, just to keep the history honest, although he was perfectly capable of making important contributions to the math of the day (plane geometry; not the logic that he, with characteristic immodesty, informs us he actually invented!)--think of his response to Zeno's paradox--Aristotle didn't view math (again, qua geometry) as being fundamental to the deepest understanding of the universe. That view was well known to him through Plato and the Pythagoreans, but Aristotle explicitly rejected it in favor of a science of nature where mathematical abstractions, though interesting as intellectual exercises, revealed nothing deep about the inner workings of the universe. If you're looking for a principled objection to the informationalism that underlies transhumanism, Aristotle's your guy.

Great post. You nailed my main issues with objectivism. I think the material is still worth reading. Rand considered herself a philosopher and seemed to feel there was a lot to be gained from telling her people to read more philosophy and broaden their horizons, but when it came to scientific works she never expresses much awareness of the "state of the art" of her time. In fact, her epistemology makes assumptions about the operation of the brain (in behavioralism and learning) that I'm not sure could be made correctly with the state of neuroscience and related disciplines at the time.

I think a better way of looking at established science is that it is completely certain, barring further information, and being willing/able to consider further, possibly contradictory information.

I don't really think confidence values are useful in the absence of knowledge of how complete your current knowledge of a domain actually is.

I do wonder if Rand was a sort of an evangelist in a sense for a more reasoned-out philosophy than what existed and maybe she thought something like, "Okay, this is good enough for now--now I'm going to go out and spread the word of this particular philosophy." Certainty does have a certain rhetorical use, and if it persuades people away form a less reasonable approach, maybe it's worthwhile. If we all sat around waiting for perfect knowledge before we started talking about our ideas, we'd never speak.

Not to say I necessarily endorse Rand's approach--my impression is she was too rigid, but at the same time, did she do a service for advancing better ideas than the average to the general public? I think a decent case could be made for her on that count.

Where is the spoiler warning for those of us in the midst of this epic novel. I'd say more but I stopped reading at John Galt is...

EY, thanks for the link in this post to your Global Risks paper. It addresses in passing something that had puzzled me : how would an AI acquire hands ? On Ayn Rand : the concept of purity seems to me central in cult formation, more so than that of absoluteness. See, for instance, the deviations of the Self Realisation Foundation in handling Yogananda's legacy. Or, for that matter, General Jack D Ripper in Dr Strangelove. So, let your knowledge and wisdom increase, but let them not be pure. Amen.

People focus on the messenger more than on the message. Jesus preached individual freedom for which he was executed by the Authorities of the time. Now, dare I say, the majority of people who praise Jesus willingly empower the authority of their time to limit individual freedom, while at the same time preaching it.

We can argue that science proves that nothing is certain, but red and white blood cells keep you alive, and that's unlikely to change. We can't live at our current state of output if we didn't take this for granted. Thus, certainties exist at various degrees, and we know that some things work.

In the same spirit, all individuals must assess for themselves how certain are the definitions of the words they use and why, if they are to remain individuals. Freedom cannot mean slavery at the same time, or a little less freedom from the initial meaning of the word. Without these certainties of language, we cannot communicate at level. It would render science impossible. Rand had her issues, and I think The Fountainhead is her best work. Her cult of personality does not do justice to the message.

I read Atlas this summer. It was hard going, but rewarding in the end. It made every other work of fiction I have read since seem easy. Ayn Rand's ideas are wonderfully different. They refreshed my thinking. However, I carried a 'cult warning' consciously in my head while reading and remembered it every time I had the urge to give up everything I owned and head to Colorado. In short, concerns about the cult of Ayn Rand put me off taking her as seriously as I might have otherwise done. (I'm not saying I would have gone to the gulch had I not had this proviso.)

I fear the word "cult" obscures many difficult issues. I'm no fan of Rand-fandom, but I think it is important to identify as clearly as possible just what signs people within such a group could use to see they have a problem. For example, "ostracizing anyone who dared contradict her" would seemingly apply to a great many, perhaps the majority, of ordinary human organizations.

Ah, but A is still A, no matter what any of you may say... :-).

James Bach, the gates of ijtihad are forever closed with the death of her Randness!

"If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book and if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book."

Robin : "For example, "ostracizing anyone who dared contradict her" would seemingly apply to a great many, perhaps the majority, of ordinary human organizations." : Yes, but there is a difference between ostracizing = damning to the nethermost pits of hell with no hope of salvation and ostracizing = delaying your next pay increase by a couple of months. i.e., the cult-dom-ness is contingent on the existential nature of the ostracization.

I really enjoyed reading this. Thank you Eliezer.

Great post.

Sure, let's say we accept that Ayn Rand turned out to be a mega-bitch mad control freak in later life?

Does that mean that 'A is A' is somehow wrong?

Can anyone say 'ad hominem fallacy'?

Ayn Rand was wrong in many regards - and her epistemology came after the definition for her philosophy, and should certainly be discounted as rationalization and little more - but any half-rational Objectivist will recognize that the philosophy should be regarded objectively, and her quite subjective views of personal values should be taken with a grain of salt.

Incidentally, if you're interested in her as a character, you may want to read We The Living (Which she herself described as a philosophical autobiography) - there are several hints scattered throughout it that she always had a love affair with power, that it was not merely something that she developed later in her life.

Such eloquence on such a trivial subject!

Ayn Rand and her coterie didn't devolve into a cult. They started out that way. Her writing is pure fetishism, from beginning to end. That it happens to fetishize technical topics and people interested in technical topics should make those of us inclined the same way particularly suspicious.

Libertarians should be viewed with the same suspicion, for the same reasons.

Nice essay but I think you'd benefit from studying the history of science a bit more. Thomas Kuhn's view of paradigms overturning one another is not supported; since Kepler and Galileo it has been almost wholly cumulative. You get can get Kepler's and Galileo's laws from Newton's and you can get Kepler's and Galileo's and Newton's from Einstein's; the surprises have largely been interpretive. Most of the limitations of Galileo's and Newton's and Einstein's laws were known within the framework of those systems. The sense in which the contemporaries of, say, Newton thought that the Newtonian system was "certain" was as a philosophical extension of his science: they thought the necessary extensions needed to address the problems would be broadly "Newtonian" in nature. Theirs was a failure of speculation and not science.

The "revolutions" have only been from systems of folk belief (sometimes sophisticated derivatives like Aristotelian thought) to modern science. Aristotle was not a mathematician of any sort or an experimentalist of any sort; that is, he was not in any way a scientist. His system was subject to sophisticated extension by the Alexandrian Greeks (notably Ptolemy used it to create a mathematical system for astronomy) and the Scholastics. For them, mathematics meant Euclidean geometry, and the Scholastics had only parts of it: they did not have the means to do quantitative analysis of any sophistication. No experiments were performed. There are many books published about Greek "science," Islamic "science," Medieval "science"; they're all talking about Aristotle's "physics" (the only relation with modern physics is the word), which contained no mathematics, no experiments and virtually no observations (although Aristotle extolled the virtues of observation in his methodology, he did not practice what he preached, and neither did his followers).

What Kepler and Galileo brought to the table was a taste for precision in measurement and the willingness to move straight from measurement to mathematical manipulation without taking an unnecessary detour through Aristotelian philosophy (or any philosophy). (Note that Copernicus was still operating in the Aristotelian tradition; he simply moved us out to one of the rotating spheres from our place in the center. Many people overlook Kepler's achievement because they don't realize there was then no concept of an orbit; the circular motion was due to astronomical objects being implanted in spinning spheres. Moving to elliptical motions was probably a bigger conceptual leap than moving away from geocentricism.) Given that their contemporaries were measuring nothing (except astronomers), and rarely creating mathematic models at all, this was a huge leap. But the leap was from a (sophisticated) system of folk belief to science. Similar leaps were taken in chemistry and biology much later and these too were from systems of folk belief (albeit less sophisticated) to science. None of them were instigated by the works of Francis Bacon.

Studying up on the math of probability theory and decision theory.

Eliezer or anyone else, which books on these subjects are good for beginners?

I think people have a built-in instinct towards self-preservation. What sometimes happens though, is people love something so much, such as a novel, that it becomes an inseparable part of who they are. And that's when cultish behavior starts, because an attack on that idea becomes an attack on them personally. To find fault with that idea is to find fault with them.

Now one thing (not the only thing) that made Objectivism different from other philosophies was that the founder presented it, not as a dry collection of premises and conclusions in an academic journal, but rather by writing a novel about it, about how some perfect exponents of this philosophy (Howard Roark, etc) would live their lives. So if there is a disproportionate number of cult like behavior in followers of this philosophy, maybe it is something to do with the presentation as a novel and not the ideas themselves or even the founder.

If you want to object to Objectivism (hah) you should do so by discussing the ideas themselves, perhaps by citing passages that highlight basic ideas of the theory. Details of Rand's personal life are irrelevant. Hug the query.

There is an interesting kernel of an idea here: how can one establish a self-renewing philosophy? How can an intellectual leader construct a set of principles which specifically allow for their own revision? Of course, this is very similar to the question of how one can construct a Friendly AI, and the question of how one can construct a Friendly government.

Some have said this essay is a poor, ad hominem criticism of Objectivism. This isn't a criticism of Objectivism per se at all and isn't meant to be - it is intended to answer the question "how did a belief that ostensibly venerates reason and independent thought give rise to cult-like behaviour?" Thus discussion of the merits of Objectivism itself don't address the question, while an account of Rand's life sheds a lot of light.

Studying Rand's life is unlikely to be particularly useful. Studying the historical development of Objectivism as a group phenomenon is probably the most fruitful strategy.

I have noticed that people's beliefs about the nature of positive traits, either in general or specifically, has a great deal of influence on their behavior. When virtues are something that you are, rather than the result of how you act, people often stop bothering to act in the difficult and expensive ways necessary to maintain that virtue.

When virtues are internalized, and made part of our identity, psychologically we no longer perceive a need to invest effort and resources into being virtuous. People who believe that they are smart don't spend as much time and energy avoiding stupid decisions and actions. Instead, they act on their impulses and inclinations; after all, they're smart, so their decisions will be smart, too. People who believe that they are moral and ethical do not struggle to find right standards and follow them. Instead, they act on their impulses and inclinations; after all, they're moral and ethical, so their decisions will be moral and ethical. Why assign resources to verifying what has already been accepted as true?

Meta-knowledge of virtue is often lethal to the virtue.

(And now this is being flagged as spam... let's try it again)

Roland:

You might try Probability Theory: The Logic of Science by ET Jaynes, and Causality: Models, Reasoning, and Inference by Judea Pearl.

The case against those who see Objectivism as a closed system has been mounted within the ranks of Objectivists. Indeed, the very terms “open” and “closed” systems were coined in a published exchange I had with Leonard Peikoff in 1990, and the battle has been raging for years between the orthodox and the independent wings of the Objectivist movement. Fortunately, there are now many of us in the latter wing. Readers following this thread may be interested in my account of the issues, The Contested Legacy of Ayn Rand: Truth and Toleration in the Objectivist Movement (http://www.atlassociety.org/David%20Kelley%20-%20Truth%20and%20Toleration.pdf). Chapter 5 in particular points out the many ways in which the “closed-system” model contradicts the Objectivist epistemology (pp. 73-85 in the PDF file).

David Kelley, founder & senior fellow, The Atlas Society

The atomic theory of chemistry is pretty damned certain.

Is it fair to point out that they have split the atom? I won't even bother mentioning QM.

David Kelley,

Maybe you were the first to use the terms "open and closed systems" within Objectivist discourse and publications, but to claim that you "coined" them is utter nonsense. They have been in widespread usage within systems theory and related fields for well over a half century in works by such people as von Bertalanffy and Vernadsky, some of this actually going back as far as the 1920s, if not earlier. Please...

Just an aside, Rothbard and his coterie made fun of the Rand's cultishness (cf 'Mozart was a Red'), then promptly developed his own (big 'a') Austrian cult after splitting with Cato. Which goes to show recognizing the warning signs in others is no protection.

The atomic theory of chemistry is pretty damned certain.

I know I already made a comment about this, but I'm just so baffled by this statement that I am hoping for some clarification. I mean, I'm pretty sure that this entry was not written before 1897, so it is fair to hold you to know that they discovered the electron. I mean you can't really believe atomic theory of chemistry, let alone think it is pretty damned certain. The theory has held in the 19th century before they discovered electrons, protons, quantum mechanics, E=mc2, quarks, and all that.

Or are you saying that the current theories of particle physics, quantum mechanics, and general relativity in their present form with respect to chemistry are certain? I don't know a physicist that will go that far. People in the field realize that science does not bring certainty.

It always confuses me when people say things like that science is certain and then give as an example a theory that has been discredited over a hundred years ago.

What did you mean by that statement? I'm certainly baffled.

Do the words "atomic theory" have a single unambiguous meaning in the context you reply to? Or do you know somehow (telepathy?) the precise referent the writer refers to by the words?

Come on, Mellway. Search for a charitable interpretation of the writer's words. Do not stop your search till you have found an interpretation of the words that makes the sentence non-foolish and non-false.

So, Hollerith, the author means something completely different than the theory that matter is composed of discrete units called atoms? Oh, that makes more sense. The other atomic theory of chemistry is pretty damned certain. I thought the author meant what everyone else means by it. I apologize for making such a silly psychic leap.

From hanging out at Mises it seems like Walter Block, Stephan Kinsella and Roderick Long are perfectly okay with criticizing Rothbard. I haven't read much from Hoppe so I don't know how he stacks up, but he definitely smacks of right-deviationism. I've heard Agorists claim that they're the only true Rothbardians though.

I suppose you could say that the important truth of atomic chemistry has not been substantively refuted: that there really are objects such as carbon "atoms," nitrogen "atoms," etc. the individual and relational qualities of which determine the natures of the substances they constitute.

In other words, there is no real alternate hypothesis to the above explanation of substances' tendency to combine in small whole-number ratios, only refinements of that hypothesis, or things thought to be physically prior.

I put a lot of weight on Lavoisier's definition of these atoms. As I recall, he wrote something to the effect that whether or not these particles he was talking about are true atoms (in the original greek sense), they were indivisible to Lavoisier. Subsequently, the term "atom" has simply meant those kinds of bodies. If you assume that "atom" must always and only mean particles which are absolutely indivisible, then of course you will disagree, but I do not think the term was used exclusively that way, even among the 18th century chemists who worked out the theory's basics.

Is it just me or do others too notice that the quality of comments and dialog here is much higher than on most blogs?

Up the thread a piece, Vejay referred to a book called The Passion of Ayn Rand's Critics, by James Valliant.

Vejay said:

Another author--James Valliant--who wrote on Ayn Rand's life studied her private journals (that were unavailable to Barbara Branden and Nathaniel Brandon [sic]). According to him, the air of cultishness was initiated and encouraged by Nathaniel Brandon, who monitored all of Rand's guests, visitors, and letters, to ensure that they were not antagonistic to Rand. Apparently, all this was done without Rand's knowledge until much later she found out, including Branden's continued deception of her.

In point of fact, Mr. Valliant's book is an unscholarly mess.

(1) Although his prime objective is to discredit The Passion of Ayn Rand by Barbara Branden, Mr. Valliant frequently misquotes her book or imposes preposterous interpretations on what she said in it. See, for instance, Neil Parille's meticulous dissection at< http://www.objectivistliving.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=4405&st=60>.

(2) Mr. Valliant insults his readers' intelligence by telling them that passages that he has just quoted from Ayn Rand's journals do not mean what anyone with a modicum of sense can see that they mean. For instance, he follows up passages in which Rand expresses extremely negative evaluations of Patrecia Scott (with whom Nathaniel Branden had been conducting a secret affair) with pious denials that Rand was ever or could ever have been jealous of Ms. Scott.

(3) If Ayn Rand ever complained about Nathaniel Branden demanding obedience and conformity from her disciples, Mr. Valliant fails to document it. It is possible to deny Rand's authoritarianism only by ignoring her published statements demanding ideological conformity, her comments during the question and answer periods of her public speeches doing likewise, and the testimony of other former associates, such as Alan and Joan Mitchell Blumenthal, who remained with Rand after Nathaniel and Barbara Branden were expelled from her circle, but eventually broke with her for their own reasons.

(4) It is clear from Mr. Valliant's own text that Ayn Rand showed some of the journal entries in question to Nathaniel and Barbara Branden at the time, though of course she did not give them copies to take with when they were expelled.

Apart from the previously unpublished journal entries by Ayn Rand herself (which may have been tampered with by Mr. Valliant, and in any event frequently do not show her in the best possible light), Mr. Valliant's book is of value only to those morbidly curious about the rationalizations that worshippers of Ayn Rand are willing to resort to.

Robert Campbell

Is it just me or do others too notice that the quality of comments and dialog here is much higher than on most blogs?

It turns out that all the people who think otherwise have already left... :) But I agree with you! All hail Cultmaster Eliezer!

Passing thought. In another world, Lewis Little is the Lysenko of the Objectivist Party.

It turns out that all the people who think otherwise have already left

Not quite all.

It's rather dishonest to compare Ayn Rand to the Soviets, there is a huge difference between kicking people out of your little club and sending them to Siberia. The philsophical difference from an Objectivist standpoint is force, the practical is death.

Read Rand's piece on "Objectivist ritualists" in The Romantic Manifesto to see that she was quite aware of the problem of too much cult-like behavior.

I do not agree with the characterization by the ARI of a "closed system" (which is why I'd rather associate with TAS), but that is a merely semantic matter of definition, and does not lead one to the absurdity that a PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM becomes obsolete as soon as a computer does, or some psychologist does work on "biases."

Both TAS and ARI are busily updating Objectivism (the latter wouldn't call it that) with more inductive reasoning to accompany Rand's largely deductive writings, but I don't see where the hell you get the claim that ARISTOTLE IS A SPECIAL CASE OF BAYES. For Rand or any other Objectivist to deal with Bayes is absurd, because Bayes starts by defining it's own central concept, probability, as the DEGREE OF SUBJECTIVE BELIEF. Objectivism has nothing to gain from such a thing, except in appropriating the math and adapting it if possible to an objective system (I'm not a mathemetician, so I'm not qualified to say whether such a thing would be possible. Nor does one gain any understanding of the nature of rationality (e.g. answer the question what is it rational for me to think) from as you recommend
" Studying up on the math of probability theory and decision theory. Absorbing the cognitive sciences like evolutionary psychology, or heuristics and biases. Reading history books..."
You seem to be confusing the role of philosophy. Philosophy does not exist to absorb what the special sciences say and spit it back out. Philosophy, and a philosophical concept like "rationality," cannot be defined or dictated to by science. Learning about some inherent "bias," or what people WANT to believe, tells you nothing about the truth or falsity of that proposition. At best, it might tell you how useful your efforts to persuade them of a proposition might be Reading history will tell you whether a given political move (assuming it's happened before, which has nothing to do with Objectivism of course, there is no complete historical capitalism by the Objectivist definition) empirically gets the result it seeks (which often aids in identifying rationality's opposite), but it will tell you nothing about the degree to which it is rational to trust the empirical, nor what a rational result to seek is, that is philosophy's domain. The math of probability theories and decision theories may have descriptive use (i.e. helping you know how to deal with people who think in the manner described), but until you show me one that doesn't rely on subjectivism as a de facto axiom, they can't tell you in the general case anything about how to be rational as such.

The entire point of philosophy is to provide constant truths, that last forever, or (if you're Kant) constant falsehoods that last almost as long.

Oh and Adirian, to dismiss a philosophy simply because of the order of events, is absurd, and to claim her "personal values" were "subjective" without evidence, is worse. Next you'll tell me that because the idea of atoms predated the case for them, there is no such thing as an atom. For one thing, the order of her writings does not necessarily indicate the order of her ideas, for another what is at one point whim can later be redeemed with the case at no cost to the ideas, regardless of what it makes you think about her personally.

Find one value in Objectivism she did not make a case for without relying on subjectivism. That is the only way you can regard that value as being subjective. Now if you want to say the case was inadequate, I'd still love to hear it, but it wouldn't establish "subjectivism," only error.

With regard to mathematics, it was only with the intellectual help of Ayn Rand's epistemology that I independently discovered hypercomplex numbers. See the linked press release for more information.

The formal invalidation of the idea that certainty is impossible is that such a statement is a self-contradiction.

I recommend that you read Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology more than once. Struggle to understand each major idea in there, and then try to invalidate them, especially the axioms. Be honest in your arguments, and fight each idea to the bitter end. Eventually, you will start to realize, just as I did, that Rand was a lot smarter than I gave her credit for and knew what she was talking about, and that I wasn't as good and sophisticated as I thought I was. But I did not take my philosophical shortcomings personally; I learned from them. I am a lot smarter and sharper now because of that mental investment. I would recommend ITOE to everyone.

I thought this was all very standard stuff; as I was taught going on half a century ago, the atomic theory of matter simply says you cannot indefinitely divide a sample of something like nitrogen in half. That is, there is a smallest discrete unit of nitrogen that retains all it's chemical properties as opposed to the notion that nitrogen is like an infinitely divisble continuous fluid.

How is it being taught these days?

Having read The Fountainhead, Atlas Shrugged and Peikoff's OPAR, I've had enough time and material to reflect on Objectivism.

While Rand's contribution to rationalism was mostly admirable, Eliezer's analysis seems very fair. What's interesting, too, is that some of its contents overlaps with the article "The Benefits and Hazards of the Philosophy of Ayn Rand", written by Nathaniel Branden 25 years ago, which can be found in his website.

I recommend the reading.

As Branden (reasonably) states, some of Rand's major flaws were:

• Confusing reason with “the reasonable”
• Encouraging repression of emotions
• Encouraging moralizing
• Conflating sacrifice and benevolence
• Overemphasizing the role of philosophical premises
• Encouraging dogmatism

An entertainingly snarky essay about Ayn Rand.

It seems possible that some with far-out ideas turn to rationalism as a natural part of their defense of them - since if your beliefs are rational, then that makes them OK.

In such cases, the far-out ideas would come first, and the interest in rational thinking would follow along afterwards.

The interest in rational thought should normally be fairly theraputic. However, much depends on how deep it goes. Objectivism may not score too highly there.

Ha! It is a horrible crime that I read this, and see in it a criticism of any faith who believes that the Bible is the end-all, be-all of God's word to this or any earth?

Why do Objectivists so frequently believe that anthropogenic global warming is not real? (It appears to be the consensus opinion on the Objectivism forum.) This belief doesn't seem to have anything to do with Objectivism, and Ayn Rand certainly never mentioned global warming.

Maths isn't very relevant to Rand's philosophy. What's more relevant about her Aristoteleanism is her attitude to modern science; she was fairly ignorant. and fairly sceptical, of evolution, QM, and relativity.

Rand herself didn't understand emergence (she casting a biologist as the embodiment of scientific corruption, because there is too much complexity in his area of study for any one human brain to be familiar with), and also didn't understand much about cybernetics, etc.

That's hardly the start of it. She opposed relativity and QM, and fence-sat on Evolution.

ETA:

I don't think "1957" is mcuh of an excuse either, particularly about evolution. For another thing, she never wavered till her death in the 80s. It makes no sense to focus on Bayes, unless your are a Bayes cultist. Rand was unaware that a realistic, raitonal science-orientated form of philosophy had arisen since she was spoon-fed Hegelianism in the early 20th century, and remained unwillingly to connect with it even after John Hospers painfully explained it to her. That's the acid test of whether you are interested in promoting ideas or yourself.

ith permission from both their spouses, which counts for a lot in my view. If you want to turn that into a "problem", you have to specify that the spouses were unhappy—and then it's still not a matter for outsiders.

I dare say many a guru or cult leader has similar "permission". It often isn't taken to ecuse their actions, because people recognise that such permission can be browbeaten ot of people by someone who seems to them to be an authority figure.

Atleast Atlas Shrugged is written in a way that suggests cultishness. All good people are good at everything, good looking and always right. Enemies are stupid, wrong and ugly. There are no bad sides in good ideas or good sides in bad ideas.

I agree with this essay, but find a more cogent critique of objectivism is here: http://www.atlassociety.org/sites/default/files/The_Contested_Legacy_of_Ayn_Rand.pdf --I also notice Kelley himself linked to it below.

For anyone who enjoys this thread, I also highly recommend the work of a fellow libertarian, here: http://ariwatch.com/ARIvsRonPaul.htm

It's also interesting that before she decided against it, Ayn Rand described her own politics as "libertarian," http://ariwatch.com/AynRandsPoliticalLabel.htm

One of the first things I read on this site was Eliezer's eloquent defense of his brother Yehuda's life, against the conformist-imposed death caused by a lack of willingness to think, communicate, and question tradition. It's interesting to read how Rand's dogmatism likely sheltered her from the possibility of unbounded life, here: http://www.alcor.org/Library/html/HowAynRandDidntGetFrozen.html

In my experience, most people are hide-bound conformists, in all but a very few areas of their lives. That this is also true of people like Rand is somewhat sad, but it confirms the rule, to which there are many exceptions. The universe is diverse, but social networks don't work well unless there are shared ideas and values. The shortfalls of human intelligence keeps these ideas and values relatively narrow in definition, lest they not be isolated from discussion and debate.

To me, the behavior of the Rand Cult, especially as Rand herself approached old age, simply reveals an obvious implication of objectivism, as it "applies to" or "programs" objectivists: Objectivists don't get old and die gracefully (nor should they, necessarily -death is bad). Their philosophy is a celebration of life, and as death approaches, they don't handle it well. Death is a total failure of their system, and they don't handle unavoidable failures well. (Not even well enough to look for a way of avoiding them, such as cryonics.)

They are enraged by their impending death, declining health, and despise rejection (especially due to their own self-recognized physical unattractiveness) above all other things. In many ways, this is understandable, but it does not a Romantic work of fiction make. (Hence Rand's temporary "upgrade" to Nathaniel Branden, and the alleged part-time pathetic drunken misery of Frank O'Connor hinted at by Barbara Branden.)

Technically, the fact that her ultimate fictional hero was John Galt is a spoiler too.