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Ayn Rand: Goddess of the Great Recession
Christianity Today | 8/28/2010 | Garry Moore

Posted on 08/28/2010 7:06:10 PM PDT by Mojave

This past spring, the Financial Industry Inquiry Commission held hearings on the world's recent financial crisis. The star witness was Alan Greenspan. The Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan translated Greenspan's typically elusive testimony this way: "I didn't do anything wrong, and neither did Ayn Rand by the way, but next time you might try more regulation."

There were obviously many reasons for the Great Recession. But I believe Noonan got to the root of one particular evil.

Fortune magazine once labeled Greenspan "America's most famous libertarian, an Ayn Rand acolyte." (While Rand formally rejected libertarianism, libertarians nonetheless admire her.) But today, both libertarians and Randians are disassociating themselves from Greenspan as quickly as Wall Street.


TOPICS: Religion; Society
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To: Lurker
The highest moral obligation one human being has to another is to never through force or fraud deprive them of the fruits of their labors or their life.

That sounds like altruism with a mask on. That's not consistent with her "moral purpose," unless A = nonA.

"Achievement of your happiness is the only moral purpose of your life, and that happiness, not pain or mindless self-indulgence, is the proof of your moral integrity, since it is the proof and the result of your loyalty to the achievement of your values."--Ayn Rand

Translation: Do what you want, don't get caught.

41 posted on 08/28/2010 8:22:40 PM PDT by Mojave (Ignorant and stoned - Obama's natural constituency.)
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To: DesertRhino

” She just says you should do it solely because it is what you wish to do. “

Narcissism is not morality.


42 posted on 08/28/2010 8:23:15 PM PDT by narses ( 'Prefer nothing to the love of Christ.')
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To: narses

I don’t know. I just want my kids to get the good parts.
Personally, since she is dead, I don’t much care about what she thought of morals.


43 posted on 08/28/2010 8:23:18 PM PDT by netmilsmom (I am inyenzi on the Religion Forum)
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To: Lurker

“The highest moral obligation one human being has to another is to never through force or fraud deprive them of the fruits of their labors or their life.”

So taxes are always immoral? Ditto capital punishment?


44 posted on 08/28/2010 8:24:53 PM PDT by narses ( 'Prefer nothing to the love of Christ.')
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To: DesertRhino
And then she continues by saying if it makes you happy to help others, or to express love others, then you should do so.

Quote, please.

45 posted on 08/28/2010 8:28:01 PM PDT by Mojave (Ignorant and stoned - Obama's natural constituency.)
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To: Mojave

Guess blaming it on Bush got old.


46 posted on 08/28/2010 8:29:35 PM PDT by Brilliant
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To: DesertRhino

“The very essence of her view of dealings with others, was that it should be based solely upon reason and virtue, never upon force.”

I thought it was, that dealings with others should be based on self interest alone.


47 posted on 08/28/2010 8:29:59 PM PDT by Persevero (Homeschooling for Excellence since 1992)
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To: Brilliant

Greenspan never worshipped Bush.


48 posted on 08/28/2010 8:31:43 PM PDT by Mojave (Ignorant and stoned - Obama's natural constituency.)
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To: DesertRhino

“There’s no gutting of morality there whatsoever,”

I don’t see her philosophy so much as a gutting of morality; but as a gutting of the Christian REASON for morality.

Some donate to charity to feel good. Others donate to glorify God. Either way, charity gets a donation. But the reason for it is different.


49 posted on 08/28/2010 8:32:38 PM PDT by Persevero (Homeschooling for Excellence since 1992)
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To: Mojave

“A is A. How do you oversimplify that?”

By pretending that her philosophy somehow insists that a person never, ever, do anything for another. She just says it should be a free choice based upon reason and self interest. She would not criticize a person who supported an elderly parent, because they loved them, to show gratitude for what they did for them, etc.

She would be critical of the idea that you should be coerced in any way, including religion, to support a bum or another person who does not deserve it.

But there’s an easy solution, if you don’t agree that this is moral, then you are free to give everything you have away to people who don’t deserve it. Then you simply make no demands of me to follow your lead, and the world will work just fine. The rub comes when people of your ilk, demand that people of mine do it your way. In fact, thats what she pretty much writes about.


50 posted on 08/28/2010 8:33:00 PM PDT by DesertRhino (I was standing with a rifle, waiting for soviet paratroopers, but communists just ran for office)
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To: narses
When I die, I hope to go to Heaven, whatever the Hell that is. Ayn Rand

I'd like the author of this insipid book to come up with some of her own quotes.

51 posted on 08/28/2010 8:33:21 PM PDT by Lurker (The avalanche has begun. The pebbles no longer have a vote.)
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To: Lurker

OK, but you call the author a liar over a very specific assertion. Is that just noise or can you back up your claim?


52 posted on 08/28/2010 8:34:42 PM PDT by narses ( 'Prefer nothing to the love of Christ.')
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To: Mojave

53 posted on 08/28/2010 8:35:21 PM PDT by Pan_Yan
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To: Mojave
That sounds like altruism with a mask on

Really? Then you have a serious comprehension problem. Not taking peoples stuff from them forcefully or fraudulently is 'altruism'? Whatever dictionary you own you should return where you got it and demand your money back.

not pain or mindless self-indulgence,

You're not real....um....smart, are you.

54 posted on 08/28/2010 8:36:28 PM PDT by Lurker (The avalanche has begun. The pebbles no longer have a vote.)
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To: Pan_Yan

“Rand would rejoice that our companies and the affluent are sitting on unprecedented wealth while our government and nonprofits are struggling financially.”

Rand would hardly rejoice, but she would point out that the current state of affairs does validate her philosophy to a great extent.


55 posted on 08/28/2010 8:43:30 PM PDT by NavVet ("You Lie!")
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To: Mojave

“Thanks. Ayn was a Kmart version of Nietzsche.”

Perspectivism is the philosophical view developed by ***Friedrich Nietzsche**** that all ideations take place from particular perspectives. This means that there are many possible conceptual schemes, or perspectives in which judgment of truth or value can be made. This implies that no way of seeing the world can be taken as definitively “true”, but does not necessarily entail that all perspectives are equally valid.

Perspectivism REJECTS OBJECTIVE METAPHYSICS AS IMPOSSIBLE, and claims that there are no objective evaluations which transcend cultural formations or subjective designations. This means that there are no objective facts, and that there can be no knowledge of a thing in itself.

WOW! Thats exactly what Rand said. sarc/


56 posted on 08/28/2010 8:44:20 PM PDT by DesertRhino (I was standing with a rifle, waiting for soviet paratroopers, but communists just ran for office)
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To: Mojave

“A is A” is an example that she used in support of the philosophy of objectivism. If it weren’t a bit more complicated than that, Atlas Shrugged wouldn’t be 700 pages long.


57 posted on 08/28/2010 8:45:30 PM PDT by NavVet ("You Lie!")
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To: Mojave

If this is the whole post and not an excerpt, it really wasn’t worth posting.


58 posted on 08/28/2010 8:46:54 PM PDT by devere
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To: DesertRhino
That said, an attempt to lay the *any* blame for this recession upon her philosophy, is one of the most uneducated, unsupportable things i’ve ever read.

You got that right. Talk about a stretch of the imagination...

59 posted on 08/28/2010 8:47:22 PM PDT by sargon (I don't like the sound of these "boncentration bamps")
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To: netmilsmom

“Personally, since she is dead, I don’t much care about what she thought of morals.”

So,,,, you think,,, that when a person is dies, their thoughts on morals no longer have any value? Please further explain this, i think it will be fascinating.


60 posted on 08/28/2010 8:52:55 PM PDT by DesertRhino (I was standing with a rifle, waiting for soviet paratroopers, but communists just ran for office)
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