[Nateman]

The funny thing about all this is that David Kelly himself is an outsider according to Leonard Piekoff, the fellow Ayn Rand herself picked as her intellectual heir.Since a central tenant of Objectivism is that you must think for yourself and let nobody else make moral decisions for you , the very idea of being "in the group" (or not) is rather silly.

[Hank Kerchief]

the very idea of being "in the group" (or not) is rather silly

Yes, it is one criticism I have of organizations in general, but for Objectivists to be carried away with this "collectivist" temptation, "to belong to something," is very strange. One of the hallmarks of Objectivism is individualism. Maybe they forgot.

Hank

[DannyTN]

"Since a central tenant of Objectivism is that you must think for yourself and let nobody else make moral decisions for you , the very idea of being "in the group" (or not) is rather silly."

What if you think for yourself and decide that God is wiser and can make better moral decisions than you and can teach you a lot?

I guess the objectivist collective would object to that level of individuality.

[elfman2]

"Since a central tenant of Objectivism is that you must think for yourself and let nobody else make moral decisions for you , the very idea of being "in the group" (or not) is rather silly. "

I think that’s both a limitation and a foundation of Objectivism. Objectivism is defined as the philosophy of Ayn Rand. She believed that it was the inevitable conclusion of clear thinking. If one concludes something else, it’s open for debate, but it’s not Objectivism. To some degree, it has to be that way, or it’s Subjectivism.