Ayn Rand and the Intellectuals

HATING WHAT THEY DON'T UNDERSTAND Liberal intellectuals (almost a redundancy, that) hate author Ayn Rand.

They don't just dislike her, they hate her with a passion. The reason? Because she has single-handedly come up with a logical and reasonable philosophy that strips them bare and reveals all their scams and schemes so that people who know her philosophy (Objectivism) automatically spot one of their scams from a long ways away.

They don't subject her to the usual mild criticism or "shunning" to which they subject liberals who say something "slightly different" from "the norm." Their treatment of Rand and her works is visceral and vicious. There are many who merely dismiss her philosophy with the wave of a hand. But they cannot explain why they feel the way they do. If asked for a reason for their opposition to Objectivism, they can't answer and launch into a personal attack on her that amounts to a "fact-free opinion."

If you point out the fact that Objectivism is a "philosophy of reason," they deny the existence of reason. If you point to the logic of Objectivism, they say there is no logic. Then they go on to tell you that "there are no absolutes." Of course, they don't even notice the fact that their very statement is a "statement of an absolute," and negates not only their entire philosophy, but the very statement they have made as well. I love being a proponent of a philosophy that allows me to "shut down" those who disagree with it so easily and completely, and with their own words.

I hasten to say that I do not accept all of Rand's opinions and that I am not an Objectivist. I am a "student of Objectivist philosophy" and am still learning all its facets. That could change later, although I don't think I'll ever agree that abortion is a good thing and that there is no "higher power" although I may not see that "higher power" the same way other people do.

One professor said Rand was a "phony libertarian" who wanted to strip communists of their citizenship. She did not. In fact, she was one of the few people not on the Left who opposed the violation of the rights of communists and said so, in print. She said that stripping them of their rights "is an invalid means of opposing communism and that the proper way to oppose bad ideas was with good ideas."

To show you just how visceral and violent their hate is, there is a story told by Ronald Merril, in his book, The Ideas of Ayn Rand, where a woman's boyfriend was horrified when he saw her reading Atlas Shrugged and grabbed it, throwing it out the window. She watched as the gardener, upon seeing the title, threw it down and ran over it repeatedly. This is an excellent example of the violent reaction that her ideas often get from people who have never really investigated them, but have listened to what their liberal friends have said about her and her works. But again, if you ask them precisely what they don't like about her and her work, they can't answer and usually sneer some personal attack upon her.

That's one of the criticisms that is most often hurled at Objectivism and its creator, that it is a "cult" that does not allow any dissention. That people have been, in effect, "excommunicated" for disagreeing with it in the slightest way. There is a certain amount of truth to that charge, but it only applies to the personal "circle of friends" she laughingly called her "collective." Rand wasn't perfect, although her mistakes are tiny when put alongside her ideas, which are destined to change the world, and already are. She did insist on complete agreement among those people and shunned those who disagreed with her. But that does not apply to those who believe in, and use her ideas to guide their lives, as I do. That's not a "cult, nor is it a "religion."

Objectivism today has two major factions, about even in strength. One faction is run by her "philosophical and financial heir, Dr.Leonard Peikoff. Peikoff was a member of her "collective" and, in my opinion, is an "opportunist," who took advantage of Rand's fall out with her original protégé, Nathaniel Branden and took over her fortune as well as the "mantle" as "The Voice of Objectivism." This faction, running the Ayn Rand Institute, and claims to be the only source for Objectivist information and ideas. But it is this group that operates somewhat as a cult in that Peikoff's contention that Objectivism, as Ayn Rand proposed it, was, and is, complete and not subject to any changes. To be an Objectivist to him, is to accept everything Rand said, as "gospel" and not deviate from it in any way. It is this which gives rise to the "cult" accusation.

But there is a second faction, run by Objectivist philosopher David Kelley, who started and runs the Objectivist Institute, a competing organization whose view of Objectivism is that it is not complete, and can be improved. It is this group who are not, and never will be, "cult-like." If you wish to associate with this group, you will never get any static whichever way you believe.

It is this division in "the ranks" that caused a severe setback in the acceptance of Objectivism for years. This division was worse than that created when Nathaniel Branden left. But the Objectivist Center has had a strong influence and the acceptance of Objectivism as an excellent guide for your life is rising again, as it must, because it is the only logical philosophy there is.

You may not agree totally with the basic tenets of Objectivism, but here you will not be met with a cold silence if you dare to suggest change. In the Objectivist Institute, you will be welcomed and your ideas debated respectfully. The concepts discovered by Objectivists are not subjective, but the final word on the details of Objectivism may not have yet been discovered. You might be the force by which we can improve the philosophy, no matter what Leonard Peikoff might say.

If you're still "drifting in a sea of opposing philosophies," and you don't know why what's happening in this world is happening, this philosophy will help you to understand. Things will become clear to you as never before, and you will be able to, as my older brother Bob said many years ago, "read between the lines" and be able to figure out why people do as they do. What brought me to Objectivism is my inability to understand why people like Nelson Rockefeller, who had more money than he could spend in three lifetimes, supported collectivism even though it was intent on taking his money away (If you want to know the answer to that, e-mail me).

But this philosophy answered most of my questions and therefore, I can follow it for the most part because it's a logical philosophy and its opponents can only stupidly deny the existence of logic to oppose it. They cannot give coherent answers as to why it is bad, so they make things up. If you want to know the truth, go to the source: The Objectivist Center.

You have no idea how hard it is not to be sarcastic.

Thanks for your patience. To be quite honest, I'd never considered debating "A is A" until I brought it up with you. I confess I don't know how it's going to turn out. As it is, even if "A is A" is true, objectivism cannot do anything with it without making a large number of assumptions, beginning with the answer to the following question: "so what?"

But let us plow on.

I have very patiently pointed out in other posts, "A is A" is epistimological, not metaphysical.

Epistemology: the study or a theory of the nature and grounds of knowledge especially with reference to its limits and validity. (Webster)

In terms of "A is A," you're saying that "A is what it is." There is here a tacit assumption: that A will never be anything other than what it is.

"A" can be any concept. For example, let A be a clock.... Now a clock cannot be a clock unless there is change, namely, the moving of the hands of the clock (or the changing of the numbers if it is a digital clock). In this case, A would not be A if there were not change (or A is a broken A).

Actually, the idea of hand movement or some other expression of the passage of time is nothing more than part of the concept of "clock" -- something that denotes the passage of time. But of course, relativity makes "the passage of time" a contingent matter, and in some frames of reference (e.g., that of a photon), it may have no meaning at all.

Actually, your choice of "clock" as an example is an unfortunate one. "Clock" has no fixed definition: it can be a candle, or a pendulum, or drips of water or sand, or the hyperfine electron transitions in an excited cesium atom, or just about anything we can figure out how to use for the purpose of measuring time. And in the process of measuring time, it must be remembered that the units by which time is measured are merely conventions, adopted because they are convenient. There's no intrinisic reason the second couldn't have been defined as longer or shorter than it currently is (and indeed it has been redefined numerous times over the past 100 years or so).

Your assertion that "'A' can be any concept," is on shaky ground here. In the case of clocks, "A" is a clock only when we decide to call it one. Before that, it's a cesium atom, or an annoying drip in the kitchen sink. And of course, "the passage of time" doesn't have a fixed meaning.

Indeed, "clock" had no meaning until somebody decided that they needed to measure the passage of time in the first place. Before that, and certainly before the advent of humanity, "clock" had no identity at all.

Thus, we have found a case where A was once ~A, and only became A when we decided to define it as such. Now, if I properly recall your definition of "axiom," this isn't supposed to happen to axioms.

Therefore, "A is A" does not satisfy your definition of "axiom."

Show me where I have asserted “objective truth” on these threads, general_re.

I plead guilty - to my knowledge, you have yet to assert such a thing here. Shall we see if I can pull an assertion of such out of you? ;)

Thus we have the case of an empiricist who, while not satisfied by a “proof of the existence of God” of the “First Cause” or “Prime Mover” type, is effectively persuaded by the proof of the existence of God by Design. He thought he could establish that on empirical grounds, if only inferentially.

Oh? How attached to the notion of omnipotence are you? ;)

That much applauded class of authors, the writers on natural theology, have, I venture to think, entirely lost their way, and missed the sole line of argument which could have made their speculations acceptable to any one who can perceive when two propositions contradict one another. They have exhausted the resources of sophistry to make it appear that all the suffering in the world exists to prevent greater---that misery exists, for fear lest there should be misery: a thesis which if ever so well maintained, could only avail to explain and justify the works of limited beings, compelled to labour under conditions independent of their own will; but can have no application to a Creator assumed to be omnipotent, who, if he bends to a supposed necessity, himself makes the necessity which he bends to. If the maker of the world can all that he will, he wills misery, and there is no escape from the conclusion. The more consistent of those who have deemed themselves qualified to ``vindicate the ways of God to man'' have endeavoured to avoid the alternative by hardening their hearts, and denying that misery is an evil. The goodness of God, they say, does not consist in willing the happiness of his creatures, but their virtue; and the universe, if not happy, is a just universe. But waving the objections to this scheme of ethics, it does not at all get rid of the difficulty. If the Creator of mankind willed that they should all be virtuous, his designs are as completely baffled as if he had willed that they should all be happy, and the order of nature is constructed with even less regard to the requirements of justice than to those of benevolence. If the law of all creation were justice and the Creator omnipotent, then, in whatever amount suffering and happiness might be dispensed to the world, each person's share of them would be exactly proportioned to that person's good or evil deeds; no human being would have a worse lot than another, without worse deserts; accident or favouritism would have no part in such a world, but every human life would be the playing out of a drama constructed like a perfect moral tale. No one is able to blind himself to the fact that the world we live in is totally different from this, insomuch that the necessity of redressing the balance has been deemed one of the strongest arguments for another life after death, which amounts to an admission that the order of things in this life is often an example of injustice, not justice. If it be said that God does not take sufficient account of pleasure and pain to make them the reward or punishment of the good or the wicked, but that virtue is itself the greatest good and vice the greatest evil, then these at least ought to be dispensed to all according to what they have done to deserve them; instead of which, every kind of moral depravity is entailed upon multitudes by the fatality of their birth, through the fault of their parents, of society, or of uncontrollable circumstances, certainly through no fault of their own. Not even on the most distorted and contracted theory of good. which ever was framed by religious or philosophical fanaticism, can the government of Nature be made to resemble the work of a being at once good and omnipotent.
The only admissible moral theory of Creation is that the Principle of Good cannot at once and altogether subdue the powers of evil, either physical or moral; could not place mankind in a world free from the necessity of an incessant struggle with the maleficent powers, or make them always victorious in that struggle, but could and did make them capable of carrying on the fight with vigour and with progressively increasing success. Of all the religious explanations of the order of nature, this alone is neither contradictory to itself, nor to the facts for which it attempts to account. According to it, man's duty would consist not in simply taking care of his own interests by obeying irresistible power, but in standing forward a not ineffectual auxiliary to a Being of perfect beneficence; a faith which seems much better adapted for nerving him to exertion than a vague and inconsistent reliance on an Author of Good who is supposed to be also the author of evil. And I venture to assert that such has really been, though often unconsciously, the faith of all who have drawn strength and support of any worthy kind from trust in a superintending Providence. There is no subject on which men's practical belief is more incorrectly indicated by the words they use to express it than religion. Many have derived a base confidence from imagining themselves to be favourites of an omnipotent but capricious and despotic Deity. But those who have been in goodness by relying on the sympathizing support of a powerful and good Governor of the world have, I am satisfied, never really believed that Governor to be, in the strict sense of the term, omnipotent. They have always saved his goodness at the expense of his power. They have believed, perhaps, that he could, if he willed, remove all the thorns from their individual path, but not without causing greater harm to some one else, or frustrating some purpose of greater importance to the general well-being. They have believed that he could do any one thing, but not any combination of things; that his government, like human government, was a system of adjustments and compromises; that the world is inevitably imperfect, contrary to his intention. And since the exertion of all his power to make it as little imperfect as possible leaves it no better than it is, they cannot but regard that power, though vastly beyond human estimate, yet as in itself not merely finite, but extremely limited. They are bound, for example, to suppose that the best he could do for his human creatures was to make an immense majority of all who have yet existed, be born (without any fault of their own) Patagonians, or Esquimaux, or something nearly as brutal and degraded, but to give them capacities which by being cultivated for very many centuries in toil and suffering, and after many of the best specimens of the race have sacrificed their lives for the purpose, have at last enabled some chosen portions of the species to grow into something better, capable of being improved in centuries more into something really good, of which hitherto there are only to be found individual instances. It may be possible to believe with Plato that perfect goodness, limited and thwarted in every direction by the intractableness of the material, has done this because it could do no better. But that the same perfectly wise and good Being had absolute power over the material, and made it, by voluntary choice, what it is; to admit this might have been supposed impossible to any one who has the simplest notions of moral good and evil. Nor can any such person, whatever kind of religious phrases he may use, fail to believe, that if Nature and Man are both the works of a Being of perfect goodness, that Being intended Nature as a scheme to be amended, not imitated, by Man.
- J.S. Mill, "Nature", Three Essays on Religion

I do not know if it was a dream or a vision, whether in the body or out of the body, but God appeared to me, and the appearance was such that it cannot be described in any terms we can understand. And in that dream or vision, God spoke to me and said, "Son, I am only a figment of your imagination."

And the voice was like thunder and all authority that could not be denied, and I was very frightened, but, even in my fright, I said: "But my Lord, this cannot be! If you are only what I imagine, than you are not at all, and what you are saying cannot be true." And God spoke to me again, as one speaking patiently to a child, "My son, that is only human reason. Suppose I had said, I am that I am, the God of heaven and earth, and you must believe in Me?"

This greatly comforted and emboldened me, for I percieved that God was only testing me. I, therefore, very boldy expressed my gratitude, "Oh, Lord, I am ashamed to have doubted you, and know that your are, and are the God of heaven and earth. I thank you and praise you for your mercy to such an unworthy servant.

But God spoke again to me, and it was as though He were angry with me, "Son, what if I lied to you when I said 'I am?'"

Now this was even more comforting, though it would discomfort any who did not truly know God, and I was blessed to know this was another test, but one in love and mercy. I was therefore more bold than ever to say to my Lord, "Oh, my God, I would never doubt you, because I know you are all Holy, and just and good, and I know you cannot lie.

Then, the visage of the vision of God changed. Then, there was thundering and lightening that I thought would split open the heavens, and then God spoke to me once, and only once again: "So you presume to tell me, the God you believe and trust is omnipotent and omnisicent, what I can and cannot do!?

This confession may not help you, but for me, it has settled all my questions about God.

Hank

I should preface this by saying that Mill has his conception of God, and I have mine - I can explain Mill's position, but I'm not sure I'm up to the task of defending it. Nevertheless, I can put on my devil's advocate hat and give it a whirl, if need be.

Why would someone ask "If God is omnipotent, how can he be good?" or "If God is good, how can he be omnipotent?"

Because he was looking at the state of the world around him, essentially. In brief, what Mill does is he looks around and observes that the world is far from being perfect, and who can really disagree with him on that? So he asks himself, if God is omnipotent and perfectly good, as He is usually regarded to be, why is the world such a mess? Surely a perfectly good being would want to create good, and not evil - why would a being that was perfectly good create evil, as God must have done if He were the omnipotent creator of everything? Surely a being that was perfectly good would want to create good and virtuous people, so why are there so many bad and wicked people about? After all, if He were omnipotent, He certainly had the power to create people who were some other way than what they are, right? Surely a being that was perfectly good would want to bring about justice, so why is there so much injustice in the world? Surely a perfectly good being would not want to cause suffering, so why is there so much suffering in the world, especially when an ostensibly omnipotent being must have had the power to prevent it?

So from that, Mill concludes that you have two choices, really - either God is in fact omnipotent, and He created this world exactly as He wanted it, with all the evil and wickedness and injustice and suffering there is. But in that case, He must be less than perfectly good, given the sort of world He chose to create. Or, God is in fact perfectly good, but is less than omnipotent, and therefore He created the best world he could. But being that He is less than omnipotent - albeit much more powerful that you or I could ever be, naturally - He couldn't create a perfect world, or one that was as perfectly good as He was. And given the choice, Mill opts for a perfectly good, but limited creator, and suggests that most people unconsciously do the same thing as well, through their various rationalizations about why the world and their personal affairs are in such a state.

Who is being presumptuous, Mills or me?

I don't know. Do you still think that omnipotence and perfect goodness can be reconciled?

Do you still think that omnipotence and perfect goodness can be reconciled?

I think it tends to be good to go to bed earlier on a Saturday night.

I wasn't really asking for a 21st Century commentary to the dead Brit's ;-` work, but thank you. What I'm saying is looking at the world and trying to learn such a thing about God from it is, well, why bother? And my point especially is that while the answer to your question is it, with all due apologies, is a non sequitur. But then I'm one of those guys who reads things like Job and Ecclesiastes and Ephesians and believes that God inspired the messages He means for us, through the writing that was done therein.

My further point is that since we know the world all too well but don't know God well enough, we might give him the benefit of the doubt as we doubt, by looking more closely into just what we're doubting about him. If he is good and omnipotent, surely he wants to see the suffering put to an end and surely there is a reason it's here and a reason God, who may just be suffering most from it lets it stick around awhile, and if he's really, really, good, he may have just devised a way to tell us what we really need to know about him, in spite of it all, which may just be the most important thing the knowing of which ultimately clears it all up.

But since betty boop hasn't answered and since there seems to be such an axiomatically 'philosophical' motif to this thread, I wouldn't want to through a wet blanket on the matter, by explaining what I think he tells us. That would be starting with the premise that God is good enough to reveal himself to us all, and all-powerfully able to make sense to us, even if through a glass darkly. You know. It would be Chriatian.

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