Alan Greenspan began his career as an Ayn Rand disciple. He was part of her inner circle of close friends until her death and contributed essays to her publications.
Her ideas, which she called Objectivism and touted as a philosophy, boiled down to acting rationally. Of course, what is rational depends on one's values and on one's understanding of a situation. She opposed altruism, which she understood as irrational self-denial. Her ideas are often parodied as a celebration of selfishness, but for her, acting rationally in self interest meant much the same as Adam Smith did by his "invisible hand" metaphor - that the intelligent pursuit of self-interest inevitably led people to benefit society. For Rand, altruism led to wasteful and destructive behavior which defeated its nominal purpose. Rand scorned stupid self-interest, i.e., crime, but thought that enlightened self-interest was the best path to social good.
My own opinion is that she was right so far as she went, but that she didn't go very far. Her ideas are too scant to bear being called a philosophy. People might have conflicting views of rational self-interest, but she never really addressed how such conflicts might be reconciled or how her ideas might apply in practice.
I agree with Bob. Rational self interest is not about being selfish. Instead it is about rewarding those who give something of value back to you.
It is not a conflict of Ayn Rand's ideas, for someone to pay their employees well. Perhaps if they enjoyed the opera, and felt they got significant return from such, they would be patrons of the arts. Though instead of donating money, they would organize shows themselves. Rent the stage, hire the talent, and sell tickets.
It isn't about donations, but investments. With a donation, you get nothing back. With an investment, there is an expectation of a return.
This isn't really selfishness, but neither is it altruistic.
I also agree that Rand never properly made the leap to philosophy. Her ideas (as they stand) do not hold up to close scrutiny. Especially when talking about government, her ideas don't quite fit. If a government is meant to represent ALL of its people, then investing in them (health care, education, infrastructure, social safety net, etc...) is a form of rational self interest (on the part of the nation), but it then violates (through taxation) the rational self interest of the individual.
As the modern Tea Party seem as though many of them are Ayn Rand followers (Paul Ryan) I would like to see her ideas discussed on a wider stage. Many of her ideas are sound, if somewhat limited in scope. It would be nice if more people realized where her ideas work, and where they break down. On an individual level, they seem to work just fine. On a national level, it would need some serious overhauling for it to be considered at all.
Once, while running a trans support group, a young trans woman showed up, a hyper-submissive, in hard core bondage gear, collared and on leash with her top, another trans woman. That meeting I had to constantly keep the submissive from overriding all the conversation with ranting about her worship of alpha male dominant men, and how all she wanted to do was to lick their disdainful boots.
Am I the only one that gets something of the same fetishistic feeling about Ayn Rand's novels. Look at the heroes, particularly in "The Fountainhead," Howard Roark is a godlike alpha male capitalist bestriding the world like a colossus, working his will against the constricting bonds of narrow minded conformity and the limits of weaker men (sissies) Virile, dominant fertile. It almost sounds like "Fifty Shades of Gray," for philosophic/economic nerds. I felt Atlas Shrugged & the Fountainhead were Ayn Rand's ridiculously overwrought masturbatory fantasies. And that they were TMI for my taste. (And the sneaking question sometimes arises, "what is Alan Greenspan's sex life and fantasies like.)
Rand sometimes said she patterned Roark on her husband. In her era (1905-1982), male superiority was still the cultural norm, so she might be forgiven for making the most of it. Sexual emotions are not rational, but Rand might have said female submission to alpha males improved our species just as it did others, so it was rational after all.
bobover3 (imported) wrote: Wed Nov 14, 2012 10:36 pm
Rand sometimes said she patterned Roark on her husband. In her era (1905-1982), male superiority was still the cultural norm, so she might be forgiven for making the most of it. Sexual emotions are not rational, but Rand might have said female submission to alpha males improved our species just as it did others, so it was rational after all.
Though denied by both, it is widely assumed that Roark was modeled on Frank Lloyd Wright, whom Rand clearly idolized. They became friends and Wright designed a house for her which was never built. There is also much similarity in the autocratic/communal structure of Rand's inner circle "the Collective." and Wright's architectural program "Taliesin," later "Taliesin West," which in turn was modeled on the ideas and structure of an esoteric group in France where Wright met his third wife Olgivanna Lloyd Wright, who greatly influenced him and who ran his programs after his death.
Also remember Rand was a pretty lusty lady. She carried on an affair with one of her followers, Nathaniel Branden, with the knowledge and consent of both spouses. She clearly disdained conventional morality sexually as well as politically.
