Ayn Rand, Objectivism, Capitalism, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness

And AR accepted medicare.

She and her supporters merit no attention.

 

To you and the mystical collectivist shrill, Bill.


Of course, with your "flattened curve", you might not get the point.

 

Self-interest in Objectivism is not an out-of-context moment of satisfying irrational whims, nor is it sacrificing your future to a present spur-of-the-moment" impulse, its doing that which furthers your goal toward reaching your highest vision of your happiness. Self-interest is not the destruction of the good to satisfy the whims, wishes, and wants of the bad; its the creation of a life worth living, a life that honors one's existence, not placate its delusional angst.

Ayn Rand: "The term “interests” is a wide abstraction that covers the entire field of ethics. It includes the issues of: man’s values, his desires, his goals and their actual achievement in reality. A man’s “interests” depend on the kind of goals he chooses to pursue, his choice of goals depends on his desires, his desires depend on his values—and, for a rational man, his values depend on the judgment of his mind.

Desires (or feelings or emotions or wishes or whims) are not tools of cognition; they are not a valid standard of value, nor a valid criterion of man’s interests. The mere fact that a man desires something does not constitute a proof that the object of his desire is good, nor that its achievement is actually to his interest.

To claim that a man’s interests are sacrificed whenever a desire of his is frustrated—is to hold a subjectivist view of man’s values and interests. Which means: to believe that it is proper, moral and possible for man to achieve his goals, regardless of whether they contradict the facts of reality or not. Which means: to hold an irrational or mystical view of existence. Which means: to deserve no further consideration."http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/self-interest.html

 

Sounds like theoretical physics.

A reason why Mr. Einstein's 'theory of relativty' was so well received was because he proved, mathematically, his concept of such relativeness from a given point to equal out correctly from each of the points being measured.

 

Let's start with Ayn Rand being on Medicare and Social Security and food stamps when she died.

 

Without those fundamental principles, theoretical physics is impossible.

 

In the first paragraph defined the objectivist’ ethical term “self-Interest” as

• Rationality
• Happiness
• Worth
• Good
• Life

But what do these terms mean? One can always ask whether reason, happiness, and life are intrinsically good, or instrumentally good.

Rand sounds like warmed-over rationalistic egoistic hedonism, and at other times like Libertarian utilitarianism, or just simple "I Wantism" which says "I want X; therefore X is good."

What if rationality contradicts happiness? How do we resolve conflicts between Eudaimonic utilitarianism, Rule-utilitarianism, or Ideal utilitarianism, or psychological hedonistic egoism? And what about when deontological duty ethics (one has the duty to always tell the truth) conflicts with one’s self-interest?

Rand provides no methodology for determining the decidability for ethical dilemmas: you just listed at least five tautologies for “self-interest” not realizing they inherently conflict with one another, and at other times act as tautological definitions for each other.

Your bold thesis is correct; circles are non-squares.

 

Why does no one on the libertarian side want to talk about Ayn Rand being on Medicare and Social Security and food stamps when she died?

 

Rationality: Fidelity to reality
Happiness: Fidelity to reality
Self-Worth: Fidelity to reality
The good: Fidelity to reality
Life: Fidelity to reality.

Really, rather simple, unless one is a self-deluded con-artist. There are no conflicts among the rational that cannot be solved reasonably. In other words, the souls of integrity have nothing to fear from each other, only the dishonest and irrational live with fear as an albatross around their desire for happiness, a fear that they are unworthy of happiness--and most likely, they are.

Furthermore, there is never any contradiction between rationality and happiness for reasoning minds--happiness is not a toke on a blunt, or a drunken night on the town, or a drugged fueled sex rump with a stranger; it is the creative and productive achievement of building a life worth living, not existing in one that needs escaping from.

Ayn Rand: "Integrity is the recognition of the fact that you cannot fake your consciousness, just as honesty is the recognition of the fact that you cannot fake existence—that man is an indivisible entity, an integrated unit of two attributes: of matter and consciousness, and that he may permit no breach between body and mind, between action and thought, between his life and his convictions—that, like a judge impervious to public opinion, he may not sacrifice his convictions to the wishes of others, be it the whole of mankind shouting pleas or threats against him—that courage and confidence are practical necessities, that courage is the practical form of being true to existence, of being true to truth, and confidence is the practical form of being true to one’s own consciousness.

 

Ayn Rand: "Happiness is not to be achieved at the command of emotional whims. Happiness is not the satisfaction of whatever irrational wishes you might blindly attempt to indulge. Happiness is a state of non-contradictory joy—a joy without penalty or guilt, a joy that does not clash with any of your values and does not work for your own destruction, not the joy of escaping from your mind, but of using your mind’s fullest power, not the joy of faking reality, but of achieving values that are real, not the joy of a drunkard, but of a producer. Happiness is possible only to a rational man, the man who desires nothing but rational goals, seeks nothing but rational values and finds his joy in nothing but rational actions."http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/happiness.html

 

Was not Rand on SS, medicare, and food stamps when she died?

 

Fidelity. Another empty tautology thrown into the Ayn Rand ethical stew pot: So it is not true that not all non-circles are non-triangles. Thanks for clearing it up for us.

 

A reason exists that Rand is not used in philosophy classes.

 

Enjoy a hot fudge sundae on a warm sunny summer day, it will clear up all your problems with “fidelity”, “reality”, “tautology”, and “happiness.”

I dare ya.



Or visit here: https://cordair.com/artists/larsen/works/theres-opportunity-here/index.html

 

Objectivism demands only one thing of humanity, respect for the rights of the individual.

Ayn Rand: "Do not make the mistake of the ignorant who think that an individualist is a man who says: “I’ll do as I please at everybody else’s expense.” An individualist is a man who recognizes the inalienable individual rights of man—his own and those of others.

An individualist is a man who says: “I will not run anyone’s life—nor let anyone run mine. I will not rule nor be ruled. I will not be a master nor a slave. I will not sacrifice myself to anyone—nor sacrifice anyone to myself.”

Perhaps Rand's error was expecting too much from humanity. It requires thought and effort to be good.

 

What Stalin, and Hitler, and Mao, and Pol Pot, and Xi Jinping, and Putin, and Chavez, and Maduro, and way far too many more, prove is: Its not in one's self-interest to be a human butchering monster.

 

Attacking Ayn Rand does not make her views any less objective and true than the medieval Catholic Pope's attack on Galileo made his observations about what revolved around what any less real.

 

The obvious: You can only make money by offering life, not death. Of course, that means understanding and integrating the concepts of make, money, and life, or what you'll get is the con-job of the pseudo-intellectuals offering the Tiger King as a morality tale of the evil of unbridled individualism. Reason is the essence of the individualism, not neurotic psychosis.

As for the technological problem of pollution:
Ayn Rand: "City smog and filthy rivers are not good for men (though they are not the kind of danger that the ecological panic-mongers proclaim them to be). This is a scientific, technological problem—not a political one—and it can be solved only by technology. Even if smog were a risk to human life, we must remember that life in nature, without technology, is wholesale death."
http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/ecology-environmental_movement.html

Kinda like the lock down and its false choice of health and safety before money and prosperity--what's the point of being healthy and wealthy if the store shelves are empty. As Elon Musk said, and I paraphrase, "If stuff isn't being made then there is no stuff to buy, no matter how many government dollars are being dumped into your checking account.'

Elon Musk Fights California For Blocking Production by Yaron Brook

 

Than make your choice, and face its consequences. Choose: Galileo or the Pope.

 

Circulus in probando, since Rand can provide no moral argument against monsters like sadistic murder William Edward Hickman of 12 year old Marion Parker. Ayn Rand loved to praise the infamous Hickman as a true "individual." In fact, she wrote a "Atlas Shrugged" type novel titled "The Street" idolizing Hickman.

Google it! I'm not your mother!

Are ethics objective, or subjective? "X is good." How would that statement be objectively verified?

Stalin just let his people starve to death--the old, sick, and poor, and did nothing to help them. He and the others justified mass murder as Social Darwinian "Herd Immunity" because it was in their self interest. Trump loved reading Hitler's "Mein Kampf" according to one of his many wives.

Mark Ames: Paul Ryan’s Guru Ayn Rand Worshipped a Serial Killer Who Kidnapped and Dismembered Little Girls

Now everything you know about Ayn Rand you have to vomit up.

 

If it exists in reality, it's objective, and that's the only side there is. There is only one "is" for "is", always.