-Submitted by David Drumm (Nal), Guest Blogger
The GOP hearts Ayn Rand. Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI), Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) and his father Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX), all mention the works of Ayn Rand as being influential in their lives. Even Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas references her work as influence in his autobiography. Alan Greenspan, former chairman of the Federal Reserve, is an acolyte of Rand’s thinking and knew her personally.
I would like to focus on one aspect of Ayn Rand’s philosophy, Objectivism, and its implications for Christianity.
Rand saw the role of any philosophical system as the understanding of reality. Reality (existence) and the ability to understand reality (consciousness) are at the heart of Objectivism. Considering existence (reality) and consciousness (man’s awareness of it), Rand assigns primacy to existence, “the universe exists independent of consciousness (of any consciousness).” In other words, “wishing doesn’t make it so.”
For Rand, consciousness is the faculty of perceiving that which exists, “consciousness is consciousness of an object.” Eric Johnson, in a review of chapter one of Leonard Peikoff’s book Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, wrote:
Since the nature (identity) of consciousness is to be aware of reality, existence is prior to, necessary for, and not subject to the control of, consciousness.
Consciousness cannot be conscious only of itself because you run into the chicken-and-the-egg problem. Consciousness requires objects to be aware of in order to create consciousness. Sensory deprivation does not validate the notion of consciousness without anything to be conscious of. Consciousness of objects, and their associated memories, were already formed before any experiments with sensory deprivation.
Rand’s primary axiom of Objectivism is the Primacy of Existence. In contrast is the Primacy of Consciousness, “the notion that the universe has no independent existence, that it is the product of a consciousness (either human or divine or both).” Rand’s Primacy of Existence is the reason for Objectivism’s position of atheism with respect to religion, especially Christianity and its “creator God.”
The Christian concept of God as a disembodied consciousness that created everything, except itself, is antithetical to Rand’s philosophy of Objectivism. Objectivism provides a solid philosophical foundation for rejecting the Christian worldview.
The Primacy of Existence hasn’t received the media attention that it deserves, and I doubt that Rand’s fans in the GOP/Tea Party would understand its ramifications.
H/T: AlterNet, Anton Thorn, Dawson Bethrick, Objectivism Wiki, Ayn Rand Lexicon.
Jim Smith:
He did follow her in the early to mid 60’s. If he had followed her, he would have let the interest rates peg to market forces. He did not, he manipulated interest rates especially during the Bush years. Thus the housing bubble.
I don’t know why you say Greenspan followed Rand’s Rx for the economy, when he clearly did not.
If you can find where she says that interest rates must be controlled by one organization, I will kiss your ass (assuming you have one) on the capital steps at noon on any given Wednesday. Hopefully he/she wont mind.
Now you are changing the subject.
“We already have seen what your jack booted thugs have done; Russia, Germany, China, North Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Argentina, Spain.”
Actually Roco the “Jack Booted” thugs you talked about, most
specifically in NAZI Germany would have been inspired by your hero Ayn. She was the one who divided up the world into the “Ubermenschen” Doers and the “Untermenshen” parasites. Hitler espoused the same philosophy when he discussed the parasites that had to be removed from Aryan Society, namely Jews, Gypsies and homosexuals. Anyone who sees the world through these lenses would be proud to don his Jack Boots and trod upon the “parasites” both literally and figuratively.
Ignorantly you constantly use the equation of those who disagree with you as fascist collectivists which is a fit oxymoron for you who displays what a moronic sociopath would look like. Most sociopaths are capable of supplying glib rationalizations, Rand and you not so much. You frankly disgust me and yes it is because of my disgust that I refuse to continue debating you and resort to ad hominem attacks. Your arguments have been thoroughly discredited and yet you continue to repetitively reiterate them since your belief is a necessity for you to avoid seeing the pathetic person, lacking human empathy that you are.
Is it any wonder that Rand saw a 1920’s sexual serial killer as heroic?
To Roco,
Yes, I am serious. That statement was based largely on the influence of Greenspan. It is interesting that you keep deflecting the conversation away from Greenspan to Reagan. Because I know Rand well, I keep reminding you of the influence she had on Greenspan and he, in turn, upon the economic problems we now face.
1974 to 1977 – Chairman of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers under President Ford
August, 1987 thru Januaqry, 2006 – Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve after initial nomination by President Ronald Reagan followed by Bush Sr., Clinton, and Bush Jr.
November, 2005 – Awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President George W. Bush
Greenspan was a follower of Rand’s philosophy of Objectivism. Thirty-one years of influence in government the last 18 of which were spent as Chairman of the Fed, a board that controls the monetary policy of the entire nation.
Gyges:
I believe that the deregulation is half assed. If you look at the code of federal regulations, there are litterally tens of thousands of regulations covering the banking industry and it’s many subsidiaries.
The reason regulations even come into being is human imperfection. Then imperfect humans create a regulation to “fix” human imperfection. And so the cycle goes until you have thousands of pages of regulations, each one put in place to repair the damage done by the previous one.
How do you regulate something that has a thousand possibilities? If I subsidise wheat prices in Minnesota, how does that affect the price of orange juice in Florida? Or if a cap is placed on the interest a credit card company can charge how does that affect the cost of gas or the stock price of the company? And how do I know if I didnt put a cap on the interest rate that it might end up being less than what the original limit was?
You can make fun all you want, but those are valid questions which most honest economists cannot answer.
To Tony C.,
Our disagreement is fundamental. You see government as a machine designed to serve a purpose whereas I see government as an extension of the persons governed and thus more human than mechanical.
The tool you champion is incapable of anticipating change for it is designed to accomplish specific task/tasks. When that task is finished the tool is dormant. Are the citizens on Main Street then to take time from their daily chores to design a new tool for the next emerging task that needs to be accomplished or have they placed men and women within government to anticipate the evolving changes and design the new tools necessary to accomplish the task? Are these men and women robots designed and programed to accomplish the task of anticipating change and designing the appropriate tools? If so, do they shut down at 5:00 pm when the power is turned off?
You have presented me with a view of a government model which you think should be rather than the one that actually exists. I cannot refute an argument based on a dream as if it were reality. Perhaps, given time, humans will develop artificial intelligence to the point that representatives will be robots programed to implement those tools for which the majority have voted. Perhaps, given time those robots will even be capable of handling programs designed to anticipate change, analyze it, and present solutions to the general populace upon which they may vote. Until then we must rely on the humans that populate our government institutions. If those people are “I” centered in their philosophies we will continue to experience the inequality of economic and social conditions that presently plague our nation.
When and if government actually becomes a machine, we can argue the lack of human presence within its departments. We may, at this time, wish to argue the appropriateness of government becoming a machine. What we cannot do is argue your dream of what government should be as if it actually were.
Buddha et al,
You guys don’t understand, the reason that deregulation has failed so spectacularly is that we just didn’t do enough of it.
See, since we deregulated JUST the S&Ls under Reagen, OF COURSE they failed. Same goes for Enron, and the home mortgage industry. Haven’t you guys learned anything from history? True Objectivist policies (you know the ones that eat their oats with cream) have just never been tried.
Buddha is Laughing:
Eat a bullet? No way, we’re not going to let you fuchnuts fuch people over. We already have seen what your jack booted thugs have done; Russia, Germany, China, North Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Argentina, Spain.
Isn’t that enough death and destruction for one philosophy? Seems to me, based on all of those countries, it would be better if your crowd ate that bullet instead.
The human race would be manifestly better off had Marx taken your advice in 1840.
Tony C:
“I am a full time research scientist, it is my job to produce good new ideas, and I don’t look for them anywhere except in my own head. I’ve overturned decades old dogma in my field three times, I didn’t get the ideas to do that from somebody else. In fact I’d say I got my ideas by divorcing myself from the dogma and outside influence.”
Welcome to Objectivism.
@Jim Smith: A government should always be looking outward for new ideas and solutions.
See, that is so vague as to mean nothing to me. First of all, “new” doesn’t mean good, fair, or profitable or useful.
I am a full time research scientist, it is my job to produce good new ideas, and I don’t look for them anywhere except in my own head. I’ve overturned decades old dogma in my field three times, I didn’t get the ideas to do that from somebody else. In fact I’d say I got my ideas by divorcing myself from the dogma and outside influence.
There is a logical conundrum in your prescription: If everybody is lookout outward to borrow the solutions of others, who is producing the solutions?
It seems to me this is a consumer’s prescription, not a producer’s description; and I find myself more often on the solution-producer side of the counter. When they look outward, they are looking for people like me.
As for government, I still disagree: Government should grow until it meets the needs of the citizens that a super-majority of citizens want met; and then stop growing and remain static until a super-majority demands more (or less) service.
A government is a machine designed to serve a purpose, it is not a living entity. Governments are composed of people but should not act like some monolithic independent person. The government should be a tool of the citizens and perform the functions the citizens demand. I do not expect my tools to innovate and experiment with new ways to accomplish their job, I want them to perform their job as fast as possible without any loss of precision and with as little variance in either time or precision as possible.
Which is why I do not think we should anthropomorphize either “the government” or “the country,” which is what you are doing. There is no mind. If you think about it, Greenspan was simply a gullible, sociopathic, ideologically consumed fool that was looking outward for new ideas and solutions, and found Ayn Rand.
Again, have you added psychic to your list of super powers, Übermench? Shot also means “stroke, throw, strike or score points”.
But so what if I did mean a gun?
I wasn’t kidding a bit when I said the world would be a better place of you bunch of venal narcissists went out and ate a bullet.
I just calls ’em like I sees ’em, Randie. At least Jim isn’t making up definitions of words to suit his purposes or fabricating history . . . you know, that thing you do. Also known as lying. Now how about that Greenspan!
Buddha is Laughing:
you definitely meant a shot to the head as in with a gun. But good try at dissembling.
If rafflaw had said that I would have believed him, he isn’t shit crazy.
Too much stress in your life? Cant handle the fryer and shake machine at the same time? Maybe you should go back to crushing cans for a living.
Jim Smith:
The government has embraced Rand’s philosophy for the last 30-40 years? Are you serious?
What do you base that on? A tax break given by Reagan and some minor deregulation? Or maybe it is the large growth in government? Or foreign wars which have no apparent US interests at stake? Or is it the bail out of large banks and GM?
You don’t know Rand either, stick to religion.
Jim Smith:
Allen Greenspan broke with Rand a long time ago. What is there to say. He wrote an article on the gold standard in the 60’s and for whatever reason decided Rand and Objectivism wasn’t for him. I guess he thought markets could be manipulated by intelligent people assigning arbitrary values to interest rates.
It didn’t work out very well did it? Just as Rand predicted.
As far as Reagan goes? She was against him for abortion and other reasons. He was actually one of the first compassionate conservatives and he embraced the moral majority.
Buddha is Laughing wouldn’t believe it anyway. He is nothing but a name caller.
And as far as name calling? I have been called all sorts of names, just scroll up. At some point, it becomes evident that minds have been made up.
To Gyges,
Thank you for the hospitality.
To Tony C.,
Ah, thank you for the clarification. I should have recognized it immediately. I would disagree with you as to the philosophy/role of government in reality by simply pointing to the immense influence Greenspan had on our economic policy. I do believe that the path chosen by this government over the last 30-40 years was heavily influenced by the Rand philosophy and the failure of that philosophy has been manifested with some clarity. Although we are not ruled by a Monarch, the philosophy of those in highly placed and influential offices can carry the same weight as a Monarch. A government should always be looking outward for new ideas and solutions. A government looking inward, “I” centered, becomes defensive and repressive. New ideas and solutions are growth.
I meant to use the word ‘the’ as there are many who consider the concept of evil to be a myth born of religion. I view evil as the intentional corruption of innocence. It is my singular definition and there is no scale. There are words such as ‘bad, hurtful, immoral, depraved, wicked, etc.’ which I use to describe certain acts, actions and persons but the term evil I save for those who intentionally corrupt the innocent. It has been my experience that the truly evil person rarely commits a crime but rather he takes great pleasure in making criminals of others.
“You are a
clownjester.”There.
That’s better.
Yep.
Sucks to be you, Roco.
Just can’t seem to get any traction for St. Ayn, can ya, sport?
Also, a shot to the head could be a fist. You’re the one who brought guns into it. However, if your lot would just step up to the plate and shoot yourselves, humanity would be much better off. Thanks for asking!
To Roco,
Your ideas have been challenged and you lack thoughtful answers. This leads me to suspect that you have not acquired ownership of the thoughts but are merely parroting the words of others.
Buddha is Laughing challenged your position with the words: “The heart of our current economic problems lies squarely with Greenspan, Reagan and both Bush clowns. They drove the car into the ditch.”
As Greenspan was a particular favorite of Rand’s, you should have been prepared to answer the challenge, rebutting Buddha is Laughing’s characterization of Greenspan’s role in our present economic crisis and supporting Rand’s good opinion of him.
Instead you centered on Reagan who Rand did not support due to his anti-abortion stand and to the fact that he ran against Ford at the ’76 convention. Ford was a favorite of Rand’s because Greenspan worked in the Ford administration. Once again you failed to grasp the Greenspan factor in a Rand argument.
You then chose the path of name calling which is always the sign of a weak argument. Needless to say, your Rand argument has lost further ground.
@Jim Smith: You said, There is no growth in “I” centered philosophies because there is no looking outward towards expansion.
Ayn Rand was proposing an “I” centered philosophy of economics and the role of government. It was a political /economic treatise. Your criticism of this political / economic treatise was that there was no “growth” in it, or no “looking outward,” from which I inferred you thought these imprecise concepts actually mattered in the role of government or economics.
2) …your views on the concept of evil.
As an atheist with no supernatural beliefs whatsoever; I’m not sure how to interpret the phrase, “the concept of evil.” I mean, the word “THE” in that phrase asserts singularity, as if there can be only ONE concept of evil.
So this won’t be that satisfying or definitive an answer. I’m not even sure I have a concept; in the sense of a coherent structure with parts, what I have is more of a definition. I think of certain kinds of acts as evil, and the people that execute them and/or promote them as evil people.
I guess I think of acts that harm innocents for personal gain (or pleasure) as evil. The harm can be physical, financial, or emotional.
For example, a serial killer is evil, a thief is evil, a wife-beater is evil, a rapist is evil, schoolchildren taunting a mentally disabled child are evil.
I think there is a scale of evil. Saddam Hussein or Hitler were far more evil than Bernie Madoff or a street pickpocket or a school bully. They are all evil, but since we have to budget for which evils to address with force, there are certainly distinctions to be made.
I think not all people are evil all the time, although some are. The schoolchildren can grow out of it; I don’t think a thrill killer will, or is redeemable in any way.
On the other hand, I do not believe cancers and other diseases are ‘evil.’ There is no intent to harm or intent to gain; they are blind, brainless biological reactions, no more evil than the growth of facial hair. They can be tragic and heart-breaking and frightening, but not everything that fits that description or ends a human life is ‘evil.’
But my definition is certainly incomplete. I was a partner in a business that drove twelve competitors out of business. So we did them some financial harm, but I don’t think of it as evil, because we competed fairly; we advertised and marketed and our customers chose us.
So I am not sure my “concept of evil” (or THE concept of evil) is much different than my concept of right and wrong; although I probably reserve the word “evil” for the more extreme cases of intentional wrong without regard to the suffering of others.