Jump to content

Objectivism

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 24.218.92.157 (talk) at 18:51, 17 September 2004 (→‎Criticisms of Objectivist scholarship). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Objectivism (capitalized) is the name chosen by Ayn Rand for her philosophy. She characterized it as a philosophy "for living on earth"; that is, grounded in objective reality and aiming to facilitate moral interaction among humans, as well as between humans and the natural world.

Objectivism has two main themes. The primary theme is a focus on the sanctity of the individual human being and his capacity to reason. In Rand's own words:

My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute.

The other theme, from which we get the name "Objectivism", is Rand's trichotomy among the "intrinsic", the "subjective", and the "objective". Neither concepts nor values are "intrinsic" to external reality, but neither are they merely "subjective" (by which Rand means "arbitrary" rather than "subject-dependent"). Rather, Rand contends that properly formed concepts and values are objective in the sense that they meet the specific needs of the individual human person. This theme thus follows from the first.

Objectivist tenets

Metaphysics: objective reality

Objectivism bases its metaphysics on the Law of Identity (Aristotle's "A is A"), which Objectivism understands to have several fundamental implications about the nature of reality and its relation to mind. In Objectivist thought, "A is A" means in part that "existence exists" and "consciousness is conscious".

Everything that exists is said to have identity, by which Objectivism means more than tautological self-identity. Everything that exists is said to have a specific nature (consisting of various properties or characteristics); "to be" is to be something in particular. Moreover, Objectivism holds that the properties and characteristics in question must exist each in a specific measure or degree; in this respect "identity" also means finitude. According to Objectivism, then, everything that exists has a specific finite nature.

The nature of objective reality is also said to be independent of mind. Objectivism emphasizes this point by distinguishing between two metaphysical premises: the "primacy of existence" premise and the "primacy of consciousness" premise. According to the first, existence is logically or metaphysically prior to consciousness; the second, vice versa.

Objectivism accepts the "primacy of existence" premise and offers in its support the proposition that consciousness is always consciousness of something that is in some way logically prior to the state of consciousness itself.

Objectivism further offers the "primacy of existence" premise, supported by this argument, as a refutation of both theism and idealism. Objectivism grants, of course, that some parts of reality are mental events and mental creations. But if what fundamentally exists is independent of any consciousness, Objectivism contends, then the universe as a whole is neither the creation of a divine consciousness nor itself mental.

According to Objectivism, then, neither the existence nor the nature of reality depends fundamentally on anyone's awareness of it, nor on anyone's beliefs or desires. Nor is reality in any fundamental way constituted by consciousness.

Moreover, according to Objectivism, objective reality is noncontradictory; no two facts of reality can contradict each other. Further, each thing's specific nature determines how it acts; this principle is Objectivism's formulation of the law of causality. Nature is to be explained in terms of nature, without reference to the supernatural.

Objectivism rejects the mind-body dichotomy, holding that the mind and body are an integrated whole, neither one of which can exist without the other, and neither of which can be interchanged between persons. Objectivism therefore rejects not only theism and idealism but also materialism, as well as any value judgment that is based upon a dichotomy between mind and body. Objectivism does not propose or favor any particular metaphysical or scientific explanation of the relationship between mind and body.

Epistemology: reason

Objectivism's epistemology, like the other branches of Objectivism, was present in some form ever since the publication of Atlas Shrugged. However, it was most fully explained in Rand's 1967 work Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology. Rand considered her epistemology central to her philosophy, once remarking, "I am not primarily an advocate of capitalism, but of egoism; and I am not primarily an advocate of egoism, but of reason. If one recognizes the supremacy of reason and applies it consistently, all the rest follows."

According to the Objectivist epistemology, through sensory perception and a distinctively Objectivist process of reason, one can achieve absolute knowledge about his environment. In doing so, it rejects skepticism. As a corollary, it also maintains that anything that is not learned by objective, rational means is not true knowledge, rejecting faith as a valid means of attaining knowledge.

From sensations to concepts

Sensory perception is considered axiomatically "valid", on the grounds that it is self-contradictory to deny the efficacy of the senses as sources of genuine knowledge. (Objectivism argues that such an assertion implicitly relies upon the validity of the senses, since the senses are the only possible source of the alleged knowledge of their invalidity.) Some animals other than human beings operate at the level of sensory perception and thus possess a measure of knowledge.

Sensation, or awareness of raw sensory data, counts as knowledge in a limited way. However, sensations as such are not retained by the mind and so cannot provide guidance beyond the present instant. Perception extends the awareness of the objects of sensation over time, a "percept" being a group of sensations that is retained by the mind. Some animals can apprehend reality on a perceptual level, and humans definitely can.

Human beings are unique in possessing another, higher level of cognition: the conceptual level. According to Objectivism, the human mind apprehends reality through a process of reasoning based upon sensory observation, in which perceptual information is built up into concepts and propositions.

However, humans are not guaranteed to achieve this level of consciousness, instead possessing a "volitional consciousness", reaching the "conceptual level" only by an act of volition to which no one can be led or forced from the outside. All humans by definition have the potential to achieve the conceptual level, but some may fail to actualize this potential -- and some may lapse from the conceptual level by practicing evasion, by which is meant evasion of reason, a deliberate abandonment of the rational consciousness.

Any mind, human or nonhuman, can explicitly hold only so many perceptual units at a time. But the human mind is able to extend its knowledge over a wide range of space, time, and scope by organizing its perceptual information into classifications.

Concept formation

A concept is just such a classification: a mental "integration" of at least two existents that share a common attribute or set of attributes (perhaps in different measures or degrees), each of which is for this purpose regarded as a unit of the concept. Once a concept is formed, it is given a specific definition and assigned a word; thereafter, it can be treated almost as a perceptual object, containing (or otherwise linking to) a wealth of implicit knowledge that need not be held explicitly in consciousness.

These concepts are formed by means of "measurement omission". In order to form a concept, such as "table", from the various particular tables (concretes), one disregards differences of degree or measurement and considers only differences and similarities in kind. Once a concept is formed, it is defined by identifying its "essential" characteristic(s) -- that is, the characteristic or characteristics on which, within the context in which the concept is being formed, the most other characteristics depend.

The reference to "context" here is crucial. Since every concept is formed in a specific context, every definition is therefore contextual. If concepts are properly formed, then even though additional knowledge may require changes to one's definitions, one's later definitions will not contradict one's earlier ones.

What is the role of reason in this process? Reason consists in forming concepts through the use of logic, what Objectivism defines as "the art of noncontradictory identification".

Objectivism denies that the proposition is the fundamental unit of knowledge, arguing instead that concepts themselves constitute the building blocks of knowledge. So, in their way, do percepts, which consist of the knowledge that something exists. Concepts, however, consist of knowledge of what exists.

Errors of concept formation

Not all supposed concepts represent genuine knowledge. In order to constitute knowledge, concepts must be formed validly, in accordance with certain non-arbitrary rules which must be adhered to if we wish to reach valid conclusions. These rules include the laws of identity, noncontradiction, and causality, as well as various principles intended to prevent pseudoconceptual groupings of entities that are not genuinely or relevantly similar.

Apparent concepts that are not formed in accordance with these rules or principles are considered "anti-concepts" and are said to represent failures of integration. A major concern of the Objectivist epistemology is the identification and avoidance of such "anti-concepts", which are regarded as mental monstrosities that do not succeed in referring to any external reality whatsoever. Objectivism also opposes what it calls "floating abstractions", or concepts formed without proper connection to their concrete foundations. In each of these cases, the principle at issue is one known as "Rand's Razor": concepts are not to be multiplied or integrated in disregard of necessity.

It is also an error to identify a concept too fully with one of its referents, i.e. to fail to generalize properly. In the Objectivist view, one who is thus "concrete-bound" (i.e. whose thinking is fixed at the level of concrete entities) is unable to use concepts properly. To be concrete-bound is to fail to achieve a fully conceptual consciousness.

Objectivism refers to any attempt to apply a concept outside its proper scope as "context-dropping". One form of context-dropping is considered a major and dangerous fallacy: the "fallacy of the stolen concept". The stolen concept fallacy consists of invoking a concept while denying the more fundamental concepts on which it depends. Much like the classical logical fallacy of "assuming what you are supposed to prove", the stolen concept fallacy is a fallacy of "assuming what you are supposed to disprove".

While many fallacies are mere errors worthy of no ethical attention, any deliberate commission of a rational error, or the deliberate refusal to abide by reason, is called "evasion"--evasion, that is, of reason. Evasion is considered grossly immoral by Objectivism, as it is a deliberate abdication of the capacities of the human person and a volitional desire to live at a subhuman level.

The analytic-synthetic dichotomy

Objectivism also explicitly rejects the analytic-synthetic dichotomy (and, implicitly, the distinction between sense and reference at least as applied to concepts). Objectivism holds that a concept means, or subsumes, all of its referents together with all of their properties, arguing moreover that it is for this very reason that the human mind is able to engage in inductive reasoning. For Objectivism, then, all propositions are "necessary" in a sense: each (true) proposition reduces to a statement of identity, i.e., a statement that an entity is one of the things that in fact it is. For instance, it might be claimed that while the proposition "1+1=2" is "necessary" because true in all possible realities, the proposition "the atomic mass of hydrogen is 1" is "contingent" because not similarly constant across possible worlds. Objectivism would reply that the second proposition is just as "necessary" as the first: if the atomic mass differed, the substance in question would not be hydrogen. Objectivism recognizes no legitimate meaning of "necessity" other than this one.

The problem of universals

Objectivism offers the foregoing account as the solution of the problem of universals. This problem has throughout the history of philosophy been regarded as a problem of metaphysics, but Objectivism asserts that its proper resolution lies in epistemology. Traditional solutions to the problem divide generally into realism and nominalism. Objectivism regards the first as "intrinsicism" (the view that universals are "intrinsic" to reality) and the second as "subjectivism" (the view that universals are arbitrary creations of the human mind). The proper resolution, Objectivism says, is that universals are concepts, created to meet the unique cognitive needs of the human mind, but objective so long as they are validly formed.

Objectivism, Classical Rationalism, Classical Empiricism

There are many notable differences between Objectivist epistemology and classical rationalism. While a classical rationalist would defend a "thick" conception of reason that includes a priori knowledge and the grasp of relations of necessity, Objectivism defends a "thin" conception that denies the possibility of a priori knowledge, tends to treat the grasp of necessity as something grounded in observation, and relegates reason to the role of classifying and organizing the information provided by sensory perception.

This should all come as no surprise: though Rand described herself as "primarly an advocate of reason," she steadfastly rejected "intrincism," under which she included traditional rationalism. For Rand, reason processes the evidence of the senses. For traditional rationalists, such as Plato, Descartes, Leibniz, Malebranche, Gottlob Frege, and G.E. Moore, reason is the source of knowledge that does not concern the physical world, but rather "The Third Realm." For such thinkers, reason is a kind of mystical intuition concerning eternal, non-spatio-temporal objects (usually, Platonic Forms or Universals). Such thinkers have held (with significant variations) that the mind can just "see" the truth of statements, especially those concerning mathematics and logic. Rand rejected this view: she thought that logic and mathematics were merely the most general sciences about empirical reality.

Equally, though, Rand rejected classical empiricism. Classical empiricists such as Hume, Rudolf Carnap, and A. J. Ayer were denigrated by Rand as "subjectivists" on account of their acceptance of descriptivist theories of meaning and reference. Rand held that such thinkers could not account for the full content of our concepts or the progress of science. Rand also rejected such dogmas of empiricism as eliminativist materialism, behaviorism, reductionism, the idea that physical phenomena are "more real" than biological or psychological phenomena, representationalist theories of perception, the distinction between truths that describe "matters of fact" and those that describe "relations among ideas", and emotivism in ethics.

Rand sought to formulate an alternative to both of these traditions, similar in spirit to the programs of such philosophers as Aristotle, St. Thomas Aquinas, and John Locke.

Ethics: rational self-interest

Objectivism defines an "ethic" as a code of values to guide the choices and actions of human beings, where a "value" is anything which a living organism acts to gain and/or keep. The Objectivist ethic begins with a meta-ethical question: why do human beings need a code of values? The Objectivist answer is that humans need such a code in order to survive as human beings.

Rand summarized her ethical theories by writing:

To live, man must hold three things as the supreme and ruling values of his life: Reason, Purpose, Self-esteem.

Objectivism maintains that, alone among all the species of which we know, human beings do not automatically act to further their own survival. A plant seems to have no awareness of any kind and simply grows automatically; an animal that possesses a faculty of sensation relies on its pleasure-pain mechanism; an animal that operates at the level of perception can use its perceptions to muddle its way through its essentially cyclic life; but a human being, who at least potentially operates at the conceptual level, lives a life that consists of an integrated whole.

Objectivism recognizes, of course, that a biologically human being can survive in a physical sense without operating at the conceptual level at all. Indeed, Objectivism regards the conceptual level as a volitional achievement that not everyone in fact attains. In speaking of "survival" here, however, Objectivism is speaking of survival as a "human being" -- that is, as a being that has realized its cognitive potential and attained to the conceptual level. It is at this level, Objectivism says, that a life is the sort of continuous whole proper to a human being.

Since operating at the conceptual level remains volitional for the duration of one's life, Objectivism holds, human beings require a code of values -- an ethic -- in order to guide them in making the choices and taking the actions that will not only keep them biologically alive but preserve their status as fully human beings. For Objectivism, a "human being" who is not operating at the conceptual level is not, in the proper sense of the word, conscious, and indeed is not even properly human: by lapsing from the conceptual level, a human being "can turn himself into a subhuman creature".

The purpose of the Objectivist ethic, then, is to guide human beings in becoming and remaining "fully human" -- or, in Rand's language, in promoting their survival as ""man qua man". In so doing, it adopts life -- that is, the specifically human form of life -- as its standard.

However, the purpose of the Objectivist ethic as applied by any particular human being is the preservation and promotion of that person's own life (again, as man qua man). In this context, Objectivism seeks to differentiate between the "standard" and the "purpose" of an ethic, adopting "life" as its standard and "one's own life" as its purpose.

"Value", again, is understood as anything which a living organism seeks to gain and/or keep. Objectivism contends that values make no sense without a single "ultimate value" -- and argues that this ultimate value is, for each person, that person's own life.

Objectivism contends, then, that "value" makes no sense apart from the context of "life". Here the Objectivist trichotomy reappears: Objectivism rejects both "intrinsicism" and "subjectivism" with regard to values just as with regard to universals. On the Objectivist account, value (or the "good") is not "intrinsic" to external reality, but neither is it "subjective" (again meaning "arbitrary"); the term "good" denotes an objective evaluation of some aspect of reality with respect to a goal, namely, the life of the human being with respect to whom the evaluation is made.

Objectivism regards the concept of "duty" as one that divorces value from its context in life (and therefore as an "anti-concept"). On its Objectivist definition, a "duty" is a moral obligation rooted in nothing more than obedience to an external authority and independent of one's goals and desires. Such a supposed moral obligation Objectivism sees as particularly destructive; according to Objectivism, one has no obligations other than those one has voluntarily assumed. Even obligations rooted directly in the needs of one's own life count as "voluntary" in this sense, for Objectivism regards the "choice to live" as the fundamental choice from which all other ethical requirements flow.

In Objectivist parlance, a "virtue" is any act by which one gains and/or keeps a value. It is in this sense of the word that Objectivism speaks of the "virtue of selfishness": the Objectivist view is that adopting one's own life as one's ultimate ethical purpose, and then making the specific choices and taking the specific actions that implement that fundamental choice to live, is an achievement worthy of moral respect. It is in this sense that Rand wrote, "Man is a being of self-made soul."

In fact, Objectivism does not list "selfishness" among its official virtues. The "values" officially recognized by Objectivism are reason, purpose, and self-esteem, and the "virtues" by which these are achieved are said to be rationality, productiveness, and pride. Objectivism maintains that productiveness -- work productive of objective value -- is the central purpose of a rational human being's life, reason its precondition, pride its outcome.

Objectivism rejects as immoral any action taken for some other ultimate purpose. In particular it rejects as immoral any variant of what it calls "altruism" -- by which it means, essentially, any ethical doctrine according to which a human being must justify his or her existence by service to others. According to Objectivism, every ethical or moral action has the agent as its primary beneficiary.

Objectivism especially opposes any ethical demand for sacrifice. Objectivism uses this term in a special sense: a "sacrifice", according to its Objectivist definition, is the giving up of a greater value for a lesser one. (In other worlds of discourse, for example baseball and chess, the term is used to mean the giving up of a lesser or shorter-term value for the sake of a greater or longer-term one. Objectivism does not regard such an exchange as a genuine "sacrifice".)

Not all superficially self-interested actions count as moral, however. Objectivism espouses an ethic of genuine self-interest -- that is, of choices and actions that genuinely do promote one's life qua human being, not merely those that we think or hope may do so. The Objectivist ethic can be called one of "rational self-interest" (rational egoism) on the grounds that human beings must discover, through reason, what genuinely is of value to them.

What about interpersonal conflict? Might it not happen that two human beings, each pursuing his or her own rational self-interest, come to an ethical impasse in which they are hopelessly at odds with one another?

Objectivism argues that this is not possible under normal circumstances (though it may happen in emergencies). Ordinarily, if human beings behave rationally, do not claim what they have not earned, and recognize that rational, productive human beings are of tremendous value to one another as trading partners, no irresoluble conflicts will arise.

This claim is the one on which the Objectivist political theory is largely founded. On the premise that no such conflicts are possible and that a world of peaceful trade is of benefit to all rational agents, Objectivism supports a principle of nonaggression. This principle is one of the most important moral rules of Objectivism. "Whatever may be open to disagreement," wrote Rand, "there is one act of evil that may not, that no man may commit against others and no man may sanction or forgive. So long as men desire to live together, no man may initiate - do you hear me? No man may start - the use of physical force against others." Rand's reasoning is that since man's mind and capacity for free will is necessary for morality to exist at all, to take that from him with an immediate threat of force is to prevent and co-opt him from acting morally. Initiation of force is seen by Objectivists as a negation of morality as it precludes choice and freewill by interposing the threat of physical destruction between a man and his desired ends. Furthermore, Objectivism holds that physical force is the only kind of force; that is, it holds that physical harm (or threat of physical harm) is the only way a person may be coerced to take an action against his or her will. Therefore, all actions which are taken in the absence of such threats are voluntary according to Objectivism, and, as a result, they are considered to be moral and fair by definition.

Politics: individual rights and capitalism

The transition from the Objectivist ethics to the Objectivist theory of politics relies on the concept of rights. A "right", according to Objectivism, is a moral principle that both defines and sanctions a human being's freedom of action in a social or societal context. Objectivism holds that only individuals have rights; there is, in the Objectivist view, no such thing as a "collective right" that does not reduce without remainder to a set of individual rights. Furthermore, Objectivism is very specific about the set of "individual rights" that it recognizes as such; the Objectivist list of individual rights differs significantly from the ones adopted by most governments, for example.

Although Objectivism does not use the term "natural rights", the rights it recognizes are based directly on the nature of human beings as described in its epistemology and ethics. Since human beings must make choices in order to survive as human beings, the basic requirement of a human life is the freedom to make, and act on, one's own independent rational judgment, according to one's self-interest.

Thus, Objectivism contends, the fundamental right of human beings is the right to life. By this phrase Objectivism means the right to act in furtherance of one's own life -- not the right to have one's life protected, or to have one's survival guaranteed, by the involuntary effort of other human beings. Indeed, on the Objectivist account, one of the corollaries of the right to life is the right to property, which is assumed to always represent the product of one's own effort; on this view, one person's right to life cannot entail the right to dispose of another's private property, under any circumstances. Under Objectivism, one has the right to transfer one's own property to whoever one wants for whatever reason, but such a transfer is only ethical if it is made under the terms of a trade freely consented to by both parties, in the absence of any form of coercion, each with the expectation that the trade will benefit them.

On the Objectivist account, the rights of other human beings are not of direct moral import to the agent who respects them; they acquire their moral purchase through an intermediate step. An Objectivist respects the rights of other human beings out of the recognition of the value to himself or herself of living in a world in which the freedom of action of other rational (or potentially rational) human beings is respected.

According to Objectivism, then, one's respect for the rights of others is founded on the value, to oneself, of other persons as actual or potential trading partners. Here is where Objectivism's claim about conflicts of interest attains its full significance: on the Objectivist view, it is precisely because there are no (irresoluble) such conflicts that it is possible for human beings to prosper in a rights-respecting society.

Objectivist political theory therefore defends capitalism as the ideal form of human society. Objectivism reserves the name "capitalism" for full laissez-faire capitalism -- i.e., a society in which individual rights (as defined by Objectivism, including property rights) are consistently respected and in which all property is (therefore) privately owned. Any system short of this is regarded by Objectivists as a "mixed economy" consisting of certain aspects of capitalism and its opposite (usually called socialism), with pure socialism at the opposite extreme.

Far from regarding capitalism as a dog-eat-dog pattern of social organization, Objectivism regards it as a beneficent system in which the innovations of the most creative benefit everyone else in the society at no loss to anyone. Indeed, Objectivism accords a high level of respect to creative achievement itself and regards capitalism as the only kind of society in which it can flourish.

Objectivism holds that an official institutional government, though a minimal one, is necessary in order to provide and safeguard such a society; such a government, on Rand's view, must have a territorial monopoly on the use of (retaliatory) force.

On either account, a society is, by Objectivist standards, moral to the extent that individuals are free to pursue their goals. This freedom requires that human relationships of all forms be voluntary (which, in the Objectivist view, means that they must not involve the use of physical force), mutual consent being the defining characteristic of a free society. Thus the proper role of institutions of governance (whether minarchist government proper or its equivalent institutions in an anarchist society) is limited to using force in retaliation against those who initiate its use -- i.e., against criminals and foreign aggressors. Economically, people are free to produce and exchange as they see fit, with as complete a separation of state and economics as of state and church.

Esthetics: Romanticism

The Objectivist theory of art flows fairly directly from its epistemology, by way of "psycho-epistemology" (Objectivism's term for the study of human cognition as it involves interactions between the conscious and the subconscious mind). Art, according to Objectivism, serves a human cognitive need: it allows human beings to grasp concepts as though they were percepts.

Objectivism defines "art" as a "selective re-creation of reality according to an artist's metaphysical value-judgments" -- that is, according to what the artist believes to be ultimately true and important about the nature of reality and humanity. In this respect Objectivism regards art as a way of presenting metaphysics concretely, in perceptual form.

The human need for art, on this view, stems from the need for cognitive economy. A concept is already a sort of mental shorthand standing for a large number of concretes, allowing a human being to think indirectly or implicitly of many more such concretes than can be held explicitly in mind. But a human being cannot hold indefinitely many concepts explicitly in mind either -- and yet, on the Objectivist view, needs a comprehensive conceptual framework in order to provide guidance in life.

Art offers a way out of this dilemma by providing a perceptual, easily grasped means of communicating and thinking about a wide range of abstractions. Its function is thus similar to that of language, which uses concrete words to represent concepts.

Objectivism regards art as the only really effective way to communicate a moral or ethical ideal. Objectivism does not, however, regard art as propagandistic: even though art involves moral values and ideals, its purpose is not to educate, only to show or project.

Moreover, art need not be, and often is not, the outcome of a full-blown, explicit philosophy. Usually it stems from an artist's sense of life (which is preconceptual and largely emotional), and its appeal is similarly to the viewer's or listener's sense of life.

Generally Objectivism favors an esthetic of Romanticism, which on its Objectivist definition is a category of art treating the existence of human volition as true and important. In this sense, for Objectivism, Romanticism is the school of art that takes values seriously, regards human reason as efficacious, and projects human ideals as achievable. Objectivism contrasts such Romanticism with Naturalism, which it regards as a category of art that denies or downplays the role of human volition in the achievement of values.

The Peikoff/Kelley split

Inside the Objectivist movement, there has been considerable dissension and criticism about Ayn Rand's work and her rightful legacy. Leonard Peikoff, the executor of Ayn Rand's estate and her (self-proclaimed) "intellectual heir" promotes Objectivism as a "closed system" that consists merely of what Rand herself wrote and said, and considers any disagreement with anything Rand said as a betrayal of Objectivism. The Ayn Rand Institute (ARI) is aligned with Peikoff's view of Objectivism.

Another school of thought was started by David Kelley, an academic once affiliated with Vassar College who later worked as an independent writer. In his essay "A Question of Sanction," and later in his pamphlet, "Truth and Toleration," he argued for greater open-mindedness in working with other groups. These works opposed the then prevalent view (among Objectivists) that those who are not Objectivist are deliberately committing evasion, and that to work with them is to sanction their evasion, i.e., their unmindfulness, i.e., their evil. Kelley also argued that Objectivism is an "open system" that can evolve beyond Rand's own writings and beliefs, and can even correct her mistakes.

Peikoff informed Kelley that he could no longer lecture under the auspices of the ARI or any of its affiliates. Peikoff claimed that Kelley had violated the basic tenets of Objectivism. Kelley responded by founding the Institute for Objectivist Studies, later renamed The Objectivist Center (TOC). Nathaniel Branden, Ayn Rand's former lover and associate, who had been "kicked out" of Objectivism by Rand herself, later began lecturing at events sponsored by TOC.

Peikoff and ARI hold that Kelley is not even an Objectivist. As Rand held that the key to her original insights was her honesty (rather than any kind of superior intelligence), Peikoff and ARI hold that any conclusion that is inconsitent with Objectivism must have been arrived at through dishonesty (Peikoff allows exceptions only for children, the mentally handicapped, and the mentally ill). In addition, Peikoff and ARI cite Ayn Rand's opposition to libertarianism in the 1960's as a reason to condemn Kelley's work with libertarians and (perhaps more importantly) his explicit categorization of the Objectivist politics as "libertarian." Kelley and TOC counter this charge by saying that Peikoff and ARI are taking Rand's opposition out of context: what Rand objected to was the ethical subjectivism associated with certain early libertarians. As the libertarian movement grew, it came to encompass many thinkers who were not ethical subjectivists, including utilitarians, deontologists, and Aristotelians very similar to Rand.

As Rand's executor, Peikoff handles the copyrights to all of Rand's works (with the exception of Anthem, which has passed into the public domain). He can thus control the translation of Rand's works into other languages. He has the power of editing and releasing Rand's unpublished works, and has written forewords for all the current printings of her books. Kelley, on the other hand, due to his willingness to work with groups that aren't explicitly Objectivist, has gained a more mainstream audience.

Criticism of Objectivism

Objectivism has been criticized on many fronts, both in popular literature and in academic literature. Generally speaking, Objectivist philosophy has had more success in the popular sphere.

Although academics largely ignore Objectivism, some have published in academic journals on various aspects of Objectivism, cf. bibliography of work on Objectivism. Rand published most of her non-fiction essays in her own newsletter and earlier in the journal she edited, in which only those who largely agreed with Objectivism were published. She did not publish in conventional academic journals. Much of the non-fiction Objectivist corpus is available only in the form of audio recordings.

Humanist and religious objections

Many forms of humanist philosophy, and most of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, claim that Rand's belief that man "must live for his own sake . . . with the achievement of his own happiness as the highest moral purpose of his life" is immoral. Both humanists and most members of the Abrahamic faiths hold that people must not live for their own sakes, and that morality calls for people to sometimes sacrifice themselves for others. Rand strenuously objects to this altruistic position, claiming that it is anti-reason. A milder version of this objection is simply that a moral person finds or achieves at least some of his or her own "values" through benefitting others. (Objectivism agrees that direct positive valuation of others is possible, even at the "cost" of one's own life. Rand herself even stated, for instance, that she would step in the way of gunfire to protect her husband, and that this was rational and selfish -- not a "sacrifice" -- because she could not bear to live without him. However, not all commentators agree that Objectivism has given an adequate philosophical account of such valuation.) Other more moderate positions argue for a combination of the two extremes -- that man must simultaneously value himself and others, or that he must value others equivalently to how much he values himself.

Criticisms of Objectivist political theory

A great number of political and philosophical currents challenge the ethics of Objectivism on utilitarian grounds. They define a moral society as one that provides the maximum good for the maximum number of people and that it may require some initiation of force or altruism to achieve that end. From a conservative standpoint, objectivism may assert the superiority of capitalism over fascism or communism, yet Rand's objectivism fails to express the appropriateness of subordinating oneself to the supremely un-individualistic discipline of armed forces in defense of capitalism, let alone risking one's life or crippling injury in defense of capitalism if such is contrary to one's economic and personal interests.

Rand's philosophy also denies the possibility that collective interests dovetail with the personal interests of most. For example, government, with the compulsion of tax collectors, truant officers, and workplace inspectors may be the sole means of ensuring that all children, who have no political power, get a reasonable chance at education instead of being consigned to factories or mines to support their parents. Government alone may have the ability to impose measures of public health against communicable diseases. One widely-held objective of politics is the creation of a "just society"; in the view of some, Objectivism's emphasis on individual rights rather than the collective good will not lead to social justice.

Finally, proponents of anarcho-capitalism view Objectivism's principle of noninitiation of force as contradicting Objectivism's insistence on a monopoly of government, claiming that initiation of force would be necessary in order to maintain such a monopoly.

Criticisms of Objectivist epistemology

As of 2004 there are a few attempts to criticize Rand's epistemology systematically. In one such attempt, Objectivism and the Corruption of Rationality: A Critique of Ayn Rand's Epistemology (2003), Scott Ryan criticizes Rand's defense of reason from a vantage point of more or less Blanshardian rationalism. Ryan maintains that Rand was in fact defending only a greatly weakened conception of reason and points out what he believes to be a number of inconsistencies (and areas of incompetence) in her epistemology. (Among other things, he takes her to task for what he describes as her misunderstanding of the problem of universals, which has throughout the history of philosophy been regarded as a problem not of epistemology but of metaphysics.) Greg Nyquist's Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature is less specifically focused on epistemology but takes Rand to task from a more "empiricist" foundation. Neither of these books are scholarly works published by major scholarly presses.

Criticisms of Objectivist scholarship

Rand is frequently criticized or discounted as a serious philosopher because of claims that she misinterprets the philosophers she criticizes, or that she does not take sufficient steps to provide citations or to use reputable sources in her summaries of philosophers. She is most frequently criticized for her reading of Immanuel Kant, whose philosophy (or Rand's understanding of it) Objectivism explicitly opposes. Critics argue that, far from being an ethics of sacrifice, Kant's ethical philosophy is actually one of reason, pointing out that the categorical imperative amounts to a demand that the intent behind one's actions be logically consistent. However, this latter component of Kantian ethics has long been the subject of controversy: many have found in hard to understand how a Kantian maxim such as "Whenever I go into the forest, I will litter" is logically inconsistent.

Academic institutional support for Objectivism has improved in recent years. There are currently fellowships for the study of Objectivism at the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Texas, and the business schools of universities such as the University of Southern California. Leonard Peikoff published a book to comprehensively present Objectivism, entitled Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand. Other works have been directed at academic audiences, such as Viable Values by Tara Smith, "The Evidence of the Senses" by David Kelley, and The Biological Basis of Teleological Concepts by Harry Binswanger. An academic journal, the Journal of Ayn Rand Studies has been publishing interdisciplinary scholarly essays on Rand and Objectivism since 1999. Whether this new scholarship and institutional support will result in any kind of dialogue between mainstream academic philosophy and Objectivism remains to be seen.

See also

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Objectivism&oldid=5953257"