Well you obviously haven’t read the complete works of Ayn Rand. You are probably too ignorant to even understand the explanations of the piercing truth of Ayn Rand as has been so clearly laid out in this thread. /snark off
With that said, I’think that Randeography is more harmful than you think. Its not merely people who don’t rule the world but know they ought to. Alan Greenspan was an acolyte of Ayn Rand and look where that got us. Rush Limbaugh uses Randisms as punctuation marks in some of his ranting broadcasts. In the first instance her influence reinforces the sort of faith in the market that leads Alan Greenspan to overlook the flaws in the market that led to the recent economic collapse. In the second instance it provides a pseudo-moralistic crutch for people like Rush Limbaugh.
Well, what I see you saying here is that even though my rational self-interest would say that my individual risk level would not outweigh the benefits, I would have to recognize that collectively, if everyone did that, our society would be in jeopardy. I would be forced to realize that it would take a collective self-sacrifice for society to survive. I would have to trust in enough other people making this same decision. Enough people would have to decide that it was worth the risk to be the first dude exposed to enemy fire for society to survive, even if it would have been better for them to be a widget factory owner.
And again, since the military can’t function if everyone is a leader, I would have to give myself over to a centralized command and control structure ready to sacrifice everything for the benefit of the state. Hmmm.
My point, which you illustrated for me, was that a society actually functions not by a bunch of individuals operating from rational self-interest, but by operating in the context of a collective group working in conjunction with one another, including making sacrifices and looking out for other people.
No. You’re confusing rational self-interest with simply saving one’s own skin; i.e. you are context-dropping. *Rational *self-interest means self-interest within the context of one’s rational values, within the context of the entirety of Objectivist ethics. So joining the military is very different than just getting a job that entails some risk. You are protecting some very important Objectivist values, like freedom. It’s in your own best interest to live in a free country, and if you value that freedom, you’d be willing to act to keep it. Otherwise, it’s not a value and you’re not an Objectivist.
Also: There’s a huge difference between mutual cooperation and collectivism. Just because it takes an enormous number of people to defend a country, each person is defending his own values. They are not handing their lives over to a collective, at the expense of their own individuality.
And remember that values are hierarchical. To risk one’s life defending freedom is not a sacrifice, except to someone who values his own skin more than his freedom . . . someone who wouldn’t mind living in a dictatorship. And that’s not an Objectivist.
Understood. But a serious question just the same. It seems that followers of Rand and libertarians are never happier than when they can hold forth and discuss all the various details of their philosophy, idealogy and beliefs. They seem to scorn the nuts and bolts actual real life political mechanics of building upon ideology and turning it into a real Randesia where they can live and enjoy a nation where their views and beliefs are put into action. In short, when do they put up or shut up?
Or is this shapeless utopian dream or some thousand year march in which they attempt to win over one mind at a time and in the meantime ride the back of a society they have contempt for?
Aren’t you “context dropping” as well, by assuming that all threats are equal? Should an Objectivist have rushed to the recruiting office to commit himself to the invasion of Grenada in order to counter the threat to his freedom, given that the threat was so minimal as to be essentially non-existent?
There might be more reason if Canadians swarmed over our borders to impose maudlin female singers and bad beer upon us, clearly, the full weight of her military might far exceeds Grenada. But still, if you determine upon rational analysis that the threat from any given enemy is minor and inconsequential, then you are not gaining anything by offering your ass as a shrapnel-absorption medium.
So it sounds like there are some circumstances where, if I am a true Objectivist, I should be prepared to sacrifice myself so that the … group with mutual interests should survive. I should recognize that if under threat, enough people need to step up in order for the mutually interested group to suceed. It’s not really okay for me to rationally self-interest myself into my backyard bunker.
When it comes to other threats to the group with mutual interests, such as adequate food, water and shelter, it’s probably okay for me to regard this as a matter for other individuals to take care of, if they so choose. I needn’t do anything to address those threats, even though they could threaten the continued survival of the group with mutual interests.
The survival of objectivism > me > other individuals.
Not as far as I can tell. If you are talking about the military, remember that it is all volunteer. The benefits would be set up such that it would be in your own rational self-interest to join an organization where you might occasionally have to risk your life.
Not this either - an Objectivist can certainly take a job as a farmer or in a water purification plant without compromising his principles.
This is more in line with Adam Smith’s line "“It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own self-interest” but Rand would endorse the idea.
I’m not disagreeing with any of this; of course all threats aren’t equal. If there’s not sufficient reason to invade a country, who would volunteer? This is a great way to keep a country’s leaders in line. If they want to start a war that’s not in anyone’s best interest to fight, no one will fight it . . . and they should be voted out of office.
That wouldn’t be a sacrifice. You’re not risking your life for the sake of others, but for the value of freedom; your life would be unbearable without it.
Right, except that would be neither rational nor in your self-interest.
Those are different kinds of “threats” than an invading army. If there are shortages of any commodity, economic factors would apply. If there’s a shortage of widgets, nobody’s stopping me from making them myself, or marketing an alternative, or teaching people to survive without them.
Its rather a pity that you are an atheist, you would have made a splendid Jesuit.
From your lips to the Ears…
Of course, that’s not how it happens, is it? Once they start banging the drums and shrieking slogans of carnage, “rational” goes right out the window, “self-interest” or no. Having been a DFH all my adult life, I had never noticed that the Objectivists were firmly with me in protesting senseless war, but perhaps its because there are so few. Wait a second…are you the guy who sold me the brown acid?
But to fling the metaphor right over the edge of absurdity, what happens if the “enemy” is a country more aligned to the values of St. Ayn than we are? A nation more fervently devoted to the capitalist ideal than our hopelessly non-rational nanny state? Wouldn’t you be logically compelled to treason? Or can you dive into the “honesty and integrity” trapdoor?
Because if everyone acts in their own self-interest, it can yield results which are against their own self-interest. This is sometimes known as the tragedy of the commons. The classic example is cutting down rain forests. It is in everyone’s best interest to have a thriving rain forest. However, it is also in everyone’s best interest to cut down a few of those lovely trees to make paper out of. If everyone acts in their own personal self-interest, they will each get a few lovely trees, but there will be no rain forest. Oops.
To rub salt into the wound, anyone who doesn’t go in and get their trees while the getting was good now has no trees and also no rain forest. So those people are doubly screwed.
This is why values must be long-range and hierarchical. In the long run, the rain forest is a higher value than paper . . . though in this particular example, today’s Objectivists do not recognize the value of a rain forest.
And by the way, if your conclusion contradicts your premise, then either your premise is flawed . . . or your logic is.
Oh I thought we might have been discussing what would happen in Randesia, where the country is RUN by objectivists. I mean, after all if “true communists” populated the soviet union, it would have worked just fine but it turns out that most people were more interested in their backyard gardens than in the collective farm they all had to spend time on.
You see, this is where I feel like I’m getting whipsawed. Isn’t it possible to objectively believe that a public education for all children is in my rational self interest (even if my kids all go to private school)? And if I can extort taxes to pay for a military (I still haven’t heard anyone say that the military should be funded by donations), then why can’t I also extort taxes to pay for public education? And If I can do that then where does it end exactly?
I don’t think there are very many people who “wouldn’t mind” living in a dictatorship or who don’t value freedom, I think that goes without saying. But if the choice were dictatorship or death, wouldn’t an objectivist tolerate the yoke of dictatorship much as Ayn Rand tolerated the confiscation of her wealth through taxation?
You see, this is where I feel like I’m getting whipsawed. Isn’t it possible to objectively believe that a public education for all children is in my rational self interest (even if my kids all go to private school)? And if I can extort taxes to pay for a military (I still haven’t heard anyone say that the military should be funded by donations), then why can’t I also extort taxes to pay for public education? And If I can do that then where does it end exactly?
I don’t think there are very many people who “wouldn’t mind” living in a dictatorship or who don’t value freedom, I think that goes without saying. So you are saying that Objectivists are no different in that they are willing to make sacrifices for things they value above their own life. Well that’s fine and I suppose Rand stated as much when she said she wold die for her husband (who she publicly cheated on, with his permission no less) but how does that army get paid for? Or is everyone bringing their own F-22s and aircraft carriers when they voluntarily sign up to defend our borders?
If a Randeologist had to choose between dictatorship or death, would an objectivist tolerate the yoke of dictatorship much as Ayn Rand tolerated the confiscation of her wealth through taxation or is the tolerability of dictatorship a “values” thing that will produce different actions in different Randeologists?
From what I gather A country operating under a Randologist theocracy would not threaten another country, unless perhaps it really really deserved it (or perhaps it posed a threat to Randesia and Randesia could only hope to win by attacking first.)
I’m not really a Randist either, but ISTM that yes, it would. Because after all, it is in my own rational self-interest to be defended. And to be defended without paying for it seems exploitative.
You are paying for a service. One group of people is specializing in defending, like the police do now. It is in my interest to be sure that there is enough incentive that someone who has those kinds of talents is drawn to use them in ways that benefit me as well as everyone else, and the soldiers and sailors and police as well.
I don’t know that Rand objected in principle to taxation, if that is what you mean.
Sure. You can argue, and many people do, that the benefits of an educated populace are sufficient to be a goal of everyone’s enlightened self-interest.
”In a fully free society, taxation – or, to be exact, payment for governmental services – would be voluntary. Since the proper services of a government – the police, the armed forces, the law courts – are demonstrably needed by individual citizens and affect their interests directly, the citizens would (and should) be willing to pay for such services, as they pay for insurance.
Most people would agree. The only debate is whether public education best achieves that goal.
