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Ayn Rand

Melendwyr said:
Wrong.

Either you're willfully misunderstanding the point, or you're too dumb to have a meaningful conversation with.
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I agree with delphi_ote.

Besides, instead of spitting invective, you could have shown us where in Rand´s philosophy it say that killing people who stand in the way of your wishes is a bad thing.
 
CFLarsen said:
I mean...they are right. So why should they care what your argument is?
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There's a hint of the Rand dialogue in there, if you add the necessary exposition:

Davin Steelreign confidently strode across the hall, the intrinsic fear rendered farsical of the cowardly emptiness of those weakened by their utter inability to quest for the secret volition of their inner will surrounded him in intimidated silence. Each step clanged and chortled on the marble floor as he swung effortlessly to his position in the front of their midst. He inhaled a large breath into his powerful frame, clenched a hard-won microphone in his endlessly sure grasp, waited a few couple of moments- then demanded with a sureness that rocked the foundations of unkempt unwillingness, "You're wrong."
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ETA Davin would then go on to talk for 50 more pages, of course.
 
What a bunch of hooey.

It's not great literature, it's something that has to be sponsored by Advil, in order to boost sales.
 
Melendwyr said:
It's people like you who used to burn heretics at the stake, who burned down the Library of Alexandria, who blew up the World Trade Towers, and who try to teach lies in science classes.
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Wow.


I mean. Wow.

W.

O.

W.

(Or perhaps I really mean, W. T. F ?)
 
Chaos said:
Besides, instead of spitting invective, you could have shown us where in Rand´s philosophy it say that killing people who stand in the way of your wishes is a bad thing.
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But it doesn't say that. It doesn't say it's good either.

I can't go through the entire text of the book demonstrating that Rand didn't say any thing someone here makes up and claims that she says.
 
Melendwyr said:
But it doesn't say that. It doesn't say it's good either.
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She doesn't?

Calmly and impersonally, she, who would have hesitated to fire at an animal, pulled the trigger and fired straight at the heart of a man who had wanted to exist without the responsibility of consciousness.
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Then why does her hero do it?
 
Melendwyr said:
You're using disambiguation as a rhetorical device. Dagny does not do 'it'. Nor has she stopped beating her wife.
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Nice try. Dagny does in fact kill someone who stands in the way of her goal. Let's try this again:

Calmly and impersonally, she, who would have hesitated to fire at an animal, pulled the trigger and fired straight at the heart of a man who had wanted to exist without the responsibility of consciousness.
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Can you read English?
 
Calmly and impersonally, she, who would have hesitated to fire at an animal, pulled the trigger and fired straight at the heart of a man who had wanted to exist without the responsibility of consciousness.

Hmmm, sounds familiar:

Calmly and impersonally, she, who would have hesitated to fire at an animal, pulled the trigger and fired straight at the heart of a man who had wanted to be a capitalist opressor.

Calmly and impersonally, she, who would have hesitated to fire at an animal, pulled the trigger and fired straight at the heart of a man who was a Jewish bacillus masquarading as a human being.

Calmly and impersonally, she, who would have hesitated to fire at an animal, pulled the trigger and fired straight at the heart of a man who had dared to challange white supremacy.

Calmly and impersonally, she, who would have hesitated to fire at an animal, pulled the trigger and fired straight at the heart of a man who had defied the will of Allah.

(etc., etc., etc.)

Clearly, for Rand, those who "want to exist without the responsibility of consciousness" have no right to live. It's a pity they are 99.5% of mankind (anybody except the all-knowing objectivists) but hey, you can't make an objectivist utopia without breaking eggs, you know.
 
The fact that she's not actually interested in having the government run people's lives makes her a fascist?

No, the fact that those who disagree with her are worthless and can be killed at will makes her fascist.

I don't think that word means what you think it does.

If your definition for who is a fascist is what they SAY their goal is, then nobody is ever a fascist in the sense of wishing opression and genocide: even Hitler and Stalin kept speaking of freedom, liberty, a bright future, etc., etc.

What makes someone a fascist is their disregard for human life, and in particular seeing those who stop one from reaching one's preferred "utopia" as less than human. This is Rand's attitude: those who disagree with her goal of "not having the government run people's life" are worthless and can be killed.

And she doesn't value human life?

No--at least not that of those who aren't objectivists and/or otherwise disagree with her.

Really, that is a remarkably weak accusation. Rand notes that value is subjective arbitrary -- people can be said to have true values only to the degree that they recognize and operate according to the objective principles that define reality.

Which is a fancy way of saying that if an objectivist (like Rand or her heroes) considers someone's life worthless, then--since they (and they alone) judge "according to the objective principles that define reality", then the "true value" is that person's life IS nothing.

It is quite typical of Rand's hubris to think that she discovered some amazing thing when she says that values should be based on reality and not on illusion. Gee, really?!?! This idea is as old--and older--than Kant and, long before, Plato and Aristotle; she discovered nothing new.

She merely thinks that what she thinks is reality is the one and only correct description of the world. In practice her demand that people "operate according to the objective principles that define reality" is simply a demand that people operate in agreement with what she says. Disagreement with Rand is by definition wrong, since she defined her views and values and the only ones that really are in sync with "the objective principles that define reality".

Sorry, I'm not buying it. This is circular logic: it's like claiming the bible being true because the bible says so.

their goals are not achieved and ultimately they produce their own destruction.

Rand's goals were not achieved either, her cult is in decline, its "intellectual" efforts a joke. I suppose that proves Rand's objectivism was wrong? No, that can't be. Like the failure of communism, the failure of objectivism is, somehow, is the world's fault.

It's people like you who used to burn heretics at the stake, who burned down the Library of Alexandria, who blew up the World Trade Towers, and who try to teach lies in science classes.

I suppose you are trying to say that I am against "reality" or "objective facts". Well, not really. I merely think there isn't the slightest reason to believe Ayn Rand mysteriously found the one and only truth about how reality is and what the objective facts about the world are.

Why on earth should we think Rand more correct than, say, Kant or Plato? They, too, claimed to have discovered how reality "really is" and what moral principles of behavior follow from that reality. They certainly were FAR more intelligent than Rand and had MUCH more sophisticated reasons to think as they did.
 
Melendwyr said:
But it doesn't say that. It doesn't say it's good either.

I can't go through the entire text of the book demonstrating that Rand didn't say any thing someone here makes up and claims that she says.
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But you CAN go through the book to find at least one or two places where she says that people who disagree with her ideas do have intrinsic value. That is, IF such places exist.
 
Skeptic said:
No, the fact that those who disagree with her are worthless and can be killed at will makes her fascist.
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1) She doesn't think that, and 2) you don't know what 'fascism' is.

What makes someone a fascist is their disregard for human life
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Idiot.

Which is a fancy way of saying that if an objectivist (like Rand or her heroes) considers someone's life worthless, then--since they (and they alone) judge "according to the objective principles that define reality", then the "true value" is that person's life IS nothing.
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Idiot.

She merely thinks that what she thinks is reality is the one and only correct description of the world.
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Is she correct? Not that you have the capacity to evaluate that question.

Sorry, I'm not buying it. This is circular logic: it's like claiming the bible being true because the bible says so.
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Idiot. Is the Bible false because it says it's true?

I suppose you are trying to say that I am against "reality" or "objective facts". Well, not really. I merely think there isn't the slightest reason to believe Ayn Rand mysteriously found the one and only truth about how reality is and what the objective facts about the world are.
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I don't know any Objectivists who think she did. Strawman argument, idiot.
 
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