Atlas Shrugged

[Zaljerem]

You could reduce Atlas Shrugged to a pamphlet:

1. Francisco's Money Speech
2. Francisco talking to Rearden about self-esteem and sex
3. John Galt on Original Sin.

Those are the three pieces that resonated with me the most, anyway. YMMV.

[Ratman_tf]

You could reduce Atlas Shrugged to a pamphlet:

1. Francisco's Money Speech
2. Francisco talking to Rearden about self-esteem and sex
3. John Galt on Original Sin.

Those are the three pieces that resonated with me the most, anyway. YMMV.

That'd be a big-ass pamphlet.

[pxib]

Ayn never makes anything brief. I'll summarize:

1. "...men had always thought of wealth as a static quantity–to be seized, begged, inherited, shared, looted or obtained as a favor. Americans were the first to understand that wealth has to be created. The words ‘to make money’ hold the essence of human morality."

2.  "...a man’s sexual choice is the result and the sum of his fundamental convictions. Tell me what a man finds sexually attractive and I will tell you his entire philosophy on life. Show me the woman he sleeps with and I will tell you his valuation of himself."

3. "Their myth declares that he ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge - he acquired a mind and became a rational being. It was the knowledge of good and evil - he became a moral being. He was sentenced to earn his bread by his labor - he became a productive being. He was sentenced to experience desire - he acquired the capacity of sexual enjoyment. The evils for which they damn him are reason, morality, creativeness, joy - all the cardinal values of his existence."

[Sir T]

2.  "...a man’s sexual choice is the result and the sum of his fundamental convictions. Tell me what a man finds sexually attractive and I will tell you his entire philosophy on life. Show me the woman he sleeps with and I will tell you his valuation of himself."

Which is probably why she went completely berserk when the man who she had been having an affair with, and to whom she dedicated Atlas Shrugs, fulfilled his selfish moral purpose by unceremoniously dumping her via a letter.  Which caused a massive scandal as the guy had set up the Objectivist foundation

[pxib]

I think that's the trouble with objectivism in a nutshell: The fundamental attribution error.

It's easy to believe that the subjective values you assign people, objects, and activities are objectively true aspects of those things. We love to assign snap-judgements without understanding the complexity of a situation. If you never actually talk to anybody who doesn't agree with you, "A is A" is obvious and comforting.

But we hate to be judged that way. When somebody assigns a low value to us, to our habits, to our friends and family, or to our treasured belongings, it hurts like hell. Their judgment is obviously subjective. Those bastards don't understand my history with these things, the secret inner lives of these people, or just how crucial or enjoyable my habits are. My subjective understanding of myself and the things I love, makes everybody else's subjective view objectively wrong... all without making my views objectively right.

In almost every way that matters in the lives and interactions of real people there is no A.

[TheWalrus]

[UnsGub]

It's easy to believe that the subjective values you assign people, objects, and activities are objectively true aspects of those things. We love to assign snap-judgements without understanding the complexity of a situation.

One could believe humans are not objects with properties.

Consider humans with properties are ones that just limit who they and others are.

[Simond]

"...And that's what your holy men discuss, is it?" [asked Granny Weatherwax.]
"Not usually. There is a very interesting debate raging at the moment on the nature of sin. for example." [answered Mightily Oats.]
"And what do they think? Against it, are they?"
"It's not as simple as that. It's not a black and white issue. There are so many shades of gray."
"Nope."
"Pardon?"
"There's no grays, only white that's got grubby. I'm surprised you don't know that. And sin, young man, is when you treat people like things. Including yourself. That's what sin is."
"It's a lot more complicated than that--"
"No. It ain't. When people say things are a lot more complicated than that, they means they're getting worried that they won't like the truth. People as things, that's where it starts."
"Oh, I'm sure there are worse crimes--"
"But they starts with thinking about people as things..."
--from Carpe Jugulum, by Terry Pratchett.

Also see Reacher Gilt in Going Postal.

[pxib]

Well sure but, as many have observed, one does not get very far in the world without treating people like things. It is only the few proud psychopaths who can completely disregard the humanity of their fellows -- and use them as tools, stepping stones, or piñatas -- who reach the highest echelons of power. The sympathy and sacrifice of the multitudes are the traits these men exploit in order to further their goals. Rand believed sacrificial morality had become so widespread that it had allowed immoral but weak men to rise to power on the backs of men who were strong but moral... so one irony of Rand's ideas (perhaps the least surprising) is that they are foundationally Marxist.

Despite differing political stripes she would find much agreement in the writing of Paolo Friere, especially when he urges us to always strive to be subjects rather than objects: Those who act, rather than those who are acted upon.

Two Marxist idealists who ultimately wanted very similar classless societies, but with very different ideas of how to reach them. Rather than redefining strength from that of the individual to that the community, Rand redefined morality from the sympathetic to the selfish.

[Fabricated]

Or we're still just a ridiculous savage ape species that has grown just enough culture to substitute being a complete amoral sociopath in business/personal relations for caving eachothers heads in with rocks.

[NowhereMan]

It's like someone read Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil and thought it was great but was far too well written and needed to be more about money.