Ayn Rand – what a woman! What a writer!

[Captain Pike]

So I'm reading Ayn Rand's, "Atlas Shrugged", and I could talk on and on about how great it is and actually how tiresome it can be when pages are spent describing a couple of milliseconds of someone's feeling. But it's great, I'm not complaining.
I feel so stupid. There is a line in the beginning of chapter 9,

"She dressed, lighted a cigarette and walked into the living room…".

Why isn't it, "lit a cigarette"? It's the past not the past participle, something like that right? I'm such a dummy. Also, Dickens is always talking about people, "being hanged", don't even tell me why, or when you say, "he was hung" – let's don't go there. I'm ashamed of being unilingual, but can anyone straighten me out here?

[Calidore]

I believe that it's always been objects are hung and people are hanged. Someone else can talk about men being hung; I'm not going there.

[Darcy88]

Ayn Rand - What a witch! What a hack!

Anyway. I think lit and lighted are both acceptable. I actually prefer lighted.

[Cunninglinguist]

Lit and lighted are both, more or less, correct past participles of light, just like spelt and spelled, knelt and kneeled are both correct. Though, the hypercorrect would probably opt for lit, spelled, and knelt. And, of course, norms change over time too...in any case, Calidore is correct about hung and hanged -- people are never hung.

[AuntShecky]

Never mind the "lit" or the "lighted." The question is why would a women purporting to be a literary artist crank out a sentence as trite as this one. I keep recalling an online interview in which Martin Amis states that he'd rather die than write a sentence like "He walked into the room."

We have to keep in mind that what I've gathered about Ayn Rand is that producing a work of literary quality wasn't her main priority. What she was obsessed with was promoting her objectivist philosophy. She put self-interest--as expressed by unrestricted capitalism-up on a pedestal, as she defied anyone with the slightest altruistic sympathy to knock it down.
As a result her works are dreadfully earnest, without a single drop of humor (or for that matter, humanity.)

Having a proverbial ax to grind does not necessarily make a writer a bad one.
For instance, few people agree with me, but I firmly believe that Upton Sinclair's The Jungle is not only an argument against capitalism run amok but it also a work of great artistry, with emotional resonance in its heart-rending portrait of poor people and their struggles.

I can remember a brief period in my life when even I got caught up in a fascination for Ayn Rand (similar to the sensibities of today's youth enchanted by libertarians like Ron Paul. I don't want to elaborate and get into the kind of political discussion that's verboten on my beloved LitNet.)

But it's with a red face that I remember that way, way, way back in the past I liked Ayn Rand. I chalk it up to a youthful indiscretion --or the bouts of temporary insanity adolescents are heir to, a brief detour off the road to intellectual maturity, which in most cases, we eventually and fortunately outgrow.

[cafolini]

I like the part about the outgrowing. Very well stated. But if the foundation of humanity was actually Plato, Aristotle, and Roman Law, as she thought, she was the epidemy of humanity. She was as insane as humanity has shown to be throughout history, and she was very far from being a capitalist, except as what I think was an idiotic reaction to her Russian background.

[Captain Pike]

Okay, either all you bookworms can't bring yourself down to my level, or maybe you just don't know! But this has brought up an interesting point, he said, after having had broughten this point upward previous to now… No no no, just kidding, although that was fun.

Turns out, that, "lit", is the irregular verb conjugation for the past tenses of, "light", a very old and illustrious verb with many uses. The form used by Ms. Rand in her previously mentioned book is actually more normal, since it makes use of the regular verb form rather than the irregular. But both, "lit", and, "lighted", are equally legitimate forms of all cases of the preterit.

[Pendragon take note] Again, we discover an instance where I almost thought I had made a mistake, but thankfully, I didn't and therefore haven't. Not as dumb as I thought I was.

[paradoxical]

"She dressed, lighted a cigarette and walked into the living room…"
I had to laugh a bit because it sounds like the kind of thing Bukowski would write.

"He sat down at the bar, ordered a beer, and lit a cigarette..."

He he. Perhaps "lit" is for dirty socialists and "lighted" is more profitable and corporate, one big libertarian universe...

[stlukesguild]

For me, this article says it all on Ayn Rand:

http://www.firstthings.com/article/2011/05/the-trouble-with-ayn-rand

Captain Pike, if you like her that is all that matters.

[Jack of Hearts]

She sucks so much. The Fountainhead reads like it was written by a bored housewife with the intelligence of a Fox News anchor and the emotional depth of a thirteen year old girl.

It's not "lit a cigarette" because she sucks.








J

[Darcy88]

There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs.

Truth.

[WillardS]

Ayn Rand – what a woman! What a writer!

Sounds like you've drunk the cool-aid.

[MarkBastable]

So I'm reading Ayn Rand's, "Atlas Shrugged", and I could talk on and on about how great it is....

Seek professional advice, I beg you. There are experts who are trained to help unfortunate people like you. Just summon up the courage to admit you have a problem. Think of your loved ones. It may not be too late.

[stlukesguild]

Having a proverbial ax to grind does not necessarily make a writer a bad one.

Indeed. One word answer: Dante.

[xtianfriborg13]

Sounds like a good writer? I'll try find her books!

[SFG75]

Her works do have a cult following in America. The "up by the bootstraps" myth is something that resonates very strongly with some people. They like to believe that individual initiative overcomes the incompetence and attempted thwarting by government. The "g" word is a loaded connotation in the states. I would liken Atlas Shrugged to anything by Dreiser or Steinbeck. The Fountainhead?, not so much.

[Jackson Richardson]

For me, this article says it all on Ayn Rand:

http://www.firstthings.com/article/2011/05/the-trouble-with-ayn-rand

Captain Pike, if you like her that is all that matters.

I do enjoy a good, devastating review. The only person I've known to be an admirer of Ayn Rand was one of the nastiest people I knew. Fortunately I only knew him on a message board, where his icon was a portrait of Ms Rand.

I'm glad I don't have to read the book now.

[cacian]

So I'm reading Ayn Rand's, "Atlas Shrugged", and I could talk on and on about how great it is and actually how tiresome it can be when pages are spent describing a couple of milliseconds of someone's feeling. But it's great, I'm not complaining.
I feel so stupid. There is a line in the beginning of chapter 9,

"She dressed, lighted a cigarette and walked into the living room…".

Why isn't it, "lit a cigarette"? It's the past not the past participle, something like that right? I'm such a dummy. Also, Dickens is always talking about people, "being hanged", don't even tell me why, or when you say, "he was hung" – let's don't go there. I'm ashamed of being unilingual, but can anyone straighten me out here?

It could be a play on word like from ''delighted'' and instead it is 'lighted' without the DE.

[Emil Miller]

For me, this article says it all on Ayn Rand:

http://www.firstthings.com/article/2011/05/the-trouble-with-ayn-rand

Captain Pike, if you like her that is all that matters.

I don't have an opinion on Rand one way or the other; in fact the only book of hers that I bought( We the Living ) was one of the few books that I didn't finish as I found it stylistically unengaging.
However, the above link smacks of the sort of hysteria that Rand's supporters are often said to display, as these extracts indicate:

There was, however, the same frantic look of terrible recognition in my eyes, the same pitch of hopeless horror in my voice, the same sense of doom. I had just discovered that some malevolent wretch had done it at last: had made a film of Atlas Shrugged.

For decades, this monstrous project had haunted the boardrooms of Hollywood studios and the lofts of emotionally arrested screenwriters; the possibility had been dangled like the sword of Damocles over the head of a defenseless world. But, until now, some merciful power had kept the tragic dénouement in abeyance

I suppose I should have seen it coming. It’s the fashion of the moment. Ayn Rand and her idiotic “Objectivism” are enjoying a—well, I won’t call it a renaissance, so let’s say a recrudescence. Suddenly she is everywhere. In the stock television footage of Tea Party rallies, there she always is on at least one upraised poster, her grim gray features looming over the crowd like the granitic countenance of some cruel heathen deity glutted on human blood.

All right, all right—perhaps I’m being just a little spiteful. I may even be overreacting.

Er......just a little.

[stlukesguild]

Emil... perhaps this critique will be more to your liking:

"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs.":devil:

[PeterL]

When I was a child, I sometimes hung by my knees from the swing-set. Criminals should be "hanged by the neck until dead."

Ayn Rand did a mediocre job writing about the obvious. Her characters were flat, and her plots were completely predictable. I believe that there are problems with her philosophy, but I don't regard philosophies as wrong. But I have found that things are often out of the hands of the individual; things happen without my agreement or volition. If everything that I wanted to do would happen, then her philosophy would be useful, or meaningful any way, but things often happen that are not what I want, and I usually have little or no control over what goes on around me.

[Anton Hermes]

It doesn't matter if I loathe the author's politics or philosophy. If she's a good writer, I'll read what she writes. Where Ayn Rand loses me is on the verbal level. I admit I never finished The Fountainhead, because after fifty pages I was only reading to get to her next howler. There are just so many awkward constructions, misbegotten turns of phrase, and so much self-infatuated speechifying, it would take me a year to appreciate them all: The township of Stanton began with a dump. :smilielol5:

[Emil Miller]

Emil... perhaps this critique will be more to your liking:

"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs.":devil:

:hand: While I will admit that a 14-year-old girl might well read LOTR, I don't think she would readily accommodate Ayn Rand until a few years later. I had to check out 'orcs' as, not being a reader of sub-Wagnerian nonsense, I had no knowledge of what they were supposed to be. I see why Rand can be a potent writer for some people because, like others on both sides of the political divide, she offers a portmanteau set of answers to the world's problems, and youthful impatience is naturally attracted to the quick fix; this is also the attraction of Marxism for those who haven't lived long enough to see its utter failure wherever it has been tried.

[Anton Hermes]

youthful impatience is naturally attracted to the quick fix; this is also the attraction of Marxism for those who haven't lived long enough to see its utter failure wherever it has been tried.

I thought Das Kapital sagged in the middle. While capitalism is sagging near the end.

[miyako73]

A paragraph like this makes me scream "move on". Who cares about stones?

"He stood naked at the edge of a cliff. The lake lay far below him. A frozen explosion of granite burst in flight to the sky over motionless water. The water seemed immovable, the stone flowing. The stone had the stillness of one brief moment in battle when thrust meets thrust and the currents are held in a pause more dynamic than motion. The stone glowed, wet with sunrays."

[Phocion]

:hand: While I will admit that a 14-year-old girl might well read LOTR, I don't think she would readily accommodate Ayn Rand until a few years later. I had to check out 'orcs' as, not being a reader of sub-Wagnerian nonsense, I had no knowledge of what they were supposed to be. I see why Rand can be a potent writer for some people because, like others on both sides of the political divide, she offers a portmanteau set of answers to the world's problems, and youthful impatience is naturally attracted to the quick fix; this is also the attraction of Marxism for those who haven't lived long enough to see its utter failure wherever it has been tried.Now, I think that is a little unfair on Marx: he often gets his name tainted by the abject failures of Communism, but in reality, none of them really deserve the tag of Marxist. Marx's economic failings were great, but nothing close to the catastrophic quixotism of marxism-leninism and its outgrowths - i can't see Marx ever thinking this would work.

[Emil Miller]

Now, I think that is a little unfair on Marx: he often gets his name tainted by the abject failures of Communism, but in reality, none of them really deserve the tag of Marxist. Marx's economic failings were great, but nothing close to the catastrophic quixotism of marxism-leninism and its outgrowths - i can't see Marx ever thinking this would work.

Well the fact that all kinds of communist offshoots from Russia to Cuba via central Europe and China described themselves as Marxist, shows that in reality Marxism couldn't succeed on its own terms but had to be adapted to something else for even the basic tenet of state control of the means of production to be adhered to.

[Anton Hermes]

Of course, the main difference between the economic philosophies of Communism and Capitalism is that when Communism was tanking, no one was demanding we keep it afloat with hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars.

[dark desire]

I believe the author and her works have harmed a lot of people. I doubt if she will ever go out of taste for people who have monomaniacal tendencies. Can there be a way literary way of (by the way of parodying) Ayn Rand so that she falls into obscurity? All I have ever read of her were 32 pages of her small philosophy book - The Virtue of Selfishness. I found that silly and constipated. One guy once told me the story of that Howard Roark book (whichever of the two it is). I don't have the patience to read the book. I don't think I will ever be able to bring myself to read Ayn Rand. I still want to understand her a bit. She is the godmother of the minions of capitalism and that culture is gaining popularity in my country. So can we compare Howard roark with one of the rogues of good literature, like Chichikov of Gogol's Dead Souls? If yes then in what ways and if not then why? And if the question I am putting is stupid then tell me that.

[Phocion]

Well the fact that all kinds of communist offshoots from Russia to Cuba via central Europe and China described themselves as Marxist, shows that in reality Marxism couldn't succeed on its own terms but had to be adapted to something else for even the basic tenet of state control of the means of production to be adhered to.

I don't really disagree, but that still doesn't make it Marxism. I just dislike it when so much wretchedness is attributed to the doctrine of someone who was fundamentally opposed to most of it. Some of the attempts at planning were downright farcical - i don't know how anyone thought it could work.

[miyako73]

Can we really call those communist revolutionaries Marxist even though they failed to establish classless societies in their countries?

[Emil Miller]

Of course, the main difference between the economic philosophies of Communism and Capitalism is that when Communism was tanking, no one was demanding we keep it afloat with hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars.

No, the real difference was whether people took their chances on the roulette wheel of capitalism or be forced into accepting a life that conformed to the next five year plan without any means of dissent. As we can see, Russia is now a capitalist country but, unlike the US, one with strong controls over who gets to manipulate the system. Call it anti-semitism, racism or any other-ism, Mr Putin isn't listening.
The same goes for China. The Han Chinese are not going to allow outsiders to get control of their economy and all the bleating about human rights etc., will not deflect them from following their determined path , which is to force the US into second place. As Caesar is supposed to have said: " Better to be the head man in a village than second in Rome."



I don't really disagree, but that still doesn't make it Marxism. I just dislike it when so much wretchedness is attributed to the doctrine of someone who was fundamentally opposed to most of it. Some of the attempts at planning were downright farcical - i don't know how anyone thought it could work.

It wasn't that they were farcical, they were actually deadly to millions of people who died as a result of the disastrous state control of agriculture that saw large numbers of landowners dispossessed of their land and the attempt to control food production by state ownership that resulted in wide scale famine and required the importation of grain from the US to prevent more people from dying than had already done so. Lenin's New Economic Plan was to allow a certain amount of capitalism so that the USSR could recover from the attempt to force communism on Russia. The only thing of value that the communist regime established was the electrification of the country but that could have been achieved without the disasters of communism, as it had been accomplished elsewhere.

[hellsapoppin]

Her works do have a cult following in America. The "up by the bootstraps" myth is something that resonates very strongly with some people. They like to believe that individual initiative overcomes the incompetence and attempted thwarting by government. The "g" word is a loaded connotation in the states. I would liken Atlas Shrugged to anything by Dreiser or Steinbeck. The Fountainhead?, not so much.


Rand wrote about such a scenario and often spoke about it on TV. While she made millions of dollars in her time, she wound up broke and on welfare which she collected under her husband's name. She lived a life of degeneracy in which she repeatedly committed adultery but made sure she would be buried next to her late husband's grave in order to give the appearance of eternal fidelity. Rand was a contradiction as so often is true of her followers, many of whom claim to be righteous Christian Republicans. The great irony being that she was an atheist who called Jesus the biggest fraud in history and openly worshiped what is called ''mammon'' in the Bible which is in total contrast to the teachings of Jesus.

[mal4mac]

...this is also the attraction of Marxism for those who haven't lived long enough to see its utter failure wherever it has been tried.

Is China an *utter* failure? It has co-opted capitalism in a big way, for the moment, but is still defined by a one-party system and declares allegiance to the ideology of Marxism-Leninism. Its constitution claims that all power belongs to the working class, that a democratic dictatorship of the proletariat has been implemented within their borders, and that they are building socialism, with the goal of achieving communism one day.

Do the atrocities committed in China have anything to do with Marxism? Aren't they due to bad management, inadequate understanding of human failings, and insufficient compassion?

Capitalism is in crisis across the globe, maybe Marx, properly implemented, is the alternative?

Sales of Das Kapital, The Communist Manifesto, and the Grundrisse have soared in the UK since 2008, since underpaid British workers were forced to bail out the banks to keep the degraded system going and the snouts of the rich firmly in their troughs.

In 2008, Reuters reported, a survey of east Germans found 52% believed the free-market economy was "unsuitable" and 43% said they wanted socialism back.

Recently, there have been a glut of books trumpeting Marxism's relevance: Terry Eagleton, Why Marx Was Right; Alain Badiou, The Communist Hypothesis...

The bourgeoisie has made the exploited pay for its crisis, but is this something that need continue? The over-exploited are still with us, in factories in the far east. And today's popular movements – Greece or elsewhere – indicate that there's a new will not to let our governments and our bankers inflict their crisis on the people.

For younger people, Marxism's renaissance in the west, is untainted by association with Stalinist gulags, and the victory of capitalism seems, after 2008, no longer written in stone.

Owen Jones, author of the bestselling politics book of 2011, "Chavs: the Demonisation of the Working Class", has said, "There isn't going to be a bloody revolution in Britain, but there is hope for a society by working people and for working people." This is British Marxism, or at least socialism at its best, the type of argument that gave us the NHS, non-violent reform, universal state pensions, and space for others (even capitalists! Though too much bl**dy space for them...)

Even Marx himself, in later writings, imagined a post-capitalist society being won by means other than violent revolution, through expanding suffrage.

Marx seems to have very good ideas for bringing some understanding to economic crises. A crisis like 2008 occurs when reality catches up with the illusory self-generating mirage of money begetting more money. For Marx, there was usefulness in satisfying needs and wants. The ultimate root of the crisis, for Marx, is the gap between use and exchange value, that is, the gap between "usefulness in satisfying needs and wants" and "the amount of labour that goes into making it". So lots of labour goes into making the banker's Porsche, but it is little use in satisfying real needs and wants (like a good education for kids trapped in bog standard comprehensives...)

Does reading Marx and Engel's critique of capitalism mean that you thereby take on a world-view responsible for more deaths than the Nazis? Surely there is no straight line from The Communist Manifesto to the gulags?

In his introduction to a new edition of The Communist Manifesto, Professor Eric Hobsbawm suggests that Marx was right to argue that the "contradictions of a market system based on no other nexus between man and man than naked self-interest, than callous 'cash payment', a system of exploitation and of 'endless accumulation' can never be overcome: that at some point in a series of transformations and restructurings the development of this essentially destabilising system will lead to a state of affairs that can no longer be described as capitalism".

That is post-capitalist society as dreamed of by Marxists. It will necessarily involve a shift from private appropriation to social management on a global scale. But why need this be violent in shift and application?

For lovers of literature, in such uneasy times, who better to read than the greatest catastrophist theoriser of human history, Karl Marx? Surely the broad minded should at least read a key work, like the Communist manifesto, alongside Rand.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jul/04/the-return-of-marxism

[Emil Miller]

Is China an *utter* failure? Is Cuba?

Since China decided to ditch Marxism in all but name, it has become the second most powerful nation on earth and is on course to become the first. In Cuba, with the retirement of Castro, the writing is clearly on the wall for what's left of the communist element of this former client state of the ex-USSR. The introduction of private enterprise into both countries signalled the failure of Marxism in so far as it had been practised, but Cuba's agrarian economy remains hamstrung by the US trade embargo that is currently under review as Cuba continues to cast off the remnants its communist past.

[mal4mac]

The only thing of value that the communist regime established was the electrification of the country but that could have been achieved without the disasters of communism, as it had been accomplished elsewhere.

There are many other things! To name a few: defeat of Nazi Germany, first satellite in space, first man & woman in space, great ballet companies, chess players second to none (accept for one bat crazy American), superb sports people. (All this doesn't excuse the gulags of course, but it shows that communism can generate a lot of progress & culture...)

[Pierre Menard]

Do the atrocities committed in China have anything to do with Marxism? Aren't they due to bad management, inadequate understanding of human failings...


It's like you're describing the very epitome of Marxism. An inadequate understanding of human failings that would ultimately lead to bad management. Marxism in a nutshell.

[mal4mac]

Since China decided to ditch Marxism in all but name...

How do you know it is Marxist only in name? It *could* be the real thing, it might be a communist state pursuing economic reforms using capitalism.


It's like you're describing the very epitome of Marxism. An inadequate understanding of human failings that would ultimately lead to bad management. Marxism in a nutshell.

Is that Marxism? Or is it Marxism as it has been, wrongly, implemented? Did Marx ever suggest sending people to gulags en masse? If Marxism doesn't take enough account of human failings, can't it be improved to take account of these? Many of the basic ideas always seemed good to me: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs." What's wrong with that?

If the Duke takes from the poor to build his mansion, you don't have to shoot him, just tax him 'til he has to convert the mansion into a museum and serve the people by showing then the treasures stolen by his Robber Baron forbears. Something like this has happened in some British stately homes, but usually because the old Duke frittered away the money through gambling & drug taking, and neglected his offshore accounts. We just need to tax them before the money is frittered away...

[Emil Miller]

I'm reminded of Mark Twain's remark, on reading his obituary, that reports of his death had been greatly exagerated. The ironic thing is that capitalism is thriving in China, Russia, Brazil,and India, all countries that 30 years ago were second and third rate economies, and places like South Korea,Taiwan, Singapore and Australia are also thriving, largely because they were not so intimately connected to the collapse of the US financial system that is fondly believed by some to be ushering in a new Marxist age. I agree that there may well be further shocks in store for Europe and the US, and that some of them could lead to some form of insurgency, but there is little appetite for Communism, outside of wishful thinkers like Hobsbawm, in the rest of the world and I very much doubt that China will revert to the poverty stricken years prior to Deng Xiaoping's economic reforms that were enacted in the face of Marxist orthodoxy.

[stlukesguild]

Is China an *utter* failure? It has co-opted capitalism in a big way, for the moment, but is still defined by a one-party system and declares allegiance to the ideology of Marxism-Leninism.

Mac... you do understand that capitalism and communism are economic systems... not systems of government? Either can exist under the most democratic or the most dictatorial of governments.

Many of the basic ideas always seemed good to me: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs." What's wrong with that?

The idea only sounds good to you if you're a talentless lazy schlep. The unanswered question... the same one that Thomas More skated past back in Utopia... was how do you promote motivation? What is going to motivate someone to put forth 15 or 20 years of schooling to become a heart surgeon when he or she could do just as well... better even... if he just jumps into some mindless job right after basic secondary school, gets married, and pumps out a brood of children? What motivates the individual to invest in a business... his or her own... or another's... without the incentive of a possible large reward? What motivates someone to put forth the long hours in starting his or her own business? Or perhaps we can be brainwashed into believing that the good of state are more important that our own needs and desires?

[mal4mac]

... how do you promote motivation? What is going to motivate someone to put forth 15 or 20 years of schooling to become a heart surgeon when he or she could do just as well... better even... if he just jumps into some mindless job right after basic secondary school...


Learning is an enjoyable activity, and surgery is one of the most enjoyable jobs - read Csikszentmihalyi's work on "Flow" to see the backing for this. Besides intrinsic interest, social expectation can provide motivation, who said "from those with great gifts, much should be expected?" Of course if a particular grade A science student decides heart surgery is too stressful for him, he shouldn't be forced to do it... Also I'm not arguing that people should all be paid the same, there is obviously a place for some wage difference, it's just the difference between the wages of the average person (or doctors!) and that of investment bankers & CEOs is crazy. A good case could be made, I think, for keeping doctors wages as they are (around £100K a year in the UK) with the prime ministers being the top wage (around £140K.) Who needs more money than that?

[OrphanPip]

I'm reminded of Mark Twain's remark, on reading his obituary, that reports of his death had been greatly exagerated. The ironic thing is that capitalism is thriving in China, Russia, Brazil,and India, all countries that 30 years ago were second and third rate economies, and places like South Korea,Taiwan, Singapore and Australia are also thriving, largely because they were not so intimately connected to the collapse of the US financial system that is fondly believed by some to be ushering in a new Marxist age. I agree that there may well be further shocks in store for Europe and the US, and that some of them could lead to some form of insurgency, but there is little appetite for Communism, outside of wishful thinkers like Hobsbawm, in the rest of the world and I very much doubt that China will revert to the poverty stricken years prior to Deng Xiaoping's economic reforms that were enacted in the face of Marxist orthodoxy.

It is a serious mistake to confuse the Chinese economic system with free market capitalism, or even a mixed economy common to most of the social-democratic West. The Chinese economic reforms were a form of state-corporatism, with very heavy government intervention and control of industry. More similar to the economies of S. Korea and Japan in the 60-70s, and Singapore today. It is heavily protectionist and deliberately favours making a small group of people extremely rich and artificially keeping down a labour class. This is why China was able to just dismiss thousands of migrant workers from the cities in response to a global recession, this is not market capitalism. These economic reforms are unsustainable in the long run.

[stlukesguild]

Learning is an enjoyable activity, and surgery is one of the most enjoyable jobs - read Csikszentmihalyi's work on "Flow" to see the backing for this. Besides intrinsic interest, social expectation can provide motivation, who said "from those with great gifts, much should be expected?"

The problem is that you are laying all the responsibility upon those who are the most "gifted" to essentially bail out everybody else. I'm sorry, but you are being incredibly naive if you believe that these individuals are likely to feel the situation is at all fair... that somehow the fruits of their abilities should belong to the whole of society. I remember similar social efforts undertaken in school... in which the brightest students were placed with the slowest and/or laziest with the notion that the bright students would help their lesser peers. The reality is that the brightest students inevitably did all the work... unwilling to let the others drag their grades down... and rather that promoting some sense of altruism and empathy, the result was the exact opposite, as those with the greatest abilities resented having to do all the work while the morons sat on their posteriors.

Then there is the reality that many jobs simply suck. Why would anyone become a nurses aid, a sanitation worker, a sewer worker, etc...? How do we decide who indeed is "gifted" enough to be given an education in literature, or music, or art, or some such field?

Of course if a particular grade A science student decides heart surgery is too stressful for him, he shouldn't be forced to do it... Also I'm not arguing that people should all be paid the same, there is obviously a place for some wage difference, it's just the difference between the wages of the average person (or doctors!) and that of investment bankers & CEOs is crazy. A good case could be made, I think, for keeping doctors wages as they are (around £100K a year in the UK) with the prime ministers being the top wage (around £140K.) Who needs more money than that?

Ultimately, this ignores the reality that all individuals are not created equal. Some will spend their income on cigarettes, alcohol, drugs, and partying... and others will save... or invest their income. Ultimately, as a result, some individuals will rapidly become far more wealthy than others. Or do we simply not allow such a creation of wealth? How do we deal with accumulated wealth being passed on over generations? If I am not allowed to pass on my wealth to my children and heirs, why should I not simply spend what I have on luxurious living rather than allow the government to take it all when I die. Then where do you imagine the wealth will come from needed for industrial and technological and scientific and medical research and development if their is no motivation for investment?

[Emil Miller]

It is a serious mistake to confuse the Chinese economic system with free market capitalism, or even a mixed economy common to most of the social-democratic West. The Chinese economic reforms were a form of state-corporatism, with very heavy government intervention and control of industry. More similar to the economies of S. Korea and Japan in the 60-70s, and Singapore today. It is heavily protectionist and deliberately favours making a small group of people extremely rich and artificially keeping down a labour class. This is why China was able to just dismiss thousands of migrant workers from the cities in response to a global recession, this is not market capitalism. These economic reforms are unsustainable in the long run.

I couldn't agree more, the last thing that China needs is free market capitalism which would allow the West to penetrate their economy and dictate political aims that were favourable to their own economies. What we have instead is a state controlled economy that allows foreign investment without it being able to serve as an instrument to bring down the Chinese leadership. The labouring masses have never been so well-off as they are today even though, as is inevitable in the massive economic changes that China is going through, there will be many that suffer as a consequence. It remains to be seen whether the economic reforms are sustainable in the long run but the oligarchical system under which China is run looks set to meet the challenges of controlling one fifth of humankind if only because the Chinese plan for the long-term as opposed to the short termism that dogs western politics.

[ennison]

This seems a digressive if interesting divergence from the question of why yon author used "lighted" and not "lit". Perhaps she was deaf.

[mona amon]

This seems a digressive if interesting divergence from the question of why yon author used "lighted" and not "lit". Perhaps she was deaf.

LOL ennison! But when has any thread ever stuck to the original purpose of the thread for more than a page? :D


The problem is that you are laying all the responsibility upon those who are the most "gifted" to essentially bail out everybody else. I'm sorry, but you are being incredibly naive if you believe that these individuals are likely to feel the situation is at all fair... that somehow the fruits of their abilities should belong to the whole of society. I remember similar social efforts undertaken in school... in which the brightest students were placed with the slowest and/or laziest with the notion that the bright students would help their lesser peers. The reality is that the brightest students inevitably did all the work... unwilling to let the others drag their grades down... and rather that promoting some sense of altruism and empathy, the result was the exact opposite, as those with the greatest abilities resented having to do all the work while the morons sat on their posteriors. - St Lukes

Ha ha, you sound like a disciple of Ayn Rand out there! The thing is, capitalism is the most rational economic system, because it is based on natural human instincts (self interest). There really wasn't anything fundamentally wrong with her philosophy, as far as economics is concerned. A bit too idealistic and simplistic is the only fault. What I don't get is why Ayn Rand is credited with the invention of the concept of Laissez-faire capitalism when it was in existence much before her time, and it had already been popularised by the classical economists, especially Adam Smith.

[Shevek]

Ha ha, you sound like a disciple of Ayn Rand out there! The thing is, capitalism is the most rational economic system, because it is based on natural human instincts (self interest). There really wasn't anything fundamentally wrong with her philosophy, as far as economics is concerned. A bit too idealistic and simplistic is the only fault. What I don't get is why Ayn Rand is credited with the invention of the concept of Laissez-faire capitalism when it was in existence much before she first mentioned it, and it had already been popularised by the classical economists, especially Adam Smith.

...I could think of a few things... namely, that there is no actual evidence suggesting that the rational self-interest that Rand accepts as dogma is a "natural human instinct." In fact, the evidence points to the contrary. The motivation of self-interest among economic actors is largely a by-product of cash economies. But of course, Rand would just explain this away by saying that non-cash economies are savage, unenlightened and collectivist rather than exploring the evidence on its own merits.

And also, many people credit Rand with inventing the concept of laissez-faire capitalism because she believes she invented it. To her, there are only three thinkers in the Western tradition that matter: "Aristotle, Aquinas and Ayn Rand."

[Minnesänger]

...I could think of a few things... namely, that there is no actual evidence suggesting that the rational self-interest that Rand accepts as dogma is a "natural human instinct." In fact, the evidence points to the contrary. The motivation of self-interest among economic actors is largely a by-product of cash economies. But of course, Rand would just explain this away by saying that non-cash economies are savage, unenlightened and collectivist rather than exploring the evidence on its own merits.


define 'rational'.

human action is always striving to attain some particular end; and to this extent we may think of Action, any Action, as intrinsically 'selfish'. the lack of 'evidence' you and many left-wing pundits mark is merely the acknowledgement that many individuals seem to exhibit values divergent from your own; but as long as the choice is voluntary, it is by nature selfish. whatever they're doing, it's rocking their boat. this is a metaphysical point of fact, however, which does not shed light on any of the manifold economic exchange problems which flower out of public property as an institution. the sharing and caring of the noble-browed villagers you are invoking is not denied you by capitalism.

it is difficult for me to understand how somebody can accuse a Randist of having 'drunk the kool-aid', when any mention of her name has provoked the blunt and singular wrath of just about any internet community i've witnessed her name be dropped in. of course, here, i am swift to forgive the proverbially limp and bespectacled creature we might refer to as the average 'bookworm'--Rand's aesthetic goes against the primacy of his very nature; the artist (or the sighing patron) has rejected this suspicious world of twinkling grins and grimy industry. he would rather sit in the leafy shade somewhere with Coleridge and William Blake and watch the trotting lambkins and not give a damn where the coffee in his cup came from. fine, let it be so. but aren't these lamb beginning to look a little impaired and rheumatic? haven't they skipped enough, at least for a while? in the bold spirit of the artist soul, let us enter the factories... perhaps there is a new beauty there.

[stlukesguild]

it is difficult for me to understand how somebody can accuse a Randist of having 'drunk the kool-aid', when any mention of her name has provoked the blunt and singular wrath of just about any internet community i've witnessed her name be dropped in.

Personally, Rand's politics have nothing whatsoever to do with my aversion. I don't need a writer to reinforce my own beliefs. I find myself nearly opposed to everything that Plato suggests... yet I cannot deny his brilliant mind and the skill of his writing. Not so with Rand... not in the least.

of course, here, i am swift to forgive the proverbially limp and bespectacled creature we might refer to as the average 'bookworm'--Rand's aesthetic goes against the primacy of his very nature; the artist (or the sighing patron) has rejected this suspicious world of twinkling grins and grimy industry. he would rather sit in the leafy shade somewhere with Coleridge and William Blake and watch the trotting lambkins and not give a damn where the coffee in his cup came from.

Please. This image of the artist or the art lover is a gross stereotype that virtually ignores the reality that artists are as various and different as any other group of human beings. To portray Blake sitting in a leafy garden with trotting lambkins suggests that you have never even read anything by Blake at all.

but aren't these lamb beginning to look a little impaired and rheumatic? haven't they skipped enough, at least for a while? in the bold spirit of the artist soul, let us enter the factories... perhaps there is a new beauty there.

And you dare to paint artists as effeminate Romantics while you offer up such a romanticized view of factories. Have you ever been in a factory in your life? Ever worked in one? One can only excuse Marinetti's romantic visions of warfare because he had no concept of what war was. I assume the same is true here.

[Shevek]

define 'rational'.

human action is always striving to attain some particular end; and to this extent we may think of Action, any Action, as intrinsically 'selfish'. the lack of 'evidence' you and many left-wing pundits mark is merely the acknowledgement that many individuals seem to exhibit values divergent from your own; but as long as the choice is voluntary, it is by nature selfish. whatever they're doing, it's rocking their boat. this is a metaphysical point of fact, however, which does not shed light on any of the manifold economic exchange problems which flower out of public property as an institution. the sharing and caring of the noble-browed villagers you are invoking is not denied you by capitalism.

What if this end -- assuming every action has an "end" -- has nothing to do with self-interest but the interests of a group, a deity or cosmic order? Of the interests of generations of people who came before the individual (as is the case of blood debts in many West African cultures)? More fundamentally though, where do you get the belief that human action can be mapped out in a neat teleological generalization? Certainly not from empirical study.

I am not presenting the findings of left-wing pundits but sociologists, anthropologists, archaeologists, and economic historians who work with evidence rather than stereotypes and assumptions. And non-cash economies are much, much more than "sharing and caring," just like capitalist economies involve much more than the (ideal) fulfilment of rational self-interest as Randians never tire of quipping.

As for your second paragraph... well... from your rambling it is clear that you are more interested in stereotypes than empirical inquiry.

[Minnesänger]

Personally, Rand's politics have nothing whatsoever to do with my aversion. I don't need a writer to reinforce my own beliefs. I find myself nearly opposed to everything that Plato suggests... yet I cannot deny his brilliant mind and the skill of his writing. Not so with Rand... not in the least.

the comparison with Plato seems excessive, but as generous men we ought at least give the woman a fair hearing, having brought what is essentially a treatise on moral philosophy to the reading lamps of millions... hardly a trifling feat.


Please. This image of the artist or the art lover is a gross stereotype that virtually ignores the reality that artists are as various and different as any other group of human beings. To portray Blake sitting in a leafy garden with trotting lambkins suggests that you have never even read anything by Blake at all.

i think you need to revisit your copies of the Songs.


And you dare to paint artists as effeminate Romantics while you offer up such a romanticized view of factories. Have you ever been in a factory in your life? Ever worked in one? One can only excuse Marinetti's romantic visions of warfare because he had no concept of what war was. I assume the same is true here.

large-scale manufacturing, global trade, the information revolution.. i think there are some ponderously suggestive images waiting to be sculpted out of the virginal marble of our age. perhaps this is what separates the timid antiquarian from the seer Artist: sometimes he who wishes to forge his own path must seek inspiration in the canyons of the city panting in the night, at other times he must withdraw to his room and lock the door against the sleepwalking crowds.


What if this end -- assuming every action has an "end" -- has nothing to do with self-interest but the interests of a group, a deity or cosmic order? Of the interests of generations of people who came before the individual (as is the case of blood debts in many West African cultures)? More fundamentally though, where do you get the belief that human action can be mapped out in a neat teleological generalization? Certainly not from empirical study.

a group, deity or a cosmic order represent potential objects of the acting subject's self-interest. an individual can even value his own extinction. this is known a priori, as a conscious action presupposes an end. acting towards something is to value it, by definition, and since valuing something and not valuing something at the same time violates the laws of logic, there is a contradiction. try to disprove me by not having dinner tonight as a means of making yourself suffer... you will soon realize that you chose to suffer as a means of accomplishing your goal: proving me wrong--which you failed. you are fighting this revelation, in vain, because you are dragging an obscene commonplace notion of 'self-interest' (implying arbitrary gross conventionalities like material stability, good health and so on) into the halls of High Thought, where the air is always pregnant with mystery, and your neophyte's croak is an affront.


I am not presenting the findings of left-wing pundits but sociologists, anthropologists, archaeologists, and economic historians who work with evidence rather than stereotypes and assumptions. And non-cash economies are much, much more than "sharing and caring," just like capitalist economies involve much more than the (ideal) fulfilment of rational self-interest as Randians never tire of quipping.

please explain to me, if you don't mind, the distinctive features of a non-cash economy, other than the absense of a material medium of exchange.


As for your second paragraph... well... from your rambling it is clear that you are more interested in stereotypes than empirical inquiry.

can't hang with the big dawgs stay off the court..

[OrphanPip]

a group, deity or a cosmic order represent potential objects of the acting subject's self-interest. an individual can even value his own extinction. this is known a priori, as a conscious action presupposes an end. acting towards something is to value it, by definition, and since valuing something and not valuing something at the same time violates the laws of logic, there is a contradiction. try to disprove me by not having dinner tonight as a means of making yourself suffer... you will soon realize that you chose to suffer as a means of accomplishing your goal: proving me wrong--which you failed. you are fighting this revelation, in vain, because you are dragging an obscene commonplace notion of 'self-interest' (implying arbitrary gross conventionalities like material stability, good health and so on) into the halls of High Thought, where the air is always pregnant with mystery, and your neophyte's croak is an affront.


You are conflating psychological egoism with ethical egoism (which is what Rand advocated, or as a variation of rational egoism), though of course neither is mutually exclusive. Psychological egoism isn't really relevant to what Rand espoused, since she clearly defined selfless and selfish actions in terms of utilitarian outcome for the self, rather than out of psychological motivation.

Also, you're providing a rather weak defence of psychological egoism because you're using circular reasoning.

[Minnesänger]

who ever said anything about rational egoism? before we can even speak of moral problems we must understand the nature of action; and what i've outlined isn't called 'psychological'-anything, nor is it circular, unless you'd like to demonstrate how.

[Shevek]

a group, deity or a cosmic order represent potential objects of the acting subject's self-interest. an individual can even value his own extinction. this is known a priori, as a conscious action presupposes an end. acting towards something is to value it, by definition, and since valuing something and not valuing something at the same time violates the laws of logic, there is a contradiction. try to disprove me by not having dinner tonight as a means of making yourself suffer... you will soon realize that you chose to suffer as a means of accomplishing your goal: proving me wrong--which you failed. you are fighting this revelation, in vain, because you are dragging an obscene commonplace notion of 'self-interest' (implying arbitrary gross conventionalities like material stability, good health and so on) into the halls of High Thought, where the air is always pregnant with mystery, and your neophyte's croak is an affront.



please explain to me, if you don't mind, the distinctive features of a non-cash economy, other than the absense of a material medium of exchange.



You're speaking a lot of Randian gibberish, but I can't see anything explaining why your rigid framework of egoism explains anything about why certain people in certain cultures do things differently... which is what my post was about. Again you invoke teleology -- "individuals" acting "towards" "objects" -- but there's evidence that a lot of people in many cultures do not act in these terms. Hence why I brought up non-cash economies (note the plural). The lack of cash (not necessarily a lack of material media of exchange as you state) means that trade is often not envisioned as an exchange between one individual and another. The exchange of goods is often regulated by community norms. I'll give the work bee in nineteenth-century Ontario as an example. There was no cash involved when recruiting neighbours to do some task that required collective efforts, but there was an expectation that the 'host' returns the favour at some point in time. But people didn't participate in bees because they expected some sort of compensation -- they did so because it was a tradition, it was a community event and it solidified neighbourhood ties. There was no specific, articulable "object" in mind when acting, and there really wasn't a sense of "individuality" until the work bee slowly faded out with the rise of individual property and cash. Should we then dismiss the participants of nineteenth-century work bees and the other countless people across historical space and time who didn't envision themselves as rational actors in a market economy? Are they merely irrational for not valuing selfishness? Or are you going to give me another formula for how everyone, everywhere, at every time makes decisions?

[stlukesguild]

the comparison with Plato seems excessive, but as generous men we ought at least give the woman a fair hearing, having brought what is essentially a treatise on moral philosophy to the reading lamps of millions... hardly a trifling feat.

The comparison with Plato is to suggest that one can disagree with much that a writer has to say... but still respect him or her as a thinker and as a writer. Rand, the writer, is laughably bad.

stlukesguild- Please. This image of the artist or the art lover is a gross stereotype that virtually ignores the reality that artists are as various and different as any other group of human beings. To portray Blake sitting in a leafy garden with trotting lambkins suggests that you have never even read anything by Blake at all.

i think you need to revisit your copies of the Songs.

There's far more to Blake than the Songs... although they are commonly the starting place. Unfortunately, many never get beyond these. The slightest real exposure to Blake would result in a recognition that he is no simpering romantic fool who sees only a world of babbling brooks and bleating lambkins.

And you dare to paint artists as effeminate Romantics while you offer up such a romanticized view of factories. Have you ever been in a factory in your life? Ever worked in one? One can only excuse Marinetti's romantic visions of warfare because he had no concept of what war was. I assume the same is true here.

large-scale manufacturing, global trade, the information revolution.. i think there are some ponderously suggestive images waiting to be sculpted out of the virginal marble of our age. perhaps this is what separates the timid antiquarian from the seer Artist: sometimes he who wishes to forge his own path must seek inspiration in the canyons of the city panting in the night, at other times he must withdraw to his room and lock the door against the sleepwalking crowds.

I'm always wary of the self-proclaimed "seers" as they tend to be afflicted with the worst forms of astigmatism. The art of the industrial and post-industrial age has been done since the late 19th century. It is no less antiquated than Neo-classical revivals. What you speak of reeks of early 20th century manifestos that now read as either comic... or tragic... in the light of the realities of the history of the the last 100 years.

By the way... good avoidance of the pertinent questions. To romanticize the realities of the factories and the canyons of the cities as you do, suggest little or no real experience with either.

can't hang with the big dawgs stay off the court.

So says the Chihuahua. Yip!

[MorpheusSandman]

i think you need to revisit your copies of the Songs.The Songs are Blake couching his radical ideas in deceptively simple verse allegories. Blake is saying much of the same things in his Songs as he's saying in, say, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, The Book of Thel, The Four Zoas, etc. but because he's doing it in a superficially simple and immediately pleasurable way, people tend to overlook those depths. To put it another way, The Songs invite a certain level of simplistic, superficial enjoyment that isn't offered by Blake's late, grand, and difficult work, but the same complex ideas and philosophies are still there. There's a reason they're still studied so much, and that's because few of them are as simple as they seem at first glance. Nonetheless, Blake was still NEVER the type of romantic caricature you paint him as, but was intellectually fighting against most of the political and philosophical trends of his day and synthesizing them with the history of mythology.

[OrphanPip]

who ever said anything about rational egoism? before we can even speak of moral problems we must understand the nature of action; and what i've outlined isn't called 'psychological'-anything, nor is it circular, unless you'd like to demonstrate how.

We do not need to understand the nature of action to discuss Rand's Objectivism, because Rand operates at the level of utilitarian self-interests. Her ideas are an extreme reformulation of rational egoism.

And yes you have outlined psychological egoism, which is the position that all actions are inherently selfish.

Your defence of it is also tautological. Your argument as a syllogism can be stated as such:

1.
A: Conscious action has a goal.
B: The goals of a conscious mind are the interest of the self.
C: Therefore the actions of a conscious mind are selfish.

While I accept the first premise, the second presumes the desired conclusion.

Psychological egoism may or may not be true, but it is a tautological premise that can't be supported simply through logic. The conclusion basically depends entirely on the presumption of a certain definition of selfishness, which no person is really required to accept.

[Eiseabhal]

Rand was out of touch with reality.

[Anton Hermes]

Rand was out of touch with reality.
Hence her popularity among the Tea Party faithful.

[julian94]

Ayn Rand's oeuvres are detritic scum--neither a hyperbole nor a redundancy.


Notice how I delve into specificity?


I am such a nice person.