Ayn Rand is an activist and all her approaches or campaigns are revengeful and she had seen so much of the Bolshevism and that motivated her to stand against the movement and she got refuge in the US and tried to blackmail the vulnerable Americans into her conspired garbage.
All her supporters remained misguided by her so called new ideas
“Those who seek to satisfy the mind of man by hampering it with ceremonies and music and affecting charity and devotion have lost their original nature””
“If water derives lucidity from stillness, how much more the faculties of the mind! The mind of the sage, being in repose, becomes the mirror of the universe, the speculum of all creation.
I couldn't resist such an easy witticism -- all in good fun, I hope.Originally Posted by cyberbob
‘The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money’ Margaret Thatcher
"Wild motives out of check" you have got to be kidding. Oh yes yes blame everything on the USA and then beg us to bail you out of the next clusterf##k that comes down the road.
"Lennie said, "I thought you was mad at me, George."
"No," said George. "No Lennie. I ain't mad. I never been mad, an' I ain't now. Thats a thing I want ya to know."
I first read Atlas Shrugged and was (then very young and foolishly...) convinced on the reasonableness of ideas. However, with time and further experience in the world, I think Rand is a complete fool.
Her propositions are undermined by the attempt to proport it. John Galt and his minions are simply the gods she has wished to destory. Rand is like the ideological architect of a modern oligarchy.
Also, there is no reason to listen to some bloke who has quit his job. Is John Galt simply upset that other people do not have his super intelligence? Is it reasonable for the super intelligent demi-god, to inflict pain and suffering on the vulgar humans by removing from them the comforts that they are accustomed to.
Humanities don't loom large at all; children are not taught to read or to enjoy reading, or to think for themselves, or to reflect about the world. More stress is put on maths and sciences - the so-called useful knowledges - and children leave school barely literate, just knowledgeable enough to function in a society of exploitation, greed and subsistance.
The elite-owned media transmit this view that education has a left-wing bias, but in fact the most important science in our society today - economy - is in the hands of right-wing, neo-liberal, free trade apologists. I doubt Harvard and Yale produce many graduates full of ideas about Marxist economics.
It's not that children resist the sirens of humanities; it's that around them there are louder sirens called NAFTA, MAI, IMF, free trade, deregulation, outsourcing, flexicurity, H-1B Visas, making them deaf to the rewards of the Humanities. Children are exposed to a model of exploitation from childhood to adulthood to the point it becomes the only reality they know. An alternative model becomes unthinkable and, after much indoctrination, undesirable.
In the US, academics are overwhelmingly left-wing. Their chokehold on academia is almost absolute. Even leftists don't usually deny it.The elite-owned media transmit this view that education has a left-wing bias
True. That's the only field in which leftists are not the majority....but in fact the most important science in our society today - economy - is in the hands of right-wing, neo-liberal, free trade apologists.
I doubt you know many Harvard and Yale graduates. Those in business and economics may be a bit more right-wing, but the majority are very left-wing.I doubt Harvard and Yale produce many graduates full of ideas about Marxist economics.
It has been a while since I've read Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead but I remember approaching them as fiction literature rather than philosophical literature. Although enjoyable - I found Atlas Shrugged quite easy to read, except the John Galt speech chapter, which I skipped altogether because I couldn't stomach its egoism - they could in no way be realistically applied to our world. Rand seems to believe in the worst of human nature, she has no faith in the miracle of human goodness to overcome the incidents caused by greed, narcissism and selfishness of capitalism. But perhaps she had to exaggerate this in her novels in order to get her philosophical point across - anyway, she has done so at the expense of any chance at artistic merit.
However, using Rand as a mirror against my own experience of the recent 2008 financial crisis, I've now come to believe that she glorifies the objectivist character, neglecting to confront the selfish traits that a tycoon must possess (and always at the expense of another, I no longer believe that wealth can be reached independent of exploitation). This is from observing my own boss, who was an avid objectivist and Rand worshipper, and a colleague who became an entreprenuer. Both were/are oblivious to their treatment of others because they are so focused on gaining their selfish goals. Furthermore, they constantly console themselves that they are actually good, altruistic people and now firmly believe this.
Anyone see Colbert's commentary on Rand last night?
''Her philosophy of rejecting altruism and only thinking of herself was exemplified by arranging weekly sexual encounters with her number one follower (I forget his name)''
Nathaniel Brandon was the sucker's name. Had Rand been a political lefty she would have been called ''antichrist'' for saying 'the best thing about Christmas was its commercialism' and for her sexual deviance. Rand's double life also included receiving government checks under her husband's name because she was broke and because she wished to disguise the lies she lived by:
http://boingboing.net/2011/01/28/ayn...ok-govern.html
Rand, like so many from the far right, was a delusional, a liar, and a do-goody whose outward appearances masked a life of moral deviance, hypocrisy of the worse kind, and personal corruption.
When stupidity is considered patriotism, it is unsafe to be intelligent
~ Isaac Asimov
But the question is, do these sirens, to go back to the other poster's terms, really have any importance outside the educational system? Do left-wing teachers really produce left-wing students? If they have such a 'chokehold', why is their influence minimal in American society? Why isn't the USA a communist society? The point I'm making is that this so-called bias really has no effect in spite of its demonization.
True, I don't know any. But if you re-read my post, you'll realise I wasn't saying Harvard and Yale didn't produce left-wing people; I was talking about economists in particular. Like I wrote before, other areas are of little importance. Psychologists or software designers with a Marxist bias are of little importance when the economy is in the hands of right-wing thinkers. And I stand by what I wrote: I doubt these colleges produce many economists with Marxist values.I doubt you know many Harvard and Yale graduates. Those in business and economics may be a bit more right-wing, but the majority are very left-wing.
So there's the answer to Emil Miller's sirens. It's worth wondering, of course, if the students who avoid the sirens of the humanities, really "form their own, albeit questionable, opinions about how they want to live their lives," or whether they don't just adopt the ideas of the right-wing economic elite.
I always like when people complain about colleges being infested with liberals. Hmmm, let's see. We have places of higher learning, places where people must study and learn and at least get a master's degree to be an instructor, and most are liberal. So, a lot of smart people are liberal. Hmmmmm, I wonder if there's a connection. . . .
I haven't read anything by Rand but i'm intrigued by whether or not she is a good writer. I don't agree with her philosophical views, i even find them horrible, but so were Borges's political views, and he is one of my favourite writers. But Borges never tried to preach anything with his literature.
What I want to know is this: are Rand's works a vehicle for questions or so called answers? Because if you want to state your opinion on something you should write an essay. Literature is for questions, for doubting. That is why I find writers who claim to be full of answers in their literary works to be utter rubbish (like Coelho).
All of this is to know whether I should bother to read some Rand in the future, or dismiss her as just another preacher.
All aboard. All souls at half-mast. Aye-Aye. -Samuel Beckett, More Pricks Than Kicks
Ayn Rand is pure trash. Her novels are subpar in technique/composition and are the incarnations of the thinly veiled desires of a bored housewife.
J
Laissez-faire capitalism might have seemed like a good idea in the middle of the twentieth century, but today it has become more than apparant that it simply does not work. It's proven to be a total failure. It inevitably leads to crises, collapse and failure. How anyone can support laissez-faire capitalism in this day and age is beyond me. Anyone who promotes "full, pure, uncontrolled, unregulated laissez-faire capitalism" like Rand is stuck in time, completely unaware and ignorant of world economics or simply depraved.
You know I had brain fever, and that is to be mad.
My very long experience of socialism is that restraint is the least of its concerns. Once the self-righteous get the bit between their teeth, there's absolutely no stopping them short of an election or revolution.
Marxist economics never takes off after university because it's fundamentally flawed and unworkable beyond the wishful thinking of the lecture hall.
Laissez-faire capitalism was the product of the industrial revolution in England and its worst excesses were mitigated by the country's Liberal party. In Germany the right-wing Chancellor Bismark ensured that similar legislation was passed, but some form of capitalism has been the norm in Western society ever since. Those countries that tried to supplant it with communism, with the notable exception of Cuba, have since abandoned Marxist economics as unworkable. If by laissez-faire you mean the recent near collapse of the the banking sector, you are right, but that has little to do with capitalism and everything to do with greed on the part of the banks and stupidity on the part of the regulators.
Last edited by Emil Miller; 05-07-2011 at 05:50 PM.
"L'art de la statistique est de tirer des conclusions erronèes a partir de chiffres exacts." Napoléon Bonaparte.
"Je crois que beaucoup de gens sont dans cet état d’esprit: au fond, ils ne sentent pas concernés par l’Histoire. Mais pourtant, de temps à autre, l’Histoire pose sa main sur eux." Michel Houellebecq.
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