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Meeting Ayn Rand on the Las Vegas Strip

theatlantic.com

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Re: Meeting Ayn Rand on the Las Vegas Strip

#51

Post by api »

lucio wrote: post #26

"When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion - when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing - when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors - when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don't protect you against them, but protect them against you - when you see corrup…

That seems to describe every nation on Earth for all of human history, to varying degrees.

Re: Meeting Ayn Rand on the Las Vegas Strip

#52

Post by digisign »

Afforess wrote: post #48

I think the biggest draw for Ayn Rand and her works is that there are very few "role models" for fiscal conservatives in today's political environment. Most Republicans are neo-conservative warhawks that only pay lip-service to fiscal conservatism. Very few of them represent the older, Eisenhower traditional-Republicanism, who feared the Military-Industrial complex and understood fiscal conservatism. Even the "tea pa…

Agreed, in America the Goldwaters, Buckleys, and other intelligent conservatives died out in favor of the fox contingent. A shame really.

Re: Meeting Ayn Rand on the Las Vegas Strip

#53

Post by sten »

lucio wrote: post #14
lordnacho wrote: post #11

I'm reasonably sympathetic so some libertarian views. But I've never been able to motivate myself to read Ayn Rand. Can someone tell me how a fiction book can make a good argument for any political view? Is it just a thin layer of story-writing on top of actual, evidence-based argument? Or is it like I fear, just a long story where everything goes right for the guys with the right views? Because I'm pretty sure you c…

It is a epic history based on a novel philosophy. The philosophy defines "right/good" values based on objective observation of reality, and then concludes that the top value for a being with reason is it's own life. So good/right things are those things that enhance your life and the things you value (your family, your love, your principles). One top principle is to "respect others reason and will, do not start aggre…

Except that humans are incapable of making objective observations in practice with anything resembling consistency.

Re: Meeting Ayn Rand on the Las Vegas Strip

#54

Post by dragonwriter »

dang wrote: post #16

This story was killed by user flags. That was a bad use of flagging, so we've overridden it. The article is clearly substantive enough to pass the minimal bar for this site. Whether it's great or not, or even good or not, is a different question.

> The article is clearly substantive enough to pass the minimal bar for this site.

Perhaps it meets the minimum bar for substance (but if so, that bar is so low that almost nothing could squeeze under it), but if so only in a general interest sort of way, exactly the kind of way referred to in the guidelines (emphasis added):

"Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon."

A review of the rather old phenomenon of the political philosophy of Objectivism that is prompted by a reasonably recent convention but doesn't really address anything new about it doesn't seem to fit into the topicality guidelines even if grants that it is substantive (which, in this case, seems excessively generous.)

Re: Meeting Ayn Rand on the Las Vegas Strip

#55

Post by api »

digisign wrote: post #52
Afforess wrote: post #48

I think the biggest draw for Ayn Rand and her works is that there are very few "role models" for fiscal conservatives in today's political environment. Most Republicans are neo-conservative warhawks that only pay lip-service to fiscal conservatism. Very few of them represent the older, Eisenhower traditional-Republicanism, who feared the Military-Industrial complex and understood fiscal conservatism. Even the "tea pa…

Agreed, in America the Goldwaters, Buckleys, and other intelligent conservatives died out in favor of the fox contingent. A shame really.

One reason: fiscal conservatism doesn't offer anyone any advantage, and politics is (sadly) mostly about competing over unfair advantage. The goal of a political campaign is to exercise your power over someone else (e.g. theocrats, PC fanatics), slant the law in your favor (regulatory capture), or directly access the treasury.

The second reason: Keynesian economics works, at least in the short to medium term. When a recession hits, real fiscal conservatives lose big. Democrats know this and play to it explicitly. Republicans also know it, and are masters at politically weaponized Keynesianism. They espouse fiscally conservative rhetoric while being ardent Keynesians in practice, usually through military spending and financial bubble-blowing.

Re: Meeting Ayn Rand on the Las Vegas Strip

#56

Post by digisign »

api wrote: post #44
PhasmaFelis wrote: post #9

> “There is nobody out there who can talk about self-esteem, about individualism, and about capitalism with the moral certainty and the moral fervor we can,” Brook declared. It is so telling that this guy thinks moral certainty and "fervor" are a good thing. A person who is 100% certain and unquestioning in his beliefs is a person who cannot be reasoned with. This avowed rationalist speaks with the language of religi…

Rand set out to create an anti-Marxism and she succeeded... in creating a dogmatic totalistic philosophy that inverts Soviet-style fundamentalist Marxism. Never fight against -- you inevitably become that which you fight. (to paraphrase Nietzsche) Like Marx, Rand was far better at criticizing than she was at proposing a solution. Both proposed scenarios with a big hand-wavey "magic happens here" step in the middle fo…

It's worth noting something I picked up watching the "making of" of the Atlas movie a few years ago.

Rand apparently put out several subtle books on the subject previously but no one seemed to get the point. It was then she finally resorted to knocking you over the head with an over-the-top version.

I found the movie simplistic, but hearing that afterwards gave some perspective.

Re: Meeting Ayn Rand on the Las Vegas Strip

#57

Post by [deleted] »

Afforess wrote: post #48

I think the biggest draw for Ayn Rand and her works is that there are very few "role models" for fiscal conservatives in today's political environment. Most Republicans are neo-conservative warhawks that only pay lip-service to fiscal conservatism. Very few of them represent the older, Eisenhower traditional-Republicanism, who feared the Military-Industrial complex and understood fiscal conservatism. Even the "tea pa…

[deleted]

Re: Meeting Ayn Rand on the Las Vegas Strip

#58

Post by notahacker »

santacluster wrote: post #42
lucio wrote: post #26

"When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion - when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing - when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors - when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don't protect you against them, but protect them against you - when you see corrup…

> when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing This part alone shows how much superficial BS this is. You cannot produce anything without using the earth's resources. They do not naturally belong to any man. So it's either "take what you want, by force, and fuck everyone else", or we find some peaceful way to share those resources amongst each other. Preferably wit…

To put things into perspective for those not familiar with the book, the character Francisco is supposed to one of the world's richest men having inherited a mining fortune from his conquistador ancestors. According to Rand's back-story, it's all down to the family lineage passing on genius from one generation to another and nothing at all to do with working slaves to death, as actually tended to happen in South American mines. It's not documented whether his ancestors asked permission from the indigenous population.

Atlas Shrugged is basically the reductio ad absurdum version of saner arguments for capitalism.

Re: Meeting Ayn Rand on the Las Vegas Strip

#59

Post by phelmig »

SkyMarshal wrote: post #19
phelmig wrote: post #10

I liked Atlas Shrugged when I read it. But I think if Dagny Taggart would see today's world she wouldn't be too happy as well. While capitalism won over communism the corruption of governments didn't die out it just became more clever. I sometimes toy with the thought of writing a second ending to be Atlas Shrugged where old Dagny looks at our world and can't grasp what is wrong with it.

In Atlas Shrugged she didn't just rail at communism, but also at the use of political "pull" over merit to shape (distort) the economic landscape. That's still very relevant in many domains today, though I think the "Dagney's" of the world (and most hackers and other astute observers) just as easily grasp it then as now.

It's not only about the "pull" over merit as you state it but about politically established priorities that harm good businesses. Just as the US cloud business was harmed by the NSA when national security (and intl. espionage) was put above competitiveness.

Those political priorities still come from "Washington" and rule over NY (or Silicon Valley). Both cities are meant within context of the book.

Re: Meeting Ayn Rand on the Las Vegas Strip

#60

Post by Retric »

dragonwriter wrote: post #41
Retric wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Further, any philosophy that includes axioms limits the value of logical reasoning. If X (which is assumed to be true) and Y then Z. It might be logically valid, but it’s still meaningless.

> Further, any philosophy that includes axioms limits the value of logical reasoning. On the contrary, as logical reasoning in any particular system of logic depends on the set of axioms defining that system of logic, any philosophy which does not admit any axioms likewise does not admit logical reasoning, and any philosophy which only includes those axioms necessary to support a system of logic can't lead to any con…

And that’s a swing and a miss. Axioms might include input from observations. "If I observe X then the gods are pleased." Followed by a lot of meaningless but perfectly logical thought.

Side stepping that, from a pure logic standpoint you can reason about philosophies independent from reality. But, with nothing actually connecting them to physical reality the value of such effort is basically just aesthetic in nature. "TRUTH is ..."

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