Search results
Feb 27, 2015 · Philosophy On One Foot. February 27, 2015. Ayn Rand was once asked if she could present the basics of her philosophy, in short form, while standing on one foot. Here’s what she said: 1. METAPHYSICS: Objective Reality. or “ Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed” or “Wishing won’t make it so.”
Introduction to Ayn Rand's ideas. My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute.
This new conception of objectivity shapes not only her view of concepts and values, but through them her entire epistemology and ethics, and the whole of her philosophic system. For this reason she called the system Objectivism. Ayn Rand Society for Professional Philosophers.
- Overview
- Objectivist ethics
- Objectivist political philosophy
objectivism, philosophical system identified with the thought of the 20th-century Russian-born American writer Ayn Rand and popularized mainly through her commercially successful novels The Fountainhead (1943) and Atlas Shrugged (1957). Its principal doctrines consist of versions of metaphysical realism (the existence and nature of things in the world are independent of their being perceived or thought about), epistemological (or direct) realism (things in the world are perceived immediately or directly rather than inferred on the basis of perceptual evidence), ethical egoism (an action is morally right if it promotes the self-interest of the agent), individualism (a political system is just if it properly respects the rights and interests of the individual), and laissez-faire capitalism. Objectivism also addresses issues in aesthetics and the philosophy of love and sex. Perhaps the best-known and most-controversial aspect of objectivism is its account of the moral virtues, in particular its unconventional claim that selfishness is a virtue and altruism a vice.
Rand held that all people, whether they realize it or not, are guided in their thoughts and actions by philosophical principles and assumptions. Philosophy thus has great practical import, and indeed possessing the correct philosophy is essential to leading a successful and happy life. The branches of philosophy that most directly affect everyday life are ethics and political philosophy.
In ethics, Rand held a vaguely Aristotelian theory of virtue based on a teleological conception of living organisms, including humans. A value, according to Rand, is “that which one acts to gain and/or keep.” All organisms act so as to preserve their lives, and life is the only thing that organisms act to keep for its own sake, rather than for the sake of something else. Life is thus the ultimate value for all organisms, not only because all other values are a means to preserving it but also because it sets a standard of evaluation for all lesser goals (and all things generally): that which preserves life is good, and that which threatens or destroys life is evil. Rand understood these claims to apply to organisms individually as well as generically: that which preserves an organism’s life is good for that organism, and that which threatens or destroys it is evil (or bad) for that organism. In this way Rand claimed to have solved the centuries-old “is-ought” problem—the problem of showing how a statement about what ought to be can be logically derived solely from a statement (or statements) about what is.
Rand defined a virtue as “the act [or pattern of acting] by which one gains and/or keeps” a value. Because “reason is man’s basic means of survival,” rationality, the virtue corresponding to the value of reason, is the highest human virtue. Accordingly, the ultimate value for each human being is not his life per se but his life as “a rational being,” which is thus his basic standard of evaluation. What life as a rational being consists in for Rand is a matter of scholarly debate, but it seems to entail dedication to the cardinal values of reason, purpose (purposiveness), and self-esteem and action in accordance with the corresponding virtues of rationality, productiveness, and pride. The consequence and accompaniment of such a life is happiness, the “state of consciousness which proceeds from the achievement of one’s values.”
The basic principle of Rand’s political philosophy is that “no man has the right to initiate the use of physical force against others.” She interpreted this “nonaggression principle” to be incompatible with the redistribution of wealth or other social goods or benefits through social welfare programs and most public services, because such institutions rely on the implicit threat of the use of force by the government against those from whom wealth is taken. The proper role of government, according to Rand, is to protect the individual’s inviolable rights to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness. The only just socioeconomic system is capitalism—“a full, pure, uncontrolled, unregulated laissez-faire”—because only it fully respects the individual’s right to property and is fully consistent with the nonaggression principle.
Students save 67%! Learn more about our special academic rate today.
1. Introduction. 1.1 Ayn Rand and Philosophy. 1.2 Life and Work. 1.3 Metaphysics and Epistemology. 2. Ethics. 2.1 What is Ethics, and Why do we need It? 2.2 Survival as the Ultimate Value. 2.3 Survival Qua Man as the Ultimate Value. 2.4 Happiness as the Ultimate Value. 2.5 Virtues, Vices, and Egoism. 2.6 Altruism. 3. Social-Political Philosophy.
Leonard Peikoff analyzes Ayn Rand’s article “Philosophy: Who Needs It,” showing how Rand applies the principles of effective communication (discussed in Lesson 1 of “Objective Communication”): motivation, concretization, logical structure and delimitation.
The root of a philosophy and whether it is life-affirming or life-negating, Rand maintains in Philosophy: Who Needs It, is its position on the primacy of existence vs. the primacy of consciousness.
