Ayn Randin objectivismin kritiikkiä ja parodiaa

Scott Ryan: Essays on Ayn Rand's Objectivism


Ayn Rand (1905-1982), born Alissa Rosenbaum, is believed by many of her followers to have been in some way remarkable as a philosopher. At one time, up until as recently as late 1998 or early 1999, I described (and regarded) myself as a somewhat sympathetic critic of Objectivism and thought there might possibly be something salvageable in Rand's philosophy if one stuck as close as possible to her political theory. (I'm a "green libertarian"/classical-liberal/free-market-capitalist myself.)

My mind was changed in part by a close and thorough examination of her epistemological writings and in part by (thanks to the Internet) extensive correspondence with lots of people who have tried to put her principles into practice. My own evaluation of her is now very different indeed from that of her followers, and in my book Objectivism and the Corruption of Rationality: A Critique of Ayn Rand's Epistemology, I attack the very foundation and centerpiece of her philosophy: her allegedly groundbreaking work in epistemology, from which "Objectivism" takes its name.


FACTISM

The Joyous, Life-Affirming, Benevolent, Liberating, Rational Philosophy of Novelist Arna de Ramm


By Scott Ryan


"The open secret from which you have been hiding, and from which your festering sores of rationalization can protect your lurching, empty husks of eye-sockets no longer, is: facts are facts." (Kirk Daggoner's speech in PROMETHEUS SHIRKED)

"Reality, or facticity, is the fact that facts are facts, that reality is real. The denial of facticity has been hawked for millennia by Caesar and the Shaman -- one of whom seeks to control your body, the other your mind." (Title essay in For Today's Thinking Man)

"To say that a fact is, is to say that one's mind is capable of grasping it. The open secret mankind has struggled to evade is: to deny the facticity of facts is to deny the efficacy of the mind." (Prolegomena to a Factist Theory of Knowledge)

"Happiness is a state of non-contradictory fact-recognition." (Kirk Daggoner's speech in PROMETHEUS SHIRKED)

"The fundamental act of evil possible to the volitional human mind is: to strip itself of its humanity and collapse to a rung even below that of any animal. This self-destruction is accomplished by: the denial of facts." ("The Cognitive Role of Cognition," in The Factist Manifesto)