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by axiom
6843 days ago
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1. You claim that she dismissed a book by Kant after reading the back cover. Please provide a reference. 2. You don't like his definition of philsophy. What definition do you like? 3. You claim pseudophilosophy should not be taught in philosophy classes. Anyone and everyone agrees with that point. You still leave open the issue of whether Rand's work is in fact pseudophilosophy. Please support your claims. |
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See above. The books in which I could have located a reference are long gone; but it's in one of her short essays (if pushed, I'd suggest that it might be found in For the New Intellectual... but wouldn't want to be held to that).
> What definition do you like?
From wikipedia: "Different philosophers have had varied ideas about the nature of reason, and there is also disagreement about the subject matter of philosophy." If not even the people who do it professionally can agree on a definition, it would be presumptuous of me to try.
Nonetheless, you misread my objection. I am objecting to the assertion that Rand's work is without question philosophy, using the definition of philosophy by which Rand identified herself as one. It's tautological; it begs the question.
Likewise, my criticism of Rand is not that her conclusions are not reasonable conclusions (although I have my own opinions on that). It is that the methods by which she reached those conclusions are not those of a serious philosophical investigation. Rand's entire "philosophy" was carefully contrived to justify the conclusions she wanted justified, and that makes it worthless as philosophy - and inherently dishonest, to boot.
> You still leave open the issue of whether Rand's work is in fact pseudophilosophy.
I haven't even presented a definition of pseudophilosophy, let alone one you have agreed upon, so it's hard to see how you can assert that I haven't proved my case. So:
: I define "pseudophilosophy" as "justification masquerading as philosophy" - or, to elaborate, "a contrived rationalisation of a priori conclusions, constructed primarily to justify those conclusions rather than to examine their validity".
: I claim that the evidence of Rand's flight to the US from revolutionary Russia, and the emotions expressed in her early fiction (primarily We the Living and Anthem, but even back as far as The Husband I Bought) demonstrate the a priori nature of her strident individualism and anti-collectivism. I do not criticise this; indeed, I have a lot of sympathy with it.
: I note that her philosophical oeuvre developed over the next few decades, from its clumsy emotive (and none the worse for that) beginnings in Anthem, through its 30-year gestation in The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged, to its expression in direct form in works such as For The New Intellectual and Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal.
: I therefore conclude that in this case, she contrived her philosophical justification to fit her a priori conclusions about the rightness of capitalism and the abhorrence of altruism.
Note that I remain in sympathy with the feelings that drove her; indeed, I would go so far as to say that I share them. But to look upon her rationalisation of those feelings as anything other than a rationalisation, the self-justification of a woman who could not allow herself to simply be, is something I find absurd.