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Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62120)
by Ralph E. Luker on June 4, 2005 at 3:48 PM
by Ralph E. Luker on June 4, 2005 at 3:48 PM
Irfan, As a philosopher who has been given the prerogative of blogging on History News Network, you seem a little quick to cop a disciplinary boundary. It was what I would have expected from you. Apart from that, I think I'll let your comment speak for itself.
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62144)
by Chris Matthew Sciabarra on June 4, 2005 at 9:30 PM
by Chris Matthew Sciabarra on June 4, 2005 at 9:30 PM
I posted a reply to your response at L&P (cross-posted at Notablog). See here.
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62148)
by Steven Horwitz on June 4, 2005 at 10:49 PM
by Steven Horwitz on June 4, 2005 at 10:49 PM
FWIW... I concur with Chris's characterization of the inclusion of Rand's work on a list that includes the tomes of mass murders, anti-Semites, etc. as obscene. Please, please show me the tangible harm her work has caused that would lead one to even consider making a comparison to the other books included on your list Ralph. Even in the worst reading of Rand that I can legitimately construct, the harm to the world that vision could have caused is far, far less than the other items on your list. I'd really love to know where the Randian utopia or the Randian individuals are that she has supposedly spawned that have caused so much harm.
My real trouble, aside from your ad hominems at those of us who, even if we don't agree with all or even most of them, take her ideas seriously (do I at 41 suffer from delayed adolescence?), is that your implicit understanding of the content of her ideas is gravely mistaken, and your extrapolation of the actions and beliefs of her looniest followers to those of serious scholars is exactly the sort of thing that Left and Right are doing to each other all the time these days, and to no good end if the idea is mutual understanding. No one should call Islam a religion of violence because of the actions of a small group of its practitioners. Doesn't the same apply here?
Calling Rand's books among the most "harmful" books of the last two hundred years really is obscene, *given the other books on the list*. Calling them the most "wrong" books of the last two hundred years would have been a far more legitimate, though I'd still say mistaken, argument. Unfortunately, many folks seem to have fallen into the trap Human Events set when they seemed to confuse "harmful" and "wrong."
My real trouble, aside from your ad hominems at those of us who, even if we don't agree with all or even most of them, take her ideas seriously (do I at 41 suffer from delayed adolescence?), is that your implicit understanding of the content of her ideas is gravely mistaken, and your extrapolation of the actions and beliefs of her looniest followers to those of serious scholars is exactly the sort of thing that Left and Right are doing to each other all the time these days, and to no good end if the idea is mutual understanding. No one should call Islam a religion of violence because of the actions of a small group of its practitioners. Doesn't the same apply here?
Calling Rand's books among the most "harmful" books of the last two hundred years really is obscene, *given the other books on the list*. Calling them the most "wrong" books of the last two hundred years would have been a far more legitimate, though I'd still say mistaken, argument. Unfortunately, many folks seem to have fallen into the trap Human Events set when they seemed to confuse "harmful" and "wrong."
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62149)
by Ralph E. Luker on June 4, 2005 at 11:09 PM
by Ralph E. Luker on June 4, 2005 at 11:09 PM
Steve, To a certain extent, you are arguing with what happens on _any_ list. That's why I prefaced the post with a _long_ piece about the silliness of lists. When I list the five things that I think most Cliopatriarchs are _not_, does that mean that I have put Libertarians or, even, Objectivists in the same category with Nazis and Communists? Of course not.
The same principle applies to other lists, as well. My list of things to do today -- let's say, bring in the mail, tell the lawyer to redraft my will, mow the lawn, etc -- doesn't mean that each of those things is of equal importance or even in the same league with each other.
So, when I say that Rand's work is in the lower half of my list of the ten most harmful books, it doesn't imply that they are harmful in the same way. Some people argued that _Mein Kampf_ didn't even belong on such a list because it had relatively little impact in Germany and -- besides, it is such a turgid read that it simply does little "harm." So, if you argue that Rand's work, albeit turgid, does little material harm to the lives it touches, does that put it on the same list with _Mein Kampf_?
There's a problem with the whole business of making lists -- it flattens out things that are much more complicated than they appear to be on a list -- I said that in several different ways and I don't quite understand why I'm having to say it again, except that devotees of a cult object to finding their sacred texts listed as harmful.
I'm a Methodist. If you want to put Wesley's Notes on the New Testament on a list of the Ten Most Harmful Books of the 18th Century, be my guest. I may think you wrong -- even hopelessly wrong. I won't call what you've done "obscene" or call you a "moron."
The same principle applies to other lists, as well. My list of things to do today -- let's say, bring in the mail, tell the lawyer to redraft my will, mow the lawn, etc -- doesn't mean that each of those things is of equal importance or even in the same league with each other.
So, when I say that Rand's work is in the lower half of my list of the ten most harmful books, it doesn't imply that they are harmful in the same way. Some people argued that _Mein Kampf_ didn't even belong on such a list because it had relatively little impact in Germany and -- besides, it is such a turgid read that it simply does little "harm." So, if you argue that Rand's work, albeit turgid, does little material harm to the lives it touches, does that put it on the same list with _Mein Kampf_?
There's a problem with the whole business of making lists -- it flattens out things that are much more complicated than they appear to be on a list -- I said that in several different ways and I don't quite understand why I'm having to say it again, except that devotees of a cult object to finding their sacred texts listed as harmful.
I'm a Methodist. If you want to put Wesley's Notes on the New Testament on a list of the Ten Most Harmful Books of the 18th Century, be my guest. I may think you wrong -- even hopelessly wrong. I won't call what you've done "obscene" or call you a "moron."
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62151)
by Chris Matthew Sciabarra on June 4, 2005 at 11:28 PM
by Chris Matthew Sciabarra on June 4, 2005 at 11:28 PM
Ralph, if I may, I didn't call ~you~ obscene. I just found it offensive that Rand, who emigrated from the Soviet Union and who extolled the virtues of human liberty, would be found on the same list as Hitler and Lenin.
But you persist in attacking those of us who take Rand seriously as "devotees of a cult," so there's no place to go with this discussion---except down.
But you persist in attacking those of us who take Rand seriously as "devotees of a cult," so there's no place to go with this discussion---except down.
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62156)
by Ralph E. Luker on June 5, 2005 at 12:02 AM
by Ralph E. Luker on June 5, 2005 at 12:02 AM
Does putting Objectivists on the same list with Nazis mean that they are the equivalent of each other?
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62167)
by Steven Horwitz on June 5, 2005 at 9:43 AM
by Steven Horwitz on June 5, 2005 at 9:43 AM
I certainly agree with the silliness of the whole enterprise Ralph. Even so, to compile a list of 10 or 12 books, out of all the books of the last 200 years, that are the most "harmful" *does* suggest that those books are at a rough level of harmfulness. Yeah, I suppose you could argue that the top 3 are REALLY harmful, the next 4 are "quite" harmful, and the last few "pretty" harmful, and then everything else misses the cut. A stretch though.
And Rand's work is certainly not "sacred" to me, nor to Chris I would argue. Whatever her failings, however, they haven't caused anywhere near the harm to real human beings and real human societies as have many of the other books/ideas on your list.
And Rand's work is certainly not "sacred" to me, nor to Chris I would argue. Whatever her failings, however, they haven't caused anywhere near the harm to real human beings and real human societies as have many of the other books/ideas on your list.
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62178)
by Ralph E. Luker on June 5, 2005 at 12:36 PM
by Ralph E. Luker on June 5, 2005 at 12:36 PM
I'll try to remember your low toleration for anything that is silly the next time I am tempted to engage in it. I don't recall your having objected to the Human Events list at all. It was only when someone thought that Rand belonged on such a list that the silliness got to you and demanded a full accounting. There's something overly defensive in that and you might want to think about it.
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62237)
by Steven Horwitz on June 5, 2005 at 9:35 PM
by Steven Horwitz on June 5, 2005 at 9:35 PM
See my reply to this over at L&P. I chimed in on a Left2Right thread ridiculing the original list, and would gladly produce email to confirm it, both of which were long before I saw your list. So your claim of selective outrage is baseless.
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62154)
by Ralph E. Luker on June 4, 2005 at 11:42 PM
by Ralph E. Luker on June 4, 2005 at 11:42 PM
Chris, I got that point. I took no personal offense in it because it wasn't directed at my person. I did take offense at being called a "moron" by a pseudonym. Do you object to any and all lists? Were you offended by my list of things Cliopatriarchs were not? It put Libertarians and Objectivists on the same list with Nazis and Communists. My point is that you apparently have a felt need to protect Rand's work as sacred text in ways that I don't feel the need to protect the work of my own religious community. What's up with that?
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62155)
by Chris Matthew Sciabarra on June 4, 2005 at 11:56 PM
by Chris Matthew Sciabarra on June 4, 2005 at 11:56 PM
Ralph, honestly: I don't object to any and all lists; what I objected to was a list that didn't seem to have any reasonable criterion for including Rand with Hitler and Lenin. You have to know that any list that includes Hitler, by its nature, is going to raise a few eyebrows in the "guilt by association" department.
I certainly do not feel any need to protect Rand's work as "sacred text." At all. I have written many criticisms of Rand's work myself, and, in my Notablog post, I actually linked to a monograph of mine, Ayn Rand, Homosexuality, and Human Liberation, that takes Rand and many of her proteges to task for the awful, harmful things they said about gays and lesbians in the early Objectivist movement.
Moreover, The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies is most definitely not a "cult" periodical. We have featured in our pages very vigorous criticism of Rand---from Bill Martin and Slavoj Zizek on the left to libertarians and conservatives on the right.
As for the person who called you a "moron": he operates his own blog, and he was responding in the comments section of my post. You can find his blog here.
I certainly do not feel any need to protect Rand's work as "sacred text." At all. I have written many criticisms of Rand's work myself, and, in my Notablog post, I actually linked to a monograph of mine, Ayn Rand, Homosexuality, and Human Liberation, that takes Rand and many of her proteges to task for the awful, harmful things they said about gays and lesbians in the early Objectivist movement.
Moreover, The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies is most definitely not a "cult" periodical. We have featured in our pages very vigorous criticism of Rand---from Bill Martin and Slavoj Zizek on the left to libertarians and conservatives on the right.
As for the person who called you a "moron": he operates his own blog, and he was responding in the comments section of my post. You can find his blog here.
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62170)
by Chris Matthew Sciabarra on June 5, 2005 at 11:08 AM
by Chris Matthew Sciabarra on June 5, 2005 at 11:08 AM
Technomaget posted to my blog again this morning; he apologizes for calling you a moron and has a bit more to say:
http://www.livejournal.com/users/technomaget/
http://www.livejournal.com/users/technomaget/
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62233)
by Roderick T. Long on June 5, 2005 at 9:13 PM
by Roderick T. Long on June 5, 2005 at 9:13 PM
In Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, Rand independently anticipated crucial aspects of Kripke's and Putnam's work on necessity and reference, including the crucial idea that a concept can include as-yet-undiscovered properties of its referents (the solution to the positivist and Kuhnian claim that reference changes every time definitions change). What more is needed to establish Rand's credentials as a serious philosopher?
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62234)
by Ralph E. Luker on June 5, 2005 at 9:23 PM
by Ralph E. Luker on June 5, 2005 at 9:23 PM
Rod, This is a point already stated by one of your L & P peers in this discussion. If you don't read what's already been said, there's no point to having a discussion at all. It _still_ doesn't mean that anyone working in either the continental or the Anglo-American philosophical traditions grants Rand a moment's notice as a philosopher. This is the second time that you have repeated a point already made, as if it were first made by you. _Really_ tedious. So, I'm done talking with you or anybody at L & P about the issue.
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62401)
by Andrew Robert Bissell on June 7, 2005 at 4:42 AM
by Andrew Robert Bissell on June 7, 2005 at 4:42 AM
"It _still_ doesn't mean that anyone working in either the continental or the Anglo-American philosophical traditions grants Rand a moment's notice as a philosopher."
In other words, if Rand isn't taken seriously by academics, that means she's not a philosopher, irrespective of whatever insights or solutions to philosophical problems she may have achieved? There's a handy Objecti-cultist word for this sort of thinking: "social metaphysics."
I suppose it's a similar line of thinking that would allow Objectivism to be derided as a "cult," while Methodism--by virtue of its larger numbers of followers--somehow qualifies as a valid belief system.
In other words, if Rand isn't taken seriously by academics, that means she's not a philosopher, irrespective of whatever insights or solutions to philosophical problems she may have achieved? There's a handy Objecti-cultist word for this sort of thinking: "social metaphysics."
I suppose it's a similar line of thinking that would allow Objectivism to be derided as a "cult," while Methodism--by virtue of its larger numbers of followers--somehow qualifies as a valid belief system.
Re: Rand: a philosopher's appraisal
(#62403)
by Ralph E. Luker on June 7, 2005 at 4:51 AM
by Ralph E. Luker on June 7, 2005 at 4:51 AM
Not at all. I'm a Methodist and am quite prepared for you to deny that it is a valid belief system. I doubt that I'd bother to argue with your denial, because I have my own doubts about its theological coherency. In its contemporary manifestations, it's pretty mushy.
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