David Bentley Hart Goes In on Ayn Rand

In the new issue of First Things, David Bentley Hart unleashes this excoriating piece on Ayn Rand and her followers, in light of the release of the Atlas Shrugged film. If you read my recent piece on Ayn Rand you won't find anything near as harsh, though Hart doesn't say anything that I disagree with. I would confirm her moral idiocy and that she was philosophically simplistic and naive, and would only apologize on her behalf when it comes to political and economic prescriptions, which Hart doesn't even touch on. And, to an extent, he doesn't need to because Rand held Objectivism to be a complete, closed, all-encompassing worldview that couldn't be partitioned. So if any aspect of it doesn't work, then the whole thing collapses, in a sense. And I would agree that as a systematic philosophy it does fail, I would only add that the political and economic aspects of it are salvageable. Though we could always get those by reading Burke, Hayek, Adam Smith, Milton Friedman etc. instead.

Perhaps just as interesting for me was that Hart included a paragraph of praise for Terrence Malick and the Tree of Life trailer--to contrast with the trailer he watched for Atlas Shrugged--which I share an obsessive love for (I've watched the trailer dozens of times).

Not long after seeing the trailer for Atlas Shrugged, I came across the trailer for quite a different kind of film: Terrence Malick’s The Tree of Life. Malick is the world’s greatest living filmmaker, and this project has been with him for years. The two minutes or so of clips that have been released are far more beautiful, moving, and profound than anything associated with the name of Ayn Rand could ever be. “There are two ways through life,” a woman’s voice announces as the trailer opens: “the way of nature and the way of grace. We have to choose which one to follow.” That is arguably the great theme of all of Malick’s finest work; and I suspect that the deeper question the film poses is whether these two ways can become one. If what little I have heard about the film is right, moreover, the answer will have something to do with a love capable of embracing all things, and of both granting and receiving forgiveness. But we shall see.

Even though I don't quite loathe Atlas Shrugged as a novel, as a film it looks to be positively awful. So I would definitely reiterate the filmic prescription at the end of the piece: see Tree of Life and skip Atlas Shrugged.

Atlas Shrugged and Ayn Rand Mania

With the release of the Atlas Shrugged film only a few days away it seems many, on both the right and left, have caught a mild case of Ayn Rand fever. Of course the left uniformly despises her, while the right generally likes her (some with qualifications, others with none), but both can't seem to stop talking about her.

One of the more interesting things I've read on her in the last couple days is this article, written by the daughter of an objectivist (Objectivism is the philosophy that Ayn Rand 'created'). Before I discuss the article (and before you read it) I'll give you a rough thumbnail sketch of the main features of Objectivism, if you're unfamiliar with it.

• Epistemologically it affirms the primacy of reality as experienced. Facts are facts, things are what they are, reality is that which our senses apprehend. Facts and reason applied to them comprise what we know and how we know it.
• The value and ultimacy of the individual. Rand believed that the individual was the ultimate end and should never be used as a means. She believed each individual is responsible for themselves alone and that, in a correctly ordered society free of restraints, the talented, able and willing would prosper while the weak would flounder.
• Laissez-faire capitalism, or economic freedom free of coercion, is good and should be a society's sole guiding economic principle.
• Political freedom is an essential good, denoting the lack of coercive, oppressive force upon the individual.
• Rand rejected collectivism or even thinking in terms of collective, societal goals and ends. Society is (or should be) only a compilation of individuals seeking their own best self-interests.
• Rational self-interest is the guiding moral principle. Individuals seeking their own happiness, without using others as means, will increase the overall happiness of humanity.
• Rand believed that altruism--true altruism, the actual subordination of one's own well-being in the service of others--was evil. Though charity is not prohibited because giving charitably and loving others is often in your own best self-interest, especially if doing so gives you a feeling of joy.

As I said, this is a rough sketch taken straight from memory and probably neglects some features, but hopefully the broad strokes will suffice for my purposes.

As for the article that I linked to it's a very sad testimony to the potential pitfalls of the ideology, if followed to the letter. An objectivist might argue that the father in the article was not applying objectivist principles properly. For example, he could be confusing short-term self-interest for overall self-interest when he makes certain decisions. Or he might underestimate the personal consequences for himself of not having a healthy, loving relationship with his daughter. Or--or--the objectivist might claim that the father actually didn't do anything--or at least very much--wrong.

Being as generous as possible, then, objectivism at least can put one on a slippery slope to moral depravity, if not lead directly to it. This combined with Rand's naive epistemology is enough for me to reject objectivism as a systematic philosophy.

However, applied solely to the economic and political realms (and not the moral realm) her ideas make a lot of sense, though they aren't particularly original. Economic freedom is indeed good, coercion and force used by the government upon individuals is bad, individuals pursuing their own self-interests is the most productive engine for driving an economy and creating the best living conditions for the most people etc.

All that said I do like The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged as novels. The writing isn't that great, and the characters obviously often exist for the sole purpose of giving voice to her philosophy, but I enjoy novels that explore philosophical ideas. Despite the fact that her ideas aren't particularly original, the vision that she creates in her fiction is fairly original and intriguing and does give voice to important conservative ideals.

If you take anything from Ayn Rand's philosophy, do it piecemeal. The parts are much greater than the whole.

On Objectivism (the Philosophy of Ayn Rand)

For those of you familiar with her philosophy, you can skip the next part, but for the rest of you here's a servicable summary/overview taken from wikipedia:

Objectivism holds that reality exists independent of consciousness; that individual persons are in direct contact with this reality through sensory perception; that human beings can gain objective knowledge from perception through the process of concept formation and inductive and deductive logic; that the proper moral purpose of one's life is the pursuit of one's own happiness or rational self-interest; that the only social system consistent with this morality is full respect for individual rights, embodied in pure laissez faire capitalism; and that the role of art in human life is to transform man's widest metaphysical ideas, by selective reproduction of reality, into a physical form—a work of art—that he can comprehend and to which he can respond emotionally.

Reading this, especially the bolded portion, it should be apparent than I'm not an objectivist myself. I am a fan of Rand's work, and of some of the principles of her philosophy, but mostly only as they apply to macro-scale systems like economic or political systems. On that level her philosophy is coherent and potent. Rational self-interest, it turns out, is an excellent principle to build an economic or political system around. It results in preserving the most autonomy and liberty for the individual, and results in creating wealth, prosperity and relatively high standards of living for all who engage in the system. Such a system also encourages human ingenuity, and results in life-bettering technological advancements in a variety of fields. Her philosophy as it applies to these macro-scale systems is not just theoretical, but has been tested historically. The success of laissez-faire capitalism in tandem with a representative democracy is a matter of historical record.

However, when you attempt to apply these principles on a micro-scale i.e. to personal morality, her philosophy breaks down. When you take it to it's logical conclusion, which Rand does quite literally and unapologetically, it results in declaring altruism an evil, and selfishness morally right. Though this strikes most people as self-evidently wrong, and it is wrong, the reason why it's wrong is not because the principles of her philosophy have no merit. They just don't apply to personal morality.

The way that she attempts to rationalize this position is essentially just semantics. That is, she doesn't actually think altruism is evil. She declares the subversion of one's own will for the sake of another individual's will, or a collective will, as evil. She doesn't really think self-sacrifice is evil, when you press her on it. Because if you feel it is right to sacrifice something for someone else, well then, that sacrifice is coming from your own will, and that doesn't qualify as altruism to her. So even in this I have sympathy for her position, and it does make sense to a large extent. The will of the individual should not cede to other individuals or other collective wills. Which I believe is true. Of course, as a Christian, I believe in sacrificing one's will to a greater will, but not to the will of another person, government or institution. Which is what she's essentially advocating against.

footnote: For those unfamiliar with her, her most popular, full presentations of her philosophy are found in her novels Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead.