Is Ayn Rand's "philosophy" a legitimate philosophy, and what do you think of it?

Question

I took some philosophy courses such as philosophy of language and philosophy of space and time, which try to find the truth of how the world really is. They ask questions such as what is space? What is time?

Ayn Rand's "philosophy" seems to be something else and I don't remember there being a college course on it. Why is that?

Answer 1

I wonder how one distinguishes a legitimate philosophy from an illegitimate one, but having said that, let me take a stab at answering this part of the question by responding in the affirmative.  YourDictionary.com defines philosophy as a "theory or logical analysis of the principles underlying conduct, thought, knowledge, and the nature of the universe: included in philosophy are ethics, aesthetics, logic, epistemology, metaphysics, etc."  I think Rand's objectivism meets this definition squarely.

Delving into the specifics of Rand's philosophy is not necessary for this answer, but suffice it to say that it comes with analysis of what Rand believes to be the proper way of living in the world around us.  This includes not only ethics (mainly based on egoism) but also the related fields of epistemology and metaphysics (that there is an objective reality that we are perceiving with our senses, and that through our senses and reasoning we can have knowledge of it).

What do I think of objectivism?  It is a good attempt at devising a philosophy based on the predicament of nature common to all people.  We all must secure our own survival.  Objectivism is not based on the wishes of an unseen deity or the commands of a dictator; rather, it localizes ethics within each decision-maker, charging that person with being truthful to others but otherwise responsible for his own well-being.  The values of objectivism apply regardless one of one's race, gender or country of origin.

Objectivism does not require leaps of faith.  It does not require unthinking deference to the judgment of others.  It does, however, demand that one, in reliance upon reason, determine his own self-interest and act in accordance with this determination.  Once this is done, the rest follows.

I am not a blind adherent to objectivism, and there are difficulties with it that require attention, but I think it is sound in its basic principles, and for that I give it credit.

There was no course on Rand's philosophy at my college either.  However, I have found that Rand's works do not require filtration through a college professor to resonate with most people.  The relative failure of Rand's views to take hold in academia does not render them inaccessible, for one can hardly be confused about her meaning when one reads Rand's writings.

Thank you for the question.

Answer 2

Time and space are the philosophy of physics. Rand was not a physicist. Unlike physicists, who abandoned traditional metaphysics after the failure of Aristotle's cosmology, she clearly stated, "It is not the special sciences that teach man to think; it is philosophy that lays down the epistemological criteria of all special sciences."

Rand was more interesting in conceptual thinking, and I learned more about how the mind works from her seminal book "Introduction to Objectivist Ethics" than from any thing else.

I'm not stuck only to her books. 25 years ago I read Husserl's "Phenomenology of Internal Time Consciousness." I've read Kant, Hegel, Aquinas, a little ibn Rusd, Occam, McLuhan, and few 20th century physicists--look at the list on my profile and that is only a partial list of what I have read.

You can find college courses on Rand, but few and far between, because liberal educators hate her. The first Rand book I read for a reading assignment in HS English. My English teacher would not discuss her, but allowed me to read the book. Then I went to college, and my soph English teacher insulted me by saying I would "grow out" of Rand, as if I was a 12 year old discovering a new girl singer who had no talent.

Get your "time and space" theories from the physicists you trust. But try to find a better epistemologist in the area of what she chose to write about, from the politics of her day, to changing the way we understand selfishness and the ego.

According to Dr. Nathaniel Brandon, he and Rand were both working on the subject of "self-esteem"--separately and unbeknownst to each other, until they humorously discovered the connection in their work--long before the general psychologist cared about it.

Yeah, she's real. She didn't have to become a non-fictional philosopher; but after the years she spent writing just the John Galt speech, working out the epistemological bugs, and straightening the kinks she may have had left-over from the philosophers she learned from, where else could she go? "Atlas Shrugged" was such a feat she couldn't top herself, so she went to work on non-fiction.

The difference between "space and time" physicists, and "rational self-interest, self-esteem, and rationality in general" are not mutually exclusive. She simply wasn't trained in physics; and the physicists our universities turn out are not interested in traditional metaphysics.

Answer 3

Philosophy can tell you how to act. That's what ethics does and it is a subset of philosophy.

Kant was certainly a philosopher and he had his categorical imperative, "Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law." And that's just one example. Ethical prescription runs rampant among philosophers.

Now about Ayn Rand: she is considered by most academicians to be a pseudo-philosopher. She is not rigorous in her thought. Her theory of rights is contrived, and her justification of "life as the standard of value" is sophistry.

But you may have hit the nail on the head with her "philosophy" being something else. What it is, is her own personal reaction to the Russian Revolution. See, the Reds took her family's home. So she makes a "philosophy" that 1) entitles her to certainty, 2) entitles her to property, 3) is the very antithesis of communism, 4) since she was intelligent and productive, she made an elite of people like her.

And as an added bonus, it allowed her, while married, to have an affair with a married man and to demand consent from both of the cuckolded, as they were the more inferior beings. (For the uninitiated, this is not sarcasm.)

Yes, Ayn Rand is a fascinating case in aversion... and rationalization.

Answer 4

Given your edit, you really seem to hold the point of view that philosophy of language is "true" philosophy. Even non-Objectivist philosophers would argue pretty harshly with that. I'd get into it, but I don't want to get too off-topic.

Objectivism does have a code of ethics, yes. How to make decisions and act in the world is an important piece of any philosophical system. However, Rand based her ethics on how the world is, and how we know it. She built her ethics on metaphysics and epistemology.

Objectivism isn't like a science, seeking to understand the world. Rather, it accepts that the world we perceive is "really there," it works through processes that people can understand, and the things we perceive have specific natures. In terms of depicting the natural world, what else would be needed from a non-scientfic perspective?

You won't find many courses out there yet. Part of it is that she's somewhat new, but a bigger part was that she butted heads with academia frequently. She had some serious disagreements with academics and wasn't afraid to put her objections to the entire way they build their careers in print.

The academics, who by and large control what courses are taught at universities, didn't actually address her arguments and attempt to show that she was wrong. Instead, they did the only thing they could to strike back: they refused to teach her ideas.

Now that some Objectivists have broken into academia (and, importantly, got tenure, usually through specializing in Aristotelian philosophy), courses may start springing up, but they are, for now, few and far between.

Answer 5

it's newer that's all it is. i don't see university courses on the metaphysics of quality and that's more worthy of being taught than a lot of philosophology -  yeah Rand's brash and certain parts of academia regard her as a bit of a loose cannon as they did pirsig and that makes it trickier to be accepted in the mainstrem luckily university lecturers setting the courses are also no longer mainstream establismentarians and a wide variety of quality is taught.

The objectivism Rand esposues is most deifnatley a solid legitimate philosophy. arguable agaisnt, as all are, but legitimate!

Answer 6

Its ethics, it is NOT objectively verified and many seem to think that egoism is valid but simply ignore the "rational" part of self interest.

I am sure if you took an ethics theory course it would cover Ayn Rand's philosophy of ethics.