Objectivism vs Feelings?

Question

I love Ayn Rand. I also love rationality, but does anyone who knows Ayn Rand and her objectivism ever think that it is sometimes a little bit too apathetic. We as humans do feel after all, and as much as it makes sense to be completely rational, do Objectivists really put that much faith in humans to believe we can live rationally, or are they just evaluating on a rational level?

Answer 1

No one can live without emotions. We react and make decisions based on our emotions, even if we use a logical argument. I don't think it is possible for anyone to make perfectly logical decisions all the time. friendships are not based on logic. Depending on where you  stand, friendships arn' logical at all cause you ahve to give other people things.

I don't have the best authority on this subkec cause I can' say I've read ayn Rand. But i still don' think objectivism should be used all the time.

Answer 2

Oh, I just answered something similar with an Objectivist answer. (His question didn't mention it.)

But Ayn Rand never denied the emotions. She made certain her followers knew that emotions were as rational as reason itself, because the human being comes equipped with them. They just have to "work right" so that when the heart speaks to the mind, it isn't telling lies to the mind.

There are many scenes, especially in Atlas Shrugged, where her characters display great emotion, such as when Reardon must grab hold of a table to tightly he is danger of breaking it or his hands--in order to prevent himself from punching the light out on Francisco.

Then there is the scene, after Reardon and Dagny have s*x for the first time, when Reardon goes on ranting to her about how she should not let his aggressive "animal nature" tell her anything about his mind. THAT is a case of his heart lying to his head, and he eventually comes to understand that.

No, Rand was very much aware of emotions and the part they play in our lives. I am going to paste the answer I just gave someone else.

"Your feelings [are a better indicator of who MOST people are, compared to their thoughts.]

Coming from an Objectivist, that might sound contradictory, at first. But here is the explanation:

"Man is born with an emotional mechanism, just as he is born with a cognitive mechanism; but, at birth, both are “tabula rasa.” It is man’s cognitive faculty, his mind, that determines the content of both. Man’s emotional mechanism is like an electronic computer, which his mind has to program—and the programming consists of the values his mind chooses.

"But since the work of man’s mind is not automatic, his values, like all his premises, are the product either of his thinking or of his evasions: man chooses his values by a conscious process of thought—or accepts them by default, by subconscious associations, on faith, on someone’s authority, by some form of social osmosis or blind imitation. Emotions are produced by man’s premises, held consciously or subconsciously, explicitly or implicitly."

“The Objectivist Ethics,” The Virtue of Selfishness; Ayn Rand

Therefore, since your mind "programs" your emotions, and does so automatically, and does so according to what you REALLY believe if you took the time to thoroughly examine what you believe instead of just accepting your mind without "examining" it, in the Socratic sense--then your emotions are going to be a better indicator of what your mind really is all about.

But if you have lived the "examined life," and your thoughts are not contradictory of themselves, then your emotional responses will match your thoughts." [end of paste]