Biography/profile of Ayn Rand, the 'Goddess of Selfishness' 1905 - 1982
Ayn Rand was born as Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum, and was a secular jewish Russian-American novelist,
philosopher, playwright, and screenwriter.
Ayn Rand created her personal paradigm called Objectivism, but unfortunately had a lot of followers.
Born in Russia, at age 21 Rand emigrated to the United States in 1926.
She worked as a screenwriter in Hollywood and had a play produced on Broadway in 1935-1936.
She first achieved fame with The Fountainhead (1943), and her best-known work was
the philosophical novel Atlas Shrugged (1957). Ayn Rand as Aristotelian:
Rand, following Aristotle and Catholics (since Council of Chalcedon), draws a sharp distinction between that which is caused by human intuition: 'the man-made',
and that what is caused by 'supreme reason: 'the metaphysically given' (body-mind split).
Metaphysically given facts are per definition TRUE and man-made phenomena are FALSE until 'RATIONALLY' proven TRUE.
Egoism disguised in logic.
Nevertheless Ayn Rand totally rejected the mind-body dichotomy (split between physical and metaphysical).
That a logician like Rand saw no inconsistency in accepting physical and 'metaphysical'
and denying the 'body-mind split' is a riddle. She must have BELIEVED in physical
and 'metaphysical' as a unity (creationism), the physical body as expression of 'metaphysical' laws (god, ratio,...).
Still circular thinking.
Rand promotes individualism (including individual property) and capitalism,
with government only as 'policeman' and 'nanny'.
Ayn Rand fanatically opposed all shapes of collectivism,
and promoted 'ethical egoism'.
Ayn Rand considered 'reason' to be the only way to 'knowledge',
and considered 'reason' to be the essence of her philosophy.
According to Rand Aristotle, 'the teacher of those who know',
is the fountainhead behind science (henk tuten: read 'logic') and every achievement in 'civilized' society.
That Western Society is an Aristotelian Paradigm and that practically all Western people
see use of logic as 'understanding' makes sense, but paradigms are 'try outs'.
Famous quote of Ayn Rand: I am not primarily an advocate of capitalism, but of egoism; and I am not primarily an advocate of egoism, but of reason. If one recognizes the supremacy of reason and applies it consistently, all the rest follows." Become an Objectivist in Ten Easy Steps . Have Fun!
Ayn Rand consistently rejected the concept of 'a priori' knowledge,
but fails to see that 'reason' produces a similar kind of knowledge.
She states explicitly: There is no a priori knowledge. There is no knowledge not derived from experience
Ayn Rand saw the philosophy of Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) as evil, because Rand believes that 'reason' is independent from any conceptual scheme.
Rand accused Kant with his 'law and order' thinking of hating life, man, and reason (Rand's reason).
In Kant’s teachings, Rand seemed to fail to see the logic and saw detest of the creative ones (in Rand's view
the strong, able, successful, virtuous, confident, happy, ..., the capitalists).
In 1960 Rand said that empiricists like herself saw
knowledge as obtained by direct perception of immediate facts, with no recourse to concepts. . .
Biography/profile of Ayn Rand, the 'Goddess of Selfishness' 1905 - 1982
