From: holmes@opal.idbsu.edu (Randall Holmes)
Subject: Re: Request for critiques of Objectivism, and for intro's to philosophy
Organization: Boise State University Math Dept.
Date: Mon, 14 Sep 1992 16:56:42 GMT

In article <BuJyuG.77v@quake.sylmar.ca.us> brian@quake.sylmar.ca.us (Brian K. Yoder) writes:
>In article <TORKEL.92Sep13051704@bast.sics.se> torkel@sics.se (Torkel Franzen) writes:
>>In article <1992Sep12.220522.17755@wuecl.wustl.edu> jaf@wucs1.wustl.edu
>> (Andy Fingerhut) writes:
>
>>  Your post is a very reasonable one, and I don't mean "reasonable" in
>>the Randian sense. Rand was a very poor philosopher, but she had a talent
>>for writing stirring stuff that appeals to a lot of (mostly young) people,
>>for reasons that aren't hard to understand. If you find romantic capitalism
>>and individualism appealing, there's no reason why you shouldn't enjoy
>>her writings. However, if what appeals to you is chiefly the realist
>>philosophy she presents, it is a relevant comment that Rand's variety of
>>philosophical realism is very poorly argued, and marred by a lack of
>>understanding of any of the philosophy she denounces. In short, there is
>>no reason to read Rand for her philosophy.
>
>Talk about poorly argued!  Content-free arguments of this kind are not
>particularly effective.  I think her arguments are quite good, they just
>are not written in the academic jargon philosophers use to write for each
>other.  If anything, I think that makes her arguments BETTER, not worse.
>
>--Brian
>
>
>
>

A principal defect of Ayn Rand as a philosopher is poor manners.  She
did not bother to read the works of the philosophers that she
denounces.  As a result, her discussions of other philosophical
systems are ridiculously easy to attack (although the features which
she projects onto all philosophers who disagree with her _can_ be
found in existing phislophical systems, and are very alarming when
encountered)!  Her own philosophical system is reasonably
well-expressed and she clearly has good intentions in writing it.  It
is well-argued on its own terms.  But she does not engage any real
opposing views, and she is in fact wrong on several important points.
I have said that Rand is not "technically competent" as a philosopher;
this is perhaps unfair -- but she is "naive" -- she presents her
theory in a vacuum, without understanding that there are other
thinkers, wholly or partly in sympathy with her, who could have taught
her to avoid some errors.  For instance, her insistence on rejecting
physical determinism is ill-advised; she makes the common error that
physical determinism is incompatible with moral choice, which it is
not.  Metaphysics is prior to ethics; you cannot argue, because
something _should_ be true, that it necessarily _is_ true (which
indicates that even if determinism _is_ incompatible with moral
choice, she cannot use this argument against it).  This is only an
example.  As a professional logician, I _know_ that Rand's
understanding of logic is inadequate; Aristotle is accurate on logic,
but he is not the final authority (the modern logicians know much
more, and even the logicians of late antiquity had made progress), and
her uses of the three Aristotelian laws of logic are silly (I use the
word advisedly).  The Law of Identity (A is A) says exactly that:  x =
x, for each x.  Rand seems to use it to say "Each thing has an
essential nature and has to have the properties which follow from that
nature".  This is true, but it is not the Law of Identity in the
logical sense.  It can be misapplied thus: 

Proposition:  The essential nature of Man includes X.

Proposition:  George has property X.

Objection:  But George does not have property X!

Proposition:  The Objector is an adherent of the forces of Evil -- he
denies the Law of Identity, Man is Man, from which we deduce that
George, being a man, must have property X, which belongs to man's
essential nature.

But the Objector has only objected to the assertion that the essential
nature of man includes X by pointing out an exception; the Law of
Identity is not the issue.  It is in fact NEVER an issue; it is
completely trivial (nonetheless true!)

Rand, as a novelist, is very impressive.  Reading her books had a
profound effect on my _ethics_ and propelled me in the direction of a
rational philosophy.  But I have never thought that Rand herself can
provide that philosophy.
-- 
The opinions expressed		|     --Sincerely,
above are not the "official"	|     M. Randall Holmes
opinions of any person		|     Math. Dept., Boise State Univ.
or institution.			|     holmes@opal.idbsu.edu
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.meta