Mayhew throws down the gauntlet

[Robert Campbell]

I read Russian Radical a few months ago, and am quite puzzled why anyone would object to it. But of course, I am not an Objectivist, much less an Orthodox Objectivist. The philosophical aspects seem too obvious to be argued in principle: Rand was exposed to a variety of philosophical influences in Russia and in her early years here in the USA, and it's helpful to see what they are so we can see what she changed or invented, and the implications of those changes and inventions.

Jeffrey,

The philosophical aspects do seem obvious, but not to Orthodox Objectivists, for whom they are beyond the pale.

All you have to do is look at On Ayn Rand, a short but, for the most part, meticulous book by Allan Gotthelf, to see how he goes out of his way to reject any dialectical aspect to Rand's thinking, at any point in her development, and how he insists that none of her professors in Petrograd could have influenced her understanding of Nietzsche. (Meanwhile, he refuses to name any source for the views that he urgently wants the reader to agree are lacking in merit.)

Or at the sudden eruption of skepticism regarding Rand's tales of studying Ancient philosophy with Nicholas Lossky, after The Russian Radical described what Lossky's overall views were like.

Or the extreme reactions of some of the younger ARIans (e.g., Gotthelf's student Greg Salmieri, or Salmieri's occasional collaborator Ben Bayer) when Sciabarra's name is so much as mentioned.

Something that is now badly needed is an account of Rand's ideas that encompasses the Orthodox Randian tale of their origin, the neo-Aristotelian or even neo-Scholastic understanding of them, and Sciabarra's dialectical interpretation.

The biographical aspects were also interesting, although now with the publication of the Heller and Burns volumes, they may have been superseded.

Such cooperation as there ever was (always tenuous, never publicized) between Chris Sciabarra and some of the ARI folks was centered on the biographical aspects. Gone for good now, thanks to Diana Hsieh and her crew.

The distinctively biographical parts of the book are partly superseded by Burns and Heller (of the two, Heller did more original research, and provides more detail), partly by Sciabarra's own efforts over the decade following the publication of The Russian Radical.

Robert Campbell

[9thdoctor]

Or at the sudden eruption of skepticism regarding Rand's tales of studying Ancient philosophy with Nicholas Lossky, after The Russian Radical described what Lossky's overall views were like.

I missed that. Were there ARIans who called her account of studying with Lossky into question? I don’t see why her story would bother them, especially with her “my views belong to the future” ending flourish. She had to do an oral exam on Plato, as I recall, it doesn't get much more ancient than that.

[Brant Gaede]

Bob, who I have always admired and had a good feeling about...he is a great scholar, and a better writer.

I look at all this and, you know what it looks like? Hobbyists. Hobbyists, working with fixed data. Dead horse beating. Down to small edits. It is thoroughly ridiculous and time-consuming, beyond belief.

I am starting to wonder why I am even looking at it, and I have been looking at things like this for a very long time.

And THAT is why Objectivism is so fucked-up: painful, needless attention to the miniscule.

It's fucked, I'm out. And won't be missed.

Go for another fifty pages: that's what is done.

C'mon back, Rich, I miss you. Trying to figure out what you're saying is saving me from premature dementia.

--Brant

[Robert Campbell]

Were there ARIans who called her account of studying with Lossky into question?

Jim Lennox, for starters.

Before Russian Radical came out, I doubt any of the ARI contingent had any idea what Lossky's own philosophy was like.

Once they found out, they wanted to put as much distance between him and Ayn Rand as they could.

Robert Campbell

[tjohnson]

C'mon back, Rich, I miss you. Trying to figure out what you're saying is saving me from premature dementia.

--Brant

I do sudoku.

[jeffrey smith]

Were there ARIans who called her account of studying with Lossky into question?

Jim Lennox, for starters.

Before Russian Radical came out, I doubt any of the ARI contingent had any idea what Lossky's own philosophy was like.

Once they found out, they wanted to put as much distance between him and Ayn Rand as they could.

Robert Campbell

It's always a trifle more confusing when whim worshipping subjectivism is engaged in by people who loudly assert they are not subjectively whim worshipping.

Only question is whether they are successfully fooling themselves, or unsuccessfully trying to fool others.

Jeffrey S.

[Robert Campbell]

One of Diana Hsieh's regulars has a remedy for all of this noisy, unscheduled criticism of Robert Mayhew.

http://www.dianahsieh.com/blog/2010/03/robert-mayhew-on-ayn-rand-answers.shtml#47

Access to my god damned FRONT YARD is available only to Approved Persons. That's the nature of private property. The fact that I choose to allow some and exclude others does not mean that my front yard can be accurately characterized in a general context as "unavailable."

The ARI, which can include and exclude as its caretakers choose, has a track record of erring on the side of gratuitous and open access. Witness the access given to the recent biographers, neither of which could be remotely characterized as having written material sympathetic to Rand.

The fact that Reisman and Campbell spoiled their welcome to that private property is a negative reflection on them, not on the ARI. And I'm a person who has respected Dr. Reisman for a long time -- but I call it as I see it.

Slam the front door shut!

That'll do it....

Robert Campell

[Reidy]

They allowed Burns into the archives and not Heller. I suspect this was because Burns is a credentialed academic and ARI is in the business of cultivating academic presige, but in any case Bahr's statement is inaccurate.

[Robert Campbell]

Peter,

I think Michael Bahr also has in mind Jeff Britting's willingness to answer some of Anne Heller's questions and his decision (or that of someone in the Archives) to let her see Scott McConnell's 100 Voices prior to publication.

Robert Campbell

[Brant Gaede]

Every religion needs Satan; the more the better. Needs God, too, assuming monotheism.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Access to my god damned FRONT YARD is available only to Approved Persons. That's the nature of private property. The fact that I choose to allow some and exclude others does not mean that my front yard can be accurately characterized in a general context as "unavailable."

Wow.

What part of "exclude" being the opposite of "unavailable" did I miss as I grew up?

I learned the English language at a very early age. I somehow missed that one. How do you exclude some people from something (in general terms, of course) by making it available (in general terms, of course)?

Damned if I know. But apparently this guy Bahr does.

Hmmmm...

I'm coming to the conclusion that there are two kinds of people in life with respect to one fundamental difference--meaning that this is not the whole shebang difference-wise, but it is fundamental. And these people can be found everywhere according to this division, especially within the Objectivist subcommunity. What are they?

1. There are those who center their lives on their own values. They wish to be the final judge and authority of who controls their own minds--and take that authority without muss or fuss as their right. They grant the same space to others.

2. There are those who want to tell others what to do--and they really get off on it.

The Objectivist version of this second is a bit of a variation, but the difference is mostly focus, not substance. These people love to tell others what they can't do--and they really get off on it. (That last part never changes.) Just look at that post by Bahr. He's loving the limelight as he tries to tell others what they can and can't do. BY GOD, NO ONE WILL GO ON MY FRONT YARD UNLESS I SAY SO! DEAL WITH IT, YOU LOWLIFES!

Well, no one will go on mine, either, but I don't go around crowing about it and getting all belligerent without provocation. Anyway, as far as I know, neither Reisman nor Robert C have tried to invade ARI's front yard without permission. Actually, I haven't heard about them trying to invade it at all.

However...

(drum roll)

I have seen certain ARI fundy people go to public, privately owned places and try to skew public opinion about Rand and/or ARI people (ad/or ARI scapegoats) by gaming the resources. For a good example, they do this regularly on Amazon reader reviews. For another, the Valliants were caught red-handed with their paws in the cookie jar on Wikipedia and got themselves banned. If I start going down this path and really start looking into it, who knows what I will come up with? There's oodles of this crap out there.

These are the same people who preach sermons with relish, hands on hips and aping Rand, on the rights of private property and the morality of respecting those rights. Yup. The very same. They try to game the system on the private property of others, flagrantly violating the intent of the owners, and have a shit-fit when someone does it on theirs. (Hsieh even called NB a "prick" for trying to goof on her on Noodlefood under a pseudonym. To her credit, I do not know of her gaming the system anywhere, although she did do a power-trip number with her little clique over at SLOP.)

Does anyone think that Jeff Bezos created Amazon reader reviews so that ARI folks could propagandize the ARI party line by flooding the reviews with biased texts? Of course not. Bezos does not promote this. It is a problem he works around. If Bezos used the skewing policy of ARI fundies on reader reviews as his standard, his customer stats would get shot all to hell and he would soon lose space to more objective (and rational) competitors.

Do the ARI fundies who try to game the Amazon reader reviews care about why Bezos has this resource? Nah. Somehow that's not "private property" to them in the same sense that their "private property" is "private property."

I was thinking about politics recently when this "individual-for-real versus bossy-person" division came to me. You find a lot of the second kind among Obama's people.

Their ideas are different than the bossy Objectivists, and their style is different, but their character is the same. They want to tell others what to do--and they really get off on it.

When I say a person has good character or bad, this is one element I judge. I don't like people who bully others (or stirke a bullying pose) with relish. I don't like it without the relish, either. I don't think bossiness qua bossiness is a virtue. In fact, I think it's a sign of bad character.

Psychologically, it's a sign of insecurity, but that's a whole other can of worms. Also, no bully I know of will admit to being insecure. But pop a bully back real hard when he starts bullying. Then everyone sees it.

I'm a first kind of person. I am the final authority over my mind, just as I believe each person is over his or her mind. Even Bahr. This little forum is a monument to that spirit.

As to people like Bahr, he can keep his front yard. I'll keep my mind.

There is one thing I hope I am doing with this focus. I hope I am planting a seed of awareness somewhere in our subcommunity about the issue of bullying and bossiness when people judge others on good and bad character.

Michael

[9thdoctor]

I thought from the git-go that it sounded like Arian, the once-persecuted Christian heresy, and Aryan. But I've never encountered anyone who thought the resemblance to Aryan more than a bit of silliness.

About the nick "ARIans." I've used the term for years, and some kind of nasty reference to Nazis never occurred to me. I use it in the same spirit that I call members of Atlantis II "A2ers" and members of Objectivist Living "OLers." It's a convenient shorthand, that's all.

Agreed, the reference to Arian Christians isn’t a slam dunk, not everyone is going to think of that, or think only of that. It could even be seen as a contraction of “american”, come to think of it. I wonder what they would like best, here’s a poll question: You’re “affiliated” with ARI, whatever that means, now would you prefer those who aren’t refer to you as:

1. Orthodox, Orthos for short.

2. Fundamentalists, Fundys for short.

3. ARIans, which I suppose is already short for ARI-affiliates or some such.

4. Don’t call us anything, just act like we don’t exist, and never again reference Ayn Rand or her ideas in any form.

5. Swallow cyanide already and die you demons from hell!

I’d put my money on 5 to win, 4 to place, 3 to show.

Edit: Oops, I left out Peikovians. Oh well, that horse got lost on the way to the post!

Edited April 7, 2010 by Ninth Doctor

[Starbuckle]

GHS writes: "The Beatson's -- I recall hearing about them, but I don't think I ever met them."

The cultural ignorance of the 60s, shared even by many who were adults during that era, is mind-boggling. The Beatsons were a very famous rock group from Britain that took the U.S. musical scene by storm. They were both very popular and very unpopular. For example, many young women would attend their concerts just to scream at them and drown out their music. The Beatsons were responsible for such tunes as "I Want to Hold Your Hand Insofar As Our Goals Are Mutually Compatible," "All You Need Is Love As a Response to Values," "Can't Buy Me Love Except Through Rational Trade," "Let It Be If It's the Metaphysically Given," and others.

[kiaer.ts]

mm