Yaron talks about the NBI years without mentioning PARC

[Neil Parille]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iB-OXSTMOQw

At 34:33

According to Yaron we'll have to wait until the Archives are available.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Neil,

I listened to some of this starting at the time you gave.

You are right that this would have been a standard point for Brook to mention PARC and he didn't. That's a sign that the PARC nonsense is evaporating and what's left is slipping down the memory hole on the ARI side. Good riddance, too.

But I don't give this much weight in my thinking anymore. That book is dead in terms of influence out in the culture. Only a miniscule fringe (and make that even smaller  ) find it important.

But I'm not snobbing. And I certainly don't want to fall into the squishy position Brook did about Rand's personal life and choices. What I mean is feign he's not interested at all in her personal life when uncomfortable issues arise, then rationalize some of her poor choices in life as a quirk of genius. It's a little like how some Christians excuse their misbehavior by saying they are inherently imperfect, i.e., blaming it all on God.

I prefer to try to understand the underlying parts of human nature that compel good intelligent people to shit on themselves at times.

 

I think I have some answers, too. But that's for another discussion.

 

Listening to Brook is irritating to me, even when he's being interviewed by someone as intelligent as Michael Malice. Sometimes he will come up with a great point, like a few of his comments on Buckley and Rand, then cut his own legs out from underneath himself by leaving out something fundamental like how much she was hurt by Buckley (meaning how important he was to her at one time).

Another good example is his comment that religious conservatives make a great opposition party and they blow it when they get power. That's a good point. But in his framing, he tacitly implies the left is better when in power. (ugh)...

His view on China was abysmal. He thinks free markets were fundamentally changing China. That might be to some degree with some individuals, but he completely misses the point that that's not what was going on by China when it developed its own loose form of fascism. He even finds it mysterious that this pro-free market effect is being taken away.

Well think about it. The very foundation of Communism is that capitalism must provide the means of creating wealth, then Communists can take it over and redistribute that wealth based on equality. And they can keep the good times rolling by having confiscated the means of production. There is nothing mysterious at all about that. It's in all the Communist literature.

Still, it gets worse. He let slip that he knows a lot of people in China and has been there often. And he's not relegating this to Hong Kong and Taiwan. He means mainland China, too. In other words, the CCP.

Ahhh... I see...

 

Brook has made a killing from China's version of crony corporatism. In other words, theft when you take away the happy talk.

(Except, puhleeze let's call it something different, right? Something like free trade, OK? At least until the money dries up. Then people like Brook can say they made their money from free trade...  )

When he came out with that comment about knowing people in China and going there often, I stopped watching the video.

I couldn't takt it anymore...

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

I didn't know he knew anything first hand about the NBI years. If he doesn't he's not worth listening to as he's such a wrongheaded lightweight on all and sundry. Except for the money angle I can't figure why Leonard Peikoff put up with him. But it's not hard to figure why Ayn put up with Leonard--that is, if you were involved with that scene in 1968.

--Brant

[Neil Parille]

He claims that Rand was "unconventional" so it's not surprising she held unconventional views on sex and marriage.  OTOH, she did swear the Brandens to secrecy.

PARC is a case of collective buyer's remorse.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

1 hour ago, Neil Parille said:

PARC is a case of collective buyer's remorse.

Neil,

I see it more as a pile of half-assed true-believer rationalizations (i.e. bullshit) mixed with some lengthy excerpts--edited-by-you-know-who--from Rand's notes to herself.

Even the typewriter thing is spun. At no time did Mr. Bonehead entertain the notion that Rand might have actually told people that story about her name being inspired by a Remington Rand typewriter, that she was following a widespread Hollywood custom back then. And what was that custom? Celebrities coming out of Hollywood often embellished their bios for entertainment value more than fact. (They still do.  )

Michael

[Neil Parille]

My point is that there was a lot of early support for the book and now people who praised it must realize the book was BS. 

I don't know if Yaron supported the book when it came out but he must be aware that as of yet there is no rebuttal of theBranden books.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

2 hours ago, Neil Parille said:

My point is that there was a lot of early support for the book and now people who praised it must realize the book was BS. 

Neil,

That's not how belief works.

I am almost sure most of them don't realize it's BS, nor do they believe that.

They gave early support to the book, not because in their view it was a good book, but because it reinforced their belief in Ayn Rand as morally infallible and the Brandens as an evil threat to her. (How many of them actually read it, for example? I mean read it, not skimmed it. Not many, that's for sure.) After the book stopped being relevant to generating buzz, I doubt any of them believe this happened because the book is BS (even though it is  ).

In my view, I think they believe the world is hopelessly corrupt and this is the reason the book flopped. But flop it did. And rather than disentangle the cognitive dissonance, they don't think about the book anymore nor talk about it (except rarely). 

However, if asked about the book (go on try it with those who praised it when it came out), I bet all of them you ask will say the book is true and important.

Why? Well, even flopped as all get out, it still reinforces their belief. Saying that makes them feel righteous. 

True or false, objective or spin, these things have nothing to do with reinforcing their belief, although they will most certainly say the book is true and objective if pressed on it

 

For me, when looking at what people do rather than what they say, the book is dead and deceased and on a rapid descent down the memory hole into total irrelevance.

Michael

[Neil Parille]

I don't know how many who supported it red it closely.  A couple people did mention that Valliant overdid it and was acting like a prosecutor wanting a conviction.

I imagine most people now know that in 2009 biographies came out that more or less confirm the Branden accounts.

The most recent review on Amazon is July 4, 2021.  Before that it was 2019.

[Neil Parille]

Someone must have gotten to Yaron because he just launched a nasty attack on Branden.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYP1wC0vXJA&t=4865s

 

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

On 10/4/2021 at 6:54 AM, Neil Parille said:

Someone must have gotten to Yaron because he just launched a nasty attack on Branden.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYP1wC0vXJA&t=4865s

 

Neil,

Still no mention of PARC, though.  

btw - When Brook was bashing NB, he said Nathanial did sanses or something like that. He repeated it, too. Sanses. I think he was mispronouncing seances.

If that's what he meant, I'm not sure that's true. I've never heard about that before.

I do know Devers was a psychic and she would come to his intensives and read people's minds (the deep stuff). All of this is in a 6 hour taped discussion between Nathaniel and Ken Wilber called Atlas Evolved: The Life and Loves of Nathaniel Branden. That link gives the first part (of 4) for free, but you have to buy the rest. 

If you scroll down that page to "Dialogue Summary," then click on the tab called "The Middle Years," you will find the following passage:

Quote

Nathaniel speaks of the transition from rationality to transrationality marked by the loss of Patrecia and the formation of a new relationship with the woman, Devers, who would soon become his wife. He and Ken explore the nature of reason as it moves into vision-logic and then beyond. Nathaniel then tells the story of how he learned of Dever’s psychic capacities and his budding enthusiasm for this phenomenon. Both he and Ken reflect on the nature of paranormal abilities and their dismissal despite evidence of their existence.

Did Nathaniel ever do seances?

I met him several times, I've talked to Devers (one long glorious phone call that lasted hours), and I just don't see it. 

Also, I've never heard about this or seen it anywhere until now.

Maybe I'm wrong, but right now, I don't think so.

Michael

[ThatGuy]

4 hours ago, Neil Parille said:

Someone must have gotten to Yaron because he just launched a nasty attack on Branden.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYP1wC0vXJA&t=4865s

 

Wait, are we sure it was 'Branden"? Were they saying "Let's go, Branden"? And not "F Joe Biden"?
(No,wait, wrong Branden...as if Brook could get over his TDS long enough to shout "F Joe Biden"...)
 

(For those who don't get it: A desperate news reporter tried to spin the chant at a Nascar race from "F Joe Biden!" to "Let's Go, Brandon!".)

 

 

[anthony]

5 hours ago, Neil Parille said:

Someone must have gotten to Yaron because he just launched a nasty attack on Branden.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYP1wC0vXJA&t=4865s

 

Lightweight. Of such shallow character and mediocre intellect is the premier voice of Objectivism?

[Jonathan]

20 hours ago, anthony said:

Lightweight. Of such shallow character and mediocre intellect is the premier voice of Objectivism?

His rhotacism really kicks into high gear when he gets all emotional and employs his irrational zealotry in the name of defending St Ayn. That wascawy wabbit Brawndon weally betwayed Wand howwibly.

[Brant Gaede]

On 10/4/2021 at 6:22 AM, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Neil,

Still no mention of PARC, though.  

btw - When Brook was bashing NB, he said Nathanial did sanses or something like that. He repeated it, too. Sanses. I think he was mispronouncing seances.

If that's what he meant, I'm not sure that's true. I've never heard about that before.

I do know Devers was a psychic and she would come to his intensives and read people's minds (the deep stuff). All of this is in a 6 hour taped discussion between Nathaniel and Ken Wilber called Atlas Evolved: The Life and Loves of Nathaniel Branden. That link gives the first part (of 4) for free, but you have to buy the rest. 

If you scroll down that page to "Dialogue Summary," then click on the tab called "The Middle Years," you will find the following passage:

Did Nathaniel ever do seances?

I met him several times, I've talked to Devers (one long glorious phone call that lasted hours), and I just don't see it. 

Also, I've never heard about this or seen it anywhere until now.

Maybe I'm wrong, but right now, I don't think so.

Michael

He did experimental things in his Intensives to adduce various altered states of consciousnesses, but seances? Not his style back then.

--Brant

[Brant Gaede]

On 10/4/2021 at 4:54 AM, Neil Parille said:

Someone must have gotten to Yaron because he just launched a nasty attack on Branden.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYP1wC0vXJA&t=4865s

 

So Nathaniel Branden was a very very smart man who stabbed Ayn Rand and Objectivism in the back. That's a great job of taking all the psychological, philosophical, political, personal and existential complexities of the 1950s and 1960s qua Objectivism respecting reducing them to nothing--that is, the Sainthood of Ayn Rand.

--Brant

[anthony]

On 10/5/2021 at 4:43 PM, Jonathan said:

His rhotacism really kicks into high gear when he gets all emotional and employs his irrational zealotry in the name of defending St Ayn. That wascawy wabbit Brawndon weally betwayed Wand howwibly.

Yes, in case Rand came over in that whole episode all too-human, as were the acts of both (apparently), instead demonize Branden.

Notice how he gets to report his moral superiority when NB approached him at a party and was cut dead. "A second hander" - about one of the most first-handed minds.

Makes me quite ill.

[Brant Gaede]

2 hours ago, anthony said:

Yes, in case Rand came over in that whole episode all too-human, as were the acts of both (apparently), instead demonize Branden.

Notice how he gets to report his moral superiority when NB approached him at a party and was cut dead. "A second hander" - about one of the most first-handed minds.

Makes me quite ill.

Rand considered his "social metaphysics" to be much better than her "secondhandism" which she built The Fountainhead on.

--Brant

[anthony]

On 10/7/2021 at 3:40 AM, Brant Gaede said:

Rand considered his "social metaphysics" to be much better than her "secondhandism" which she built The Fountainhead on.

--Brant

The slurs of him must make you steamed, Brant, from what you knew, professionally and personally, of the man. My long impression is of ARI wanting to expunge him from Oist history. Very poor objectivity, that, condemning him out of context from one private, unhappy period and by Rand's over the top, very womanly reaction.  A "non-essential" to philosophers, one would think - an episode to be simply isolated from Branden's overall output, before and later. But that's also the intrinsicism I go on about - 'knowing' inside-out someone's moral character from a single superficial, distant sighting.  I 'knew' him from his later works, some of his s-e books which have never ceased to amaze me in their profundity and warmth and understanding of human (-and man's) nature tying in much of Objectivism, implicllty and at times, explicitly. . I often wonder how many Objectivists have been, by this demonizing manner, totally put off from reading NB, at least with an impartial, not to add, rationally selfish, mind. An intellectual-psychological loss to any.

[Brant Gaede]

Rand's and Branden's relationship from the get go thru the publication of AS was a mutual feeding frenzy that continued on for many more years thru inertia not to mention Branden's intellectual entrepreneurship which, after the break of 68, Peikoff fed off of with greatly diminishing results. NBI made the Objectivist world go for ten years. Frankly, it was a cultural wonder.

--Brant

so I experienced and witnessed