jaybird3rd

Barbara, It's been a year of exciting discoveries for me, thanks in large part to your important and thought-provoking work. I'm glad to have had the opportunity to tell you this, and I can't think of a more appropriate way to bring the year to a close. Again, thank you very, very much. Jay

http://www.foxbusiness.com/index.html I just read Stossel's blog post, and I'm curious about the pictures of the Atlas Shrugged characters he included. Does anyone here know who created them or where they came from?

I can't help but wonder if, at the start of their careers (which they presumably embarked upon with honorable intentions), the people responsible for this would have wanted to spend their professional lives deliberately spreading lies and falsehoods under the guise of legitimate scholarship. What gets me is ... who do they think they're fooling, and why are they doing this? To "protect" Objectivism? How do they justify "protecting" a philosophy which teaches respect for the facts of reality by blatantly rewriting so much of its history? To "protect" Ayn Rand's reputation? Are they afraid that people will learn that she was wrong or irrational at times, or that she didn't always live up to her own standards? Don't we already know this, and isn't this true of everyone? The only other possible reasons I can think of are decades-old grudges, petty jealousies and turf wars, and the secondhand prestige and money to be gained from riding Rand's coattails. These are small-minded and short-sighted motives that are unworthy of the ideas they claim to be protecting, as if Objectivism ever needed to be "protected" by their kind in the first place. I hope this historical revisionism comes to an end after those who have a personal stake in it finally shuffle off this mortal coil, but I share your fear that it will nevertheless be a setback for Rand scholarship. However, I also take comfort in the fact that it is being publicly exposed for what it is in places like this thread, and I somehow think that, in the end, Rand's work will endure and will prove resilient enough to outlive the tampering of its so-called "guardians."

Roger Bissell: I must agree with the prevailing sentiment here. As I've begun exploring the Objectivist corpus of literature, I've found the over-reliance on the so-called "oral tradition" to be a strange and frustrating anachronism. In an age of print-on-demand technology and MP3 downloads, some of the most important resources are still available only through mail order, on CDs and cassette tapes, for hundreds of dollars. This is a serious barrier to entry into the world of Objectivism, and the best possible way to surmount it is to do the hard work of parsing this material into books. Despite its ups and downs, I think this project has been an outstanding and groundbreaking beginning, and I think it can only make other similar projects that much easier; here's hoping that Barbara Branden's Principles of Efficient Thinking is among them! I don't consider the errors in the index to be serious enough to prevent me from enjoying the book just as it is. I think a corrected index offered as a supplement is a fine solution. In fact, I might as well make a virtue of necessity and say that I rather like the idea of having a removable index; it will be easier for me to use this way, particularly for a book of this size. However, although I'm sure you've considered this already, one thing I would strongly recommend is to flag the index terms in the actual text and to let the computer generate the index for you instead of building it manually; this will allow the computer to update the index automatically if the pagination changes again. It is possible to do this in Microsoft Word, although the very best tool to use would probably be a document preparation system such as LaTeX, which is very popular among academic writers (and book typesetters!) for just these kinds of tasks.

Well, you're very kind. I think one of the things that has contributed to whatever progress I've made is my lifelong tendency to find and devour any available resource on every subject I become interested in; as a kid, I used to drive my parents crazy with this. The subject of Objectivism has kept me busier than most (what an understatement!), and as I've explored it, I've been amazed at the body of work that has been amassed over the years, by Rand herself and by others who have written on her ideas. I think I've benefited greatly from having such a rich library available to me from the beginning, and as I said earlier, that's especially true of Nathaniel's and Barbara's writings. As for the circumstances that lead me to quit my job with the Army ... I can identify with much of what you've said about your own career. The facility I worked for specialized in maintaining heavy armored vehicles and helicopters, but I worked in the paper-pushing software development department while I was still a full-time student. Most of our biggest software projects were farmed out to overpriced contractors who usually delivered shoddy goods; we were responsible for fixing them, and for other equally mundane and non-creative "work." Everyone did as little as possible and bolted out the door at exactly 4:30. When I would say that I only needed another half hour to finish what I was working on today, but that it would take me two hours to recreate my context and finish it tomorrow, I would in effect be told that I was a government employee and that I should learn not to work so hard. I could go on forever, but suffice it to say, I didn't fit in to the tenured government employee monoculture and learned that this was not a place that wanted the best I had to offer, and thus was not a friend to my highest aspirations. I was vaguely aware of this already, but I didn't know how to put it into words until after I had read Rand. When I finally understood what was bothering me, I knew that I had to leave for my own well-being, and I turned down the opportunity to hire on full-time with benefits after graduation. Were it not for Rand's influence, I don't know if I would have had the courage to do that. Jay

I think you might be right about this. It's been a strange and enlightening experience, embarking on a study of philosophy only after having been trained in computer science. It seems almost as if I have unknowingly approached my education backwards, and that I am only now (quite accidentally!) being exposed to certain topics that I wish I was more aware of in the beginning. In other words, if my background in computer science has helped me to understand these broader philosophical topics, the reverse is also true: my exploration of philosophy, as meager as it has been, has already deepened my understanding of computer science. To give only one example of what I mean: so much of modern software engineering involves constructing abstract models of objects, entities, relations, and actions, and programming them to interact in ways that will allow the computer to solve problems in the real world. Having read a little of Rand's Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, and having heard some of David Kelley's lectures on the subject, it seems obvious to me now that epistemology--particularly in the areas of concept formation and validation--is directly applicable here, especially since some of the most difficult challenges that students of computer science face early in their careers involve learning to synthesize useful and valid sets of models. However, in all the years I've spent in computer science classrooms, I don't recall epistemology ever being mentioned or discussed explicitly. I can't help but wonder how much more I would have learned, or how much better I would have learned it, if I understood more of the philosophical underpinnings of what I was doing. But, because I did not, my understanding of the philosophy was very indirect and very skeletal. I'm much more conscious of that now, and this is what prompted my remark about having an "impoverished understanding" in this area. On the other hand, perhaps the philosophy is more resonant to me now than it would have been if I was not already familiar with at least one potentially fruitful area of application. From what little I've read of ITOE so far, I do know one thing for certain: if Rand could have lived longer while retaining her powers, and if she had been interested in studying the subject, I'm sure she would have made an excellent computer scientist. It's been fascinating to learn something of the workings of her mind. Jay

Thanks to all of you for such a warm welcome! It's greatly appreciated.

I think you're referring to the same interview that prompted me to buy Barbara's book. If so, it was the one conducted by Don Swaim of CBS for his radio program Book Beat. It was edited into a two-minute segment, so the interview was never aired in its entirety. Here is a direct link with an MP3 download: Wired for Books: Audio Interview with Barbara Branden about Ayn Rand I agree that it's an excellent interview. Before I heard it, I knew little about Barbara Branden except that certain people among the so-called "Objectivist orthodoxy" had strong feelings about her and about her book. After listening, I didn't find anything objectionable at all (in fact, I was quite impressed with her), and now that I've bought her book and read it twice, I still don't think it contains anything objectionable. And I'm more impressed than ever. Don Swaim also interviewed Nathaniel Branden for Judgment Day in 1989: Wired for Books: Audio Interview with Nathaniel Branden

A very belated hello to the Objectivist Living community! I've mostly remained a "lurker" in the months since I first discovered these discussion boards, but I could not allow this year to come to an end without formally introducing myself and offering a sincere word of thanks to all of those who have contributed to the many fascinating discussions here, which I have followed with great interest. I'm a thirty-three year old male currently living in Alabama, I have recently completed my master's degree in computer science, and I have spent most of my career to date working with computer technology, as a technician, network administrator, and software developer. However, having recently discovered a greater passion for teaching, I have decided to devote the remainder of my career to teaching and to conducting research in the area of educational technology. I will begin my search for a doctoral program next year, and hope to begin my PhD studies in 2011. I am a relatively new Ayn Rand enthusiast, having been introduced to her work through the recent surge of interest in Atlas Shrugged. I don't remember what prompted me to do it, but I picked up a copy of the audio book version of Atlas early this year, and began listening during my daily commute. I don't think I need to describe for the people here the impact that it had on me. I was working for the U.S. Army at the time, and immersing myself in the world of Atlas Shrugged every morning before going to work in a government office (which fit every negative stereotype of a government office that you can imagine) became an increasingly wrenching experience for me; I would move through my days in a state of complete preoccupation with what I was hearing every morning in my car. I wish I had heard it all much earlier in my life, but since I was taught at home during my high school years through a very fundamentalist Christian satellite school (which would never have gone anywhere near Rand's books), I was denied the privilege. I moved on to The Fountainhead immediately after I finished Atlas, and then began learning more about Rand herself and about the fascinating and fractured world of Objectivism. I decided that I was a libertarian as a teenager living in the liberal northeast, and I decided I was an atheist after moving to the "Bible belt" in my twenties, so I've known for a long time that I seem to be a natural outsider everywhere I go. But one of the things I became aware of through my exposure to Rand's work is that, because my formal education had focused so heavily on technology and computer science, I was left with a somewhat impoverished understanding of other important areas of life, most notably philosophy, psychology, and economics. After getting my master's degree out of the way in May, I decided that I needed to remedy this imbalance in my knowledge before I would be ready to move on to my PhD studies, so I quit the government job (which had become intolerable to me by this time) to work part-time and to engage in private study for a year or so. The Rand corpus has served as my starting point, and although I haven't read them all yet, I now own all of Rand's novels and most of her collections of nonfiction essays. I have tried to avoid the compromised revisionist works from the Ayn Rand Institute, which I learned about thanks to Robert Campbell's diligent efforts to expose them. I've also begun branching out to the works of other writers directly or indirectly connected with Rand and Objectivism. Of these, I have been most deeply impressed by the work of Nathaniel Branden. I now own most of his books, too, and it's possible that his work has affected me even more profoundly than Rand's! His writings in psychology have opened doors in my personal life and have enabled me to work on myself in ways I hadn't thought possible, while his writings and talks on Objectivism have provided important clarifications and corrections to Rand's ideas just when I needed them. As I have worked my way through the fundamentals, I think Dr. Branden has helped me to avoid the kinds of mistakes and misunderstandings that many overenthusiastic newcomers to Objectivism seem to stumble into, and I'm certain I will learn even more from the recent publication of his NBI lectures. Also helpful in this regard--and equally impressive to me--was Barbara Branden's excellent biography, The Passion of Ayn Rand, which I bought after hearing this promotional interview from 1986. It has been such a pleasure to read Barbara's book and her writings on this site, and the opportunity to convey my gratitude "in person" was one of the factors that motivated me to (finally) sign up as a member. Now that I am here, I'm only too aware that I have much to learn, and I'm sure I will have many questions for you all, but I also hope to make a positive contribution in any way I can. My thanks once again to Michael Stuart Kelly and to all of the "regulars" here who have contributed much to my understanding of Objectivism so far. And, should either of them grant me the honor of reading this introduction, thanks most especially to Nathaniel Branden and Barbara Branden. You have enriched my life. Jay

Thanks very much for posting this review. I pre-ordered the book as soon as I learned about it several months ago and finally received it on Thursday the 17th, and as a relative newcomer to the world of Objectivism, I am so glad to have these important lectures in printed form. My criticisms of this first edition are relatively minor, and many of them agree with yours: issues of design and layout, a few typos that survived the editing process, the boldfaced underscores of definitions that were dropped from the index (as was mentioned in another thread), and so forth. But these are truly minor issues, and the book is perfectly enjoyable--and will serve as a valuable point of reference for future works--just as it is. Roger Bissell and his colleagues did an outstanding job of preparing the material for publication, and of persuading Dr. Branden (who seemed to be against the idea just a few years ago) to undertake the project, and I salute them all for their efforts. One additional issue with the book that I've noticed (and forgive me if this has been pointed out elsewhere) is that there are several inaccuracies in the index. For example, in the index of names, Leonard Peikoff's heading points to page 112, but his name appears only on page 104. Benito Mussolini's heading points to page 334, but his name appears only on page 330. In the index of terms, the heading for "A is A" points first to page 36, but page 36 is blank (between chapters one and two); the term appears on page 28. I haven't looked at enough entries to detect a pattern, but I suspect that the pagination was somehow changed during the printing process, and the index was not updated accordingly. But again, the entries I've checked are only off by a few pages, and the index as it is still makes the book easier to search than it would be without any index at all.