henry_cameron

Mikhail,

You also said, to me when I asked what is wrong with letting fiction be fiction: "Everything is wrong with it."

If you know everything is wrong with it, you know at least something. (I'll interpret the claim of "everything" as a rhetorical excess for now.)

So are you asking a real question or making an affirmation, something to the effect that Ayn Rand was a hypocrite?

btw - If you are making an affirmation, I believe there is a problem in your reasoning. In Objectivism, it is called a concrete-bound view. In this case, it is when you look at a plot line in a fiction work which is used to throw certain principles into dramatic emphasis, replace the principles with the plot line in your argument, then complain (or insinuate) that the principles have nothing to do with reality. That's a switch-off of concretes, not an understanding of principles and how they are derived from reality. It's actually not a very good understanding of fiction plot-lines, too.

Michael

You know, Michael, I am starting to be irritated.

Of course I asked a real question! Furthermore, I obtained a real answer. Specially for you I reproduce this answer once more: Ayn Rand did not go to strike because she thought that the situation in America was still not so bad. In this still-not-so-bad situation it is appropriate to live not like John Galt, but still like Howard Roark who also didn't go to strike and also payed taxes.

As for the alleged problem with my reasoning, I let readers to decide themselves which of us does not have a "very good understanding" of principles, concretes, and fiction plot-lines. You are talking to me in a haughty manner, which I am not going to tolerate.

To your point, I notice that Ayn Rand did not go on strike in her life. And she paid her taxes. She even spoke at West Point late in life.

Yes, I know that, and I asked why. This was exactly my original question.

So what am I missing in your reasoning?

In my reasoning --- nothing.

"The Apology of Capitalism" ???? is this a translation "issue"?

I don't think so. The title in Russian is "Апология капитализма", which can be literraly traslated to English as "The Apology of Capitalism".

Here is the book: http://www.ozon.ru/context/detail/id/1555152/

By the way, there are actually some problems with translations to Russian of Ayn Rand's works. For example, the title of the first part of "Atlas Shrugged" is translated to Russian as "Непротивление", which means "Non-resistance".

I am extremely interested in your concept of "establishing an 'Internet state'" and the advantages to establishing a quasi state in the ether.

This is not my concept. For example, there is a book "Crypto Anarchy, Cyberstates, and Pirate Utopias" edited by Peter Ludlow. This book is actually a collection of articles covering a number of topics including establishing a state in internet. I am not endorsing the content of this book, I haven't read it (yet), I just indicate its existence. Maybe your caustic attitude to this topic is justified, I don't know.

How did you come to reading Ayn's works

Reading Ayn Rand is not so rarity in Russia as you probably imagine. All four her novels are translated to Russian and published, also at least four collections of non-fiction articles are published in Russian ("The Apology of Capitalism", "The Virtue of Selfishness: A New Concept of Egoism", "Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal", "The Morality of Individualism"). Reportedly, Andrei Illarionov, the former adviser of president Putin, claimed that he saw "Atlas Shrugged" in the Putin's private collection of books. This of course doesn't necessarily mean that Putin read it, but nevertheless this means something. The very fact that the Putin's adviser was an admirer of Ayn Rand, or at least was influenced by Ayn Rand, means something (Illarionov is a libertarian, not an objectivist, now he is working for the Cato Institute).

So, no special story about how I came to reading Ayn Rand. First I heard about it and was interested.

and what career are you pursuing in Russia?

I am a mathematician.

Are there any good hidden valleys in Russia?

There are plenty of valleys, but I am not sure about whether they're hidden. Nowdays that we have satellite surveillance, it seems that any hidden place must be underground or somehow otherwise schemed to be undetected, I don't know.

What's wrong with a fiction book being fiction?

Everything is wrong with it. It is appropriate here to give a quote from Ayn Rand herself:

"My personal life is a postscript to my novels; it consists of the sentence: 'And I mean it.' I have always lived by the philosophy I present in my books --- and it has worked for me, as it works for my characters. The concretes differ, the abstractions are the same."

Notice that Objectivism is not a philosophy of self-sacrifice.

I know it. But strike is not a self-sacrifice.

Consider Objectivists Paul Ryan, representative from Minnesota, and Rand Paul Senator from Kentucky, The Tea Party, and others. You could argue for withdrawal and survivalism, political activism, or ever revolution, but don't burn out just yet.

Change is coming.

I am not sure what kind of change this would be.

You call Rand Paul an "objectivist", but this is hardly true. Among other things, look for example this video:

where he describes the disagreement between Ayn Rand and Murray Rothbard as "minor and petty differences". In the meantime, Murray Rothbard is an anarchist, he is in favor of abolishing police force. If by "change is coming" you mean anarchy, then no thanks. It seems to me that all these libertarians and tea-partiers do not bother to delve into basic ideas. Change without knowing what to change, how, and why, could be bad change. Change without proper philosophical grounds could be a slippery slope to "hope and change" and "change we can believe in".

And, by the way, Paul Ryan is from Wisconsin, not Minnesota.

Now back to the original topic of making the strike a reality.

Welcome to OL. You're from Russia, wow.

Ayn Rand answered basically the same question in the Q&A period following her talk “Faith and Force: Destroyers of the Modern World”. Here’s a link where you can listen for free. I’m not sure where in the Q&A it was, but if you’re new to her work (I gather that’s the case) you’ll certainly enjoy the whole thing.

http://www.aynrand.org/site/PageServer?pagename=reg_ar_faith_and_force

Thank you! I enjoyed indeed.

So, she said that the situation is still not so bad.

Anyway, I think it is worth at least bear in mind the possible options. Libertarians in recent years acted at least in three directions:

1. Free State Project,

2. Seasteading,

3. Crypto-anarchy.

Maybe it is time for objectivists also to consider something like this. I am not saying that we must do something immediately. Rather, we need to carefully think all this over.

For example, instead of crypto-anarchy (we are not anarchists after all), is it feasible to establish an independent state within internet? Maybe not, but anyway I think it is at least worth discussing (from our, objectivist, perspective). The same with the FSP and seasteading --- we need to analyze the experience of our libertarian friends.

Here is a question which I've recently sent to Leonard Peikoff, but he didn't answer it in his podcast. Maybe it was asked previously, but I didn't find. In the meantime, the question really bothers me.

So, has Ayn Rand ever thought of making the strike a reality? Of actually stoping publishing books and going with a bunch of businessmen to a valley in Colorado mountains?

And now, shouldn't we all instead of discussing ObamaCare go to strike?

Because if not, then it turns out that all this Atlas Shrugged thing is just fiction, nothing more, and has nothing to do with reality, isn't it?

You know, now there are thousants (if not tens or even hundreds of thousants) people in the world who claim to be objectivists. So what? The first thing one would hope to read on this forum is the discussion of an appropriate place for valley. Yet, I do not see anything like this.