Quote: (02-19-2013 08:47 AM)Blaster Wrote:
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Sounds pretty familiar to me. I think people like to tear down Objectivism for two reasons:
1) it's idealistic beyond realistic expectation
2) it promotes the concept of heroes
I'm not very familiar with Rand or Objectivism but based on the definition you quoted, I don't have a problem with either of those I have a problem with this:
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the proper moral purpose of one's life is the pursuit of one's own happiness (or rational self-interest), that the only social system consistent with this morality is full respect for individual rights embodied in laissez-faire capitalism
How does beliefs about the nature of perception and knowledge accumulation lead to pure individualism and laissez faire? Sometimes, best for the individual and best for the group align very well. Sometimes what's best for the individual conflicts with what's best for the group. Perhaps most importantly, some things that can be accomplished by a group cannot be accomplished individually.
Suppose you have 9 people living in an apartment in a snowy city. They have to clear snow from their driveway and surrounding sidewalks. It would be easy to do with a snowblower. Without a snowblower, it's luck of the draw-- whoever needs to clear the driveway first gets to shovel it out (and likely do a half-assed job, only good enough to get their car out). In this case, nobody, including the landlord, is wealthy or under enough pressure to be willing to spend $500 on a snowblower. Yet, if everyone pitched in $55, you could buy a community snowblower. If necessary, people moving out could get a refund, people moving in could be required to buy-in. If and when the blower is ever sold, everyone with buy-in could get a cut of the proceeds. This is a communal strategy.
It should be fairly obvious how this logic applies to communities at varying scale. Cities and States can fund services and equipment that benefit everyone, but that no one person individually could afford or profit from owning individually. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding Objectivism, but if it requires strictly individualistic/libertarian Laissez-faire capitalism I can easily see why people would have a problem with it.
Solid point. Despite the dog-eat-dog nature of true laissez faire capitalism, which has never really truly existed, I think even the most die hard capitalists would agree that any economy requires management and supervision. Let the people trade as they will, as long as some very basic requirements are met. That's a whole other topic.