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Atlas Shrugged

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Quatermass
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26 Dec 2010, 6:10 pm

ruveyn wrote:
Quatermass wrote:
A novel's purpose is to entertain, first and foremost, not ram ideology down people's throats with all the subtlety of an intubation sans anaesthetic. Even Stephanie bloody Meyer has some idea of how to write entertainment, even if it is only mediocre entertainment. If Atlas Shrugged was a movie, it should have been riffed by Mystery Science Theater 3000.

.


Ayn Rand saw her novel as a way of articulating her philosophy, not as entertainment. There was nothing entertaining about Ayn Rand. She was Dead Serious in every aspect of her life.

ruveyn


This much is obvious.

Awesomelyglorious wrote:
Master_Pedant wrote:
Ayn Rand is a truly disgusting human being.

Eh, I've actually wondered about the role of the mentally ret*d within society.


Well, imagine if the term 'ret*d' got officially applied to Aspies. You may now commence defecating bricks.

Idiotchief wrote:
So i'm getting the general consensus of the of her philosphy and morals is she's a egotistical megolomaniac that while intelligent takes things in the wrong direction?


Monomaniac, IMO, and probably narcississtic, but yes, that's about right.


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26 Dec 2010, 6:19 pm

ikorack wrote:
I've read Anthem and this section of text above me(after all it could have been a fluke) and that book are the reasons I am not likely to ever read atlas shrugged. I liked Anthem but not for anything except the thoughts it evoked in my imagination, the quality of the novel itself was negligent.(good concept, bad delivery) In my opinion she should have just written her ideals out as essays and left the fiction writing to better authors.


The question would be whether writing her thoughts and philosophy out in a dry, intellectualized sort of way would have been nearly so effective in distributing her ideas and influence as writing what amount to arguments in story form were. Plenty of authors have written straight philosophy or moral theory to no avail, but very few if any of them are considered as influential as Rand is, leading me to wonder if her success (like that of the bible) is at least in part due to putting her arguments in allegorical form as stories. Obviously something in her work speaks to many people, and I'd wager it's not her writing style.

I think a common fallacy many people make when it comes to Ayn Rand is assuming that she's an all or nothing proposition, where as I feel that it's fine to appreciate her celebration of the individual and denouncement of an overbearing state while rejecting some of her more extreme social Darwinism. Like most people, I think of Rand as being neither black nor white but rather gray, having both good and bad qualities. At the end of the day she was just an author with some strongly held beliefs that she effectively conveyed to the world at large through her writings, nothing more and nothing less.


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26 Dec 2010, 6:22 pm

Quatermass wrote:
Eh, I've actually wondered about the role of the mentally ret*d within society.


Well, imagine if the term 'ret*d' got officially applied to Aspies. You may now commence defecating bricks.
[/quote]
Um.... I am not sure the real issue is the label "ret*d", but rather the real issue is the question of the degree of ability of certain individuals. I mean, we can say that it would be unfortunate for aspies to be mislabeled as "ret*d", but, I don't think that's the issue so much as the degree of differences in functioning that are usually given the label of "ret*d".



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26 Dec 2010, 7:07 pm

ruveyn wrote:
With one major exception. Corporations usually do not have armies. Governments do.

There is nothing fundamental in the nature of a corporation that prevents it from having an army; the reason they typically do not is because the state forbids it. Corporations have, in the past, used hired thugs and paramilitary violence to shut down attempts by workers to unionize. In the absence of government (or in a situation where government was too weak to exert a serious influence) there is every reason to believe corporations would return to such behavior.


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26 Dec 2010, 8:33 pm

Orwell wrote:
There is nothing fundamental in the nature of a corporation that prevents it from having an army; the reason they typically do not is because the state forbids it. Corporations have, in the past, used hired thugs and paramilitary violence to shut down attempts by workers to unionize. In the absence of government (or in a situation where government was too weak to exert a serious influence) there is every reason to believe corporations would return to such behavior.


I'd hate to see a Blackwater ("Xe")/Walmart merger.


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ruveyn
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26 Dec 2010, 8:56 pm

Orwell wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
With one major exception. Corporations usually do not have armies. Governments do.

There is nothing fundamental in the nature of a corporation that prevents it from having an army; the reason they typically do not is because the state forbids it. Corporations have, in the past, used hired thugs and paramilitary violence to shut down attempts by workers to unionize. In the absence of government (or in a situation where government was too weak to exert a serious influence) there is every reason to believe corporations would return to such behavior.


The State Forbids It. In short the State retains a monopoly on force which is exactly my point. Corporations are constrained by law not to have armies (although they may have security guards for their property). Governments have armies. That is the difference I was talking about.

The monopoly is maintained by positive man made law, not by natural law, but since man made law is enforced with lethal weapons man made law must be taken seriously.

ruveyn



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26 Dec 2010, 9:01 pm

East India Company, anyone? Gazprom (has its own intelligence agency).... Some companies, realistically speaking, not only have an army, but also a foreign policy. At present, the latter is more dangerous, imo.


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26 Dec 2010, 9:08 pm

91 wrote:
East India Company, anyone? Gazprom (has its own intelligence agency).... Some companies, realistically speaking, not only have an army, but also a foreign policy. At present, the latter is more dangerous, imo.


Dead for 200 years. Do you know the difference between Now and Then?

ruveyn



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26 Dec 2010, 9:18 pm

^^^

Gazprom was founded in 1989, is that recent enough for you?


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26 Dec 2010, 9:19 pm

ruveyn wrote:
marshall wrote:
I'd say that Ayn Rand's ideals are definitely not in the interest of "aspies" or people with disabilities as a whole. It might apply well to a small minority who are able to make their special interest into a lucrative career, but that's more of an exception than a rule in the cutthroat world of modern capitalism where office politics and social hierarchy dominate the corporate culture. Contrary to the claims of wide-eyed libertarian idealists, capitalism is only as just and only as merit based as our corrupt human nature will allow. Defects in human nature cause dysfunctionalism in corporate culture that are just as bad or worse than the dysfunctionalism in government bureaucracies.


With one major exception. Corporations usually do not have armies. Governments do.


But if corporations are powerful enough to outright buy sovereign governments they are powerful enough to dictate the use of force. If left unchecked, money becomes power. You get to choose your poison. It's either tyranny of the government or the tyranny of the plutocracy. If a power vacuum is left open, some entity is going to take advantage of the opening, i.e. use it to gain power for itself.



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26 Dec 2010, 9:48 pm

marshall wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
marshall wrote:
I'd say that Ayn Rand's ideals are definitely not in the interest of "aspies" or people with disabilities as a whole. It might apply well to a small minority who are able to make their special interest into a lucrative career, but that's more of an exception than a rule in the cutthroat world of modern capitalism where office politics and social hierarchy dominate the corporate culture. Contrary to the claims of wide-eyed libertarian idealists, capitalism is only as just and only as merit based as our corrupt human nature will allow. Defects in human nature cause dysfunctionalism in corporate culture that are just as bad or worse than the dysfunctionalism in government bureaucracies.


With one major exception. Corporations usually do not have armies. Governments do.


But if corporations are powerful enough to outright buy sovereign governments they are powerful enough to dictate the use of force. If left unchecked, money becomes power. You get to choose your poison. It's either tyranny of the government or the tyranny of the plutocracy. If a power vacuum is left open, some entity is going to take advantage of the opening, i.e. use it to gain power for itself.


Blackwater ("Xe") is technically a corporation that is a (mercenary) army. While most of their work is done in the form of contracting out to government, I'm sure it's not that much of a stretch to have Xe contracted out to another corporation.


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26 Dec 2010, 10:18 pm

Why would I read a book from a author who consider me as a parasite deserving to die.

There is also this: http://www.michaelprescott.net/hickman.htm


ruveyn wrote:
Orwell wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
With one major exception. Corporations usually do not have armies. Governments do.

There is nothing fundamental in the nature of a corporation that prevents it from having an army; the reason they typically do not is because the state forbids it. Corporations have, in the past, used hired thugs and paramilitary violence to shut down attempts by workers to unionize. In the absence of government (or in a situation where government was too weak to exert a serious influence) there is every reason to believe corporations would return to such behavior.


The State Forbids It. In short the State retains a monopoly on force which is exactly my point. Corporations are constrained by law not to have armies (although they may have security guards for their property). Governments have armies. That is the difference I was talking about.

The monopoly is maintained by positive man made law, not by natural law, but since man made law is enforced with lethal weapons man made law must be taken seriously.

ruveyn

Except that corporations don't have the restriction giving to govnerment with though fights to prevent them from abusing their powers.
Tribunals work as a independent power and constitutions limit their powers. So soldiers won't budge my door without a good reason. Of course, such limitations can be overide, but it's still better that corporations who with their army would do as they please without limitations from the laws.


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26 Dec 2010, 10:25 pm

ruveyn wrote:
Orwell wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
With one major exception. Corporations usually do not have armies. Governments do.

There is nothing fundamental in the nature of a corporation that prevents it from having an army; the reason they typically do not is because the state forbids it. Corporations have, in the past, used hired thugs and paramilitary violence to shut down attempts by workers to unionize. In the absence of government (or in a situation where government was too weak to exert a serious influence) there is every reason to believe corporations would return to such behavior.


The State Forbids It. In short the State retains a monopoly on force which is exactly my point. Corporations are constrained by law not to have armies (although they may have security guards for their property). Governments have armies. That is the difference I was talking about.

The monopoly is maintained by positive man made law, not by natural law, but since man made law is enforced with lethal weapons man made law must be taken seriously.

ruveyn


For a US citizen to be completely ignorant of the violence promulgated against organized labor by business for at least a couple of centuries is, perhaps, a better indication of basic intelligence than an IQ test.



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26 Dec 2010, 10:49 pm

Tollorin wrote:
Why would I read a book from a author who consider me as a parasite deserving to die.

Out of interest.



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26 Dec 2010, 10:57 pm

Tollorin wrote:
Why would I read a book from a author who consider me as a parasite deserving to die.


As part of a case study of the minds of egomaniacs?


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26 Dec 2010, 11:33 pm

Sand wrote:
For a US citizen to be completely ignorant of the violence promulgated against organized labor by business for at least a couple of centuries is, perhaps, a better indication of basic intelligence than an IQ test.


No, it is a better indication of labor relations knowledge, or at the very least, of perception. Then again, it might be a better indication of literacy rather than intelligence, as I learned about such things from reading (namely Hannibal and Fast Food Nation).


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