"But feel free to correct me if I've mis-interpreted any of Rand's philosophic premises;..."
And what would motivate someone to spend all the weeks and months that task would take?
Instead, on the outside chance that you have an honest mind, I'll take a long shot at inspiring you to bite the bullet and correct your own violations.
And hyperbolic your errors are:
"Genocide Is Painless: The World According to Rand ---- In the world according to Rand, the destruction of civilization and the death of billions of men, women and children is not a tragedy. ---- And Rand? Well Rand seems to believe that most of the human race is garbage in need of disposal. Once that job has been done, then comes the millennium!"
Point to one death reported in Atlas and explain the standard by which you lay the blame on any one of her heroes. [cite chapter/page of specific incidents please. I haven't read it for several decades.]
Here's some help: Start with the two ideas you correctly agree with Rand on: 1) existence is independent of our mind (objective) and 2) feelings are a result of the ideas man holds, not a substitute, i.e. action directed by reason is our only means to live -- to survive and flourish as a human being. Add to 1) and 2) that our reason and actions are exercised by choice -- volition. And that means all men are fallible. And thence, if your life depends on the rationality of your actions to produce and acquire the sustenance of your life and my life depends on the same for my life, and both of us are fallible, neither has a moral claim to the choices and actions of others or the product of those. And since physical force is the only possible way to interfere with volition, only one socio-economic principle is necessary:
No man may initiate the use of physical force to gain, withhold, or destroy a value owned by any other human being.
Rand's heroes never violated that principle. Whence the "genocide"?
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And here is a whopper of a self-contradiction:
"In the real world we all do things that don't "make sense". We gamble when the odds are against, because it's fun; we fall in love and lust for all sorts of reasons, not jus because we admire our mate; we spend time on the internet typing two or three thousand words about Ayn Rand, though probably only a half-dozen people will read it; he take walks along the lakeshore when we could be making money — just because it feels good; we get that quivering, jelly feeling in our bellies at the sight of a small child because our genetic heritage as built caring for children into our nature; we spend idle hours at cafes, or arenas, because we just like being around other people — I could go on and on."
You already agreed that feelings are not knowledge. Here you take for granted that the positive feelings in each case validate the actions (whether they "make sense" or not). You have pre-excluded that a positive feeling could come from an irrational action (in the short run) that when repeated through life will have disastrous consequences. The connection you have missed is that the very objectivity of reality and independence from our wishes means that those practices either are or are not valid in each individual's case, and reality is the judge and jury. You may not take validity of anything for granted solely on the strength of "we all do it."
When you assemble your personal philosophy, you avoid false assumptions about people and their actions by identifying the underlying ideas that are the root cause. And those you must order and validate by tracing their lineage all the way back to that axiom of axioms: existence exists. And even though its creator is an Objectivist, you can't get that ability from Wikipedia. .
no subject
And what would motivate someone to spend all the weeks and months that task would take?
Instead, on the outside chance that you have an honest mind, I'll take a long shot at inspiring you to bite the bullet and correct your own violations.
And hyperbolic your errors are:
"Genocide Is Painless: The World According to Rand ---- In the world according to Rand, the destruction of civilization and the death of billions of men, women and children is not a tragedy. ---- And Rand? Well Rand seems to believe that most of the human race is garbage in need of disposal. Once that job has been done, then comes the millennium!"
Point to one death reported in Atlas and explain the standard by which you lay the blame on any one of her heroes. [cite chapter/page of specific incidents please. I haven't read it for several decades.]
Here's some help: Start with the two ideas you correctly agree with Rand on: 1) existence is independent of our mind (objective) and 2) feelings are a result of the ideas man holds, not a substitute, i.e. action directed by reason is our only means to live -- to survive and flourish as a human being. Add to 1) and 2) that our reason and actions are exercised by choice -- volition. And that means all men are fallible. And thence, if your life depends on the rationality of your actions to produce and acquire the sustenance of your life and my life depends on the same for my life, and both of us are fallible, neither has a moral claim to the choices and actions of others or the product of those. And since physical force is the only possible way to interfere with volition, only one socio-economic principle is necessary:
No man may initiate the use of physical force to gain, withhold, or destroy a value owned by any other human being.
Rand's heroes never violated that principle. Whence the "genocide"?
----------------------
And here is a whopper of a self-contradiction:
"In the real world we all do things that don't "make sense". We gamble when the odds are against, because it's fun; we fall in love and lust for all sorts of reasons, not jus because we admire our mate; we spend time on the internet typing two or three thousand words about Ayn Rand, though probably only a half-dozen people will read it; he take walks along the lakeshore when we could be making money — just because it feels good; we get that quivering, jelly feeling in our bellies at the sight of a small child because our genetic heritage as built caring for children into our nature; we spend idle hours at cafes, or arenas, because we just like being around other people — I could go on and on."
You already agreed that feelings are not knowledge. Here you take for granted that the positive feelings in each case validate the actions (whether they "make sense" or not). You have pre-excluded that a positive feeling could come from an irrational action (in the short run) that when repeated through life will have disastrous consequences. The connection you have missed is that the very objectivity of reality and independence from our wishes means that those practices either are or are not valid in each individual's case, and reality is the judge and jury. You may not take validity of anything for granted solely on the strength of "we all do it."
When you assemble your personal philosophy, you avoid false assumptions about people and their actions by identifying the underlying ideas that are the root cause. And those you must order and validate by tracing their lineage all the way back to that axiom of axioms: existence exists. And even though its creator is an Objectivist, you can't get that ability from Wikipedia.
.