No American philosopher has sold more books to the general public than Randover thirty million at last count, with over a half million being sold on a yearly basis. Rands legacy is widespread and enduring. Yet, despite the extent of her influence, her ideas have not received much attention from scholars and critics.Her philosophical views, many of which are extremely controversial, literally cry out for interpretation and criticism. But little along these lines has appeared. Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature represents a major contribution to a critical understanding of Rands so-called Objectivist ideology. Based on extensive research of Rands writings, including her journals and letters, the book demonstrates how Objectivism sprung from Rands romantic and idealistic view of human nature. Rand repeatedly claimed that the goal of her writing was the projection of an ideal man and that her philosophy was merely a necessary means to that end. Using this insight as an interpretive touchstone, the book proceeds to explain how Rands views on history, human knowledge, morality, and aesthetics were profoundly influenced by her idolatry of the ideal man and where she went wrong in developing her unique but flawed vision of human society.
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Greg Nyquist is a freelance writer and independent scholar specializing in economics and philosophy. He has served as contributing editor to Dispatches and WorldNet magazines and is webmaster and assistant editor at jrnyquist.com, the controversial opinion website. He has appeared several times on the Jeff Nyquist's "Out of the Box" Radio show. Since March of 2000 he has written many articles and blog posts detailing the excesses in credit markets and warning of an impending financial meltdown. He is author of Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature, considered in some quarters as the most important critique of Rand's philosophy. He lives in Eureka, California.
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21 of 28 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Why all the spite?,
By
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This review is from: Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature (Paperback)
The author offers a few worthwhile criticisms of Rand's philosophy, but there is far too much spite. He regularly claims her philosophy is vague and superficial, simply her subjective prejudices, lacks empirical support, and consists of verbalisms having little to do with reality. Despite this, he agrees with significant chunks of it! In the Introduction he says, "None of Rand's views on human nature, epistemology, history, ethics, or politics bother me all that much." Why then all the spite? To a great extent the Introduction is one long rant and could be skipped or read after the rest of the book. Such a start undercuts the author's credibility and highlights his emotional dislike of Rand. Then there are his own flawed ideas. For example, he says there is no such thing as induction, yet repeatedly makes generalizations about Rand. Chapter 1 - Theory of Human Nature The author gives two basic conceptions of human nature - naturalistic and utopian. He considers himself an extreme naturalist and Rand a utopian. Are there no other alternatives? Rand was surely an idealist (ordinary sense, not the philosophical one). She thought the world could be a better place. If he completely disagrees with that, he is as much fatalistic as naturalistic. He regards her philosophy not as the search for truth, but her means of projecting the ideal man. Her standard of human greatness is so unrealistic no man could ever meet it. Only her fictional characters could. Of course, some of them are near superhero status, but that doesn't imply real people can't be geniuses, rational, courageous, or have integrity. The author says Rand's theory of human nature is based on the human mind having complete control over the body and will. Saying that a man must "create himself" is a lot like saying man has no given nature. This is a gross exaggeration. She held there are automatic mechanisms, which undercuts "complete control." She also had plenty to say about man's given nature. How did Nyquist miss it? Rand says the ideal man has no "inner conflicts" between his reason and emotions. The author says this is wrong; conflicts are between different desires. This is a valid point for real people much of the time. I doubt that Rand would have disagreed. Nyquist has an "inner conflict" between his reason and emotions at least when it comes to Rand. Emotions aside, he finds much to agree with. Let emotion enter, and his antagonism overwhelms him. He critiques Rand and her disciple Leonard Peikoff on the choice to think and innate emotions. Peikoff says there are no innate emotions and wrote some things I haven't found in Rand's writing, so it's hard to know if she would have agreed. In any case he makes some valid criticisms of their claims, especially on the choice to think. Peikoff claimed there is no `why', and Nyquist rightly jumps on it. On the other hand, he makes false or dubious claims and misrepresents them. For example, Rand wrote that man's emotional mechanism was tabula rasa. However, she also wrote that the physical pleasure-pain mechanism of man's body is automatic and innate, which Nyquist ignores. This undercuts his depiction of Rand's position. Also, "blank slate" does not mean "no slate." He claims Rand could not bring herself to reject the fundamental impulses toward religion, man's spiritual salvation. She wanted to save men's souls, but instead of looking to God, thought she could do it herself. Chapter 2 - Theory of History Much of this is about Peikoff's theory of history. Rand wrote very little on the topic. The author rightfully criticizes Peikoff's theory for its exaggerated importance assigned to philosophers. He claims instead that history is driven by more practical matters like human sentiments and desires and their unintended consequences. A good example is money qua medium of exchange. He endorses Vilfredo Pareto's idea that desires and sentiments are the primary determinants of the social order. The chapter is not without the author's own misconceptions. For example: "There is absolutely no reason to believe that ideas become more influential as their degree of abstractness increases. If anything, they probably become less influential. . . . How can principles so vague and indefinite possibly guide man's concrete actions?" He seems oblivious to the phenomena that "more abstract" extends the range of application. For example, in biological taxonomy genus is more abstract than specie. Genus applies to multiple species and thus more organisms. Chapter 3 - Theory of Knowledge He critiques Rand's claim about the significance of the problem of universals and Rand's solution to it, which rests heavily on her theory of measurement omission. I largely agree with the author's criticisms here, especially on measurement omission. It is not that measurements are never omitted, but that she grossly exaggerated their role and was inconsistent. The author's comments on abstraction show his misunderstanding of it in regard to concept-formation. Abstraction is the selection of common characteristics of the referents and thus central. In contrast Nyquist says it is purely secondary and approvingly cites Santayana that "the abstract is what is less familiar to the speaker." Huh? He misunderstands Rand's words or distorts them for polemical purposes. One of many examples: "Rand's most serious epistemological error is her assumption that all human knowledge is ultimately conceptual in nature and can only be formulated through a process of deliberate conscious reasoning." But in Rand's own words, knowledge is "a mental grasp of a fact(s) of reality, reached either by perceptual observation or by a process of reason based on perceptual observation" (ITOE, 1979, 45). He notes that Ayn Rand did not solve the "problem of induction" and he agrees with Karl Popper about it. Chapter 4 - Theory of Metaphysics The author says he detests metaphysics; it's too abstract, speculative, and non-empirical. I agree when the metaphysics is of somebody like Hegel, who gets Nyquist's attention. Moving on to Rand, he goes after her axioms and oft-repeated "A is A" as verbalisms empty of empirical content. (I think there is more to them than he acknowledges, when their meaning is elaborated.) He even agrees with them on some level, but criticizes the way Rand and other Objectivists use them polemically against other people. The author's own view on logic is common but incoherent. On page 98, he says the following. "Reality is neither logical nor illogical; it just is. Logic is a quality that applies only to the realm of thought." . . . "Those who, like Rand, assume that reality is logical, are guilty of confusing our ideas about reality with reality itself." (I have even seen some who call themselves Objectivists express this view.) "Our thoughts about reality must be logical if they are to correctly represent reality." I must ask: How can thoughts -- logical or illogical -- be compared to reality if reality is neither logical or illogical (in his view)? Chapter 5 - Theory of Morality The author wholly agrees with Hume's attack on the so-called naturalistic fallacy, that one can derive an `ought' from an `is.' He contends Rand's morality is a complete failure, critiques her positions like `life is the standard of value' and the tension between bare survival and survival appropriate to man's nature, and altruism versus egoism. As an aside, this issue is often debated elsewhere as "survival versus flourishing." Despite all the criticisms, he believes there are some elements of truth in the Objectivist ethics. One of several topics he undertakes is the dictum honesty is the best policy. After noting some exceptions given by Leonard Peikoff, Nyquist declares: "Once you admit that your moral principles do not apply `under all circumstances,' then you have, in effect, given yourself the right to break your moral principles any time you choose." Really? It's a policy, not a rule without exception. It may mean that the policy is a not quite as broad as expressed earlier. An exception to `all X are Y' leaves `some X are Y' or `most X are Y', not `no X is Y'. Chapter 6 - Theory of Politics He starts on the wrong foot. Citing Peikoff: "Politics, like ethics, is a normative branch of philosophy." Nyquist says: "No where is the basic problem of Objectivist theory of politics more aptly expressed . . . Peikoff is expressing the Objectivist view that political philosophy is primarily concerned, not with the basic facts of political conduct in the real world, but on how politics ought to be conducted." I disagree. Peikoff is saying a political theory, no matter whose, follows some ethical principles. For example, some would say "it's moral to rob Peter to pay Paul." Two pages later Nyquist in effect says the same thing: "the overwhelming influence of sentiment on political thinking". Oddly enough, he concedes to Rand "her every normative claim about social, economic and political relations." Nevertheless, he can't resist inserting ridiculous comments. "She suffered from the delusion that political problems could be solved by manipulating conceptual constructions." "It should be obvious that Rand and her followers have little if any, notion of how many real-life obstacles stand in the way of the implementation of their theory." And where is Nyquist's vaunted empirical support for this? I doubt he knows more than a handful of her followers, so he can't know what they think about this. Two obvious and enormous real-life obstacles are the prevalence of the sentiment that it's moral to rob Peter to pay Paul and business should be heavily government-regulated. I'd bet the vast... Read more ›
27 of 37 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Melodramatic Slights of Logic,
By
This review is from: Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature (Paperback)
In search good supplement to my continuing rehabilitation from my Ayn Rand addiction, I looked to this book. I wanted a solid rebuttal of some of the contradictions I had gleaned off of Rand's writing. As Greg will tell you, academic philosophers have largely ignored Rand, and he promises to clear all that up. Needless to say, I was excited to read this book, because as much as I respect Rand's philosophy, I haven't heard any criticisms. Maybe I was just being sucked in to the infamous Randian cult lifestyle, I wanted a complete picture.
However, I was let down. There are points worth noting, some mistakes of Rand that are elucidated, some knowledge to be had from this book... But most if not all of it, I feel, was gone about in an unbecoming to a philosopher and sometimes childish manner. As far as tackling Ayn Rand goes, I was expecting Nyquist to show her up on her own ground. That is, clear and unambiguous discourse on errors in thinking Rand had committed. Not so. My expectations were shattered. This book is littered with personal slander of Ayn Rand that supposedly discredits objectivism. Constant misrepresentations of her philsophy, either through ignorance by Nyquist or maybe he thought the reader wouldn't notice. Appeal after appeal to a "that's just how people are, everyone says so". Ayn Rand probably knows best of all that her philosophy and "people" don't match the best, as you can tell from her fiction. Often Nyquist simply stoops to generating controversy by using a word in a different sense that Rand has. More often was a pulling my hair in intellectual agony than picking out any tidbits of worthwile criticism. I want my money back Greg. Paypal me.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
An Intelligent Criticism,
By S. Sweet SYRN (Tampa, FL USA) - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature (Paperback)
Before getting started, would like to make a small request. Besides dealing with controversial topics and itself being controversial, Rand's work covers a wide range in terms of breadth and depth while introducing ideas original to public discussion. It is difficult and intimidating under the best of circumstances for people to merely adjust to such novel ideas. We can relax a bit and realize that there is no need to figure everything out instantly or with rancor, and there is no requirement that anyone else adopt our chosen beliefs. That having been said, let's proceed.A long-term "student of Objectivism," I welcome books which offer an intelligent, fair, unbiased evaluation of Rand's ideas. Rand herself said, "Think!" Thinking is good for everyone, and that is just what Nyquist has done. As background, he has undertaken the strenuous initiative of seriously studying a great many prominent thinkers and philosophers who wrote work relevant to this book. Perhaps because he has maintained a website featuring critical discussion of Rand's work, he has drawn fire in some of the book's reviews. Some have thought that his book is little more than a personal attack on Rand. Some have dismissed him out of hand. While there are passages and words which are going to be inflammatory in this book, I personally chose to ignore all of these and focus on only the reason and supported conclusions herein presented. It seems that Nyquist studied Rand quite well, though, perhaps not exhaustively. I say that because I believe in one or two places, he missed Rand's meaning or intent. But overall, it is a good representation with references, albeit many times quotes of Leonard Peikoff written after Rand's death. At points, it appears as if Peikoff is clarifying or even extending Rand; yet it seems true that now, for most people, Peikoff speaks fully and finally for Rand. These days, even the new edition covers of her novels indicate they are authored by "Ayn Rand and Leonard Peikoff." This book begins by noting that Rand's works make her one of the most widely read philosophers of the twentieth century and one of the most enduring writers of any generation, yet Rand's work has not been subject to a genuinely intelligent and penetrating criticism. For me, the books of Albert Ellis and Jeff Walker are intelligent as well as penetrating; yet I agree with author that there are really few books which fully challenge Rand from the standpoint of traditional academic philosophy, and at the same time define all of their terms. In other words, for many Rand readers, no study of philosophy has been pursued beyond the works of Rand, yet some books critical of her seem to assume a philosophy degree. Nyquist attempts to bridge this gap by explaining the meaning of concepts he uses in terms the average person can follow. Essentially, Nyquist believes that man/woman has a certain, rather regrettable, nature and that he/she has always behaved accordingly and will not change on Rand's account. Strength, force, manipulation, even deceit, trump empathy, reason, negotiation, honesty. This is the given character of man, who is doomed to exist in a confusing world of selfish and conflicting desires, sentiments, passions, emotions. I would pause here to note that this characterization of the nature of humankind is not new but has its roots in a very ancient doctrine which is heartily endorsed by Judeo-Christian theology, holding that man's very nature is sinful, that humans are born sinful, that no amount of good acts are sufficient to convince the deity and his earthly church representatives otherwise, and that it is by the grace of the deity alone that they are accepted for "salvation," provided of course that they keep faith with the churches. Rand very critically examined this doctrine at length and I would most highly recommend what she had to say about it; I will go into more detail below about the problems with theology; but suffice to say for now, that this doctrine of original sin and sinful nature, besides being an unproven matter accepted on faith alone, has had countless derivative, corrosively destructive, effects on the human spirit down through the centuries to the present time. Nyquist contradicts Rand's assertions that man's life as man is the proper standard of value; that happiness is life's purpose; that honesty is the best policy; that sex is an expression of one's highest values; that evil is ultimately impotent; that reason is one's only judge of values or one's only guide to action. Rand's philosophy is "Utopian to the core;" little historical or current empirical evidence exists to support her propositions; and she has grossly overlooked formulating any intelligent discussion of the issues grappled with by thinkers such as Burke, Weber, Michel, Schumpeter, Pareto, or numerous others. Nyquist posits that Rand is centrally wrong or at best, half-right, about the nature of man; and that, in turn, her theories of knowledge (epistemology), metaphysics, morality, politics, history, and aesthetics are either confused, corrupted, or both, and must fall. Intellectuals in general are pretty useless for the most part. That man has risen to dominate the planet, not on the basis of size or strength, large teeth or claws, but by using his brain, known as "thinking" seems to be of too little import to be worthy of mention. A notable failure on Rand's part, says Nyquist, is what he terms her emphasis on empty verbalizing, especially in the empirically important area of metaphysics. He demonstrates a level of validity here; on the other hand, he himself quotes numerous writings of philosophers; could not any similar criticism be leveled at those others as he levels at Rand? In epistemology, there is a well-known problem with inductive reasoning. The scientific method rests not only on induction to develop a premise, but also deduction, to test that premise to find where it fails to describe reality. Thus has physics, for example, progressed from Newton to Einstein to quantum mechanics to string theory, and it continues to test. Rand, on the other hand, relies exclusively on induction and abstraction, and her approach fails to solve the inductive problem of "how many cases are enough to prove a point?" Here I would observe that, in some instances, statistics and induction are useful in scientific investigation, for one example, double blind studies used in medical research; statistics used in areas of research such as sociology, politics, marketing. More significantly, Nyquist relies on some broad assumptions about man's psychology, advising that ideas have relatively little to do with causing emotions, motivations, and behavior. This is in marked contrast to the emphasis given thinking (cognition) by modern psychology. Albert Ellis, in his book "Is Objectivism a Religion," admits to having been either first influenced or in early accord with Rand's concept of thoughts as an important (not the only) cause of emotion and his derivative Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) accords with this recognition. Ellis has been in clinical practice some 60 years and is one of the world's most respected psychologists and prolific writers of books on human behavior. The research and writings of Aaron Beck, M.D., David Burns, M.D., Matthew McKay and many others; as well a voluminous body of research and clinical evidence, accord with this recognition that thinking and common thinking errors are important in determining emotional health or illness and corresponding motivation. Today's gold-standard treatment is cognitive-behavioral therapy. Nyquist, it seems, would equally exclude influences of environment (for example he says that children learn language due to an inborn drive to do so, presumably instead of modeling language), for which he offers little authority. Nyquist posits that action-directing emotion is nearly always a function of frustration or fulfillment of objectives and not of philosophies as Rand claims. In these assertions, he hopes to prove wrong a central tenet of Rand's, namely that men and women can build character and live successfully and happily by the judicious use of their minds. For his behavioral theories Nyquist offers few references, and this is disappointing in view of his insistence that we must back up our claims and assertions by solid evidence. I think that on this point Rand was more correct than Nyquist gives her credit for. Please however take into account that this endorsement in no way extends to Rand's subsequent ideas of "psychology," of which she had no known formal training, and which were largely speculation. Recognizing that thoughts do affect emotions and behavior is not the same thing as formulating a system of psychology from the armchair. Dr. Ellis, mentioned above, wrote an entire book delineating the many differences between his REBT system and elements of Rand's system ("Is Objectivism a Religion?") Many psychologists would have grounds of disagreement with ideas Rand claimed followed from her main premise. And well they would disagree, as they make their living working with real people; if Rand's entire system of "psychology" were to be used for this purpose, as it was during the days of Nathaniel Branden Institute, it would be expected to have the same disastrous results it did then. In this regard, please see the books of Ellis and Walker. Walker is not a psychologist, but he has assembled hundreds of quotes from people who were in Rand's inner circle. The books of the Brandens also are relevant concerning Objectivist "psychology." One of Rand's major, and to me, most valid, points is the following. Heretofore, most major philosophies and systems of morality have been intricately tied to religions. The majority of Americans... Read more ›
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Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature, Leonard Peikoff, Western Civilization, Middle Ages, Western Europe, Atlas Shrugged, Nathaniel Branden, United States, Rand's Objectivist, Dark Ages, Hence Rand, Great Northern Railroad, Ancient Greece, Nazi Germany, Once Rand, Barbara Branden, Thomas Aquinas Browse Sample Pages:
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Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature, Leonard Peikoff, Western Civilization, Middle Ages, Western Europe, Atlas Shrugged, Nathaniel Branden, United States, Rand's Objectivist, Dark Ages, Hence Rand, Great Northern Railroad, Ancient Greece, Nazi Germany, Once Rand, Barbara Branden, Thomas Aquinas Browse Sample Pages:
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