To me, the appeal of “objectivism” is that it’s very internally logically consistent. It’s hard to find a contradiction within the structure, or at least it was for me when I read it and thought about it some time ago.
The issue is that the whole structure rests on a tiny set of simple assumptions which are themselves entirely baseless. It’s basically a beautiful structure floating in mid air.
It’s sort of an intellectual trap, in my view. People who are good at finding contradictions in ideologies bungie into the middle of this one, look around and can’t find any contradictions. So they think, this one must be better than the others. Just don’t look down!
I find this nicely captures the difference between "rationality" and "reasonableness". A system can be rational but rest on unreasonable assumptions; a system may not be entirely rational but at least can have reasonable assumptions.
Indeed, all sufficiently mature ideologies evolve towards self consistency. Also, most ideologies have no internal epistemology, so their interpretation is anything you want.
The Ambrahamic faiths are arguably some of the most "mature" ideologies in existence, and I don't think any (secular) religious scholar would describe them as self-consistent.
(This isn't a slight: responsa are a normal thing in every world religion. But the idea that self-consistency happens when an ideology becomes mature doesn't seem especially borne out.)
I agree with you, but I think the parent idea still stands because most of the Abrahamic faiths are self-consistent when the interpreter is sufficiently liberal enough to explain away and reconcile contradictions (i.e. not take a strictly literal interpretation).
For non-believers (I'm in that category) we see a load of inconsistencies. IMHO many of them are so clearly contradictory I wouldn't think there was even debate (i.e. which day did Jesus die? Was it on the day of Passover (Good Friday) as in the Gospel of Mark? Or was it just after noon on the day before the Passover meal is celebrated as in the Gospel of John?), but there is extensive literature written by people bending over backwards to reconcile these things. So, I think the Abrahamic faiths do follow the pattern of converging toward self-consistency.
Those are inconsistencies but are they reasonable inconsistencies when someone is memorializing an event a couple of decades prior? I think yes. Small inconsistencies like that don’t bother me. Eyewitnesses perspectives are often different even minutes after an event.
Larger inconsistencies and contractions should be the focus and if you can articulate why those are significantly problematic to a belief system, a scholarly believer is more apt to listen. However if you come at them with “the problem with your belief system is because two people writing about an event mixed up what day it occurred on 20 years later…”, it’s really not impressive evidence to an important contradiction.
You're describing inconsistencies in the lore, not the ideology. Such inconsistencies in the lore can rise to inconsistencies in the ideology when part or all of the lore itself is held to be inerrant as part of the ideology, but this is not necessarily the case.
The classic (and hardly the only) inconsistency in the ideology in Christianity is the lex talionis of Exodus 21 and Jesus' repudiation of it in the Sermon on the Mount.
This is more along the lines of what I'm thinking, which is that the doctrines evolve to include a protective wrapper of auxiliary doctrines which answer the apologetic questions. I know someone who can rattle off answers to your questions, relative to his sect, though he's no longer a believer.
At least for me, I think most non-religious people have larger issues with the seeming ideological contradictions rather than historical ones. For example, many cases where God seems to approve of ethnic genocide, infanticide, etc., and yet one of the fundamental Ten Commandments is "thou shalt not commit murder".
It’s also the hallmark of successful cults. Internally consistent is not a virtue. It helps, but it’s insufficient on its own. And kind of dangerous in isolation of other positive qualities.
Axioms are arbitrary, but must be agreed upon. It's a good point to make. Most ethical theories suffer from this meta-ethical problem that people really just won't agree on the axioms at the end of the day.
That's a very good description. I enjoyed most of the book but it was also tremendously theoretical, never tried anywhere before, and I just don't see how it would ever perform in civil society. Objectivitists are never wrong, and some of the political ideologies that have formed around it have that superiority mindset - the theory is perfect, it's everyone else who does not understand.
Can you list the tiny set of simple assumptions and why they are entirely baseless? It's literally been decades since I read atlas shrugged and I remember very little.
edit, nevermind, someone listed them below.
The list below is not quite what I would say. I’d have to give it some thought to produce the list though. My mind tends to store abstract impressions and I have to regenerate the concretes when needed (unless I write them down, which I did not).
To expand on this, in case there are folks unfamiliar with Ayn Rands works. The consistent structure of her philosophy depends on
1. Metaphysics: Reality exists independently of consciousness ("A is A"), and humans can perceive it directly
2. Epistemology: Reason and logic are the only valid means of understanding reality
3. Ethics: Rational self-interest is the highest moral good
4. Politics: Individual rights (especially property rights) are absolute and capitalism is the only moral system
You can derive some of these from the others. Because reality is objective and we can know it through reason, we should always act only based on reason instead of emotion. Obviously our own happiness and self interest are proper moral aims. Doing that requires individual rights and capitalism.
This is internally consistent. The best part is that the book is fiction and no one comes out and says this in so many words. You need to “work it out” on the basis of the good guys believing this and the bad guys being collectivists. You feel smart when you work it out and you’re also more likely to accept it, because it wasn’t thrust on you. Of course the book throws subtlety to the wind around the end with a 100 page monologue.
As for the assumptions the philosophy rests on:
- Cognitive biases exist. Different people will perceive the same situation differently because of these biases. But objectivists will claim they don’t have any biases. I know at least two who told me they’re completely unbiased. (In fairness both have grown up since they told me this).
- Individual self interest will often conflicts with the interests of others. Game theory shows us that two prisoners pursuing “rational self interest” will lead to a worse collective outcome.
- Markets will often fail, spectacularly. And also, the right intervention can prevent them from failing. There are economics papers that discuss these failures, although in fairness many were published after Rand wrote her books.
"It’s basically a beautiful structure floating in mid air"
I didn’t expect a BioShock Infinite reference here! The game’s world is deeply influenced by Ayn Rand’s Objectivism, and the entire series serves as a powerful critique, showcasing why such a philosophy might not succeed in practice.
The issue is that the whole structure rests on a tiny set of simple assumptions which are themselves entirely baseless. It’s basically a beautiful structure floating in mid air.
It’s sort of an intellectual trap, in my view. People who are good at finding contradictions in ideologies bungie into the middle of this one, look around and can’t find any contradictions. So they think, this one must be better than the others. Just don’t look down!