My book is finally in print
My first philosophical work is finally available on Amazon! It's a logical derivation of the societal values which underpin a society dedicated to preserving and promoting the individual pursuit of purpose. Both Kindle and print versions are available. Thanks especially to all those here in the Gulch. Many of you are cited on the acknowledgements page and if you aren't it's probably because I was rushed at the last minute to get something to the editor! If you are interested in a signed copy, pm me with your address.
As it turns out, I'm about to publish via Amazon "My Journey Toward Peace" which has some overlapping themes. Congratulations! Writing my work has been the most challenging and satisfying work of my life - so far.
I'll be getting the paper back version later this week.
Liked the style and thought it was much more Human than Rand.
PS, one complaint I had with Amazon is that they make a large portion of our books readable before purchase. No rhyme or reason to what pages they make available.
Wish we had some say in that process.
I have read about, but I don't think that makes her
less human....
Much of an author's appeal is their ability to convey a message according to the times. Try reading Shakespeare now - iambic pentameter isn't that popular in most English classes! Back in his time, however, Shakespeare was commonly read and his performances even drew the attention of nobility.
I think that Rand wrote for the 1960's and that times have changed. It's like MacGuyver in the third season right after the Berlin Wall came down - suddenly the show had to do a major pivot and become a lot less about spying and the Cold War and more about just a resourceful guy out helping people.
No, she did not. She was prophetic in the sense that she foresaw the trajectory of where communist dictatorship led to.
Her genius is playing out now, as we see the gradual encroachment of communist doctrine in our lives, more than half century after publishing her novels.
I would like the user downvoting this write an alternate view, e.g. "actually if you look at Rand's predictions about not just communist dictators but also..." I'm making that up. We'll never know what you think if you just vote.
They don't respond because they have no coherent answer, only a contempt for Ayn Rand's ideas (and me) that conflict with their conservative politics and religion. Lashing out in anger is all they have, whether by 'downvoting', or those like Blarman and Ashinoff who occasionally erupt in angry outbursts of snide personal attacks with false accusations, then receding again into sullen silence as they dramatically announce that they ignore what I post.
Too many conservatives have no idea what Ayn Rand's ideas are and don't care. They were attracted to some aspect of a novel or something she said in a video and treat it, falsely, as an endorsement of, and somehow compatible with, their own contradictory beliefs.
Ayn Rand was an intellectual who consistently and systematically organized her principles in a coherent philosophical whole making sense of the world and human thought and action. Recognizing the importance of ideas, ideas were here life and career., which made Atlas Shrugged and the rest possible. To like Ayn Rand is to like her thinking.
But the worst of the conservatives seem to regard her philosophy as some kind of secondary adjunct that is optional. They want some of the emotional results of Ayn Rand's thinking without the cause that makes it possible.
But "times have changed" and "Rand's style was Rand's style", Captain Obvious tells us. This is all so typical of his pompous, vacuous pronouncements.
The plot and characters in Ayn Rand's 1930s novel dramatically showing the oppression in the Soviet Union was "dry and academic" and "for the 1960s"? The 1943 psychological best seller The Fountainhead was "dry and academic" for the 1960s in 1943? Atlas Shrugged, a novel with timeless values and a gripping plot that still appeals to millions is "dry and academic" and "for the 1960s"? All the essays and lectures of the 1960s through the early 80s that brought people to their feet with excitement and applause? What is he talking about?
If that is what Blarman believes then what is he doing on this forum other than as an unethical militant internet warrior thumbing his nose at the purpose of this forum as he promotes his anti-Ayn Rand religious conservativism, grandiosely claiming to "combat trolls on the pages of social media, attempting to bring sanity and rational thought to the Internet!" His Platonist speculations, pretentious floating abstractions, and ignorance of Ayn Rand are anything but "sanity and rational thought".
times erases my feelings over OUC's thinking of her
as somewhat less human than others, with a "cold and hard personality". Your comments have educated me!! and I cannot thank you enough!
She always provided unique philosophical analysis whatever the examples and time period, and did not like to revisit the same analysis for another example of it later. She expected her readers to learn it the first time without her having to repeat.
Many of her articles did not pertain to contemporary examples at all, such as the Objectivist Ethics and other theoretical ethical and political essays, and the whole Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology.
The notion that she "wrote for the 1960s" is truly bizarre and shows a real ignorance in his swaggering spouting off the top of his head.
I might have said, instead, her lacking expression of humanity.
Blair also understands and expresses that Life, especially human life did not just happen randomly...something Rand prefers not to address.
A cold and hard personality would never have been able to write "The Fountainhead", let alone "Atlas Shrugged".
Where are you getting this idea? It is totally off the page.
I don't notice that with others when philosophy is being discussed.
As stated, "we can understand why"...meaning, she invented the thing, she is defining and defending her work, we also might add, her experiences that lead her there.
Of course, as you state, a more human personality emerges in her writings and I am sure that showed with others in private as well.
Many "experts" simply ignored and denied her.
If you look up other authors who were trailblazers and how did they react to the negative environment, her style was not unusual.
" more human personality emerges in her writings and I am sure that showed with others in private as well. "
There is no such thing as "cold and hard" and "more human in her writing".
It is the very same individual.
Just look at Trump, for example. Many say he is totally different in private or one on one, and here, we can also understand why.
I never found her cold and hard, but passionate, straight to the point, intelligent and informative. Combative as well, with reason, considering the many stupid and attacking questions volleyed at her.
Not the best definition right now but I am working on it. I am sure I'll get a lot of feedback on that one too.
I also see that when discussing a philosophy it can be viewed as a waving finger at you. This is it, it's definitive and don't question it. Not everyone is like that but that's the impression I get from Rand.
Funny thing is that Objectivism is probably more humanly relatable than many other philosophies if it was never tainted by the extreme left's viewless point.
Carl, I think the more you are trying to specify what you mean by "human" the more you are getting stuck.
Maybe you want to provide a few examples how a "Human" should come across?
"I also see that when discussing a philosophy it can be viewed as a waving finger at you. This is it, it's definitive and don't question it. Not everyone is like that but that's the impression I get from Rand."
That is, again, is totally off the page. Rand was one of the geniuses who based her philosophy on facts. Not all of them do, in fact, most philosophers live in the highest levels of the thought process, bringing forward theories that have nothing to do with reality.
As you are saying it yourself in closing, Objectivism is a most humanly relatable philosophy, contradicting your statement made just a sentence before.
You and others may not view her as dry, academic or cold but I did and still do. I also stated possible reasons as to why that is...just look what she had to endure in those times.
I view her that way, that is my impression and you and other do not, that's ok and especially ok because we value her work.
Ayn Rand did not say anything "just happens randomly". Nor did she "prefer not to address" religious mysticism. She did address it, with devastation, as irrational.
I saw some of the comments about Rand and "more human" but I understand what you mean. When I "read" (actually listened to) Atlas Shrugged, the voice actor doing the narration was very good, but some of the roles like Rearden and Galt were delivered in a rather deadpan manner and my only criticism of those characters, along with Roark in Fountainhead (again, audio book narration) was that they sometimes seemed flat, emotionless, like for a character to be likeable for me, they have to show a certain range of human emotion, in my opinion that makes it more effective and their speech more effective. It seemed to me, and perhaps this was merely the artistic license of the narrator and/or my imagination, that the antagonists were given livelier voices than the heroes. Of course there's some literary license at work here, too. I doubt that any audience, in 1957 or 2019 would listen to a three hour radio speech, I don't care what the topic is :). Again Rand was a philosopher, so one could criticize these long conversations and soliloquies as being too deeply philosophical. To each his/her own, but that is kind of the point.
I do look forward to checking out the book, even if for no other reason than to get a fresh look at some of these philosophies.
The manner in which audio books were recorded are unrelated to the emotional impact in her writing. You should read the books as they were written.
Blarman's book will not give you a fresh look at these philosophies". Contrary to his claim he is not a philosopher, and is quite ignorant of the field. He didn't even get the meaning of Descartes' 'cogito ergo sum' right, and was completely wrong in equating it with Ayn Rand, whom he also gets wrong.
I hardly think I'd notice the difference! Hahahaha. :D
Blarman not only misrepresents Descartes, being an avowed fan of Plato he confuses existence with his own speculations and equates Descartes with Ayn Rand, which are in fact opposites. He doesn't understand either.
If you decide to pursue understanding Ayn Rand's philosophy you will see the significance of all this.
It is very easy to criticize others for perceived faults and seek to tear down. It is much more difficult to realize that value and economy come from mutual cooperation and that life is not a zero sum game. It requires taking people for who they are and what they have to offer rather than who you want them to be. It requires understanding and accepting that it is the differences in people which make an economy possible in the first place - that if we were all clones there would be no competitive advantage, no new ideas, no alternative products/services.
Go ahead and criticize. You bring nothing of value to the table.
Jan
Jan
Now I know your last name is Christensen.
I would never have guessed that ewv was instrumental in your developing your thought process but the mind works in curious ways.
Blarman responded to me by evasively going off on tangents, often laced with baseless and gratuitous false personal accusations. He never acknowledged his mistatements and often later repeated them as if nothing had been said. He demanded that I not respond to his public posts and tried to get me banned from the forum, then dramatically announced that he was not reading what I posted. He does not engage in "critical thinking", has not "honed" his reasoning, and I have nothing to do with his book.
You can not read my mind and the real dishonesty is in pretending you can understand my motives or my mind - especially since you have never asked me anything honestly seeking the truth. You're too busy misrepresenting others' statements and impugning their character. I even address honesty in the book as the second core virtue - right after equality. I'd suggest you try giving either (preferably both) of those values a try. It's what I advocate everyone do because if everyone did that, we'd have a better world in every way.
Whatever he claims as his motives, his published assertion that I "helped" him is false. I have nothing to do with his book, and his own public reactions through false accusations, personal attacks, and lack of improvement in his subjective writing show that he gained nothing positive from me even indirectly. His own evasions and rationalizations as he reformulates the same fallacies to try to 'better' put them over are not any kind of "help" from me, and I have no interest in whatever contortions his mind went through in deciding what to write which he thinks are "instrumental". No one is "reading his mind", only observing what he writes and does.
Blarman should cease his snide personal attacks and false accusations here as he presumptuously gives sarcastic "suggestions" and pretentiously wraps himself in "honesty" while gratuitously and falsely accusing rejection of his thoughts and actions as "dishonest". His constant personal attacks and false subjective accusations are no defense of what he is doing.
However, I found that there are people you can't learn anything from because you went through those periods they are in a long time ago.
But everyone learns differently.