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From: trc@houca.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: superman and other comic books
Message-ID: <402@houca.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 11-Oct-83 09:13:44 EDT
Article-I.D.: houca.402
Posted: Tue Oct 11 09:13:44 1983
Date-Received: Thu, 13-Oct-83 00:37:08 EDT
Organization: American Bell, Holmdel NJ
Lines: 64

Response to Jeff Myers, RE My first Rand and Against Individualism:

Fascinating book reviews, Jeff - you seem to have skimmed the introduction
to the Fountainhead, and listened to a second-hand account of Atlas Shrugged.
>From this in-depth study, you conclude that Ayn Rand is an elistist with
nothing but contempt for the "vulgar masses", and a fascist that believes that
most everyone is a parasite upon a few supermen.  Maybe next you should
re-skim BF Skinner and see exactly what it is that he advocates - which is
essentially a super-big-brother, all-encompassing "scientific"-/psychological
state - in which, presumably, the psychologists decide who is to behave in
what fashion.

Atlas Shrugged may be a bit longer than your average comic book, but it
has at least a fraction more content and story as well.

As for the person born on a desert island - *perhaps* most persons wouldnt
develop tools.  So what?  This is supposed to be prove that there is no 
person who could?  In fact, Rand's "supermen" are people that have, through
a combination of nature, nurture and thought, become able to break free of 
the common-place and to go beyond it.  How do you suppose that new ideas 
and discoveries are made?  By the "vulgar masses"?  How do you suppose that 
new industries get started?  By committee?  Rand's point is that those people 
who deserve to be most admired, are the most despised, and that this is a 
symptom of anti-individualism arising from altruism.  That is why she wrote
the Fountainhead for them - to tell them the reasons that they are correct
for being the way that they are, and that those that despise them are wrong.
Her intention, I think, was to explicitly show them the ethical foundation 
upon which their morality rests, while exposing that lack in their opponents.

The legacy of civilization, - its knowledge - is available to most anyone in 
the West.  Why is it that those that make particularly good use of it should 
owe those that do not do so?  Perhaps the great author owes something to the 
invention of the electric light - but does he owe it to the masses, or Edison?  
The US government answered this question - by providing for patents granted to 
the inventor, and copyrights to authors.  The industrialist certainly owes his 
employees something for their labor - and he covers that debt when he pays 
them their agreed upon salary and benefits.

Extreme individualism means standing on your own two feet and supporting
yourself by being productive - not by laying back and surviving off of the 
efforts of others.  The latter is parasitism - which is usually a form of 
lying to oneself, denying that obvious truth that productivity is required 
for the support of one's life.  The parasite is the antithesis of the 
individualist - the individualist seeks to survive on his own efforts, 
while the parasite seeks to survive only by the effors of others.  To be 
an "extreme individualist" does not mean that one cannot participate in 
society - what is society, after all, but a large number of individuals 
interacting.  The individualist is one that believes that the only proper 
method of interaction is *trading* - both sides giving and both sides 
receiving in a manner that both can gain values.  

As for "speci-ism" (a form of altruism that allows sacrifice of individuals
for the sake of the species) why should an individual care about the 
survival of his species if that species chooses to sacrifice him for its 
survival?  Why is it that the survival of the species would not be best 
served by the attempt of its individual members to live primarily by their 
own efforts, rather than depend upon the efforts of other members of the 
species?

I might apologize for the "flaming" and sarcastic nature of this note, but 
I think that your statements entirely justify what I have said.  So I wont.

	Tom Craver
	houca!trc