Name: For the New Intellectual
ISBN: 9780451163080

For the New Intellectual

This is Ayn Rand's challenge to the prevalent philosophical doctrines of our time and the "atmosphere of guilt, of panic, of despair, of boredom, and of all-pervasive evasion" that they create. One of the most controversial figures on the intellectual scene, Ayn Rand was the proponent of a moral philosophy--and ethic of rational self-interest--that stands in sharp opposition to the ethics of altruism and self-sacrifice. The fundamentals of this morality--"a philosophy for living on Earth"--are here vibrantly set forth by the spokesman for a new class, For the New Intellectual.

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dmfdmfMar 2024

I think learning it all on your own is not efficient even for a genius. At the very least (assuming you are a genius) you should do a double major in Electrical Engineering and Mechanical Engineering and a minor in philosophy at a mid- or top-tier university. EE and ME are the practical expression of the foundation of classical physics. Einstein's early work was related to integrating these two fields. In short (I am a bit sketchy on the exact details since it has been a while), before Einstein there was an odd inconsistency in Maxwell's equations whereby the results differed if the magnets were moving or the coils were moving in generating electricity. Since all motion is relative, at least mathematically, it should not matter which was moving. Einstein's revolution amounted to modifying the concepts of space and time (using Lorentz transformations) to make that inconsistency go away BUT it is possible that that is not the only possible solution to the puzzle. Once you get your BS degrees you should get your PhD in physics at a mid-tier school or no one will listen to you.

The reason you need to minor in philosophy is to understand the history of the field going all the way back to the Greeks. Most importantly, you need to clearly define a theory of concepts and apply it to fundamental concepts such as existence, consciousness, free will, space and time. Current physics (and math, btw) are vitiated by inconsistent fundamental concepts. In fact, Einstein's concept of spacetime is a denial of consciousness (an axiom) and a deadend. The fundamental concepts in physics should be lightspace and gravitytime to avoid this error. You won't learn much in modern philosophy courses in regard to these issues but you need to understand the history and read Ayn Rand's Philosophy:Who_Needs_It, Introduction_To_Objectivist_Epistemology and the title essay of her anthology For_The_New_Intellectual.

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dmfdmfFeb 2021

You are entering a very long and deep rabbit hole with a 2000 year history. Your questions are the central issue in epistemology, a branch of philosophy. The philosophers have endlessly discussed the validity of reason and logic which ultimately reduces to defining a valid theory of concepts (or abstractions). The best overview of this history is the introduction to Rand's book "For The New Intellectual".

>By abstracting a system we can work with the essential relationships and features without getting caught up in details and exceeding our working memory capacity.

You are on the right track here. In Rand's "Introduction To Objectivist Epistemology" (where she spells out her theory of concepts) she identifies this as a fundamental cognitive need. As she put it, concepts are "space" savers that allow us to condense the world of experience into a manageable set of abstractions/concepts. The fundamental epistemological question is how do we define/use concepts without falling into contradiction or thinking in a circle.

BTW, Rand is not popular on HN so you won't get much discission here but read and judge her work for youself.

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dmfdmfMay 2019

Read Ayn Rand's title essay in her anthology "For The New Intellectual" for the history and current state of Western thought.

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abtinfFeb 2018

> The Chinese government is right to require all of it's citizens data to be stored in domestic datacenters.

"The only proper purpose of a government is to protect man’s rights, which means: to protect him from physical violence. A proper government is only a policeman, acting as an agent of man’s self-defense, and, as such, may resort to force only against those who start the use of force. The only proper functions of a government are: the police, to protect you from criminals; the army, to protect you from foreign invaders; and the courts, to protect your property and contracts from breach or fraud by others, to settle disputes by rational rules, according to objective law. But a government that initiates the employment of force against men who had forced no one, the employment of armed compulsion against disarmed victims, is a nightmare infernal machine designed to annihilate morality: such a government reverses its only moral purpose and switches from the role of protector to the role of man’s deadliest enemy, from the role of policeman to the role of a criminal vested with the right to the wielding of violence against victims deprived of the right of self-defense. Such a government substitutes for morality the following rule of social conduct: you may do whatever you please to your neighbor, provided your gang is bigger than his." - from "For the New Intellectual"

https://www.amazon.com/New-Intellectual-Philosophy-Anniversa...

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hliyanDec 2016

OP here. What a coincidence, it's precisely Ayn Rand I'm talking about, and I've read every book of hers except For the New Intellectual (by the time I got around to it, I had thankfully recovered). I even read most of Nathaniel Brandon. Please, don't try this.

Ayn Rand has some great ideas, but they make certain assumptions about human nature that are quite simply not true (which is the same problem with capitalism).

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gwenhwyfaerSep 2007

> Please provide a reference.

See above. The books in which I could have located a reference are long gone; but it's in one of her short essays (if pushed, I'd suggest that it might be found in For the New Intellectual... but wouldn't want to be held to that).

> What definition do you like?

From wikipedia: "Different philosophers have had varied ideas about the nature of reason, and there is also disagreement about the subject matter of philosophy." If not even the people who do it professionally can agree on a definition, it would be presumptuous of me to try.

Nonetheless, you misread my objection. I am objecting to the assertion that Rand's work is without question philosophy, using the definition of philosophy by which Rand identified herself as one. It's tautological; it begs the question.

Likewise, my criticism of Rand is not that her conclusions are not reasonable conclusions (although I have my own opinions on that). It is that the methods by which she reached those conclusions are not those of a serious philosophical investigation. Rand's entire "philosophy" was carefully contrived to justify the conclusions she wanted justified, and that makes it worthless as philosophy - and inherently dishonest, to boot.

> You still leave open the issue of whether Rand's work is in fact pseudophilosophy.

I haven't even presented a definition of pseudophilosophy, let alone one you have agreed upon, so it's hard to see how you can assert that I haven't proved my case. So:

: I define "pseudophilosophy" as "justification masquerading as philosophy" - or, to elaborate, "a contrived rationalisation of a priori conclusions, constructed primarily to justify those conclusions rather than to examine their validity".

: I claim that the evidence of Rand's flight to the US from revolutionary Russia, and the emotions expressed in her early fiction (primarily We the Living and Anthem, but even back as far as The Husband I Bought) demonstrate the a priori nature of her strident individualism and anti-collectivism. I do not criticise this; indeed, I have a lot of sympathy with it.

: I note that her philosophical oeuvre developed over the next few decades, from its clumsy emotive (and none the worse for that) beginnings in Anthem, through its 30-year gestation in The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged, to its expression in direct form in works such as For The New Intellectual and Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal.

: I therefore conclude that in this case, she contrived her philosophical justification to fit her a priori conclusions about the rightness of capitalism and the abhorrence of altruism.

Note that I remain in sympathy with the feelings that drove her; indeed, I would go so far as to say that I share them. But to look upon her rationalisation of those feelings as anything other than a rationalisation, the self-justification of a woman who could not allow herself to simply be, is something I find absurd.

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