RichyRich

Close cousins, ie in the same way that the Cato Institute and the right are close cousins, so is Rand and the right.

No, the left like and dislike some of Rand's conclusions just as the right like and dislike some of Rand's conclusions. For example the left like her support for abortion rights or her atheism. Yet they still don't admire her. But the right look past their perception of her failings and admire her anyway. Er, I'm not sure what your point is here. I stand by my statement that the left and Rand are alien, yet the right and Rand are close cousins.

An example; Glenn Beck, the darling of the right, LOVES Rand. Obviously he doesn't agree with her atheism and such things but he manages to look past that because essentially he is cut from the same cloth. There is no-one on the left who admires her since the left and Rand are completely alien. The closest I can think of is Christopher Hitchens and he doesn't so much as admire her, as mockingly acknowledge her existence.

If you want to read an inspiring atheist who emphasises the minds role in spirituality, read Lucretius who wrote his poems just before the birth of Christ. There was an original thinker. As a philosophy student, Rand would have been aware of him. So I doubt that Rand's "contribution" is original. I agree that faith can be dominant on both the right and the left, but I wouldn't say either had a monopoly on rational thinking. Rand however, clearly favoured the right more than the left, and they return the favour even today (for example many in the tea party idolise her). No one on the left would idolise Rand. I don't think its controversial that Ayn Rand is on the right wing in the same way that I don't think its controversial to say that the Cato Institute is on the right wing. Yes they may not be fundy-faithheads but the right wing is a big tent and Rand clearly sheltered in it.

I completely agree with you on this. Rand definitely had more sympathy with the right wing in every area, from her fictional philosophical abstractions, to her friendships with right wing intellectuals. Her whole being is a rage against the left. She even manages to be an atheist in a religious kind of way. Here is her quote that I find outrageous:

Rand said her only debt was to Aristotle. She clearly was indebted to many people above all Nietzsche. Her Nietzschean influence is crystal clear throughout her novels and especially in her early works. To specifically not acknowledge this anywhere is arrogant to the extreme and really pisses me off. I think most people who aren't Objectivists would agree with me, but my question is do Objectivists think she was arrogant for not acknowledging her intellectual debts? And if so why doesn't this bother you enough to reject her and her philosophy?

Recent receipts? They could have been bought by someone else. CCTV evidence of you in the shop buying the items? You could have a secret twin or an alien doppleganger. Your secret twin could have fooled all your witnesses too. Prove that you don't have a secret twin. You can't? Then you can't prove you didn't murder the person at 9pm in Madrid, Spain. This is the mess agnosticism gets one into.

The essential question the OP asked as I see it hasn't been answered. Why is a baby a human, but a foetus is not a human? Both depend on others for their survival, and both exist because of parental choices, namely choosing unprotected sex produces a foetus and choosing not to abort produces a baby. So unless the woman was raped (i.e. no parental choice) how is it logical to treat a foetus and a baby differently in an Objectivist framework?

I agree, but in your original post you say (bold mine): "But to assert no God exists, also without proof, is equally foolish." But above you are saying that it's not equally foolish, that there is a 99.9999% chance that atheists are right and a 0.0001% chance that theists are right. Those odds are quite clearly stacked against theism. Edit: Even Richard Dawkins says he is technically not an atheist in the same way that he's not ruled out the existence of fairies. So it's a completely moot point.

Do you think being agnostic about the Flying Spaghetti Monster is rational? If not then try to figure out why not. A person would be rational to be agnostic over the possibility of flight in Da Vinci's time since there was evidence for mechanical flight i.e. birds. Your sister sounds like a rational person insofar as she pays lip service to religion for the music and schools. Insofar as she actually believes the stuff then she has at best not thought about philosophy, or at worst she is irrational. There really is no evidence for a god and until I see some I will remain an atheist. Since I will consider evidence to the contrary and will change my mind if there is evidence for a God, this makes my position evidence based and scientific, a far cry from being "foolish".

I wouldn't describe Hitchens as a leftist. Rather he's a strange mix of neoconservatism, Trotskyism, and libertarianism. His views definitely span the left-right spectrum.

Capitalism began around the start of the 18th Century as a result of both the Age of Enlightenment across Europe and the Industrial Revolution in Britain.