Why don't Universities accept Objectivism as real philosophy?

[ctrl y]

I can think of one other reason why academics have trouble with Objectivism: method. Rand presents Objectivism as an integrated system, in terms of essentials. Modern and contemporary academic philosophy is much more comfortable addressing issues in isolation, and trying to analyze them in detail. Because of this methodological difference, Objectivists and traditional academic philosophers often seem to be speaking different languages. Each side has built up its own set of technical vocabulary, its own key concepts, and its own grasp of what the critical issues in philosophy are. As a result, when presented with a philosophic argument written from an Objectivist context, most academic philosophers automatically reinterpret it in terms of the concepts with which they are familiar. Figuring out how to bridge this gap is a significant part of what some of the Anthem-funded Objectivist academics are working on. An excellent example would be Ben Bayer's paper A Role for Abstractionism in a Direct-Realist Foundationalism, forthcoming in the peer-reviewed journal Synthese. (Bayer and Salmieri's paper How We Choose Our Beliefs is also interesting.)

Please explain the nature of this methodological gap in more detail. What problems arise in trying to bridge it? Can you give an example of how academics reinterpret Objectivist arguments in terms of their own concepts?

Objectivist methodology is conceptual

What does this mean?

Excellent post.

Edited January 9, 2010 by ctrl y

[khaight]

Please explain the nature of this methodological gap in more detail. What problems arise in trying to bridge it? Can you give an example of how academics reinterpret Objectivist arguments in terms of their own concepts?

Here's one quick example. Objectivism upholds three broad metaphysical categories: the subjective, the intrinsic and the objective. Mainstream academic philosophers don't typically distinguish between the objective and the intrinsic; as a result, they tend to classify any phenomenon which depends on consciousness in any way as subjective, and they interpret the claim that something is objective as implying that it does not depend on consciousness at all. Given that context, a statement like "concepts are objective" is simply baffling -- it sounds like an endorsement of some kind of Platonic realism.

Here's another example. The analytic-synthetic dichotomy is widely accepted in academic philosophy. This leads philosophers to divide propositions into two broad categories: the analytic, which are necessary and logical, but not based on reality; and the synthetic, which are contingent and inexplicable, yet reality-based. This makes it impossible to grasp the proper nature of metaphysical principles, which are both necessary and reality-based.

As for what it means that Objectivist methodology is conceptual -- Objectivism tries to build a system. Integrating widely disparate concretes together under principles, and tying principles together. The overall thrust is to take concretes and subsume them under a relatively small number of wide abstractions. This is in part a result of the Objectivist view of the epistemological purpose of concepts -- the condensation of units to address the crow epistemology. Most modern philosophers are nominalists, which means they view concepts not as integrations of concretes, but as socially-dictated arbitrary groupings which could always be different. From that standpoint, the Objectivist emphasis on conceptual integration is just arbitrary -- one group trying to dictate how it prefers that words be used.

[Thales]

Okay, but what exactly are you disagreeing with? I dispute the presupposition that academic philosophers reject Objectivist, and your comments do not provide any evidence of such rejection.

Hmmm, okay, I assumed what I thought most Oists knew. I've heard it expressed by many Objectivist intellectuals, such as Binswanger and Peikoff, that there is a great deal of vitriol directed toward Ayn Rand and her ideas from academic philosophers. I've seen this sort of hatred first hand in various writings and offhanded remarks by philosophers.

Now, I don't believe that either venue or format are the reason. I think it's because they don't like her message.

Maybe; but one of the problems that Objectivism faces is precisely the unwarranted claim that it's an philosophy held only by youngsters, one that people grow out of.

I meant a younger generation like Tara Smith. It's a slow, but natural changing of the guard, so to speak.

[khaight]

I've heard it expressed by many Objectivist intellectuals, such as Binswanger and Peikoff, that there is a great deal of vitriol directed toward Ayn Rand and her ideas from academic philosophers. I've seen this sort of hatred first hand in various writings and offhanded remarks by philosophers.

I've also heard other Objectivists like Yaron Brook and John McCaskey say that the resistance to Ayn Rand in academia is much less now than it was a generation ago. My impression is that we're faced with less outright hostility and more incomprehension, which is progress.

[Thales]

I've also heard other Objectivists like Yaron Brook and John McCaskey say that the resistance to Ayn Rand in academia is much less now than it was a generation ago. My impression is that we're faced with less outright hostility and more incomprehension, which is progress.

Yes, this was my second point above. I think inroads are being made! The humanities departments are lagging the philosophy departments, but philosophy is the more important realm!

[Shinji Shiranui]

I'm currently reading "The Fountainhead" for the fisrt time, and entering this trhead reminded me of something.

I was talking to a guy that studies phlisophy in one of the "best" mexican unviersities, so I decided to talk to him about objectivism and Ayn Rand. First of all, he had never heard fo her, second, he was pretty offended when I told him that Rand defends capitalism (philosophers and philosophy students in my country have this weird idea that they have to be socialists in order to become philosophers), but the owrst thing was when I told him that people, reasonable people, have to build new philosophies in order to have a better life on this world, and that I respected Rand for that.

His answer (I still laugh when I remeber it) was something like this:

"Are you f**** crazy? I don't study philisophy to create new philosohpies, that woulkd be an insult to the great thinkers of the past. We have to understand them, and try to aplly their ideas into our world. Creating new philosophies would be an insult to them!"

Then he talked about traditions, the achievements of Plato, whom he considered the only true philospher on History, the value of Nietzche's nihilism, and a lot of praise to the existencialist. For this guy, being sad for knowing that life is not forever, is the most beaitful feeling ever invented by a human being....

I think many universities, I don't know if this is the case around the world, but it is on my country, is to produce "philosophers" that don't think, but simply repeat evertything they read on books without having ideas of their own, a lot like the architechs in The Fountainhed, like Françon and Keating. This sad true is even more evident in my country, because the goverment, icompetent and corrput, only whishes to suck as much money and work force from the population as they can, and this is easier if the goverment also controls the formation of future thinkers.

So, why would someone defend a philosophy that teach you to think on your own? That's outrageous! (I'm being sarcastic, of course...)

[bluecherry]

That thing about the insults really is funny, because by that same logic, there should only have ever been one philosopher - everybody else, all those great thinkers he admires, they were all insults to who came before them.

As for aiming to produce people just to repeat past respected thinkers' ideas and discouraging any deviation from that, it reminds me the scene in Anthem where our hero comes in with a light bulb and they all are outraged about the creation of the thing in the face of the grand invention of the candle. How dare he just go and think he could make something else when the candle was so great and respected for so long and people are already so invested in it? Who gave him permission to go and try to add something to their great tradition?