Hello Everyone

[$Rational-EGOIST$]

Hello guys,

My name is Alpha, I'm 18 yrs old; I live in New york City where I attend the City University. My intended major is Computer Science. I ran into this forum a couple of days ago through a link from "Capitalism Magazine". I've been reading up, and so far, all seems great. It's truly refreshing to see the high level of rationality from lots of people here, and for a moment it almost made me feel as if most of my fellow humans were sane. It's really great to see some like-minded individuals to whom I don't have to explain that A is really A, and round squares just cannot exist. Keep up the good work.

As for my familiarity with Objectivism--in relation to most of you--it's rather brief: approximately 7-8 months. I "stumbled" into this philosophy at a time when I probably needed it most. I had just recently been acquainted with atheism [well...more like being able to express it explicitly, and being able to hold my ground in the face of the linguistic acrobatics of the theologians], and I was---so to speak---hunting for a rational world view. I almost began to fall into the hands of the wrong kind of atheists: the so-called Secular 'Humanists', but I was lucky enough to run into "The Virtue of Selfishness" in my local library. The title was...let's say...inviting. I read Ayn Rand's Introduction and I simply couldn't put the book down. The levels of clarity and rationality of the author were almost hypnotizing; and this is how my initiation begun.

Since then I've been reading up a lot--trying to rectify the horrifying errors of the past 17 years--and I'm pretty much familiar with the basics now. I've read most of the introductory works [AS, TF, VS, OPAR, PWNI, FNI, ARL, etc...], and this is what has saved me from those mischievous little socialist of professors that I have. However there's still a lot that I have and want to do.

Anyway, I might as well stop for now, and I hope this will be a rewarding experience for us all. Have a great New Year everybody.

[RationalBiker]

Welcome aboard! I think you find this forum to be thought-provoking, informative and fun.

[stephen_speicher]

... but I was lucky enough to run into "The Virtue of Selfishness" in my local library. The title was...let's say...inviting. I read Ayn Rand's Introduction and I simply couldn't put the book down. The levels of clarity and rationality of the author were almost hypnotizing; and this is how my initiation begun.

I find it encouraging that your interest in, and introduction to, Objectivism was via the ethics. I have observed over the years that, in general, those who find their way to Objectivism via the politics are less likely to sustain their interest in and embrace the entirety of the philosophy, as compared to those who are initially sold on the ethics or epistemology. Ethics and epistemology are more fundamental, whereas politics is more derivative, and the two former generally reflect more of a core interest and grasp of the philosophy than the latter. (This is just my observation in general and it certainly does not apply to everyone.)

Anyway, welcome to the forum.

[realitycheck44]

I find it encouraging that your interest in, and introduction to, Objectivism was via the ethics. I have observed over the years that, in general, those who find their way to Objectivism via the politics are less likely to sustain their interest in and embrace the entirety of the philosophy, as compared to those who are initially sold on the ethics or epistemology. Ethics and epistemology are more fundamental, whereas politics is more derivative, and the two former generally reflect more of a core interest and grasp of the philosophy than the latter. (This is just my observation in general and it certainly does not apply to everyone.)

I'm not sure I follow. How can you have one without the other? Isn't the reason for a capitalistic society partially because of the virtue of selfishness? How could you properly understand (and defend) Capitalism without first understanding the nature of man (ie selfishness is a virtue)? So my real question is what justification for Capitalism do these people have, before understanding the ethics behind it?

Just curious

Zak

[stephen_speicher]

So my real question is what justification for Capitalism do these people have, before understanding the ethics behind it?

Ask the typical libertarian or conservative. Objectivism is unique in that it is a totally integrated philosophy; all the parts, epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, politics, and esthetics are interconnected, and you cannot, logically or consistently, have one without the other and still reflect the philosophy of Objectivism.

In contrast to Objectivists, other people can hold conflicting, contradictory, and unintegrated philosophical views. The pragmatic conservative can vouch for capitalism because it works, or the libertarian can advocate capitalism based on a concept of freedom held as a floating abstraction. There are many different "justifications" that others have, but only Objectivism, only Ayn Rand, established the real ethical base for the system.

The point I was making in my prior post was that conservative and libertarian types can be drawn to Objectivism because of a political common cause, but lacking the ethics and epistemology they will not sustain an interest in Objectivism, or, at least, not embrace it in its totality.

[oldsalt]

Welcome to the forum.

I began with Atlas Shrugged, and it was the sane ethics that impressed me and caused me to seek further. Oddly enough, I was told that I would be disappointed in The Fountainhead, since I had read Atlas first. Silly people. It wasn't until much later that I even knew that Miss Rand had written non-fiction works, and I was thrilled to find these works.

I found that everything I read was an extrapolation of Galt's speech. That speech is an absolute tour de force in succinct philosophical writing. I don't think there's ever been anything like it written about any integrated philosophy -- or any philosophy, integrated or otherwise.