I get the feeling that this is people over hyping their field to boost their own status. It's amazing technology, but I doubt there's any emergency here. In another way this reminds me of Roark's court room speech in the fountainhead "Thousands of years ago, the first man discovered how to make fire. He was probably burned at the stake he had taught his brothers to light. He was considered an evildoer who had dealt with a demon mankind dreaded. But thereafter men had fire to keep them warm, to cook their food, to light their caves. He had left them a gift they had not conceived and he had…
The Fountainhead Chapter I; Howard Roark to the Dean --- "Why do you want me to think that this is great architecture?" He pointed to the picture of the Parthenon. "That," said the Dean, "is the Parthenon!" "So it is." "I haven't the time to waste on silly questions." "All right, then." Roark got up, he took a long ruler from the desk, he walked to the picture. "Shall I tell you what's rotten about it?" "It’s the Parthenon!" said the Dean. "Yes, God damn it, the Parthenon." The ruler struck the glass over the picture. "Look, " said Roark. "The famous flutings on the the famous…
I feel like the Rand stuff was shoe-horned in to make the title fit Not really. It is just buried in the long article (probably too deep). TL;DR: he likes Rand, has the cover of one of her books as his Twitter avatar, and defends her ideas on the web. The passage: From an interview with the Washington Post: “WP: I noticed your Twitter avatar is the cover of Ayn Rand’s “The Fountainhead.” Kalanack: I don’t know what you’re talking about. [Laughs.] It’s less of a political statement. It’s just personally one of my favorite books. I’m a fan of architecture.” See. Not a political…
"I wonder what it is that makes this single one-page scene in one book the center piece of many reflections on her books on general." Aside from the ambiguous rape scene in Fountainhead, there are a couple of fairly aggressive sex scenes in Atlas Shrugged as well. I mentioned it twice among several paragraphs of serious philosophical criticism, but color of the bikeshed and all that. "On top of that, I resent your attempt at an ad hominem by suggesting that the main audience is sexually hypertensive adolescents." That part of my post was autobiographical. But still, I think you're fixating…
I have generally had a fairly negative impression of the organizations that exist today to support her philosophy, but I read most of her books (fiction and nonfiction) and enjoyed them tremendously. I've had a generally negative impression of her followers. All self identifying "Objectivists" I've met seem to be "second-handers" latching onto greatness as a substitute for their own work. This term comes from The Fountainhead, which I enjoyed greatly. I am certain that it's useful to occasionally ask oneself, "Am I second-handing?" My answer in a few cases has been "yes." (In…
She certainly didn't waste much time rejecting Hickman's violence there. This is getting a bit silly, I mean, why would she? It's her private diary which she's using to plan works of fiction. She doesn't need to explain to herself that she doesn't condone violence. Secondly, the contention is that Rand thought most people had 'worse sins' than child murder. One could conceivably interpret her sentence to mean that, but I think the only reason anyone has is because Michael Prescott ellipted the quotation in his article. It is vastly more likey that Rand was still speaking generally, and it…
Heh. It does add a certain something when you read her books. 1984 probably packed more of a punch when it was distributed covertly in totalitarian Soviet states. You're reading about a society which bans books, in a book banned by your society. It's less meaningful in a liberal democracy where 1984 is widely read. Likewise, in Atlas Shrugged you're reading about a society which doesn't ban certain ideas but sneers at them and makes them unseemly in polite society. Which is exactly how Atlas Shrugged is treated. For the record, I think the Fountainhead is the most literary of her books.…
Nice to see an intelligent comment from someone who actually read Rand (and sounds like they got something out of it) instead of just mouthing things that they heard about her. For reasons that I won't explain, I think you are right about the FH being a better literary work than AS. I also agree that her work in politics was not original because most of that work was already done by the others. Her achievement was to provide an ethical base for Capitalism without which it would perish in time. Her greatest achievements are in ethics and epistemology. I disagree that "she oversimplifies…
Am I the only one who hears echoes of Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead in this article? The creative who refuses to conform to "institutionalized mediocrity" and relentlessly pursues his own path - was that not Howard Roark? Of course most people won't wind up dynamiting a building, but still. Anyway, it's an interesting article, although I'm not sure what actionable information is there. We all know that creative / OOTB thinkers sometimes have a hard time getting people to take their ideas seriously. And we also know that not all "creative" ideas are actually good ideas. Sometimes your…
"Throughout the centuries there were men who took first steps down new roads armed with nothing but their own vision. Their goals differed, but they all had this in common: that the step was first, the road new, the vision unborrowed, and the response they received—hatred. The great creators—the thinkers, the artists, the scientists, the inventors—stood alone against the men of their time. Every great new thought was opposed. Every great new invention was denounced. The first motor was considered foolish. The airplane was considered impossible. The power loom was considered vicious.…