Atlas Shrugged LO9877

GaltJohn22@aol.com
Tue, 10 Sep 1996 15:56:31 -0400

Replying to LO9835 --

Grover Partee wrote:

>Rather I would argue
>that the tools presented in Rand's and Braden's philosophy lend themselves
>as easily -- perhaps even more so -- to a totally self-centered and
>self-serving, amoral aquisition of power and wealth to the detriment of
>others and to the detriment, if need be, of our organizations.

Let us analyze this, Grover. First, Rand speaks not of power - only power
over one's self - indeed she eschews any power over another. So
"acquisition of power" is incorrect here. "amoral" depends assumes some
universal "morality" which is probably impossible to define. Certainly
Rand did *not* support "detriment: to others - rather, she empowers the
individual to do what is best for themselves.

So, that leaves us with the phrases "self-serving" and "self-centered" -
they seem to be used here as negative things - but what is intrinsically
bad about serving one's own best interests?

Implying that Galt and Hitler were similar seems ludicrous to me; no one
could name a philosophy more antithetical to Objectiveism than is Fascism
unless it were, possibly, Marxism. In neither of these
politico-philosophies is the *Individual* valued in any way.

This is probably my last message to LO - I have enjoyed many of the
discussions here tremendously! Thanks everyone!

--
Hal Popplewell
GaltJohn22@aol.com
 

Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>