Basically, Objectivism is a lot like Realism in that it is assumed that reality exists independent of the perceiver. It is discovered rather than created, and it exists pretty much as it is perceived, but reason is also a tool which we use to integrate facts of our perception. According to Rand, A is A, and the law of causation is a corollary. She doesn’t recognize all the problems with perception that more rigorous philosophers talk about, and she doesn’t see that an immovable, objective reality conflicts with the idea of freedom for human beings. If we all have common essences and reality is not something we can control, then we are slaves to it or like pieces of clay shaped and molded by external forces beyond our control. Behaviorists and other determinists love to make this point, that freedom is only an illusion. Existentialism, however, sees reality as more of a human creation, at least we participate in making ourselves and our reality. It’s not just external to us and beyond our control, forcing us to be what we are. We have freedom, but with freedom comes responsibility. We can’t just blame things that happen to us on an external reality beyond our control. We can’t just be victims. Since we create ourselves and our reality, we also bring about that which happens to us. In psychology, if the behaviorist is the objectivist (Of course Rand, herself, rejected Skinner as she rejected anyone who didn’t agree entirely with her.), then the humanist would be the existentialist or subjectivist.
Now, my philosophy is Neo-Objectivism. I try to combine the best of Objectivism with the best of Existentialism to keep the best of two worlds while off-setting the weaknesses of each. Too much objectivism clashes with freedom, but too much subjectivism ignores facts of survival which are pretty much objective. I believe there is an essence of humanness such that humans long ago and humans in other parts of the world are substantially the same as I. There is some natural law which is universal, so that we can have an objective morality based on human survival. However, we also have freedom within those objective parameters. We couldn’t have morality if we didn’t have this freedom, but unbounded freedom also eliminates the need for prescription. So, there are certain facts about reality and human existence which are objective, universal, as true for one person as for another, but we also have freedom within those objective parameters to forge our own paths, to create ourselves and reality.
Rand would disapprove of me big time. She has said that Existentialism is a philosophy for barefoot savages. She doesn’t like anyone tampering with her system. It’s all or nothing. Well, I respect her originality and individualism, but I can’t be original and my own individual if I am just her blind follower. I still respect many aspects of her philosophy, but I think my version is better.
Writings on my website and messageboard go into further detail of my philosophy, comparing and contrasting it with others and continuing to explain and defend it.
bis bald,
Nick
