Ethics and economics: Understanding the relationship

At the second monthly Atlas Meet in Delhi, on 22 Aug 2009, there was a vigorous discussion on whether while discussing Ayn Rand's ideas, we spend too much time on the economic and business aspects of her philosophy, rather than other equally important dimensions such as ethics or aesthetics. That led me to ask what is the relationship between ethics, economics and entrepreneurship?

And today, there is a post from Prof Stephen Hicks, Department of Philosophy, Rockford College, Illinois, USA, on this blog. Prof Hicks is presently the Executive Director of the Centre for Ethics and Entrepreneurship.

Prof Hicks has written the entry on Ayn Rand on the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, where he comments on the ethics of rational self-interest.

Rand’s ethic of self interest is integral to her advocacy of classical liberalism. Classical liberalism, more often called “libertarianism” in the 20^th century, is the view that individuals should be free to pursue their own interests. This implies, politically, that governments should be limited to protecting each individual’s freedom to do so. In other words, the moral legitimacy of self interest implies that individuals have rights to their lives, their liberties, their property, and the pursuit of their own happiness, and that the purpose of government is to protect those rights. Economically, leaving individuals free to pursue their own interests implies in turn that only a capitalist or free market economic system is moral: free individuals will use their time, money, and other property as they see fit, and will interact and trade voluntarily with others to mutual advantage.

Fundamentally, the means by which we live our lives as humans is reason. Our capacity for reason is what enables us to survive and flourish. We are not born knowing what is good for us; that is learned. Nor are we born knowing how to achieve what is good for us; that too is learned. It is by reason that we learn what is food and what is poison, what animals are useful or dangerous to us, how to make tools, what forms of social organization are fruitful, and so on.

Thus Rand advocates rational self interest: one’s interests are not whatever one happens to feel like; rather it is by reason that one identifies what is to one’s interest and what isn’t. By the use of reason one takes into account all of the factors one can identify, projects the consequences of potential courses of action, and adopts principled policies of action.

The principled policies a person should adopt are called virtues. A virtue is an acquired character trait; it results from identifying a policy as good and committing to acting consistently in terms of that policy.

One such virtue is rationality: having identified the use of reason as fundamentally good, being committed to acting in accordance with reason is the virtue of rationality. Another virtue is productiveness: given that the values one needs to survive must be produced, being committed to producing those values is the virtue of productiveness. Another is honesty: given that facts are facts and that one’s life depends on knowing and acting in accordance with the facts, being committed to awareness of the facts is the virtue of honesty.

Prof Hicks has also written a monograph titled, Ayn Rand and Contemporary Business Ethics. He has also published a paper in the Journal of Private Entreprise, titled "What business ethics can learn from entrepreneurship", where he summarises,

"Entrepreneurship is increasingly studied as a fundamental and foundational economic phenomenon. It has, however, received less attention as an ethical phenomenon. Much contemporary business ethics assumes its core application purposes to be (1) to stop predatory business practices and (2) to encourage philanthropy and charity by business. Certainly predation is immoral and charity has a place in ethics, neither should be the first concerns of ethics. Instead, business ethics should make fundamental from the values and virtues of entrepreneurs—i.e., those self-responsible and productive individuals who create value and trade with others to win-win advantage."

Given the presence of a number of entrepreneurs at the Atlas Meet in Delhi last week, and the interest in discussing the ethical basis and implications of the virtue of selfishness, I am looking forward to a more engaging discussions on this topic. We could also use this as an opportunity to share other relevant materials, which will enrich the discussions on the blog, as well as at the future Atlas meets.

An update on the Monthly Atlas Meet...

As evidence of the growing interest in the Ayn Rand in India initiative, 12 people have already confirmed their participation in the Atlas meet in Delhi tomorrow. This is in spite of the fact that, for one reason or another, there are a few people from last time who won't be able to make it. Just goes to show that new people are streaming in steadily.

Of course, 12 needn't be a final number! We always have room for last minute entrants, so if you are interested, please mail us at info@aynrand.in. As a reminder, the details of the meeting are available here.

The power of fiction

There has been a surge in the sale of Atlas Shrugged in the past one year, more than 50 years after it was first published. But a lot of people have wondered why Ayn Rand chose to convey her ideas through fiction.

“If a novel is well done,” Ayn Rand said, “the reader feels the dramatized events of the story on his own skin, so to speak. He is impelled to rage against some injustice. To root for characters he cannot help identifying with.”

Erika Holzer, an associate of Ayn Rand recounts how Rand herself looked at fiction.

“One evening back in the mid-60s, when my husband and I were Ayn Rand’s lawyers [and] the three of us took a break from business . . . Rand drew a fascinating distinction about the impact that . . . fiction, as opposed to nonfiction, has on readers. ‘Reading non-fiction,’ she told us, ‘is mainly an intellectual exercise whereas fiction involves the reader in a personal experience. It’s the difference between reading a technical manual on flying a jet airplane as opposed to experiencing the actual sensation of hurtling through space in one. The manual may be educational, even stimulating, but the plane ride is happening to you.’” (Emphasis Rand’s.)

Erika tells the story of how she and her husband helped track the film version of We The Living, originally made in Italy, during the second world war in "We the Living: The power of fiction".

After Apollo, Now Dionysus Revisited...

In her 1969 lecture Apollo and Dionysus (click here for the lecture), Ayn Rand identified two significant events that happened that year almost simaltaneously, representing two opposing set of ideas with 'fiction-like' perfection. They were the lauch of Apollo 11 (identified as 'Apollo') and the Woodstock rock festival (identified as 'Dionysus'). She identified the former as the end result of an inviolate acceptance of the absolutism of reality, a belief in the efficacy of reason and a heroic dedication to the rational mind. The latter she identified as an irrational, mud splattered, drug induced orgy of dark and savage emotions.

The Woodstock festival represented the zenith of the hipppie culture. As it attained its 40th anniversary last weekend, the Times of India published its tribute on the 14th of August (click here for the TOI article). While the article in the TOI mentions that this music festival was all about 'love', 'peace' and 'idealism', it carefully avoided any further details such as 'love of what?', 'peace for whom?' (certainly not the residents of Bethel who suffered the festival!), and a 'dedication to which ideals?' These are precisely the questions Ayn Rand deals with in her lecture as she exposes the mindless, range-of-the-moment, terror-stricken core of the hippie system of values. The TOI article, as expected, is completely non-judgmental about the matter.

Indians might be interested to know that two famous Indian spiritual leaders spoke at this festival, and Pandit Ravi Shankar and Ustad Allah Rakha, both stalwarts of Indian classical music, even performed. Pandit Ravi Shankar was supposedly apalled by the drug-induced atmosphere, and the irreverant destruction of musical instruments that a couple of the artists indulged in.

Agenda for the Delhi Meet

Hello,
The agenda for the monthly Atlas meet in Delhi has been finalized. Here it is:

5 to 5.15 pm: Welcome and introductions

5.15 to 6.15 pm - Session 1: Savour and Study
Video screening - Yaron Brook, president of Ayn Rand Institute, USA, interviewed at an university in Guatemala (10 min)
Discussion on relevance and implications in the India context

6.15 to 6.30 pm: Tea break

6.30 to 7.30 pm - Session 2: Spread and Sustain
Video clips of "Night of January 16", a play by Ayn Rand (10 min)
Discussion on the feasibility of the options and strategies brainstormed last time for reaching out to other admirers of Ayn Rand and promoting her ideas.

Please click here for complete details of the meeting.

Celebrities in India who relate to Ayn Rand

Every now and then, we read or hear about prominent personalities who acknowledge the impact Ayn Rand's writings have had on them. It would be interesting to compile a list of such persons, and know their views. Please do add more to this list, when you find a relevant reference.

Here is one published in the DNA newspaper, titled "I got to know about the book due to a contest", on July 1, 2009.

Mumbai: Actor Rajeev Khandelwal's preference in books relate to nature and the human mind. "Ayn Rand's Fountainhead is my favourite book till date," confesses the good looking man. The book deals with complex human relationships very lucidly and also reflects beautifully on the varied nature of the human mind.

"I first read it when I was in college and from then on it's been five times since I have re-read the book. I came to know about the book as there was a contest on Ayn Rand's two most popular books --Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged," says Rajeev... ... ...

Read the complete item here.

2nd 'monthly Atlas meet' in Delhi

The wonderful participation that we had for the first session of the monthly Atlas meet in Delhi, has me really looking forward to the next one coming up on the 22nd of August! This time we should have even better participation, with new faces in our mix...

The venue remains the same as before (inlingua International School of Languages, N-12, South Ex - 1, New Delhi -49), as does the time (5 pm - 8 pm). In fact, according to a decision made in the previous session, the monthly meeting in Delhi will be scheduled for the fourth Saturday of every month - advance notice so that you can make early entries in your appointments diary! Watch this space for information about the agenda.

Please confirm your participation on info@anyrand.in, or contact me at amar@aynrand.in. For further details, please click here.

Ayn Rand In Indian Universities?

An article published in the Times Higher Education website (click here for our page devoted to this article) gives a very good idea of just how popular Ayn Rand is becoming in American universities. The days when she was shunned by professors are long gone. Today her ideas are not only quoted in the media, applied in corporate boardrooms and debated in informal campus clubs, but they have actually made a dramatic entry into mainstream academia. Professors and students alike are curious about what she had to say about the art, literature, philosophy, politics and culture of our times. Even those teachers who don’t fully agree with her, according to the article, are realizing in ever growing numbers, that she is too important to ignore. Their attitude is something like, ‘I don’t completely agree with this, but I think you should know this.’ Wow!

The question we should ask is – when or how will this ever happen in India? If one was to consider the various humanities departments in The Delhi University as representative of the trends in Indian academia, officially Ayn Rand is still a bad word. The various syllabi (often antiquated in content) and the professors who teach them are most likely to behave as though she never existed. Her mention or the sight of one of her books in a student’s hands is met with a quick sideways glance or a very skeptical stare. Anti-Americanism is hot, Noam Chomsky is ‘the guru’, and the days of socialism and even communism haven’t evaporated yet. The sense that one gets in the celebrated ‘north campus’ in the Delhi University, apart from boredom, is that of resistance to change. DU, it seems, hasn’t changed much since the 80s. In these circumstances, I’m afraid, the prospects of Ayn Rand being taught officially in classrooms look very bleak.

About Selfishness In A Team Sport

An article published in our ‘Ayn Rand in India’ website a couple of days ago examines the role of selfishness, as defined by Ayn Rand, in team sports. According to the author, there is essentially no conflict between an individual surrendering a bid to short-term personal glory for the interests of his team, and the virtue of selfishness.

This is understood in the light of Ayn Rand’s unique perspective that selfishness is the pursuit of ‘rational self-interest,’ not personal glory at any cost. When a rational person, in this case an athlete, chooses a sport such as football to dedicate his life to, he needs to begin by identifying the proper behavior or set of actions that are required to attain the highest level of excellence and success possible to him on the football field, and then develop his skills accordingly. And success and excellence in a team sport can only be achieved, if every individual coordinates his efforts with those of his other teammates towards a common purpose – victory for the team. Any action detrimental to a team victory, even if it suits someone’s momentary individual ambition, contradicts the very principle on which any team sport is based. It neither profits the athlete’s career, nor does it achieve happiness for him. In fact, it achieves quite the opposite, including very fairly earned hatred and anger from other, more ‘rational’ teammates. It is certainly not an example of selfishness, in the objectivist sense... Click here to read the complete article.

Atlas Shrugged on small screen

Word is floating about Atlas Shrugged finally being made into a movie. While many are happy others are ... well, not-so-happy. I am one of the slightly sceptical one. My argument is on two counts: (a) movie adaptations of books, and (b) Rand's novels.

(a) Movie adaptations of books:
I have hardly ever seen any good movie adaptation of a book. The movie always takes something away from the story told in words. Some parts which you think were essential to the novel are completely missed out in the movie. The movie in the end is one person's imagination of the novel (the director's).

(b) Rand's novels:
There are some books you read which change you, some preach about being better, some show the 'real' side of life. But Rand's novels introduce you to your essential self. Post your read, words like morality, selfishness and happiness have a greater meaning. The novels are not just another great story told very well (whereas they do make a great read!) But they engage you for a philosophical self-discovery. This is perhaps very difficult to freeze in a frame.

If anyone hasn't seen ' The Fountainhead' movie, here's the link. As much as I was waiting to see Howard Roark in flesh and blood, I was a little disappointed to see the actor in this film. Perhaps, Howard Roark cannot be in flesh and blood, he is an idea of a free man. An ultimate destination of being free, which is always a mark higher than us.

Here's hoping the makers of the Atlas Shrugged series, do justice to the written word.

Read the article on the series here.

Atlas Meets Delhi - Report

The much awaited first Atlas meet in Delhi was quite a memorable affair. It brought together ten enthusiastic voices driven by a common interest, although the backgrounds and the experiences with Ayn Rand were as varied as one could imagine (not to mention an 11th ‘little’ observer, who will perhaps need a decade and a half before he can really contribute to this group!). There were no dissenters, however, and it was agreed, by and large, that the core group should only contain people who have an interest in Rand and her philosophy and would appreciate and contribute to an initiative to spread these ideas further in India.

The Participants
The meeting was conducted between 5-8 pm, in two sessions divided by a little ‘tea and snacks’ break. The participation was slightly different both sides of the interval. In the first part, Vikram, Barun and Amar, playing hosts, were joined by Avinash Mullick, formerly a facilities manager with ICICI bank, Arun Virmani, an architect inspired by Howard Roark, Sharad Joshi, a Rajya Sabha MP (yes, a member of parliament influenced by Ayn Rand!), Poonam Kapoor Vasudeva, a textile designer and a theater person, and Jayant Bhandari from Vancouver, who was passing through Delhi and found this evening an engaging enough prospect. Sharad Joshi left us at the tea break, but his empty chair was more than made up for, as two new participants joined us at that time – Anuradha and Gautam, a software engineer. Both of them have had a long association with Barun and the Liberty Institute, and both are very interested in Ayn Rand’s philosophy (and they were the ones with Rohan, their nine month old son).

The Course Of The Meeting
It took no time for the ice to break and the meeting to gather speed. Much of the discussion, debate and cross-fire along the course of the evening were surrounding the questions – ‘what value can such a group add to the participants?’, and ‘how can Ayn Rand’s ideas be spread further in India?

It all began when, after the introductions, Barun gave the background behind the initiative of the Atlas Meets and set out its objectives. Vikram summed these up as the 3S’s. The first of these is to savor the company of like-minded individuals (what greater goal can there be than the simple pleasure from such an unusual and refreshing evening?). The next is to study Ayn Rand’ books, her philosophy of objectivism and commentary upon it. Also included in this is applying her philosophy to current issues. Third in line is spreading her ideas in India. An alert observation by Sharad Joshi gave us a 4th S – sustaining this group and its efforts in the long-run. Finally we all decided that this was, in fact, the most crucial of all the S’s!

More specifically, several ideas were suggested to actively promote these S’s over the course of these meetings, and even beyond them. Here is a list:

1. Translations of Ayn Rand’s books into Indian languages.
2. Actively promoting an understanding of certain excerpts from Ayn Rand’s novels – perhaps even developing video versions of some of the long speeches and monologues from the Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged (like the Galt’s speech video already on you tube)
   Reaching out to university students through publicity campaigns and perhaps even talks and lectures.
3. Identifying the right age group to begin promoting Ayn Rand’s ideas in India
4. The need to promote the Ayn Rand Institute’s essay contest in India.
5. Using the medium of bookstores to publicize this group and Ayn Rand’s ideas.
6. Blog posts and comments applying Ayn Rand’s ideas to current issues.
7. Applying Ayn Rand’s ideas to public positions, such as the political and economic situation in India.
8. Writing letters to the editors based on the two points mentioned just above
9. Applying Ayn Rand’s ideas to personal situations and circumstances
10. Watching videos and interviews with an objectivist interest
11. Inviting guests for talks
12. Starting a study group for those interested in understanding objectivism further
13. Hosting the play ‘Night Of January 16th’ in Delhi (a couple of us observed that a theater group in Hyderabad had performed this recently)
14. Identifying famous Indians who can be considered objectivist role-models

Tfinal choice of targets will depend, to a great extent, on the level of interest and initiative that the people seriously involved are willing to show. Identifying this might be the objective of our next meeting... The first of our decisions was, simply, pertaining to the regularity with which this group should meet. We decided that the fourth Saturday of every month represented a time interval and discipline that everyone was very comfortable with.

Chicken Soup For The Soul…
This is what Vikram called it – not the entire meeting, but the first part of the John Galt’s Speech video that we screened just before the snacks break. We all ‘watched’ the powerful words, enhanced by an interesting collage of images, with rapt attention. The entire representation is in 17 parts, and is certainly worth a watch on youtube.

We also screened a short talk given by Yaron Brook, devoted to the reasons why he is optimistic about the influence that Ayn Rand’s ideas might have in America’s future. It gave us a very good idea about the scale of effort that the Ayn Rand Institute is putting in, and the sudden boost in general interest in Ayn Rand’s novels in America. This is available on youtube as well.

Well, this was as much as we could pack into three hours! And has this been a long blog post… I guess it indicates that the meeting was a real tour de force! Vikram has even posted a video on youtube from our meeting.

Here is the link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qUiY3bcOPY. Be sure to catch a glimpse!

I, for one, am already looking forward to the next edition of the Atlas Delhi meet planned for the 22nd of August.

- Amar Gujral

Atlas Shrugged Essay Contest 2009

For the past many years, the Ayn Rand Institute has been hosting the Atlas Shrugged Essay Contest for college students.

Deadline: Sept 17, 2009

• FIRST PRIZE: $10,000
• 3 SECOND PRIZES: $2,000
• 5 THIRD PRIZES: $1,000
• 20 FINALISTS: $100
• 20 SEMIFINALISTS: $50

Atlas Shrugged—Topics
Select ONE of the following three topics:
1. Hank Rearden does not apply the same philosophy to his personal life that he applies to his business. In what way does this contradiction harm him psychologically and practically? What is the central error that he makes? How does correcting his error improve his life?

2. In Atlas Shrugged, the heroes want to "make" money while the villains want, on the surface at least, to "have" money. What is the difference between these two views of money? Explain your answer by reference to actual events in the novel.

3. Choose one of the following pairs, and compare and contrast each character's approach to life and basic motivation:
a. Hank Rearden and Francisco d'Anconia
b. Dagny Taggart and Lillian Rearden
c. Eddie Willers and James Taggart Atlas Shrugged—Judging

Essays will be judged on both style and content. Judges will look for writing that is clear, articulate and logically organized. Winning essays must demonstrate an outstanding grasp of the philosophic meaning of Atlas Shrugged.

Essay submissions are evaluated in a fair and unbiased four-round judging process. Judges are individually selected by the Ayn Rand Institute based on a demonstrated knowledge and understanding of Ayn Rand’s works. To ensure the anonymity of our participants, essay cover sheets are removed after the first round. Winners’ names are unknown to judges until after essays have been ranked and the contest results finalized.

For more details, rules and entry details, click here.

Atlas Meets Delhi

Calling all those who cherish the ideals that Ayn Rand portrayed in her writings. You are welcome to this meeting in Delhi, on July 25, 2009, at 5 pm, in South Extension Part 1.

For more details, please visit this web page.http://www.aynrand.in/story.aspx?id=2657&pubid=2547

Relevance of Ayn Rand can hardly be lost, but in today's economic and intellectual environment, the ideals of individual liberty she articulated decades ago seem even more appropriate.

Looking forward to meeting you.

Free Access to HBL

Some of us might not be aware of "HBL", an email list for Objectivists that is moderated by Harry Binswanger, a leading Objectivist Philosopher.

Recently, to celebrate the Objectivist Conference in Boston, HBL has thrown open it's webpage to non-members for one month. This might be a great opportunity for budding Objectivists to read what other Objectivists the world over are talking about. Here is the message from HBL that gives details of how to access the posts:

HBL (Harry Binswanger List) is an email list for Objectivists moderated by Harry Binswanger, a leading Objectivist Philosopher. For the first time ever, anyone can read HBL online--through the end of July--by going to this site:

http://www.hblist.com/OCON

and entering OCON as both username and password. Lowercase ("ocon") also works in both the URL and for username and password. So, hurry on over to http://www.hblist.com/ocon and get a free spiritual lunch for the next 4 weeks!

Ayn Rand and MJ

I am not an MJ fan. I have grown up listening to him, like any kid anywhere. Like him or dislike him, but you simply cannot ignore him. Even at a time when Mc Donalds was not in India, Michael Jackson was present in many households.

What fascinated me, however, was his constantly changing looks. I would try and find reason as to why a coloured man want to be white? Why would someone who is so strong on the struggles of the coloured, paint himself white? I have many answers, but not one completely justifies this.
Since his death and the media hype, I began this quest to find an answer. I read a lot about him.

My friend is a BIG fan and she was very much affected by MJ's death. Together we listened to his songs, and watched his speeches and read his thoughts. And my fascination only grew. Here was a man, I thought, who was a true hero. He believed in himself so much that nothing else mattered. He loved his work and he did it the best and some more.

I saw many photographs, and one in particular struck me - one where he is standing under the flood lights, his arms wide open, his face upturned, eyes closed, his body taut with expression, I saw for the first time an exalted figure of man! And I wanted to know what Ayn Rand thought of MJ? I wanted to know if my thoughts echoed what she believed in. I googled "Ayn Rand and MJ". I got no search results.

Is it possible that Ayn Rand completely missed out on MJ? I understand that she doesn't have to have a detailed opinion on anything and everything. But, I was disappointed that how could she have possibly missed out someone who epitomises the exaltation? How could she have missed out the creator, the producer, who opened new doors for music?

On the 1st of July, when I searched again, I found two results: one from Atlasphere, and another from a different blog.

Here is what Orit Arfa writes in Atlasphere: "These (pop) songs may not involve complex arrangements that spell out an expansive, philosophical view of man; rather, they give us in the matter of a few minutes a “sense of life,” which Rand defines in The Romantic Manifesto as “a pre-conceptual equivalent of metaphysics, an emotional, subconsciously integrated appraisal of man and of existence.”

I have a few answers with regards to Ayn Rand and MJ. The rest I am free to figure out for myself.