| | Robert,
There is all the difference in the world between a teacher "looking over your shoulder" and a dictator. One chooses one's teachers. Hopefully one chooses wisely. Choosing a teacher involves listening to what they say and making judgments about it. The relevant question is "is what my teacher is saying true?" If one judges that it is, one acts accordingly. An onlooker, even one whose life is directly affected by the choice (as you have been when a manuscript is withdrawn) cannot assume that that result is the work of anything other than considered choice. It is, after all, the author's right to agree that publication in JARS is "bad for Objectivism" even if you disagree and even if the author reconsidered under the direction of ARI. Any insinuation that "do it our way or leave" is an effort to stifle debate (one can, obviously, as in the case of Linda Reardon and George Reismann, leave and continue to debate), or anything more than the legitimate desire to control content given its mission (to promulgate what it believes to be true) is totally gratuitous. ARI is clearly not a debating society, a liberal arts college, or a haven for dissidents. One agrees or one doesn't.
A broader stroke: Individualism is not a matter of conformity, it is a matter of first-hand judgment. One cannot decide whether any given person has exercised it by virtue of agreement -- whether with ARI, TOC, or you, or anyone. Surely this is not an issue unfamiliar to the readers of The Fountainhead.
The idea that one can prove "the moral perfection of Ayn Rand" either in whole or in part by discrediting the Brandens is hogwash. To the best of my knowledge no reputable person at ARI or within its orbit subscribes to such a bizarre non-sequitur. If you think that has been MY claim, I'm sorry that you so grossly misread and misunderstood me. But EVEN IF IT WERE MY CLAIM, its truth or falsity has to be demonstrated.
Even more bizarre is the claim that her moral perfection could be construed as an adequate proof of the truth of any or all of her philosophy. On the contrary, it is the truth of her philosophy -- specifically her moral code -- that must be accepted before one can make any judgment about the morals, perfect or otherwise, of anyone on the planet (including professors of philosophy or publishers of magazines). Again, if you think that I have made that claim I am sorry about your inability to read.
The possibility that any one of her ideas will "never need supplementation or correction" is a straw man. First, because they are HER ideas. She can neither supplement or correct anything she said.
Can others "correct" her ideas. NO. They can disagree with them and are free to do so in any forum, including JARS or TOC or The Ayn Rand Society or The Ford Hall Forum, that allows such disagreement. Fred Seddon is one scholar who does so with some measure of success -- i.e. there are some that agree with his dissenting views. ARI is not such a forum, in my judgment.
Can others "supplement" her ideas. SURE. Leonard Peikoff and Tara Smith and Gary hull, et al, do so all the time, if by supplement you mean take one or more of her ideas and integrate it within a narrower or wider context. People outside the ARI orbit can as well. And any and all of them can claim that their "supplementation" is true. It is then up to the individual judgment referenced above for each of us to decide the truth of their claim.
Finally, that brings us to the issue of the arbitrariness of any argument that assumes the falsehood of any of her ideas in the absence of proof. Further, when such a proof is offered, the failure to agree that it is valid or true does not constitute evidence of nonengagement. I can have every issue of JARS on my shelves, and read every article and disagree and believe that publishing an article of mine would not be good for Objectivism, and still be very much engaged with Rand's ideas.
To repeat, disagreement does not imply dis-engagement.
Tom
P.S. to Michael...The world is full of people who want to "do my thinking for me" if by that you mean people who have ideas, argue for them, publish them, and obviously want to influence my thinking. James is no more guilty of that than Ayn Rand is. To object to this is to object to living in a society that exchanges ideas and learns from others. People who are sure of the truth of their position hope to persuade. If not, they keep to themselves and don't publish books or write posts.
(Edited by Tom Rowland on 9/25, 1:15pm)
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