Why Businessmen Need Philosophy [Englisch] [Taschenbuch]

An excellent collection of essays including two glorious diamonds by Ayn Rand (that have been in limited print/availability). Thanks to ARI for making these essays available, and Rand's other unpublished works available--as she wished.

This is an excellent book to use to introduce your business friends to the importance of philosophy--and why businessmen need it. It is the second book you should give them--right after Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged. As Atlas Shrugged was ridiculed and misrepresented, so is this book to be despised and smeared by all the lice out there--all the more reason to buy several copies of it!

As for my allegedly 'devout belief in altruism's equation of self and evil', my critic is exercising more imagination than sense. I do not think the self is evil. On the contrary, I think the self - each and every human self - is made in the very image of G-d and should be treated with the utmost respect.

It is 'Objectivism' which provides no foundation for this high view of the self. According to 'Objectivism', the self - that is, consciousness - is merely a natural fact, a by-product of the material universe. Rand maintained that each person is 'metaphysically' an end in himself, but she was not logically entitled to this view: at most she could hold that each person is an end-in-himself *to* himself, but not to others.

'Objectivist' has ever given a remotely plausible reason why a businessman should not cut corners even when there is little risk of getting caught," this is just ignorance. For example, see _Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand_ by Dr. Leonard Peikoff, pp. 270-274 and _passim_.'

I have already seen _Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand_ by Dr. Leonard Peikoff, pp. 270-274 and _passim_ , as well as the rest of his very poor book. Perhaps 'Mr. A' did not read my review of that book. Or perhaps he failed to grasp the meaning of the words 'remotely plausible' in my statement.

As for the passage to which 'Mr. A' refers me, it does not at all provide a 'remotely plausible reason why a businessman should not cut corners even when there is little risk of getting caught'. Much of Peikoff's explanation has to do with the *high* risk of getting caught. Beyond this, all that Peikoff 'explains' is that a self-respecting person will behave honestly for his *own* sake, for the sake of his *own* integrity. What he does not explain - and what he must explain if he is to meet my criticism - is why honesty should contribute to one's self-respect and integrity in the first place. (This view makes perhaps some sense as regards 'honesty with oneself'. It is absurd as applied to honesty with *other* people, unless we assume - as Rand and Peikoff both illicitly do - that the way we treat other people is part of the basis for our self-respect.)

Nor does Rand explain this, nor has any 'Objectivist' ever explained it - in this book or anywhere else. Rand merely *asserted* it, in the hope that she would be able to retain traditional other-regarding virtues on a foundation of 'egoism'. I am afraid this aim has not become any less nonsensical in the half-century or so since she first made the attempt.

Also: if religion is all so terrible and unnecessary, why is it that in the very passage to which 'Mr. A' has referred me, Peikoff favorably quotes Jesus? He remarks on p. 273 that Jesus' question, 'What shall it profit a m

(To be fair, that assumption is often caused less by personal meanness than by devout belief in altruism's equation of self and evil. As Ayn Rand explained, the corollary of selfish = evil is evil = selfish. Both sides of that equation are of course false, and its source is religion - which is one reason why _no one_ needs religion.)

As to the statement "no 'Objectivist' has ever given a remotely plausible reason why a businessman should not cut corners even when there is little risk of getting caught," this is just ignorance. For example, see _Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand_ by Dr. Leonard Peikoff, pp. 270-274 and _passim_.

If you think that the statement "man's life on earth has scientific requirements extending to his chosen behavior" is not remotely plausible (and that the supernatural is plausible), then avoid _Why Businessmen Need Philosophy_; you would consider your time better spent agitating for the display of the Ten Commandments in schools. If, however, you are a common-sensical and rational person operating in the real world of business, you will find in _Why Businessmen Need Philosophy_ a solid defense of independent thinking and personal wealth-creation as highly moral. You will see that the noblest and most selfishly profitable activities in the short- and long-term are those guided and informed by the moral virtues defined in this book: independence, integrity, honesty, justice, productiveness, and _pride_ (or earned self-esteem). Pride is the crown of the virtues, as Aristotle said. But this is something that the miserable "self = evil" people will never find plausible.