Tom truly was a conduit for information. That opening blurb accurately describes why I think Tom Snyder was quite unique and a treasure the likes of which one rarely sees in a generation. Perhaps more of a depleted resource today than ever in modern history. The idea of discussing for the sake of thinking without any pretense of it being answered conclusively and feeling ok that there are questions that may be timeless and better us as a species solely by engaging in free, accessible, unhindered correspondence without fear of reprisal no matter how revolutionary or controversial (and thought-provoking) it may be.
This was really good. Ayn Rand was a prophetess ... or I suppose she would say that through reason, she correctly predicted what would happen to the United States and the world if it continued on its course.
Ah... finally, at 68, I have found a label that largely encompasses my own philosophy. Better late than never, I suppose. I found myself repeatedly uttering Yes, and of course, and brilliant, and perhaps I wasn't daft... Tom, always enjoyed your interviews, how fortunate you were one of the mediums she chose.
She did this interview the year I was born. I studied philosophy formally 20 years ago at the U of Oregon and we certainly studied Kant. It’s just this year (2023) that I read Ayn Rand and it has been life altering.
Man, you either do not know enough about Ayn Rand, or haven't lived enough life to see how that the way she describes human nature , and the realities of life do not correspond with reality. Superficially , at first, she seems to make sense. But the more you read what she has said over the years, AND how she acted in real life, you'll see she was a hypocrite. In many ways what she suggests is ironically utopian, despite her arguments sounding anti-utopian. That is because she actually says how people should act, and how they should think. But if what she said was fact, and if it were self evident then everyone would simply agree with her and her writings would in no way be controversial. Basically she is dictating what she deems the correct morality even if it seems at first she is for letting people "think for themselves". It is an unresolvable contradiction in her arguments.
The enmity originates from the left who don't want humanity to rise on its merits, to succeed as much as their drive takes them, to have individual freedom. The left want a collective, where everyone is poor, mediocre and don't question authority.
Which is of cause just a typical ad hominem of someone who actually doesnt give a sh** about those who are meant by "they" and does everything to not understand different... surpsrise, surprise... IDEAs.
Funny how she turned out to be a hypocrite who fooled people into thinking she was a serious and rational person when really she was just as human as everyone else and lived off of and fed her feelings whenever it suited her.
He interrupted her at 15:30 when she said "however, the basic premise of". I would have loved to have heard what she was going to say. These people like Donahue, Mike Wallace, and so on, kept interrupting her thoughts. Tom did a good job.
she almost cried at the end. you know that even if in those times she had a significant reputation thanks to her books, she was not appreciated in a personal level cotidianetly and because of that being praised moved her in that moment.
I am so happy to find Ayn Rand material. I have felt like a lone ranger in NZ since the '60's and '70's, trying to keep her work out there and appreciated. Under lockdown her wonderful book 'Anthem' kept me sane. 'The Virtue of Selfishness' gave a whole new take on life. What a different world it would be, a Renaissance of Reason.
Because her Philosophy is anti-christian, anti-conservative, and anti-woke/liberal. She is counter to every mainstream morality and ideology. So anyone is going to think her Evil until coming from it with an open abstract mind.
"The highest tribute to Ayn Rand is that her critics must distort everything she stood for in order to attack her. She advocated reason, not force; the individuals rights to freedom of action, speech,& association; self responsibility, NOT self-indulgence; & a live-and-let-live society in which each individual is treated as an END, not the MEANS of others' ends. How many critics would dare honestly state these ideas & say. "...and that's what I reject"? ---Barbara Branden, author of The Passion of Ayn Rand.
I love the way miss top of the class skews the narrative, speaks of the greater good, the inventors, scientists, entrepreneurs etc. The only people who fuel society are the working class! I will give you something, if all the CEOs, Proprietors, managers etc do EVERYTHING themselves, everything, I will call them self-made and, EVERYTHING they earn, they can keep! Wonder how that will pan out! 🤔🤔🤔🙄
She ticks every box, racist, Eugenecist, miss-ogynist, sexist, Abelist, every IST, ISM, PHOBE oozes from every pore. Her letter to her niece in the 50s who asked for a loan of £25 sums up how crazy she was, she could have refused and that's fine but instead wrote a heavy tome! 🥴
@Corey Florez Do you know how many geniuses are buried in paupers graves globally who were stopped from aspiring to their full potential? Until all are allowed to aspire to their full potential we will never be the bes, tonly the best under a toxic circumstance! Interesting how you say the, non-existent working class, existed was not rendered. ,🤔
Having been brought up by leftist teachers and being surrounded by leftist friends, and centre-left parents, I read leftist newspapers and I was attracted to a leftist university. Therefore I only heard about Ayn Rand through a leftist filter that cast her as a villain. I didn't get on with her famous novels and didn't think about her much until recently (in my 50s). I can now begin to see that she was one of the most important philosophers and intellectuals of the 20th century. She was also born only a few years after my grandmother, also a Russian, a very formidable woman who I loved immensely. I am excited about my new journey with Rand, which has included this interview and will next feature Piekoff's book on her philosophy. I will then go to her original nonfiction and then I think I will have another go at the novels!
But as she predicted, nothing happens to this country. This country is still stronger than all other countries on earth. So Harvard and those big universities didn’t do any wrong, probably she’s jealous of it. I’ve seen such rants from right wing people, don’t know why they hate schools and universities so much. May be that could be the reason trump started a university and eventually shut it down 🤣🤣🤣
Ultimately, it takes someone born and raised in communist Russia to explain to the ungrateful Americans how truly GREAT this country is and how we should NEVER apologize or feel guilty for our success.
Rand was not born under Communist rule at all. She was born in Tsarist Russia and saw the Russian Revolution first hand at age 12 and saw the Bolsheviks take her father’s business away. Hard to overstate how foundational that event was in her life.
@@Miguel-un1vh so she had a better perspective of it all since she experienced the beginning of communism and she knew what it was like before Communism plus she lived in America .
I had forgotten about Tom but so enjoyable to see him again in this interview. I need to go search him on TH-cam and rediscover his work… And she is so right about the universities, and since this interview, they have become way worse.
Please listen and be objective. She’s a great philosopher way ahead of her time offering the understanding of what can make our species less vulnerable and strong with an understanding heart and virtue that comes from reason. Please open your mind to her logical pursuit of well-being and community strength capable of better results compared to our present….crap!
It's just her being smart. Having an advanced analytic thinking ability especially in regards to establishing effect from cause does give one remarkable predictive powers that might seem psychic.
You simply do not know enough about what she wrote and how she behaved in life. Try to find something about her being a hypocrite. There are many articles about her as well as testimonies from people who knew her. She had a twisted view on reality in which she said one thing and did something absolutely different which was more consistent with the human nature of most people.
@@StopFearJust a tip. When you are wanting people to do some research you need to give them a starting point, a book title, article title or something. I know you can’t post links but don’t just suggest someone research with no start point. If you genuinely care about the uplifting of your fellow man you should do this.
All of you critics that attack her personally need to study more and maybe you will understand the wisdom in what she is saying. She believes in individualism, where your self-interest comes first. Everyone needs a basic moral standard to live by. Good or bad it will determine your own happiness, which is the main goal of every person.
@@ccrider4516Taking some money back from a government that stole it from you to begin with under threat of force and detainment isn't the big paradox you think it is. Do you think it's moral that they take large amounts of your income and spend it in the most wasteful inefficient ways? Don't you know if it wasn't for the supposedly altruistic medicare system everything wouldn't be so massively overpriced? Do you think the medicare system is like being on the dole?
@@ccrider4516 You're the paradox you've probably been on the dole all your life. She was Not on the dole since she had--like all of us--been already FORCED to pay for said Medicare for the preceding 50 years of her life.
You are suggesting that everyone who has criticized her in the past, and who criticizes her today somehow just does not understand what she said or meant. No, very qualified and accomplished people over the years have made very strong counter arguments to Ayn Rand showing how her views are in many ways contradictory , and/or do not reflect the realities of society or human behavior. Even the term "self-interest" is extremely vague and can mean absolutely different things to different people. It just depends on how many steps forward one is counting. The term "self interest" can be applied to absolutely anything to the point of absurdity, as can its opposite "non self interest" (altruism, generosity, whatever term). For example, could you possibly define at what point something is "self-interest" and at what point does something stop being "self-interest"? I don't think you'll be able to. Also a lot of what she claimed also shows she was very unfamiliar with a lot of philosophy that has come long before her where philosophers addressed these issues at length back and forth.
This comment proves you have no clue what you are talking about. Ayn and objectivism put reason and individual thinking over religion and collectivism. Somehow you chose distort her message
Yeah open minded conversation. Where does that exist today? Joe Rogan lol. I mean props to Rogan, but a few steps way under Snyder and Charlie Rose. Can you imagine him drinking whiskey and smoking dope with Ayn Rand? Haha. Nope
Tom: “There are many people in this country, forgive me, in this world who think you’re daft.” Ayn: “They don’t think that. They want you to think that.” I heard that. 🤯
14:43-17:03 Absolutely spot on, and absolutely prescient. Today, we are living with the results of the failures of intellectual leadership she talks about here.
you have no idea what you are talking about. Just read any of the numerous essays in which others demonstrate ways in which Ayn Rand was demonstrated to be wrong, a hypocrite, and in some way she was actually proposing another utopian world where only the worldview she had is the "correct" one, and everyone else's "wrong"
Wow, you’re right! You’re so convincing! Instead of simply declaring that I don’t know what I’m talking about (and I am not offering any theories of my own, I am simply agreeing with what she said at that particular point in the interview), why don’t you enlighten us? Why don’t you give us your wisdom based on your life experiences? Why don’t you break down what she’s saying and counter it with your own brilliance, rather than appealing to authority without even citing the actual authority?
Ayn Rand was a second rate philosopher. Anyone who thinks that acting from an emotional standpoint is immoral, and that reason (not intuition) is are primary survival skill is either naive or remarkably ignorant.
Talk about predictions, everything she said is spot on, its the basic truth, even the GOD line at the end, I consider myself a man of faith, and she is clearly an atheist, she was so respectful and eloquent.
Rand is a gift that the ordinary US citizen is unfortunately unaware of her importance and contribution to the human experience. Everything she feared and predicted is in evidence today. "god" help us all!
yes, there is going to be a societal collapse. It's already here and let's hope some of her works survive. Then I think people will be ready to hear her. Unfortunately, most Americans are anti-intellectual and second handed. They hold the beliefs that are popular at the moment. They are afraid to think for themselves.
Rand was able to predict what is now happening with startling clarity because she understood the basic ideas that were and are dominant in our world and she knew what the inevitable consequences of those ideas put into practice would be. Read her article in Philosophy: Who Needs It on inflation and money. She nailed it but bring up her name and prepare for the shitstorm. What a tragedy. I've thought about how I would explain where we are right now to her. I'd tell her that Cuffy Megs and Dr. Stadtler are fighting over the levers of Project X. That's how close we are to total collapse right now.
If conservatives think valid and deep critique is "hate"... they still dont do anything right. Dont be bothered with "hate" ... check out the arguments. Ayn Rands assumption about what human beings are is rather easy to destroy. Unfortunately especially those with huge power do like her assumptions very much. What is quite not to understand: Why so many who are NOT in power fall for these claims.
@@BoothTheGrey If you're a liberal or a leftists you should ask yourself that very same question: why is it that you fall for all the liberal mainstream media lies regarding anything that doesn't follow their ideologies. Unless, of course, you're a member of the deep-pocketed liberal class. In that case, it would just be sheer unethical hypocrisy. And speaking of hate, it behooves you to contact one of the country's oldest socialist bookstores and publishers, City Lights Books, in San Francisco, and ask them if they stock any Ayn Rand books. Their answer, as is your reply, should be, in a more logical world, an indictment of liberal philosophy.
Wow, what an interview. Just brilliant on both sides. What a wise wise woman. But I think it may be too late for Americans to save their country, it is being brought to its knees exactly as Ayn Rand said it would. Excellent. Tom Synder is an example of how interviews should be held - respectfully.
😂😂😂 no sarcasm here - right! I've been appreciably illuminated by the matters discussed in this interview and will seek others in which Ayn Rand is guest.😊
For all you rock fans this is who the author of RUSH 2112 album it is based off her book Anthem. Neil Peart took a lot of heat because people believe he was pushing individualism in his early music
Neil also renounced and later said this in a Rolling Stone interview: "For me, [Rand's writing] was an affirmation that its alright to totally believe in something and live for it and not compromise. It was a simple as that. On that 2112 album, again I was in my early 20s. I was a kid. Now I call myself a bleeding heart libertarian. Because I do believe in the principles of Libertarianism as an ideal because Im an idealist. Paul Therouxs definition of a cynic is a disappointed idealist. So as you go through past your 20s, your idealism is going to be disappointed many many times. And so, Ive brought my view and also Ive just realized this Libertarianism as I understood it was very good and pure and were all going to be successful and generous to the less fortunate and it was, to me, not dark or cynical. But then I soon saw, of course, the way that it gets twisted by the flaws of humanity. And thats when I evolve now into a bleeding heart Libertarian. That'll do."
@@tommroy people change with age as do ideology groups I use to be die hard union democrat but now at 61 I lean toward conservative because democrats have moved towards liberal/socialism. A system has to have a mixture of beliefs if one side gains to much power it turns into tyranny then a unhappy society, because their individual needs and happiness are not being met
Pardon the phrase. But she’d be rolling in her grave along with Orwell seeing how things are today. Unfortunate her books are not studied in schools. At least none that I went to. Most definitely not now!
I've actually thought about how I would tell her what's going on today. I wouldn't know where to begin except the whole "woke" ideology pretty much sums it up.
Do you have a problem with exposure to aposing points of views, or do you have a inkling that the point of view you ascribe to is not as affective as you hope it is?
Objectivism can't be the philosophy of anyone who doesn’t accept total responsible for their own thoughts and actions. This is why it's rare. Few humans have reached this level of confidence and courage.
There was never a moment in my life that I fit. It did not mean there was something else other than what my eyes ears and brain were being told. Thank you Ayn Rand. Someone who knew what the other is. Me.
No, because in order to be wrong you have first to make a coherent statement. Rants aren’t wrong or right; they’re just rants. It's very easy to preach "rationalism". It's a bit more difficult actually to reason.
Rand is the opposite of Nietzsches. He literally advocated for Dionysus as the source of art. How can the OP even think for a second these philosophies are correlated?
I really enjoyed that and i wish it would of been longer . My she got so much right and especially the bit at the end about todays conservatives being utterly useless and deeply implicit in bringing about a very un-conservative world . Thats exactly whats happened here in the U.K. and also in the U.S. as far as i can make out .
It’s sad we had a chance to change course and of course went in the opposite direction and completely changed America for the worse. If we truly tried it her way it would be interesting to see how and where america would be now. I bet more peaceful, less taxed and controlled and regulated, more prosperous
"you're supposed to apologize to every naked savage". Yes, exactly. She was one of the great minds of the 21st century. I wrote 21st century and I MEANT 21st Century.
When she says what religion and philosophy have in common she reveals her own lunatic perspective of her philosophy as a closed grid , exactly same as a religion. No wonder she is nothing but an anecdote.
As long as the "phone" provides the "right" to choose learning/info/influencers of equal quality status unbiased so that it's receiving youth can then choose right or wrong pathways to influence a personal philosophy for life as set by influencers ideologies, suggestions etc also chosen for a righteous or shocking appealing appearance set by the standards of the phone content monopolies chosen by it's invite.
Objectivism is the pursuit of your self-interest based on rational thought. This is over of the heads of 90% of the public. Her philosophy doesn’t lend itself to talk show formats or sound bytes.
She basically says what we hear on those airplane tutorials: put the breathing mask on yourself first, and then apply it on your child = make yourself happy first to make others happy.
I wouldn't ever think that universities have been in this path for more than 40 years, I was born in 1975, listening to someone who's not religious saying this thing when I was 4 years old? Sounds Prophetic 😮
Imagine how moving it would be, the moment you realize the person that appears so stern, stubborn, and hard nosed actually is heartbroken to see you are unknowingly walking off a cliff. Is that not at least partially what Rand is doing by speaking? She loves the country and what it stands for. She thinks we won’t fail because she had seen signs of our ability to wake up. You all see where we are now. What do you think? Was she not mostly right?
The answers to the personal questions are more interesting than the rants. I was struck by this bit, though: Rand, she says, learned, from a famous philosopher whose name she couldn’t remember, that one when dies one’s life doesn’t end, that, rather, the world itself ends. I don’t know the name of this philosopher either, but I do know the name of the philosophy: it’s called “solipsism”.
I do not agree with Ayn Rand and her teachings, but i sympathise with her in the sense that it must be terribly tiring to have to explain yourself all the time.
willielunch ,,,she did not commit suicide. It was heart failure, natural causes. read your comment down below about logic reason going mad, suicide love, purpose, joy etc. I think you were describing yourself,,, interesting, read, except for the suicide part ,,,weird
The obvious counter argument is that you can be immoral, allowing yourself to be guided by your emotions, and to follow your heart. In other words, an artist.
Objectivism is just another dogma. All we have is individual experience and each of us should be content with this because if we’re paying attention we have everything we need to grow and evolve contained almost exclusively within our own experience. There is no need for religion, Objectivism, philosophy etc. If we don’t like the experience we’re having, we have agency to change it (although we don’t always understand this). The issue with any philosophy, religion or belief systems is that they impose a one size fits all approach. Ayn Rand is just a product of her experience and I haven’t delved deep enough into her yet to know if she’s sufficiently self-aware to understand this, and whether she confuses her subjective truth (her philosophy) with objective truth. It does seem so far that this is exactly what she’s done having failed to understand that her world view arose having been conditioned / surrounded by communism, materialism, Marxism etc early in life.
@@pricejoss I agree in part however I have personally found Ayn Rand to be a useful guide along a pathway of thinking. While each step must be your own, most of the pathways have been walked before. You walk along the path with some for a while, listening and thinking about what they are saying, but ultimately you path diverges. People arguing their point, or describing their experience of reality, with conviction is not dogma - dogma is for the followers - communication is for thinkers. I do not believe that your own facilities are enough in this world. There is just too much evidence to the contrary. Appropriate training yields results. It is pretty simple in that regard. The world is complex and the mind even more so.
@@AudioLemon It’s dogmatic to hold onto a position when it’s not accurate or correct and in the face of so much evidence to the contrary. Ayn Rand was nowhere near as smart as she believed herself to be. Ironically, she lacked the very thing she claimed to live by, objectivity. This interview is littered with examples. Reciprocity is hardwired into human beings. It is an evolutionary advantage. To argue against it isn’t even worth discussion because it is so fundamental to our species. That’s why Ayn Rand will be only ever be a footnote in history and incomparable to the likes of Kant. She is nothing more than an extremist (as in fringe) who empowers and legitimises other extremists. I’m not knocking that she’s helped you personally, that’s good, but she has very little to offer on a macro level.
@@pricejoss You seem to be misunderstanding her. She is used that as are most autistic people. To be clear being dogmatic means to follow an established tenet or principle. She was not dogmatic, she was individualistic. They are not the same. You are semantically mistaken in this regard. Attacking her intelligence is an odd thing to do, I would say she was smart enough wouldn't you? It is ironic you mention Kant, who is said to have been awoken (woke culture = any rand) by Hume who argued 'that we only know the mind through a subjective, essentially illusory series of perceptions.' This is the basis of Ayn Rands objectivism. It is a subjective statement of reality that can be agreed on. It is object in this sense, not object in and of itself which would be impossible for a human to conceive as it is wholly abstract and outside of reality - like a God of sorts - which is anathema to this kind of thinking. When you say she helped me personally - what you are saying is she has created useful structures for thought in those versed in the history and cultural of philosophy, mathematics, engineering, music, art and cognitive thinkers. You may disagree with her but you will never be able to ignore her. She has found as place in the great discussion. She rolls around in my mind with Scorates and Aristotle and Leinbinz and Bach. She is there and will be forever I believe. She has communicated something of meaning to the world, as she intended.
@@AudioLemon Rand was a slave to her own ideology i.e. dogmatic. She lacked the self-awareness to see that it came from a reaction to her early life experiences at the hands of Lenin and then Stalin. In essence, her philosophy is the opposite extreme of communism. Life happens in the centre, not at the extremes. While she was clearly intelligent, my point was she had blind spots. Her philosophy makes little room for psychology. It’s just a product of her experience at a point in history and time and it’s not much deeper than that. It’s a reaction and an overly intellectualised one at that. Someone like Victor Frankel had a lot more to offer humanity through his reaction to his personal circumstances. Rand hated Kant but Kant is a titan compared to Rand in the minds of others, hence the comparison. Rand advocated rationality and reason but I would argue that parts of her philosophy are highly irrational and lacking in reason - her blind spots. We have to be able to separate out our own experiences from the experience of others but Rand projected her own experience onto the world as if it were universal. It wasn’t and isn’t. Maybe individualism is a riposte to communism but even then it’s deeply flawed. If I were to be nuanced, there are some things to pick out from her thinking that are useful but dated. She strikes me as a 20th century Jordan Peterson, philosophy-lite for lightweight intellects.
So. Her message: be selfish and proud like Big Oil, Ag, Chem, Pharma, Healthcare, Citizens United; Aipac, Netanyahu, Donald Trump, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Zuckerberg, Blackrock, Buffet, etc. Rand would be in ecstasy living in the current state.
Barely five minutes in she called philosophy a science! Tells you all you need to know about Ayn Rand and the nonsense she calls Objectivism. I read all her novels by the time I was 20 and thought that she was on to something. For those unfamiliar with her work, there’s really not much to it. Her basic message is this: selfishness is a virtue. Now, that I’ve reach the end of my life I know as deep as knowing goes that she is wrong: a selfish life is a wasted life.
She acts like all her achievements weren't given a shred of charity, like she just did it all on her own. Sometimes being at the right place at the right time and sometimes it's not what you know but who you know.She is a very lazy selfish person she reminds me of my mother.She doesn't take into account some people don't wish to live in her paradigm of money but are forced too nor do some people want to run a business but are no less valuable.
Tom…”I’ve never been to Harvard.”
Ayn….”That’s to your advantage.”
She has great comedic timing.
To his advantage. True forty-five years ago, true today
Tom truly was a conduit for information. That opening blurb accurately describes why I think Tom Snyder was quite unique and a treasure the likes of which one rarely sees in a generation. Perhaps more of a depleted resource today than ever in modern history.
The idea of discussing for the sake of thinking without any pretense of it being answered conclusively and feeling ok that there are questions that may be timeless and better us as a species solely by engaging in free, accessible, unhindered correspondence without fear of reprisal no matter how revolutionary or controversial (and thought-provoking) it may be.
This was really good. Ayn Rand was a prophetess ... or I suppose she would say that through reason, she correctly predicted what would happen to the United States and the world if it continued on its course.
This is a fantastic interview, given that it was filmed also in 1979. Thanks a lot for sharing
My pleasure & thank you forcwatching.
Ah... finally, at 68, I have found a label that largely encompasses my own philosophy. Better late than never, I suppose. I found myself repeatedly uttering Yes, and of course, and brilliant, and perhaps I wasn't daft... Tom, always enjoyed your interviews, how fortunate you were one of the mediums she chose.
🤍🩵💙AR 💯
I suggest "Objectivism" by Dr. Leonard Peikhoff. It is a brilliant summery and explanation of the details of Rands philosophy.
Oh
She did this interview the year I was born. I studied philosophy formally 20 years ago at the U of Oregon and we certainly studied Kant. It’s just this year (2023) that I read Ayn Rand and it has been life altering.
Look at Tom
You studied Philosophy? So, what’s it like working at a gas station?
You don’t sound very smart if your sad life was “altered” by this Zionist sociopath
@@TommyTumma At least he's not working for Epstein like so many others like Gates...
Man, you either do not know enough about Ayn Rand, or haven't lived enough life to see how that the way she describes human nature , and the realities of life do not correspond with reality. Superficially , at first, she seems to make sense. But the more you read what she has said over the years, AND how she acted in real life, you'll see she was a hypocrite. In many ways what she suggests is ironically utopian, despite her arguments sounding anti-utopian. That is because she actually says how people should act, and how they should think. But if what she said was fact, and if it were self evident then everyone would simply agree with her and her writings would in no way be controversial. Basically she is dictating what she deems the correct morality even if it seems at first she is for letting people "think for themselves". It is an unresolvable contradiction in her arguments.
All these years we have seen such emnity towards Rand and yet she is amazingly precient in this interview.
The enmity originates from the left who don't want humanity to rise on its merits, to succeed as much as their drive takes them, to have individual freedom.
The left want a collective, where everyone is poor, mediocre and don't question authority.
"They are terribly unselfish because they haven't a single idea of their own." This interview is so relevant today.
As if the Zionist psychopath had any ideas itself
Which is of cause just a typical ad hominem of someone who actually doesnt give a sh** about those who are meant by "they" and does everything to not understand different... surpsrise, surprise... IDEAs.
Funny how she turned out to be a hypocrite who fooled people into thinking she was a serious and rational person when really she was just as human as everyone else and lived off of and fed her feelings whenever it suited her.
@@JacksonHoulihan Yes, she was a total hypocrite in addition to having crazy ideas about human nature that are inconsistent with reality.
@@StopFearNo
He interrupted her at 15:30 when she said "however, the basic premise of". I would have loved to have heard what she was going to say. These people like Donahue, Mike Wallace, and so on, kept interrupting her thoughts. Tom did a good job.
she almost cried at the end. you know that even if in those times she had a significant reputation thanks to her books, she was not appreciated in a personal level cotidianetly and because of that being praised moved her in that moment.
She’s right all we have to do is listen to this and remember our history since this interview to now.
I am so happy to find Ayn Rand material. I have felt like a lone ranger in NZ since the '60's and '70's, trying to keep her work out there and appreciated. Under lockdown her wonderful book 'Anthem' kept me sane. 'The Virtue of Selfishness' gave a whole new take on life. What a different world it would be, a Renaissance of Reason.
I use to think she was evil. Now I see she was a very intelligent and charming woman.
Curious why would you think her evil?
Because her Philosophy is anti-christian, anti-conservative, and anti-woke/liberal. She is counter to every mainstream morality and ideology. So anyone is going to think her Evil until coming from it with an open abstract mind.
"The highest tribute to Ayn Rand is that her critics must distort everything she stood for in order to attack her.
She advocated reason, not force; the individuals rights to freedom of action, speech,& association; self responsibility, NOT self-indulgence; & a live-and-let-live society in which each individual is treated as an END, not the MEANS of others' ends. How many critics would dare honestly state these ideas & say. "...and that's what I reject"?
---Barbara Branden, author of The Passion of Ayn Rand.
I love the way miss top of the class skews the narrative, speaks of the greater good, the inventors, scientists, entrepreneurs etc. The only people who fuel society are the working class! I will give you something, if all the CEOs, Proprietors, managers etc do EVERYTHING themselves, everything, I will call them self-made and, EVERYTHING they earn, they can keep! Wonder how that will pan out! 🤔🤔🤔🙄
She ticks every box, racist, Eugenecist, miss-ogynist, sexist, Abelist, every IST, ISM, PHOBE oozes from every pore. Her letter to her niece in the 50s who asked for a loan of £25 sums up how crazy she was, she could have refused and that's fine but instead wrote a heavy tome! 🥴
I am against government, against policing but, I am for society, Rand was for herself and to hell with everyone else! Disasterous!
@Corey Florez You only have to convince yourself of that although when you skew a narrative it is easier to try and convince others, without success.🤔
@Corey Florez Do you know how many geniuses are buried in paupers graves globally who were stopped from aspiring to their full potential? Until all are allowed to aspire to their full potential we will never be the bes, tonly the best under a toxic circumstance! Interesting how you say the, non-existent working class, existed was not rendered. ,🤔
So nice to see an intelligent conversation, on TV, with neither attempting to silence the other with calculated interruption.
Having been brought up by leftist teachers and being surrounded by leftist friends, and centre-left parents, I read leftist newspapers and I was attracted to a leftist university. Therefore I only heard about Ayn Rand through a leftist filter that cast her as a villain. I didn't get on with her famous novels and didn't think about her much until recently (in my 50s).
I can now begin to see that she was one of the most important philosophers and intellectuals of the 20th century. She was also born only a few years after my grandmother, also a Russian, a very formidable woman who I loved immensely. I am excited about my new journey with Rand, which has included this interview and will next feature Piekoff's book on her philosophy. I will then go to her original nonfiction and then I think I will have another go at the novels!
Come to the Objectivist Summer Conference! July 2023.
@@doctorx0079 is that in the USA? If I feel abundant next Spring I will book it :)
@@chelseapoet3664 it's in Miami 🙂
Same here man! Took a long time to understand her, unfortunately now that it’s too late for this country
But as she predicted, nothing happens to this country. This country is still stronger than all other countries on earth. So Harvard and those big universities didn’t do any wrong, probably she’s jealous of it. I’ve seen such rants from right wing people, don’t know why they hate schools and universities so much. May be that could be the reason trump started a university and eventually shut it down 🤣🤣🤣
Ultimately, it takes someone born and raised in communist Russia to explain to the ungrateful Americans how truly GREAT this country is and how we should NEVER apologize or feel guilty for our success.
Rand was not born under Communist rule at all. She was born in Tsarist Russia and saw the Russian Revolution first hand at age 12 and saw the Bolsheviks take her father’s business away. Hard to overstate how foundational that event was in her life.
@@Miguel-un1vh so she had a better perspective of it all since she experienced the beginning of communism and she knew what it was like before Communism plus she lived in America .
Obviously, Rand was acutely aware of the failure of the welfare state.
30:25 😅 30:28
@@Miguel-un1vhyou missed the point, of course!
I had forgotten about Tom but so enjoyable to see him again in this interview. I need to go search him on TH-cam and rediscover his work…
And she is so right about the universities, and since this interview, they have become way worse.
th-cam.com/play/PLxEUz9H7TzIG2CPcxZ7kq3Sn8U0-MXF3P.html
Tom Snyder truly was one of a kind. What a treasure
Please listen and be objective.
She’s a great philosopher way ahead of her time offering the understanding of what can make our species less vulnerable and strong with an understanding heart and virtue that comes from reason. Please open your mind to her logical pursuit of well-being and community strength capable of better results compared to our present….crap!
Wow. Not only was she smart she was a bloody psychic
It's just her being smart. Having an advanced analytic thinking ability especially in regards to establishing effect from cause does give one remarkable predictive powers that might seem psychic.
@@socksumi "There are no psychics... only those who pay attention to details." - The Mentalist
I really enjoy watching and listening to Ayn. She's quite fascinating. I love how she's completely unabashedly herself and not affected.
You simply do not know enough about what she wrote and how she behaved in life. Try to find something about her being a hypocrite. There are many articles about her as well as testimonies from people who knew her. She had a twisted view on reality in which she said one thing and did something absolutely different which was more consistent with the human nature of most people.
What proof of these claims do you have?
OK, so she was surrounded by worshippers and acolytes. Not her fault...
@@StopFearJust a tip. When you are wanting people to do some research you need to give them a starting point, a book title, article title or something. I know you can’t post links but don’t just suggest someone research with no start point. If you genuinely care about the uplifting of your fellow man you should do this.
She told Phil Donahue that she believed that so called humility was almost always disingenuous, and contributed to an unhealthy mind.
All of you critics that attack her personally need to study more and maybe you will understand the wisdom in what she is saying. She believes in individualism, where your self-interest comes first. Everyone needs a basic moral standard to live by. Good or bad it will determine your own happiness, which is the main goal of every person.
The attackers are victims and this society supports and encourages victimhood
@@ccrider4516Taking some money back from a government that stole it from you to begin with under threat of force and detainment isn't the big paradox you think it is. Do you think it's moral that they take large amounts of your income and spend it in the most wasteful inefficient ways? Don't you know if it wasn't for the supposedly altruistic medicare system everything wouldn't be so massively overpriced? Do you think the medicare system is like being on the dole?
@@ccrider4516 You're the paradox you've probably been on the dole all your life. She was Not on the dole since she had--like all of us--been already FORCED to pay for said Medicare for the preceding 50 years of her life.
You are suggesting that everyone who has criticized her in the past, and who criticizes her today somehow just does not understand what she said or meant. No, very qualified and accomplished people over the years have made very strong counter arguments to Ayn Rand showing how her views are in many ways contradictory , and/or do not reflect the realities of society or human behavior. Even the term "self-interest" is extremely vague and can mean absolutely different things to different people. It just depends on how many steps forward one is counting. The term "self interest" can be applied to absolutely anything to the point of absurdity, as can its opposite "non self interest" (altruism, generosity, whatever term). For example, could you possibly define at what point something is "self-interest" and at what point does something stop being "self-interest"? I don't think you'll be able to.
Also a lot of what she claimed also shows she was very unfamiliar with a lot of philosophy that has come long before her where philosophers addressed these issues at length back and forth.
Excellent interview! It seems that since this interview we have now abandoned religion but kept Kant and are left with nothing.
What does that even mean and where and when is it even true?
Tried reading Kant a long time ago. Too wordy & esoteric for me.
This comment proves you have no clue what you are talking about. Ayn and objectivism put reason and individual thinking over religion and collectivism. Somehow you chose distort her message
GODDDD. he was a great interviewer
All Heart❤💙
Yeah open minded conversation. Where does that exist today? Joe Rogan lol. I mean props to Rogan, but a few steps way under Snyder and Charlie Rose. Can you imagine him drinking whiskey and smoking dope with Ayn Rand? Haha. Nope
Yes he is way more interesting and clever than she is.
Tom: “There are many people in this country, forgive me, in this world who think you’re daft.”
Ayn: “They don’t think that. They want you to think that.”
I heard that. 🤯
14:43-17:03 Absolutely spot on, and absolutely prescient. Today, we are living with the results of the failures of intellectual leadership she talks about here.
you have no idea what you are talking about. Just read any of the numerous essays in which others demonstrate ways in which Ayn Rand was demonstrated to be wrong, a hypocrite, and in some way she was actually proposing another utopian world where only the worldview she had is the "correct" one, and everyone else's "wrong"
Wow, you’re right! You’re so convincing!
Instead of simply declaring that I don’t know what I’m talking about (and I am not offering any theories of my own, I am simply agreeing with what she said at that particular point in the interview), why don’t you enlighten us? Why don’t you give us your wisdom based on your life experiences? Why don’t you break down what she’s saying and counter it with your own brilliance, rather than appealing to authority without even citing the actual authority?
😬@@senorsicon6116
Wow, she really understood the dangers being brought forth from the universities, way back then.
We are so far gone now Ayn rand would be shocked how bad it’s gotten
Ayn Rand was a second rate philosopher. Anyone who thinks that acting from an emotional standpoint is immoral, and that reason (not intuition) is are primary survival skill is either naive or remarkably ignorant.
@@brooke4627smoke another one lady
@@quitefranklysamanthatheres1018 No more shocked than Orwell. Both knew where we were headed.
@@brooke4627 Spoken like the oedipal mother...
Great interview, tom yoy are the greatest, and Ayn Rand was a great intellectual.
Talk about predictions, everything she said is spot on, its the basic truth, even the GOD line at the end, I consider myself a man of faith, and she is clearly an atheist, she was so respectful and eloquent.
Tom Snyder, was one of the best interviewer... Ayn Rand was an interesting person. I totaly agree with her. Objectivity is it !!!!
Outstanding interview!
Looks like Tom Snyder interviewed Mrs. Rand rather quite better than Mike Wallace did twenty years earlier in 1959, but maybe that's just me.
Watch the Johnny Carson interview 1967 fantastic 😍
Mike Wallace was awful to her, kept interrupting. Tom was much better, you are absolutely right here.
Rand is a gift that the ordinary US citizen is unfortunately unaware of her importance and contribution to the human experience. Everything she feared and predicted is in evidence today. "god" help us all!
yes, there is going to be a societal collapse. It's already here and let's hope some of her works survive. Then I think people will be ready to hear her. Unfortunately, most Americans are anti-intellectual and second handed. They hold the beliefs that are popular at the moment. They are afraid to think for themselves.
"Good helps he who helps himself." He is the original Objectivist.
Rand was able to predict what is now happening with startling clarity because she understood the basic ideas that were and are dominant in our world and she knew what the inevitable consequences of those ideas put into practice would be. Read her article in Philosophy: Who Needs It on inflation and money. She nailed it but bring up her name and prepare for the shitstorm. What a tragedy. I've thought about how I would explain where we are right now to her. I'd tell her that Cuffy Megs and Dr. Stadtler are fighting over the levers of Project X. That's how close we are to total collapse right now.
God helps those who help themselves... until they're caught helping themselves to others' stuff.
If liberals and leftist hate her so much she must be doing something right.
If conservatives think valid and deep critique is "hate"... they still dont do anything right.
Dont be bothered with "hate" ... check out the arguments. Ayn Rands assumption about what human beings are is rather easy to destroy. Unfortunately especially those with huge power do like her assumptions very much.
What is quite not to understand: Why so many who are NOT in power fall for these claims.
@@BoothTheGrey If you're a liberal or a leftists you should ask yourself that very same question: why is it that you fall for all the liberal mainstream media lies regarding anything that doesn't follow their ideologies. Unless, of course, you're a member of the deep-pocketed liberal class. In that case, it would just be sheer unethical hypocrisy. And speaking of hate, it behooves you to contact one of the country's oldest socialist bookstores and publishers, City Lights Books, in San Francisco, and ask them if they stock any Ayn Rand books. Their answer, as is your reply, should be, in a more logical world, an indictment of liberal philosophy.
Wow, what an interview. Just brilliant on both sides. What a wise wise woman. But I think it may be too late for Americans to save their country, it is being brought to its knees exactly as Ayn Rand said it would. Excellent. Tom Synder is an example of how interviews should be held - respectfully.
And intelligently, without trying to confirm a narrative.
I am so proud to be an American.🇺🇸
Fascinating to see all the people who know more than Ayn Rand in the comment section of TH-cam. 😮
😂😂😂 no sarcasm here - right!
I've been appreciably illuminated by the matters discussed in this interview and will seek others in which Ayn Rand is guest.😊
Phil Donahue (1980)
Mike Wallace (1959)
There are probably others. Those are off the top of my head
For all you rock fans this is who the author of RUSH 2112 album it is based off her book Anthem. Neil Peart took a lot of heat because people believe he was pushing individualism in his early music
Neil also renounced and later said this in a Rolling Stone interview: "For me, [Rand's writing] was an affirmation that its alright to totally believe in something and live for it and not compromise. It was a simple as that. On that 2112 album, again I was in my early 20s. I was a kid. Now I call myself a bleeding heart libertarian. Because I do believe in the principles of Libertarianism as an ideal because Im an idealist. Paul Therouxs definition of a cynic is a disappointed idealist. So as you go through past your 20s, your idealism is going to be disappointed many many times. And so, Ive brought my view and also Ive just realized this Libertarianism as I understood it was very good and pure and were all going to be successful and generous to the less fortunate and it was, to me, not dark or cynical. But then I soon saw, of course, the way that it gets twisted by the flaws of humanity. And thats when I evolve now into a bleeding heart Libertarian. That'll do."
@@tommroy people change with age as do ideology groups I use to be die hard union democrat but now at 61 I lean toward conservative because democrats have moved towards liberal/socialism. A system has to have a mixture of beliefs if one side gains to much power it turns into tyranny then a unhappy society, because their individual needs and happiness are not being met
If this interview gives one food for thought well then let's say at the end of this video I am quite content. Wonderful from both sides.
Brilliant. Her thoughts are so relevant today....45 years into the future.
How many high school students even know if Ayn Rand today?
They’re not allowed to read her books. They’ve been demonized by the woke Marxists.
Wow timeless.
My bible in high school upon the tall ships was Atlas Shrugged.
She is a legend
"The most dangerous thing in the world today are universities." I so agree. What would she think of the current universities? Lol
I mean things back then were just as bad.
Pardon the phrase. But she’d be rolling in her grave along with Orwell seeing how things are today. Unfortunate her books are not studied in schools. At least none that I went to. Most definitely not now!
@@theonemanbandit7374 My AP English class back in 2006 studied The Fountainhead.
I've actually thought about how I would tell her what's going on today. I wouldn't know where to begin except the whole "woke" ideology pretty much sums it up.
Do you have a problem with exposure to aposing points of views, or do you have a inkling that the point of view you ascribe to is not as affective as you hope it is?
Objectivism can't be the philosophy of anyone who doesn’t accept total responsible for their own thoughts and actions. This is why it's rare. Few humans have reached this level of confidence and courage.
It is a filter. It filters out almost everyone who isn't a sigma.
Rare indeed, in fact to be an Ubermensch
No one, even
She is right on.
Politics of a society is a reflection of the philosophy of that society.
"To the degree you deny rationality, to that degree you will die." - Ayn Rand
There was never a moment in my life that I fit. It did not mean there was something else other than what my eyes ears and brain were being told. Thank you Ayn Rand. Someone who knew what the other is. Me.
I miss Tom Snyder. He was always thouggt provoking and entertaining. Guests always felt comfortable with him.
Well, she wasnt wrong about the universities.
No, because in order to be wrong you have first to make a coherent statement. Rants aren’t wrong or right; they’re just rants. It's very easy to preach "rationalism". It's a bit more difficult actually to reason.
@@jeffryphillipsburns Sounds like a bit of a rant there dude
@@jeffryphillipsburns Ideas can come in the forms of rants too.
She was spot on
The last Greatest Prophet of Reason, hence the greatest Philosopher 🙏❤
Both are very impressive, each in their own way. Also in this interview, I could feel Nietzsche's influence.
*You:*
▶▶Love
▶▶Hate
▶▶Don't Care About
*Nietzsche?*
Nietzsches influence - oh dear no wonder she was up the spout.
Rand is the opposite of Nietzsches. He literally advocated for Dionysus as the source of art. How can the OP even think for a second these philosophies are correlated?
I really enjoyed that and i wish it would of been longer . My she got so much right and especially the bit at the end about todays conservatives being utterly useless and deeply implicit in bringing about a very un-conservative world . Thats exactly whats happened here in the U.K. and also in the U.S. as far as i can make out .
Trump is Moses and Qanon is Jesus to at least 10-million quacks.
It’s sad we had a chance to change course and of course went in the opposite direction and completely changed America for the worse. If we truly tried it her way it would be interesting to see how and where america would be now. I bet more peaceful, less taxed and controlled and regulated, more prosperous
The whole flyover country jumped on the Jordan Peterson bandwagon. So their god himself cant help us now.
I love the part where she says "you're supposed to apologize to every naked savage." Good old Ayn! One of the great minds of the 19th century
You mean the 20th Century…
@@thebigrussian nope I wrote 19th century and I MEANT 19th century
"you're supposed to apologize to every naked savage". Yes, exactly.
She was one of the great minds of the 21st century.
I wrote 21st century and I MEANT 21st Century.
@@sandythomas8911 As if anyone cares
@@boogerie 1900-1999 was the 20th century.
this lady is alive and in the present to the max!
Amazing lady!! I love her works!
When she says what religion and philosophy have in common she reveals her own lunatic perspective of her philosophy as a closed grid , exactly same as a religion. No wonder she is nothing but an anecdote.
"Some day phones will be smarter than People. On that day all societies will bow down to stupidity." - Albert Einstein
Did he really say that?
@@michellegarbarinorirs4255, "Here's your sign." - Bill Engvall
Uncle Albert never said that.
As long as the "phone" provides the "right" to choose learning/info/influencers of equal quality status unbiased so that it's receiving youth can then choose right or wrong pathways to influence a personal philosophy for life as set by influencers ideologies, suggestions etc also chosen for a righteous or shocking appealing appearance set by the standards of the phone content monopolies chosen by it's invite.
Objectivism is the pursuit of your self-interest based on rational thought. This is over of the heads of 90% of the public. Her philosophy doesn’t lend itself to talk show formats or sound bytes.
she called it.
That was excellant !!
I miss real talent like Tom Snyder.
The world was not ready for Ayn Rand. And still isn’t ready for her wisdom.
She basically says what we hear on those airplane tutorials: put the breathing mask on yourself first, and then apply it on your child = make yourself happy first to make others happy.
What an excellent analogy! We said
What a brilliant woman.
I am so happy to c Ayn Rand talk: in person. I am a HUGE Fan of hers. ThQ Android. U tube.
Mumbai India
I wouldn't ever think that universities have been in this path for more than 40 years, I was born in 1975, listening to someone who's not religious saying this thing when I was 4 years old? Sounds Prophetic 😮
That ending was really wholesome. I hope Rand read Piper's letter to her and somehow came to see the objective reality of God and salvation in Christ.
amazing. Absolutely amazing. God bless you for posting this for me to see
Say what you will about ian rand. She believes what she says and has the courage of her conviction.
I LOVE and respect her so much! In today's depressing, WOke and SUB-mediocre world, I am making sure, that Ayn Rand gets ALL the credit she is due.
Tom Snyder has the perfect look for 1979.
She's quite likable in this interview, Tom Snyder's vibe is a good combo I guess.
Absolute Brilliant Woman and Philosopher.
Imagine how moving it would be, the moment you realize the person that appears so stern, stubborn, and hard nosed actually is heartbroken to see you are unknowingly walking off a cliff. Is that not at least partially what Rand is doing by speaking? She loves the country and what it stands for. She thinks we won’t fail because she had seen signs of our ability to wake up. You all see where we are now. What do you think? Was she not mostly right?
Tom Snyder was one of the best interview hosts imo. So was Buckley.
44 years later and everything she said is more true than ever. Thank you for the upload.
She was cold as ice and frozen in her own cave.
Exceptionally skillful intriguing novelist
The answers to the personal questions are more interesting than the rants. I was struck by this bit, though: Rand, she says, learned, from a famous philosopher whose name she couldn’t remember, that one when dies one’s life doesn’t end, that, rather, the world itself ends. I don’t know the name of this philosopher either, but I do know the name of the philosophy: it’s called “solipsism”.
Parmenides maybe
I do not agree with Ayn Rand and her teachings, but i sympathise with her in the sense that it must be terribly tiring to have to explain yourself all the time.
willielunch ,,,she did not commit suicide. It was heart failure, natural causes. read your comment down below about logic reason going mad, suicide love, purpose, joy etc. I think you were describing yourself,,, interesting, read, except for the suicide part ,,,weird
I wonder how she's enjoying hell. She's been there for just over 40 years.
She offers another thought of mind.
The obvious counter argument is that you can be immoral, allowing yourself to be guided by your emotions, and to follow your heart. In other words, an artist.
Objectivism is just another dogma. All we have is individual experience and each of us should be content with this because if we’re paying attention we have everything we need to grow and evolve contained almost exclusively within our own experience. There is no need for religion, Objectivism, philosophy etc. If we don’t like the experience we’re having, we have agency to change it (although we don’t always understand this). The issue with any philosophy, religion or belief systems is that they impose a one size fits all approach. Ayn Rand is just a product of her experience and I haven’t delved deep enough into her yet to know if she’s sufficiently self-aware to understand this, and whether she confuses her subjective truth (her philosophy) with objective truth. It does seem so far that this is exactly what she’s done having failed to understand that her world view arose having been conditioned / surrounded by communism, materialism, Marxism etc early in life.
@@pricejoss I agree in part however I have personally found Ayn Rand to be a useful guide along a pathway of thinking. While each step must be your own, most of the pathways have been walked before. You walk along the path with some for a while, listening and thinking about what they are saying, but ultimately you path diverges. People arguing their point, or describing their experience of reality, with conviction is not dogma - dogma is for the followers - communication is for thinkers. I do not believe that your own facilities are enough in this world. There is just too much evidence to the contrary. Appropriate training yields results. It is pretty simple in that regard. The world is complex and the mind even more so.
@@AudioLemon It’s dogmatic to hold onto a position when it’s not accurate or correct and in the face of so much evidence to the contrary. Ayn Rand was nowhere near as smart as she believed herself to be. Ironically, she lacked the very thing she claimed to live by, objectivity. This interview is littered with examples. Reciprocity is hardwired into human beings. It is an evolutionary advantage. To argue against it isn’t even worth discussion because it is so fundamental to our species. That’s why Ayn Rand will be only ever be a footnote in history and incomparable to the likes of Kant. She is nothing more than an extremist (as in fringe) who empowers and legitimises other extremists. I’m not knocking that she’s helped you personally, that’s good, but she has very little to offer on a macro level.
@@pricejoss You seem to be misunderstanding her. She is used that as are most autistic people. To be clear being dogmatic means to follow an established tenet or principle. She was not dogmatic, she was individualistic. They are not the same. You are semantically mistaken in this regard. Attacking her intelligence is an odd thing to do, I would say she was smart enough wouldn't you? It is ironic you mention Kant, who is said to have been awoken (woke culture = any rand) by Hume who argued 'that we only know the mind through a subjective, essentially illusory series of perceptions.' This is the basis of Ayn Rands objectivism. It is a subjective statement of reality that can be agreed on. It is object in this sense, not object in and of itself which would be impossible for a human to conceive as it is wholly abstract and outside of reality - like a God of sorts - which is anathema to this kind of thinking. When you say she helped me personally - what you are saying is she has created useful structures for thought in those versed in the history and cultural of philosophy, mathematics, engineering, music, art and cognitive thinkers. You may disagree with her but you will never be able to ignore her. She has found as place in the great discussion. She rolls around in my mind with Scorates and Aristotle and Leinbinz and Bach. She is there and will be forever I believe. She has communicated something of meaning to the world, as she intended.
@@AudioLemon Rand was a slave to her own ideology i.e. dogmatic. She lacked the self-awareness to see that it came from a reaction to her early life experiences at the hands of Lenin and then Stalin. In essence, her philosophy is the opposite extreme of communism. Life happens in the centre, not at the extremes. While she was clearly intelligent, my point was she had blind spots. Her philosophy makes little room for psychology. It’s just a product of her experience at a point in history and time and it’s not much deeper than that. It’s a reaction and an overly intellectualised one at that. Someone like Victor Frankel had a lot more to offer humanity through his reaction to his personal circumstances. Rand hated Kant but Kant is a titan compared to Rand in the minds of others, hence the comparison. Rand advocated rationality and reason but I would argue that parts of her philosophy are highly irrational and lacking in reason - her blind spots. We have to be able to separate out our own experiences from the experience of others but Rand projected her own experience onto the world as if it were universal. It wasn’t and isn’t. Maybe individualism is a riposte to communism but even then it’s deeply flawed. If I were to be nuanced, there are some things to pick out from her thinking that are useful but dated. She strikes me as a 20th century Jordan Peterson, philosophy-lite for lightweight intellects.
So. Her message: be selfish and proud like Big Oil, Ag, Chem, Pharma, Healthcare, Citizens United; Aipac, Netanyahu, Donald Trump, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Zuckerberg, Blackrock, Buffet, etc. Rand would be in ecstasy living in the current state.
Barely five minutes in she called philosophy a science! Tells you all you need to know about Ayn Rand and the nonsense she calls Objectivism. I read all her novels by the time I was 20 and thought that she was on to something. For those unfamiliar with her work, there’s really not much to it. Her basic message is this: selfishness is a virtue. Now, that I’ve reach the end of my life I know as deep as knowing goes that she is wrong: a selfish life is a wasted life.
Then you have wasted your life by understanding nothing. Sorry to say, but your lefties brainwash was too strong.
die in peace with... yourself...?
Still ringing a bell today
She trusts her rational mind. But where did that mind and rationality come from?
Her brain, which is the seat of consciousness.
I have so much respect for this woman.
She acts like all her achievements weren't given a shred of charity, like she just did it all on her own. Sometimes being at the right place at the right time and sometimes it's not what you know but who you know.She is a very lazy selfish person she reminds me of my mother.She doesn't take into account some people don't wish to live in her paradigm of money but are forced too nor do some people want to run a business but are no less valuable.
She writing novels in her head , I can see that when your daydream in class
I miss Tom. Dan Akroyd used to do a great impersonation of him on SNL.
yes he did. one of his better.
On the destructive effect of American universities 15:00
Emmanuel Kant. 18:30
The Age of Envy. 25:04
Did she said "woke" before woke was it... ahead of her time......
What an interview. Other than Rogan, no one does this.
Thank you for share
Your Welcome/My pleasure.
What a brilliant woman, a prophet!
Always watched the Tom Snyder Show back in the day. He actually "interviewed" people, which seems to be a lost art.