The Perception of Certainty: Ayn Rand Reconsidered. (Or maybe just considered...)

The universe doesn’t deal in absolutes, but that’s the only currency that Ayn Rand ever accepted.

I don’t trust certainty.

The person who never questions their position has never truly looked at it from any other angle, and is locked into a single point of view. Such a person views their certainty as the foundations of all that they believe, or in their view all that is, and perceives any attack on said certainty not just as an attack upon themselves but as an attack against all reality and reason.

Perhaps this is why I have never given any credence to Ayn Rand. Her perception of her own philosophical correctness was absolute; she believed that the assumptions that formed the basis of her own beliefs were so correct that no assault on them could be tolerated; that any who would do so were obviously evil.

Ayn Rand, if you’ve never read her works (The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged are her best known), had a philosophy she called “Objectivism” which she described thus: "the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute." Atlas Shrugged was perhaps the ultimate expression of this philosophy. Whether or not you accept these philosophical points depends on whether you can accept man/humanity as intrinsically heroic (I can’t), whether you can accept happiness as the only worthwhile goal in life (I don’t) and personal achievement as the highest goal one can aspire to (a concept that I entirely reject). She also had an ego; she described herself once as "the most creative thinker alive". She wasn’t.

I have always believed that wisdom was where you found it; that even the most vile and reprehensible of characters might know something of value and have something to teach. But I was never able to look into Ayn Rand’s writing and find any wisdom there, even though philosophically I am certain that there must be some to be found. Perhaps that’s because I could never get past her absolute certainty in her opinions (and opinions they are, despite her certainty of them).

And perhaps it’s a flaw in my own character that prevents me from giving Ayn Rand her due.  Perhaps it’s my own distrust of her certainty that keeps me from paying any heed to her philosophy. I would find it regrettable if any bit of wisdom encased in her writing escaped me because I couldn’t stomach her work. Just the same, I do not believe that there’s enough of value there to justify my abandoning my profound dislike/distrust of Ayn Rand.

In the end, I think that it’s her perception of certainty that I have always distrusted most, and perhaps that’s because of my own distrust of Ayn Rand’s perceived certainty.

When one finds perceived certainty, one should always themselves perceive doubt. That’s my philosophy, anyway; I doubt that Ayn Rand would agree.

The Blues Viking
The opinions expressed here are mine and if you don't like them you can get your own damn blog.


Wikipedia on Ayn Rand