you don't need to preach to me on the benefits of business
OK... fine. But if you aren't going to fully understand Ayn Rand's work, then you don't need to preach to us about how misguided you think it is.
The whole point of discussions like this is to have an intellectual discussion. To dismiss people who disagree with you by accusing them of "preaching" (when they aren't) has no place on HN. (As I'm sure you well know.)
I like to think I'm fairly familiar with Ayn Rand's work, though I'm by no means an expert. I'm a computer scientist, but my philosophy minor was supervised by one of the few tenured professors who specializes in Rand scholarship in academia (and he is a fan of hers).
I don't really see this as far off, though. Rand really did believe that it was unethical to be altruistic. Not because it led to negative outcomes, or was inefficient, but because it was, in her view, inherently unethical to be altruistic. The altruistic sentiment was a character flaw at best. She did approve of philanthropy in some circumstances, such as foundations that were set up to advance their founders' views. But it had to be for reasons other than altruism, and it would ideally take into account whether the recipients were "worthy" of the help, not be Christian-style unconditional charity.
You neglect to mention why Rand opposed altruism and considered it inherently immoral: because it means putting other people above oneself and therefore self-sacrificing for others.
That's true, but there isn't really much argument for that position in her work (certainly not argument I found convincing). It's almost assuming the consequent: you prove that putting your own good above collective good is moral because the alternative would be putting collective good above your own good. Well, yes, that's definitionally true. But what's wrong with putting collective good above any one individual's good (including your own)?
Her answer wasn't the consequentialist one that Adam Smith and other market-economy defenders proposed: that self-interest produces the best overall outcome. It was instead somehow more metaphysical, that somehow self-interest is the highest good, and putting any other goods above one's own good is corrupting the greatest good. I see it as a kind of take off on Nietzsche's master-morality/slave-morality dichotomy, except, unlike Nietzsche, she ties it to the free market and commerce. (Nietzsche believed in great people putting their own self-development ahead of the masses, in the elitist sense that if you're better than everyone, you should focus on your own development first... but he considered business and money-making to be a dirty, mass occupation that in no way qualified as "great" or "elite".)
She does provide various arguments. There's no shortage there. Whether you find them convincing is up to you but please don't mix that up with her not publishing stuff to argue her point. For example, not living in a second-handed way is a main theme of The Fountainhead, and that's closely related to the altruism issue.
> Her answer wasn't the consequentialist one that Adam Smith and other market-economy defenders proposed: that self-interest produces the best overall outcome.
Correct.
One thing that might be helpful is to understand Rand's view on compromise. She said you can compromise on concretes when you agree on a principle, but you must never compromise your fundamental principles.
For example, if you agree on the principle of trade, you can compromise (haggle) on the exact price or contract terms, and you're still both following a good principle and can both benefit.
But you must never compromise between collectivism and individualism, capitalism and socialism, life and death, freedom and slavery, rationality and irrationality. Those sorts of compromises between opposite principles amount to sacrificing some good that one shouldn't give up, and allowing in some unacceptable evil. Nor should you compromise your values in order to get something that you don't value or value less. That isn't a reasonable compromise, it is surrendering your values and principles for the benefit of others.
Given this sort of view of compromise, it's no good to ever compromise your own life, no good to ever sacrifice yourself. Anything that asks you to do that is evil. If there is a rational trade to make, then make the exchange and benefit, but don't sacrifice yourself for unspecified or vague future benefits which no one is accountable for providing to you.
> One thing that might be helpful is to understand Rand's view on compromise. She said you can compromise on concretes when you agree on a principle, but you must never compromise your fundamental principles.
This is why I find it so interesting that Rand ended up accepting social security and medicare from the government[1]. You seem to know a lot about Rand -- do you have any idea how she justified her accepting government benefits?
She took the benefits because the government took far more than that from her! She was just getting a tiny part of it back.
She actually wrote at length about this issue [1]. That people keep puzzling over it shows that they don't understand AR (which is perfectly fine if they don't claim to understand her), or just want to smear her.
That view of compromise is actually at the core of what I don't see convincingly argued for. Why shouldn't we compromise on principles, rather than just concretes, if it would produce pragmatically better outcomes? Why is it better to have dueling, inflexible idealized political positions, the hardline socialist against the hardline capitalist, each knowing they're right through some kind of metaphysical inspiration which can never be shaken by the presentation of actual facts? I would much rather have people in closer contact with reality, working out case-by-case situations pragmatically, than people living in an inflexible, idealized world where they know their views are pure and good, and opposing views are evil and bad.
The problem with using her novels as an argument for the position is that they only really work in an affective, sense, imo, as implying consequentialist arguments, sort of along the lines of a morality tale or fable: look what could happen if things are done this way, or alternately, if they were done that way. And I think a lot of people do read them that way; the famous "going Galt" plot, for example, is commonly taken as a parable for why bad things will happen if you institute too much regulation and burdening of productive individuals. But she explicitly disclaims "things will turn out better/worse" as a reason to accept or not accept her philosophical/political views, so her novels aren't supposed to be read that way. But they're actually more effective that way! Which is why I think it's so common for fans of Rand to ignore Objectivism and instead read her as more of a general pro-free-market, libertarian author.
You seem to believe that there is a conflict between principles and reality. AR did not. Because principles are induced from reality and are always true (within the relevant context).
That's what I think is clearly a sham in her work: her unacknowledged Nietzschean influence is quite strong, and like him, she does not deduce principles from reality, but from metaphysical first principles that are arrived at through an obscure armchair-philosophizing process, certainly not an inductive, scientific one.
That there is really no nuance or context in her novels (or other work) follows fairly directly: these are idealized, metaphysical types, and an empirical or inductive methodology is nowhere in sight. She occasionally claims something about induction, but does not actually follow any such methodology, certainly not in any rigorous fashion.
her unacknowledged Nietzschean influence is quite strong
Can you point to one actual claim made by AR that is in common with Nietzche? I seriously doubt there is one.
Going away from actual claims to mere generalities, yes, AR and Nietzche were both "individualists" in a sense - but in a totally different one. Nietzche in a predatory way, AR in a "mutual trade for mutual benefit" way.
she does not deduce principles from reality, but from metaphysical first principles
She doesn't decduce, she induces, and she does not do it from metaphysical first principles at all. Her core metaphysics is axiomatic, but the rest of her philosophy is inducted from reality. Most of her philosophical essays are just summaries of the results of this process. There is no work that "competely induces" Objectivism. There are a couple of works by Leonard Peikoff that talk about the Objective process of doing this. Until recently, they were only recorded lectures, but "Understanding Objectivism" was just released as a book.
That there is really no nuance or context in her novels
A lot of people don't "get" the novels. Just a few days ago an Objectivist was telling me how mind-blowing Atlas Shrugged is, because there are about "12 layers" (quoting him) of meaning in any given chapter. You would be surprised. It does not appear to be this way on the surface.
OK... fine. But if you aren't going to fully understand Ayn Rand's work, then you don't need to preach to us about how misguided you think it is.
The whole point of discussions like this is to have an intellectual discussion. To dismiss people who disagree with you by accusing them of "preaching" (when they aren't) has no place on HN. (As I'm sure you well know.)