>Objectivism holds that the only social system which fully recognizes individual rights is capitalism,[72] specifically what Rand described as "full, pure, uncontrolled, unregulated laissez-faire capitalism."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objectivism_(Ayn_Rand)#Politics...

And here's a freebie from some googling:

>As far as the role of government is concerned, there are laws--some of them passed in the nineteenth century--prohibiting certain kinds of pollution, such as the dumping of industrial wastes into rivers. These laws have not been enforced. It is the enforcement of such laws that those concerned with the issue may properly demand. Specific laws--forbidding specifically defined and proved harm, physical harm, to persons or property--are the only solution to problems of this kind.

So perhaps Rand had nuanced views on this, but I don't hear the same nuance in her followers. And I don't see how the two quotes can be reconciled either.

Ayn Rand thought the role of government was to protect individuals from initiating force against one another. Period. If you poison the air in a way that harms someone, that constitutes initiation of force.

She called the economic and political system resulting from this "laissez-faire capitalism," or more commonly just "capitalism."

In context of the partial quote you gave, "unregulated" means "without economic regulations," not "without any laws."

So, that's how you reconcile things.

There is actually no "nuance" here at all; this stuff is all totally "black and white," clear and consistent, in her writing.

You say "I don't hear the same nuance in her followers," but I'm not sure who you're actually referring to here. Objectivists are quite few and far between. For example, most people in the Tea Party who are Atlas Shrugged fans don't actually understand Rand on an intellectual level.

Reconcile your weird semantics of "laws" and "regulation" with the constant screams of "oh no regulation" every time there is an attempt to pass laws preventing harm to people?

There are no semantic oddities. It's just that "regulation" is context dependent, even in everyday English.

When people scream "oh no regulation," they mean "no rights-violating/improper laws," but there are other cases where "regulation" just means "laws."

It's not as if Rand claimed to be "against regulation" and left it as that, which would be pointless and sloppy.

In talking about politics, as elsewhere, she was extremely precise: the point of the government is to protect the individual from the initiation of force.

Force is also well-defined in her work, and it includes poisoning someone.

So is a law banning certain allergens from food a regulation or a protection from violence for those to whom the allergen is poison?

What about law requiring those who give others food to warn them about potential allergens?

What about a law requiring that warning to be stated in a clear, easy to read manner (rather than hidden fine print)?

(say the allergen is soy, which is not an obvious ingredient in say, ice cream, yet is present in a lot of ice creams).

The line isn't so clear as you pretend.

I don't know what point of mine you are trying to disagree with, or what you are getting at. You seem to be missing the forest for the trees.

Everything you have asked about has a very straightforward answer, but you lack the philosophical context to see that.

It's like asking a chemist to explain molecular bonds, when you don't even know that atoms exist.

As I've said, the proper principle of government is to protect individuals from the initiation of force by others.

Since the reasons for this principle are out of the scope of this discussion, yes, you could certainly find some way to appear to pick on it and score points, yet actually fail to do so successfully.

Nonetheless, correctly applying this principle means that if something is always a poison to everyone, it's not a legitimate product. There is no legitimate use. Producing it and selling it is simply initiating force.

On the other hand, if something is a legitimate food, it's fine to sell it.

There is a separate question about allergens. It is an allergic person's responsibility to make sure they don't ingest allergens.

The government forcing people to label things is an initiation of force and a violation of rights.

Absent such regulation, there would still be plenty of food producers who make information about food content publicly available, since it is needed by their customers who have allergies, and for other reasons.

In the cases where food producers do not publish their ingredients (in which case, probably nobody should consume the food...), people with allergies would just be out of luck.

It's not clear whether you are actually advocating this kind of interpretation of Ayn Rand's position or not.

It seems to me that the principle of government being solely to protect individuals from the initiation of force by others is a great one, and should be the primary one. For bringing this idea into my consciousness, I am grateful to Ayn Rand and those who propagate her work.

However, "sophacles" doesn't seem to be arguing against the principle. He or she seems to be arguing against a simplistic interpretation of its implications.

For example you say: "correctly applying this principle means that if something is always a poison to everyone, it's not a legitimate product. There is no legitimate use. Producing it and selling it is simply initiating force."

Who decides what is a poison to 'everyone'? Well since by the correct application of the principle, it is the government's responsibility to protect individuals from this initiation of force, it must therefore be the responsibility of the government to recognize these situations.

Does that mean that the government needs to set up a science infrastructure to decide what is harmful to 'everyone'?

If so, how is it to staff this infrastructure with scientists, and how is it to decide who is qualified to do the work? Perhaps it needs to establish an education system for this purpose. Given that working as a government scientist by necessity means giving up a lot of time that could otherwise be spent securing shelter and provision for the future, perhaps the government should set up a way to house and provide for its employees in their old age... and so it goes on.

I'm all for the principle, seriously. I just don't see how it helps to offer unrealistically simplified interpretations of how to apply it to people who are interested enough to engage.

Unless you really do think that Ayn Rand had a perfect and complete prescription for the best of all possible societies...

I'm concerned about what level of evidence an Objectivist society would need to pass such a law. According to Chapter 33 of "The Passion of Ayn Rand," Ayn Rand demanded a "rational" explanation of why to stop smoking and said the statistical evidence of the link between smoking and lung cancer wasn't proof. It took an X-ray of her own lung cancer to get her to stop. Since the lead/crime hypothesis bases its conclusion heavily on statistics, I don't think it would pass the Rand test.

She didn't trust the specific evidence presented by the US surgeon general. It wasn't an issue of not trusting any kind of statistical evidence. She was actually very pro-reason, pro-science, etc.

I haven't read that book, but while I'm sure there are many facts in it, the overall tone (and motivation for its writing) is a giant (and dishonest) character assasination. Supposedly this is documented extensively in the book, "The Passion of Ayn Rand's Critics" (by James Valiant), though I haven't read that, either.