(July 11, 2016 at 5:22 pm)Lucifer Wrote: I recently discoved Ayn Rand and learned about her philosphical views. I found it extremely interesting. The idea that "altruism is immoral" completel goes against all my previous ideas and intuitions, and therefore is quite an uncomfortable idea to entertain, but when I pushed through and read more about what she meant by it, it makes a lot of sense to me. To put it in my own words, she argues that people should not sacrifice themselves for other people if it does not fit with their own needs, because it is equal to suicide. If you help someone, do it because you have a need to do so, not because you think you should do that because you want to be a good person. You are responsible for your own life, and your own happiness. This sounds very healthy to me. I want people around me to live like this, I want my loved ones taking good care of themselves. Most people also have a need to take care of the people around them and to connect with them, so I don't think that this philosophy leads to people to live self centred lives. It is very counter-intuitive, but it makes sense to me.
What do you think? Do I describe her philosophy well? Is there a flaw in this reasoning? Has this philosophy impacted your ideas as well?
We evolved as a social species, where altruism, kin selection, reciprocity, cooperation were necessary for our survival. This is the main source of our morality.
Her philosophy, as I see it, is borderline sociopathy.
As I see it, altruism and reciprocity are part of the makeup of psychologically healthy people.
You'd believe if you just opened your heart" is a terrible argument for religion. It's basically saying, "If you bias yourself enough, you can convince yourself that this is true." If religion were true, people wouldn't need faith to believe it -- it would be supported by good evidence.
