Comments on: An Open Letter to the Ayn Rand Institute http://www.afilsforyourthoughts.com/blog/2008/04/21/an-open-letter-to-the-ayn-rand-institute/ Where Ideas are Valued.. and Evaluated Sat, 12 Mar 2011 14:02:52 -0500 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Haider http://www.afilsforyourthoughts.com/blog/2008/04/21/an-open-letter-to-the-ayn-rand-institute/comment-page-1/#comment-408 Haider Tue, 22 Apr 2008 07:55:06 +0000 http://www.afilsforyourthoughts.com/?p=78#comment-408 Dear Don Veto, thank you for your input. What's troubling about the ARI at the moment is that they've made it their mission to focus on "current affairs" that they do not understand properly, and which they view from a very distorted impression. Welcome to the blog :) Dear Don Veto, thank you for your input. What’s troubling about the ARI at the moment is that they’ve made it their mission to focus on “current affairs” that they do not understand properly, and which they view from a very distorted impression.

Welcome to the blog :)

]]> By: Don Veto http://www.afilsforyourthoughts.com/blog/2008/04/21/an-open-letter-to-the-ayn-rand-institute/comment-page-1/#comment-407 Don Veto Mon, 21 Apr 2008 19:29:31 +0000 http://www.afilsforyourthoughts.com/?p=78#comment-407 The Ayn Rand Institute should read up on their namesake with her Liberatarian philosophies of laissez faire, or live and let live and freedom for all and not express biased out of context opinions. The Ayn Rand Institute should read up on their namesake with her Liberatarian philosophies of laissez faire, or live and let live and freedom for all and not express biased out of context opinions.

]]> By: Haider http://www.afilsforyourthoughts.com/blog/2008/04/21/an-open-letter-to-the-ayn-rand-institute/comment-page-1/#comment-406 Haider Mon, 21 Apr 2008 09:05:32 +0000 http://www.afilsforyourthoughts.com/?p=78#comment-406 @Bashar: The site promotes the philosophy of Ayn Rand, and they don't usually consider visitors as customers, so there is no real drive to please all visitors :) What I find troubling about their attitude is that they promote the philosophy of rationality (a great philosophy, might I add, which I agree with to a very large degree), but they do not apply it correctly. @Professor McElwain: Thank you for your contribution. I believe that an interpretation of the Holy Koran can both justify and be the cause of terrorism. However, what I disagreed with the writers about is in the causal relationship they draw between the Holy Koran and terrorism, as though the meanings they have attributed to the text are the only possible meanings. I touched on this issue in my article: <a href="http://www.afilsforyourthoughts.com/blog/2008/04/09/islam-and-the-muslims/" rel="nofollow">Islam and the Muslims</a>. I don't think Ayn Rand minimizes the importance of religion. She makes a strong case for the importance of ideas in general, and religion - as a set of beliefs or ideas - can have an enormous influence on an individual's life as well as on society, politics, etc. @Bashar: The site promotes the philosophy of Ayn Rand, and they don’t usually consider visitors as customers, so there is no real drive to please all visitors :)

What I find troubling about their attitude is that they promote the philosophy of rationality (a great philosophy, might I add, which I agree with to a very large degree), but they do not apply it correctly.

@Professor McElwain: Thank you for your contribution. I believe that an interpretation of the Holy Koran can both justify and be the cause of terrorism. However, what I disagreed with the writers about is in the causal relationship they draw between the Holy Koran and terrorism, as though the meanings they have attributed to the text are the only possible meanings. I touched on this issue in my article: Islam and the Muslims.

I don’t think Ayn Rand minimizes the importance of religion. She makes a strong case for the importance of ideas in general, and religion – as a set of beliefs or ideas – can have an enormous influence on an individual’s life as well as on society, politics, etc.

]]> By: Thomas McElwain http://www.afilsforyourthoughts.com/blog/2008/04/21/an-open-letter-to-the-ayn-rand-institute/comment-page-1/#comment-405 Thomas McElwain Mon, 21 Apr 2008 08:30:07 +0000 http://www.afilsforyourthoughts.com/?p=78#comment-405 Ayn Rand has been a major contributor to western philosophy and her work has been especially precious in balancing western thought in danger of being skewed by focus on epistemology alone. But her work appeared several centuries after the period when Islamic philosophy was the fountain of western thought, and reflects not only the historical forgetfulness of that situation, but also something of the peculiar relationship between the Christian and Islamic populations in the particular country of her origins. Despite the influence of local and historical trends in her experience, she made remarkable achievements in philosophy, achievements which bear some similarity, in gross, to those of the late Islamic philosopher Mulla Sadra (Sadra al-Din Shirazi) and his followers. The attempt to find a causal relation between certain passages of the Qur'an and what is termed "Islamic terrorism" is in fact partly justified. The people who perpetrate such acts do themselves refer to such passages in justification of their behaviour. However, to find in the Qur'an the cause of such phenomona is naive and methodologically faulty. American slavery was vehemently justified in its time by reference to the Bible, yet any historian that considered a Semitic text produced in the Middle East 2500 years ago to be a primary cause of American slavery would not be taken seriously. Just as there were historical, social, economic, political and to a lesser extent religious factors involved in the origins and maintaing of American slavery, so there are historical, social, economic, political and to a lesser extent religious factors involved in "Islamic terrorism." Islam is far more important as a justification for terrorism than as a cause of it. Christianity is appealed to in the reaction to "Islamic terrorism", but is hardly a truly determining factor in the policy of "war against terror". The Christian view of the crucifixion of a man in the Middle East as solving problems may well be involved in the recent policies in regard to Afghanistan and Iraq, but the belief in the crucifixion can hardly seriously be maintained as a primary cause of the second Gulf War. That is the kind of explanation the writers you refer to seem to be making. There is an uncomfortable lack of sophistication in the argument. If I have read Ayn Rand correctly, she tends to minimize the importance of religion as a reasonable explanation of phenomena. Not all of her followers have been able to debarrass themselves of the effects of education having lurking Christian characteristics, but of course these are people who never went to Soviet schools. The crusader mentality is based more on fear that reason, and is therefore not susceptible to the arguments of logic. Ayn Rand has been a major contributor to western philosophy and her work has been especially precious in balancing western thought in danger of being skewed by focus on epistemology alone. But her work appeared several centuries after the period when Islamic philosophy was the fountain of western thought, and reflects not only the historical forgetfulness of that situation, but also something of the peculiar relationship between the Christian and Islamic populations in the particular country of her origins. Despite the influence of local and historical trends in her experience, she made remarkable achievements in philosophy, achievements which bear some similarity, in gross, to those of the late Islamic philosopher Mulla Sadra (Sadra al-Din Shirazi) and his followers.
The attempt to find a causal relation between certain passages of the Qur’an and what is termed “Islamic terrorism” is in fact partly justified. The people who perpetrate such acts do themselves refer to such passages in justification of their behaviour. However, to find in the Qur’an the cause of such phenomona is naive and methodologically faulty. American slavery was vehemently justified in its time by reference to the Bible, yet any historian that considered a Semitic text produced in the Middle East 2500 years ago to be a primary cause of American slavery would not be taken seriously. Just as there were historical, social, economic, political and to a lesser extent religious factors involved in the origins and maintaing of American slavery, so there are historical, social, economic, political and to a lesser extent religious factors involved in “Islamic terrorism.” Islam is far more important as a justification for terrorism than as a cause of it. Christianity is appealed to in the reaction to “Islamic terrorism”, but is hardly a truly determining factor in the policy of “war against terror”. The Christian view of the crucifixion of a man in the Middle East as solving problems may well be involved in the recent policies in regard to Afghanistan and Iraq, but the belief in the crucifixion can hardly seriously be maintained as a primary cause of the second Gulf War. That is the kind of explanation the writers you refer to seem to be making. There is an uncomfortable lack of sophistication in the argument. If I have read Ayn Rand correctly, she tends to minimize the importance of religion as a reasonable explanation of phenomena. Not all of her followers have been able to debarrass themselves of the effects of education having lurking Christian characteristics, but of course these are people who never went to Soviet schools. The crusader mentality is based more on fear that reason, and is therefore not susceptible to the arguments of logic.

]]> By: Bashar http://www.afilsforyourthoughts.com/blog/2008/04/21/an-open-letter-to-the-ayn-rand-institute/comment-page-1/#comment-404 Bashar Mon, 21 Apr 2008 07:48:42 +0000 http://www.afilsforyourthoughts.com/?p=78#comment-404 I really don't know who Ayn is Haider, but from what I read I can recall similar acts by many others. You can't take part of the sentence and make it a sentence by it self. Logic thinking is simple If this do that As you have taken the time to give strong examples from the Quran to clarify it, if a company or site wants to be credible they ought to do their homework before they start talking, or else, they are just talking like everybody else. They are not helping any cause here, but creating more enemies for them selves. Sadly however, the western world must have many people who wish to hear such claims, and are willing to take it as granted without further investigations. Others must have a say on it, but then again, you say they never replied to your emails. So, one can only guess. I really don’t know who Ayn is Haider, but from what I read I can recall similar acts by many others. You can’t take part of the sentence and make it a sentence by it self.

Logic thinking is simple
If this
do that

As you have taken the time to give strong examples from the Quran to clarify it, if a company or site wants to be credible they ought to do their homework before they start talking, or else, they are just talking like everybody else. They are not helping any cause here, but creating more enemies for them selves.

Sadly however, the western world must have many people who wish to hear such claims, and are willing to take it as granted without further investigations. Others must have a say on it, but then again, you say they never replied to your emails. So, one can only guess.

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