I certainly respect the journey your life has taken you on or the journey you took your life on or whatever. Yet when I read Rand I am struck by how similar she often sounds to many existential authors I've read...
“There is only one fundamental alternative in the universe: existence or nonexistence—and it pertains to a single class of entities: to living organisms. The existence of inanimate matter is unconditional, the existence of life is not: it depends on a specific course of action. Matter is indestructible, it changes its forms, but it cannot cease to exist. It is only a living organism that faces a constant alternative: the issue of life or death. Life is a process of self-sustaining and self-generated action. If an organism fails in that action, it dies; its chemical elements remain, but its life goes out of existence. It is only the concept of ‘Life’ that makes the concept of ‘Value’ possible. It is only to a living entity that things can be good or evil.”
To make this point fully clear, try to imagine an immortal, indestructible robot, an entity which moves and acts, but which cannot be affected by anything, which cannot be changed in any respect, which cannot be damaged, injured or destroyed. Such an entity would not be able to have any values; it would have nothing to gain or to lose; it could not regard anything as for or against it, as serving or threatening its welfare, as fulfilling or frustrating its interests. It could have no interests and no goals.
It is interesting that Rand wanted to name her philosophy "existentialism" as it is based on the primacy of existence but the word had already been taken...
And let me add that there is NOTHING in Rand's philosophy that obstructs or discourages a life of service to others, to the planet, or to anything one happens to "VALUE". NOTHING WHATSOEVER. |
