Here’s the seventh, and final, post in my series about the “Objecting to Objectivism” show, hosted by by Matt Dillahunty and Russell Glasser of the Atheist Experience group.  I’ve spent a plenty of time pointing out inaccuracies in the hosts’ presentation of Objectivism, so to finish this series I want to point out a revealing admission Dillahunty made during the show, briefly address what Ayn Rand meant by “second-handed” (which Glasser didn’t bother to offer the viewers), and offer some closing comments.

Criticizing a book you didn’t read

If an individual want to learn something about any subject, he has to gather facts related to that subject.  For example, if I want to learn more about cats, I have to gather data by looking at cats, reading books about cats, or talking to feline experts.  If I want to learn how to change my oil in my car, I have to open the manual and read the instructions.  If I want to learn what Matt Dillahunty stands for, I have to listen to his podcasts, read his internet postings, or even talk to the man.  And of course, if I want to learn what Atlas Shrugged is about, I have to read the book.  Right?

Apparently not.  Around minute 84 of the video, Dillahunty made the following statement (emphasis mine):

And yet, there’s no particular original idea, I find no particular original idea in Atlas Shrugged, the Fountainhead, or Objectivism.

This is Dillahunty’s opinion, and I wasn’t going to respond to this because I want to focus on the the inaccuracies in his and Glasser’s show.  However, hearing this statement reminded me of something that he said earlier in the show.  Around minute 60, Dillahunty and Glasser said the following (emphasis mine):

Dillahunty: Yeah, and this promotion of oligarchical ideas where the intelligent are the ones who rule or these separatist societies where we’ve taken all the geniuses off… having not read Atlas Shrugged, and… I have no idea how John Galt’s little experiment worked out.

Glasser: Oh, of course, he took over the world.

I think the presentation Dillahunty and Glasser gave of Objectivism is evidence enough that their opinion of Objectivism is not based on facts, but here’s an explicit admission that Dillahunty’s opinion isn’t.  He said he didn’t find an original idea in a book he had never read.  I don’t know what else to say.

Except this, that is.  Immediately before he made the minute-84 minute I quoted above, Dillahunty said the following:

She wrote a book or something about “Philosophy, Who Needs It” and she consistently railed against the ideas of various philosophers including some reportedly, like Kant, she had never even read.

This is Dillahunty criticizing against Ayn Rand for railing against the ideas of philosophers that she hadn’t read, all while deriding the ideas of a philosopher that he hadn’t read.

By the way, Ayn Rand did not promote oligarchy.  And Atlas Shrugged did not end with John Galt “taking over the world.”

Second-handers

One of the big false statements that Russell Glasser repeatedly made was about second-handers.  According to Glasser, Objectivists use the term “second-handers” in a similar way that scientologists use “suppressive person,” and that Objectivists can split people into three classes:  the geniuses, the “useful” people like Eddie Willers, and second-handers.  He addressed “second-handers” so many times that I could have made it a separate post in this series, but frankly I feel that his assertion is so ridiculous I don’t want to spent much of my time to address it.  I will, though, do something that Glasser wouldn’t do:  Use Ayn Rand’s own words to identify how she used the term.  By doing a quick search on the Ayn Rand Lexicon website, I was able to find the following quote from Ayn Rand from “The Argument from Intimidation” in her book “The Virtue of Selfishness:”

A [second-hander] is one who regards the consciousness of other men as superior to his own and to the facts of reality. It is to a [second-hander] that the moral appraisal of himself by others is a primary concern which supersedes truth, facts, reason, logic. The disapproval of others is so shatteringly terrifying to him that nothing can withstand its impact within his consciousness; thus he would deny the evidence of his own eyes and invalidate his own consciousness for the sake of any stray charlatan’s moral sanction. It is only a [second-hander] who could conceive of such absurdity as hoping to win an intellectual argument by hinting: “But people won’t like you!”

Final comments

There are enough problems to write more posts in this series, but I believe that by this point I’ve shown that the two hosts gave a very inaccurate presentation of Objectivism.  It’s one matter to discuss whether Objectivism is right or wrong, but it’s an entirely different matter to misrepresent what it is and what Ayn Rand stood for.  The former is a great thing, and it’s something that I still question even today as I learn more and more about Objectivism.  The latter is a bad thing, no matter what you’re discussing.  It’s a matter of intellectual honesty.  I think the viewers and listeners should expect more from the Atheist Experience than they received from the “Objecting to Objectivism” show, and I hope I’ve helped to correct some of the bigger factual errors.

That said, I’d like to speak positively about one of the hosts, Matt Dillahunty, especially because I’ve spent much of the past few posts tearing down things that he said.  Putting his show on Objectivism aside, he actually seems like a pretty rational guy.  Just check out the following from his bio on the Atheist Experience website:

I was raised in a loving, Southern Baptist home and was a fundamentalist Christian for over 20 years. [...] After the first couple of years, reason forced me to acknowledge that my faith had not only been weakened by my studies – it had been utterly destroyed. The thoughts, writings and wisdom of people like; Robert Ingersoll, Voltaire, Dan Barker, Richard Dawkins, Farrell Till and many others, helped free my mind from the shackles of religion without a single moment of despair. I continue to study philosophy, religion, science, history and the many other topics which have helped me to understand reality and enjoy my life.

Having spent the majority of my life compartmentalizing my religious beliefs to keep them safe from skepticism, it’s thrilling to leave the critical, investigative, hungry portion of my brain turned “on”.

I have respect for people who are able to take those overcome those types of influences in their lives for the sake of the truth.  That’s not only an act of intellectual honesty, it’s an act of courage.  I know that when I visit my family for Thanksgiving and Christmas, I don’t have to worry about hiding parts of my life so I don’t make anyone cry and worry over my soul.  I think that if he took that same approach to Objectivism, he’d have a different opinion than the one that he gave on this show.  He’d at least see that her books were different than his co-host described them.

I don’t know anything about Russell Glasser except what I’ve heard on this show.  And that he considers Objectivists “foolish atheists” who make other atheists look bad.

Part 1: Objecting to Objectivism – The King’s Rational Self-Interest?
Part 2: Objecting to Objectivism – Cooperation
Part 3: Objecting to Objectivism – Objective Reality
Part 4: Objecting to Objectivism – The Train Scene
Part 5: Objecting to Objectivism – Teaching, Altruism, and the Profit Motive
Part 6: Objecting to Objectivism – Did Ayn Rand Read Kant?
Part 7: Objecting to Objectivism – Matt Doesn’t Like the Book He Didn’t Read