Rand on Selfishness
The individual–the smallest minority on earth–has the right to live for his own sake. This means not only the freedom to set his own moral code and seek out actions that benefit that, but to use his labor and the products of it to serve this end.
In a nutshell, this is what the idea of selfishness as a virtue means in objectivist ethics.
All these processes hinge on man’s ability to reason. Reason is crucial to understanding Rand’s world view because, as Rand herself notes in the introduction to The Virtue of Selfishness, the concept of selfishness itself is morally neutral. It states only that man has a right to a moral existence. Ethics–a separate process–determines which actions and values help propagate that existence. Reason and its consistent application are synonymous with morality in objectivist ethics. Hence, the man who pursues actions that benefit his sense of self is a “selfish” and moral man.
This process cannot happen unless the individual chooses to use their mind to develop a cohesive sense of self and to orient it in the wider world. John Galt, the hero of Atlas Shrugged, is Rand’s embodiment of rational self-interest.
“[I]f devotion to truth is the hallmark of morality, then there is no greater, nobler, more heroic form of devotion than the act of a man who assumes the responsibility of thinking.” Rand says by way of Galt in Atlas Shrugged.
The genius inventor of a revolutionary type of engine, Galt is absent from most of the book because he refuses to submit his interests to the collective and allow the products of his mind to be used in ways he does not approve of. Society in Atlas Shrugged is on the brink of collapse and, in an effort to make up for its political and social shortcomings, demands individuals sacrifice for “the common good.”
This idea–that in times of hardship and because of the unequal distribution of limited resources–individuals need to look to interests beside their own is not unknown in today’s political discourse.
Take space pioneers like Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson, and Elon Musk who have used their personal fortune to build private companies aimed at space exploration and other scientific advancement and have faced criticism for doing so.
“Anyone who thinks we do not have an oligarchy right here in America is sorely mistaken,” Sanders said in a Senate budget hearing. “Today in America, multibillionaires like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson are off taking joy rides on their rocket ships to outer space.”
Sanders’ implication in this and other critical comments seems to be that commercial space flight developed by the wealthy is a moral outrage because that money could be used to solve poverty and other social ills.
Part of Sanders’ criticism is also that public subsidies should not go to private entrepreneurs in this avenue. He argued against a $10 billion subsidy to Blue Origin in the 2022 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). And in this area he’s right. No Randian hero would seek money that was not his and was stolen from others to accomplish his ends, nor would they submit to the power the government would have over them in such an arrangement.
Sanders is one of the looters–the men who seek to rob individuals of their wealth and knowledge and use it for public gain–from Atlas Shrugged. He does not object in principle to money being spent on space exploration–he’s all for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration having funding. He just doesn’t want billionaires to pursue commercial space flight, preferring their money be spent on other social programs.
“Frankly, it is not acceptable…that the two wealthiest people in this country, Mr. Musk and Mr. Bezos, take control of our space efforts to return to the moon.” Sanders said in a floor speech criticizing subsidies in the NDAA. “This is not something for two billionaires to be directing; this is something for the American people to be determining.”
The problem here is that Sanders would give himself the moral authority to determine how another man’s wealth and intellectual pursuits are best spent while robbing that individual of the right to do the same. He places virtue in the amorphous American people–given voice through him–and their ability to spend others’ money, but lambasts private individuals for using their money as they see fit.
It’s exactly this attitude that Galt and others go on strike against in Atlas Shrugged. As Galt says in a radio speech in the novel, “We are on strike against the dogma that the pursuit of one’s happiness is evil. We are on strike against the doctrine that life is guilt.”
That Bezos and others are using their personal wealth to chase long-term goals such as space exploration, which have promises for the betterment of humanity in the future, while issues like poverty still exist now, is not any sort of moral stain upon them. Human good, Rand notes in an essay titled “The Objectivist Ethics” does not require sacrifice. “It holds that the rational interests of men do not clash—that there is no conflict of interests among men who do not desire the unearned, who do not make sacrifices nor accept them, who deal with one another as traders, giving value for value.” Rand wrote. And that’s what entrepreneurs like Bezos are doing.