I do think Rand was being a bit more complex than that. The whole point of “Atlas” is: the heroes are failing to win because they insist on acting as though they were in an ideal fair world, but those who who accept the status quo and work to win inside it will end up burned worse, because the system is structured to corrupt and consume them—meanwhile our heroes escape with virtue intact. “Atlas” constructs a spread of parasitic, beaten, adapting, fair-but-accepting, and fair-and-renouncing characters to illustrate this. Rand is trying to say “a rationalist who understood the rules of the game would decide not to play”.
Really, the fault with “Atlas” is that it posits an awful world-spanning System that in factual reality, just doesn’t exist. And without that premise it’s two inches of wasted paper.
“Really, the fault with “Atlas” is that it posits an awful world-spanning System that in factual reality, just doesn’t exist.”
I can’t agree with that. I don’t believe there’s some secret, scheming Conspiracy making schools stunt the intellectual development of children. Nevertheless, that is the overwhelmingly common outcome in my society.
There’s no System trying to corrupt the world. Just lots of individual actors acting in accordance with that they perceive their interests to be.
There’s no Invisible Hand, either. Yet markets self-organize.
Oh come on, “it could be self-organizing” is so obvious I left it out. Your entire comment was wasted unless you can show there actually is some self organizing evil.
What Rand says is more like “An awesome rationalist who understood the sick twisted rules of the game would leave and start their own game and not stick with those awful losers who make the world suck.”
So sure, Atlas explicitly encourages embracing the reality of an unfair world full of parasites—the heroes’ character progression comes through that acceptance. But the characters of Atlas implicitly encourage whining and bitterness, which are symptoms of failing to accept the reality of an unfair world.
And I think the implicit message affects readers much more strongly.
I do think Rand was being a bit more complex than that. The whole point of “Atlas” is: the heroes are failing to win because they insist on acting as though they were in an ideal fair world, but those who who accept the status quo and work to win inside it will end up burned worse, because the system is structured to corrupt and consume them—meanwhile our heroes escape with virtue intact. “Atlas” constructs a spread of parasitic, beaten, adapting, fair-but-accepting, and fair-and-renouncing characters to illustrate this. Rand is trying to say “a rationalist who understood the rules of the game would decide not to play”.
Really, the fault with “Atlas” is that it posits an awful world-spanning System that in factual reality, just doesn’t exist. And without that premise it’s two inches of wasted paper.
“Really, the fault with “Atlas” is that it posits an awful world-spanning System that in factual reality, just doesn’t exist.”
I can’t agree with that. I don’t believe there’s some secret, scheming Conspiracy making schools stunt the intellectual development of children. Nevertheless, that is the overwhelmingly common outcome in my society.
There’s no System trying to corrupt the world. Just lots of individual actors acting in accordance with that they perceive their interests to be.
There’s no Invisible Hand, either. Yet markets self-organize.
Oh come on, “it could be self-organizing” is so obvious I left it out. Your entire comment was wasted unless you can show there actually is some self organizing evil.
What Rand says is more like “An awesome rationalist who understood the sick twisted rules of the game would leave and start their own game and not stick with those awful losers who make the world suck.”
So sure, Atlas explicitly encourages embracing the reality of an unfair world full of parasites—the heroes’ character progression comes through that acceptance. But the characters of Atlas implicitly encourage whining and bitterness, which are symptoms of failing to accept the reality of an unfair world.
And I think the implicit message affects readers much more strongly.