Ayn Rand: Optimist or Pessimist?
by Neil Parille
Introduction
At first glance, Ayn Rand advocated what might be considered an “optimistic” view of human nature. She rejected the doctrine of original sin as a “monstrous absurdity.” [Rand, For the New Intellectual (“FNI”), p. 136.] Along with her rejection of original sin, she also denied that human beings have instincts, and therefore any tendency to self-destructive or irrational behavior. Likewise, she was skeptical of claims that character traits and intelligence are genetically fixed or predetermined. [Rand, The Virtue of Selfishness, p. 147.]
Rand’s optimistic view of human nature has a corresponding element in her view of history. In many places throughout her work, she states that mankind has a bright future; a future in which reason will predominate and the hold of the irrational – whose archetypes are Attila and the Witch Doctor – will be destroyed.
Yet, in spite of Rand’s optimism, her evaluation of human history was largely negative. Rand lists only a few periods of history when the hold of the Witch Doctor and Attila were broken: ancient Greece, the Renaissance, the founding of the United States, and the Nineteenth Century. The rest of history is, as John Galt says, “a string of blank-outs over sterile stretches eroded by faith and force . . . . “ [FNI, p. 169.][1]
The Question
A key question for the Randian interpretation of history is as follows: If reason is man’s key to survival, why have there been so few periods of history when reason has gained the upper hand? Professor Eric Mack draws attention to an interesting tension in Randian thought. According to Rand’s ethics, man can survive only by reason. Yet in her critique of culture, she concedes that the most irrational people thrive and even dominate. [Eric Mack, Problematic Arguments in Randian Ethics, JARS, Vol. 5, No. 1.] Why do the various characters of the Randian world – the moochers, looters, parasites and second-handers -- win out when their irrationality should doom them to quick destruction?
The Choice to Think
One answer to this question may be found in Rand’s concept of “the choice to think.” Thinking is hard work and most people lack the initiative required for sustained, conceptual thought. In spite of Rand’s rejection of original sin and biological instincts, she does have her own equivalent of “original sin,” namely man’s unwillingness to think conceptually:
The process of abstraction, and of concept-formation, is a process of reason, of thought, it is not automatic nor instinctive nor involuntary nor infallible. Man has to initiate it, sustain it and to bear responsibility for its results. [FNI, p. 15.]
Most people, however, prefer to evade and “blank out.” There is a tendency flee into irrationality. As she puts it, irrationality is “a state of default.” [FNI, p. 21.] People believe what the Witch Doctor tells them out of “ignorance, cowardice, or mental sloth.” [FNI, p. 18.] Once the Witch Doctor gains the uppers hand, it is easy to persuade the mass of humanity to accept his lies. But why is this?
Some help comes from Rand’s journals. In her notes for Atlas Shrugged, she writes more negatively about the “common man” than in her published writings. Two statements indicate a pessimistic evaluation of the majority of mankind:
Men’s intellectual capacities have always been so unequal that to the thinkers the majority of their brothers have probably always seemed sub-human. And some men may still be, for all the evidence of their rationality, or lack of it.
The average man doesn’t have the strength to do what is right at any cost, against all men. Only the genius can do that. The genius clears the way for the average. But when genius goes, the best in the average man goes with him. [Harriman, ed., Journals of Ayn Rand, pp. 466 and 474.]
Unlike her journals, Rand’s published writings place greater emphasis on the ease by which the human mind can be programmed or conditioned by education and fear. In her essay “The Comprachicos,” Rand contends that is likely that a child, by an early age, may be so “programmed” that his rational faculty becomes “paralyzed.” Nonetheless, because man is a volitional being, it is never too late to start thinking conceptually. [Rand, The Return of the Primitive, p. 65.] In fact, a cultural revolution can be created by an “intellectual vanguard” which presents a philosophically comprehensive view of human existence. [Sciabarra, Ayn Rand: the Russian Radical, pp. 366.]
Conclusion
Ayn Rand’s thought presents an interesting combination of both optimistic and pessimistic elements. She is pessimistic concerning the ability of the common man to take steps to change the course of history. She is optimistic (for the most part) about human nature and man’s future.
[1] The most detailed discussion of Rand’s view of history is found in Chris Sciabarra, Ayn Rand: the Russian Radical, pp. 353-79.
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