An Objectivist Statement of Resolves

An Objectivist Statement of Resolves
by G. Stolyarov II

We, the undersigned, in the spirit of Ayn Rand’s recognition of the necessity for the integration of mind and body, theory and practice, thought and action, hereby explicate the principles and mindsets that fundamentally classify us as Objectivists. While on any other issues we may diverge and exhibit viewpoints of even diametrical opposition, we exhibit toward the following essentials an unflinching commitment in all areas of existence and shall present these issues in any and all sferes of the larger culture in a manner that does not unduly disparage any of us, their propagators. We hold the following premises and values to be self-evident or derivative from the self-evident, and hereby assert our advocacy of them before the world.

Resolve 1. Reality is absolute. Three fundamental axioms are universal to this reality: existence, identity, and consciousness. It is upon these axioms that all of man’s logic and possible tools for interacting with the absolute reality are founded.

Resolve 2. Man is capable of fathoming the absolute reality. Man’s reason is an objectively valid tool of cognition when it rests on proper integration and extrapolation of the three axioms and the formation of concepts consistent with said axioms. There is no aspect of the absolute reality that is inherently off-limits to human comprehension.

Resolve 3. Man is an entity of volitional consciousness and can choose with regard to any aspect of the contents of said consciousness via the initial decision of awareness versus non-awareness. By employing his consciousness, man ultimately actualizes one of two fundamental values: life or death.

Resolve 4. The life of the individual is the ultimate value, and no value exists outside the context of the life of the individual who is the valuator. Every individual, being an entity inherently capable of reason, is entitled to pursue those values, which his mind considers optimal for the promotion of his life, provided that such does not infringe with an identical prerogative on the behalf of every other individual.

Resolve 5. Selfishness, the placement of one’s own interests, material or intellectual, as one’s foremost and inviolable priority, is the ultimate morality.

Resolve 6. The initiation of fysical force, fraud, or the threat thereof is the greatest possible moral infringement. In response to such criminal deeds, and only in response to them, retaliatory force may be employed.

Resolve 7. The proper purpose of government is to protect individuals against the initiation of force. It is not the function of government to initiate any sort of force against its own citizens, nor to extort from its non-force-initiating citizens any action to which they would not have freely consented.

Resolve 8. Every individual possesses absolute and inviolable natural rights to life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, and property. These rights are not granted by any external agency, but rather are an attribute inherent to beings of volitional consciousness. These rights are negative obligations upon others, only. They require that others abstain from depriving an individual of his pursuits and property, not that they furnish said individual with any concrete gains.

Resolve 9. Any intervention of the government in the economic sfere is immoral and intolerable. A consistent advocacy of liberty and individual rights calls for complete, unadulterated laissez-faire capitalism.

Resolve 10. Any government intervention with regard to an establishment of religion or ideology is immoral and intolerable, as is any coercive imposition of ideology upon an individual by any entity.

Resolve 11. Objectivism does not acknowledge any entity superior in status to man, or any entity whose existence is wholly or partly off-limits to human comprehension.

Resolve 12. Works of art are reflections of the metafysical and ethical premises held by their authors. The purpose of a rational esthetics is to convey those impressions and values that are in accord with a universe where man can and should exist as a free, prosperous, active entity.

Resolve 13. With regard to the non-coercive self-destructive behavior performed by certain individuals, it is manifestly immoral to impose force upon those persons for the sake of correcting such behaviors. It is not, however, immoral, to endeavor to persuade those individuals to alter their course of action. Rather, such discourse and argumentation are encouraged in the interest of propagating rational values.

Resolve 14. As self-interested entities, we, Objectivists, hold it of value that the settings surrounding us be as thoroughly infused with the above principles as is within our capacity to bring about. It is in our interests to propagate said ideas and, at the very least, not to impede their propagation. For sake of our own self-interest, we promise to abstain from claiming any others who propagate the above principles to be worthless, or otherwise insult those individuals in a manner that absolutely denies the legitimacy of their contributions to the ideological arena.

Resolve 15. Any and all persons affirming this resolution have thereby secured for themselves the absolutely correct designation of “Objectivist” and cannot be rationally denied to possess such a title.

It is consented that this statement be circulated and endorsed by all those willing through any means, provided that it is retained entirely in its original form.

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