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Tuesday, January 17, 2006 - 3:14pmSanction this postReply
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Jack Wheeler's article is quite interesting.  Maybe Rand was closest to Aristotle in the area she thought she was farthest (or is it furthest).

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Wednesday, January 18, 2006 - 12:09pmSanction this postReply
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Neil,

The preferred term to use in your sentence is further. The usage panel for The American Heritage Dictionary prefers that farther be restricted to sentences in which it refers to literal distance.

In the opening paragraph of his paper, Fred Miller contends that "the question whether Rand's ethics is 'Aristotelian' should not turn merely on whether Rand and Aristotle make similar moral pronouncements, but on whether there are deeper parallels involving fundamental principles and methodology."  [Concerning judgements of intellectual similarity, see further, the exchange between Peikoff (Prof. E), Gotthelf (Prof. B), and Rand in IOE app. 221-22.]  At that point, Miller enters a note concerning Jack Wheeler's 1984 essay, saying: "Although Wheeler makes some interesting comparisons, he tends to exaggerate the parallels between Rand and Aristotle and makes no attempt to explain why Rand was critical of Aristotle's method in ethics. Nor does he mention 'Causality Versus Duty'."

As you know, in her essay "Causality Versus Duty" (1974), Rand addressed a number of important issues in moral philosophy. One of them was the choice open to human beings concerning their ultimate ends. Professor Miller's paper included that issue prominently in his comparison and appraisal of the ethics of Rand and Aristotle.

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Tuesday, May 20, 2008 - 2:48pmSanction this postReply
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Rand held that for man, “to live is his basic act of choice. If he chooses to live, a rational ethics will tell him what principles of action are required to implement his choice.” Does that mean that the choice of an ultimate value is arbitrary? Uninformed by reason? Not if “only life-promoting goals qualify as objective values” (VH 12).
Here are some further reflections.


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Wednesday, May 21, 2008 - 4:28amSanction this postReply
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Not if “only life-promoting goals qualify as objective values”

That is why there are values - and there are viable values....


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Wednesday, September 4, 2013 - 7:00pmSanction this postReply
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Greg Salmieri was interviewed last month on University of Chicago Philosophy Podcasts on the topic “Aristotelian Good Life and Productive Work,” which can be heard here. Dr. Salmieri lectured on “Man’s Life as the Standard of Value in the Ethics of Ayn Rand and Aristotle” at OCON 2013.*

I have written on the ethics of Aristotle in contrast to Rand’s in “Rand and the Greeks” (2009).

Forthcoming in the series Ayn Rand Society Philosophical Studies:
Ayn Rand and Aristotle: Philosophical and Historical Studies (2014)
James Lennox, editor


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