Why Ayn Rand Was Wrong About Altruism, Selfishness, and Human Nature - Evonomics

3/17/2018 Why Ayn Rand Was Wrong about Altruism, Selfishness, and Human Nature - Evonomics
about contributors newsletter donate
DONATING = CHANGING
ECONOMICS. AND
CHANGING THE WORLD.
Nathaniel Gold
Evonomics is a labor of love, it's fre
and it's ad-free. We spend hundred
of hours and thousands of dollars
Human Nature
spreading the word about The Nex
Why Ayn Rand Was

Evolution of Economics.
If you think that's a worthy mission
as we do—one with powerful
leverage to make the world a bette
place—please consider offering you
Wrong about
support.
Altruism, Selfishness,
and Human Nature
Rand would be surprised by the new science of sel shness and altruism.
    
By Eric Michael Johnson
“Every political philosophy has to begin with a theory of human nature,” wrote
Harvard evolutionary biologist Richard Lewontin in his book Biology as
Ideology. Thomas Hobbes, for example, believed that humans in a “state of
nature,” or what today we would call hunter-gatherer societies, lived a life that
was “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short” in which there existed a “war of
all against all.” This led him to conclude, as many apologists for dictatorship
http://evonomics.com/ayn-rand-was-wrong-about-selfishness-altruism/ 1/12
have since, that a stable society required a single leader

about
incontributors
order to control the
newsletter donate
rapacious violence that was inherent to human nature. Building off of this,
advocates of state communism, such as Vladimir Lenin or Josef Stalin, believed
that each of us was born tabula rasa, with a blank slate, and that human nature
could be molded in the interests of those in power.
Ever since Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand has been gaining prominence among
American conservatives as the leading voice for the political philosophy of Change the World
laissez-faire capitalism, or the idea that private business should be DONATING = CHANGING
unconstrained and that government’s only concern should be protecting ECONOMICS. AND
CHANGING THE WORLD.
individual property rights. As I wrote in Slate with my piece “Ayn Rand vs. the
Pygmies,” the Russian-born author believed that rational selfishness was the and it's ad-free. We spend hundred
ultimate expression of human nature. of hours and thousands of dollars
Collectivism,” Rand wrote in Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal “is the If you think that's a worthy mission
tribal premise of primordial savages who, unable to conceive of as we do—one with powerful
individual rights, believed that the tribe is a supreme, omnipotent ruler,
that it owns the lives of its members and may sacrifice them whenever it support.
pleases.” An objective understanding of “man’s nature and man’s
relationship to existence” should inoculate society from the disease of
altruistic morality and economic redistribution. Therefore, “one must
begin by identifying man’s nature, i.e., those essential characteristics
which distinguish him from all other living species.
As Rand further detailed in her book The Virtue of Selfishness, moral values
are “genetically dependent” on the way “living entities exist and function.”
Because each individual organism is primarily concerned with its own life, she
therefore concludes that selfishness is the correct moral value of life. “Its life is
the standard of value directing its actions,” Rand wrote, “it acts automatically
to further its life and cannot act for its own destruction.” Because of this Rand
insists altruism is a pernicious lie that is directly contrary to biological reality.
Therefore, the only way to build a good society was to allow human nature, like
capitalism, to remain unfettered by the meddling of a false ideology.
“Altruism is incompatible with freedom, with capitalism and with individual

rights,” she continued. “One cannot combine the pursuit of happiness with the
moral status of a sacrificial animal.” She concludes that this conflict between
human nature and the “irrational morality” of altruism is a lethal tension that
tears society apart. Her mission was to free humanity from this conflict. Like
Marx, she believed that her correct interpretation of how society should be
organized would be the ultimate expression of human freedom.
Ayn Rand was wrong about altruism. But how she about
arrivedcontributors
at this conclusion is
newsletter donate
revealing both because it shows her thought process and offers a warning to
those who would construct their own political philosophy on the back of an
assumed human nature. Ironically, given her strong opposition to monarchy
and state communism, Rand based her interpretation of human nature on the
same premises as these previous systems while adding a crude evolutionary
argument in order to connect them.
DONATING = CHANGING
Get Evonomics in your inbox ECONOMICS. AND
CHANGING THE WORLD.
Enter Your Email Keep Me Posted! Evonomics is a labor of love, it's fre
Rand assumed, as Hobbes did, that without a centralized authority human life Evolution of Economics.
would erupt into a chaos of violence. “Warfare–permanent warfare—is the
hallmark of tribal existence,” she wrote in The Return of the Primitive. “Tribes leverage to make the world a bette
subsist on the edge of starvation, at the mercy of natural disasters, less place—please consider offering you
support.
successfully than herds of animals.” This, she reasoned, is why altruism is so
pervasive among indigenous societies; prehistoric groups needed the tribe for
protection. She argued that altruism is perpetuated as an ideal among the poor
in modern societies for the same reason.
“It is only the inferior men that have collective instincts—because they need
them,” Rand wrote in a journal entry dated February 22, 1937. This kind of
primitive altruism doesn’t exist in “superior men,” Rand continued, because
social instincts serve merely as “the weapon and protection of the inferior.” She
later expands on this idea by stating, “We may still be in evolution, as a species,
and living side by side with some ‘missing links.’”
Rand’s view that social instincts only exist among “inferior men” should not be
dismissed as something she unthinkingly jotted down in a private journal. In
two of her subsequent books—For the New Intellectual and Philosophy: Who
Needs It?, where it even serves as a chapter heading—Rand quips that
scientists may find the “missing link” between humans and animals in those
people who fail to utilize their rational selfishness to its full potential. How
then does Rand explain the persistence of altruistic morality if human nature is
ultimately selfish? By invoking the tabula rasa as an integral feature of human
nature in which individuals can advance from inferior to superior upwards
along the chain of life.
“Man is born tabula rasa,” Rand wrote in her Introduction

about
to Objectivist
contributors newsletter donate
Epistemology, “all his knowledge is based on and derived from the evidence of
his senses. To reach the distinctively human level of cognition, man must
conceptualize his perceptual data” (by which she means using logical
deductions). This was her solution to the problem of prosocial behavior and
altruism among hunter-gatherer societies.
“For instance, when discussing the social instinct—does it matter whether it

had existed in the early savages?” Rand asks in her journal on May 9, 1934. DONATING = CHANGING
“Supposing men were born social (and even that is a question)—does it mean ECONOMICS. AND
CHANGING THE WORLD.
that they have to remain so? If man started as a social animal—isn’t all
progress and civilization directed toward making him an individual? Isn’t that and it's ad-free. We spend hundred
the only possible progress? If men are the highest of animals, isn’t man the of hours and thousands of dollars
next step?” Nearly a decade later, on September 6, 1943, she wrote, “The
process here, in effect, is this: man is raw material when he is born; nature tells If you think that's a worthy mission
him: ‘Go ahead, create yourself. You can become the lord of existence—if you as we do—one with powerful
wish—by understanding your own nature and by acting upon it. Or you can
destroy yourself. The choice is yours.’” support.
While Rand states in Philosophy: Who Needs It? that “I am not a student of the
theory of evolution and, therefore, I am neither its supporter nor its opponent,”
she immediately goes on to make claims about how evolution functions. “After
aeons of physiological development, the evolutionary process altered its course,
and the higher stages of development focused primarily on the consciousness
of living species, not their bodies” (italics mine). Rand further expands on her
(incorrect) views about evolution in her journal:
It is precisely by observing nature that we discover that a living

organism endowed with an attribute higher and more complex than the
attributes possessed by the organisms below him in nature’s scale shares
many functions with these lower organisms. But these functions are
modified by his higher attribute and adapted to its function—not the
other way around. – Journals of Ayn Rand, July 30, 1945.
One would have to go back to the 18th century (and Aristotle before that) to
find a similar interpretation of nature. This concept of “the great chain of
being,” brilliantly discussed by the historian Arthur Lovejoy, was the belief that
a strict hierarchy exists in the natural world and species advance up nature’s
scale as they get closer to God. This is an odd philosophy of nature for an
avowed atheist, to say the least, and reflects Rand’s profound
misunderstanding of the natural world.
To summarize, then, Rand believed in progressive about

evolutionary changenewsletter
contributors
up the donate
ladder of nature from primitive to advanced. At the “higher stages” of this
process (meaning humans) evolution changed course so that members of our
species were born with a blank slate, though she provides no evidence to
support this. Human beings therefore have no innate “social instincts”–
elsewhere she refers to it as a “herd-instinct”–that is, except for “primordial
savages” and “inferior men” who could be considered missing links in the scale
of nature. Never mind that these two groups are still technically human in her
view. Selfishness is the ideal moral value because “superior men” are, by DONATING = CHANGING
definition, higher up the scale of being. ECONOMICS. AND
CHANGING THE WORLD.
Logic was essential to Ayn Rand’s political philosophy. “A contradiction cannot and it's ad-free. We spend hundred
exist,” she has John Galt state in Atlas Shrugged. “To arrive at a contradiction of hours and thousands of dollars
is to confess an error in one’s thinking; to maintain a contradiction is to
abdicate one’s mind and to evict oneself from the realm of reality.” I couldn’t If you think that's a worthy mission
agree more. However, Rand may have had more personal reasons for her as we do—one with powerful
philosophy that can help explain her tortured logic. As she was first developing
her political philosophy she mused in her journal about how she arrived at her support.
conclusion that selfishness was a natural moral virtue.
It may be considered strange, and denying my own supremacy of

reason, that I start with a set of ideas, then want to study in order to
support them, and not vice versa, i.e., not study and derive my ideas
from that. But these ideas, to a great extent, are the result of a
subconscious instinct, which is a form of unrealized reason. All instincts
are reason, essentially, or reason is instincts made conscious. The
“unreasonable” instincts are diseased ones. – Journals of Ayn Rand,
May 15, 1934.
This can indeed be considered strange. Looking deep within yourself and
concluding that your feelings are natural instincts that apply for the entire
species isn’t exactly what you would call objective. It is, in fact, the exact
opposite of how science operates. However, she continues and illuminates her
personal motivations for her ideas.
Some day I’ll find out whether I’m an unusual specimen of humanity in
that my instincts and reason are so inseparably one, with the reason
ruling the instincts. Am I unusual or merely normal and healthy? Am I
trying to impose my own peculiarities as a philosophical system? Am I
unusually intelligent or merely unusually honest? I think this last.
Unless—honesty is also a form of superior intelligence.
Through a close reading of her fictional characters,about

and other entries innewsletter
contributors
her donate
journal, it appears that Rand had an intuitive sense that selfishness was natural
because that’s how she saw the world. As John Galt said in his final climactic
speech, “Since childhood, you have been hiding the guilty secret that you feel
no desire to be moral, no desire to seek self-immolation, that you dread and
hate your code, but dare not say it even to yourself, that you’re devoid of those
moral ‘instincts’ which others profess to feel.”
In Rand’s notes for an earlier, unpublished story she expresses nearly identical DONATING = CHANGING
sentiments for the main character. “He [Danny Renahan] is born with,” she ECONOMICS. AND
CHANGING THE WORLD.
writes, “the absolute lack of social instinct or herd feeling.”
He does not understand, because he has no organ for understanding, the of hours and thousands of dollars
necessity, meaning or importance of other people. (One instance when it
is blessed not to have an organ of understanding.) Other people do not If you think that's a worthy mission
exist for him and he does not understand why they should. He knows as we do—one with powerful
himself—and that is enough. Other people have no right, no hold, no
interest or influence on him. And this is not affected or chosen—it’s support.
inborn, absolute, it can’t be changed, he has ‘no organ’ to be otherwise.
In this respect, he has the true, innate psychology of a Superman. He
can never realize and feel ‘other people.’ (That’s what I meant by
thoughts as feelings, as part of your nature.) (It is wisdom to be dumb
about certain things.)
I believe a strong case could be made that Ayn Rand was projecting her own
sense of reality into the mind’s of her fictional protagonists. Does this mean
that Rand was a sociopath? Diagnosing people in the past with modern
understandings of science has many limitations (testing your hypothesis being
chief among them). However, I think it’s clear that Ayn Rand did not have a
strongly developed sense of empathy but did have a very high opinion of
herself. When seen through this perspective, Rand’s philosophy of
“Objectivism” and her belief in “the virtue of selfishness” look very different
from how she presented it in her work. When someone’s theory of human
nature is based on a sample size of 1 it raises doubts about just how objective
they really were.
Update: A point that has been brought up repeatedly is that Ayn Rand used a
different definition of altruism than what is standard in biology and so
therefore what I wrote is invalid. This is incorrect. To clear up any confusion,
Ayn Rand relied on Auguste Comte’s definition from his Catéchisme Positiviste
(1852) where he advocates “l’altruisme sur l’égoïsme” (altruism over egoism)
because, he writes, “vivre pour autrui fournit le seul moyen

about
de développer
contributors newsletter donate
librement toute l’existence humaine” (to live for others provides the only
means to develop freely throughout human existence). The biological definition
of altruism is not only consistent with Comte, it subsumes his definition and
makes it testable and, one would think, more objective.
2015 September 21
DONATING = CHANGING
Donating = Changing Economics. And

ECONOMICS. AND
CHANGING THE WORLD.
Changing the World. Evonomics is a labor of love, it's fre

Evonomics is free, it’s a labor of love, and it's an expense. We spend hundreds
of hours and lots of dollars each month creating, curating, and promoting Evolution of Economics.
content that drives the next evolution of economics. If you're like us — if you If you think that's a worthy mission
think there’s a key leverage point here for making the world a better place — leverage to make the world a bette
please consider donating. We’ll use your donation to deliver even more game- place—please consider offering you
changing content, and to spread the word about that content to influential support.
thinkers far and wide.
MONTHLY DONATION
 $3 / month
 $7 / month
 $10 / month
 $25 / month
ONE-TIME DONATION
You can also become a one-time patron with a single donation in any amount.
GIVE NOW
If you liked this article, you'll also like these other Evonomics articles...
Do Outside Three Evolutionary Apes Make Tyler Cowen and

Enemies Make Us Ideas to Change the Irrational Joseph Henrich
Nicer to our Future of Economic Talk Economics,

BE INVOLVED
We welcome you to take part in the next evolution of economics. Sign up now
to be kept in the loop!
Enter Your Email DONATING = CHANGING

ECONOMICS. AND
Keep Me Posted! CHANGING THE WORLD.
This entry was posted in Human Nature and tagged Ayn Rand. Bookmark the permalink.
WHY AMAZON FOUNDER JEFF BEZOS WHY NEOCLASSICAL AND If you think that's a worthy mission
FAILED MISERABLY AT APPLYING BEHAVIORAL ECONOMICS DOESN’T as we do—one with powerful
DARWINIAN COMPETITION TO HIS MAKE SENSE WITHOUT DARWIN leverage to make the world a bette
BUSINESS place—please consider offering you
support.
16 Comments Evonomics 
1 Login
Sort by Newest
 Recommend 2 ⤤ Share
Join the discussion…
LOG IN WITH
OR SIGN UP WITH DISQUS ?
Name
Unfettered Fire • a year ago

Why does a tree produce fruit? It does not benefit from the fruit itself, but is created as an
offering to the next evolution of species. What has the human species prepared as an offering to
the next evolution of beings... besides luxury bunkers, a metaphor for the failure of man to
coexist fruitfully with the natural order of things?
△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›
Matt Faherty • a year ago

Why was my long rebuttal deleted?
1△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›
Matt Faherty • a year ago

It's also worth noting that using Rand's private journals as a meaningful source of her
philosophy is bizarre and malicious in and of itself. What other philosopher gets that treatment?
Does anyone go through Focault, Quine, or Singer's private journals they wrote as 20 year olds
to find parts where they wrote something strange, and then use it to debunk their formalized,
official philosophical writings?
py

Ged Hession • 2 years ago
I've always thought the best person to discuss this was John Kenneth Galbraith. He believed that
humans are motivated to cooperate. For instance a person may dig a ditch to drain a field if (a)
they are by coercion made to do it by a beating master or (b) they are given a reward , they do it
for pecuniary gain or (c) they see the necessary of draining the ditch, for food production or
disease prevention, they identify with the task or (d) they see the benefit of draining the ditch,
either for disease prevention or food production.
Paul May > Ged Hession • a year ago

And he's since been shown to be correct; we are naturally social and altruistic, and it's DONATING = CHANGING
why we are so successful--contrary to a large portion of Rand's teachings. ECONOMICS. AND
1△ ▽ • Reply • Share › CHANGING THE WORLD.
Δημήτρης > Paul May • a year ago Evonomics is a labor of love, it's fre
I think we are all three kinds: We are egoists, like all other animals. We try to
satisfy our physical needs, to eat, drink, make love etc and to avoid the threat to of hours and thousands of dollars
lose them. We are altruists, trying to satisfy our social needs, including the motive spreading the word about The Nex
of love and to be recognized by others. Animals are also altruistic. But we are also Evolution of Economics.
idealists, trying to satisfy our own purposes. This is not egoism because in order to If you think that's a worthy mission
accomplish our own task we sacrifice our personal natural needs, including our as we do—one with powerful
very life (e.g. Socrates, Jesus etc). Idealism does not exist in other animals, leverage to make the world a bette
because they are not capable of forming purposes; they act only because of causes place—please consider offering you
and not for purposes. support.
Derryl Hermanutz • 2 years ago

Supposing men were born social (and even that is a question)—does it mean that they have to
remain so? If man started as a social animal—isn’t all progress and civilization directed toward
making him an individual? Isn’t that the only possible progress? If men are the highest of
animals, isn’t man the next step?”
Like pretty much every political philosopher except John Locke, Rand assumes "man" born
fullgrown into the world. Rand believes the man chooses his own nature; others make their own
assumptions about the "nature" man is endowed with. All of these are counterfactual fictions.
Man is born as a helpless infant into a family that takes care of him for many years until he is
ready to go into the world on his own. As a man he does not stride naked into "nature": not
unless he chooses to live as a self-sufficient hermit in the woods. He leaves home and tries to
find a place for himself in "society". People are born and raised in a social environment, and
would die if they were not taken care of for many years.
Within modern civilization, the world people are born into is more social and man-made than
anything to do with "nature". What is natural about working in an office in a city? What is
natural -- what is "individualistic" -- about being hired to manage a big collectivist business with
hundreds or thousands of employees and annual sales revenues larger than the GDP of most
see more
11 △ ▽ • Reply • Share ›
Unfettered Fire > Derryl Hermanutz • a year ago

Precisely. So now we've seen what this political ideology of Rand, Friedman, Hayek and
others has resulted in - a rentier neoliberal capitalism that is killing the host.
Kristina • 2 years ago

Great Article! Thank you for Lewontin's quote! Very useful for my PhD. Keep up the great work!
ep y S ae

Pero Gruyo • 2 years ago
Horses are egoists.
Snakes are egoists.
Dogs are egoists.
Lions are egoists.
Virus are egoists.
Bacteria are egoists.
The question is : "WHY" MEN SHOULD BE ALTRUISTS?
Of course, the guy on the article refers to Rand as a sociopath. Rand call this argument from
intimidation.
2△
DONATING = CHANGING
▽ • Reply • Share ›
ECONOMICS. AND
Nemerian > Pero Gruyo • a year ago CHANGING THE WORLD.
[citation needed] on everything you just said. Evonomics is a labor of love, it's fre
And except snakes, you couldnt have picked worst examples. and it's ad-free. We spend hundred
All of those are highly social and hierarchical pack animals. of hours and thousands of dollars
And bacteria freely swap around their genes.
And in biology, viruses are highly debated if they are even alive.
Paul May > Pero Gruyo • a year ago
Because altruism and social behaviour is why humans are so successful.
support.
A single man on his own is no more successful than a chimpanzee.
Humans need society to be as successful as we are, and all humans act in and in response
to society--even the most rugged individualist libertarian has used and does use society.
AJ > Pero Gruyo • 2 years ago

The question isn't about "should" to begin with, it's about what human nature "is".
Jukka Aakula > Pero Gruyo • 2 years ago

Animals take care of their children. They are not egoists. The can be hugely collectivist
also - like ants and naked mole rat.
Δημήτρης > Pero Gruyo • 2 years ago

Bacteria ane viruses die in order to produce new lives. Lions, dogs, horses etc would
sacrifice themselves for the benefit of their offsprings or even of their friends of another
species (e.g. dogs for thei master). Is this natural selfishness or altruism?
Paul May > Δημήτρης • a year ago

Bacteria don't die; they are immortal. They split to create new ones, but they do
not die to do so.
Viruses weren't alive to start with.

✉ Subscribe d Add Disqus to your siteAdd DisqusAdd 🔒 Privacy
Život Je Prekratak Da Bi Bili Nesretni Na Poslu

Možda to niste znali, ali mnogo trgovatelja zarađuje novac na
financijskim tržištima svaki dan, bez obzira na to ide li ekonomija
gore ili dolje.
Learn More
Sponsored by Trazim Posao Online
Report ad
DONATING = CHANGING
ECONOMICS. AND
CHANGING THE WORLD.
leverage to make theJOHNSON
ERIC MICHAEL world a bette
support.
Eric Michael Johnson received his

masters degree in evolutionary
anthropology and he pursued his
dissertation on bonobo (Pan
paniscus) behavioral ecology
before switching fields to work on
the history of evolutionary biology
in late-19th century England,
Europe and Russia. Twitter:
@Ericmjohnson
SHARE THIS ARTICLE
 
 
 
DONATING = CHANGING
ECONOMICS. AND
CHANGING THE WORLD.
support.
back to top

Why Ayn Rand Was Wrong About Altruism, Selfishness, and Human Nature - Evonomics

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Why Ayn Rand Was Wrong About Altruism, Selfishness, and Human Nature - Evonomics

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

3/17/2018 Why Ayn Rand Was Wrong about Altruism, Selfishness, and Human Nature - Evonomics

about contributors newsletter donate

Why Ayn Rand Was

have since, that a stable society required a single leader

“Altruism is incompatible with freedom, with capitalism and with individual

“Man is born tabula rasa,” Rand wrote in her Introduction

“For instance, when discussing the social instinct—does it matter whether it

It is precisely by observing nature that we discover that a living

To summarize, then, Rand believed in progressive about

It may be considered strange, and denying my own supremacy of

Through a close reading of her fictional characters,about

because, he writes, “vivre pour autrui fournit le seul moyen

Donating = Changing Economics. And

Changing the World. Evonomics is a labor of love, it's fre

thinkers far and wide.

Do Outside Three Evolutionary Apes Make Tyler Cowen and

Nicer to our Future of Economic Talk Economics,

Enter Your Email DONATING = CHANGING

Join the discussion…

Unfettered Fire • a year ago

Matt Faherty • a year ago

Matt Faherty • a year ago

about contributors newsletter donate

Paul May > Ged Hession • a year ago

Derryl Hermanutz • 2 years ago

Unfettered Fire > Derryl Hermanutz • a year ago

Kristina • 2 years ago

about contributors newsletter donate

AJ > Pero Gruyo • 2 years ago

Jukka Aakula > Pero Gruyo • 2 years ago

Δημήτρης > Pero Gruyo • 2 years ago

Paul May > Δημήτρης • a year ago

Viruses weren't alive to start with.

✉ Subscribe d Add Disqus to your siteAdd DisqusAdd 🔒 Privacy

about contributors newsletter donate

Život Je Prekratak Da Bi Bili Nesretni Na Poslu

Sponsored by Trazim Posao Online

Eric Michael Johnson received his

SHARE THIS ARTICLE

about contributors newsletter donate

You might also like