Is Rand's Objectivism consequentialist/consequentially motivated?

Question

Background (not looking to get into the weeds on this; just clarifying my viewpoint): It seems to me that the concept of a moral force or law is not really empirically supported. That is, statements like "it is wrong to kill" are only enforceable from a consequentialist standpoint.

Further, it seems to me that actors are motivated only by the way the environment (including their own emotions) responds to their actions. As a result, there is really no such thing as good or bad action. There is only the sequence of events that arise from each actor in a system creating actions that they believe will maximize their neurological reward factors.

This starts to sound like Objectivism. I am new to Ayn Rand, so I'm curious if somebody with some real knowledge can answer this for me.

Was Rand's Objectivism motivated by a purely empirical conception of how things "ought to be"? Or, did Rand believe that there was some extrinsic moral force that gave her ideas a real property of being "good" beyond the maximization of individual happiness? I think I might agree pretty strongly with Rand, but only if she sought Objectivist government out of a purely selfish belief that these policies would benefit her. Did she believe that Objectivism was a solution to some kind of universally-imposed problem of good action? If so, what did she (or any of her followers on here =]) view as the origin of that problem?

Answer 1

Rand's view of morality is something like the following. Human beings have the capacity to create knowledge about the world, and to make choices in the light of that knowledge. The world is not set up in such a way that you and other people are bound to be victims dependent on alms. It is possible, and good, for you to gain from trading with other people. That is, you can deal with another person entirely on the basis of offering him some value he wants in return for him offering you some value you want: the trader principle.

You wrote:

Or, did Rand believe that there was some extrinsic moral force that gave her ideas a real property of being "good" beyond the maximization of individual happiness?

Rand though you should pursue happiness in the sense that you ought to pursue values that will lead to you being happy:

Happiness is that state of consciousness which proceeds from the achievement of one’s values. If a man values productive work, his happiness is the measure of his success in the service of his life. But if a man values destruction, like a sadist—or self-torture, like a masochist—or life beyond the grave, like a mystic—or mindless “kicks,” like the driver of a hotrod car—his alleged happiness is the measure of his success in the service of his own destruction. It must be added that the emotional state of all those irrationalists cannot be properly designated as happiness or even as pleasure: it is merely a moment’s relief from their chronic state of terror.

What about government? Rand's position was that individual rights are necessary to secure the conditions under which people could act on the trader principle. Securing those rights requires that people should act according to an objective set of rules: don't steal, commit fraud, commit murder etc. She argued that government was necessary to secure those rights, and that securing those rights is government's only proper function.

If you want to know more, "The Virtue of Selfishness" is a short introduction to Objectivist moral philosophy, You may also be interested in "Philosophy: who needs it" and her novels especially "Atlas Shrugged" and "The Fountainhead". If you want to discuss these issues further, you might be interested in the Fallible Ideas discussion group.

Answer 2

Rand's moral philosophy is normative (obviously) and derived from consideration of consequences, but it is not consequentialist in its framing of moral principles and rights. Rand argued that moral philosophy requires principles that can be applied in the absence of the ability to foresee particular consequences, in the sense of the full outcomes of actions. Consideration of consequences from action justify the moral philosophy (the inquiry for which occurs at a broad level of considering the kinds of consequences that flow from broad classes of action --- e.g., honesty, dishonesty, etc.), but the principles of that moral philosophy are not framed in terms of consequences.

This aspect of Objectivism being "consequentially motivated" without being consequentialist is addressed in great detail in Smith (1995). Smith argues that the Objectivist moral philosophy is neither deontological nor consequentialist, but instead it is "teleological". For example, on the topic of rights, Smith notes (following the Objectivist moral philosophy) that:

Rights are consequence-based but not consequence-bound. Rights are consequence-based insofar as they are grounded on the premise that recognition of rights is necessary for achievement of the sought end. Desired outcomes are the source of rights' authority. Rights are not consequence-bound, however, because the actual or immediately projected outcomes of our actions are not the decisive test of whether rights should be respected on a given occasion. (p. 103)

This is an important point to understand with regard to the whole of the Objectivist theory of moral philosophy and rights. Since Objectivists appeal to reality to ground their philosophy, the Objectivist moral philosophy is thus necessarily grounded in consideration of the consequences of action. This is the source of the moral principles, but those principles must then be framed at a level of generality and applicability that does not require exceptions that appeal to the ability to fully project the consequences of a particular action.

As an example of the kind of reasoning used in Objectivism, consider a general moral question like: I woke up late and missed a work meeting; should I be honest about the reason, or should I blame car/computer troubles beyond my control? A classical consequentialist approach might operate by tracking the likely consequences of this particular truth/lie and then performing some kind of cost/benefit analysis on these assessed consequences. A person operating under this approach might decide that there is no way for their boss to discover the lie and that it is relatively simple to keep the lie in mind for future consistency, so there are few/no negative consequences of lying in this case. By contrast, an Objectivist view would be more sceptical of the ability to track the long-term consequences of the proposed lie, so it would step back to the broader meta-assessment of the general consequences of dishonesty (perhaps dishonesty over relatively small matters like this or perhaps broader forms of dishonesty) and it would search for a more general principle about whether one should be honest or dishonest in a broad range of situations. Even if it seemed clear that there are few/no negative consequences in this particular case, the Objectivist would be mindful of the general value of the principle of honesty in broader situations. As Smith puts it in the above quote, "...the actual or immediately projected outcomes of our actions are not the decisive test...". Thus, one can imagine a situation like this in which a classical consequentialist would lie (on the basis that the projected consequences of the lie in this situation are small/nil) whereas an Objectivist would tell the truth (on the basis that the full long-term consequences of honesty are positive in a broader range of situations).

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Smith, T. (1995) Moral Rights and Political Freedom. Rowman & Littlefield: Maryland