Welcome
Once in a while,
we listen to a talk and we know
we have experienced something
special.
We know we have experienced something memorable,
and we know that this talk
will stay with us for a long time.
For many of us in the object community,
such a talk was 1 that my colleague,
doctor Ron Ga gave back in 2007,
It was a talk with the memorable title,
Atlas Rad
America's second
declaration of independence.
And today, we'll get the chance to what's
this memorable talk again and we'll have the
chance to watch it together.
Because America's independence day is approaching,
and we thought this is a very fitting
opportunity
to link
a unique novel, the ideas of... And the
values of a unique novel, with the ideas
and the values of a unique
country.
We also want you to support us in
our efforts to share these
revolutionary methods of Atlas ra.
To help more people come across the moral
revolution of iron rand, a revolution that She
saw. As the continuation of the political
revolution and of the spirit of the fourth
of July.
And before we what's the talk, actually, there
will be a broadcast. We will... What's only
the main part of the talk, not the
introduction, not the Q and A will just
watch on
lecture. But before we brought broadcast a talk,
I have with me today On encore himself
for a short
introduction before the the broadcast.
So On I watched this talk
some years ago, and the time I was
watching it. I thought, okay. This is a
love letter.
To the country country. This is a love
letter
to the ideas that made America
special and the people that make this country
possible.
But my first question to you has to
do with the title itself, because this is
the first thing that stuck out for me.
America's second declaration of independence. And this second
declaration of independence is a novel. How did
you come up with this concept?
It it's really what the story of Atlas
shrugged is about. So if you think of
the parallel
between the founding of America and what Atlas
shrugged is about. Start with the founding of
America.
It's
in the run up to the declaration of
independence, the I mean, what we would now
call the Americans
are trying to find common ground, trying to
appease, make terms with compromise
with Britain.
And they find over, like, a period of
decades that they're just unable to do it.
And this... The last straw is we need
to declare our own independence and thinking of
the of some of the wording of the
declaration. Of our... Assume our status as equal.
So now they're Declaring, we're gonna be a
new nation where they're equal of Britain or
a France. So they're assuming their own place
as... You can think of it, like, a
full
individual or full adult in the world. And
what atlas front is about is about that's
the same pattern
of it's about the men who are enormously
productive have a great ability
intelligence. The kind of people who built America,
and they've been over a period of a
long time. Been trying to find some kind
of common ground make terms compromise
with their actual opponents and enemies. And what
the story is about is that them learning
that's what we've been doing, and we've gotta
stop doing that. And so you can... The
way that I put it is that you're
declaring your moral independence. We're assuming our place
as
individuals
in the world and in our society, and
we're not gonna be treated, like, second class
citizens,
there to be exploited. It's that's what the
novel about. And in that sense, it's it
is
parallel to the story of the creation of
America itself.
Right. So the 2 pro protagonist ski is
on the 1 hand, the protagonist of July
fourth, the founding fathers. And when it comes
to ultra strikes, it's ai rand.
So listening to your talk, 1 gets the
idea that Time run fills this
spiritual
bond towards the founding fathers. So how does
hair ideas relate to the ideas of the
founding fathers?
Yes. She had profound
admiration for the founding fathers for the creation
of America and particularly for the declaration of
independence, and that's another link of why I
titled it. Like this, she called the declaration
of independence,
the greatest
political document in human history.
And and she meant it. Like, what that
was not hyper, she meant that
So the
the...
She thinks of herself
as champion
and defending America and 1 way you can
look at it to to make it
to focus it. In the
declaration, probably,
the most radically new idea, and there's a
lot of radical new ideas in the declaration
is
that an
individual should
pursue his own happiness. He has the right
to do that. That right should be protect
it. Governments are instituted to protect his rights
and
and the end of what he's after is
to achieve his own happiness.
That's at a political level. If you ask
it a moral level, does
anybody champion and fend the pursuit of happiness.
When we mean it as each
individual
pursuing their own
individual happiness,
The answer is no. No 1 does until
I ran an Atlas shrugged. And so to
think of it, like, what is it that
she is
celebrating and then giving a much deeper
explanation and defense for. It's the idea that
morally
you should you should it's right morally right
to pursue your own happiness. And that's what
the at the shrugged is about and about
the heroes of the story,
learning to do that and learning to do
that fully. And it's, again, it's it's a
a deep
and
profound
tie to what the declaration of independence and
the American revolution is about if you understand
it at a deep philosophical level.
Right. 1 last question because I know everyone
in our audience is looking forward to the
broadcast is looking forward to the lecture itself.
But I have to ask you. You gave
this lecture in 2007.
We are at 2024.
Looking back
and comparing 2007
2 today. Are you more optimistic about where
the country is going, are you more optimistic
that this moral revolution that I run and
vi envisioned can actually take place?
I'm more optimistic in this sense. It's
our mission at the institute at at I,
where you work where I work at. Ina
ran Institute is to get Ina iran's new
ideas and especially her new moral ideas, the
moral
revolution that she's launching an Atlas shrugged to
get that into more people's minds
And 1 of the ways to do that
is to get atlas shrugged into more people's
hands into readers or gonna to to consume
the book and the story, and it as
you know, it's a it's a mystery story.
It's an exciting story. So it... It ignites
a lot of young people.
We're grow. I mean, Ari ai,
we're trying to get bigger and bigger, but
we've... I've been here 20 plus years, and
we've
doubled or tripled in size since I've been
here. So we're getting more effective at getting
our message out. But we know it's a
long term
struggle. And it's and it's a it's a...
Our mission is long term. It's not, like,
we're gonna convince people in 5 years or
10 years. We're gonna convince more people. 5
years from now than now. And again, more
people 10 years from now than 5. But
it... It's... This is a mission that's gonna
take time. It's part of why we need
support because it's a long change project.
And I don't think there's anything more difficult
than changing people's moral ideas. So to get
to to people to understand
this enlightenment
idea that the pursuit of happiness
is what your life should be about, and,
again, the should means morally should.
That is... They're being taught from all kinds
of
directions and avenues, the opposite of that. So
for this idea to really take hold. It's
gonna be long term. It's it's a long
term prospects. But the idea is right,
and the proof of this, and this is
I ran off and said that the proof
that the idea is right, is the success
of America, and particularly its success
so insofar as it lived up to the
promise of the declaration of
independence. And so
what we should be seen is success building
upon
success. And as people get more interested in
Ina rand and her ideas, they achieve success
in their own lives and they dedicate their
own lives to the pursuit of their own
happiness. And when people see that, it's... They
effect on in. Like, I want some of
that. And that's how the the ideas and
the philosophy will grow, and I'm certainly optimistic
long term. That this will succeed.
1 last thing before we travel back in
time to 2007
and we find ourselves in that beautiful hotel
where the talk was given. I have a
request for our viewers.
Help us get this book in the hands
of more people. Picture this. Picture an idea
young person, which is already burning with the
fire of
wanting to do something with their life of
wanting to change the world of wanting to
be something be given than what they are
at the moment, and imagine that young the
realistic person coming
into contact with Atlas tract. This is what
we are trying to do, but we need
your help. So you have the chance right
now to help us By going to in
rand dot org slash donate
end
whatever
you think is
is whatever you can give to help us
again, pass the button of this model revolution
to more and more young people.
So now we are going to
proceed to the actual
broadcast will be in the same stream.
I will be in the comments and we
are all what's together this
talk by An, but from 2007,
Atlas Sr, American second declaration of independence. On.
Thank you very much. And
I'll see the 2007
non card in a few seconds in the
script.
Great. Thanks Steve. Let's begin.
The Ina rand institute mission. Is no doubt
an ambitious 1.
We're trying to help bring about an intellectual
change in the culture.
That will restore and revitalize
America's
foundation.
And perhaps our most important activity in this
regard. Is to get Ina Rand novels
into the hands of Americans.
And the most vital of her novels to
get into their hands is atlas shrugged.
Now why?
Why do we believe that the foundation of
America needs restoring
And what does a novel a work of
fiction have to do with anything,
much less with the course of a culture
and the fate of a nation.
Now, these are the questions I'm gonna try
to answer tonight.
My focus is not gonna be on the
novels, on the details of the novels story.
And I'm gonna try to avoid as many
plots oil as I can for those who
have not yet read the enough.
My focus is going to be on atlas
shrug cultural importance.
Now to understand that cultural importance, we must
first rewind
about 230
years
to the birth of the nation
and see what the American
revolution,
both accomplished
and failed to accomplish.
It's easy to forget how radically new an
idea America is.
The founding fathers invented a new form of
government.
All previous forms of government had concentrated
power into the hands of the state at
the expense of the individual.
The theo placed power into the hands of
priests and pope,
who as spokesman for the supernatural
or to be ab obeyed without question.
Monarchy
placed power into the hands of a king
or a queen,
whose subjects lived and died by the rulers
Edi.
Ari
placed power into the hands of a hereditary
elite.
Who tram on members of the lower classes.
Democracy placed power into the hands of the
majority
who could do whatever they wish to the
minority.
In all these systems, rec
individuals
were dealt with in the same way.
They were greeted with the instruments of physical
comp
with imprisonment,
torture
death.
The priests placed galileo
under house arrest and burned bruno at the
stake.
The king beheaded, Thomas Moore.
The aristocrats
tram upon the individual peasants on mass.
Sometimes to literally so that literally they could
bathe in the peasant blood.
The at opinion democracy
ordered
socrates to drink Hem.
To all such outrageous, the founding fathers said
no more
They devised a political system
that placed power into the hands of the
individual at the expense of the state
The individual they declared
possesses the ina in both rights to life,
liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
The government does not stand above the individual
as is master.
The government stands below the individual as its
servant.
To secure these rights, Jefferson wrote in the
declaration of independence,
governments are instituted among men
deriving their just powers from the consent of
the government.
And if a government tres on the rights
of the individual, quote, it is the right
of the people to alter or to abolish
it and to institute new government.
Close quote.
Now in the declaration, the founding fathers were
of course declaring
independence from great britain.
But more deeply, they were declaring independence from
priests and from kings from a aristocrats and
from the will of the majority.
They were creating a sanctuary
for individuals, for individuals with un bound minds
for the galileo and the socrates of the
world who are now to meet with a
different fate.
Now what motivated
the founding fathers to take the incredibly dangerous
action of creating a new country.
Why? Did they risk their lives, their fortunes
and their sacred honor?
The
the key to understanding the founding father's
motivation is that they were this worldly
fact based
ideal,
As students of the enlightenment of Europe's age
of reason, the founding fathers believed in the
perfect
of man
If man un
uses his rational mind. And if he carefully
studies and
formulate the methods by which in fact human
values. And prosperity are achieved,
then perfection they held. Here on Earth was
possible to man.
This is precisely what the founding fathers did
with respect to the subject of government.
They painstakingly
studied the forms and the history of governments.
In order to define a perfect method of
governance.
The result was the constitution of the United
States
along with its system of checks and balances,
which were designed to prevent the emergence of
any
absolute power.
Now to most British subjects, British rule was
good, which comparatively speaking to the rest of
the world it was,
and it was good enough.
But to the founding father's good was not
good enough.
As ideal, they sought perfection.
And when they saw the possibility for action,
therefore they rebelled when few other men would
have done so.
Now to burn with this type of ideal,
requires a profound self esteem.
It requires a spirit that wants to see
perfection made real
for itself and in its own life.
Genuine self esteem,
not that we're all okay variety,
isn't earned esteem of one's own soul
It is the conviction that you are deserving
of success and happiness
because you are continually working to achieve these.
If you wonder about the imposing stature of
the founding fathers of men like Washington and
Jefferson.
This is the key. They were men of
genuine self esteem. Men who took the perfection
of their own lives
mind,
character and happiness with the utmost seriousness.
They were abstract thinkers and doors,
men of wide and constantly expanding air addition,
who are also lawyers, farmers,
printers, business owners,
architects, and inventors.
Now this kind of individual will jealous guard
his freedom
is freedom to follow his own judgment
to make his own choices and to enjoy
the values
and wealth he creates.
To such an individual, the issue of his
own perfect
is a daily reality.
Which he will allow no 1 to use
to such an individual, the idea that he
is sinful,
are rational or a miserable creature,
desperately in need of a superior to tell
him what to do has no reality.
This kind of individual will allow no king
or a government to dictate his convictions
or dispose of his fortune and life.
Not for any reason or to any degree.
For the founding fathers, the motto live free
or die had real meaning
Without freedom, they would be dead. Their mode
of existence would be dead, their un
un bound pursuit of their own perfection would
be dead.
And so they thought.
The declaration of independence was a
declaration of self esteem.
It was a
declaration of self esteem.
But the founding father's achievement is eroding.
They would be shocked by the power that
is now concentrated
in the hands of the American government at
the expense, of the individual.
Can you imagine Jefferson
submitting to building inspectors
who would decide if Monte monticello is up
to code.
Or pleading with Fda officials to take an
experimental drug
that according to his scientific judgment is beneficial
or allowing social security administrators to dictate how
much he has to save for his retirement
and where he has to invest it.
Or patiently patiently watching the tax collector as
he takes his money away and pours it
down the aid drains of Africa.
Can you imagine him pros
himself before the Fcc
who would determine if it's broadcast content is
obscene.
Can you imagine Thomas Jefferson seeking the government's
permission to smoke a cigarette in a restaurant,
eat a irr spinach,
screw in and and in incandescent light bulb,
or buy a trans fatty French fry.
And yet, today,
Americans do not have the self esteem to
protest these user patients of their judgment, their
choice, their freedom.
America's
declaration of self esteem has not taken full
root.
Why not?
Now although the core of self esteem is
an earned confidence in one's power to think
and to produce,
which Americans have earned in abundance
Full self esteem
requires that 1 self consciously,
value 1 self.
Full self esteem requires that 1 know x
explicit
moral terms that 1 is good and why.
This positive moral
evaluation. It's and self evaluation. The
declaration of independence does not fully provide and
the founding fathers cannot not provide
The European enlightenment had promised to put morality
on a rational,
scientifically
and mathematically precise
foundation,
but it could never deliver on its promise.
And far too many of its intellectual leaders
assumed that the content of morality
would be essentially Christian morality,
stripped of its mystical trapping,
and somehow
defended by rational argument.
The founding fathers agreed with the European
intellectual.
Jefferson for instance made his own
compilation of Jesus
teachings.
Jefferson
compilation, which omit the miraculous from the new
testament
includes the sermon on the mount.
Indeed, Jefferson in a letter refers to Jesus
as, quote, the sublime preacher of the sermon
on the mount, close quote.
Now ask yourself this,
Does the sermon on the mount not ind
incite Jefferson
and the other founding fathers as evil?
When the British struck America's right cheek,
did Jefferson in the declaration Tele america to
turn to offer them the left.
Did Jefferson love his enemies or did he
go to war with them?
Did Jefferson, who had a gallery of war
in his home? Portraits of men like isaac
Newton and John Lock
think that the blessed or the poor in
spirit.
Or that the only people worthy of admiration
or those who choose to make something of
their spirit.
Did Jefferson and and the other founding fathers?
Think that the meek shall inherit the yours
earth or that the rational and the industrial
is shell.
Did Jefferson give up riches?
Or did he seek them?
On every essential,
the founding fathers did the opposite of what
the Sermon commands?
And that's what because the sermon on the
mount is a
declaration of war on self esteem
is a declaration of war on self esteem.
Anyone who has achieved anything
and taken pride and joy his accomplishments
is condemned by Jesus.
Woe unto to you that are rich
for you have received your
consolation.
Woe to you that are full. For y
shall hunger.
Won't to you that laugh now for y
shall mourn and weep.
Well, who then has a right to feel
good about themselves
according to the sermon,
the meek and the poor and spirit,
which means
those who have little cause to esteem themselves.
So you can look at America's history
this way.
The founding fathers created a new form of
government, and thereby opened up a comp a
continent to their kind of men.
Men of self esteem
individuals who were ready to drop their backward
cultures and work for a better future.
Individuals who value themselves so highly.
That they sought the best for themselves and
in themselves by coming to America.
But the founding fathers left these people unable
fully to understand or appreciate their own greatness,
open to every form of abuse and vulnerable
to every sort of moral den pronunciation,
and the den
soon came.
The new country had explode into an org
of productive.
Most responsible for this prosperity
were men who had never had a chance
to exist before, to capitalist,
and industrial list,
oil,
steel,
new financial instruments,
railroads,
these and other innovations, the rockefeller,
the Carnegie, the Jp Morgan's and the Van
builds
brought into the new world, and taught men
how to value.
For this, they weren't denounced as robert barons.
In essence, it was Jesus voice rising against
them
woe to you that are rich for Yi
shall suffer,
woe to you that build railroads and oil
derrick, for yi shall mourn mourn and weep.
And more than just moral
pronunciations came.
If America was to be the land of
the ideal. As the founding fathers had promised.
And if the ideal is in fact that
the meek and the poor and spirit Shall
inherit at the earth, that America's government needed
drastic
overhaul.
All the new government powers,
the alphabet soup of regulatory
agencies that Jefferson would have rebelled against were
justified by attacking the men of self esteem
in the name of the meek and the
re.
For instance, what is the moral
justification for the Fda's existence?
Rich?
Greedy drug companies.
I. E. Those who discover and manufacture life
saving compounds
will exploit an experiment on hap less patients.
So the government must oversee the companies every
move?
Besides how can the meek be served
unless the government, so through its process of
approvals and rejections,
favors the kind of drugs the meek need?
And how can the poor spirit achieve blessed.
If in their mindless,
they pop some pill that they should have
known 1 might kill them. So to protect
the bless it from their own rationality.
We need wise government officials to tell everyone
what pills they may and may not swallow.
Or what is the moral
justification for the creation of social security.
To quote from the administration's website in an
article
about the history of social security, it is,
quote, the government's duty to to provide for
the welfare of the poor
close quote. If a person is too meek
to provide for his old age
then those who are richer should be forced
to provide for his retirement.
If a person is too ignorant or irresponsible
to save for his own retirement, if he
is that poor and spirit,
then the government must step in, and in
his name, strip everyone of control over their
retirement plans.
Or what was the moral
justification for the income tax ratified in 19
13,
soak the rich.
Now to all of this, to whatever form,
the sacrifice of men of self esteem. To
men without self esteem takes.
I'm rand and Atlas shrug says
no more.
In 1 of the world's great acts of
independence,
Iran declares in effect
that the essence of the sermon on the
mount,
along with everything it pre
and everything it implies
is evil.
The idea that the good
consistent achieving the good of others of your
neighbors of your country, even of your enemies,
of anyone or anything, real or imagine that
is not you. The idea that you must
sacrifice your personal values with even without even
the
expectation of return,
The idea that nobility means being selfless
and wicked means being concerned with self.
The idea that morality is synonymous with alt
and immoral morality synonymous with ego ism.
All of this is challenged in Atlas run.
On this of this whole approach to good
and evil.
Rand asked questions no 1 dared to ask.
What she asked?
Is the good
according to this morality?
Now supposedly is that you achieve the good
of others.
But what then is there good.
Well presumably that they achieved the good of
still other people.
But then we're again faced with the same
unanswered question,
what is the good of these other people?
To the question, what is the good?
This approach to around the actually offers no
answer.
It gives you only a chain of arrows,
leading to nowhere,
a string of zeros.
Adding up to nothing.
The code uphold no ultimate value,
no positive
ideal.
It is un concerned with the main task
of ethics,
namely of defining the good that men must
live up to.
Now what does this do to men in
actual practice?
It means that it's in possible to know
whether 1 has ever achieved the good
or failed in the attempt.
Now what is this do to a man
of self esteem?
To anyone striving to be good?
This code declares that you have never done
enough.
No matter how much you've sacrificed.
You can never achieve your own moral.
You can never reach the good.
Have you ever wonder why the demands for
sacrifice can continue to grow and grow.
The income tax, for instance started off as
something that would only of, of course apply
to the very rich.
And which of course would be capped at
7 percent of income.
But then it grew to 15 percent, 20
percent, 25 percent, of all income and included
in its clutches more and more productive citizens.
Now can we at any stage
protest that we've sacrificed enough that we've already
achieved the good of others.
Don't be so naive.
Who said the good is achievable.
Or why is it decade after decade as
the Us pours money into Asia, Africa and
the Middle East?
Still more hand outs are demanded from us.
Can we ever protest that we've sacrificed enough
that we've achieved the good of others?
Don't be so naive.
Why do you think the good is achievable.
Therefore the result, to any rational person striving
to be good is a state of moral
anxiety,
self doubt and guilt,
No matter how much he has sacrificed.
The thought haunt him that he could have
sacrificed still more.
Most good people therefore stop trying to be
a hundred percent moral,
and they thereby abandon the quest, for self
esteem.
Now what are the sc rules who are
actually un concerned with being more?
No matter the nature of their concrete actions
or how dreadful the outcome so far. So
long as their motive is not self interest.
Anything is permitted to them.
Whatever they do, they retain the halo of
morality, self
Have you ever wondered why when the so
called humanitarian at the Un
produced debacle after debacle?
And corruption after corruption, their power and prestige
only increase.
Have you ever wondered why when government program
after government program leads to disaster
when social security
undermine a person's retirement and public
education undermine a child's mind.
The power of these programs only increases.
Have you ever wondered why as individuals were
murdered in the thousands
and tens of thousands in communist, Russia and
China. On on in the east and West
alike,
said,
give them more time. They may eventually achieve
the good of others.
Atlas shrugged gives us the answer.
Nothing can count its failure to achieve the
good of others
because nothing counts as success.
To quote from Atlas.
Quote,
the good of others is a magic formula
that transforms
anything into gold,
a formula to be recite as a guarantee
of moral glory
and is a fu for any action.
Even the slaughter of a continent.
You need no proof.
No reasons, no success.
All you need to know is that your
motive was the good of others, not your
own.
Your only
definition of the good is a.
The good is the non good for me.
Close quote.
So what we have here is a negative
morality.
This code is unable to specify the nature
of the good.
But it does define in precise detail, the
nature of evil.
To be concerned with advancing your own interest
is evil.
To escape evil, therefore, you must sacrifice
your values.
The concrete advice,
the code offers is sacrifice
sacrifice
and then sacrifice some more.
This is the real focus of the code
and why Rand names it the morality of
sacrifice.
Sacrifice your money to strangers who have not
earned it, pro preclude a sermon on the
mount and sacrifice you love to enemies you
hate.
Sacrifice the values of both matter and spirit,
sacrifice,
sacrifice.
But does the morality of sacrifice
not contain some enormous hidden double standard.
As I ran asked in Atlas shrugged, and
all further quotes will be from the novel
unless I indicate otherwise.
Quote,
Why is it moral to serve the happiness
of others, but not your own.
Why is it immoral to produce a value
and keep it? But moral to give it
away.
And if it is not moral for you
to keep a value,
why is it moral for others, to accept
it.
If you are selfless and virtuous when you
give it, are they not selfish and vicious
when they take it. Does the virtue consist
of serving vice?
Is the purpose of those who are good
self em inhalation for the sake of those
who are evil?
Close quote.
Now what is the sermon on the mount
answer to these questions.
Well, to quote again from Atlas,
the monstrous
answer is no. The takers are not evil,
provided they did not earn the value you
gave them. It is not immoral for them
to accept it,
provided they are unable to produce it,
unable to deserve it,
unable to give you any value in return.
Quote.
Why, for instance, do drug companies not have
the right to sell their inventions to anyone
eager to buy them?
Because the companies invented them.
Now why do we the public through the
Fda,
have the right to dictate what drugs these
companies can and cannot sell.
How they have to research, test,
manufacture and label the drugs,
what uses the drugs can be prescribed for
and who can purchase them? What gives us
this incredible power?
The fact that we didn't invent the drugs.
Or why does an employee not have the
right to invest all as income as he
judge best for his old age?
Because he earned the money.
Why do we the public
have the right to take part of his
income, pool it into a so called insurance
scheme and dole it out to whoever supposedly
needs it.
Because we didn't earn the money.
Quote,
such as the secret core, of your creed.
The other half of your double standard.
It is immoral to live by your own
effort, but moral to live by the effort
of others,
It is immoral to consume your own product,
but moral to consume the product of others.
It is the parasites
who the moral just... Vacation for the existence
of the producers,
but the existence of the producers
is an end in itself.
Close, quote,
Now if you want just 1 contemporary example
to fix in your mind, the gruesome essence.
Of the morality of sacrifice
and what it does to self esteem,
consider America's response to 09:11
When the twin towers collapsed,
many people in the Middle East danced in
the streets.
But others there, although sympathetic to the revel
sought to hide the revel reit, from view.
They worried that the attacks had gone too
far this time, and an America would refuse
to suffer such an outrage
They worry that our self esteem was not
completely strangled,
and that their gl would revive it,
They worried about our ind nation and our
wrath.
And there were some signs of this on
the part of the American people. There was
some anger and some desire for revenge.
People wanted bush to do something.
Responding to the country's mood, the administration promised
a campaign of shock
and the extraction of infinite justice.
But then there is no doubt bush ash
himself,
what would Jesus do?
Tragically, it was 1 of the few questions
to which Bush knows the answer.
Operation infinite justice was renamed.
Gone was the extraction of justice,
replaced by the goal of bringing democracy to
the Middle East so that its inhabitants can
elect whomever they wish.
Killers emphatic not excluded.
A campaign of shock and us did steal
materialize,
but not in the way originally meant.
Imagine the utter shock of the Islamic warriors
and their numerous supporters.
When they realized that it was not Us
bombs dropping on their heads,
but packets of lentils,
barley stew,
biscuits,
peanut butter, and strawberry jam,
along with the message.
This is a food gift from the people
of the United States of America.
Imagine the awe they must have felt at
their own power
they had attacked the Pentagon and toppled the
twin towers,
and this had brought them not Us soldiers
bent on their complete destruction.
But Us soldiers bent on rebuilding their hospitals
in moss and bringing them the vote.
The young soldiers all the while dying in
the process.
We are proving to these people that the
meek shall inherit the earth and that blessed
indeed or the poor in spirit.
The power these killers feel is real.
It is granted to them by the morality
of sacrifice,
Now, the sermon on the mount and all
its variations through the centuries.
Atlas shrugged reveals is a morality of evil
and 4 evil.
But it has a fatal flaw.
It requires that it that its victims
accepted.
Quote,
I saw that the enemy was an inverted
morality.
And that my sanction was its only power.
I saw that there comes a point in
the defeat of any man of virtue. When
his own consent is needed for evil to
win.
I saw that I could put an end
to your outrageous by pronouncing a single word
in my mind.
I pronounced it.
That word was
no.
This is the beginning of In iran's declaration
of moral independence.
To win one's moral independence, 1 must first
say no to the corrupt ideal of sacrifice.
1 must reject as un unspeakable evil,
any morality that demand sacrifices,
whether the sacrifice of your values to the
mis fortune or a rationality of others or
the sacrifice of their values to your mis
fortune or a rationality.
Whether it be a relative
demanding an attention he has not earned or
the latest healthcare scheme from Washington,
promising to give us something for nothing by
soaking the rich.
1 must say no.
The moment the good requires victims. It cease
to be good.
To win one's moral independence 1 must uphold
the individual's moral right to exist,
beginning with one's own,
you have the right to exist a moral
right to your own life and to trying
to achieve happiness
within its days and years.
No 1 has a moral right to man
that you gain his permission to exist by
sla administering to his needs and protecting him
from his own shortcomings.
No 1 has a claim on your life.
The moment someone waves his pain or need
or failures around,
proclaiming that it is these that ent him
to your values,
he removes himself from any moral
consideration.
The founding fathers grasped
politically
that no 1 gains a right to your
life, by virtue of his real or alleged
superiority.
Neither priest nor king nor a ari democrat
nor the majority gains a right to your
life by of superior social
position, mystic visions,
ancestors,
wealth or numbers.
What must now be grasped morally
is that no 1 gains a claim to
your life by virtue of his real or
alleged
inferior.
No 1 gains a moral claim to your
life by virtue of his inferior wealth,
power,
happiness,
intelligence,
ability,
knowledge or judgment.
What this means is that your moral stature
not at the mercy,
of someone who has failed or perhaps could
not even be bothered
to provide for his own health or retirement
So politically,
the
declaration of independence taught us to reject the
notion of un
served.
Morally,
Atlas
teaches us to reject the notion of unearned
guilt.
Now in place of unearned guilt,
1 should embrace the nature of one's existence
as an individual human being,
a being that must seek and create values
in order to remain vibrant
alive.
This is the pre condition of self esteem
to seek in all things the best for
1 oneself,
to embrace life is to recognize that the
whole act of valuing
arises in the context of one's own life
and the need to make it go well.
From a child choosing a toy to a
teenager choosing a friend to an adult choosing
a career
or a lover or a form of government?
The need to do so arises from the
same question.
What will advance my life?
The pre condition of self esteem is to
refuse as the founding fathers refused to settle
for anything less than the ideal in one's
life.
And to this quest for the ideal, morality,
properly conceived is an indispensable aid.
Its task is to teach you fully, what
the value
and how to value.
Its task is to teach you how to
achieve life. And happiness.
Alice shrugged accordingly offers a new conception
of the moral ideal
a new conception of the sacred and the
exalted,
far different from that of the sermon on
the mount.
Fundamental to Atlas new moral code or the
action requirements
of life and happiness.
Central to its new ideal, therefore,
are the virtue of thought
production, and trade,
thought,
production, and trade.
Atlas shrugged is a him to man's mind.
Every value that man is achieved
had to first be discovered by some individual
mind
from picking fruits to hunting with spears to
planting crops in order to harvest them only
months later.
From the invention of theater, as a source
of enjoyment and emotional fuel to the discovery
of perspective in painting, to the creation of
music and then of more and more complex
harmon and forms of composition. From the
identification of the laws of motion to the
formulation of the laws of logic
from the discovery of germs and antibiotics
to the invention of the transistor and the
computer
For each of these steps,
some mind had to figure it out.
This is the source of human life and
happiness.
To worship life, therefore,
means to worship man's intelligence.
And if it is one's own life that
1 seeks then the development of One's intelligence
becomes the most fundamental
of goals
to learn to think to make connections, and
to see farther than what has so far
seen to learn to think carefully,
systematically,
logic
objectively,
to learn to see the full implications of
one's ideas.
All this becomes the most important of tasks.
The scope of one's knowledge and the power
of one's thinking will dictate the success or
failure of all one's value pursuits.
From earning a university
degree to succeeding as a doctor or computer
programmer or Ceo
to raising kids who competent, well behaved and
independent.
For rand as for the founding fathers
Abstract thought is not a game in which
1 cynical marvel at the alleged paradoxes of
the universe.
Thought,
abstract thought. Is purposeful.
It demands a serious
dedication to one's life.
It demands the honesty of a mind seeking
all the facts
because of these and only these will dictate
its conclusions about how to act.
It depend it demands the independence of a
mind reaching its own verdict. No matter how
many people say otherwise.
It demands the integrity of a mind committed
to acting on its own.
Considered judgments.
Thought is purposeful.
Thought is selfish.
Thought is for the sake of production.
Which brings us to the second production.
The of production atlas the shrug shows means
a dedication to making the ideal
real.
It means far more than holding a job
is a dedication to the work of, quote,
we're making the earth in the image of
one's values.
It represents the proper union of the spiritual
and material.
What Atlas drug shows is that the souls
of an artist and of an industrial list
are 1 in the same.
The artist has a new vision of beauty
of what could be, and he strive to
give it material form
to e a sculpture of a woman to
paint a beautiful landscape
or to write ser d.
The industrial list has a new vision of
prosperity
of what could be,
whether it be railroads, chris cri crossing the
continent,
a metal
superior to steel
or a computer on every desk,
and he works endlessly to bring his vision
into existence.
All production is born of a dedication to
one's life and reality.
It is the earthly form of ideal.
And without it, there is no self esteem.
Now the producer in his dealings with other
men
demands and non sac
mode of existence.
In issues of both matter and spirit. In
money and in love, he is a traitor
Quote,
a traitor does not ask to be paid
for his failures.
Nor does he ask to be loved for
his flaws.
Just as he does not give his work,
except in trade for material values.
So he does not give the values of
his spirit. His love his friendship, his esteem,
accept payment and in trade for human virtue.
In payment for his own selfish pleasure.
Which he receives from men he can respect.
Close quote.
Trade is moral,
not because it achieves the welfare of the
meek. Or the wealth of the nation.
Trades
justification is not that it's somehow commute selfish
into self sacrifice.
Adam Smith's invisible hand, taken as a
justification is corrupt.
Trade needs no outside
justification.
The
justification of trade is precisely that it's trade.
It's an interaction in which each person is
able to pursue his self interest.
It is the only form of interaction, in
which men meet 1 another as equals, not
as exploit and exploited it.
What is the result?
What happens when say? You trade your paycheck
for a new computer.
Both parties achieved their self interest. You both
obtain something more valuable to you than that
which you give up.
Trade is the only form of human interaction
that it once demand self esteem.
It demands that each trader be seeking the
best for his own life.
And in turn allows each person to preserve
his self esteem because he has neither sacrificed
his self to others.
Nor try to cheat reality through the double
standard of demanding sacrifice of others to self.
Trade,
production and thought.
These form the core of atlas rug new
life based morality.
Now notice how stark this ideal contrast to
the sermon on the mount religious conception of
morality.
Faith, hope and charity
are its virtue.
Faith means belief in the absence of logic.
It is the opposite of thought.
Hope means that you are unable to reach
the ideal
that perfection is beyond you reach
but that that but that by God's grace,
you might obtain it in some alleged
life.
It is the opposite of working
to achieve the ideal in this life.
It is the opposite of production.
Charity
means giving yourself over body and soul to
your neighbor and even your enemy.
With the expectation of no return
It is the opposite of trade.
Jesus on the cross exhibited these virtue.
He had the faith. That there was an
other otherworldly father.
He had the hope that he would gain
the grace of this other otherworldly being
He had the charity to sacrifice his own
soul for those of sinner.
The result was his death.
For a morality of life, this cannot be
the image of the moral ideal.
What then is.
The great thinkers and producers,
the men of the mind,
the heroes of Atlas shrugged,
the scientists,
philosophers,
artists,
inventors and industrial
who make a human mode of existence possible.
Individuals like Aristotle, newton,
Edison and Rockefeller.
Remember Jefferson gallery of war,
Who were some of the individuals included in
it, other than himself?
Philosophers like Francis Bacon and John Lock,
scientists like Isaac Newton and Benjamin Franklin,
political thinkers and men of action, like Volta,
T and Thomas Pain.
In Iran's terms,
men of the mind.
And this in a nutshell is the greatness
of the American
revolution.
It was the possibility
of such ideal men that served as its
motive power.
And the tragedy of the revolution is that
Jefferson and the other founding fathers
still thought of Jesus as the sublime preacher
of the sermon on the mount.
What atlas shrug shows
is that the choices either or
and more, it shows us the Jefferson gallery
of war
or worthy of that which they had never
been granted
before.
Moral
fact,
moral
admiration, and moral esteem.
In atlas shrugged, the character of hank rear
is the representative of the man of self
esteem of the true America.
Rear is a man of tremendous intellect
drive and productivity,
who is denounced for his ability.
And although he possesses the core of self
esteem, He's h by the thought that morally
he's un.
Atlas the shrug is a story of his
liberation.
To all such men of real self esteem
atlas the shrugged throws a lifeline
from the morality of sacrifice.
Quote,
They had known that theirs was the power.
I taught them that theirs was the glory.
Quote.
Now why did Ina rand do all of
this in the form of a novel?
Well precisely because her concern was the moral
ideal.
She wanted to give
material expression to her new vision of the
ideal.
The form in which 1 does this is
art.
The goal of my writing she said after
Atlas Shrug publication is the projection of an
ideal man.
Art allows 1 to experience the ideal made
real.
It allows 1 to inhabit that world for
a time.
As anyone who's read atlas the drug nose,
the
contemplation of a great work of art.
Is an unforgettable and indispensable
experience.
Now, I ran, of course knew that 1
can learn a lot from Atlas shrugged. But
she regarded this as a secondary benefit.
The book's primary
essential value is that within its pages, 1
experiences her new ideal made per
and real.
Any great romantic work of art is to
quote from 1 of her later essays
quote, an entity complete in itself, and achieved
realized
I movable fact of reality.
Like a beacon
raised over the dark crossroads of the world,
saying
this is possible.
Close quote.
And that's what Atlas shrugged is by presenting
a new moral ideal of what is possible
to man.
Atlas shrugged is America's second
declaration of independence.
Now having said this, I bet some of
you are still wondering,
is the comparison
out the shrug to the declaration of independence
really that exact.
After all, the declaration won the support of
the American people,
whereas Rand iran's new moral ideal has not
yet.
Now this is true, but I think
I mean, it's true only up to a
certain point.
First off, the declaration and the American
revolution hardly had unanimous support.
This did not stop the founding fathers from
change in the world.
Much more importantly, however,
although although Americans have not yet rejected
the morality of the sermon on the mount.
And embraced Ina iran's new morality of life,
they have embraced atlas shrugged.
Since its publication in 19 57,
Atlas shrugged has been popular.
Last year, it sold over a hundred and
30000
copies.
To be sure, the book is still regularly
ignored or lamp by many of the cultures
so called
intellectual.
But not so among the nation's citizens.
Atlas shrugged has already had a significant
impact on America.
And you can I believe see this impact
in 2 broad areas?
First, it has helped disarm evil.
And second, it has helped inspire the good.
Take the first issue.
Now today, it's hard to imagine. The twentieth
century
infatuation with socialist.
Despite a trickle and then a stream and
then a torrent of data about the misery
and deaths socialism was producing in the country's
experimenting with it.
Intellectual cl to it as the coming of
heaven on earth.
In America socialism was to come not by
revolution, but peace meal and by vote.
Now there were other insightful critics of socialism,
especially some economists,
but none was more penetrating than 9 rand.
In atlas shrugged and are later writings,
She stripped socialism of its cloak of rationality.
She showed it to be neo mystic,
a secular
version of religion of religion, a secular
version of religion.
The intellectual ignored or ridiculed Atlas shrugged in
an attempt to evade its existence,
but they knew the critique existed.
Now, a major
explanation of socialism lost appeal is, of course,
the devastation and death it produced in Britain
in Russia in Germany
and in China.
But my point is that that awareness of
the devastation was not sufficient for socialism
demise.
The socialists were always ready with an excuse.
Socialism had not been fully implemented,
or we didn't wait for the latest 5
year plan to bear fruit
or monstrous extremist like Stalin Hitler and M
have hijacked a peaceful system.
Socialism is noble in theory they cried, but
men aren't yet good enough to practice it.
We must try again.
Atlas the shrug showed that socialism is anti
life and practice
because it's irrational in theory.
Intellectually at the shrug made the choice confronting
the socialist clear.
Choose the men of the mind
by embracing capitalism
or choose to remain anti capitalist
by reno the men of the mind,
Most socialists chose to remain anti capitalist.
They were to thus revealed for the sn
meal that they are,
and Americans increasingly abandoned the left.
But not only did Atlas shrugged in this
way help give Americans some breathing room.
It also provided them with clean air to
breathe in,
When prominent
individuals in the culture are asked to name
the books that have had the most impact
on them, they regularly name Atlas Shrugged.
The number of times that Doctor Brooke, the
Institute executive director.
In his travels
meets successful businessman,
enthusiastic
about Atlas Road and its formative influence on
them.
Has ceased to surprises us.
Atlas the shrugged has given men of the
mind a sense that it is good to
produce,
It has inspired businessman and entrepreneurs by showing
them that their work is noble.
A significant
Aspect of the revival of the business in
the of business in the eighties,
and of the technological
and entrepreneurial revolution in the nineties,
in silicon Valley and beyond is this.
The participants implicitly think that what they are
doing is good.
This is a conviction that Atlas shrugged has
helped create.
Now at the intellectual level, Atlas Shrugged has
accomplished at least the following.
It has helped resurrect the idea of capitalism.
Before Atlas shrugged, capitalism was not just a
dirty word. It was an unspeakable word.
The book put it back on the intellectual
map.
And so although today the essence of capitalism
is still far from understood, the possibility
of it being understood now exists.
Atlas Rung has helped gain
recognition for human intelligence and ability
for man's mind.
Prior to atlas shrugged in
intellectual pratt on about human instincts,
material resources, and manual labor as the sources
of prosperity.
Today, many more people understand that the value
potential
contained in material resources and human labor
remains unrealized,
absent the actual source of prosperity,
human intelligence.
Today, companies and nations alike talk about the
importance of human capital.
Now these I believe are some of the
first steps in the march towards independence for
the men of self esteem.
In atlas shrugged, they have been inspired by
a vision of what can and should be.
However, it's true. They have not yet come
close to fully understanding that vision and the
conditions under which it can endure,
While the thinkers and producers of to... Sorry,
when the thinkers of and producers of today,
x explicitly talk about morality.
Some version of the sermon on the mount
usually still gus forth.
Moreover culturally, the intellectual have regroup.
Centuries ago after the brutality of religious rule,
the intellectual in effects said, the supernatural
version of the sermon on the mount has
failed.
So let's try the secular version.
Today, what we are beginning to see.
Is the intellectual saying that the secular version
of the sermon on the mountain has failed?
So let's
retry the supernatural
version.
It's always a game in which tails you
lose heads they win.
So what remains to be done to in
fact make at shrugged America's second declaration of
independence?
First, we must recognize that the hardest thing
in the world for someone to do is
question his moral code and embrace a new
1.
It is not an accident that in some
2000 years since the sermon on the mount,
only 1 individual has challenged that ab dismal
sermon
and proposed a radically new moral coat.
And this is why we must get atlas
the shrugged in as many hands as we
can't.
Especially among the young who are more willing
to question received wisdom.
We must learn and then continuously argue you
for In rand new morality of life and
against the morality of sacrifice.
And we must show the implications of each
code
for every important issue of the day.
In short, we must do the kind of
work that the institute is doing
on an ever increasing in scale.
And we should do this work not because
the world might go to hell in 30
or 40 years.
Although it might, that's not the issue. The
founding fathers did not create a new nation
because the world was about to go to
hell.
They create a new nation because they wanted
to achieve the ideal.
They were not motivated
by a negative, but by a positive
in the words of atlas shrugged,
it was not death that they wish to
avoid, but life that they wished to live.
In the name of what is possible and
on this, Atlas shrug fiftieth
anniversary, let us be grateful. For the ideal
and self esteem that atlas the shrug can
bring to our own lives if we work
at them.
And let us take our turn now. To
pledge our honor to achieving the ideal and
self esteem, which Atlas shrugged alone can bring
back to America.
Thank you.
Thank you for listening to the Ina Rand
Institute live.
Remember to subscribe wherever you listen. You can
also find on Youtube. If you like this
content, please share or leave us a review.
For more information, go to I rand dot
org.