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Ayn Rand's The Virtue Of Selfishness

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In Ayn Rand’s The Virtue of Selfishness, Rand trusts in the Objectivist ethics, which proudly advocates for rational selfishness. Most people think that when a man speaks of existing for his own self (selfishness), that he believes in a right to sacrifice others. Rand disagrees with this belief stating that a man’s self-interest can in fact be served by non-sacrificial relationships with others; selfish humans do not need to destroy others in order to achieve happiness. According to Rand, a man who is selfish is called a trader. A trader is a man who earns what he gets, treats everyone as independent equals, and does not grant his love to the weaknesses or flaws of others. Rand also realizes that only a selfish man is capable of love and happiness …show more content…

These people believe in making choices that positively affect others but negatively affect themselves. Rand looks at this as illogical to society. According to Rand, those who accept the ethics of altruism lack self esteem, lack respect for others, and are a nightmare view of existence due to their idea of men being trapped in a “malevolent universe” where disasters are the primary concern of one’s life. To help express her view of altruism, Rand gives the example of a man who can spend a fortune on his wife who he is passionately in love with in order to cure her dangerous illness or spend the fortune on saving the lives of ten other women who mean nothing to him, which is what the ethics of altruism would see as ethical. Altruists feel that the man is only sacrificing himself if he is helping those who are strangers, whom he has no love for; that would be an act of “selflessness” versus helping his wife which would be an act of “selfishness”. Rand sees this as absurd and says rational principle is just the opposite: “never sacrifice a greater value to a lesser one” (Rand,

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Use Of Controversial Material In Anthem, By Ayn Rand

632 Words | 3 Pages

(Part 1 Paragraph 65(It might be Paragraph 64, or 66)). Once again, Rand is not identifying stealing as tolerable, but by reading Anthem and understanding the actual reason for the We’s thievery, they can understand that in that specific case it was what was necessary for the character to progress in the

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'Individualism In Ayn Rand's Anthem'

518 Words | 3 Pages

Austin Xu Ms. Thixton English Pre-Ap 10/5/17 Individualism Is a Right Equality 7-2521 lives in a collective society where individuals only exist as part of a group and the rights to be an individual in the city is forbidden. In the novel, Anthem, Any Rand employs significant symbolism and artistic imagery in order to passionately display that individualism is a human right. Ayn Rand uses symbolism to display the importance of individualism to humanity.

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Individuality Is Not A Sin In Anthem, By Ayn Rand

511 Words | 3 Pages

Individuality Is Not a Sin Equality 7-2521 thought individuality was a sin, but later on knew it was not a sin. This is correct; not everything people do affects others in a way. In the book Anthem, by Ayn Rand, in a story where everyone is the same and no one is allowed to be different, there was one person named Equality 7-2521 who dared to be different. Equality discovered that is is okay to be an individual.

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Collectivism And Selfishness In Ayn Rand's Anthem

594 Words | 3 Pages

Selfishness and selflessness can be balanced, and this balance is crucial to a functioning

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Essay On Equality And The Golden One In Ayn Rand's Anthem

948 Words | 4 Pages

His mindset soon becomes to be very selfish even by ignoring Liberty. Rand gives her theme of selfishness that she believes would benefit us all if we would only try

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Ayn Rand's Utopi The Ideal Society

379 Words | 2 Pages

When reading a novel about the ideal society you begin think, this often leads to odd thoughts that you would have to share with your family unit if you had lived in this apparently perfect community. Just think about it, no homicide, no robbery, nothing that could possible put you or your assigned (yes, assigned) family in harm 's way, it really makes you ponder upon what you would be losing. But what about what you gain. We would call this place Utopia, a seemingly perfect, yet imagery (emphasis on imaginary) community. I prefer to think of it as a game, the only twist is you are the game creator your task is to keep everybody comfortable and relaxed, but still able to provide for themselves and others.

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Objectivism In Ayn Rand's Anthem

1284 Words | 6 Pages

We can see their eyes, green and yellow as coals, watching us from the tree branches beyond” (84). When he was living under the protection of the City, he was unaware of how to perform these tasks. However, once he left, he had to employ cognition to determine what he should do and how he should go about doing it. This was important to his survival, as Ayn Rand’s philosophy of objectivism states. The desire for individuals not to sacrifice themselves for others is present in

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The Effects Of Greed In The Monkey's Paw

353 Words | 2 Pages

In the short story "The Monkey's Paw", Mr. White, Mrs. White, and Herbert were all affected by the emotion greed. In the beginning, Herbert was a selfless boy that worked to support his parents. After the heard about the monkey paw, however, he turns into more of a wealth loving character. He finds out about the wishes and almost immediately starts talking about being "rich and famous and happy", he also told his father to wish to be emperor. This, in my opinion, is a bit greedy.

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What Is The Pursuit Of Wealth In The Great Gatsby

1439 Words | 6 Pages

His story warns that the pursuit of wealth—even as a means to an end—causes loss, despite the seeming gain. In order to achieve fulfillment, we must abandon that pursuit in favour of the direct pursuit of the things that would do

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Altruism In Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead

1302 Words | 6 Pages

Howard Roark is the embodiment of the perfect human being, as envisioned by Ayn Rand. Although utterly selfish, he is the only one in The Fountainhead to live his own life. From a young age one is taught that ‘it is better to give than receive’ and that to live a life of altruism is much more ethical than to live a life of selfishness. Roark does not follow these teachings. He denounces altruism - he lives a life of independent thinking which is not tainted by the world.

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Ellsworth Toohey In Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead

695 Words | 3 Pages

Toohey's explanation of his actions is a facade for his true motivation of gaining power and control over others. The author Ayn Rand does not agree with Toohey's assessment of his reason and portrays him as a villain who is willing to sacrifice the happiness and well-being of others to promote his agenda. Rand believes that individualism is a superior philosophy to collectivism and that Toohey's actions demonstrate the dangers of collectivism. Toohey's explanation of his actions is a facade for his true motivation of gaining power and control over others. The author Ayn Rand does not agree with Toohey's assessment of his reason and portrays him as a villain who is willing to sacrifice the happiness and well-being of others to promote his agenda.

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Examples Of Selflessness In The Fountainhead

470 Words | 2 Pages

In Ayn Rand’s Novel “The Fountainhead”, Toohey exhibits a type of selfish selflessness behavior due to the fact that his actions contradict his perplexing words. He tries to cover his true self with a blanket of sugar coated words, because he wants to seem so low, that people feel bad for him then in return he manipulates them into doing things for him without them knowing. This is also why he thinks of himself as selfless, because the other party doesn’t know what is truly happening. Even though Toohey is selfless because he doesn't gain power directly, he is selfish because he uses people for the sake of what he can do to them. It has been said that Toohey does not in fact care about man, but mankind itself.

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Ayn Rand's Argument Against Ethical Egoism

566 Words | 3 Pages

The philosopher Ayn Rand believed that an individual’s life is of the utmost importance, as is her well-being. She knew that altruistic ethics require individuals to sacrifice their own wellbeing and lives for the sake of others. With ethical egoism, and will value their own wellbeing above all others. So, she was for ethical egoism. Ayn Rand also had an argument against ethical egoism believing it is a mistake to treat the interest of some individuals as being less important than the interest of others.

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Character Development In Little Women By Louisa May Alcott

962 Words | 4 Pages

A person possessing a trait such as selfishness can control a human’s soul, which affects their will for change. People portray selfishness on a day-to-day basis, that they think it is a normal characteristic of a person. Amy is an example of a selfish sister in many ways. She burnt Josephine’s book

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Greed In Literature: A Literary Analysis

806 Words | 4 Pages

Greed is existent within all individuals despite how generous and altruistic one can be. Because of how commonly greed is seen in society, many authors have instilled selfishness as a part of literature for ages and still continue to do so. Thanks to this narrow-minded understanding everyone withholds, author such as Thomas Hardy, Tom Godwin and Shakespeare, present this self- centered understanding in a unique approach during the olden times. Although the past stories carry the same message quite thoroughly as did before, author such as Charles Bukowski are capable of exhibiting the same message in reach of his own poems. While going through the decades of literature, modern authors are now able to explain with scenarios society is able to relate to.

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