Mudita Journal

WWRD: What Would Roark Do?

February 25, 2004 · Filed under: Intellectual, Objectivism
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Diana’s public departure from The Objectivist Center is the hot topic of discussion among many Objectivists this week. When she posted her letter to the OWL discussion group, David Potts replied with what I found to be the most insightful and productive commentary on this subject so far:

Many readers can probably remember the first time they realized that their parents didn’t have all the answers. I myself recall when I, as a young child, asked my mother how far we could see. She said, “Oh, in flat county about ten miles.” I explained that this wasn’t what I meant, I meant how far in principle, if the eye were unobstructed. Of course, my question was based on a false assumption, and she couldn’t answer it. I’m not sure she ever quite understood what I was asking. The incident made a big impression on me. From that day, I understood that there were things she didn’t know much better than me.

Zoom forward a few years to one of my first graduate school philosophy seminars, on the theory of universals. This is years later, obviously, but still nearly twenty years ago. Someone in the class, in an exasperated tone, asked the professor in so many words if he couldn’t make his presentation clearer, since the student was having trouble. This professor was no slouch. He now teaches philosophy of science at the University of Pittsburgh and gives papers to groups like the Aristotelian Society in London. Anyway, his only answer was to mutter that we’re all (himself included) just trying to sort these matters out.

I trust the lesson of these parables for the current thread is clear. If you’re advanced enough in Objectivism to be frustrated at the lack of guidance from places like TOC and ARI — and this is a group that will include many OWL readers — do not assume that they are privy to special, still more advanced knowledge which they are for some reason failing to divulge to the rest of us. Like your parents and professors before them, though they may know more than you about many things, that doesn’t mean they have the answers to all the hard questions. Don’t be surprised if, in many areas, they like you are just trying to sort matters out.

I will go one step further. There is more to the above than that, if you belong to the advanced group of Objectivists I’m talking about, it’s time to stop expecting or hoping for enlightenment or mentoring or any other form of special illumination from cognoscenti at TOC or ARI. There is also the point that you may have to rely on yourselves for answers to the difficult philosophical questions that still confront you personally and that confront Objectivism. This reflection may be thrilling for some, terrifying for others, but when I look around I don’t see any other advanced guard of Objectivism. You’re it. Time to start acting like it.

Amen.

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