In this engaging 1959 interview, her first on television, Ayn Rand capsulizes her philosophy for CBS's Mike Wallace. The discussion ranges from the nature of morality to the economic and historical distortions disseminated about the "robber barons." She also comments on her relationship with Frank O'Connor, provides some autobiographical information and gives her perspective on the future of America.
Ayn Rand attacks altruism as evil and both defines and defends her philosophy of objectivism. Rand also explains how monopolies cannot exist unless they are supported by government erected barriers to competition.
Seeing as how we only have a few other interviews with Rand up here on Youtube, I thought I'd add this one to the list. Lesser known then the Phill Donahue or Wallace ones, it is still a treat to see her in action.
In her first public appearance since husband Frank O'Connor's death [November 9, 1979 ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayn_Rand#Later_years , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayn_Rand )], we see a rare personal side of Rand— As always, the ideas do shine through: the acknowledgement of achievement; the evils of altruism; American schools sacrificing the gifted for the less gifted; the nationalization of American oil interests in the Middle East; the fatal arguments for the existence of God;... and much more.
Rand's greatest influence was Aristotle, especially Organon ("Logic"); she considered Aristotle the greatest philosopher.In particular, her philosophy reflects an Aristotelian epistemology and metaphysics -- both Aristotle and Rand argued that "there exists an objective reality that is independent of mind and that is capable of being known."Although Rand was ultimately critical of Aristotle's ethics, others have noted her egoistic ethics "is of the eudemonistic type, close to Aristotle's own...a system of guidelines required by human beings to live their lives successfully, to flourish, to survive as 'man qua man.'" Younkins argued "that her philosophy diverges from Aristotle's by considering essences as epistemological and contextual instead of as metaphysical. She envisions Aristotle as a philosophical intuitivist who declared the existence of essences within concretes."
Ayn Rand was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, on February 2, 1905. At age six she taught herself to read and two years later discovered her first fictional hero in a French magazine for children, thus capturing the heroic vision which sustained her throughout her life. At the age of nine she decided to make fiction writing her career. Thoroughly opposed to the mysticism and collectivism of Russian culture, she thought of herself as a European writer, especially after encountering Victor Hugo, the writer she most admired.
Rand held that the only moral social system is laissez-faire capitalism. Her political views were strongly individualist and hence anti-statist and anti-Communist. She exalted what she saw as the heroic American values of rational egoism and individualism. As a champion of rationality, Rand also had a strong opposition to mysticism and religion, which she believed helped foster a crippling culture acting against individual human happiness and success. Rand detested many prominent liberal and conservative politicians of her time, including prominent anti-Communists, such as Harry S. Truman, Ronald Reagan, Hubert Humphrey, and Joseph McCarthy. She opposed US involvement in World War I, World War II and the Korean War, although she also strongly denounced pacifism: "When a nation resorts to war, it has some purpose, rightly or wrongly, something to fight for -- and the only justifiable purpose is self-defense."
Ayn Rand defected from the U.S.S.R. and came to the the U.S., where her anti-collectivist writings formed the intellectual basis for the philosophy she called Objectivism. She is the celebrated author of many books and essays including We the Living (1936), The Fountainhead (1943), Atlas Shrugged (1957), and Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal (1966).
This video is of Rand's last public lecture at a 1981 National Committee for Monetary Reform conference in New Orleans. The text of this lecture, which is titled "The Sanction of the Victims," would later be published in a collection of her works called The Voice of Reason: Essays in Objectivist Thought (1990).
In the lecture, Rand admonishes American businessmen for apologizing for capitalism and for, in some cases, directly funding detractors of the free market. Notably, she says that "It is a moral crime to give money to support your own destroyers." She also answers audience questions after the lecture.