Naughty Nutrition

That's funny, those events also inspired me to re-read it. Interestingly, it was even worse the second time around, and by that I mean very poorly written with fantastical, cartoonish characters who were either hopelessly corrupt and pathetic or endlessly ideal. What's really ironic is that most of the people suggesting Rand's world is coming to realization are really Wesley Mooches who fashion themselves as John Gault. It's the bankers and other corporatists who live off the public teat the way Mooch's stooges do that pronounce themselves free-market followers of Rand's objectivism. I'm not sure what's funniest of all, whether it was one of Rand's own acolytes that less us down this road - Greenspan, or when I hear so-called conservatives worshiping a drug-addicted polygamist atheist.

Atlas Shrugged is arguably the greatest book ever written and I think "Ma" Chalmers has to be taken in the context of the time the book was written. In 1957, Vegetarians were the precursors to hippies and their values often associated with Communism or Socialism.

I wonder how Ayn Rand would feel today about many of the themes mentioned in passing throughout the book, such as smoking (not seriously considered as a health threat during the years she wrote Atlas Shrugged) and definitely food. My guess is, judging from all her writings, she did not give a lot of thought to food or what a proper philosophically-based diet should be.

There is, of course, no way to know for sure, but since Ayn Rand valued peace and abhorred killing except in the case of self-defense, I have to wonder if she would have become a proponent of a vegan diet. I am certain she would support the creation of in-vitro "fake" meat as a marvel of Man's scientific progress, though many vegans are adamantly against "test-tube" meat.

If we must be "meaty" (and there is no reason we must), we can at least end cruelty to other animals and factory farming while we do it.

This is an usual article. Diet is not the proper concern of Philosophy so Rand would have nothing to say of diet qua philosophy. She would say that one should form a judgement based on the latest dietary science. A lot of Objectivists incidentally sympathise with the Paleo diet.

A further point is that on killing animals Rand was ambivalent. The concept of killing only in self-defense only referred to humans because force against a human is a violation of his rights. Animals - in Objectivism - do not possess rights, this is because rights, in Objectivism, are politically defined concepts based on the needs of man to survive. It's a long chain of reasoning far beyond the scope of this comment.

It's a fair point though - Psychologists should resist the urge to campaign for government intervention "for our own good" when freedom is the proper way to allow a civil society to flourish.