Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Wiktionary
n. 1 The state of being objective. 2 moral objectivism. 3 (context philosophy English) Any of several doctrines that holds that all of reality is objective and exists outside of the mind. 4 The specific objectivist philosophy created by novelist http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayn%20Rand, endorsing productive achievement and logical reasoning.
Wikipedia
Objectivism is a philosophical system developed by Russian American writer Ayn Rand (1905–1982). Rand first expressed Objectivism in her fiction, most notably The Fountainhead (1943) and Atlas Shrugged (1957), and later in nonfiction essays and books. Leonard Peikoff, a professional philosopher and Rand's designated intellectual heir, later gave it a more formal structure. Peikoff characterizes Objectivism as a "closed system" that is not subject to change.
Objectivism's central tenets are that reality exists independently of consciousness, that human beings have direct contact with reality through sense perception, that one can attain objective knowledge from perception through the process of concept formation and inductive logic, that the proper moral purpose of one's life is the pursuit of one's own happiness ( rational self-interest), that the only social system consistent with this morality is one that displays full respect for individual rights embodied in laissez-faire capitalism, and that the role of art in human life is to transform humans' metaphysical ideas by selective reproduction of reality into a physical form—a work of art—that one can comprehend and to which one can respond emotionally.
Academic philosophers have mostly ignored or rejected Rand's philosophy. Nonetheless, Objectivism has been a significant influence among libertarians and American conservatives. The Objectivist movement, which Rand founded, attempts to spread her ideas to the public and in academic settings.
Objectivism, or Objectivist, may refer to:
- Any standpoint that stresses objectivity, including:
- Objectivity (philosophy), realism, the conviction that reality is mind-independent
- Moral objectivism, the view that some ethics are absolute
-
Objectivism (Ayn Rand), a philosophical system created by Ayn Rand that declares real knowledge to be metaphysically objective
- The Objectivist movement, a movement formed by followers and students of Rand's philosophy
- The Objectivist Party, an American political party espousing Rand's philosophy
- The Objectivist poets, a group of Modernist writers who emerged in the 1930s
Usage examples of "objectivism".
Nevertheless, science has progressed together with the ideology of scientific materialism that does embody a number of sacrosanct theories and a priori statements, namely the principles of objectivism, monism, universalism, reductionism, the closure principle, and physicalism.
A great irony regarding the violation of objectivism is that the academic psychologists who rejected introspectionism in favor of behaviorism were of the same generation as the pioneers of quantum mechanics.
The Newsletter deals with the application of the philosophy of Objectivism to the issues and problems of today’s culture—more specifically, with that intermediary level of intellectual concern which lies between philosophical abstractions and the journalistic concretes of day-by-day existence.