The virtue of selfishness : a new concept of egoism

152 Pages·2005·0.98 MB·English

by  Ayn Rand

Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Introduction
Chapter 1. - The Objectivist Ethics
Chapter 2. - Mental Health versus Mysticism and Self-Sacrifice
Chapter 3. - The Ethics of Emergencies
Chapter 4. - The “Conflicts” of Men’s Interests
Chapter 5. - Isn’t Everyone Selfish?
Chapter 6. - The Psychology of Pleasure
Chapter 7. - Doesn’t Life Require Compromise?
Chapter 8. - How Does One Lead a Rational Life in an Irrational Society?
Chapter 9. - The Cult of Moral Grayness
Chapter 10. - Collectivized Ethics
Chapter 11. - The Monument Builders
Chapter 12. - Man’s Rights
Chapter 13. - Collectivized “Rights”
Chapter 14. - The Nature of Government
Chapter 15. - Government Financing in a Free Society
Chapter 16. - The Divine Right of Stagnation
Chapter 17. - Racism
Chapter 18. - Counterfeit Individualism
Chapter 19. - The Argument from Intimidation
INDEX
THE VIRTUE OF SELFISHNESS
“Ethics is not a mystic fantasy—nor a social convention—nor a dispensable,
subjective luxury.... Ethics is an objective necessity of man’s survival—not by the
grace of the supernatural nor of your neighbors nor of your whims, but by the
grace of reality and the nature of life.”
“The Objectivist ethics proudly advocates and upholds rational selfishness—
which means: the values required for man’s survival qua man—which means:
the values required for human survival—not the values produced by the desires,
the feelings, the whims or the needs of irrational brutes, who have never
outgrown the primordial practice of human sacrifices.”
Ever since their first publication, Ayn Rand’s works have had a major impact on
the intellectual scene. Her new morality—the ethics of rational self-interest—
challenges the altruist-collectivist fashions of our day. Known as Objectivism,
her unique philosophy is the underlying theme of her famous novels.
MORE WRITINGS BY AYN RAND
FICTION
WE THE LIVING
THE EARLY AYN RAND
NIGHT OF JANUARY 16TH
PHILOSOPHY
General
OBJECTIVISM: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand
by Dr. Leonard Peikoff
THE AYN RAND LEXICON
THE AYN RAND READER
PHILOSOPHY: Who Needs It?
THE VOICE OF REASON
FOR THE NEW INTELLECTUAL
THE OMINOUS PARALLELS by Dr. Leonard Peikoff
THE VIRTUE OF SELFISHNESS
Epistemology
AN INTRODUCTION TO OBJECTIVIST EPISTEMOLOGY
Politics / Economics
CAPITALISM: The Unknown Ideal
RETURN OF THE PRIMITIVE
Art, Literature & Letters
THE ROMANTIC MANIFESTO
THE ART OF FICTION
THE ART OF NONFICTION
JOURNALS OF AYN RAND
LETTERS OF AYN RAND
Available wherever books are sold or at
penguin.com

SIGNET
Published by New American Library, a division of
Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street,
New York, New York 10014, USA
Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto,
Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)
Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R ORL, England
Penguin Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2,
Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.)
Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124,
Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.)
Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park,
New Delhi - 110 017, India
Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore,
Auckland 1311, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.)
Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue,
Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa
Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices:
80 Strand, London WC2R ORL, England
Published by Signet, an imprint of New American Library,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
First Signet Printing, November 1964
eISBN : 978-1-10113722-2
Copyright © Ayn Rand, 1961, 1964 Copyright © The Objectivist Newsletter, Inc., 1962, 1963, 1964
All rights reserved
Permission requests for college or textbook use should be addressed to the Estate of Ayn Rand, PO Box
51808, Irvine, California 92619.
Information about other books by Ayn Rand and her philosphy, Objectivism, may be obtained by writing to
OBJECTIVISM, PO Box 51808, Irvine, California 92619.
Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the
copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-
party Web sites or their content.
The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the
permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic
editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of
the author’s rights is appreciated.
http://us.penguingroup.com
Introduction
The title of this book may evoke the kind of question that I hear once in a while:
“Why do you use the word ‘selfishness’ to denote virtuous qualities of character,
when that word antagonizes so many people to whom it does not mean the things
you mean?”
To those who ask it, my answer is: “For the reason that makes you afraid of
it.”
But there are others, who would not ask that question, sensing the moral
cowardice it implies, yet who are unable to formulate my actual reason or to
identify the profound moral issue involved. It is to them that I will give a more
explicit answer.
It is not a mere semantic issue nor a matter of arbitrary choice. The meaning
ascribed in popular usage to the word “selfishness” is not merely wrong: it
represents a devastating intellectual “package-deal,” which is responsible, more
than any other single factor, for the arrested moral development of mankind.
In popular usage, the word “selfishness” is a synonym of evil; the image it
conjures is of a murderous brute who tramples over piles of corpses to achieve
his own ends, who cares for no living being and pursues nothing but the
gratification of the mindless whims of any immediate moment.
Yet the exact meaning and dictionary definition of the word “selfishness” is:
concern with one’s own interests.
This concept does not include a moral evaluation; it does not tell us whether
concern with one’s own interests is good or evil; nor does it tell us what
constitutes man’s actual interests. It is the task of ethics to answer such
questions.
The ethics of altruism has created the image of the brute, as its answer, in
order to make men accept two inhuman tenets: (a) that any concern with one’s
own interests is evil, regardless of what these interests might be, and (b) that the
brute’s activities are in fact to one’s own interest (which altruism enjoins man to
renounce for the sake of his neighbors).
For a view of the nature of altruism, its consequences and the enormity of the
moral corruption it perpetrates, I shall refer you to Atlas Shrugged—or to any of
today’s newspaper headlines. What concerns us here is altruism’s default in the
field of ethical theory.
There are two moral questions which altruism lumps together into one