Talk:Objectivist movement/Archive 1

This is an archive of past discussions about Objectivist movement. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

The only sources given doesn't seem to match the criteria of WP:V. --Pjacobi 09:56, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Since there's no citation saying that Kelley has gained a more "mainstream" audience, I'm deleting the last sentence. Two things about the sentence strike me as suspect: 1) What does "mainstream" mean? It seems like a weasel word. 2) Kelley certianly doesn't have a BIGGER audience; the Ayn Rand Institute is four or five times the size of the Objectivist Center. Further, ARI has many more media appearances, especially on the biggest media outlets, like CNN, FOX, CBS, etc. LaszloWalrus 08:31, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

The term "mainstream" is awfully vague in this context, and should be kept out for that reason. Some ARI media appearances (e.g., Leonard Peikoff on the Bill O'Reilly show) have arguably helped to marginalize ARI, but there is no way to sort this issue out simply by enumerating media appearances, or estimating total readership or viewership. But then, I'm not sure that Objectivist organizations always wish to seen as "mainstream" anyhow. -RLCampbell (talk) 15:40, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

I've eliminated the statement saying that Peikoff believes that any conclusion not consistent with Objectivism is dishonest. He explicitly denies this in this essay: [1]. LaszloWalrus 23:41, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

No, Peikoff does not say what was attributed to him, and the allegation needed to be cut. However, he did say things like this: "if you grasp and accept the concept of “objectivity,” in all its implications, then you accept Objectivism, you live by it and you revere Ayn Rand for defining it. If you fail fully to grasp and accept the concept, whether your failure is deliberate or otherwise, you eventually drift away from Ayn Rand’s orbit, or rewrite her viewpoint or turn openly into her enemy." Actual quotations from Peikoff's essay would be beneficial. -RLCampbell (talk) 16:04, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Rename from Objectivist movement to Objectivism (movement)

I know the term Objectivism is/was primarily used to reference the philosophy, but isn't/wasn't the most common term used to reference the movement itself also Objectivism? If so, shouldn't the name of this article be something like Objectivism (movement) or Objectivism (the movement) rather than Objectivist movement? --Serge 05:43, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

Not sure, but I don't think so. This source distinctly talks about the "Objectivist movement" as distinct from "the philosophy of Objectivism", for instance. [2] RJII 06:01, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

Sure, some go to the trouble to differentiate, carefully. But see "And it's a kind of large-scale disaster for the philosophy and current movement of Objectivism"[3], "OBJECTIVISM AS A MOVEMENT AND LIVING PHILOSOPHY"[4], "Objectivism: The Philosophy and the Movement" by David Kelley[5], "In the article, McLemee traces the history and significance of the philosophy and movement of Objectivism."[6], etc. etc. The bottom line is that the term most commonly used to refer to the movement surrounding/advocating/promoting the philosophy of Objectivism is also Objectivism. The bottom line is that there are countless bonafide sources that use the term Objectivism to refer to the movement. I think many of the conflicts on the Objectivism article is that some see it as the movement, even though it's about the philosophy. Wouldn't it be helpful to be able to say, "Hey, you're talking about Objectivism the movement... go to Objectivism (movement)?" Telling him to go to Objectivist movement cannot be as effective because that person knows he's talking about Objectivism (the movement), not something called the "Objectivist movement" which he has never heard of. --Serge 06:30, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

Good points. I'm fine either way, but I'm leaning toward your suggestion. RJII 06:40, 21 June 2006 (UTC) On second thought, I'm fully behind you on this. RJII 06:42, 21 June 2006 (UTC) On third thought, I don't know. It almost seems like we would be propagating the confusion. I'll go either way. RJII 07:32, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

This article needs help

This article needs lots of help, I tagged it as such, and will get to work on it when I get a chance. Crazynas 07:12, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Length of citations

The lenght of some citations is way to long. Please summarize these citations, and include some footnoes if you must. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 04:22, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

Some of these contain a lot of useful info. For instance, it would be hard to summarize Walker's comparison to Hubbard as there are several similarities there that are worth mentioning. -- LGagnon 04:52, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

Maybe, but this is not an essay, it is an encyclopedia. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 03:23, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Merging

Unless there are any specific objections I will proceed with merging in a few days. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 02:31, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Censorship

So now we have a so-called admin edit-warring to protect Rand from charges of culthood. Gotta love it. Al 04:18, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

I would suggest that you keep your sarcasm at bay, and conduct this discussion civilly. I would also request that you take my involvement in this article in good faith. I am not protecting anyone from such charges, I am interested in this article being accurate and NPOV. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 04:33, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm sure. Thank you so much for threatening to block me. I'm certain you can see how this increases my willingness to assume good faith. I'm equally certain that you want this article to be as NPOV as the one about your Maharaji. Al 04:56, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

That was not no threat to block you, but a gentle remind you to stop using personal attacks as a way to make your point across, as you have already done several times in this and several other article. This is another reminder to: Do not engage in personal attacks. Discuss the article, not the editor And while I am it, I ask you to put a stop at you inuendo and false accusations, such as accusations of vote stacking, and others. As it pertains to the RfCs, I would also ask you to let the editors comment freely, without challenging each and every one of them. We know the dispute, let's hear what they have to say. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 14:58, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

For the record, please note that I cannot execercise my admin privileges in articles I am actively involved. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 16:01, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

This Article Definitely Needs Help

I have to agree with the above poster who said this page needs help. It does.

For one-- why is this article called "Objectivist movement" in the first place? It seems to discuss the controversy surrounding Objectivism and the responses to that criticism. That would lead me to expect a title like "Controversy over Objectivism" or "Objectivism: Support and Criticism" or even "Objectivism: Cult Accusations" or something like that. Setting aside the fact that the current contents of this article aren't well represented by the current title, "Objectivism movement" doesn't strike me as a very good title anyway-- why should the movement be a different article than Objectivism (Ayn Rand)? Normally we just incorporate the movement of supporters of a Philosophy into the article about the ideas Philosophy itself. Sure, we could make an argument that the IDEAS and the Movement are separate-- but it seems easier just to talk about the two in one article. In this case, however, all the current text is about the controversy-- there's really not a lot of "movement" text anyway. For the time being, I'd suggest moving most of the material here to a page named one of the other titles, so as to create a "Controversy and Responses" page. If you can put in enough stuff about the history of the Objectivism movement here, then keep it. If there's no objections, I may create the controversy page myself in a few days.

I notice that Responses to Objectivism duplicates some of the content in this page. The cult accusations part of that page should probably be merged over to the Controversy page. "The Ayn Rand Collective", "Ayn Rand Institute", "Nathaniel Branden", and "Leonard Peikoff" seem to have a lot of what I would expect to find in a page on the "Objectivist movement"-- so incorporate their text into this page as needed.

It doesn't seem to me that the Cult Accusations do a very good job of presenting its case. It mentions some people have called it a cult, but doesn't really explain their reasonings, etc. There have been whole books and websites about this-- I'm sure we could find some short concise discussions of why people feel it is a cult.

I also have to frown upon the text that compares Objectivism to Scientology or Satanism. Certainly, there are similarities, but there are also many extremely huge differences. It seems like the criticism of Objectivism should be about Objectivism itself. The current arguments go "Objectivism is like Scientology, and Scientology is bad, so Objectivism MUST be bad, right?" It would be much better to just talk about Objectivism itself, rather than liken it to other things. The Satanism "guilt by association" is particularly bad. "LeVay liked her, and he's a SATANIST!" That's a little like attacking Vegetarianism by pointing out Hitler was one-- it's just a lousy argument. I was tempted to delete the Scientology and Satanism sections outright, but, right now Wikipedia had Ten Bazillion articles about how wonderful Objectivism is, and only a few paragraphs calling it a cult, so... for the sake of balance, i won't just delete those parts-- but they probably should be replaced with something more substantial.

--Alecmconroy 10:42, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Peron Article Reference

I just edited a reference to an article by Jim Peron, which previously called him "Jim Peron of the Objectivist Reference Center." As the owner of of that site, I can definitively say that no one is "of" it other than myself. Peron's article was published several years ago in an online magazine, and I have simply "reprinted" it on my site (with his permission). I have updated the mention and the associated footnote accordingly. Since I am making a change that relates to a reference to my own website, I wanted to explain fully. (I wish I had time to fix some of the other issues with this article. Perhaps in the future.) -- RL0919 19:26, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

NPOV

I removed the NPOV tag because there doesn't seem to be much discussion over this article anymore. --24.220.246.20

A Modest Proposal

One way to think about the Objectivism phenomenon is to see it as a political ideology, though not only that. The discussion of political philosophy in this article makes it clear that Objectivists are, like many conservatives, pro-market, and elsewhere in the article, like many liberals, secularists. But one would never discover from this article that the preponderant majority of Objectivists, including the two main think tanks (ARI, TOS) are very hawkish on foreign policy, holding views analogous to many so-called neoconservatives. Since isolationism is such a prominent feature of the libertarian tradition, this feature needs to be addressed somehow. I hate to see the drafters of this article descend into yet more controversial topics, inviting more edit warring, but promoting the War on Terror has become a central feature of contemporary Objectivist culture, and this is not merely a "movement" issue. The Objectivist view is that governments which violate the natural rights of their own citizens have no legitimacy, and thus are "fair game" for military intervention. This view conflicts with a widely held view that governments cannot legitimately engage another country militarily unless it has been attacked itself, and is thus of philosophical interest. The War on Terror is of especial interest to Objectivists because of the convergence of issues (conflict with religion in the form of Islam, defense of capitalism, the legitimacy of pre-emptive military attack on rights-violating governments, etc.)

I haven't looked at all the Objectivism-related articles to see if there is a discussion in any of them, but I think that we should be talking about this here first. And perhaps people can direct me to discussions elsewhere in Wikipedia if such already exist. Agent Cooper 14:24, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Shermer

According to this, Shermer has recanted his cult accusations in the latest issue of The New Individualist. The most current issue online is from December. Does anyone have a copy of the latest issue to confirm, disconfirm or explain what Shermer says? If he has fully or substantially recanted his position, this article needs to be substantially re-written. Endlessmike 888 00:57, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

I'll have to look more closely at the article. But as I read it, Shermer is friendlier toward Objectivism than he used to be. He is still concerned about the propensity to moral denunciation, however, and he does not directly refer to any of his "cult" charges. A recantation, it is not.-RLCampbell (talk) 18:26, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

A second look indicates that Shermer finds much common ground with The Atlas Society, while continuing to take exception to the "heavy-hammer approach" of ARI. So I've added a paragraph about his current position.-RLCampbell (talk) 02:55, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Merge from Randroid

Please merge any relevant content from Randroid per Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Randroid. (If there is nothing to merge, just leave it as a redirect.) Thanks. —Quarl ^(talk) 2007-02-26 08:49Z

Complete re-write

This article has massive problems, that much is obvious. So I've re-written it. I still have a lot of references to gather, so the re-write is held on my user page. I've included a history of the Objectivist movement (which will be more heavily sourced in due course), since the topic of this article is 'the Objectivist movement', not 'why Objectivism is a cult.' You can look at what I've got so far here. If I've made any factual errors please correct them, and if you know some of the sources please include them. I'll post some suggestions on the talk page, since I think the article should include a few more things. Once it is fully sourced then we can take the next step. Endlessmike 888 21:45, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

I was told by several other editors that my updates were excellent, plus I've corrected several of the main problems with the original. Lack of sources and total lack of info on the Objectivist movement, for example. My update preserves everything in the original, but now the article has a flow, rather than seeming like a splatter paint of random information about Objectivism. Endlessmike 888 02:10, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

BTW, I think the tags about sources, clean-up, and neutrality can go now. Endlessmike 888 02:11, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Also thanks to SteveWolfer for helping. Endlessmike 888 02:13, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Very nice. It is a monumental improvement over the original article. It feels a lot more like a real article now. Kukyona 17:22, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Things to do

The claims made in the sections dealing with NBI need sources, which can be found in back issues of The Objectivist Newsletter and The Objectivist. I won't have access to my back issues until Monday, so please fill those in if you have copies to find the refs. Endlessmike 888 02:36, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

cult accusation

Compare the LaRouche movement article with the Objectivist movement article. Why is it ok that the LaRouche section on cult accusations is tiny, while prior to my revision this entire article was about cults? The LaRouche movment is widely known for encouraging kids to drop out of school, live in a group home, and raise money for LaRouche. Hence the cult accusation against LaRouche is timely, pertinent, and important. Yet the Objectivist movement does literally the opposite (encourages kids to get college educations, encourages them to not live in group homes, and gives them scholarships and free education). Moreso, this accusation against Objectivism is becoming more obscure as time goes on, and Objectivism is for some reason required to have extensive sections dealing with the cult accusation! Sense made = zero. I'd like to see some reasons why Objectivist related articles need such extensive discussion of this accusation, while an actual cult (or at least something more commonly agreed to be cult-like) does not . Endlessmike 888 08:10, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

the cult accussation needs to be treated neutrally, currently you present all the counter arguments much more significantly than the argument, that is likely because you support that side, and thus are not 'neutral' but try to give the claims their merits.--Buridan

You didn't answer my question. Why is it acceptable to devote major space on cults in the Objectivist movement article, when the standard set by an actual cult (LaRouche) is much lower.

Also, I deleted the addition of the Randroid section. I already covered BOTH the term Randroid, and Rothbard's paper. There was no need to repeat the exact same thing again. Endlessmike 888 19:09, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Citations

There are a few citations I need help with. First, the Brandens dispute Valliants claims. But they've only done so on web forums. I assume that a web forum would count as their own testimony and therefore be okay to cite? Second, Buridan you asked for a cite to justify Laissez-Faire Books as a libertarian bookstore. Their parent organization is The Center for Libertarian Thought. I added that but just wanted to double check that it was satisfactory. Endlessmike 888 19:35, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Walker

The comment is cited. Plus it is a stupid criticism. (Analytic philosophy claims to be based on logic. So I guess analytic philosophy is similar to Scientology in some important respect). I say keep it. Endlessmike 888 02:44, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

good faith?

My edits were all in good faith. I suggest you look at them. I requested citations, put in NPOV where appropriate, and made good faith changes to make the rest of the article fit. I started editing it because people deleted the one bit of text from it that there was a consensus in afd to preserve. Then i edited the npov out of the header so it conformed to that standard, then i went through and asked for citations for any fact that was unreferenced or likely opinion. In short, I made this article a better article by wikipedia standards. Deleting the books, as the books were not related to the objectivist movement, but just imports that belong more appropriately on other pages, was the only bit that is really debatable. --Buridan 17:13, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

You requests for citations were reasonable. I filled most of them, though a few more remain. I should have them filled by the end of the day. Also I found a cite for the lack of an Objectivist organization, so I retract my claim that such citation would be impossible.

About the books, limit the list to both of Peikoff's books, Kelley's Contested Legacy, and Smith's recent book. Those are the ones relevent to the movement. Then just link to the bibliography. That's my two cents. Endlessmike 888 19:16, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Buridan, your attacks on Rand and Objectivism have a long history. Here is a quote from your user page that speaks to your motivation: "I have a theory about the value of wikipedia and its subsections.... It is called Randrot. Randrot is the pernicious expansion and promotion of Ayn Rand as a significant and important figure in any given area other than literature and book sales. As Randrot grows, the value of wikipedia decreases so that you cannot click more than two links without seeing a mention of Rand...This, I view, as evidence of the inability of editors to discern and promote the actual state of affairs from the ones they wish to promote. When wikipedia becomes more about the promotion of someone's status, than the actual status of that person.... it loses value."1. And then there your belief that Objectivism killed tens of millions of people " 2. And you say you have no personal POV to push. I guess all of the other pages in Wikpedia were unavailable or had reached perfection so you came over here to be helpful. Steve 19:25, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

look randrot exists, and try to cite appropriately. i actually only came here because the randroid bit was deleted, which if you go read the afd for it, you'll find they wanted it preserved here. so i moved it here, and then like i suggested would happen, it was deleted. it should have a place here under criticisms. below is the content you keep deleting and there is a consensus to keep. anyway, i see it is integrated, just without the negative bits. the article does need to recognize the negative a bit more.--Buridan 21:45, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Randroids

Randroid is a pejorative term for some or all followers of Ayn Rand's Objectivism. It is a portmanteau of Rand's name with the word android.

Murray N. Rothbard considered Objectivism to be cult-like.^[1] Libertarian writer Justin Raimondo has referred to Objectivism as a "death cult",^[2] due to the foreign policy positions advocated by Leonard Peikoff and Yaron Brook.

Raidroid, using that language, down to the word "portmanteau," is discussed in the first paragraph of the criticism section. Murray Rothbard's criticism is discussed in the immediately following paragraph. Raimondo's criticism isn't about the Objectivist movement, nor does it contain the word "randroid," so it is irrelevent to this article. Endlessmike 888 22:48, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

yes i saw you included it after i wrote the above. --Buridan 02:00, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Was that why you added the NPOV tag? I'm removing it, but if you still have some objection to the neutrality of the section put it back and we'll take it from there. Endlessmike 888 22:43, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

yeah seems well enough to be stable for a while now. --Buridan 19:12, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

Links section

LazloWalrus deleted a number of links, and ordinarily I'd agree with him that Wikipedia often collects way too many links. But this case is very different. Those links ARE a key part of the Objectivist movement - they are kind of the grass roots connection of the people to the movement and each other. They are the best representation of the differences in groups that make up the Objectivist movement. These links are where they get their news of what is happening in the movement. They are where informal articles are stored. They are where events in the Objectivist's world are advertised and discussed. They are where new ideas are put forth. Steve 18:14, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

The Atlasphere is ok, I think Front Range is, too. (The Atlasphere has gotten national press, and Front Range has hosted numerous Objectivist intellectuals.) But SOLO, RoR, and Objectivism Online are just webforums. If we link to forums why not blogs? Endlessmike 888 20:10, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

A blog is usually just one person talking - if that person were important to Objectivism then their blog might be included. But a forum is where part of the movement exists - many new comers enter the movement through these web-sites. They are repositories for articles on Objectivism. We mention Internet forums in the article. The Internet and the forums are as important today as the campus clubs were a decade or so ago. These forums are where the differences in the details between different factions are visible. For example - Ed Hudgins, Tibor Machan and Robert Bidinotto - all key players in the movement and all have posted at RoR in the last week or so. Why would we not list these links? Steve 20:48, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

"We mention Internet forums in the article..." Good point. I say limit it to the big two then: OO and RoR. Endlessmike 888 22:03, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Steve, I disagree with what you added to the article. While it is true that Barbara Branden, Tibor Machan, Chris Sciabarra, and Ed Hudgins participate in Rebirth of Reason and Objectivist Living, none of the others publish anything online (except on the webpages of ARI and TAS). I'm unaware of Peikoff, Gotthelf, Binswanger, Brook, or Kelley using webforums in any notable way, or in any way at all. Endlessmike 888 18:13, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

Mike, I restored the last revert but then I went in and deleted the names you have mentioned. I was forced to put these in the article in this fashion because of those people who are not friends of Objectivism or an honest article that were deleting them. Steve 21:35, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

Journals

I tried to find proper citations for the journals cited in the academia section, I've removed all the forthcoming ones; since they are forthcoming, they aren't out and until they're published, they don't really exist. Several of the ones that were supposed to exist I could only find as books, so they aren't really journals either. Here's the paragraph that was left iwth the forthcoming articles:

Articles on Rand’s ethical and epistemological views have appeared in journals such as Social Philosophy and Policy,^[3] American Philosophic Quarterly,^[4] and The Review of Metaphysics.^[5]

WLU 14:59, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

These are all legitimate citations, since by now all of the articles have been published. However, all of the authors are affiliated with ARI, which leaves a somewhat incorrect impression as to who is an Objectivist author and who is publishing scholarly work about Rand's ideas.-RLCampbell (talk) 21:01, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

NPOV Issues

Seems like discussion on this article died down 6 months ago; clearly, much debate is still needed.

On a "random article" search, I happened upon this one. Reading through the entire article, I was astounded by the unmistakable slant towards Objectivist standpoints. Every paragraph in the "Criticism" section ends with a refutation or marginalization of the critique. The entire tone of the article is defensive, as if the point of the entry is to defend the attacks against the so-called "movement". This poorly made article is yet another crate of ammunition in the anti-Wikipedia camp's arsenal.

Peron

This last quotation of Peron is too out of context to be properly meaningful, especially to non-Objectivists. I believe the entire discussion of the cult label deals in non-essentials and fails as an argument.

Objectivists are no more cult followers of Objectivism, than are readers and proponents of Adam Smith's economic views. Some understand them properly, some don't. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.71.136.147 (talk) 18:31, 23 May 2008

Canvassing alert

An objectivist group is canvassing its members to edit Ayn Rand related articles. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Turnsmoney (talk • contribs) 18:53, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

This user has not been active since the day after posting this charge. There is no evidence that anyone has become an editor at Wikipedia in response to the post that was cited. Case closed?-RLCampbell (talk) 15:43, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

The Collective: BLP violation

In accordance with BLP policy I removed unsourced material commenting on private lives of living persons.KD Tries Again (talk) 03:44, 7 April 2009 (UTC)KD Tries Again

Orphaned references in Objectivist movement

I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Objectivist movement's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "rothbard":

From Criticisms of Objectivism (Ayn Rand): Rothbard, Murray (1972). ""The Sociology of the Ayn Rand cult."". Lewrockwell.com. Retrieved 2006-03-31.
From Ayn Rand: Rothbard, Murray. "The sociology of the Ayn Rand cult". Retrieved 2006-03-31.

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 08:12, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

Not to worry, BOT old chum, everything seems in order. Skomorokh 09:40, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

Valliant

He does not appear to be a reliable source, and frankly unless his allegations against Rothbard are rather more substantially backed up I don't think they should stay. TallNapoleon (talk) 06:55, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

As soon as one starts digging, one starts to find stuff. The Valliant book might, in effect, be self-published. See discussions about the publisher here, here, here, here, here...and many more. Without advancing an opinion on whether Valliant and IP 160 are one and the same, there is now a big question mark, to say the least, over whether the Passion book counts as a reliable source at all (per WP:SPS). This is interesting too, although not perhaps reliable in itself.KD Tries Again (talk) 15:06, 10 May 2009 (UTC)KD Tries Again

Whatever we decide about the book – RS, SPS, to be used for attributed opinions only – we need to be consistent across all articles. Shall we move this to the cross talk template or to WP:RSN for transparency? Having read through the links, the claims that Durban House is a vanity/subsidy press don't seem conclusive, at least as far as we are concerned: all we are interested in is what sort of fact-checking/approval process it went through – who signed off on it – not the financing. On the one hand, I'm tempted to take the line that sources should not be included unless we are sure of their reliability, and wash our hands of the Valliant/Merrill/Youngkins business once and for all. That would mean our articles would be far more restricted in what they could say with citation however. Gotthelf's review of Merrill was a good indication of its scholarly worth – I realise there is a serious issue of partisanship in Valliant's case, but are there appraisals of his work by credentialled scholars of Objectivism we could use to judge it by proxy? I'd be interested in hearing Sciabarra's assessment, for one. Skomorokh 17:45, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Unless I misread WP:SPS, whether the author paid for the book to be published, wholly or in part, is something we areconcerned with. If there are cases of self-published works which are properly edited and therefore reliable, then the community should be convinced that WP:SPS needs to be changed. Right now, if someone has paid to have their work published, its unacceptable as a source with one exception - that it's by an established expert. There is no exception for a self-published work, which has also been properly edited. That would be something the community might want to add to the policy. Given that reservations have already been expressed about the reliability of the Valliant book, the circumstantial but quite independent (not Rand-related) consensus across several websites that Durban is a vanity house, has to be placed on the scales. That someone with an IP address in Valliant's neighborhood is not only editing Rand articles to include references to the book, but has also edited personal information about Valliant on Wikipedia - again circumstantial - also has to placed on the scales. All these pieces of the jigsaw need to be out there so editors can reach agreement about the authority of the source, and whether it has been cited disproportionately to its reliability. (Remember, I am the guy who has argued against self-published sources both pro- and anti-Rand, so please don't assign an agenda to me.

Sciabarra's opinion of the book is here: "To be clear: Valliant didn't write a biography of Rand or an intellectual history of Objectivism. He wrote a prosecutorial indictment that frequently exhibits a scorched-earth style, which tends to undermine any truly reasonable points he has raised about bias, contradictions, conflicting points of view, corroborating evidence, or insufficient sourcing in the works of the Brandens." Even if he liked it, we would still need to be concerned about WP:SPS (by all means move this discussion if there's a better place to have it).KD Tries Again (talk) 22:43, 10 May 2009 (UTC)KD Tries Again

(edit conflict)No worries, no-one's pinning agendas on anyone, I understand your position and don't outright disagree with any of the points you have just made. Your correction on the point of the financial relationship between author and publisher is well-made: WP:V does draw attention to this (though I am not convinced it should). I am quite averse to using circumstantial evidence to impinge a source – as far as I am concerned either the source is, in and of itself, reliable, or it is not, independent of how people abuse it. That said, I'm thinking more about your point on SPS. There seems to be three arguments for including a book as a source:

It meets the criteria for WP:RS as scholarship (i.e. by its publication or publisher).
It does not meet the criteria for RS as scholarship, but does meet the criteria for WP:SPS (i.e. by virtue of its author)
It is not reliable for verifying statements of fact, but is worthy of inclusion because it states the opinions of a notable individual.

On the first point, I think it's clear that The Passion of Ayn Rand's Critics does not,as far as the evidence I have seen indicates, meet the criteria for scholarship; there is no indication that it was pre-vetted by the scholarly community, edited or approved by a suitably qualified figure, or published by a respected scholarly press. I may be wrong on this, and am open to correction.

Secondly, I have seen no indication that Valliant has a track record of publications in otherwise reliable sources. I have searched in academic archives and have not come up with anything that would establish him as an expert in philosophical biography as say, Bryan Magee or Walter Kaufmann were.

Thirdly, it may be the case that Valliant, and by extension his work, is notable, but given that this was challenged recently with the result that his article was redirected. Again, the burden of proof is on those who would assert notability, and we must assume in the absence of evidence (regarding WP:BIO or WP:PROF) that he is not notable.

In conclusion, Valliant may qualify on one of the above conditions, but the argument in favour seems underdetermined by the evidence as things stand. Unless there are objections, I will propose on the {{Objectivism and Ayn Rand Cross Talk}} that all references to the book and its author be removed until consensus as to their reliability is forthcoming. Skomorokh 23:07, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks to KD Tries Again for the interesting links. I read through a few of them (Like Sciabarra noted at the end of his rejoinder to Valliant, "I have a life" and don't want spend too much time reading this kind of back-and-forth internet pissing contest). I confess to being a little surprised by the discussion on the publisher Durban (which I mistakenly suspected could have been a respected publisher, but doesn't seem to be) and finally persuaded by the Valliant-Sciabarra exchange that Valliant is neither an notable intellectual (which after careful research I already determined weeks ago by a search of the independent third-party publications regarding his work) nor a seriously objective Rand scholar/author/biographer worthy of citation. Bottom-line: agree it should be removed from Wikipedia as shameless promotion of a minor, non-notable partisan self-publication of questionable encylopedic value. J Readings (talk) 02:28, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Kill it with fire. Oh, and there's another Merrill ref in one of those too. TallNapoleon (talk) 06:52, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Is it time for a return to citing the James Valliant book? I note it is now cited by two recent Rand biographies.207.216.142.50 (talk) 05:53, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

(outdent) I would have to see the context in which he was cited. That said, no, I don't think we should bring it back. TallNapoleon (talk) 19:54, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Removed Material

I removed material from the subsection on responses to cult accusations, because the only source for it is an individual's website. I'm not aware of a source for these particular arguments that meets Wikipedia reliability standards, but if someone has one they can reintroduce with a proper citation. The cut material:

A specific analysis of Shermer's claim on an Objectivist-influenced site argues that:
Objectivism does not meet most of his own list of what makes a cult, such as "inerrancy of the leader", "omniscience of the leader", "hidden agendas" and "financial and/or sexual exploitation", and

Shermer's fundamental objection to Objectivism seems to be its certainty, especially in the area of morality, and Shermer's own Skepticism leads him to make certainty per se the fundamental criterion of a cult. Thus rather than arguing against Objectivism's reasons for claiming certainty, Shermer merely equates it to the faith-based certainty of cults."

The citation was: Craig, Robin. "The Rand Cult".

I know that the material is preserved in the archives anyway, but I also know that changes related to a sensitive area like accusations of cultism can lead to ugly disputes, so I wanted to have the details on the talk page. --RL0919 (talk) 14:02, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

ARIwatch.com is missing from External Links. ARI Watch exposes the worst of the so-called Ayn Rand Institute. -- Mark