Atlas Shrugged as a Philosophical Novel Lecture VI
Trade vs Power
David Kelley
The World Theme: What happens to the world when the prime movers go on strike…. The first question to decide is on whom the emphasis must be placed—on the prime movers, the parasites, or the world. The answer is: the world. The story must be primarily a picture of the whole…. In The Fountainhead I showed that Roark moves the world —that the Keatings feed upon him and hate him for it, while the Tooheys are consciously out to destroy him. But the theme was Roark—not Roark's relation to the world. Now it will be the relation…. Journals, 390 ff
Outline I.
Trade as the principle of freedom and justice
II.
Plot implementation: the wreck of the economy, Galt agonistes
III.
Characterization: Rearden vs. Boyle
IV.
Statements of the theme
V.
Buried riches: the generosity of the producers
Trader Principle A trader is a man who earns what he gets and does not give or take the undeserved. He does not treat men as masters or slaves, but as independent equals. He deals with men by means of a free, voluntary, unforced, uncoerced exchange—an exchange which benefits both parties by their own independent judgment….. In spiritual issues, a trader is a man who does not seek to be loved for his weaknesses or flaws, only for his virtues, and who does not grant his love to the weaknesses or the flaws of others, only to their virtues. The Virtue of Selfishness, 35
The mystic parasites who have, throughout the ages, reviled the traders and held them in contempt, while honoring the beggars and the looters, have known the secret motive of their sneers: a trader is the entity they dread—a man of justice. Galt’s speech, Atlas Shrugged, 939
What is Trade? Trade
Power
Voluntary Mutual benefit Inducement by value Positive-sum Relation of equals Independence Justice, the earned Counts on the best in
Coercive Sacrifice or subordination Inducement by fear Negative-sum Relation of dominance Dependence Injustice Counts on the worst in
people Best rise to the “top”
people Worst rise to the top
Coercion Thought—he told himself quietly—is a weapon one uses in order to act. No action was possible. Thought is the tool by which one makes a choice. No choice was left to him. Thought sets one's purpose and the way to reach it. In the matter of his life being torn piece by piece out of him, he was to have no voice, no purpose, no way, no defense. He thought of this in astonishment. He saw for the first time that he had never known fear because, against any disaster, he had held the omnipotent cure of being able to act. No, he thought, not an assurance of victory—who can ever have that? —only the chance to act, which is all one needs. Now he was contemplating, impersonally and for the first time, the real heart of terror: being delivered to destruction with one's hands tied behind one's back. Atlas Shrugged, 205
The Pyramid of Ability The man at the top of the intellectual pyramid contributes the most to all those below him, but gets nothing except his material payment, receiving no intellectual bonus from others to add to the value of his time. The man at the bottom who, left to himself, would starve in his hopeless ineptitude, contributes nothing to those above him, but receives the bonus of all of their brains. Such is the nature of the 'competition' between the strong and the weak of the intellect. Such is the pattern of 'exploitation' for which you have damned the strong. Atlas Shrugged, 988-989)
Summary I.
A Philosophical Thriller
II.
Producers Vs Looters And Parasites
III.
Reason versus Anti-Reason
IV.
Pursuit Of Happiness As Moral End
V.
Unity of Mind and Body
VI.
Trade Versus Power
The Gulch