Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology

Identification

• "Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology" is a collection of essays on the subject of epistemology published in 1967. The book consists of eight essays by Rand, plus one by Leonard Peikoff, a longtime associate of Rand and the heir to her estate.
  
  

Features

• Objectivism teaches that reason is the faculty by which humans gain knowledge. In her book "Philosophy: Who Needs It?", Rand called reason the faculty that enables humans to form abstract thoughts and concepts.
  
  The basis of knowledge is awareness of the physical world around us, which we grasp through use of the five senses. This is the perceptual level of knowledge. As we age and our mental abilities grow, our memories develop. Other animals have perceptual abilities and the capacity for memory, but for Objectivists, it is reason that sets humans apart and raises knowledge from the perceptual to the conceptual level. Rand's emphasis on human reason reflects the influence of Greek philosopher Aristotle, who called man the rational animal.
  
  

Effects

• The ability to perceive physical reality through use of the senses is known as empiricism. For Objectivists, the sights, sounds, smells, tastes and touches of the physical world are the data or the evidence on which knowledge rests. Reason is the faculty for identifying and understanding what the senses perceive.
  
  

Logic

• Rand noted that abstract thinking is not automatic and that humans are capable of making mistakes and believing things that are false. Therefore, Objectivists emphasize logic as the method that human reason employs to ensure correct thinking. Rand called logic "the art of non-contradictory identification." This means that two contradictory ideas cannot be true and that any idea that contradicts observable reality is false. For Objectivists, then, logic provides criteria by which human reason can judge the validity of an idea or argument.
  
  

Benefits

• Rand, a staunch individualist and advocate of laissez-faire capitalism, saw reason as the key to unlocking the world's mysteries through the scientific method. She also argued that reason made modern industrial society, with all its advances, possible.