Fore more urdu books visit www.4Urdu.com

More oxford books @ www.OxfordeBook.comFore more urdu books visit www.4Urdu.com234WHO IS JOHN GALT? 1957–1968In the letter it also became clear that Rand thought of Atlas Shruggedas a kind of revealed truth. She argued that for her or Nathan to assumea stance of “uncertainty” would be tantamount to pretending “that AtlasShrugged [had] not been written.” She also seemed to equate disagreementwith ignorance, and understanding with agreement. If her ideasweren’t presented as deriving from “rational certainty,” it would permitthe audience to make “assertions of disagreement, while evading andignoring everything” she and Branden said. Rand was unable to conceiveof a person’s understanding her ideas, yet disagreeing with them.She told Hospers that the classes were offered “only to those who haveunderstood enough of Atlas Shrugged to agree with its essentials,” as ifthe two were synonymous. Rand also explicitly rejected any pedagogicalrole, telling Hospers that NBI’s purposes were very different from thoseof a university. They had no interest in the development of their students’minds: “we are not and do not regard ourselves as teachers. . . . Weaddress ourselves to adults and leave up to them the full responsibilityfor learning something from the course.” 48 Despite her emphasison reason and independent judgment, Rand had a very narrow idea ofhow this reason should be used. She conceived her ideal student as anempty vessel who used his or her rationality only to verify the validityof Objectivism. At the same time, she excoriated those who did so asweaklings or cowards.Although Objectivism claimed to be an intellectual culture, it wasdecidedly not one devoted to freewheeling inquiry, but rather a communityin which a certain catechism had to be learned for advancement.A flyer for the Basic Principles of Objectivism class openly alertedpotential students to the bias inherent in NBI. “The lectures are notgiven to convert antagonists,” the flyer noted, but were “addressed exclusively”to those who had read Rand’s major works, “are in agreementwith the essentials of the philosophy presented in these books, and seekan amplification and further study of this philosophy.” This tendencywas most prominent in New York, where Rand’s opinions and actionshad an immediate effect on the atmosphere at NBI. Her interest in herstudents seemed directly proportional to their agreement with her ideas.An NBI student remembered, “When she learned that I was a physicist,she made a comment about how physics has been corrupted by badphilosophy. She was apparently expecting my agreement. But I couldn’t