I don't like it much, either, Phil, so I'll stop with our agreement that five quarters of such sales by an academic book would be impressive.

Jim I don't like lawyer-type pick-pick-pick bickering back and forth, so I'll conclude by pointing out that I could not have been unaware you had made a point yourself when the very first sentence of my post commented on it:

"It [your point about its selling rank at University Press] would only be impressive if [we know] the actual number of copies..."

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That said, 2500 for a quarter for this kind of book is a good number, especially if sustained.

Thanks for the compliment, but I do not know the numbers.

I do know about the publisher's excitement. I also know that just the first quarter represents over 2,500.

And, Phil, the sarcasm wasn't directed at any of the fine points you made, but that you seemed entirely unaware that I had made a point myself.

Start a fight? No. In your case it's hardly necessary and it's almost too easy. You're such a wind-bag that it usually only requires applying a little pin and "POP", you're gone.

As for "Unrugged Individualism", I read the first 10 or so pages and was so nauseated by it, I couldn't read any more. It was worse than just boring which is the problem with his speeches. It was disgusting. That was not the case with his prior screeds, e.g. "Truth and Toleration", which while thoroughly mistaken were at least intelligent and well-written. "Truth and Toleration" was about the high point of Kelley's intellectual career. As is often the case with people who break with Objectivism, it was all downhill from there (see the Brandens)*.

(The reason is that for all their purported creativity and originality and all their yapping about it vis-a-vis Objectivism, they actually have nothing of any substance to say. So, without Objectivism they are empty suits - or maybe I should say, empty-headed. See JARS for example - which I imagine is what Phil considers the epitome of Objectivist "chewing". But then obviously Phil can't distinguish chewing from puking).

*Sadly, the same thing is likely to happen to Tracinski**. It is especially tragic in his case because he is brilliant and had tremendous promise.

**Some people say it already has (which I don't agree with).

As a matter of policy, I have come more and more to avoid responding to Fred, since his characteristic objective is simply to start a fight rather than thoughtful discussion.

For example, since he didn't say anything substantive about U.I., nothing is interesting enough to respond to.

So, Phil, have you read the book?

Not that I would dream of interfering with your usual "destructive and irritating" pontifications even in the absence of such a minimal expectation for someone choosing to comment on it.

As for your "five or six thoughtful and substantive points" (whose counting), why would it matter if Objectivists are or aren't discussing certain books if non-Objectivists aren't reading them? ITOE, for example, has generated a lot of discussion among Objectivists but it hasn't as yet penetrated much outside of Objectivist circles.

That is also true of PARC, but you haven't read that one either.

Not that it is has ever stopped you before from lecturing Objectivists on what they should or shouldn't be doing.

Also, as regards your own list of books, to include Kelley's "Unrugged Individualism" - a manual for limp-wristed Objectivism - is bizarre, while omitting "Ominous Parallels" which I understand has sold about 75,000 copies or "The Objectivist Lexicon" about 50,000. (To forestall questions, I haven't verified these numbers. It's just what I've heard.)

So, Jim, how many copies has Capitalist Manifesto sold?

> you're so right..the fact I noted says nothing...

Jim, I took the time to make about five or six thoughtful and substantive points.

Your sarcastic (and inappropriately adversarial or hostile in tone!) one-liner doesn't address any of them and misstates the very first point I was making: It's exactly the kind of destructive and irritating debate I was referring to.

You're better than that.

I don't expect surprises from the economic and moral/philosophical aspects, which are adequately expressed in Rand and Mises. (Here's a philosophical aspect that I've found needs some emphasis, tying intimately into the economic: respect for the law of causality. Hard, unyielding reality of the way the market works, that doesn't yield to government magic-wand-waving. Case in point: statists taking credit for labor legislation ignores cause and effect: the cause was enough growth in the economy to be able to afford labor legislation by that point. Labor legislation wasn't some kind of magic-wand-waving that gave people high wages and shorter hours. One very nice thing about Mises, despite the largely irrelevent-to-economics-proper question of his Kantian underpinnings, is his emphasis on approaching economic discussions from the standpoint of conceptual, causal understanding and that historical events, studies and interpretations don't invalidate that understanding.) Not having seen Bernstein's book, the best one-stop "manifesto" I've seen is Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal. Rand is a master. She spends the first chapter doing something that wouldn't occur to another thinker: to answer the very question itself, "What is capitalism?" Do even the intellectuals know how to identify what they're attacking? It's a lesson in applied epistemology as much as anything. Anyway, the idea of Bernstein's book is to gather all these aspects into one place, which should be a valuable thing for more beginner-types.

I had the opportunity to meet Andy in person a few months back, and I did raise this very point to him: that there's the moral and the philosophical and the economic already well laid-out in plenty of other texts, but hardly enough in the way of historical setting-straight. That's one thing I do look forward to in AB's book.

No, you're so right, Phil. The fact I noted says nothing and has no value of any kind whatever.

I should note that the -full scale philosophical- books on Objectivism or engaging in detail with the philosophy are the most important of all and are in a class by themselves with regard to what I was talking about and with regard to their importance:

1. Peikoff's OPAR,
2. Kelley's Unrugged Individualism and the forthcoming (hopefully one of these years, with Will Thomas) Logical Structure of Objectivism,
3. Tara Smith's Ayn Rand's Normative Ethics,
4. George Reisman's Capitalism: A Treatise on Economics.

There needs to be more of a literature of thoughtful (as opposed to factional or partisan or redneck) -and, above all, detailed- comment on these four books in particular than there has been. With extrememly few exceptions it has been spotty, superficial, lightweight, and unsatisfying by and large. This can be done in Oist magazines or on websites and in discussion boards.

If the Objectivists (and/ or free market or Aristotelian communities) don't have the intellectual wherewithal to aggressively "chew" and comment on and advance the works of their own people in this manner and create a buzz that way, it is far less likely that anyone else is going to be aware of them, engage with the issues raised. Or be intrigued and motivated to go out and buy and read them.

That's how things are done with regard to building interest or starting a conversation, it often starts from debate and discussion -within- a civilized, intelligent, and thoughtful movement.

Transmission belts.

Debates about a book.

Widening circles of discussion.

Jim, that would only be impressive if you know and are willing to tell us the actual number of copies it adds up to.

Otherwise, those of us familiar with academic publishing wonder if it's like saying an academic press which only sells a tiny double digit handful of books cracked the triple digits this time.

My suspicion having watched for the last decade this deluge of secondary books by Bernstein, Mayhew, Shoshana Knapp, Mary Ann Sures and many others about Rand's life, about her novels or even about substantive issues such as a defense of laissez-faire, is that a number of them may be worthwhile or have fresh insights in their content. And/or they may have a cumulative secondary effect of making her academically respectable. So people will say, "there is a growing literature about her"...and those are worthwhile goals.

But one wonders if anyone except existing Objectivists (not movers and shakers, influential people among the intellectual classes) is reading them or if they are gathering dust in unsold cartons in publisher warehouses.

It's important for us as Objectivists not to be kept in the dark about any actual measurements (as opposed to hype) about whether or not these books are having an impact. And the writers themselves need objective, crticial feedback so they can improve (not merely if it's a book by someone from TOC all ARI-leaning people will have negative things to say about it & if it's an ARI book all TOV people will 'diss it).

Also, more frequent *substantive reviews and analyses* of the books by Objectivist writers and intellectuals, "chewing" these books, laying out some of their content, giving their pros and cons, where the writer is good and where he is flawed would help. Shayne's post here didn't have 'meat" about the actual book: quotes, examples, other concretization.

Posters, commenters, writers should look at some of the conservative magazines ... Commentary, etc. ... and websites to see how a mature movement with articulate, polished critics discusses, reviews, analyzes, contests its own material internally (and without personal acrimony and factionalism).

Whether one agrees with all of his conclusions or not, the best example that springs to mind of the skill of how to write what is called a "review essay" on a book was done several years ago by Will Thomas of TOC. He compared the pros and cons of the two of the most important books aimed at intellectuals who are not already Objectivists in the "secondary literature", namely, Gotthelf's and Machan's academic books summarizing Objectivism.

People should read his essay to learn how to write scholarly, intellectual reviews and commentary on other writers and thinkers. And how -not- to engage in personal attacks and food fights in doing so.

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(...And, no, to preempt a distraction, Jim this is none of this is a comment on your book since I haven't read it, or on any one book in the secondary literature ...so please let's not get sidetracked onto that or comparable issues and away from the important points I'm raising in this post.)

BTW: this title was the number one selling book for its publishing house -- University Press of America -- for the 4th QTR of 2005 and throughout -- all four QTRs -- 2006.