I don't think everything she has to say is bad, wrong or unimportant, even if I think she was nutty, verbose and a poor writer, but I was pointing out that she isn't nearly as important, from my perspective, as the OP claimed.

It's (been) required reading at West Point, amongst other places in the US. High-school reading lists are probably poor indicators: Plato, Nietzche, and Kant would be Atypical if not unheard of (if that is your standard).

Atlas shrugged has other interesting reasons to read it, however. Its main theme is actually dealing with assholes at work. Academics are embarrased by it, because its filled with "non-collegial" behaviour. But that just means they don't get out much.

Economics as a field which assumes opportunistic and deceitful behaviour are non-events. Atlas Shrugged is a great reminder of the fallacy in that. A typical Economist would consider Rand a "Crackpot", for using opportunistic and deceitful behaviour as basis for an empirical philosophy. But consider that lawyers get paid to write contracts to mitigaet the very dangers that economists assume away. Your Lawyer will tell you...never trust an Economist...theyre all crackpots and live in Ivy towers. =D

As a side bar, have you actually read Nietzche? I think academics (and a few of his old landlords) would consider him more of a "crackpot" than Rand. Clearly Rand and Nietzsche have nothing in common? Perhaps other than its the lie that tells the truth.

Academics are embarrased by it, because its filled with "non-collegial" behaviour. But that just means they don't get out much.

Where on earth are you getting this? Academics celebrate texts far less collegial than Rand's. Rand's work, as literature, is dismissed because, as literature, it isn't very good. Her work isn't taken seriously or engaged with philosophically for other reasons, but propriety isn't one of them. To invoke the ancient stereotype of the "stuffy academic" is ludicrous. Academics today are probably the most open-minded, least proprietous group around.

I think academics (and a few of his old landlords) would consider him more of a "crackpot" than Rand.

I can't speak to the attitudes of his old landlords, but no, modern academics do not consider him a crackpot. For political reasons he was in and out of favor around the times of WW1 and WW2 (due to the misappropriation of his work by various groups, most famously the Nazis), but he's never ceased to be hugely important to continental philosophy, and Walter Kauffmann set the record straight and rehabilitated his image for the English-speaking world decades ago.

In the humanities you can either avoid drawing any definite conclusions (e.g. conclude that an issue is a complex one), or draw conclusions so narrow that no one cares enough to disagree with you. The kind of philosophy I'm advocating won't be able to take either of these routes. At best you'll be able to achieve the essayist's standard of proof..."

Sound familiar? Slightly Nietzshean?

Likewise, Rand's heterodox views have made her about as popular as Larry Summers at a "women in STEM" mixer, but then she pre-dated by 50 years the 3 [economics] nobels that took Nietszchen epistimology seriously (1991, 2002, 2009).

People still confuse here work with being expositions of free-market economics. This of course is non-sensical. What is relevant and unique is that she takes seriously the key omitted behavioural assumptions of neo-liberal Economics. Which is a contr-indication of blind support for neo-liberal economics.[1]

Her work is most intersting in its analysis of the internal workings of firms, a point directly off the map of neo-classical economics (Coase: the nature of the firm 1932, nobel 1991), in particular the non-market (hierarchy) driven decisioning mechanics.

The nature of these dynamics (ie, expositions of opportunism and bounded rationality), are precisely the types of discussions dismissed by post-frege philosophy as 'crackpot', in the sense of not being formalistically relevant to Academic philosophy (viz: At best you'll be able to achieve the essayist's standard of proof).

But these topics are slightly more interesting than that.

And not exactly the work of a "crackpot".

_______

[1] Ironically, "L"iberal interventionist economic types have a greater problem with her critique of "conservative" economics. Her critique of the neo-classical assumptions also applies to its derivatives, including the variant of neo-classical commonly known as 'welfare' economics. This is the modern "L"iberal branch of economics. see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welfare_economics

All fine and good, but your claim was "academics...would consider him more of a 'crackpot' than Rand." That's what I replied to, because it's not true.

You asked the parent commenter "have you actually read Nietzche?" Well, I have, cover to cover, including the Nachlass. More importantly, I've read exhaustively in the tradition that descends from him. Nietzsche had an enormous influence on Heidegger, Gadamer, Deleuze, Foucault, Blanchot, Derrida, and just about every other important continental philosopher of the last century. And then there are all the critics, novelists, poets, painters, sculpters...

There's simply no point comparing Nietzsche's reputation to Rand's. No one credible has ever really considered him to be a "crackpot." Even analytic philosophers like Searle appreciate Nietzsche.

He was widely (wrongly) viewed as tin foil hat (nihlist, etc) for 100 years.

No, not widely, and not for 100 years. Nietzsche's impact was already being felt both philosophically and in the arts by the 1910s.

PG's great essay on the history of philosophy doesn't even mention him

A few things, here.

1) It's not an essay on the history of philosophy, though it does have a section titled "History," which limits itself to a cursory discussion of Aristotle's Metaphysics.

2) Much as I respect pg, I'm not sure why I should put any stock in the selection of thinkers in this essay or credit his views on philosophy. He was a philosophy major for "most" of college? Nifty, but like most humanities disciplines in modern universities, philosophy, at the undergraduate level, just gets you caught up with where you should've been when you finished high school, had high school actually done its job. Even from this short treatment, it's clear that there are huge gaps both in pg's knowledge and in his understanding of, for example, Wittgenstein and Aristotle. Which leads me to:

3) The essay is simply wrong in many of its assertions. For example:

"The proof of how useless some of their answers turned out to be is how little effect they have. No one after reading Aristotle's Metaphysics does anything differently as a result."

If you're interested in just how off base this is historically, here are a few things that might interest you:

[-] Any of James Joyce's novels, or any criticism exploring the philosophical undercurrents of his work, e.g. The Aesthetics of James Joyce by Jacques Aubert. Joyce had a Jesuit education. Aristotle's influence is immediate, palpable, and bears incredible fruit.

[-] A fair bit of Ezra Pound's poetry and criticism (ABC of Reading, Guide to Kulchur, The Spirit of Romance, various essay collections like Machine Art and Other Writings, and so on). Pound was influenced not only by the Metaphysics but by the Nicomachean Ethics and the Rhetoric.

[-] Medieval Theory of Authorship: Scholastic Literary Attitudes in the Later Middle Ages, by A.J. Minnis. I mention this in a last-but-not-least way, as Minnis traces a clear path from Aristotle to how we read today.

Now, does the average person do anything differently as a result of reading Aristotle? Of course not, at least not as a direct result. The average person doesn't do anything differently as a result of much at all (that's what makes them average). But the people who set the terms of culture, the influencers? You bet your ass they do -- if not as a result of reading Aristotle, then as a result of reading some contemporary equivalent, e.g. Plato -> Baudrillard -> The Matrix -> Average Person.

Sound familiar? Slightly Nietzshean?

Not to me, no.

in the sense of not being formalistically relevant to Academic philosophy

For analytic philosophers maybe, but continental philosophers decoupled rigor from exactness long ago. Lack of exactness wouldn't stop them from reading Rand, if they thought there was value there.

But you don't need to defend Rand to me. I'm indifferent, not hostile. I only popped into the discussion to point out that Nietzsche's place in the philosophical canon is secure.

It's (been) required reading at West Point, amongst other places in the US.

I didn't know that. Thanks. It must be more popular than I realized, but I still don't see where it's considered terribly crucial in general, as the original comment claimed. I shouldn't have made it sound like my personal claim was any indication of absolute reality. My mistake. A survey would probably lay this issue to rest, but this was really supposed to be a one-off comment.

Atlas shrugged has other interesting reasons to read it, however. Its main theme is actually dealing with assholes at work. Academics are embarrased by it, because its filled with "non-collegial" behaviour. But that just means they don't get out much. Economics as a field which assumes opportunistic and deceitful behaviour are non-events. Atlas Shrugged is a great reminder of the fallacy in that. A typical Economist would consider Rand a "Crackpot", for using opportunistic and deceitful behaviour as basis for an empirical philosophy. But consider that lawyers get paid to write contracts to mitigaet the very dangers that economists assume away. Your Lawyer will tell you...never trust an Economist...theyre all crackpots and live in Ivy towers. =D

Chill! I'm speaking on what my impression is of the popular opinion on Rand in education, not what I think of Rand myself.

Also, your statement that the main theme of Atlas Shrugged being about "dealing with assholes at work" is very interesting and I'm not sure how you came up with that.

As a side bar, have you actually read Nietzche? I think academics (and a few of his old landlords) would consider him more of a "crackpot" than Rand. Clearly Rand and Nietzsche have nothing in common? Perhaps other than its the lie that tells the truth.

I've read some of Nietzsche's stuff, and yes, Rand is very much an imitation of him (what does that prove and why are you asking me that rhetorically?). I'm still not sure I buy that Nietzsche is considered more of a "Crackpot" by academics than Rand is, having gone to a university in the US and having seen firsthand the curriculum in a philosophy class, but it's completely subjective, so you might be right.

West Point has no business assigning either book to any class presented to a future Army Officer. I mean it: None.

I would get rid of any instructor who required students to read either Atlas or Fountainhead. The heroes in both books behave immorally by any sane standard, in terms of what West Point Cadets are being taught in their other classes. Howard Roark commits a violent rape in Chapter Two -- later, he blows up a sky scraper. John Galt would simply be considered a terrorist today.

I haven't read her other books, but from a literary perspective, Anthem has the same problem that I gather her other works have, just in miniature: there is a core of an actual novel there and it's starting to build an interesting world and characters, but then at some point it degenerates into a pages-and-pages-long non-fiction essay in Ayn Rand's voice pasted into the book, with a pretty flimsy excuse for what these pages of text are doing in a novel (I think in Anthem it's the character thinking out loud or something).

Probably among members of the political faction that identifies with the author's philosophy, but among people outside of that faction not so much. It's certainly not a consensus view in the US; its far from a must-read in any practical sense, though most moderately political aware people with a college education probably are aware of it, even if they haven't read it.