When Atlas shrugs, the sky falls.

Atlas Shrugged

When Atlas shrugs, the sky falls.

kilodt 12-30-2006, 6:12 PM

"The only large[ celestial globe ] evidently surviving from antiquity is that in the Naples Archaeological Museum, held upon the shoulders of the statue of Atlas, known as the Farnese Atlas. The globe is marble, 65 cm in diameter, covered with constellations depicted in relief (no stars). The question of whose astronomy inspired the artist's celestial vision has long been investigated and debated...."

Ayn Rand's title and dialogue are topsy-turvy from a mythological standpoint: ""If you saw Atlas, [the giant who holds the world on his shoulders,] if you saw that he stood, blood running down his chest, his knees buckling, his arms trembling but still trying to hold the world aloft with he last of his strength, and the greater his effort the heavier the world bore down upon his shoulders--what would you tell him to do?"

"I...don't know. What...could he do? What would you tell him?"

"To shrug."

LESSON: If you intend to show off your smarts by referring to mythology, research your topic first, or else your name will suffer embarrassment in perpetuity.
Published foot-in-mouth disease outlasts even mythology.

Please see http://www.jcf.orgJosephCampbell Foundation, one of the world's foremost experts on mythology and its relation to religious philosophy.

Also see Mythology for Dummies http://dummies.com .

Re: When Atlas shrugs, the sky falls.

VthConcerto 01-18-2007, 4:06 PM
In what way does Rand suffer foot-in-mouth disease? It was artists, not she who depict Atlas as holding the globe on his shoulders. Yes the myth says that he holds the sky, not the globe (but then the fact of the world being a globe was unknown at the time of the myth’s creation), but so what? They analogy is perfectly fitting either way, is it not? In Rand’s story, the great thinkers of the world are supporting the existence of the looters, moochers and all those who tout the philosophy of altruism and who comprise the rest of the population.

Francisco is merely pointing out that to do this only allows the proponents of this philosophy to flourish and little by little destroy every opportunity to be a free and productive individual who lives for himself and refuses to ask any man to live for him or to live for any man. If the people of the mythical Atlas’s time were to do nothing but hinder his ability to hold up the sky, the globe or anything else that needed to be held up in order for those very people to survive, according to Francisco, the proper course of action would be to let the people have the world that their actions so persistently strive toward: one of utter destruction and ruin.

Nitpicking about whether Atlas was supposed to have been holding a globe or the sky does absolutely nothing to counter the argument that Francisco’s is the correct course of action to take. But even if you were to degrade Rand’s reputation by pointing out that she used imagery that agrees with artists’ representations of Atlas as opposed to mythical representations, doing so does nothing to comment in any way on her ideas. The two are separate: woman and idea. I hope the distinction is appreciated.

Re: When Atlas shrugs, the sky falls.

cherrypi 07-29-2007, 11:37 PM
I agree with VthConcerto, you have not proved Ayn an idiot. Here's your lesson: do your research in art and understand the ideology Ayn Rand is trying illustrate before you start pointing a finger at anyone for some technicality like this. This kind of thing makes one vicious cycle of one person accusing another all in different disciplines and then it just carries on, when what should have happened was understanding and knowledge before ranting.

Re: When Atlas shrugs, the sky falls.

solo 08-21-2007, 3:35 PM

Cosulting Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 2nd ed. 1998, the definition given for Atlas is: "1) Class. Myth., a titan, son of Iapetus and brother of Prometheus and Epimetheus condemned to support the sky on his shoulders: identified by the anceints with the Atlas Mountains." Atlas is the giant who supports the sky, not the world, so your point is correct. In the scene in Atlas Shrugged from which you are quoting, Francisco D'Anconia is explaining to Hank Reardon his relationship to the welfare of the society in which he lives and those who are destroying it. On earth, the producers of life-sustaining value are those who support human existence. Rand seeks to draw an analogy here and to do so she has tweaked the myth, probably because the term "world" has better dramatic effect than "sky." For your knowing, the second definition given is: "2) a person who supports a heavy burden; a mainstay." From this it may be concluded that the tweaking is slight indeed. Perhaps you should also raise your point wth map makers who call their work an "Atlas" and see if they think it is worth their time.

As far "showing off your smarts" is concerned, if you intend to denigrate the intellect of Ayn Rand, you're going to have to do alot better than this.