"What Can One Do?"
by Ayn Rand

This question is frequently asked by people who are concerned about
the state of < today's health care system > and want to correct it.

More often than not, it is asked in a form that indicates the cause
of their helplessness: "What can one person do?"

I was in the process of preparing this article when I received a
letter from a reader who presents the problem (and the error) still
more eloquently: "How can an individual propagate < the correct ideas
> on a scale large enough to effect the immense changes which must be
made in order to create the kind of ideal social system
< or health care system > which you picture?"

If this is the way the question is posed, the answer is: he can't.

No one can change a country single-handed. So the first question to
ask is: why do people approach the problem this way?

Suppose you were a doctor in the midst of an epidemic. You would not
ask: "How can one doctor treat millions of patients and restore the
whole country to perfect health?"

You would know, whether you were alone or part of an organized
medical campaign, that you have to treat as many people as you can
reach, according to the best of your ability, and that nothing else
is possible.

People approach intellectual issues in a manner they would not use to
deal with physical problems.

They would not seek to stop an epidemic overnight, or to build a
skyscraper single-handed. Nor would they refrain from renovating
their own crumbling house, on the grounds that they are unable to
rebuild the entire city.

But in the realm of ideas, they still tend to regard knowledge as
irrelevant, and they expect to perform instantaneous miracles,
somehow or they paralyze themselves into inaction by projecting an
impossible goal.

If you are seriously interested in fighting for a better < health
care system >, begin by identifying the nature of the problems.

The battle is primarily intellectual (philosophical), not political.
Politics is the *last consequence*, the practical implementation, of
the fundamental philosophical ideas that dominate a given nation's
culture.

You cannot fight or change the consequences without fighting and
changing the cause; nor can you attempt any practical implementation
without knowing what you want to implement.

In an intellectual battle, you do not need to convert everyone.
History is made by minorities or, more precisely, history is made by
intellectual movements, which are created by minorities.

Who belongs to these minorities? Anyone who is able and willing
actively to concern himself with intellectual issues. Here, it is not
quantity, but quality that counts (the quality and consistency of the
ideas one is advocating).

An intellectual movement does not start with organized action. Whom
would one organize?

A philosophical battle is a battle for men's minds, not an attempt to
enlist blind followers. Ideas can be propagated only by the men and
women who understand them.

An organized movement has to be preceded by an educational campaign,
which requires trained- self-trained - teachers (self-trained in the
sense that a philosopher can offer you the material of knowledge, but
it is your own mind that has to absorb it).

Such training is the first requirement for being a doctor during an
ideological epidemic and the precondition of any attempt to "change
the world."

"The immense changes which must be made to < rationally reform the
American health care system > cannot be made singly, piecemeal
or "retail," so to speak; an army of crusaders would not be enough to
do it.


But the factor that underlies and determines every aspect of human
life is philosophy; teach men the right ideas and their own minds
will do the rest. Philosophy is the wholesaler in human affairs.

Man cannot exist without some form of philosophy, i.e., some
comprehensive view of life. Most men are not intellectual innovators,
but they are receptive to ideas, are able to judge them critically
and to choose the right course, when and if it is offered.

There are also a great many men who are indifferent to ideas and to
anything beyond the concrete-bound range of the immediate moment;
such men accept subconsciously whatever is offered by the culture of
their time, and swing blindly with any chance current.

They are merely social ballast, be they day laborers or company
presidents, and by their own choice, irrelevant to the fate of the
world.

Today, most people are acutely aware of our cultural-ideological
vacuum <and the legal and economic chaos of our health care system>;
they are anxious, confused, and groping for answers. Are you able to
enlighten them?

Can you answer their questions? Can you offer them a consistent case?
Do you know how to correct their errors? Are you immune from the
fallout of the constant barrage aimed at the destruction of reason
<and freedom in our health care system>? Can you provide others with
antimissile missiles?

* A political battle is merely a skirmish fought with muskets; a
philosophical battle is a nuclear war.*

If you want to influence a country's intellectual trend <or bring
rational reform to the health care system>, the first step is to
bring order to your own ideas and integrate them into a consistent
case, to the best of your knowledge and ability.

This does not mean memorizing and reciting slogans and principles;
knowledge necessarily includes the ability to apply abstract
principles to concrete problems, to recognize the principles in
specific issues, to demonstrate them, and to advocate a consistent
course of action.

This does not require omniscience or omnipotence; it is the
subconscious expectation of automatic omniscience in oneself and in
others that defeats many would-be crusaders (and serves as an excuse
for doing nothing).

What is required is honesty- intellectual honesty- which consists
in knowing what one does know, constantly expanding one's knowledge,
and never evading or failing to correct a contradiction. This means:
the development of an active mind as a permanent attribute.

When or if your convictions are in your conscious, orderly control,
you will be able to communicate them to others.

If you like condensations (provided you bear in mind their full
meaning), I will say: when you ask "What can one do?" the answer
is "SPEAK" (provided you know what you are saying).

A few suggestions: do not wait for a national audience. Speak on any
scale open to you, large or small, to your friends, your associates,
<your patients>, your professional organizations, or any legitimate
public forum.

You can never tell when your words will reach the right mind at the
right time. You will see no immediate results, but it is of such
activities that public opinion is made.

Do not pass up a chance to express your views on important issues.
Write letters to the editors of newspapers and magazines, to TV and
radio commentators and, above all, to your Congressmen (who depend on
their constituents).

If your letters are brief and rational (rather than incoherently
emotional) they will have more influence than you suspect.

The opportunities to speak are all around you. I suggest that you
make the following experiment: take an ideological "inventory" of one
week, i.e., note how many times people utter the wrong political,
social and moral notions as if these were self-evident truths, with
your silent sanction.

Then make it a habit to object to such remarks. No, not to make
lengthy speeches, which are seldom appropriate, but merely to say: "I
don't agree." (And be prepared to explain why, if the speaker wants
to know.) This is one of the best ways to stop the spread of vicious
bromides.

(If the speaker is innocent, it will help him; if he is not, it will
undercut his confidence the next time.) Most particularly, do not
keep silent when your own ideas and values are being attacked.

Above all, do not join the wrong ideological groups or movements, in
order to "do something". To join such groups means to reverse the
philosophical hierarchy and to sell out fundamental principles for
the sake of some superficial political action which is bound to fail.
It means that you help the defeat of your ideas and the victory of
your enemies.

The only groups one may properly join today are ad hoc committees,
i.e., groups organized to achieve a single, specific, clearly defined
goal, on which men of differing views can agree.

In such cases, no one may attempt to ascribe his views to the entire
membership, or to use the group to serve some hidden ideological
purpose (and this has to be watched very, very vigilantly).

I am omitting the most important contribution to an intellectual
movement: writing. Books, essays, articles are a movement's permanent
fuel, but it is worse than futile to attempt to become a writer
solely for the sake of a "cause." Writing, like any other work, is a
profession and must be approached as such.

It is a mistake to think that an intellectual movement requires some
special duty or self-sacrificial effort on your part. It requires
something much more difficult: a profound conviction that ideas are
important to you and to your own life. If you integrate that
conviction to every aspect of your life, you will find many
opportunities to enlighten others.

It is too late for a movement of people who hold the conventional
mixture of contradictory philosophical notions. It is too early for a
movement of people dedicated to a philosophy of reason.

But it is never too late or too early to propagate the right ideas-
except under a dictatorship.

If a dictatorship <or government run socialized medicine> ever comes
to this country, it will be by the default of those who keep silent.
We are still free enough to speak. Do we have time? No one can tell.
But time is on our side because we have an indestructible weapon and
an invincible ally (if we learn how to use them): reason and reality.

"What Can One Do?" by Ayn Rand
< with personal editorial modifications in
bracket >

This appeared in original form in the Ayn Rand Letter, January 1972
Published in " Philosophy: Who Needs It? "

For sale at :
http://www.aynrandbookstore.com/

<NB: We also have other powerful tools at our disposal the awesome
power of the internet in disseminating ideas, and the most important
tool of all: the trust of those patients for whom we personally
provide life- giving and life-preserving medical care- and who trust
their own doctor to make decisions that are in their best interest,
while rightfully distrusting politicians, lawyers and today' s
politically biased media.>