usefulness

People that do not process information have nothing to say.

They have internal concepts that, in a strangely only-human way make sense to them subjectively, but are of no use socially. They have no participation in the objective mode.

What is processing information? That, it turns out, is a broader and deeper question than most people imagine and it is a life-long education in "process" thinking. The human mind is not automatic when it comes to thought. Human thought is a choice. Rand was very interesting on this topic and very common-sensical. Her point was that we must choose - on a fundamental level - to begin the process of independent thought. Our feeling of hunger are automatic (what Hume calls instinct, maybe) but our thoughts and our ability to process information and produce "real" thoughts are a choice, like choosing to get up in the morning.

In another article I outline how all humans (usually around mid-twenties) make an often unconscious choice between nihilism and value, between not thinking and thinking. Someone who has not made the choice to think is (when older) still confronted with real choices that require real thought; and this cannot be avoided. So, without training, without effort, without a string of fundamental steps and choices, the default lapse into nihilism is almost unavoidable. This life-position of random accidents is supported by the cultural/moral language systems and so the default choice seems natural and can, in this way, be "defended." Fate, for example, is a defended attribute of existence that doesn't really have a definition - yet it is supported by "vulgar" understanding.

Because of this, adults are mostly depressed. They have no ability to self-analyze and are unaware or forget the moment where that choice was so relevant and pressing. They can't even see it or imagine it. They continue on, as a rule, and use hedonism or "pleasure" in the place of a real, permanent "happiness."

The take-away for process thinkers (or those partially ordained) in this truism is that "rote-only" thinkers do not really long for happiness because they can't conceptualize happiness in their conscious life. They merely serve a deeper, subconscious rancor toward the people and the ideas that support process advantages and rewards. The average rote thinker spends most of his mental life lashing out at real thinkers and real ideas. They thrive in the cultural/moral language system that isolates them and compounds their problems by offering an alternative to productivity.

If you're wondering why Rand was so popular it was because her ideas spoke from reality and not from her subjective default. If you're wondering why Rand was so hated it was because rote-only thinkers are easily angered by a literal translation or reevaluation of the word good and the word happiness into, for example, Christian forms (for a lack of better historical terminology).