As we've studied India from the inside-out these past few weeks, focusing on entrepreneurship and its role in the emerging mega-economies of Asia, it is important to define what it means to be entrepreneurial.
The film clip is from the film adaption of Any Rand's The Fountainhead (which I admit I've not read). The story of the making of the film goes that the director was very compliant with Ayn's input throughout production, but objected to the length of the hero Howard Roark's climactic oration before a court defending his orchestrated destruction of a public venue conceived and designed by himself. Rand could not be dissuaded, so the entire speech made the final cut and became one of the longest in film history clocking in around 5.5 minutes.
Roark doesn't speak about entrepreneurship directly, but he does speak about what it means to be entrepreneurial. An individual uses his or her faculty of reason and knowledge to manipulate the rules of natural world, the laws of physics and economics, principles of social interaction, and laws imposed by governments, to conceive and produce a thing. This could be a product or service to sell for profit, a work of art to hang in the home, a meal on which to sup, an algorithm to automate a computer program, or anything else at all. I used to have time to make my dinner at home 6-7 nights a week, and I always told people I loved doing so not because I have any penchant for cooking, but because I'm a member of the only species ever capable of assembling many different foods and food elements to produce something more pleasing and more healthful than what I can pull directly out of the ground.
Many see the rise of civilization as an assault on nature, but it is a mistake to believe that cities and agriculture are separate from nature. Take the city for example: these is nothing in the construction of this hotel from which I write that did not come from the earth. The concrete, the steel, the wood flooring, and the glass, all came from natural deposits of materials that were gleaned, manipulated, and reorganized (by applying our knowledge of physics and chemistry i.e. natural forces) to make those things useful for producing a service that can facilitate the needs of people willing and able to pay for them. The building and the city of which it is part is not a supernatural phenomenon imposed by humans that is fatally disturbing the otherwise serene environment, but rather a highly organized instance of natural elements with a specific purpose.
I'm sure you all know that animals can't do this. It's really the only thing that separates dogs and squirrels from us, the thing that makes it worthwhile distinguishing ourselves from other living things, and it's also the thing that separates us from each other, as we all have different proficiencies and proclivities. Our individual abilities and talents are ours. We own them by nature, and the application of them with integrity, passion, and strategy is what could be described as entrepreneurialism, if there could be said to be such a school of thought. Howard Roark describes this before the court in defense of himself, as individualism and the optimum use of one's talents should be something we all defend.
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