Leaderboard

I highly recommend this book as well, and also purusing some of Hitchen's videos on YouTube, he can be quite an entertaining debater sometimes. Hitchens views appear very similar to Objectivism in many ways, however for some strange reason he despises Rand. In one article I read on his on Slate, he was speaking sincerely of a soldier who was an atheist and decided to join the army and fight in Iraq, citing Hitchens as one of his biggest influences. The article mentions the books the soldier carried with him, one of which was "Atlas Shrugged" to that Hitchens (in this other wise somber article) said 'We'll, nobodies perfect' The dig at Rand was strangely out of place for the context of the article. In another debate I caught he spoke of being offended by flushing a book down a toilet, and made a reference that should he flush Atlas Shrugged down the toilet he should not fear for his life afterward. His basis for morality, like most of the secular materialists, has no philosophical foundation. He seems to push 'the golden rule' and state that morality explicitly existed before religion (usually citing the good semaritan or the jews before seeing the 10 commandments) Obviously I find this to be his biggest weak point. Similarly, frequent charges against his book were that many more people have been killed in the name of communism, whose atheism is seen as a counter, then in the name of the religion. I find his counter arguments weak, which generally center around the predominant psychological attitudes present in post czarist Russia, instead of focusing on religious type thought as the source of these ills, he seems to focus on specific religions. Hitchens usually points to 'enlightement era values' and says show me a society which killed in the name of those values' The lack of a philosophical foundation for morality seems evident to me in Hitchens, but I love his stuff. Shermer stands on stronger ground on this front, and is explicitly a supporter of free markets and individual freedoms, he also seems to like Rand, though certainly does not consider himself an objectivist. Shermer focuses on religious thought as the worse kind of evil, characterizing it as thought which is based on faith explicitly as evidence or despite it, and not faith in a particular god or story. Founding any belief system on anything other than reason is what he considers religious thought, and Soviet Marxism in nearly every form was a cultist like religion by that standard (and I think by any standard of religion which encompasses the worlds religions)

I see my arguments are being ignored while people go on to continue discussing issues I've challenged as if I haven't. I've been accused of incoherence, and then organized my thoughts quite clearly. Next, my posts have been called walls of text, that are "unreadable". So I will make these points again, and briefly, since my other posts are more comprehensive. If I'm being redundant, it's only because I have been given evidence that people have not actually read the substance of my posts, so I'm acting as if I've not said them. Principle 1: There are no givens in human behavior. If a person chooses to violate your rights, your only option is to deal with it. Hopefully, you'll be in a situation where your rationality will give you an advantage over their irrationality. So, if the population you live within (since 'society' doesn't exist, and is 'only a concept'), wants to take your money, they will. Your ability to produce better guns is what might stop them. Principle 2: There is a point after which you would decide to deal with other men like men, rather than like beasts. This is when the population you live within generally holds reason as the proper means of interaction between men. If these people want to steal the gains you produce, you would have good cause to rebel against them. If they find such actions illegitimate, and agree with you that rational men should not use force against each other, then you should return the favor and not use force against them. Principle 3: Reason is the process by which a man judges how he should interact with other men. Reason is a process that occurs in the mind of an individual man. Free trade acknowledges that this process can and does reach different outcomes depending on the man. This includes different outcomes concerning the proper times and means of the use of legimiate retaliatory force. If you are treating men as men, and not beasts, your judgments about the use of retaliatory force in your interactions with them must be based on a common standard that is known to all so that all may rationally plan their actions around that standard. Otherwise, you reject the rationality of man. Because men cannot think collectively, consensus as an epistemological process must be employed to determine the standard for the use of force. A man cannot hold to his own personal standard for the use of force, if he is to treat those with whom he interacts as rational men. By personal standard, I do not mean the fudamental ethical standard of initiation vs. retaliation. By all means, if his neighbors reject that standard, a man should rebel against them. I refer to what constitutes initiation of force, and what the proper retaliation should be, and by whom. So, by no means can the consensus legimately decide that your economic gains should be their property for their needs. That misses the point.

I have already covered that repeatedly. By the moral standard that men may delegate their rights to the Government, and that to refuse them the right to do so constitutes a violation of their right to do so. By what moral standard to you propose to refuse men the right to do so?

It's more than just a denial of economics this author has, but a denial of reality. He anthropomorphizes "society", saying that the wealthy "owe" society, because generations before that wealthy person has created certain medicines and technologies that the wealthy people of today may benefit from, so as a result, they have an obligation to.. some other people who have no relevance to the things they benefit from.

The two complicating factors you are objecting to I will identify as collective action and time. Can consent can be made subject to the collective action of voting? You have the power to do so. You have the right to make that agreement. The real question is do others have the right to hold you to your agreement to abide by the decision of the group? Yes, so long the agreement is not an abdication of your rights. It does not matter if the agreement is with one other person or a group, the principle is that rights are inalienable. It is not and cannot be true that any cost of acting in accordance with the agreement violates your right to property, if it were true there could never be agreements or contracts. Agreeing to give up some particular amount of cash is not a surrender of your right to property. Ayn Rand knew what representative government was and approved of it. (see "Collectivized 'Rights'" quoted in post 158 on consent.) Can consent be granted in advance of an agreed upon action? If yes, then I can be held to my prior commitment despite the fact that I may have changed my mind at the moment of action. The objective means to establish such a prior commitment is called a contract. Ayn Rand knew what contracts were and approved of them. (see "The Nature of Government" quoted in post #124) Both of your objections, the collective action aspect and the time element, are resolved by recognizing government is by contract. Not the Social Contract of Rousseau which is unconstrained by any definition of rights and force but a Civil Contract that establishes a government limited by rights. Ayn Rand was against a government that had a "blank check" over the lives and property of its citizens. A government that has no authorization to nationalize businesses, no authority to expropriate goods, no power of eminent domain to seize land, no power to declare a paper currency legal tender and then roll the presses forever, but does have a defined power to tax credit transactions to an amount specified by law enacted by a representative government is not a government with a blank check.

Did you know that you are not limited to all-caps and the bold style, you can also make in a bigger size like this: YOU CANNOT CLAIM TO HAVE THE MORE REASONABLE ARGUMENTS AND THE GUN TO COMPEL ME TO SUBMIT TO YOU SIMULTANEOUSLY. That is soooo much more impressive.

I suppose in a kind of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac or FDIC manner, but without any mandatory participation / regulatory powers. Or for instance, if the voters ok Gov't to operate a casino in order to help fund Gov't, and contribute start up funds voluntarily, then Gov't sets up the Casino on the Vegas Strip along side all the others. Competing like any other business but the revenue goes to Gov't instead of investors.

YOU CANNOT CLAIM TO HAVE THE MORE REASONABLE ARGUMENTS AND THE GUN TO COMPEL ME TO SUBMIT TO YOU SIMULTANEOUSLY. If I don't agree that society must be forced to pay for government services, that does not make me a criminal. You have no right to compel me by force. Your need for some man-made good is not a claim on any producer. Want a prosecutor to argue your cause in court? Pick up a law book. Do it yourself. Get a job. Stand on your own two feet. BE A MAN. No, wait. MAN UP. Yes, I like that better.