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treii28

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Posts posted by treii28

  1. I was also pointed once to the works of James P. Hogan for Sci Fi fans. He tends to create some great characters with very O'ist leanings. The book I was put onto was written before the end of the cold war so you have to take that into account when you read it, but it is called 'End Game Enigma'. Some of his other's that I read and liked included "Two Faces of Tomorrow" which is underlaid with some interesting philosophical ponderings on the emergence of artificial intelligence. Another I highly recommend is "The Legend that was Earth". Beside the main character being almost Roark'ish, some of the conversations between the hyper-logical Hyadean and the unschooled Columbian girl Ramona are precious! "Do Hyadeans gamble?"

  2. When a friend of my father's passed away they just had what amounted to a wake. We had a bunch of people get together and we shared stories about Bob. It was a celebration of his life, not a mourning of his passing.

    I've said as much to anyone I know that they can just do whatever with my body. Burn it, donate it to science. I won't care, I'll be dead. But as far as the spiritual ones, I've told them point blank that if they really believe what they claim to believe and they do any kind of long, drawn out mournfest for me, I am going to use whatever means are at my disposal to haunt them for the rest of their lives!

    hehehehe

  3. You cannot steal an intangible item, nor do I believe anyone has the right to own anything they conjure up in their minds.

    This is where I differ with many objectivists/libertarians.

    What has ever been built by man that hasn't first been 'conjured up in the mind'? By that line of reasoning, anything can be stolen. But you're going to say that 'stuff' is property? By what right? Isn't the notion that you 'own it' just conjured up in your mind?

    (and if you dare suggest that 'possession' is ownership, then I'll steal all your stuff and when the police show up, I'll tell them you said that and that "I" possess it now. Therefore by your own words, it's mine)

  4. Someone mentioned that Peikoff did address this very recently. They did miss one part though. If it's your only option then yes, you fight to survive. Peikoffs example was in fact that of an Island also, so I don't know if you sent him the question as well.

    Although Peikoff did not state this in his example specifically he did elude to it, but if there were another Island that you were sure you could swim to, then no. If there are other options available to you, the moral course is to pursue alternatives before resorting to force for your survival.

  5. 62159_1516585766324_1584889576_1199385_2430999_n.jpg

    Dagny Taggart was nine years old when she decided that she would run the Taggart Transcontinental Railroad some day. She stated it to herself when she stood alone between the rails, looking at the two straight lines of steel that went off into the distance and met in a single point. What she felt was an arrogant pleasure at the way the track cut through the woods: it did not belong in the midst of ancient trees, among green branches that hung down to meet green brush and the lonely spears of wild flowers-but there it was. The two steel lines were brilliant in the sun, and the black ties were like the rungs of a ladder which she had to climb.

  6. I also looked up Francisco D'Anconia. I had a link somewhere on the meaning of the last name, but I'm having a hard time finding it now. (I think google changed something in how they are weighting search results, as anytime I put in anything with Anconia now it brings up links to the money speech that I search for and use a lot)

    Francisco means 'free man' in Spanish.

    The link I found on D'Anconia said it meant something akin to 'of very high price' or essentially 'not for sale' akin to 'that which cannot be purchased at any price'

  7. I find it hard to believe she didn't put at least some thought into the names as I have noticed a few things in particular. Perhaps circumstance, perhaps subconscious on her part.

    Orren: pale or light

    I would read that as lacking color or vividness.

    Boyle: 'vain pledge'

    and of course if she picked them based on sound, Boyle also sounds like 'boil' which can have a couple of meanings, of course one being to cook in hot water which of course turns something solid or liquid into a non-corporeal gaseous state, and also the legion that can be found on the skin. A stretch, I know, but the sound of the latter again, represents a connotative subconscious discomfort so probably had at least some significance.

    Hank: diminutive of Henry and apparently in some cases also of 'John' (from Johan??), meaning 'home ruler' or one who holds power over his own domain

    Reardon: royal bard

    Wesley means simply 'western meadow' so again fall back on sound and the full name sounds like 'Weaselly mooch'

    Mouche is also a french word meaning 'fly' or 'pesky insect' as well as meaning a parasitic insect.

    Taggart: son of the priest

    Perhaps also a stretch due to non-religious views, but if there was anything akin to a religious notion in Shrugged, it was that of the business world. The priest of business would be the builder of the Taggart line.

    Dagney: scandanavian for 'New Day'

    James: now here's where I don't think the names are completely and strictly by 'chance' because James is a derivative of Jacob. and means 'He who supplants. usurper: one who wrongfully or illegally seizes and holds the place of another'

    Now tell me that is just happenstance????

    Midas is a given as the mythology of one who turns to gold anything he touches.

    Mulligan: (Origin Gaelic) Locality. Mullechean, the top or summit, a height

    In addition to the things you point out about Galt, it is also shown in one reference I found to be a derivative of Walt or Walter 'commander of the army'

    Stadler means 'Lives near or works in a barn' I'm guessing that's a nice way of saying "one who shovels manure" - someone pointed out to me it has a Yiddish meaning also [from Hebrew shtadlan, meaning compromiser, appeaser, lobbyist] (originally a Jew who works for anti-Semites)

    Robert meaning simply 'bright fame'

    Put the two together and you get either 'famous for shoveling crap' or 'turning against his people / working for the enemy'

    I'm still looking into names, but there are a lot more hits than misses on them. Some are likely coincidence, but that James one really got my attention

  8. If I understand you correctly, if no one volunteers assistance, severely disabled individuals are left to fend for themselves under the Objectivist viewpoint? This would be my understanding of Rand's description of a "true" capitalist system.

    I had an issue with this and objectivism for a short period of time. But as is usually the case, I fell back on the advice of Rand herself:

    "Whenever you think you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong." - Ayn Rand

    In actuality, I hadn't really looked to closely at the premises. Or at least hadn't broken them down enough. So I strove to do so.

    What I came up with among a number of things included some of the following:

    1) life has value

    2) no one wants to suffer

    3) limitations both persistent and transient can exist to limit ability

    4) limits on ability can prevent someone from fulfilling even their most basic needs

    5) not fulfilling one's basic needs leads to suffering

    My first epiphany in that re-examination was #1. Life has value. Even the disabled or less capable can provide value to others through living their lives. People recognize value in others, which led me to another conclusion:

    6) any decent person does not wish another to suffer

    Why? Because any decent person at least perceives that life has value and can therefore identify with the value in the lives of others. And most people have experienced some form of suffering, and can therefore also identify with the consequences of suffering in others. This leads to another conclusion.

    7) helping others in whom we identify their value, provides decent people with value in return

    As others eluded to, people with family members will help the disabled in their families out of love. People will help their friends out of friendship. People will help strangers out of a sense of compassion and the aforementioned identification with their suffering. There is value to be found in helping others, and many people find it all the time. This made me realize, I had underestimated the compassion of people.

    But of course, there was still one big sticky in my head. I tend to draw such concepts out to extremes to test them under the best and worst case scenarios. I imagined a condition where even the able were faced with limitations that made it difficult to help others. Say a global disaster or a full blown nuclear exchange - something way out there! There may exist some very extreme scenario where even the compassion people have in finding value in being charitable will be limited by their ability to meet even their own basic needs. What of the disadvantaged then?

    Do you see what I saw? Based on my prior conclusions that people find value in charity, and that I underestimated the compassion (ability to find such value) people have, do you see what suddenly hit me?

    Try to imagine the scenario I described - a situation sooooo bad that even the most capable cannot provide for themselves. Cannot do so soooo badly that they are unable to even consider compassion in helping others. Can you even imagine a scenario where no one - absolutely no one is able to express fundamental human traits like compassion? If we ever really really reached a situation that terribly and incredibly bad, who "should" survive it? The most capable or the least?

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