Greebo

Spiral is saying that he is NOT a victim if he agrees to pay $2.00 for a widget that Dormin pays $1.00 for. I think you should avoid the accusation towards others regarding false claims when you don't seem to want to support your own. First you were going to delete your account and never come back. Now you want the moderators to intervene on your behalf? This thread is getting too long? Why? Does it being long highlight your inability / unwillingness to defend your assertions?

Thank you for supporting my point. Values are values only if they are of value to someone, for something. Yes, the same product can be used the same way by different people. How it can be used, however, does not determine the value of the thing to the person using it. How it WILL be used by that person does. Quite an assumption. Now without those assumptions answer my question. So the seller should not be allowed to sell his widget for less than another seller? Why have you evaded these questions: "What is the nature of that disadvantage? How was this disadvantage achieved?" "You understand that achievement and work are not the same thing?" And why have you seemingly ignored the rest of my post? If Dormin uses my widget to replace a broken part in his car, while Spiral uses my widget to invent a new machine which will cumulatively save billions of hours for everyone, which widget was of more value?

Agree with zombie - Google should block France.

Sorry, I'm not following you. Please clarify the meaning of your terms, as my reading of this statement renders it nonsensical. How do you know the relative value of a house to someone based on their curent economic status? What is the nature of that disadvantage? How was this disadvantage achieved? You understand that achievement and work are not the same thing? You do not understand the relative value concept. A value is that which one acts to gain or keep. As Rand pointed out, the concept of value is not a primary concept - to be a value means it is of value to someone, for something. To whom and for what are the questions that determine the *market* value of that thing. To Dormin, the market (or "relative") value of the widget is $1.00. If the widget can only be obtained for $2.00, then Dormin will not buy it, because it is not of sufficient value to him for his purposes to make that trade. Spiral, on the other hand, will, because for spiral and his purposes, the market value of the widget *is* $2.00. No, it isn't, because value presupposes "of value to someone for something". The term I used before - "objective value" - is probably confusing. I said that the widget has objective value. This is true - but this is not to say that the widget *is* the value. If the widget were removed to some far corner of the universe, never to be reacquired, it would be of no value to anyone. All the gold and platinum in the asteroiod belt is worthless if we cannot make use of it. The objective value of the widget in the context above is simply stating that the widget does have some value to someone for something - therefore it is *a* value - something someone will act to gain and/or keep. The widget above has objective value to both Dormin and Spiral - but how much value to each varies, thus the market value to each of them is different.

If I trade my widget to Dormin for $1.00, that's balanced. If I trade another identical widget to Spiral for $2.00, that's also balanced. It's balanced because while the widget itself has objective value, only Dormin, Spiral and I each individually know the relative value that the widget has to us. We each determine - or rank - the widget objectively against our other values to conclude at what level trade is acceptable, and at what level trade for a widget is not worth it. The arbitrary is introduced when you, human_murda, declare that the value of Widget is X and thus everyone must trade Widget at that level. You are not able to rank our values for us, so you are not able to judge for us what value the widget should have.

I did not say that you forced me to read it, did I? With regards to the question - I find myself doubting that you actually were interested in what other people think, primarily because you have not responded to anything that anyone else said. That lends the appearance, at least, that your intent was actually just to set the stage to answer yourself, once you had confirmation that you had some readers. If that was the desire, you would be better served by simply writing an essay, rather than apparnetly wasting everyone elses time by leading them to believe that you genuinely were seeking answers. If that was not the desire, well that's the impression you've given me, so you might want to consider some changes in your approach to these topics.

So after forcing myself to read that wall of text, it seems as if you asked the question not to get an answer, but to set the stage in order to simply state your own answer. Was there a genuine question in your original post?

Holy Wall of Text batman.

What can Mr. Thomspon do wiht Mr. Galt's life without Mr. Galt's agreement? He can lock it up, he can destroy it. Is that ownership? Can you do more with the things YOU own than simply hold onto them or destroy them?

That's a big if requiring to take on faith that this will occur. Given the nature of ponzi schemes, I see no reason to extend that kind of faith.

Would you say then that your question has been answered sufficiently?

Technically she's not wrong. Earth has been here for 6,000 years. And a big big plus...

For the record, I finally found what 'human_murda' was talking about. It amounted to about one paragraph in the book It was after Hank's trial, when he was engaging in black market trading to buy coal from an abandoned mine that had been taken over by a young man who in a different era, Hank suspected would have been a great industrialist, but in the highly oppressive anti-free trade world they were in, was likely destined to be a criminal. And once again, human_murda completely missed the point. "he actually 'neened' the society to be different for him to achieve anything" - no, what he needed was a free society based on respecting free trade. What he HAD - what drove him to be a black marketeer - was the kind of society the OP proposes when he declares that everyone has to get a "fair share" and that "having money gives them the right to buy, no consent of the seller needed!"

Banks provide some value to their customers in the forms of loans which produce interest, and in savings accounts which are paid interest. Interest on savings is not paid from other people's deposits. Your heirarchy does not model itself after a bank. A company that buys a real product or service (did you just say money isn't real?) sells that product or service to customers, and collects money from them in trade, which is then paid to its employees. Your heirarchy does not model itself after a business. Your heirarchy depends on one thing only: Get more suckers to give up their money so the first people who joined can acquire more. It is not sustainable in the long term, it will collapse. Even if the scheme is presented with perfect honesty to all concerned, it is a short term scheme only. We are long term thinkers here - your get-rich-quick scheme will not appeal to us. We do not consider such ventures moral.

Ragnar Danneskjöld hijacked Government owned ships carrying goods taken by force from producers. Your parallel falls flat on its face. This is the kind of language used by people who cannot actually defend their positions, in a blatant attempt to transfer the guilt over their own failure to think to the person who does think. You are right about one thing, though. There is no point in discussing this with you further.

Does "being forced to pay for it" count as participating in those programs?

I submit that you do not. I submit that you have mistaken "self destruction" with "not producing". If you need an example of self-destruction, I suggest you study Gail Winand from The Fountainhead, and Dr. Robert Stadler from Atlas Shrugged. Both men destroyed themselves - in two different ways. And Stadler's self destruction did not occur at Project X, by the way. No, that's not why she went on strike. Try reading it again. Indeed. So the hotel owner uses his time, money, blood sweat and tears to create a hotel, and some couple can come in and force him to trade with them if he doesn't want to? Have you forgotten that a sale requires the consent of the seller? [q]Sure he could close his doors to villains but not a fair trader. [/q] Why does your having money entitle you to force me to sell you my grain? You have said they have the right to do it - defend that claim. Prove the source of that right.

If you pass laws backed up by guns that compel me to participate in anything, do I have *any* responsibility to your system? If so - to whom am I responsible? Those like me, who are also participating against their will? Or those who embrace the system that enslaves those of us who don't want any part of it?

Nonsense. I can work for someone else and earn just enough to cover my needs, without contributing one whit more to the society which wishes to enslave me than I must. I could work as a janitor, or day laborer, or any number of things to keep myself going WITHOUT providing a hotel for them to sleep in - without creating any values for them that requirs the productive efforts of my mind. I think you do not understand what self-destruction means. You may need to read the book again. I happen to be on my 4th or 5th iteration, and I think you're forgetting quite a bit of important detail. Think about Owen Kellogg, for instance. Sorry, what? So it is your position that the gay couple has the right to force their trade upon the hotel owner?

I advise you not to go down this rabbit hole with Jacob - but if you do, well, you were warned.

Patent morality is a hotly debated topic here, so I'll leave that to others. As to this: It is not *our* need, it is the basic need of Man that Man be free to act. Do we need others to change? No. We can simply refuse to work. Does us refusing to work exert some hold on others? How? Ask yourself question - imagine two scenarios based on recent political events. In both scenarios, a gay married (or would be married depending on your state) couple wishes to rent a room in a motel. In the first scenario, the owner, who vehemently disapproves of gay marriage and homosexuality at large, refuses to rent them a room. (this actually happened in NH as I understand it) In the second scenario, there *is* no motel in the location where the gay couple wishes to rent a room. In the first scenario, an argument that the motel owner was holding others (to wit: the gay couple) to his "need" (ie: his standard that gay is immoral) by leaving them no option to rent a room. In the second scenario the gay couple has no option to rent a room because no such room exists. If the impact of our actions on others is exactly the same as the impact would be on others if we did not exist, what are we doing that can be said to hold anything over others? What force are we using? Answer: None. But now if you force the motel owner to rent his room anyway, what changes? The gay couple gets something they want, but what happens to the motel owner? If the gay couple did not exist, he wouldn't rent his room to them. If the gay couple gets their way, his room gets rented *against his wishes* - thanks to *their* "need". Who was held to whom's standard then?

I disagree with your choice of words. We're *ALL* businessmen. I'm a computer programmer. That's my business. I sell my time and ability to program for a salary and benefits. I'm also a landlord. I sell the use of my property for money. If we're not businessmen, then we're living by some means other than productive effort and trade with other producers. If we're living by some means other than productive effort and trade with other producers, then statistically speaking we're almost certainly living off of the productive effort of others without engaging in trade - which, as Man Qua Man, would be immoral. One rare exception to the statistics would be the substinence exister who lives solely by producive effort and trades with no one.

True, but in this case, calling people who reject *some* gods in favor of others "making them atheists for those [rejected] Gods" actually is nonsense. One is not an atheist to *some* gods. One is an atheist or one is not an atheist. Someone who accepts any idea of God is not an atheist in any sense, no matter how many other Gods they don't believe in. What's really sad, however, is that the entire point being made by Spiral about the inconsistency (read contradiction) of those who DO believe is being lost because of a bad choice of words on his part.

While I think Robert Kiyosaki's advice is often not that good - I do think his "Cashfow 101" game is actually a good game for teaching finance and at least something about Capitalism. You circle the board, trying to buy properties that are profitable while avoiding bad decisions like going into massive debt for a boat, attempting to reach your ultimate goal not OF, but BY becoming rich. (Your ultimate goal is something you pick at the game start that can only be achieved by having a boatload of money)

On the IP point... If Rand did not intend for intellectual property to be property in her use of the language, then please explain why Hank Reardon so vehemently held onto his sole right to produce Reardon metal (until it was extorted) and refused to share the formula? The formula to his metal is just as much IP as software or music is - it's a combination of ideas that creates something new.