IchorFigure

There is nothing wrong with metaphysical "inequalities", which is the collectivist way of twisting unique individual differences into a sin.

Hopefully any forum goers from Norway are all right and not involved in any of the events that took place in Oslo today. I don't really have much to bring to the topic but figured it needed a thread. I'm not terribly familiar with the politics in that part of the world. It seems as though the shooter and main suspect of the bombing is being called a right-wing extremist type. But what does this mean in the context of Norway's culture? I haven't yet seen any further specifications released about his motivations. (besides clearly being a psycho)

Totally agree with what Grames has been arguing. I don't see how it's a pyramid scheme. They don't offer a type of product that needs to be propogated to more buyers in order for you to profit. According to their method the GPU will use its power to solve complex math problems. The idea of which is to emulate a natural resource (like gold/silver). So the Bitcoins can be "mined" and brought into existence but only in a limited manner that takes a difficult process to acquire.

I'm bumping this to ask for other posters thoughts about Bitcoins. I recently learned about it and I haven't come to a firm conclusion yet. I'm having trouble seeing whether it is in fact a clever, productive form of exchange. Or if it is somehow a scam of some type. Having a foot in the world of Objectivism and free markets means you get to see how incredibly wrong many people are when it comes to economics and financial instruments. (Many people decry interest, or short selling for example). I recently learned about BitCoins and some people I knew were talking as if it were some make money fast scheme. I followed them up to a point when I had more questions than answers at which point I dismissed as just wanting to make some easy short term money. Today however a friend of mine and I began talking about it and he explained it in more detail. I found the idea to be very interesting but I'm still erring for "needs more info". As I understand it Bitcoins are being used as a kind of international, online-only medium of exchange correct? What I found intriguing is the way it is created to emulate a natural resource by using "mining". As far as I understand they set it up so that the Bitcoins can't be just created like fiat currency, a person has to use their GPU to actually "mine" them. (interestingly, computer parts also do contain actual precious metals such as small amounts of gold, so in a way it's almost as though it does tie-back to the real world of commodities). And so as GPU power increases so will the ability to Bitcoin "mine". I'm still quite confused however, and so I'm asking what smart forum goers here at OO.net think about it. I truly loathe using the word, but is it "sustainable"? Is it a solid idea that has actual real world productive results? Or is it at root a scam?

I remember an episode where he spoke about wanting to write a sci-fi novel. I don't think he gave any details beyond that. He just said if he writes it he'll do it under a pseudonym. There may be another episode I never heard you're thinking of instead.

That looks completely insane.

Thanks for reminding me about this. I finally got around to watching it. Here's how I would order my opinion of the candidates after hearing them speak, in order from worst to least terrible: Rick Santorum, Tim Pawlenty, Herman Cain, Gary Johnson, Ron Paul. Rick Santorum was just a dreadfully typical bible thumper. Heralding the family as a fundamental unit of society, saying rights come from God, and that no one is perfect. I had to really focus at times just to tell Santorum and Pawlenty apart. Pawlenty was like a slightly less terrible clone of Santorum. They made me think of that bit in Futurama with the identical politicians debating each other. Herman Cain has his bright moments where he gets it right, but he also steps uncomfortably into religion at times like with gay marriage. And then his closing statement just struck me as weird on a number of levels. Gary Johnson I'm not real familiar with, I really enjoyed his flat out simple rejection of any tariff. There were times I liked his answers better than Ron Paul's and others I thought his were worse. Of course Ron Paul is well known, and I have definite issues with him, but of the speakers presented I preferred him most of all. I don't need to get into long details but I don't agree with his default stance of punting rights violations to the state versus the federal govt. And I don't like his borderline pacifism or latent Christian influences on things like abortion.

Yes. I really love both Binswanger and Allison and they did good, but I don't think they're as good debaters as they are strict intellectuals/professionals in their area. Yaron is much better at it. He cut's through the b.s. and presents abstractions in a simple way. Pragmatist guy kept trotting out meaningless factoids to run the treadmill on then the discussion hung. Klein is very much a douche, approaching the nihilistic Leftist mold. Not far underneath the cool exterior of the "practical" "pragmatic" middle-of-the-roader emerged an egotistical poser. Fake laughing, back talking, and interrupting to dominate the argument.

The debate is in less than an hour. Lets see if they can break a live viewers record.

Is that .gif of Obama kicking a door real? I mean, just the images? Why the hell would he kick a door so childishly?

How about we make up our own chart of "What ObamaCare has done to you". Pointing out all the ways ObamaCare actually lowers ones quality of life. -Raises actual costs of medical treatments. -Lowers quality of medical treatments. -Robs you of a potentially greater quality of life had future medical innovations not been obstructed. -Lowers economic productivity in general and hence lowers your future standard of living. -Further wounds individual rights and brings objective rule of law closer to an end. -Empowers shmoozers and social palm-greasers to trample over anyone without clout. etc. etc.

This tiny underdog film has made $3mil so far. He's just being ridiculous and making himself look silly. Critics don't like my movie so I won't make more of them, that will show them! Most likely in my opinion he's just being whiny or as suspected his only goal was to keep the film rights. Which he has done, so why make more?

TIME stopped being respectable and relevant to me many years ago. Somewhere around the point where they printed the issue with the person of the year as "you" with the cheap foil reflective material on the cover. Their journalism falls somewhere between leftist chearleading and Entertainment Tonight coverage.

Yeah, I guess it's not necessarily a reference per se. Possibly just a coincidence but there it is. In any event Portal 2 is another great game from Valve. It's like being in a Pixar movie.

Just something nifty I ran into. The new game Portal 2 has an online store you can purchase different looks and expressions for your co-op play character. One of them is a shrugging motion called the "atlas shrug". For only 1.99, how Capitalist

Good critics critique it as a movie as it stands on its own as a work of art. Not how it conveys Rand's book.

Critics at rotten tomatoes aggregate out to be 5% so far: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/atlas_shrugged_part_i/

I'd be very curious as to the film creator's actual grasp of Objectivism (and in what way he intends to speak about it) before wanting to fund him. Does he actually understand or does he only think he understands in a superficial political way?

Yeah, the guy seemed nervous and upset and all over the place. In fact at one point Harry makes a hand gesture then he flinches as though he was afraid Harry were about to toss something at him lol. Also, I was annoyed Barber pronounced egoism like "eggo-ism", like he's talking about the philosophy of Eggo waffles.

Yeah his opening statement was his best. After that the opponent basically proceeded to attack Objectivism the entire debate, and not really freedom. And he did so by running a Gish gallop around all the usual accusations: black-and-white principals are equal to dogmatic authoritarianism, Rand was a Nietzschean who wanted the weak sacrificed to the strong, Objectivism supports anarchy in politics, etc. The starkest moment was when Benjamin laid it all out clearly that what he wanted was for people to be forced into sacrificing their lives for other people.

A strange debate... I like Harry and he's very intelligent, but I don't think either of them were good debaters. The Demos pissant was able to dance around and make silly attacks on him without Harry getting to the real issues. Harry allowed himself to get put on the defense when he could've done otherwise. Harry is good with abstracts and facts, but not good at articulating philosophical ideas quickly in a easy to understand way.

I haven't seen HB in many speaking situations. I've seen Yaron's talks many times online, so Harry could be refreshing. It starts soon.

Iirc Stephen Bailey was heavily outvoted, but it was not surprising as he was in a traditionally Democratic district anyways. I don't know how Florida would turn out, but if he wants to run then good on him.

Are you arguing that a property owner must always be consulted to comply with the owners terms before the police may properly carry out their job? If that's the case then all you have to do is think about how that would work out in reality. If that police chase scenario were to happen consider how the criminal is already speeding anyway, whether you agree with it or not. Imagine a psycho has snapped and breaks into a clock tower. He brings a sniper rifle and begins shooting at people from the top floor. Are we supposed to think that the police need to track down the property owner of the clock tower and get his permission before they act on capturing the criminal? What if he is out of state and not able to be contacted? What if he is a pacifist who's terms are that no policemen wield guns on his property? I mean, it's just completely absurd. The Police exist to limit and put an end to criminal actions (a criminal use of force) as quickly and efficiently as possible. They are reacting because rights are under concrete physical attack by someone who doesn't respect them to begin with. Come to think of it this is almost a mirror of the policy situations in the Middle Eastern wars. The military has to act more like a service provider than an authority within their region. They have to get permission to act under strict terms (such as leaving mosques alone etc.). The result is that the enemies gain the upper hand by virtue of not giving a damn about terms and rights while the enforcers are crippled with policy. (And yes I do realize the powers and context of a domestic police force and a military war are different, but this specific analogy is helpful)