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Showing content with the highest reputation on 11/07/11 in all areas

  1. At risk of being accused of not properly responding to this topic, I have a question in response to this summation you've provided. Are you saying that, should you feel threatened by some third party, you would have the right to point your gun at me and demand that I rescue you? How do you think I ought respond to such a thing?
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  2. The following is certainly not the official Objectivist stand, but my own. How will you treat this question, metaphysically or psychologically? your tastes or the truth? Maybe Objectivism resolved that riddle but not explicitly. Even if by empirical evidence we could be certain about the sun rising tomorrow, the sun is still too close and well understood. We are ignorant of that which exceeds our scale, which may or may not be infinite. the distant past, the distant future, the very small and the very large (Richard Dawkins compares this to viewing from a burka). When thinking/speculating at a scale that far exceeds what humanity will ever get to know, we our confronted by uncertainty. For all conceivable practical purposes (and Objectivism demands the application of a principle to reality) absolute certainty is applicable. For Objectivism to be rational it demands to be fallible even if 99% correct. It's it's neither authoritarian (dogmatic/infallible) or mystic (relativistic/ applying uncertainty to the scale humans can indeed control). Objectivism rightly asserts that the universe is knowable, and it is to a certain extend that is good enough. But if we call this "contextual certainty", we must acknowledge that it plays a (rightful) psychological role - that of focusing on the knowable instead of literally going crazy with the unknowable (unless properly channeled).
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  3. Capital in a production function does not refer to financial capital such as equity and bonds but rather physical capital such as land, plants, machinery, etc. A production function models how physical capital is combined with labor to produce physical output. Physical capital itself is notoriously hard for economists to quantify and calculate. It is difficult to valuate the capital in use by a company, quantify depreciation of capital, etc. There are forms of capital that are sometimes relevant but are nonphysical, such as reputational capital. It's one of the most difficult issues in empirical economics. If you're further interested, here is a link with probably more than you ever wanted to know on the subject: http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/16/16/43734711.pdf
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  4. Why would you want to undertake such a task? That obligatory part said; I'd recommend actually evaluating whether you gain any value by trying to turn "socialists" into "capitalists" as if it were an evangelical mission. If you do try and distill whether that value comes from practicing your oratory or arguments, or like to litigate, or just enjoy getting together. For tools you could play them the Stossel Show on repeat; he's mastered the art of non being confrontational with confrontational ideas. genius really. Our very own Glenn B'ck
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  5. it was Halloween!!! for the love of Galt!
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  6. Also, the blog post is tagged with the words "satire" and "snark", so yes, it was definitely intended as a joke.
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