Harrison Danneskjold

1: If you take a bunch of Coke bottles, fill them with cat urine and sell them to innocent bystanders, it should be considered fraud- because the packaging of a product is a statement about what it contains. Therefore, if you take the outer appearance of any product that exists and put anything inside EXCEPT that product, it is implicit fraud. Above I was describing the methodology for proving this, which would be necessary for it to be law (as it would be replacing aspects of IP which I'm arguing against) and attempting to show the difference in their respective requirements. 2: If one takes implicit fraud seriously and projects this proposed methodology for proving the accused guilty or innocent of it, then it is a logical necessity that this would have to be executed by some sort of government- by process of elimination. (The accused can't run these tests, nor can the victim, nor can the public at large- if you've accepted my whole nondisclosure bit) This isn't strictly relevant to this thread but I'm still trying to work out that particular issue for myself (government vs. anarchy; I've been leaning towards the latter) and it bears enormous significance to that- namely that I should check some relevant premises of my own. 3: Some of my posts here haven't been the slightest bit intelligible. I'd prefer to think that the majority of them have been but, if that's your evaluation, I'm sorry to hear that. Feel free to ask for any further clarification; I'd be more than happy to help. Or at least to try.

Indeed! And you know what. . . That would seem to almost-perfectly correspond to defensive/retaliatory force, as well. Shooting people is bad, AND SO [consequently; not in spite of] if you point a gun at me I'll shoot first. I like it. Well, that's just the thing. 1: Legally, the right to life necessitates the right to die (no senseless obligations; only causality) and so, assuming you're defending your rights and your attackers have thusly forfeited theirs, you have the legal right to fight back against overwhelming odds. 2: Morally, your own life should be the standard of value (although I think your happiness should truly be the ultimate value; life only being an absolute requirement for any chance of that); to throw your life away for no reason would be immoral. But that's what I'm saying; DON'T throw it away; only understand that against a rational and determined mind there is no such thing as overwhelming odds. And yes, so long as you're defending yourself, fight dirty! Cause some damage; make the Home Alone movies look downright chivalrous!

"I am merely complying with the system which my fellow men have established. If they believe that force is the proper means to deal with one another, I am giving them what they ask for. If they believe that the purpose of my life is to serve them, let them try to enforce their creed. If they believe that my mind is their property—let them come and get it.” -Ragnar Danneskjold That is what I'm advocating. Don't throw your life away- if some criminal confronts you with a bigger gun then the moral thing to do is to comply. All I'm asserting is that the human mind is THE biggest gun.

I assume you're referring to my earlier assertion that patents and copyrights cannot be enforced objectively? The answer to your question is yes. The difference between this recognition and the other is the difference between identical and approximate. With patent infringement, one must discern whether or not a certain design was inspired by or based off of another- which necessarily means attempting to discern the thought process which led to it and thusly cannot be done objectively (assuming the judge is not a close friend or family member of the accused). With implicit fraud, one must discern whether something's appearance (the packaging) is identical to another product's and if its contents are identical. If the first is while the second is not then it is fraud. I believe we now have computers which can do this; that is how simple it is. You look at the bottles; are they the same? If so you taste (more likely chemically analyze) the sodas; are they the same? If not, fraud. This would, however, imply some sort of third party (such as a government); there would be no way for a competitor to do so without discovering your secret formula.

Reread my response; I was specifically referring to hypocritical Muslims. I would not feel safe among self-consistent Muslims, at all; never once have I made an attempt to excuse them. And yes, many Islamic scholars do advocate a worldwide Caliphate and THEY are evil; so is anyone else who expressly and knowingly advocates the same. I am not saying that it is not an evil ideology and I am not whitewashing the atrocities which are committed for it, each and every day. All I'm saying is that the hypocritical ones (while still hypocritical and thusly immoral!) are not a direct threat to us. The peaceful Muslims aren't immediately dangerous any more than Conservatives are likely to start burning people alive, again. Which isn't to say that it couldn't happen, someday- but not in our generation. Values are determined by your philosophy (whether explicit or implicit) and, while it doesn't 'make' anyone do a thing they don't want to, as a form of protophilosophy religion DETERMINES what its followers want to do. It is not magickal; it does move people to do good or evil. Observe- Hell, observe 85% of human history. This statement. . . Your definition of 'terrorist' (which is already a conceptual stumbling block) would include American soldiers- who 'blindly' obey the chain of command and practically breathe violence. Would you like to reconsider that and try again? . . . Have I introduced you to this author that I simply adore; Ayn Rand? Are you aware of the extent to which this directly contradicts the most fundamental Objectivist premises? If not- I don't really know where to start, but I could suggest a few things for you to read. If you are aware and you think that she was wrong, that's fine; tell me why. Let's not beat around the bush. Exactly.

That which is random is out-of-bounds to human knowledge; you cannot predict or understand it. For instance, you could tell me that there's a 1/6 chance of a die landing on any given side or a 1/2 chance of a coin flip landing heads or tails; I assert that this doesn't count as functional knowledge. If you had to build cars or skyscrapers that way, we would end up "knowing" that only 1/6th of people who use them will die horribly. If you planted crops with statistical and probabilistic knowledge, you would starve one year in six. For something to "truly" be random is for it to be causeless (because there's supposedly no reason for any one outcome, instead of another) which ultimately defies the law of identity. Truly random particles would behave illogically. That which has no identity is beyond the scope of human understanding; that which is out-of-bounds to reason, for all intents and purposes, doesn't exist. It's semantically null to debate over the nature of things we cannot understand; it is as futile as debating how many angels could dance on the head of a pin. So if there are parts of the universe which we can never understand, there is no reason whatsoever to discuss or even think about them. If you can't understand it then it's a waste of time to try- if you cannot think about something then it "exists" in exactly the same way that unicorns do. But, again, this isn't metaphysical but epistemological. Note that nowhere in here did I assert whether or not the Copenhagen Interpretation is true; all I'm saying is that even IF it's true, it renders itself irrelevant to the whole of humanity and utterly meaningless.

I've been thinking about this a lot, lately, and I think I understand the present malfunction. SL, can what you are trying to convey be summarized as the assertion: "there may be entities within (and/or inclusive) aspects of the universe which are not logical"? Because that's what common-sense is; the informal use of on-the-fly logic. Many people tend to make invalid assumptions while using common sense but that stems from lapses of judgment and shoddy reasoning. Common-sense itself, if followed ruthlessly and rigorously enough, is the precursor to formal logic. I think this is part of what Plasmatic is criticizing, based on 1. Common sense is amateur logic 2. Your username is strictly logical and 3. you're criticizing common sense. I do see where you're coming from but I think the word you're looking for is intuitive. Things are not always exactly what they seem to be, at first glance (which I infer is the brunt of your argument, and is true) but human beings can find out the truth behind appearances. . . Through the use of common sense. Now, I think what Plasmatic is trying to say (please correct me if I'm wrong) is this: Human beings can only perceive the universe through human senses and human minds (i.e. logic). We have no other way of knowing anything. Now, he's saying that it's impossible for there to be anything we can't understand, and that's probably true (I won't go there; unnecessary) but consider this: If there were any entity (and/or) aspect of the universe which was imperceptible or illogical, could we ever actually be aware of it? I'm not sure how well that corresponds to your actual argument but, if you follow that line of reasoning, I think it boils down to "We know that we cannot know anything" which IS impossible. It isn't a metaphysical problem; it's epistemological (not WHAT exists but HOW we know it). Furthermore, I think if you stop and rethink the concepts you're using and your terminology, you'll find that the disagreement is actually much smaller than you think.

Yes. But it must be remembered that, in these cases, their hypocrisy is the reason why most Christians and some Muslims are willing to peacefully coexist with us; the hypocrisy consists of mixing GOOD ideas in with the evil. The alternative is that philosophy truly is a parlor game in which any concept may be stretched to fit any meaning you please- in which case there can be no good or evil. Garshasp and Tadmjones: Remember that NOBODY is interchangeable with anyone else; nobody may be judged for anyone else's ideas, words or actions. The only person that anyone is morally responsible for is themselves. Apply that to everything else in your entire argument and I'll have nothing else to dispute.

Agreed.

This is true. "Moderate" and "extremist" implies that philosophy is some sort of parlor game in which you can stretch the principles like taffy- Enough said. "Sincere" and "hypocritical" would be much more accurate. This has a small kernel of truth in it. Yes, human beings have the moral responsibility (IF they wish to be just) to denounce evil wherever and whenever they see it, and in this respect I agree; the hypocritical Muslim community has been disturbingly silent. But the rest on that issue. . . You should really check your premises. When one accepts an idea which necessitates the initiation of force. So IF you find A Muslim who tells you, point-blank, that a worldwide Caliphate would be good, then THAT Muslim is evil and fully deserves to be treated as such. But to assert that ALL Muslims are evil would be as wrong as to assert that ALL Christians oppose [Darwinian evolution, gay marriage, abortion, et cetera] or that ALL Objectivists enjoy Atlas Shrugged (I'm sure some don't). A human being is not that cut-and-dry.

Alrighty, then. Lots of package-dealing here. It's understandable; they're the typical concepts one hears thrown around willy-nilly on any given day, but we still need to stop and evaluate them. Average muslims aren't harmless; let's start there. I don't care to play numbers games. If you mean that statistically average and numerically dominant Muslims are out to get me then I won't dispute it. I do not know such statistics, nor do I care; it's irrelevant to my point. All I mean is that, if you see someone wearing a burkha in a supermarket, she is not likely to follow you home and slit your throat. I am referring to regular, American Muslims, of the type one might expect to meet in any American city. . . Where we do not lynch people in the streets. Next bit. Logically following from what I mean by 'average' Muslims, yes; I would feel SAFE in such a community. I would not feel comfortable; frankly, I would probably spend most of my time trying to show them the irrationality of their religion. It would not work out very well- because I personally have an issue tolerating ideas that I know are blatantly false. But a Muslim who would refer to me as 'infidel' and 'enemy' is not the sort of Muslim I'm referring to; the community you describe contradicts the people you describe there. Okay; again you're discussing human beings in terms of statistics which you can assign guilt to. Check that. IF any Muslim (one, uno, singular) explicitly approves of actual, bloody jihad THEN yes, you're right. Such a person is dangerous and deserves to be treated accordingly. But check your premises- you are making wild generalizations about human beings with free will. IF there is ONE Muslim who does not approve of jihad THEN it invalidates the blanket assertions, because that one Muslim cannot be blamed for anything he did not personally do.

"A given person’s sense of life is hard to identify conceptually, because it is hard to isolate: it is involved in everything about that person, in his every thought, emotion, action, in his every response, in his every choice and value, in his every spontaneous gesture, in his manner of moving, talking, smiling, in the total of his personality. It is that which makes him a 'personality.' Introspectively, one’s own sense of life is experienced as an absolute and an irreducible primary—as that which one never questions, because the thought of questioning it never arises." You may not be able to fully identify your sense of life; that would require knowing about every process happening anywhere in your brain, at any time, which I suspect is physically impossible. (If you knew them all then there would be more to know; namely your added knowledge; which is itself a process to understand) But you can sure as Hell come close- by ruthless introspection and analysis of everything that goes on inside your own mind. You may not be able to figure the whole thing out, down to the last detail, but you can absolutely get a very good idea of the big picture.

My son's name is JT; an abbreviation of William James Tiberius Jodeit. Yes, this was my idea and no, I don't regret it at all. Of course, he's still having trouble stringing multiple words together, but I figure if it's too unbearable he can just go by JT.

As would I. And if you figured out how to make something very similar to Coke, put it in an identical bottle with the Coca-Cola logo, that would be wrong and illegal- regardless of patents or copyrights. It would be fraud. Yes. . . I'm not sure if Coca-Cola would've been stolen from; maybe, maybe not. I think the victims there would be the people who were sold "Coke" and intentionally defrauded at large. It might make sense to conceive of Coke as having a percentage of their market share stolen (that's the bit I wasn't sure about; "theft of market shares" strikes me as a rather fishy concept) iff we bear in mind that the primary victims were the customers and Coke is secondary. Like inheritance; if I leave something to someone after I die, they have no right to receive it (after all, they have no right to my things) but everyone must recognize MY right to dispose of it. . . Which, in that context, just so happens to mean the former. I think something along those lines would be more applicable to the scenario above; the customers' rights were violated by false advertising and oh, by the way, X number of dollars should rightfully have gone to Coca-Cola (as per inheritance). Either way, I doubt the hypothetical Pseudo-Soda Baron would be able to enjoy his fortune for long.

Both involve an inventor's right to profit from his ideas. With patents, you make your idea public and are then given a unilateral monopoly on it, for a given number of years, which is enforced at governmental gunpoint. This assumes that, once you explain your idea to someone else and help them understand how it works, you have the right to prevent them from actually using that knowledge (which is what I'm disputing). If we assume, for the sake of argument, that you do NOT have any such right, then how would any inventor actually profit from his idea? (Wouldn't others swoop in and build it, first?) I would suggest that he simply be careful with whom he explains it to. So imagine a factory where they make something, for instance Coca-Cola, of which the formula is this big secret. So all of the employees have signed waivers which promise that they'll never tell anyone how it works, and if they do they're liable for millions and millions of dollars. Same idea. So it would accomplish the same thing (the inventor of a product gets a monopoly on it for a while) but by different means; the difference is one of forbidding someone to do X or simply not telling them how they would do X, in the first place. And yes, then they would retain the ability to sit down and figure X out themselves, if they truly wanted to. But do we really want to declare that they legally aren't allowed to figure it out?

Yes. Not simply for the sake of marketplace-governance, as such, but because I think an inventor's right to profit from his own ideas should naturally follow from the physical fact that he alone knows about this idea (this fact immediately stemming from his claim to the idea, at all- that he put in the time and effort to think of it, himself). So from that principle, contractual nondisclosure agreements would be the most obvious implementation but there may well be others I haven't thought of yet; just not patents and copyrights. And if we went with such contracts they would still need to be enforced, somehow. I'm not sure if I pointed it out or not, but you'll notice a common pattern throughout this thread- My primary concern with patents and copyrights is that I don't think anyone else has the right to tell me which ideas I can or can't act on. It removes ideas from actions, into two different categories when there should only be one; this is why keeping your idea a secret would solve the whole issue (ideas and actions stay in the same arena- you simply don't let people into yours, in the first place). So the problem stems from the fact that inventions are a type of idea which necessarily entail a certain, very specific action; namely to build it. Not so with art. Art can do many things for people, it can affect people profoundly and wonderfully, but the concept of an invention is a verb while an artistic concept is a noun; there's nothing in particular to do with it except observe. So the issue that applies to copyrights and patents, in the manner which I've been criticizing them this entire time (specifically inventions, innovations; physical possibilities) does not apply to artwork. Again, I'll have to give it more thought. I really have yet to analyze it at length but, off the top of my head, I don't see any such problem with copyrighting Anthem or Ebeneezer Goode. Well, maybe if a different band wanted to play the song as a sort of a cover-thing, then that might fall into the same problem. Otherwise not.

True. I would say it was pretty close but, no; it's not truly accurate. "Money is the material shape of the principle that men who wish to deal with one another must deal by trade and give value for value. . . When you accept money in payment for your effort, you do so only on the conviction that you will exchange it for the product of the effort of others. . . Those pieces of paper, which should have been gold, are a token of honor – your claim upon the energy of the men who produce. . . " Et cetera, et cetera. Money is a tool; a placeholder which allows the exchange (and, more importantly, the savings) of goods and services. What I was trying to get at is this: If you own something which you are legally forbidden to sell, it is just as if you owned something which you were legally forbidden to use; a car you were forbidden to drive, a house you "own" but are forbidden to enter, et cetera. If I told you that Earth has a second moon, you would demand proof; you would declare that such is impossible because we see only one in the night sky. If I told you that it's an invisible moon you would (if you continued the conversation) point out that the tides rise and fall in synch with the conventional moon, and no other; if I declared that it's both invisible and massless you would suggest we send a rocket there. If I told you that Earth has a second moon, which cannot be seen, heard, touched, smelled or tasted, you would likely ask me then in exactly what sense it exists. That is what I'm getting at with property you can't sell. You can do anything you want with your property, unless it violates the rights of others. This directly contradicts some of my earlier statements; I'd like to retract them. I was attempting to drop the issue of idea-ownership momentarily, so that we could continue more productively. That was a mistake. If you own an idea, which someone else knows about, then you have the right to do whatever you please with it. But that's not a constructive line of reasoning, so I'll rephrase it this way: I wholeheartedly agree that an inventor has the right to benefit from his labor; the issue is not with that but with implementation. Patents and copyrights consist of figuring some problem out or finding some unique solution, running out and ensuring that everyone else hears about it and then declaring that nobody may actually act on it without your permission. Obviously, I think this is immoral. What I think would be completely moral would be if an inventor found some novel solution and simply acted on it, himself; he has no obligation whatsoever to tell anyone else about it. No, this doesn't protect a single person from having their ideas reverse-engineered or from subsequent inventors reaching the same idea, independently. And THAT is the reason why I think it would be moral. I prefer this implementation precisely BECAUSE I agree that an inventor has the right to the product of his mind. . . ANY inventor, regardless of whether someone else thought of it first. Inventors A and B both arrive at the same idea, independently, but A gets to the patent office first; doesn't B have an equal right to the idea? If we implemented something like nondisclosure, instead, there's no reason for any dichotomy; A and B can both enjoy the profits of the mental labor they both performed, independently. Patents and copyrights necessarily entail "You can't sell that to anyone; I thought of it first and if you have my cake then I can't eat it!" Nondisclosure, quite simply, nips that entire issue in the bud; it allows everyone to bake their own cake so that nobody has to fight over one. (Don't like the terms of using my idea? Then I won't tell you; invent it, yourself!) Isn't that Lassiez-Faire at it's finest, when everyone is able to succeed or fail on their own? When everyone is allowed to bake their own cake and eat it, too? As to whether or not this applies to artwork, as well, I think there's a further distinction required (I don't see a problem with treating artwork as intellectual property). But I'm still working on that one; I'll come back to it at some point.

I was wonderfully surprised by Warm Bodies (and subsequently found its comparison to Twilight an affront to reason); zombies which, despite their urges to eat brains, still retain the choice to think- or not. Wreck-It Ralph, too. Sure, basically everything cinematic these days pays homage, in one degree or another, to mysticism-altruism-collectivism; some of them are even profoundly evil (The Lorax). Still, if you can stomach the obligatory minute or two of lipservice, I think there's a surprising amount of rational selfishness to be found. Also, isn't an antihero a protagonist who is meant to be a 'bad guy'? Because if so (from the Wikipedia article about it) I would consider almost all of the ACTUALLY moral protagonists to be such: Batman Jason Borne Rooster Cogburn Sherlock Holmes The Man with No Name ("Blondie" from Good, Bad & Ugly) Shrek Han Solo Jack Sparrow . . .

Exactly my point. Well, not that it's irrelevant as such, but that it's nobody else's business. Isn't copying someone else's idea an action? So it's fine to copy someone else's idea for yourself, so long as you don't sell it. What's the difference? Yes, if you sell someone else's idea then that inventor in a way caused the sale; ergo (by your reasoning) they caused that sale and own at least some of the money; ergo if you don't give them some then it's theft. But what about the sale that they never made to you? I do understand the distinction there but I think it's arbitrary; here's why: If I build myself an iPod then I can listen to music on it, helping me to enjoy my own life just slightly more. We've agreed this would be fine? If I build myself an iPod and then sell it, I have money which also exists for the same purpose but not necessarily the same means to achieve it. If I build myself an iPod, sell it and use the money to buy an iPod from the inventor, would that be moral? Because point A is moral, B is not (because you've converted iPod into money); would C be okay? Money is nothing but a symbol; symbolic of labor performed and goods to be enjoyed. If I have the right to a certain piece of property then, by logical necessity, I think that I MUST have the right to sell it. I'm tired and having trouble articulating this at the moment; I'll come back and clarify this some more, tomorrow. 1: Nondisclosure agreements would constitute a monstrous system? Really? Is it better to know all about some tantalizing possibility, which you are forbidden to enact, or to wonder about it and be told "go figure it out, yourself!"? Because that's what I'm advocating, here; if you want to do something, but not to pay the inventor, then that's fine- invent it yourself! 2: By what mechanism does one loot innovation? Would torturing some inventor's secrets from him by unspeakable means do it, or is it simply an elementary-schooler's complaint of "He's copying me!"? 3: Once defining how one would go about looting innovation, please explain its relation with what I have actually said, here.

Yes, it does. But do you really believe that I am here, on Objectivism Online, pouring time and energy into this exercise so that I can guiltlessly build my own iPod or plagiarize massive swaths of Atlas Shrugged? Do you REALLY think that I have put all of this mental effort into this so that I don't have to THINK, anymore? "Others looking it over and discovering the process you achieved." No, nondisclosure would not protect you from that. And that, my friend, is the point. I do not think that anyone should be legally immunized to that. I am not advocating "free" anything. Nondisclosure would take contractual form, making it fully consentual among everyone involved and tying it neatly to the principles of personal responsibility. Nondisclosure would protect anyone's idea just as much as patents and copyrights, except in cases where the idea is blatantly obvious, and except against reverse-engineering; all of the things which are defined arbitrarily by patents would be naturally and cleanly delineated. A system of contractual nondisclosure agreements would retain the essential purpose of patents and copyrights but without any ambiguity. Please explain to me how this is demanding "free" anything at all, except perhaps the FREEDOM (political freedom; freedom from guns) to act on the ideas I understand. Of course not; that would be absurd. But we are not discussing DO or DO NOT, are we? And if we SHOULD "protect people's innovations" in the way in which you mean it, which is that you SHOULD NOT act on other people's ideas and that to do so is theft, then you are indeed a thief.

Well, I don't see the reason why you could own something without permission but not sell it, as per your example, so I would extend it slightly further than that- unless there is some critical difference between owning it and selling it. (?) I would say that you don't have to give Mercedes-Benz part of your profits unless there was a prior contract (or unless there is said crucial difference). So in my ideal view of LFC, if you invented some new design like that, instead of patenting it you would only tell a few specific people about it, after they signed the proper documents. Something like: A agrees to pay B $X, upon hearing about his awesome new idea, if it could truly do what B claims. (Otherwise you'd get a catch-22 where nobody wants to buy an idea until they know the specifics, but you can't tell them the specifics or they don't have to pay you. But that would solve it) There may be something to this. I have, for quite some time, had trouble differentiating between possible and impossible and I do have a tendency towards empty logical constructs. But it is NOT intentional. I AM very much interested in reality and IF I am no longer discussing any aspect of it THEN I will emphatically drop it! I was looking for inconsistencies because I hadn't found any! I have no beef with Objectivism; I think it's by far THE most profoundly true philosophy IN existence (if not the truest one POSSIBLE) and I was trying to verify that; much like a scientist tries to invalidate his own hypothesis! Please don't misunderstand, I am not attacking Objectivism! I am pointing out a perceived flaw in order to either correct the misperception or to point it out to everyone else!! It's not like I'm disputing the primacy of existence or man as a rational animal; in the grand scheme of essentials and abstractions what I'm really doing is nitpicking with punctuation. That's not it, either! I've said- numerous times throughout this entire thread! That I think there is a perfectly viable alternative, that the differences between these two are minute and (again!) that the alternative would leave everything else perfectly intact, exactly the way it should be! Does the whole of Objectivism rest on this? If I'm right, does that REALLY invalidate ALL of Objectivism??? Please review my earlier posts.

Global warming, deforestation, manmade A B C and D; environmentalism, in general, runs rampant. Black History Month. During black history month one year I specifically remember my choir teacher, who was white, telling my class all about white priveledge and how oppressed everyone else still is. Some schools (the only one I know of is in Iowa) have a class on American Government; I don't think I need to go into more detail. But it is much less mysticism (at least, in any religious sort of sense) than it is altruism and collectivism; the mysticism is hard to find, the altruism is inescapable.

Nicky- I apologize; you're absolutely right on that one and I'd like to rephrase myself. Why not patent fire? Because it's a natural phenomena; you can't patent it any more than you could patent gravity. Why not patent the wheel? By which I mean: if you could patent this wheel or that wheel, why can't you patent this basic component or that; why not this part (THE wheel) or that part (THE axle)? I maintain that the latter is arbitrary and capricious. The former, however, is not; the distinction between the manmade and the metaphysically given (natural and artificial), which I had momentarily forgotten (sorry) is logical and sound in every way. You're right, I was wrong and I have no intention whatsoever of questioning that distinction. I'd also like to apologize to tadmjones for being slightly snarky, there. Eiuol- I've been thinking about it and I think I can tell you explicitly where I stand on it. Take force, for example; it's objectively harmful and so it can only be used against those who start it. To say that force is universally evil and may ever be used against anyone would be just as fallacious as to say that it's objectively good and should be encouraged. There is a reason for the principles behind force, which it depends on; these reasons clearly delineate when it may and may not be used. I would look at exclusivity in a very similar manner. Property rights are the right to action- to create value and subsequently to enjoy it and do almost anything you please with it (again, just because you build a nuke with your own two hands doesn't give you the right to use it). But since values have specific and concrete natures they are finite; they can only be used in so many ways, so many times by so many people. Consequently, I would draw the principle of property-exclusivity from the finite nature of property; it's instrumental to your enjoyment of it. So, for instance: "Can I eat your cake?" "No; if you do then I can't have it, too." "Can I run through your yard?" "No; you'll trample my flowers." "Can I occupy your house while you're at work?" "Not unless you can do so without a trace and without any measurable impact (contrary to the nature of physical objects; let alone biological organisms); not unless you do so Mission: Impossible style." "Can I use your bike while you're on vacation?" . . . So I would uphold exclusivity but not universally or in perpetuity; only inasmuch as it's necessary for all other aspects of using your own property (which are many and far-reaching, but finite). Analogous to the principle of retaliatory force. Note that ideas, while having their own specific nature (they are, after all, neurological mechanisms) aren't finite in the same sense or the same manner. There is an issue with this line of reasoning, though; specifically how you may or may not enjoy your own property, because that will directly affect your right to its exclusivity. But I'll figure that out next; this is as far as I've gotten at the moment.

Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live. City of Ai. For that matter, the entire book of Exodus is one giant commandment to commit genocide. Would you like chapter and verse? Preemptive military force is not retaliatory force; that's a contradiction. It IS self-defense. Just ask anyone who, staring down the barrel of some thug's gun, decided to shoot them first. ALL violence of self-defense must come BEFORE force is actually initiated against you; it's ALL preemptive. This is a logical necessity because there is no way for a corpse to avenge itself. Mdegges- you surprise me. In a good way. DA, try this contradiction on for size: 1: God is omnipotent; whatever he wants to happen, happens 2: God loves all of his children equally and wants everyone to go to heaven 3: Sinners burn in Hell for all of eternity C: ! One of these must be false. Any given pair of them may be true, but all three cannot simultaneously be true. So pick one; which one of these things is false? Your choices are a negation of Hell (and no Earthly reason for anyone to obey God, at all), a negation of God's omnipotence (which, since that's your choice, I'll soon explain is a negation of the law of identity) or the fire-and-brimstone omnipotent sadist of the Old Testament. Would you like some more?