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Hakarmaskannar

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Everything posted by Hakarmaskannar

  1. Thanks for the link. I've watched Mr Brook's lectures before, but this is the first time I've heard him debate and it was an enjoyable time spent, especially the Q&A at the end. His opponent truely seems to be lost in a socialist fantasy, and falls back on precedent, rather than on justifying Eminent Domain on logical grounds, as his only arguement. I'd love to know how such a supposedly educated man can hold such incorrect premises, but I guess I'll grasp it better when I get around to studying the DIM Hypothesis when I get the chance
  2. Thank you for the suggestions. I just wish I had longer than a week to see more of the city, but I'll be sure to head to the Rockefeller Center. I'll have to print out a street map and plan some of our trips out, otherwise we'll get swamped with sights and go round in circles
  3. I will shortly be visiting New York (middle of Feb '07) and was wondering if any O'ists living iin, or familiar with, the city could pass on any recommendations with regards to eating out, entertainment, sites to see etc. BTW, the trip wll be romantic (hopefully) so I aim to try for the horse-drawn carriage at Central Park on Valentine's Day but anything else to consider would be appreciated. P.S. We'll be staying in Manhattan, if that makes a diference. (Coming from England, I have very litttle real idea of the size and scope of American cities.)
  4. I believe that the course you mentioned that appeared on the meta-blog is this one by David Harriman. Hope that helps
  5. Prison Officer for about eight years now. I used to enjoy the job but whereas previously it was about justice, now it's about rehabilitation and showing 'Compassion', so I'm taking a week off in February to look at career/education options for the future.
  6. Itallics added by me Hello and welcome, Melchior I couldn't find a response amongst the replies to a few of the things that jumped out at me from this post. so I decided to try and address them myself. As far as Objectivist ethics go, there is no importance to a belief in non-violence. For us, the initiation of the use of force is unethical but the retaliatory use of force is not only justified, but indeed moral. This, like any Objectivist position on ethical questions, is derived from the metaphysics/epistemology that leads us to Rights as they are properly defined. This is the step that leads to the Objectivist political position on the proper role of Government. Since uncontrolled and unregulated use of retaliation would lead to chaos, as it would lead to a 'He-started-it-first' round-a-bout, we insist that the purpose of Govenment is to hold the monopoly on the retaliatory use of force and to use it's power, within objectively-defined limits and with objective laws, to protect the rights of the individuals of the country. the government would do this through the Police - to be a front-line response to crime and to investigate after the fact; the Courts - to enforce justice for both criminal acts and contractual law; and the Armed Forces - to protect each individual of the state threatened by an outside aggressor. The second point I'd like to address is about the 'negative emotions'. These, like all emotions, are not an 'illusion of the ego-self', but the end result of lightning-fast calculations weighing the considered object/idea against your system of values. If I feel fear, it is because something (a direct threat or an immediate danger) is perceived to be being posed to something I value highly such as my life, or that of those I value most and love. That is not an illusion, just the end result of the weighing-up process. Hope that wasn't too off-topic, but I thoought they were worth a mention. Edited a spelling error
  7. Unfortunately for me, living as I do in the UK, my local Municipal Council (who I am forced to pay taxes to for my waste removal an other services, regardless of how much I need or use them) has decided to change their waste-collection service without consultation with those who are paying for it. Our bins have been getting collected weekly but now we residents have been provided with a green bin that is to be collected on alternate weeks from the black bin collection. We have also been given a green box (about 8 cubic feet capacity that gets collected weekly). The only items allowed into the large green bin are "Cardboard untouched by food" and "Green waste" (ie. grass and hedge cuttings) which is useful seeing as most of us living near the town centre have no lawns. The small box is for glass, paper, tins. That leaves me having to make sure that my black bin is able to last two weeks with plastics, food-contaminated products, waste-food leavings and all the other sundry items left over from a family of five. Just another fine example of Government-provided service that would be much more efficient and cost-effective if free enterprise was allowed to flourish.
  8. Eight years of Kempo Ju-Jitsu with some cross-training in Muay Thai and sword-work. Previously, several years boxing and kick-boxing. Thankfully, all my teachers have had a practical approach to the training and have left out the mystical rubbish. As my Kempo Ju-jitsu sensei said,"The Japanese have Ki - We have adrenaline."
  9. I do enjoy films and although I've never wanted to watch Hostel, I have seen, and enjoyed, Saw 1+2. It wasn't for the gore or sadism but I enjoy the being-scared-but-not-being-in-danger of watching a good, scary film. Saw is a well-plotted psychological-horror, with a protagonist who puts 'sinners' into situations that they can escape from, but only if they accept the full desperation of their plight. I didn't watch to see people die, I watched to see if they lived - and trying to guess plot-twists in the film is also quite fun.
  10. Well, if this forest is a 'top' value, to both yourself and the other locals, then you should do everything you legally can to preserve it. My best suggestion is that you all sell your houses and businesses and use the money to set up a commune in your newly-acquired forest. Happy hunting/fishing/grubbing-in-the-soil, etc.
  11. Was it through a failure to collect the evidence, a flaw in the Chain of Evidence, or lack of funds to have DNA testing done for a 'trivial' case that led the State to not have sufficient proof?
  12. This amusing video was made by BBC staff for an informal leaving party for a collegue but someone thought it was inappropriate and reported them to the powers-that-be. Hopefully the BBC won't suffer a similar fate to the publishers of the cartoons that infuriated the muslim world...then again, maybe it'd be enough to stop their biased left-wing reporting
  13. As I've just gotten 'Phantom' I decided to check out what was happening at the SoT site and I found out that TG has finished talks with Sam Raimi to do the whole series of books as a series of mini-series. Apparently Raimi is a fan of the books and TG was happy with his (Raimi's) approach to telling the story on the screen. Check out this link for the whole story. Also, just above it on the page is a link to a nice interview with TG.
  14. While reading the Religionofpeace website I stumbled across a link to this website that I really enjoyed and thought some of you might find it interesting as well - [url=http://www.6thcolumnagainstjihad.com/index.htm]6th Column homepage[/url
  15. David Gemmell's 'Legend'. Failing that, I'd love to see a depiction of that moron, Che Guevara, that was historically accurate
  16. I had a similar discussion at work and a collegue pointed to a door that had painted iin an off-yellow colour. He claimed that reality is all about the opinions of the observer. He asked what colour the door was and I replied, "Yellow". He said, "Well, I say it's more orange. Which of us is right?" I pointed out to him that it makes no difference what we want to use as a descriptive term - the colour of the door wouldn't change and that it had a verifiable wavelength measurable with the proper equipment. Opinions don't make reality - Some opinions are correct because they correspond with reality and some are blatantly incorrect because they ignore reality. Logic is the art of non-contradictory identification and isn't subject to whims or opinions. If one opinion (or 'logic') contradicts another then one, or both, is/are wrong.
  17. Actually, your dismissiveness, about the research done by others that follows the scientific method or about those who reveal the underhanded way in which the greenhouse scare is presented through the media, says more about you than I can in mere words.
  18. All good points but as for your pluses... Points 1 and 2 may make good PR points but since there are many scientists around the globe who do not subscribe to the greenhouse myth the points are mostly irrelevant. In fact, there are those who posit the theory that the emission of carbon-dioxide into the atmosphere may actually be beneficial, especially in the improvement of crop yields and in staving of an over-due cooling period in the climate. This and a couple of these make good reading. I doubt you'd find many on these forums that would take the side of the anti-lifers
  19. Misery is as good a film as the book too (thanks to the inspired performance of kathy Bates). The Lord of the Rings trilogy is a perfect example of films that capture the essence of the books whilst removing all the 'fluff' that the author felt complelled to include. Remember, when a film is based on a book the style of the original writing plays a part. It is difficult to express the thought-processes that are regularly stated in first-person perspective narration. Also, if a person is watching a film after readin the book they may have a different visualisation of the characters/scenes/etc. from the director and producers...maybe even different from the writer at times. The success of translations of great books to the screen often depends on the, dare I say it, concensus of opinion regarding the accuracy of the portrayal of these themes. Edited to expand on original reply.
  20. Don't forget the value of product-placement in your home. The people who are most likely to take advantage of a freebie offer without giving it an honest try are those most likely to boast to their friends about it. If the company gets a few acceptances of trial-offers from those people and even one decides they like it then the point of the offer has been successful. Yes, they might all just take the freebie and run, but since it's all planned for under the company's advertising budget it's still spreading the product around
  21. Having just finished it I can give you no bettter advice than to read Andrew Bernstein's 'The Capitalist Manifesto'. It truely is a fascinating and insightful read that will blow away any reservations an honest (focused) reader could possibly have about Capitalism. Many of the situations alluded to or stated above are delved into succinctly in this book.
  22. I treat debates like those as valuable to myself because they both sharpen my debating skills and give me a concrete example for me of how successful I have been in integrating all the information I have read. I am aware of the futility of trying to reason with those that have abandoned all semblance of it but I like to be prepared for when, or if, I am drawn into these debates when companions or collegues(who may lack the intellectual ammo to defend their views) are ambushed by radicals of any ilk.
  23. I was at a get-together at the weekend for my birthday and my Dad invited my (hippy/waster) brother along for my Mun's sake. Everyone knows we tend to keep our conversations short and to-the-point as we don't see eye-to-eye on much at all but the family thought he'd have the sense to keep to small-chat like everyone else was. It was not to be. I was drawn into a conversation of which I'll give you the high-lights... My brother started asking my opinion about crime and punishment and mentioned a prominent local case involving a nationally-renowned sportsman who was convicted of a driving offense that left another man crippled. I said that the punishment was tame compared to that suffered by the victim (which my brother agreed on) but when I said that since this person had a previous conviction for a similar offense then this should have been taken into account after guilt is determined, but before sentence is passed. At this point my brother called me a 'bully'. He started quoting statistics but got annoyed when I refuted them with first-hand experience of the reality of reoffending and prisoner attitudes to sentencing. He then steered the conversation around to economics and I was dragged into a debate about the EU Human Rights Charter. Needless to say, I explained the proper origin,meaning and application of true rights and explained that I am an individualist, not a socialist. He tried to sway me with appeals to helping myself by making things better for all those around me first and I told him he was putting the cart before the horse. So he announced that I was a 'fascist'. I explained that he hadn't even got a clue about what Fascism really meant and that his communist/socialist policies were almost identical to those employed by the Fascists...in fact by any version of Statism. Then we got onto economics and after challenging me on the moral grounds of Capitalism I defended my views succinctly and then was called a 'Nazi'. At this point my family had had enough and kicked him out. What struck me was that throughout the whole debacle every time I answered a point he made he seemed to brush it off, ignoring it without answering the validity of my reply, then resorted to emotional appeals, then insults when those appeals failed to dent my resolve to debate rationally and intelligently. I don't have a problem having debates with people like my brother, but would have wanted it to take place away from everyone else there as I knew how heated it would become (at least from one side). What annoyed me is that my brother reminded me that he had a degree in business/economics so he 'knew how corrupt Capitalism really is'. This is what my taxes have gone to produce...a 33-year-old who has never worked a day in his life, is still at university doing who-knows-what, living in the shadow of ivory towers and acting like his fairy-tale education has some relevence to the real-world. I'm sure others here have had similar experiences so I apologise if I've belaboured the point, but I wanted to get it off my chest, and I didn't want to upset my parents by reminding them about what happened to their idea for the invite. Thanks
  24. Three Q&A sessions where Miss Rand was asked about feminism are quoted on page 106 of Ayn Rand Answers. The following is the shortest example of her answers. (Questioner) - "Could you give us a word about the womens' liberation movement?" (AR) - "I'd be the last person to give you that. I'm a male chauvinist." The answers to the other two questions go more in-depth into Miss Rand's views of the political movement claiming to act for "equal rights" for women but her stance is as has been stated in the previous posts.
  25. If you read the introduction you'd see that the writer expresses similar sentiments to those espoused by TOC (that Objec tivism, or what they'd call hard-line Objectivism) has been hijacked by cold, soul-less judgers-of-others. TOC, and apparently the owner of that site, consisitently hold that the ARI and Mr. Peikoff are too quick to judge others and too rigid in their application of O'ist principles. Check out this essay for an insightful explanation of the reasons and motives for this type of attack on ARI's position.
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