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Pancho Villa

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Everything posted by Pancho Villa

  1. I repeat: no precautions? You kid. There are many, many ways to be cautious and rather safe during a pandemic that do not involve medicine. More to the point, though: it isn't happening now? There is no effective system - repeat, no effective system - that will make people take their pills fully. Many, many people are stupid about how they take their medicine, even today. However, in a LFC economy? Stupidity would be abjectly punished. People, to support its ideals, would have to be far-thinking and (for the most part) rational. I think that gives far better odds that silly, unenforceable regulations or lawsuits that people will responsibly use medicines.
  2. No precautions against bacteria? You joke.
  3. We are, however, aware of this and unlike the fools who create these resistant strains, are able to think ahead and take precautions. My point still stands. A small inconvience for us, in the long run, nothing more.
  4. I don't read much fantasy anymore, but an obvious choice for fans of the Genre is Faith of the Fallen by Terry Goodkind, which is almost explicitly Objectivist in nature. I've only read that book, so I can't comment on the other books in the Sword of Truth series, but that one is golden.
  5. AP: EU Wants Shared Control of Internet Because Yahoo news articles tend to die off in time, I shall quote the whole article here.
  6. The question is not whether they're doing this on principle or not - its, what principle are they acting on - altruism or selfishness? The results, I think, will bear them out. Selfishly persued goals are done with drive, and an eye on a specific goal. If this was just a token tossed out for PR it will result in nothing.
  7. Such ideas will pass out of fashion as their owners pass from existence.
  8. I am merely wary that GE is throwing money at things they don't think will work out of pressure. It is hardly a far-fetched idea that they might do so.
  9. The start of it goes something like this. X person/group raises a ruckus, bothers the company. The company determines (minus any principles) that in this one instance, it would be far less costly to just appease them than to engage in the lengthy court battle that would no doubt ensue. Unfortunately, it is their lack of principles (their so-called 'pragmatism' that is anything but) that becomes their undoing. Such concessions, like with any group who's tactics mirror that of a bully, only encourage more and more demands at periodical intervals. Before you know it, we have the absurd sight of one of the largest companies on earth leaping forward to appease a tiny group of insane bullies who could never hope to get such measures put in themselves...because that is the corporate culture you have created, one of avoiding conflict with bullies.
  10. (I blame Dagny for pointing me out to this one) Your Results: 1. Ayn Rand (100%) Click here for info 2. John Stuart Mill (85%) Click here for info 3. Nietzsche (74%) Click here for info 4. Jean-Paul Sartre (71%) Click here for info 5. Aquinas (70%) Click here for info 6. Aristotle (70%) Click here for info 7. Epicureans (69%) Click here for info 8. Thomas Hobbes (69%) Click here for info 9. Cynics (66%) Click here for info 10. David Hume (66%) Click here for info 11. Jeremy Bentham (65%) Click here for info 12. Plato (65%) Click here for info 13. St. Augustine (62%) Click here for info 14. Kant (55%) Click here for info 15. Stoics (51%) Click here for info 16. Spinoza (47%) Click here for info 17. Prescriptivism (42%) Click here for info 18. Nel Noddings (37%) Click here for info 19. Ockham (29%) Click here for info
  11. "Common sense" is usually considered that which is easily observable to be good/bad, true/false, independent of the philosophical questions (good/bad, by what standard?) Essentially, it has been extensively used by philosophers of the modern age to balance out their irrational theories. "Use some common sense" is basically an admission that their own theories don't work and that one must sneak in (under the cover of the nonphilosophical concept 'common sense') another philosophical system in order to properly function in the world. "Common sense" can also be used in a quasi-mystical way, in order to avoid argument against a superior position. "Having no taxes won't work; use some common sense," is a classic example. In this sense "common sense" is used as both an appeal to a (false) authority (namely that "common sense" should be taken as an absolute) and an implied threat; why, if you don't agree with me, you're obviously stupid/lacking in common sense! Several other ways to use it, but "common sense" is really an empty concept. It gets filled by whatever the context happens to be, and can be a good thing or a bad thing. An objective definition of common sense would, literally, be opinions that are commonly held about things. Which makes it a useless (or at least nonevaluative) term.
  12. Of course. But since I'm not a leftist shitbag, she isn't important to me at all. I consider keeping up with politics and current events something like watching bacteria under a microscope. The bacteria is of no significance; its how I can learn to cure the disease that is. Edit: To that end, I really think its rather indicative of a lack of perspective to keep a "shit list" of people around. They aren't worth considering a moment beyond sheer necessity anyway; why actively engage in thought about them when you do not have to? My brain is a valuable tool, my time an inestimable worth to me. Why use such a beautiful thing on Cindy Sheehan, of all people?
  13. You have got to be freakin' kidding me. Anyway, I shall procure the book some time today.
  14. Hey, if rights are made to seem as ridiculous as this, who is going to object when they're all taken away? Oh well, they'll get what they deserve. The only problem is that I might get what they deserve, too.
  15. I know thats a blast from the past, but for future reference there are things like Image Shack and Photobucket for such uses.
  16. http://www.fluwikie.com/ You might want to take a nice, long read on that website. It regards the coming of the asian bird flu pandemic.
  17. My point actually was that, 'important' or not she is not significant to my life - or the life of anyone who does not wish to travel through the sewers of current retarded politics. I keep up on my news and politics, but the updates on dispicable people are so absurdly stupid that I don't let it bother me. I have my own, long-term plans for affecting change. Until events compel me to grab my AK and actively rebel (something I don't rule out, but consider rather unlikely,) all of the mishmash coming out of the political sector is 'unimportant.' I think some perspective needs to be kept, here. There will also be dispicable people that the media spotlights on - it is part of their function, the way they are currently set up.
  18. Woah, someone was brave enough to take the environmentalist movement's premises to its logical conclusion. If you want to call it 'bravery.'
  19. Well, here in Dallas it went for "could hit us as still a category 1" to "oh...well, it got really cloudy for a few hours. I heard it rained in some eastern parts of Dallas, too." So much for Rita.
  20. While all true, it seems somewhat superfulous to mention this. Schools are all but explicitly (and there is an argument for explicitly) set against a child's reasoning faculty. There is no reason to not teach ID on that factor because it isn't the concern of the public education system in the first place. It is a cry of "Hey! That doesn't fit!" that sadly can be applied to the entire education system. So, true, but useful? I don't know.
  21. Well, I have "mastered" classical trigonometry, which is to say I passed a course in it. But future courses (calculus in particular) depend rather heavily on knowledge in this area. It has been painful for me to use this knowledge, which I have always had a feeling was broken, to learn these otherwise interesting subjects. Your mileage may vary.
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