Bryan

I like your entire idea, the whole thing. I don't really have anything to add, I just wanted to express my support .

Wow, if I did that, I could never ever criticize anyone for anything. I find that if somebody is acting in an immoral manner that I also used to engage in, I have more empathy for them, but that doesn't stop me from judging them. Nobody should be exempt from judgment of their virtues and vices. I deserved to be judged poorly for being an amoral bastard in the past. But the key word is past.

So are you saying that they should be the same or not? I'm confused to the point that I'm not sure if you've actually said anything in the course of this thread. I think both IP property rights and physical property rights should both cease to exist. What's mine is yours and yours is mine. Just kidding. I'm a little torn on the issue. I need to be more familiar with current copyright laws before I can make a judgment. It seems fair now that copyrights expire 70 years after the author's death. At that time, perhaps whoever is the owner of the copyright should be given "first dibs" to renew it. If they fail to, then it is open for anyone else to renew it. If nobody renews it for a period of time (5 years?), then it is permanently expired and goes into the public domain. The easiest thing to do would be to make it exactly like physical property rights, but that could lead to stagnation and many great works being lost forever. Again, I need to give this issue some more thought.

I don't think when Ayn Rand ever implied that libertarians "steal her ideas without giving her credit". I think what she meant was they used her ideas, attributed them to her, but dropped the context on which they were based on. The problem with the LP as a whole is that there are too many different types of people, many with conflicting philosophies, that all fit under the LP's giant umbrella of "freedom". Anarchists, violent separatists, drug addicts, transhumanists, and true capitalists cannot really be grouped together under one political party. I quoted it from Objectivism Research CD-ROM, available at the Ayn Rand Bookstore. It contains virtually all of Ayn Rand's writings and OPAR and Ominous Parallels by Leonard Peikoff. It is an absolutely amazing value at $60 .

What gave you the idea that any Objectivist was advocating coercive taxation?

I have shown the exact words in the context they are used in the Constitution. They are used to note the date it was ratified, the "Seventeenth Day of September in the Year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and Eighty seven". This is simply the "official way" to express the date September 17, 1787. Because America is (and was) on the Gregorian calendar, the year is implied as the year of "our Lord" by convention, not literally. While the vast majority of the founders were indeed Christian, Christianity was not the basis of the government. Do you think that the US government has a Christian basis, or do you just like to take words out of context to disagree with Objectivist intellectuals? If you do believe that there is a Christian basis to the Constitution, you are going to have to provide more evidence than the manner they express the date.

If, as you say, we don't have any compelling reason why the differences between IP and physical property should result in different ownership rules, why can't you say that you think that IP ownership should be the same a physical property ownership?

You claimed to find the statement ludicrous. I would define a ludicrous statement as one that was completely without reason (absurd, nonsensical). I have never found Miss Rand to make a ludicrous statement. Here is what Ayn Rand actually wrote in regard to libertarians plagiarizing her ideas: Given your premise that this statement is ludicrous, do you agree with her assessment of liberals and conservatives? If so, how could she be correct about those two political groups and so incorrect (to the point of absurdity) about libertarians?

How many other things has Miss Rand said that you find ludicrous? I can't think of any. If you find this statement so ludicrous but not others, maybe you should check your premises. From The Objectivist: Libertarians hijacked her ideas about capitalism (didn't even call it capitalism) and left the egoism and (especially) the reason behind. It’s like pouring a bowl of Lucky Charms cereal and adding the milk, then proceeding to eat only the tasty marshmallows. You could say you ate breakfast, but really all you ate was a bunch of sugar and horse bones.

Here is a lengthy thread dealing with this topic: why the condemnation of Libertarianism?

You still have not explained how the usage of "our Lord" in the Constitution, given the context in which its used, possibly implies any sort of religous basis to the foundations of the US goverment.

Tom, The ownership of physical property ends as soon as the owner gives it to someone else. If the owner dies he gives it to someone else in a will. The ownership of physical property for a specific individual is never eternal. The copyrights of intellectual property (not patents) last the length of the author's life plus 70 years. In those 70 years after the author's death, the copyright belongs to whoever the author willed it to. Is this too long of an amount of time or too short of an amount of time? If IP rights should be extended longer than 70 years (as physical property rights are) after the author's death, what is your reason for this being the case?

My guess is simply marketing. And it may not even be the choice of ARI, it may have been the choice of the publisher. You will sell more copies of a book if it has Ayn Rand's name on it as the primary author, than if it were any of the other authors in the book. Another example of this is the paperback version of The Ominous Parallels. At first glance, Ayn Rand's name appears more prominently on the cover than Leonard Piekoff's. If you look at the table of contents listed on the Ayn Rand Bookstore's website, it clearly lays out all the essays and who they are written by.

Where is the essay "Patents and Copyrights" published? Is it in Capitialism: TUI? For whatever reason, I have no recollection of it. I understand the point that you and Jennifer make about the earned vs. the unearned. I suppose my initial thoughts about the eternalness of copyrights is really a reaction to the commonly held belief these days that if someone purchases a hard copy of some sort of intellectual property its theirs and they can do whatever they want with it. This is especially common with computer software. There are a lot of people that think copyrights should be extremaly short (along the lines of the length of a drug patent) and then people's writings and music are "fair game". It strikes a deep nerve in me when someone's work is blatantly ripped off. I realize I need to do some further thinking on this issue and read Miss Rand's essay.

I have my own phrase for most (not all) homeless people: "Alcoholics and/or Drug Addicts".

I searched the entire text of the Constitution and found only one mention of "Our Lord". Article VII: To imply that this constitutes a religous basis to the Constitution and the foundation of the American governement is misleading at best, dishonest at worst. Edited for clarity.

I want to draw a distinction between a copyright and a patent that somehow got lost through the course of this thread. My initial response was in respect to copyrights of intellectual property (i.e. books, movies, software, artwork, etc.). I believe that these copyrights should be indefinite; nobody's individual, absolutely unique creation should ever be opened to the "public domain" against the wishes of the original artist(s) or their rightful heirs. Patents on inventions are another issue entirely (an issue that I am unclear of my thoughts on).

Isn't the choice arbitrary? You haven't been given any new information about what is behind the remaining two doors; the host has simply eliminated one of the bad choices. Its a 50/50 chance you'll get the car no matter which of the two remaining doors you choose.

David, I give explicit permission to quote, publish, distribute, profit from anything I write, in its entirety. This also applies to any films or computer software I may create in the future. My intellectual property is your intellectual property. I'll have my lawyers draw up the paperwork and fax it to you this afternoon. I do have a copyright to this, but now you're free and clear to use it. I also have a copyright to the phrase "double cheeseburger", so that's yours now too.

Whoever created it, unless they surrender their ownership rights through some sort of agreement. For example, most musicians (using the term loosely) surrender the ownership rights to a record producer in exchange for the capital to produce their record and some other monetary compensation. In a perfect world, forever. In the United States according to Wikipedia, copyright lengths are "28 or 95 years for works copyrighted 1923-1963; 95 years for works copyrighted 1964-1977; thereafter life plus 70 years. (Copyrights prior to 1923 have expired.)" The ownership right of the copyright holder is absolute. This is theft. If a piece of software is truly "open-source" it is under the GNU Public Lincense, which is a form of copyright. I believe that this is a form of copyright infringement, if the owners of the Star Trek copyright (Paramount?) wanted to, they could seek legal action against a person posting a story that usurps their intellectual property. Copyright infringement, unless permission was obtained from the people that created the series (why would these people refuse though?). They are morally absolute, the owner has a right to "dispose" of their property in any manner in which they see fit.

You guys are exceptions How many people do you go to school with share your values, or could even honestly tell you what their values are? I know I didn't have a purpose when I was a teenager. You are all fortunate to discover Objectivism at such a young age, I didn't know about Ayn Rand until I was almost 24. I guess I shouldn't say fortunate though, I could have discovered Objectivism when I was younger, I just wasn't looking

Was this intended to be a "text message" on a cell phone? Using a keyboard, it is very easy to use periods, capital letters, and commas.

Maybe all the people thought that they were seeing angels were really seeing aliens the whole time.

Why does the Libertarian Party of Arkansas not state the moral idea that libertarianism rests? They say this; socialism rests on the moral idea that 'Man is his brother's keeper', but we rest on the idea (Blank out). The above quote hardly upholds the moral argument for capitalism.

I don't think there is any official Objectivist stance on the issue. My personal opinion is that it is certainly possible that there is life on other planets, but the possibility of us encountering it anytime in the near future is almost zero.