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DrBaltar, I'd like to make sure I understand your position. You have stated that you are quite certain that volition is merely an illusion created by our inability to see all of the vast array of forces that actually cause us to choose one alternative over another. When we choose A over B, we may think we are making a free choice, we may think we are evaluating facts X, Y and Z, reaching a conclusion and making a choice freely, but in reality the "choice" is the outcome of an unimaginably vast set of factors -- gazillions and gazillions of subatomic particles interacting with one another and with force fields and who knows what else, all following the purely deterministic laws of physics. If this is true, then all of the evidence you offered in earlier posts -- the "Computational Argument", the "Physical Argument" and the "Biological Argument" -- these are not the actual cause of your "choice" to believe in determinism and reject volition, because the actual cause is outside your perception. The actual cause that made you "choose" to believe in determinism is that unimaginably vast set of factors I just mentioned. Granted, you look at the "Computational, Physical and Biological Argument" and you think it supports your belief in determinism. But that evaluation is also determined by the vast set of factors I mentioned, correct? In other words, you had no choice but to believe these facts support determinism; that “choice” was the inevitable outcome of all of those particles and fields. Likewise, I, who have read the arguments and remain convinced that volition is real, am similarly pre-determined to evaluate them as not supporting determinism. Is that a correct summary of your position?

To the contrary, the Japanese were highly religious and certainly were not "constrained to one nation". Emperor Hirohito was considered to be a divine being with a godly right to rule. And the Japanese people wrote the book on suicide bombers and worship of death. In the drive toward the Japanese homeland in 1944-1945, some 2,800 kamikaze attacks sunk 34 American ships, damaged 368 others, killed 4,900 sailors, and wounded over 4,800. Those are the American figures; the Japanese claim that closer to 5,000 kamikaze attacks were made. Tens of thousands of Japanese soldiers staged suicidal bonzai attacks against American soldiers in various land battles on the islands. Today's jihadists have nothing on Japanese willingness to die for the sake of killing their enemy. And it wasn't just the military that worshipped death. In the battle for Okinawa, thousands of Japanese civilians jumped off cliffs on the island rather than surrender to American forces. After Okinawa was captured, American forces found plans for the defense of the Japanese home islands. These plans called for millions of Japanese citizens, arranged in lines 3 - 4 deep and armed with old rifles, pitchforks, kitchen knives, clubs etc., to meet any attempted landings on the home islands with suicide charges across the beaches After what they had witnessed on Okinawa, American military commanders were convinced the Japanese would carry out these plans. Nor were the Japanese "constrained to one nation". At the height of their empire, the Japanese occupied China, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, New Guinea, Manchuria and sundry other Pacific islands. Yet they gave up when sufficient death and destruction was visited upon their country. We beat the Japanese and the Germans by fighting war the proper way: with overwhelming force coupled with the demand for unconditional surrender. No, the way we are conducting the war in Iraq gives them reason to think they can win. Our tactics in Iraq are another attempt to fight a limited war, just as we did in Vietnam, and they are failing just as they did in Vietnam. With imbedded reporters and Al Jazeera crawling all over the backs of our soldiers to instantly publicize any civilian deaths -- and our horribly wrong-headed willingness to accept moral responsibility for those deaths -- coupled with the ridiculous notion that we must build power plants, water treatment facilities, hospitals, schools, etc., we have set an impossible task for our military, a task that can be derailed by random suicide bombings and IEDs. The letter we intercepted from Al Qaeda's number two man, Al Zarhawi, to Al Zarqawi in Iraq made clear that their strategy is to use our media to convince the American public that the war is unwinnable and to pressure our leaders to withdraw. Our foolish efforts to minimize Iraqi civilian casualties, even at the expense of American casualties, plays right into their hands. Imagine if we had taken this approach to fighting the Japanese, Germans and Italians. We would have surely lost. If Iraq was a threat (and I think it was, though not as big a threat as Iran) the proper response would have been regime destruction, not regime change. If we inflict sufficient damage to the regime and to the nation's economic infrastructure, it won't matter what happens in the aftermath; whoever is left will not have the resources to mount any sort of threat to us. Had we annihilated the states that supported them -- like Saudi Arabia, Syria and Iran -- after, say, the first bombing of the World Trade Center, these bastards likely would not have been around to stage 9/11. But this is really irrelevant, because the issue here is not the behavior of the die-hard hardliners. The issue is your contention that we dare not use overwhelming force because if we do, the fence sitters will join the battle against us. History does not support this notion. During our firebombing of Japanese cities and the mass slaughter of Japanese civilians. none of the Japanese in this country staged suicidal attacks on Americans. The Muslims in this country already have (AUTOMATICALLY) the option of strapping bombs on their chests. The issue is your proposal that we give this group veto power over America’s right to self-defense. In the first place, even if it were true that the annihilation of our worst enemy (Iran) would motivate some of these bastards to stage suicide attacks, that would not justify allowing the Iranians to develop nuclear weapons and the ability deliver them to our soil. Second, and equally important, I would resist to the death the idea of giving Muslims in America the ability to dictate when, how and if we can defend ourselves from threatening regimes. That would be an act of moral suicide more deadly than any Islamic bomber. What do you think is going to stop them? Diplomacy? Threats from the United Nations? Yes, absolutely, we should annihilate Iran right now, completely out of the blue and the more out of the blue, the better. (The choice of how to do this is a military question. But I think with our overwhelming air power, we can do it with bombing alone.) Any nation that is an overt sponsor of international terrorism, that chants "Death to America" at all of their major government functions and openly advertises their intent to wipe England, America and Israel off the map, is a completely legitimate target. It is suicidal idiocy to stand by and allow these monsters to develop nuclear weapons. If a man points a gun at your head, you need not wait for him to pull the trigger before destroying him to eliminate the threat. Likewise, if a man declares openly his intent to procure a gun and kill you, you need not wait for the threat to materialize before taking action against him. Indeed, prudence dictates that you act sooner rather than later. I don't think random or capricious nuking has been suggested by anyone. And if you are truly not advocating appeasement to placate our domestic Muslims (or any other Muslims), what exactly are these costs you refer to?

Two questions: 1) What you suggest above is one possible reaction to the use of overwhelming American military force to destroy a threatening nation. Another possible reaction is that Muslims all around the world, radical and non-radical alike, would instantly see that jihad against America is a disastrously losing proposition, and seeing that, would turn on the jihadists to save themselves from another American attack. Why do think it will be the former reaction and not the latter? Did the firebombing and nuking of Japanese cities in 1945 "radicalize" the remaining Japanese civilians and turn them into fanatical kamikazes willing to fight to the death? Or did they surrender unconditionally? Did the annihilation of Berlin, Dresden, Nuremberg, and virtually the entire Rhineland by thousands of B-17 bombers in 1944-1945 radicalize the remaining German civilians into becoming Nazis willing to fight to the death? Or did they surrender unconditionally? History shows that what encourages your enemy, and draws additional recruits to his camp, is weakness and a lack of resolve to fight with all you have; it is the attempt to fight limited war that encourages the other side, not the willingness to lay to waste his entire nation. Consider a more recent example: the Vietnam war. For the better part of a decade, we attempted to fight a limited war, with the best targets off-limits to our air power. When Nixon finally lifted that constraint and permitted unrestricted bombing of North Vietnam, this did not "radicalize" the civilian population and encourage them to fight even harder. No, they sued for peace within weeks. (Foolishly, we accepted and agreed to a peace treaty instead of finishing them off.) 2) If Iran succeeds in creating the risk of mass death in the U. S. (courtesy of a nuclear weapon delivered by missile fired from a freighter off our shores or smuggled in on a container ship), and the only way to eliminate that risk is to cause mass death in Iran, do you advocate we accept the risk in order to placate the Muslims within our borders?

I think you are confusing the potential and the actual; or, to put it another way, you are equating what could be with what is. The fact that a given fetus "can survive without the mother" means the fetus is a potential human being; but an actual human being is not a biologically-dependent parasite on another being's physiology. The referents of the concept "man" do not include such organisms.

Unfortunately, this sort of performance by a Republican Administration is nothing new. Many conservatives express dismay over Bush's spending and call for a return to "Reagan conservatism". Reagan is indeed the darling of the conservatives, but his record is hardly any better than Bush's. Reagan campaigned on two broad themes: reduce the size of the non-defense portion of the Federal government while building military superiority over the Soviets. There was enormous public support for these two ideas. Reagan was elected twice by a combined electoral vote of 1,014 to 62. If any president had a mandate to carry out his campaign promises, it was Reagan. Many of us were thrilled to hear these words in Reagan's first Inaugural Address, However, from the start it was clear that Reagan would not challenge the altruistic premises of the liberals. The following statements are also from Reagan’s first Inaugural Address. Translation: Government must provide opportunity (such as, for instance, taxpayer funded education and jobs training), reflect compassion (help the poor), lend a hand when people fall (unemployment benefits) and heal them when they are sick (taxpayer funded health care). Pure altruism from page one of the liberal playbook. By the end of that speech, I knew Reagan's domestic programs were doomed. Consider this passage from Reagan’s 4th State of the Union Speech: So who articulated the concept of a "safety net" to catch all those unlucky enough to fall off the gravy train? Reagan. There is only one way government “meets its responsibilities”: by taxing the productive. Granted, Reagan’s speeches are filled with calls for greater freedom, more individual responsibility and less government. But there is always a proviso to the effect that altruism will not be challenged. What was the practical effect of conceding the liberal’s altruistic premise? Under Reagan, non-defense spending rose by $322.5 billion, an increase of 70.1%. (Defense spending also increased under Reagan -- but this was entirely appropriate given the threats we faced.) Federal government payments to individuals -- the direct transfer of wealth from those who earned it to those who didn’t -- increased from $278.5 billion to $501.7 billion, an increase of 80%. The Executive Branch added 233,000 new civilian employees during Reagan‘s administration, an increase of 112 government employees every working day for eight years! These additional employees stayed busy, too. Approximately 376,000 new pages of rules and regulations were added to the Federal Register. Reagan and the Republicans have succeeded in proving one thing: one cannot promote capitalism, or even the narrower principle of limited government, if altruism is one's ethical base.

Intellectualammo, thanks for the information about fetal blood flow and the umbilical cord. Prior to your post, it was not clear to me exactly when the blood flow from mother to fetus stopped. It is now.

This is a tough question. But I think they do have rights, at least in some cases. A fetus is a biological parasite living on a physiology to which it has no right. Conjoined twins, by contrast, are living on a shared physiology to which they each have an equally valid claim. Does that negate their rights? I don't see why it would. Of course, their right to act is severely compromised by the fact that neither party could act unilaterally. However, even if they do possess rights, I would say that any conjoined twin (or otherwise deformed person) that has zero chance of ever functioning as an adult, cannot claim the right to be supported by their parents indefinitely. If they can be surgically separated or if they are conjoined in a manner that permits them to function, then a case can be made that the parents should keep them alive until this can be done. But if there is no hope of them ever functioning as a man, I don't see why the parents should be penalized for this for the rest of their lives. In the case where they share a heart and are not likely to live long without separation, I think it is the parent's call to decide which twin lives. I don't know how I would ever make such a call; it would be tough.

Rights are not a function of the state of medical technology, of what medicine can or cannot do at any point in time. Until the fetus is physically seperated from the mother and no longer living off her physiology, it cannot acquire any rights and the mother has the right to kill it and remove it from her body. That is the line as far as rights are concerned. If it is true that there is no way to stop labor once it begins, that does not push the line defining the mother's rights any farther back; it would simply mean that the fetus would have to be killed and she would give birth to a dead fetus. If for some reason there is a point when it is no longer possible to kill the fetus and there is no alternative but to give birth to a living child, (and I cannot imagine why that would be the case with today's medical technology), this does not diminish the mother's rights; it simply means that at present she has no way to exercise her right past a certain point; she must abort prior to that point or take responsibility for the child that results. But this would only be a practical limitation, not a limitation on her rights. As an analogy, one has the right to have a tumor removed from one's brain ( provided one can find a surgeon willing to do it and provided one can pay for it). If the tumor's location makes it inoperable with current surgical techniques, this does not change one's rights in any way. It simply means that at present one has no way to exercise that particular right. The principle that rights are not a function of technology also applies to claims concerning the "viability" of the fetus; just as technological limitations do not remove or diminish one's rights, advances in technology do not create new rights. The fact that technological advances make it possible to keep a fetus alive outside the womb at earlier and earlier stages of its development does not endow it with rights or diminish the mother's.

Yes, indeed, many statements become irrelevant when you take them out of context, as you are doing here. If you view my remarks in post 24, you will see that the fact that a fetus is "not open to reason", while a man is open to reason, is relevant -- in the context of what I was discussing in post 24. But if you change the context by switching from your assertion that "a fetus in the womb" should be handled the same way as "a man in one's house", and instead address the narrower issue of whether a fetus has the right to be removed alive, then yes, the fact that the fetus is "not open to reason" becomes irrelevant. Why would it include such a right? If the mother can only remove the fetus provided it stays alive, then the fetus has a right greater than the right of the newborn child: it has the right, under certain conditions, to remain alive by using the mother's body against her will. This transforms the right to life to the right to be a biological parasite on an involuntary host.

No, you do not have the right to smother it. The infant has the right to be free of the initiation of force. And I did not say that a fetus may be aborted merely because it is not open to reason. I say it may be aborted because it does not have the right to occupy and make use of someone else's body against their will. The fact that a fetus is not open to reason was only cited as one thing that distinguishes it from a man in your house against your will. But viability does not confer the right to use the body of another against their will. An adult is an eminently viable being; but no adult has the right to use someone else's body against their will. Claiming such a right is tantamount to claiming the right to enslave others. No adult has a right to enslave and neither does a fetus. The right to life, according to Objectivism, means the right to engage in all the activities necessary for man’s proper survival. As a rational being, man’s proper survival is to use a process of reason to produce what he needs. Thus, the right to life means the right to be free to think, free to produce, and free to keep what one produces. Ownership of one’s body is implicit in the right to life. If someone else (such as a fetus) can hijack your body for their use, then one is not free to engage in whatever productive activity one wishes. Thus, the right to life cannot mean the right to remain alive via the involuntary support of others, especially when that involuntary support consists of using their body against their will. Regarding children, there is another thread with over 350 posts discussing various reasons why children have a right to support from their parents (including some dissenting views). I have no desire to rehash those arguments here, but I will make one point: since the parents create the child and bring him into the world by choice, the support they are then obligated to provide the child is not involuntary. The child's right to support from his parents does not contradict the principle that no one may remain alive via the involuntary support of others.

The two situations are not analogous. There are three significant distinctions between a fetus and "someone in your house against your will". "Someone in your house against your will", even if it is a burglar, is presumably (or possibly): 1) an entity that has rights, until and unless it is convicted of crimes in a court of law; 2) an entity that is open to reason and persuasion; and 3) an entity capable of a self-sufficient existence, i.e. an entity that does not have to survive as a parasite on the bodily functions of others. If these things are true, and if there is no imminent danger to one's person, then one can argue that reason requires one attempt to remove them by some means other than killing them. But none of these conditions applies to a fetus in the womb. A fetus has no rights, is not open to persuasion and is nothing less than a parasite on the mother's body; such an entity cannot claim the right to anything, including the right to remain a parasite until another host body, or a machine, can be located to sustain its existence.

Since there can be no such thing as the right to use another person's body against their will, the mother must have the right to abort anytime prior to birth.

She didn't say anyone not reading Valliant's book is immoral; she said, " A person who accepts any part of the Brandens' portrayal of Ayn Rand, yet refuses to read the book is either dishonest, irresponsible, or a coward." And she is correct. The people she refers to are not refusing to read the book because they cannot afford to purchase it; they are refusing to read the book because they claim to be uninterested in the subject matter, a claim which is hard to reconcile with all of the effort they have put into promoting the Branden's lies over the years. You have a way of taking my statements out of context and twisting their meaning. Here you are implying that I, or Valliant, attacked, or advocated attacking, the Branden's character instead of attacking their arguments. I did nothing of the sort, and neither does Valliant. If a person tells vicious lies over a period of many years, the implications for their character are obvious. But exposing those lies, as Valliant has done, does not constitute an improper attack on their character. The purpose of Diana's post ( I assume) and my response is to encourage you to read Valliant's book. I will be happy to discuss its content -- after you read it.

I agree completely with Diana's post: Valliant's book is a must-read for anyone who wishes to promote Objectivism. It is a bombshell that blasts decades of deception and dishonesty by the Brandens -- and lays to rest the numerous falsehoods about Miss Rand's personal life and behavior. While it is true that Miss Rand's character is philosophically irrelevant, and cannot logically be used to attack Objectivism, the Branden’s lies are damaging nonetheless. They have perpetuated the thoroughly false notion that Objectivism is psychologically flawed, incomplete and cannot be practiced without substantial risks to one’s self-esteem and mental health -- and they offer their own lies about Rand’s personal life as proof. If nothing else, the Branden’s lies constitute a distraction from actual philosophical issues; they deflect attention away from the brilliant and revolutionary ways Objectivism untangles philosophy’s historical conundrums, dead ends, contradictions and package-deals. Valliant’s book is the end for the Brandens. It is also a touchstone for the objectivity of their followers, people like Robert Bidinotto and others at TOC. Their reactions to the book, so far at least, demonstrate that there is one truth the “Truth and Tolerance” crowd cannot tolerate: the indisputable fact of Ayn Rand’s honesty and benevolence.

If, through your negligence, you injure another person such that they can no longer support themselves, are you under no obligation to support them?

I believe Miss Rand made it clear where she drew the line. From page 1 of the Lexicon: and also on page 1:

If we are talking about concepts there is definitely something "forcing us to go one way or the other": the need for clarity in cognition. Including the "androgynous" (which means "neither specifically male or female" or "possessing both male and female characteristics") among the referents of the concept "male" would render the concept meaningless; it would no longer refer to something specific. This is why we have we have the concepts "male", "female", "androgynous" and "hermaphrodite"; they refer to four different types of entities. I suggest you read pages 69 - 74 of ITOE for a discussion of why certain concepts should not be combined or integrated. "Masculine", "male" and "manly" are three different concepts referring to three different characteristics. Through the observation of similarities and differences, our mind permits us to abstract and identify different characteristics; the process of measurement-omission permits us to integrate our observations into a single unit; we concretize this unit by assigning a word to represent it. Nothing about this process implies "fuzziness".

All of our categories? What is "fuzzy" about the category, "male"? Stated more generally, is it your position that the referents of all concepts are selected arbitrarily?

The state-enforced (legalized) discrimination that existed in 1940 violated many people's rights, not just the rights of blacks. State-enforced laws that disenfranchised blacks through poll taxes, voter literacy tests, etc. were definitely a violation of the rights of blacks. Such laws were, properly, eliminated by constitutional amendments and federal laws. (There were other violations of black people's rights by such egregious organizations as the KKK and certain police departments; but here we are talking about systemic, state-enforced discrimination.) However, other so-called Jim Crow laws were not violations of the rights of blacks. The laws that forbid blacks from eating with whites, riding in the same railroad cars, sitting in the same seats on the bus, etc. were actually a violation of the rights of the owners of those businesses, not a violation of the rights of the blacks who were forced to use different facilities. No one can claim the right to use a given privately owned facility; that is up to the owner of the facility. A law requiring blacks to eat in a separate room in a restaurant is not a violation of the black perosn's rights; it is a violation of the rights of the man who owns the restaurant; he is the only one entitled to decide who may or may not eat in his building. Nor is segregated public education a violation of the rights of black people. No one, white or black, can claim a right to any sort of coercively financed education at someone else's expense; there is no right to a public education, be it in an integrated classroom or a segregated one. All such education is a violation of the taxpayer's rights. Granted, regardless of whose rights it violates, state-enforced discrimination is evil and should be abolished. The Jim Crow laws should have been repealed, or declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. Individuals would then have been free to decide whom they will and will not associate with, economically, socially, professionally or otherwise. But observe what happened instead. The civil rights legislation of 1964 was followed by a vast array of laws-by–regulations issued by the Food and Drug Administration, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the anti-trust division of the Justice Department, the Federal Communications Commission, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Interstate Commerce Commission, the Consumer Protection Agency, and the Department of Labor. This effectively replaced state-enforced discrimination against blacks with state-enforced discrimination against businessmen, which means, against the men of highest ability in society. We have switched from punishing men for the color of their skin to punishing men for their ability, drive and ambition. Is that progress?

If this is true, it can only mean that god maintains the patient's suffering even after death; you will suffer as long as god wants you to suffer and not a damn minute less. How compassionate.

KMS, do you know anything about Objectivism?

"Acts based in these teachings", i.e. acts based on religion, gave mankind at least 500 years of the dark ages, during which time people were beheaded, stoned to death, burned at the stake, drowned, drawn-and-quartered, skinned alive, dismembered and disemboweled -- all based on religion. More recently, acts based on religion have resulted in the horrific burning, crushing and exploding deaths of thousands of innocent people. Were you unaware of these facts?

This fatwa does not surprise me. Islam is a religion of fatwas – thousands and thousands of religious rules governing the smallest details of one’s existence. Islam leaves virtually nothing to the discretion or judgment of its followers; thinking is forbidden. At IslamOnline.net, online fatwa sessions are held two or three times a week. Muslims submit questions online and various Muslim clerics cite the appropriate fatwa (religious ruling) that governs the situation. Over the last 5&1/2 years, the clerics at this web site have “issued” over 10,000 such rulings. Now, many of these rulings are redundant – the same question may be asked many times – but even allowing for this, there are still thousands of rules governing the life of a Muslim. To get a feel for the utterly mindless and suffocating nature of Islam, go HERE and read some of the fatwa sessions.

Here is some additional data from a recent Heritage Foundation study on the "poor". ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- - Forty-six percent of all poor households actually own their own homes. The average home owned by persons classified as poor by the Census Bureau is a three-bedroom house with one-and-a-half baths, a garage, and a porch or patio. - Seventy-six percent of poor households have air conditioning. By contrast, 30 years ago, only 36 percent of the entire U.S. population enjoyed air conditioning. - Only 6 percent of poor households are overcrowded. More than two-thirds have more than two rooms per person. - The average poor American has more living space than the average individual living in Paris, London, Vienna, Athens, and other cities throughout Europe. (These comparisons are to the average citizens in foreign countries, not to those classified as poor.) - Nearly three-quarters of poor households own a car; 30 percent own two or more cars. - Ninety-seven percent of poor households have a color television; over half own two or more color televisions. - Seventy-eight percent have a VCR or DVD player; 62 percent have cable or satellite TV reception. - Seventy-three percent own microwave ovens, more than half have a stereo, and a third have an automatic dishwasher. “Overall, the typical American defined as poor by the government has a car, air conditioning, a refrigerator, a stove, a clothes washer and dryer, and a microwave. He has two color televisions, cable or satellite TV reception, a VCR or DVD player, and a stereo. He is able to obtain medical care. His home is in good repair and is not overcrowded. By his own report, his family is not hungry and he had sufficient funds in the past year to meet his family's essential needs.” -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Given how well-off the “poor” are, I guess we should not be surprised at the other major finding of the study: “ In good economic times or bad , the typical poor family with children is supported by only 800 hours of work during a year. That amounts to 16 hours of work per week.” In other words, whether jobs are plentiful or scarce, the poor are only working an average of two days a week. Source: Robert E. Rector and Kirk A. Johnson, Ph.D. “Understanding Poverty in America”, The Heritage Foundation, http://www.heritage.org/Research/Welfare/bg1713.cfm

I take this to mean that you no longer dispute the meaning of Miss Rand's statements; you simply disagree with them, which is fine. Your position is that the child is only entitled to whatever support the parent chooses to offer. If the parent chooses to offer no support, that may be immoral on the parent's part, but it is none of the government's business. The government should take no action, even if it means the child's death. Given that, I have some questions about something you wrote in post 357: (emphasis added) If it is "right for him to live as his nature dictates", how should an infant live? His "nature dictates" that he live as a dependent. That means that "it is right for him to live as a dependent." Why, then, does he not have a right to do so?