Emily

Upon reading the post about dealing with loneliness, I introspected on my own life and a sense of longing I am having even though I do have people that I share values with and am close to. For many years, I have admired a man I know. He is exactly what I am looking for in a man and I have never found an equal to him. I chased him romantically, but was unsuccessful. Now he is one of my closest and most valued friends. He has had a very positive influence on my life. My admiration of him has given me additional motivation to improve myself and to actively pursue my goals. He has also gotten me to try new things which I now enjoy very much, like playing tennis. Usually I see him 2-3 times a week. I value this time with him and am satisfied with our friendship. I do not want to pursue a relationship with him for two reasons. The first is there is a lack of something which keeps him from having the same feelings for me. Secondly, he now has a girlfriend. For the past week, his girlfriend has been in town. Being that this is the only time he can spend with her, he has let it be known that he does not want to be disturbed while she is here. I have chatted some in the past with his girlfriend online and find that I like her very much and am eager to meet her. I also think that if she is better suited for him, that it is better that he be with her. I would like to meet her very much. At first, this was because I was curious to what type of woman could be so incredible that she could win the object of my affection. Once I started talking to her, I found that I had a much stronger reason to want to meet her. I have never met another woman that I could talk with so freely and about things that interest me. Usually when I talk to women it is boring small talk and nothing of substance. With her, I found that we had common interests and a common view on how we deal with things. Meeting her would allow me to confirm this, as well as enjoy the company of a new found friend. I know, however, she is not in town to see me. I cannot expect to see her, although she has said that she thinks that it is likely we will meet before she leaves. I have been having some unexpected difficultly with the situation. I think it is totally reasonable for him and her to want to spend time alone, however I miss spending time with him. I find myself thinking about the fact that I cannot contact him, frequently. There is another thing, too. I still admire him and I'm not sure what to do with my admiration. I know it is likely that I will never be in a romantic relationship with him again. How did Rearden handle knowing that he would never have that which he loved, because she had found John Gault? He had lots of work to do rebuilding the world, but wasn't he lonely knowing that he would never have someone he could share it with in a way greater than friendship? If the man I admire really is the best, as Dagny was the best, what should I do?

I think the answers to these questions can be found in Ayn Rand's essay "The Objectivist Ethics" in The Virtue of Selfishness. I added the bold for emphasis. In other words there would be no self-interest of the society itself, only the men who make it up. Individuals living by Objectivist philosophy would have no problem with the over all good messing with the individual rational self-interest given that the members are indeed rational. One of my favorite quotes from Atlas Shrugged is: An Objectivist society would be constantly changing and improving itself. In the article "To Outsource or to Stagnate?" by Onkar Ghate, a senior fellow of the ARI he says: http://www.aynrand.org/site/News2?page=New...ws_iv_ctrl=1021 Classically, yes, if you are going by religious or altruist standards. Objectivists do not go by their standards, if fact Objectivist standards are conflicting with these standards.

I agree with you. Why does being happy at the moment mean you will be unhappy the next moment? Are you talking about 'happiness' from whims or an escape from reality?

I once had a girlfriend who worked as a pizza delivery person and she told me it was common for drivers to spit in the pizza of repeat low tippers. I don't know if BaseballGenius and UpsizeThis can confirm this trend, but it was enough to make me avoid ordering pizza. When I do order it, I'm sure to always tip well, no matter what service I get.

I could justify tipping a cab driver for doing a good job getting you to your destination safely. I once had to take a two hour cab ride from Newark to Philly when my plane was canceled and I was lucky to survive the ordeal. The cab driver cut off a semi-truck at one point and we nearly wrecked. In this case it was nice to have the option of not tipping the cab driver to show my dissatisfaction. I could also see tipping a cab driver for getting you somewhere quickly when you are in a hurry as reasonable.

Why are you sure that the second law didn't get violated?

The change in entropy is the amount of heat transferred (the inexact differential of QR) at a certain temperature (T). From the 1st Law of thermodynamics, the inexact differential of Q is the change of internal energy plus the inexact differential of work done in the system. So only internal energy is used to calculate entropy. The thing about entropy is it doesn't just apply to the system, you also have to take into account the entropy change of the local surroundings and the universe due to the process. All natural processes are irreversible and have an entropy change on the universe.

From the second law of thermodynamics entropy is always increasing. The second law is a physical law therefore cannot be derived, but relies on the fact that it can be proven true through experimental data. Not everything has already been discover. There are always ways we can improve previous concepts and just because the 2nd Law is accepted doesn't make it an absolute truth. Here is a link to the abstract for the article on FT. You'll have to purchase the article if you want to read it. http://prola.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v71/i15/p2401_1 Why do we still use the 2nd Law? Probably for the same reason we still use Newtonian physics. It works within a certain range.

Entropy refers to the amount of heat that is transferred between two quasi-static equilibrium states. The Kelvin-Planck statement of the 2nd law states that it is impossible to have a heat engine which converts all heat into work (i.e. 100% efficiency). We cannot view the Universe as a reversible process because there are dissipative effects, therefore the system and its surroundings cannot be returned to their original state without producing any changes. Therefor the system (the Universe) must be irreversible. If there is irreversible transfer of heat than there is an increase in entropy. However, the fluctuation theorem, which refers to changes in irreversible systems far from equilibrium, states that entropy will decrease as the system size increases. This contradicts the 2nd law as it says that entropy decreases, rather than increases. The FT has problems though when you use it to predict earlier states of the system. Both the second law and the FT rely strongly on experimental data. So yes, entropy in the Universe is decreasing and it violates the 2nd law.

The second article has an obvious lack of credibility with an advertisement directly above it claiming "Sign up and publish now!" Not to mention the author didn't spend much time editing the article, as it has a mistake in the first sentence that spell check wouldn't catch. If I am correct, the word "way" should be "wary." I wouldn't be too worried about this article swaying anyone of even a mildly rational mind.

Are you saying that IQ level had no influence on human evolution? Also, you are contradicting yourself with these two statements.

I don't think there is anything wrong with me. In fact, the more critical I become, the more confident I feel. When everyone has a right to my attention there is no differentiating between those that deserve it and those to whom I feel obligated to give it. As I let go of those obligations, I am freer to spend MY time doing the things I judge as valuable. Since I initially posted this I have stopped talking to both of the people mentioned in the original post. It's not that I don't like them, but that I don't care about them anymore. I see no reason to waste my time on them. Sometimes I still have a hard time facing the fact that I am becoming what many people consider to be cold and uncaring, but I don't think it is bad. I'm not cold and uncaring to those who matter to me. I have no tolerance anymore for the wallowing in problems you speak of. I know a few Objectivists in person, but they are not close friends. I don't have a group of "best friends" anymore, but I don't feel that I need it. Sometimes I do feel lonely, but I don't want to settle for someone less than my standards to "fill" this loneliness. My plan is to focus on my work, improve myself, and be as productive as possible. Hopefully, if there is someone of a like mind around they will be drawn to me, because am certainly not going to stress over looking for such a person.

I have found the O'Reilly books to be very clear and interesting resources for C and C++.

You say "of course" to my comment that in many cases engineers are inventors, but you also say they are not "de facto inventors." This seems like a contradiction to me. What is the difference you mean between the phrases "are inventors" and "de facto inventors"?

I would argue that in many cases engineers are inventors. I have 3 main jobs: 1.) Full time Electrical Engineering student. 2.) Junior Electrical Engineer at a stainless steel mill 3.) Student researcher in the Nanotechnology lab at my university.