TheEgoist

"Too much weed". I don't understand this string of words.

This topic title lists my favorite things ever. And that's all I got to say about that.

There are many Democrats and a couple of Republicans. Unfortunately they're usually fatally flawed in another way.

There are honest communists. You're making excuses for him when you wouldn't for others, because of your conception of him asa some kind of hero. He isn't.

Sorry, but Ron Paul doesn't pass the secularist exam, as far as I am concerned. To pass that test, it's necessary that you repudiate the role of religion in government. Paul does not meet this necessary criterion

I am hoping for the Republicans, however I will not be voting in this election. Even to support gridlock, i really can't make myself pull the lever for people I know I despise.

Since when does Swig make posts?

Actually most of the "rebels" in the party are trying to show they are blue dogs, not more Left.

It's cute when people that don't read comics think this alteration. Like Rudmer, it's a reimagining that will not be DC canon. It's a reimagining that is necessary for interest in Supes, really. He's a dry character and you can only write so much over 70 years about a hulking semi-deity. It's also probably motivated by the comic book audience more than a sense of life. Comic book geeks are normally too wide to fit in the aisles at the book store or too scrawny to pick up a single issue comic. People like to read about people like them doing great things. See Spider-Man for the most famous example of this. Spidey comics started out with a guy who just a normal geeky kid with a new-found super power. He still had all the anxieties of a youth to deal with, along with getting treated like an Atlas by the people of New York. I'm excited about the Earth One stuff. It's going to knock the really complex continuity on its ass and I might start buying comics again because of it. STill, this was done by Smallville for Superman...I'm looking forward to some other character reimaginings, though.

Was wondering if anyone familiar with topics in mereology knows any good introductory texts, famous/valuable papers on the topic or important figures. I'm taking a class and want to get primed on it first.

no guiz, it's da gubbermint conspeeracie again/

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Right. I'm reading in some secondary, not-exactly-reputable sources that Abelard thinks something along the lines of Rand with measurement omission, specifically the maxim you quoted. My paper isn't actually due til November. I'll try and see if I can find some better sources for this thesis (It's not the thesis of my paper. My paper is just a defense of conceptualism as being contra both realism and nominalism and being the most plausible general approach to the problem) Dante, I don't know the policy of giving out papers. I know there is at least a time limit though. But I'll ask.

Yeah, I posted this as a facebook note and another Objectivist pointed this out to me. There is a clear importance in difference. In fact, if two things were qualitatively identical you probably couldn't say there was a universal or essence there. It's a good point. I'll post my response from there here as well. "I guess my point is not so much that she and Abelard are identical, but that Rand could be defined as a conceptualist. I don't see something in the conceptualist approach to universals that ruses out the Objectivist answer. On the contrary, it seems Rand shares much more in common with folks like Abelard (and also with Aquinas and Locke and other early moderns) than she does not share with them. So my general point is more posing the question: why isn't Objectivism a form of conceptualism? Sascha, I think that is how Rand characterizes conceptualists. And I think there is warrant, in that many people who were of the conceptualist school of thought would detach ideas from reality. Our ideas are representations in our minds, we don't know reality in and of itself. So any concept we form is purely a mental construct from other mental imprints that external reality bestows to us from our senses. However, that ignores what I see as the essence of conceptualism. A conceptualist could come to bad conclusions, based on other epistemological/metaphysical views they already held. However, Objectivists have a direct realist approach to perception, which I think can justify a conceptualist approach as objective, although mind dependent. Or I could be totally wrong."

I've been writing a paper on universals. It's pretty much a defense of conceptualism, since I was given a limited amount of topics to choose from and defending a general conceptualist thesis seemed best. Conceptualism is often seen as a form of soft nominalism, but that's really just because anything that isn't a form of realism (Universals are things that adhere in objects themselves, in Objectivist lingo you'd call it "Intrinsicism") is put in the Nominalist school. To give a somewhat sophomoric description of the school of thought; universals exist in the mind, independent of reality. We create universals from perceived similarities in things. The most noted conceptualist, who really spelled out the first theory of conceptualism that I know of, was Peter Abelard. We read commentaries on him for class and I decided to look more deeply into his views myself for this paper. Abelard's views are remarkably close to Rand's in many respects. This is quite obvious in his identification that universals are not extended out into reality, but are based on the perception of unity amongst classes of objects. Abelaard thought there was a completely objective process to gain knowledge about universals and that there was a right way and a wrong way to group things as "universals". He espoused a view very close to Rand's theory of measurement omission. We see two objects, like distinctly crafted tables, and we ignore the features of both that are different and form our universal based on their similarities to one another. Clearly this is echoed in Rand, and she deems that which two distinct entities have in common "the conceptual common denominator". What we have in Abelard, and in Rand, is a rejection of realism and nominalism. We can't class together things either based merely on linguistic trends or on a detached metaphysical view of universals. Universals are neither social myths nor properties that exist in objects without the perception of them. I decided to do what any rigorous, tenacious scholar hell-bent on finding proof of my thesis that Rand and Abelard can at least be lumped together in a general school of thought on universals: I googled it googling. "Abelard and Rand": The first thing that came up was an article expressing my very opinion of the matter. Really don't know who the author is at all, and it certainly isn't an academic resource. Nevertheless, it's a pretty decent analysis of the two philosophers with only a few things to quibble about. Rand lumps together conceptualists with the nominalists, implying they are both of the same philosophic strain: subjectivism. Based on the evidence, I'd have to disagree with Rand on that. We can at least say there are glaring similarities between the two schools, especially in regards to Peter Abelard. Perhaps it is because Rand never encountered any writings of Abelard or commentary on him? I certainly haven't found any proof that she did. That's unfortunate. I always find it very satisfying when I have an idea, and someday find out some extremely smart guy came to the same basic conclusion. So, have any other O'ists run across this before? I'm next to ignorant on Abelard. I hadn't heard his name until this semester in a topics in metaphysics course. I'd love to have someone enlighten me on the situation; am I wrong or right in seeing similarity here?

The idea that all the big corporations that profited from the past few years bailouts and stimuluses were just victims is completely naive. Yes, those poor men who got all the money. Respectable banks like BB&T were openly hostile. What about the rest?

A mere appeal to appearances does no good. Reality is often not as it appears to perceivers.

You've portrayed an incredible lack of knowledge on the subject. All sociology is the study of societies as a whole. It isn't some conspiracy to subordinate individuals to society. It just doesn't care about just any single individual. It puts things in the context of society. Everything you've said has been backed by 0 evidence or regard for historical validity. There are in fact many individualist sociologists. That many, dare I say most, sociologists have been left-wing and influenced by bad people is irrelevant to what it IS.

I guess I should make clear that I am looking for stuff on Set Theory post-Russell's Paradox. I don't know much about the history of it, but I do know he predates a kind of re-modeling of how one deals with sets. It's my understanding that will be the main content of the course, while Cantor and the nineteenth century will probably just be used as an introduction. Could be totally wrong though as I've only spoken with the professor once about it. Anyway, besides not being totally relevant, I think I remember Corvini's courses being a bit pricey. Unless Corvini has something novel to say on the paradoxes that overthrow much of that era's work, I don't think it's a worthy investment.

I hope I've not posted this in another section. I know I've posted requests like this on other forums I frequent. I plan on taking a class next semester that will be focusing on logic and set theory. As far as logic goes, I have a fairly competent grasp of the notation, concepts and methods of first order logic. However, I find I know far too little about set theory. I assume this class will provide introductions itself, but I would like to be primed for course. I have a copy of "Naive Set Theory" ready to crack open but I want to make sure I'm not going to hit a roadblock somewhere in the book. I'm not what you would call a math whiz, and I know set theory assumes you know your stuff. I know a lot of folks on here are much more familiar with these topics, so suggestions of texts or even internet resources to begin my journey at would be great.

What do you make of the claim that only an "accomplished scientist" could come up with a specific solution to how induction is done in a specific scientific field, like physics, combined with the fact that Harriman isn't really an accomplished individual in the field of physics?

What I can deny is that Locke's political philosophy had a good foundation. His theory of ideas also led to Kant's distinction between phenomenal/noumena object.

Except of course John Locke's ideas naturally lead to Hume, naturally leads to Kant...

Where has David come out against Peikoff? Was it on the forums? In this topic? Didn't see it myself.