[Water in Objectivist Society]

This must have been asked before but I can't find anything specifically. A more plausible problem with water is how does one commodify ground water, or rivers and streams? Can someone own an aquifer? What if I own a huge amount of property and am able to seed clouds to induce it to rain only or mostly on my property, denying rain water to others? Can I dam up water of a river that runs through my property to make hydroelectricity?

Those are good questions I've never seen directly addressed here either. I have no idea how you could own a resource that migrates like water within, say, the several drainage basins of the United States. But at the same time, in a true Objectivist world, everything is owned by someone, so it would have to be worked out somehow.

[Extracting resources from primitive countries]

Again, it takes great effort to end a long standing institution that is ingrained in a culture. It's not something that is changed on a dime. Do you agree with this? In fact, it's remarkable how fast it was changed.

You really can't say that America "perpetuated it for 100 years". It was just that hard to bring it to an end and it required the most costly of wars to really end it. Hold context: slavery existed everywhere through all of man's history and was not vanquished nor even understood to be wrong. In America it was ended.

This is an injustice. Saying that America made "mistakes" regarding slavery, as if that's the essential, completely drops context of the times. Here you have this historical precedent of a country founded on ideas that put a stop to slavery and the thing people highlight are the non-essentials. All you do is perpetrate an injustice by repeating the claim. What should be said first and foremost is that America founded a country that set out the ideals that ended slavery and supported the freedom of all men on principle. Then, after that you can talk about the mistakes that were made, but it's way down the list in comparison to the feat.

I think you yourself are doing an outstanding job of context dropping here. Slavery didn't end until it was convenient to do so, but you ignore that and contend that it was just some magnanimous decision that America made on principal alone. No one would ever understand the real history coming from such an oversimplification of it. The real truth involves things that are ugly, beautiful, horrific, humane, intelligent, ignorant, etc. Whitewashing history does no one any good but the propagandists. We don't need to love our country like a 2-year old loves his mommy; we need to recognize and understand our country for what it is, and has been, warts and all, and embrace it all the same.

Here is a link to the previous discussion and my points regarding your assertions.

[Extracting resources from primitive countries]

The answer is no doubt "yes". Because you put the restriction pre-Columbian on the sites (and I can't imagine what relevance such a condition has for the discussion)... I don't know of any specific evidence that establishes a property claim in the Northwest going that far back. The history of Cuzco is less obscure, so I can say "at least 1", and point to it.

I haven't been back in awhile but I wanted to at least post one last thought on this thread. My arbitrary selection of pre-1492 America is just an attempt at trying to narrow down some concrete examples to work with, much as your arbitrary selection of the Northwest.

I hope it's clear that I hold your interjection of a pre-Columbian restriction to be fundamentally wrong-headed. The proper question to be asking is, in the context where there is no civilization and no government, where anarchy prevails, how should a rational and moral being deal with other people? Very simply, he should attempt to determine what is somebody's property, and he should respect that person's right to property, but he may and should take for his own property unowned land that he recognizes as a tool for his survival.

There seems to be a big difference of opinion on what constitutes property in societies that don't recognize individual property rights. I don't see why you feel I'm being wrong-headed, because I don't know of any real world historical circumstances such as this (no civilization, no government, total anarchy) since perhaps the stone age. I give Kendall credit for at least taking this question head on and coming up with some objective criteria to make a determination of the limits of property rights for such societies. You seem to keep scooting around the issue, but regardless you don't seem to want to say definitively whether or not individuals in such societies, based on the criteria I laid out earlier, would have any property rights beyond what they physically were living on.

It is clearly not condemning a person to die if you require them to respect other people's rights. Are you really claiming that because some Indians lived as savages for centuries that they were genetically incapable of using their minds and grasping the concept of a man having rights?

I don't know why you brought genetics into this but clearly it is not a factor. Cultural conditioning is a powerful force, and I'm saying you could not expect them to understand and accept another way of seeing property overnight, when it would probably take at least a generation to truly overturn their cultural norms, even when a more enlightened view is handed to them. Surely you can see your inflexible approach to the matter would visit suffering on a great many people, simply because they were unenlightened enough to override their cultural conditioning.

And if you're interested, there are many instances in history where tribes did not enjoy their property rights, and yet they did not die. For example, Jews were forceably taken from their land millenia ago, and yet they still exist. The Cherokee were forceably taken from their land in 1838 and yet there are thousands of Cherokee in Oklahoma. A bunch of Dutchmen disrespected the property rights of a bunch a Welshmen around 1600 years ago, and yet there are still Welshmen.

So its cool if great numbers of them die as long as the ethnic group still exists? I'm just saying I wouldn't be so rigid in my implementation of property rights when confronted with a culture where that idea had not yet evolved. My determination of a land rights would have to include enough of the claimed land to keep such a society viable, with access to water and natural resources relative to its population. However, I am not an expert on early Native American societies. It is possible, as Kendall points out, such claims to land would be far more limited than the territories they laid claim to.

[Extracting resources from primitive countries]

Slavery is one practice that America deserves credit for vanquishing. The whole idea that America, which came into existence when there was a massive slave trade going on world wide was some how responsible for it is just an absurd proposition perpetrated by modern, anti-American intellectuals. America was founded in the promotion of liberty on principle for the first time in the history of mankind. And, make note, it was only with Enlightenment ideas that slavery was recognized as wrong in the first place. It was only with Enlightenment ideas that the practice was recognized as an abomination. It was in the West, in America, England and France that the practice was ended. It wasn't done in Africa. It wasn't done in South America.

Note also, leftists today care not one whit about slavery or harsh treatment of people. They didn't care about it in the Soviet Union, nor in Communist China. They didn't care about it in Iraq, nor in Iran, nor in Afghanistan. The point I'm making is that modern intellectuals who smear America falsely are themselves not nearly to the level of the founders either morally or intellectually. In fact, they are very corrupt and shallow thinkers. They would never have fought slavery, as is proven by their actions today and they have no capacity to defend liberty.

So, this whole idea America "made a mistake in the past" regarding slavery is only possible to make if you don't know the history of America or slavery. America is the country that 1> recognized it was immoral (the first major step), 2> had men with the courage to take it head on, 3> vanquished it. That's what America deserves credit for.

I guess at the end of the day, you really don't know how great this country is.

I don't know why you are bringing this up again as I thought you and I had settled this issue in another thread a while back. But okay, at the risk of side-tracking this thread even more, I'll bite again. America gets credit for vanquishing slavery, but it doesn't get a free pass on perpetuating it for almost 100 years after gaining independence. And it was only as a bi-product of the Civil War that slavery ended, it was never a magnanimous decision made on principal alone until it was politically convenient. And your complete omission of Christian Abolitionism is astounding. If you have something new to add please go back to that old thread and post there, rather than continue here.

[Extracting resources from primitive countries]

Neither David or I are claiming that it matters not how you use the land. If you use it in ways that "resemble important aspects" of ownership, that is ownership. That is, use in that manner would indicate the concept is formed. The debate is what constitutes empirical uses taken as a whole that would inidicate this. Improvements, individual tract demarcation (as opposed to territorial boundaries), etc. I think one of the most important aspects is trade in land.

Right, that is what I meant by "resemble important aspects." We are talking about societies without the concept of property rights, but trying to figure out if they may still procure property rights based on their use/occupation of the land. You have sketched out some broad fundamental guidelines as to how to evaluate a society's claim to land, particularly in post 40 of this thread. Let's stick with the Native American example. My understanding is that many Native Americans farmed, built structures, occupied the land permanently. Are any of these three criteria alone worthy of respecting that tribe's land ownership (if collectivism is a sticking point, perhaps consider it a 10,000 person co-op)? Does meeting all three of these criteria add enough weight to the claim to constitute ownership?

No, that is not what I'm claiming. For instance, if a bunch of Palestinians invades a kibbutz (a commune said to be owned by the community) and "claims" the land as unowned, that is unjustified. If a gang of wandering Huns happen to bed down by a river in the wilds for a couple of nights, that doesn't constitute a claim of ownership.

The same question to you: would any pre-Columbus Native American tribes enjoy any land ownership rights, given their useage and occupancy of the land as expressed above? This assumes that we can agree that such peoples did more than "picking berries", "pitching tents", or "crapping in the woods."

Given the thoughts you have expressed on this thread, particularly with Gary, my guess is that you would not agree that some de facto property rights have been established. Again, I have to assert that most Native American tribes should have property rights on at least some of what they considered their territory, because I would be more liberal as to what constitutes land ownership for peoples who had not yet advanced intellectually enough to make more proper claims. Consider this partially benevolence, or whatever, but the alternative is clearly condemning these peoples to die, or significant numbers of them, as it is unrealistic to expect them to reverse centuries of tradition overnight to adapt. Look how long it took the Cherokee to see the light, and hell they still got screwed.

[Extracting resources from primitive countries]

I can't be held responsible for the idiocy of my neighbors in this way. Even though those around me are slobbering primitive collectivists who believe that The Great Spirit gave all of the land to The Tribe As A Collective to share selflessly, I do hereby stake out and claim as my own land this plot of 20 acres, on which I claim the exclusive right to hunt, fish, log, pick berries and plant corn. I own this land, it is my property. I do understand though that the slobbering masses may not recognise my rights.

Your position seems to be that regardless of how the land is used, how much of it is physically occupied, no person can make any claim to land without the prerequisite concept of individual property rights, and certainly all land claims based on collectivism are invalid. Hence, someone such as yourself who comes along, a person who properly recognizes such a concept, and makes a claim on the same land, is morally justified in taking it? I am not clear as to whether you would take into account how the land is used, or how much of it is occupied. If the less-evolved thinkers use the land in ways that resemble in some important aspects how modern property rights respecting peoples would, you would pay it no heed?

To gobble up and fence off a tribe's territory because they didn't "think" of it the right away strikes me as wrong, especially if they demonstrated occupancy and improvement of the land. As I stated earlier, negotiating with said primitives would be the most moral course to me in such a case, exchanging something of value for the land, provided they were in fact using or occupying the land on a permanent/regular basis. Can there be no de facto recognition of property rights based on certain circumstances?

[Charlton Heston Dies at 84]

From http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/06/movies/0...&ei=5087%0A

"In Mr. Heston, the N.R.A. found its embodiment of pioneer values — pride, independence and valor. In a speech at the N.R.A.’s annual convention in 2000, he brought the audience to its feet with a ringing attack on gun-control advocates. Paraphrasing an N.R.A. bumper sticker (“I’ll give you my gun when you take it from my cold, dead hands”), he waved a replica of a colonial musket above his head and shouted defiantly, “From my cold, dead hands!”

Not to be too disrespectful but this Onion headline almost made me spit up my coffee.

Charlton Heston's Gun Taken From His Cold, Dead Hands

[Extracting resources from primitive countries]

This question has a standard already embedded in it. Does this idea bother you?

"plot" implies some standard of demarcation already so I'd ask what you mean by it. IF you mean a patch of land on which a tribal people has grown corn on for centuries, then I'd think this would be a valid claim. If you mean 1,000 square miles across which a nomadic people moves, taking up little space temporarily in various spots, and harvesting things which simply wildly live on the land be they plant or animal, then I'd say, that is an invalid claim.

The question really goes to what constitues a valid claim to property amonst a people who have no concept of it.

Did they work the land?

Did they buy and sell it?

Did the conceive of the land as owned?

Did they think of it individually or collectively (which might indicate a more territorial approach)?

If you think about it, harvesting from broad tracts (if that is your standard) gives very broad claims to someone who has done little to the land itself.

Remember we're talking about the establishment of hte concept of property. All this changes somewhat once the concept is established. If you buy a parcel of land and want to leave it fallow (or build temporary structures on it) that's your business, but the system and framework are already established.

I think while my understanding about what Rand had to say about the establishment of property rights is limited, she was pretty clear that you can't empirically take an example from within a society that has them established and say that because that exists, then a valid claim, by someone who doesn't recognize property rights to establish them is simply that usage of the land. I think that is the fallacy that is being committed here.

"I own a plot of land. I subsist off of it. Therefore someone who subists off land has a valid claim to new land."

"I own a plot of land. I erect a temporary structure on it. Therefore someone who erects temporary structures has a claim to new land."

My particular view is that usage doesn't go to historical precedent. I can own land and leave it fallow, but leaving land fallow doens't give me a claim to new land. I think the strongest case for an existing claim is the extent to which it was treated, as property. Was it bought or sold, demarcated, owned individually, etc. All other claims, based upon use are weaker. But if we line those up, and look at their strength, some of the things off the top of my head that might be cause to consider.

specificity of the plot - demarcation of the plot

long term usage of the plot

working the land vs. simply harvesting nature

No where would I consider need as criteria.

I'm curious to those who are taking position against this type of view. What exactly do you think constitutes a valid claim to land? Do you think the native americans could have claimed the entirety of the US as theirs based upon the fact that they "roamed" it?

Since we're mostly on the subject of Native American peoples, I'm curious as to why you feel a significant percentage of them "roamed." Before Columbus the Americas were chock-full of people who lived in permanent locations, creating elaborate dwellings, working the land, and burying their dead in those locations with the implied thought that they considered the land more or less their permanent home. The rampant European diseases wiped out entire villages and tribes, probably reducing the population of the Americas by about 90 percent. This brought about complete civil disorder and chaos for most indigenous tribes, and gave Europeans the impression that all this open land was just there for the taking.

With such divergent ideas about what constituted ownership, the only equitable solution I can see is entering negotiations with the "primitives" and offering something of value in exchange for a piece of their land. There are examples of this being done. This does not mean negotiating with a rogue tribe of the Sioux nation, then declaring the land parcel has been bought and subsequently all other Sioux tribes need to vacate the land. The criteria for ownership would be roughly:

1) worked the land, such as planted crops, including physically making use of all portions of the territory. They couldn't just claim land they didn't physically occupy with some regularity

2) other indigenous peoples recognized their claim to the territory, documenting its authenticity

It would be up to the party with the more established concept of property rights to make these determinations for the most part. If the indigenous peoples made unwarranted claims on land, then others would have the right to take it by force.

[Extracting resources from primitive countries]

One thing to mention is that Native American peoples did recognize the territory of other tribes, so somehow this idea of land ownership was understood amongst each other without a written deed as such.

"Primitive" peoples such as the Mayans had many fascinating innovations and achievements without ever demarcating plots of land to individual owners. Seems this should count for something. If you refuse to accept their less evolved cultural interpretation of property, then they can be stripped of their access to the land, more importantly, their means of survival?

[Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal]

I've got to say that this is bizarre! I don't think you are going to sell capitalism by promoting prostitution.

Under a capitalistic government, prostitution would be legal; but also under capitalism she would have skills to work in a factory or something without the need to sell her body. In other words, I think prostitution would be the last ditch effort to keep oneself financially viable, and wouldn't occur that much under capitalism.

Plus, under the morality of capitalism -- i.e. Objectivism -- I don't think there would be a need for guys to go find professional hookers to get sex, they could just find a girl friend who enjoys sex for the sake of enjoying sex; provided they have earned it by their character. In other words, under the morality of life on earth, there would not be moral prohibitions against pre-marital sex, and one could find a romantic partner who would have sex that is mutually enjoyable.

So, it would have been better if you showed her getting a real job under capitalism, instead of turning to prostitution in desperation.

I can't figure out why Objectivism would have a problem with prostitution per se, given the prostitute in question is doing it of their own volition and for rational reasons, i.e. money. I also think the relative stigma on prostitution, not to mention danger, makes few women choose this path unless under duress. Therefore it can be a lucrative business for the women who do choose it (on the higher end, that is), given the high demand for no-strings-attached sex so many guys are looking for. Guys who want a hooker aren't interested in a "relationship." I don't see how this goes away under capitalism. In fact I see it becoming more prevalent.

[My Complaint Letter to My College]

When leftist intellectuals speak of "opportunity", then never are speaking of legal impedements, they are talking of a person's failure to get what they want. Walls was not talking about dictatorships.

If you want the context, you can read the 1977 interview with Murray Atkins Walls

That was quite the arcane link you dug up there I did flip through it a little but I couldn't find the specific quote.

Seems like you know something about this Walls. Was she an advocate for violent civil disobedience? I'm guessing not, but I'd like to see what you're basing this assumption on. Most civil rights advocates repudiated violence. I have to say that to make that quote out to be condoning the initiation of force to resolve grievances is a pretty fantastic distortion. It's just the realistic recognition of cause and effect, not an implicit "threat." If I told you that ignoring your termite problem would have devastating consequences for your house, that is not a threat.

[My Complaint Letter to My College]

I think you could be making too much of it. I don't know who said this or what the context was, but note the phrasing "...don’t have the opportunity...". This is hardly the same as your unsuccessful job application at Microsoft, where you surely had the opportunity to get that job, but were not selected.

Citing the likelihood that civil disobedience will ensue if people are held down by, say, a brutal dictatorship, is not the same as advocating violence. It is simply a warning that to eliminate the opportunities people have to better themselves, bad things will happen.

[Research on Rand's Economic Theories]

I would start with a writer whose work Rand admired, Henry Hazlitt. His book What You Should Know About Inflation is sound in theory and analysis:

I present in this chapter a chart comparing the increase

in the cost of living, in wholesale commodity prices, and

in the amount of bank deposits and currency, for the twenty year

period from the end of 1939 to the end of 1959.

Taking the end of 1939 as the base, and giving it a value

of 100, the chart shows that in 1959 the cost of living (consumer

prices) had increased 113 per cent over 1939, wholesale

prices had increased 136 per cent, and the total supply

of bank deposits and currency had increased 270 per cent.

The basic cause of the increase in wholesale and consumer

prices was the increase in the supply of money and

credit. There was no "shortage of goods." As we noticed

in the preceding chapter, our rate of industrial production

in the twenty-year period increased 177 per cent. But though

the rate of industrial production almost tripled, the supply

of money and credit almost quadrupled. If it had not been

for the increase in production, the rise in prices would have

been much greater than it actually was.

Entire book online here:

http://www.mises.org/books/inflation.pdf

No offense but this paper is not "research". None of the information is cited back to an original source. The closest he comes is by just citing the names of other people.

[Left Brain Vs Right Brain]

The point is not whether or not you can see both directions but of which you see first.

I think this is the point, your initial impression. I saw the image moving CCW first, but after further observation could see it either way. Interestingly after seeing the image reversed, my initial impression was that the reversed image was moving CW, but then my brain shifted to seeing it CCW the more I watched, so for whatever reason I think I'm wired to seeing it CCW.

[Indoctrination in the California Education System]

So many of these homeschoolers are fundamentalist Christians who want to indoctrinate their kids in BS, creating any army of ignorant religious zealots. So there is definitely an upside to this.

Currently there is a Christian school suing the University of California because it won't allow some class credits to count towards admission. The denied credits are are all from classes based on distorted Christian textbooks. I haven't heard an update on that one but last I heard it was going to trial last November.

[Fair Tax]

It's the same thing. One repeals an amendment by passing a new one. See Amendments 18 and 21.

Is there any evidence that the implementation of the Fair Tax would create a massive black market for good and services, to circumvent the tax? Perhaps the low sales tax effective in most places that have one, is too low to create much of an incentive to break the law.

[A Study On Racism In The Job Force In America.]

I’m getting it from observation and reading.

Its not racism, I already explained why.

I've read a TON on multiculturalism. I'm gaining information from direct observation, reading and even arguing. 80 some odd professors signed a paper condemning the Lacrosse team. If you don't know about it, then so be it.

Where you're getting this information is what I'm interested in. It sounds like you are going by what other people think of it, not by reading primary materials on it that don't automatically pre-judge it. You might benefit greatly by going to some forums, or even someone in person, and asking some open-ended questions to find out more.

Did that published ad even mention the Duke lacrosse players? You might want to look that one up again.

Those who are rational and value freedom. "talk radio kind of stuff"? Another one of your fuzzy, kind of, sort of arguments?

Talk radio is notorious for bad and misleading information, its purpose is to get people juiced up ("I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore!"). You can hear a lot of good stuff too, and its generally entertaining. But its not a good reliable medium for getting any real information.

Because I don't believe it was fundamental.

Check out this site I found, a quick passage:

Slavery was still very much alive, and in some places even expanding, in the northern colonies of British North America in the generation before the American Revolution. The spirit of liberty in 1776 and the rhetoric of rebellion against tyranny made many Americans conscious of the hypocrisy of claiming natural human rights for themselves, while at the same time denying them to Africans. Nonetheless, most of the newly free states managed to postpone dealing with the issue of slavery, citing the emergency of the war with Britain.

That war, however, proved to be the real liberator of the northern slaves. Wherever it marched, the British army gave freedom to any slave who escaped within its lines. This was sound military policy: it disrupted the economic system that was sustaining the Revolution. Since the North saw much longer, and more extensive, incursions by British troops, its slave population drained away at a higher rate than the South's. At the same time, the governments in northern American states began to offer financial incentives to slaveowners who freed their black men, if the emancipated slaves then served in the state regiments fighting the British.

When the Northern states gave up the last remnants of legal slavery, in the generation after the Revolution, their motives were a mix of piety, morality, and ethics; fear of a growing black population; practical economics; and the fact that the Revolutionary War had broken the Northern slaveowners' power and drained off much of the slave population. An exception was New Jersey, where the slave population actually increased during the war. Slavery lingered there until the Civil War, with the state reporting 236 slaves in 1850 and 18 as late as 1860.

The business of emancipation in the North amounted to the simple matters of, 1. determining how to compensate slaveowners for the few slaves they had left, and, 2. making sure newly freed slaves would be marginalized economically and politically in their home communities, and that nothing in the state's constitution would encourage fugitive slaves from elsewhere to settle there.

Walter Williams, as I told you. I linked to his statement, but I also remember him saying it. The Founders were strongly anti-slavery. I'm referring here to the Northerners primarily.

Walter Williams is an economist, not a historian, so he is not an authority.

Anyway, the long and short of it is that the founding ideals of America lead to the ending of slavery. Enlightenment ideas lead to the view that slavery was evil, and must be ended. This is what is outstanding about that period. Slavery itself existed through all of mankind's history. The Egyptians had slaves, the Romans had slaves, the Arabs had (and have) slaves, the Indians had slaves, etc. etc. America fought and ended slavery on principle. .

The Enlightenment ideals certainly made some people feel guilty about slavery, but didn't do much to actually end it. I will concede that reading this made me take more seriously the Enlightenment's influence on popular thought about slavery. But, as the source I cited says, it was more pragmatic and circumstantial reasons why it ended it the north, and then eventually the south.

Say there is an overweight person who finds out that to lose weight he should start eating more fruits and vegetables and cut out the saturated fat, but does nothing for years until he marries a woman who cooks all his healthy meals for him. Then when he loses weight he attributes his success to his discovery of important nutritional guidelines years ago, when in reality he only succeeded in losing weight because of his wife's cooking. He may have felt increasingly guilty about ignoring his health, but he let circumstances solve his problem rather than acting on what he knew to be the proper dietary principals. This is similar to the argument that you are making.

[A Study On Racism In The Job Force In America.]

I'm following logic here. Racism is elevating race to a high level or the highest levels of importance in ones value system.

Where are you getting this definition? How does this mesh with the explanations I already gave you on why this isn't racism?

It's all around the culture. I see it daily in various forms. Let me give you a high profile case in point, the Duke University Lacrosse team. What happened there? Several of the faculty of the university came out against the team based solely on race. They had no regard for the evidence. They disregarded the evidence and vilified the players and still to this day, so far as I know, haven’t changed their views on the matter. These are the multiculturalism driven faculty members, the intellectuals who are at the cutting edge of the movement. This is the kind of stuff they are attempting to pour into the culture at large.

So you have never read anything on multiculturalism? Rather, you are just gleaning information from 3rd parties? BTW, what Duke professor are you referring to in particular? Is there a specific quote about something he/she/they said about the Duke lacrosse players?

These are people we can’t have running America.

What "we" are you referring to? And how are multiculturalists running America? That sounds like talk radio kind of stuff.

Christianity existed some 1800 years at that point and didn't lead to freedom. In fact, it lead to subjugation and the Dark Ages. Saint Augustine and Christianity led man to hell on earth for 1000 years, because they shunned the City of Man (aka Rome) and pursed the “City of God” (aka heaven). However, the enlightenment ideas were explicitly for freedom, and provided the source of inspiration for the American Founders.

Christianity has led to all sorts of contradictory things, including slavery and Abolitionism. Why don't you want to acknowledge Christianity's role in ending slavery?

Jefferson, Madison, et.al, were explicitly driven by enlightenment ideas. The DOI is the founding document of America. I'm not aware of Jesus or the Bible as being a part of the founding documents. I do know they worked hard to keep religion out of government, and explicitly and strongly voted down including any mention of Jesus. Lincoln at Gettysburg references the founding ideals as the major inspiration for the war.

God is mentioned in the opening and closing paragraphs of the DOI. Ending slavery is nowhere to be found in the DOI. Why do you use "they" when referring to ideas of the founding fathers? They were not of one mind on anything. The Constitution was a document of compromise.

America ended slavery and did so on principle. Or, put positively, America was the first country based on freedom, i.e. on the idea that men have inalienable rights. The American ideals were fundamentally correct. The French, otoh, didn't have most of their ideas right. Liberty, Equality, Fraternity are not the foundations of freedom. The right of each man to his life, his liberty, the fruits of his labors and the pursuit of his happiness is the foundation. Now, to be sure, "fruits of his labors" was left out of the DOI, but it was in other state documents.

I just showed you an early document from France, and France abolished slavery in 1794, so this contradicts your earlier pronouncement. Also if you read the Federalist Papers you'll see clearly the workings of Founding Fathers' minds when it came to government. As an interesting side note, they explicitly endorsed taxation as fair and just, albeit indirect taxation.

Think of it logically. Many of those in the northern states were against slavery, and thus wanted a slave to be worth zero, but a free man to be worth a full person. The southern states wanted slaves to be worth a full vote. The compromise was 3/5. Clearly the goal was to get the south to free their slaves, because then they'd get more representation in government.

Where did you read this? If this was the motivating factor it has been conspicuously left out of every history book I've ever read.

[A Study On Racism In The Job Force In America.]

Do they merely not believe in universal truth, or do they believe more in some type of racial-based truth? Clearly, when it comes to abstract human values and ethics, there are universal truths and these are the truths that we must try to figure out. To think that there are some type of race-based truths that would trump the universal ones is the very definition of racism.

In its most abstract form, racism is an idea about knowledge and truth, not about action. If I am Greek and think, "we Greeks are just a bit dumb, that's just how we are", that would be a racist idea. It does not have to be about one's own superiority, even though it often is.

The example you just gave is racism, as I defined earlier, by assigning traits to people by race. Multiculturalism doesn't do that. Are you asking this question rhetorically? As far as what "truth" they believe in and how it applies, you'll have to ask a specific multiculturalist I guess. I think you need to try to apply your abstract idea of what you think racism is to multiculturalism as a concept. I don't believe they would see universal truth as applying to multiculturalism, although that is a broad statement, but I don't feel most aspirants even link the two concepts. What universal truths about "abstract human values and ethics" do you know that would invalidate multiculturalism, and how do you know them? I dismiss it as being impractical in a ethnically diverse country, not because it is racist. Have you ever talked at any length to a multiculturalist about this concept?

[A Study On Racism In The Job Force In America.]

I think we may be talking at cross-purposes here. I am not speaking of what people could think and feel, nor even of what they do think and feel. Many people in the world accept their values implicitly from the small culture that surrounds them. I was talking about what was objectively correct. i.e. not what is, but what is right. i.e, the correct philosophical view to which an individual should aspire.

That is the context.

Now, within that context, if a person is born to long line of gangsters, but is not a criminal himself, he ought not -- objectively -- feel any shame and guilt for the crimes of his dad and gramps. Perhaps he does, but that's psychological baggage that he should work through. Philosophically, he does not bear any blame. Similarly, if someone comes from a long line of high-achievers, scientists, businessmen, etc. but is very average himself, he ought not -- objectively -- feel any pride in the achievements of his ancestors. If he does, that's psychological baggage that he should work through.

What applies to his family, also applies to his "race".

My disagreement is with the idea that multiculturalism is racist, by any definition in any dictionary. Is the idea that one can have pride (irrational as it may be) in their culture mutually exclusive from the idea that such pride constitutes tacit acknowledgement that said culture is superior? I don't think so, because the culture only sees value in the social mores as they apply to that culture. So in their understanding there is no universal truth as to what is good for everybody. Their thinking on this doesn't extend beyond that, as far as I know. So I don't think you have to worry about it being racist. Although perhaps you have a particular example of racist multiculturalism that you heard or witnessed that sheds light on your stance. Talking in generalities like this without tying to specific examples can lead to sloppy thinking.

I don't understand the distinction, although perhaps it's because I'm not totally up on Duke's position on race. Is the distinction that you're drawing between multiculturalists not expressing their position of genetic superiority and Farrakhan actually saying it? As Objectivists know, every "is" implies an "ought", so if a man is supposed to feel pride in the accident of his being white because his nature is superior, then shouldn't he overtly express that pride, which moves him to the "overt racist" camp from the "silent racist = multiculturalist" camp? I'm not sure that the difference between the multuculturalists' "keeps the consequences of his pernicious philosophy secret" approach and the supposed racist's "is overt about his philosophy" is a distinction worth making. The former is more dangerous, in my opinion.

I can allow that you feel multiculturalism is irrational, but your assumption that having pride in one's culture makes one racist as much as Duke, just not overtly so, I can't agree with. During the class I took there was never any implication that one race had any superiority over another. You make a leap from "having pride in one's ethnicity" (probably better concept to use than race), to being racist. Feeling good about oneself because one is part of a group, something bigger than oneself, is the message. The individual mores of the culture are just the markers of that culture, commonalities that bind people. The pride is in the collection of these mores, not really in any individual one, and it only applies to the those who identify with that culture. You've already explained why this is incorrect according to Objectivist thought, but personally I don't find anything racist about it. Your logical progression tying it to racism is pretty strained, IMO.

[A Study On Racism In The Job Force In America.]

Racism is exactly the moral fault of assigning significance to a man's racial history..

Just to reiterate these are not my views, I'm just trying to lay out what multiculturalism is. Now when you say the above, this seems to be wholly in another category from racial discrimination, or believing in racial superiority, or assigning traits to individuals based on race. You're using a broad brush to define what you view as being racist. I wouldn't lump the average multicultural professor in the same category as David Duke.

[A Study On Racism In The Job Force In America.]

Listen, putting race over the individual, indeed, placing it at the highest levels is racist. It matters not one whit the motivations of the people behind it, the ideas are what they are. Such ideas once unleashed and accepted are dangerous.

I just wouldn't go so far as to use the word racist. Maybe race biased would be a better terminology.

It holds that whites are inferior or less worthy of life. Really, I see nothing stopping any claims of superiority or inferiority, or hatred of one race for another. The sky is the limit when it comes to the irrationalism possible.

You haven't responded yet as to what your experience has been with multiculturalism. A class? A book?. I think you got a hold of some bad information possibly. There is nothing inherent in multiculturalism that says "down with whitey." I think you're having a visceral overreaction to multiculturalism, painting it as being so sinister. You can disagree with it, even vehemently, without attributing the future downfall of civilization to it.

The principles were what lead to the vanquishing of slavery, regardless of how bumpy the road was getting there.

Furthermore, I see a much bigger context here. America ended slavery on principle for the first time in human history. That is a gold star on America.

Curious as to where are you getting this. It is much more historically supportable that slavery ended primarily due to the convenient timing of the Civil War, and the principals that were drawn on in reference to ending slavery were largely that of Christianity. You can give the Enlightenment some credit, but it was not the driving factor. Most people, even Lincoln, thought whites were superior and blacks should not be treated as equals. Intellectuals going back to the Founding Fathers had contradictory ideas on slavery and blacks.

I'm not sure you can say America was the first to address the rights of man in its founding documents. Just doing a quick look-see on the internet I found some interesting stuff. Did you know the issue of slavery has been touched upon often in the course of history? The institution of slavery was addressed by French intellectuals during the Enlightenment. Later, during the French Revolution, the National Assembly issued the Declaration of the Rights of Man, which declared the equality of all men.

Regarding the 3/5 man, it was applied to slaves and the reasoning behind it was to get states to free slaves.

I've never heard this interpretation before. Do you get this directly from Walter Williams or did you see this some other place? Every historical reference I've ever seen said the 3/5 compromise was made in order to satisfy the southern slave holding states on the issue of determining population for representation in the Federal Government. The northern non-slave holding state didn't want slaves to count as a whole person, or the population in the south would be too much. The southern states wanted the slaves to be counted. The compromise was that 5 slaves would count as 3 people.

[A Study On Racism In The Job Force In America.]

I didn't imply you were defending multiculturalism. You simply stated that racism and multiculturalism were different. However, reading your descriptions of two concepts I could not see what difference you wanted to highlight.

I think you're using "racism" to describe a situation where someone thinks that something about their racial identity makes them superior. And, you described multiculturalism as the idea that one should have pride in their racial identity. If pride is something one feels because one possesses or earns something of value, then I'm curious how you see those two concepts as being different. Is it because on is taking pride in things that one believes are of no greater objective value compared to the things in other races; or it is something else?

I think regular folk -- not the intellectuals who teach them -- often have a benign concept of multiculturalism. They hold sessions where they talk about each other's birth, marriage and death customs, and taste each other's cuisine. They're right in thinking that many of these practices and values that are historically practiced by certain ethnic groups are simply optional ways (of getting married, or enjoying food, etc.). To them, multiculturalism means: all these customs are objectively equal. This concept says: the things that are specific to your ethnicity and race may be values, but the form in which they are implemented is simply an optional historical accident. The variety is fun and we can remain attached to our particular optional values, but we realize that they are not objectively any better than those of other people. This type of concept of multiculturalism is quite reasonable, and is not repudiated by Objectivism.

Pride is different from affinity and valuing. It is one thing for me to enjoy and value Chinese food more than some other food; but, it is quite different if I took pride in the goodness of Chinese food, because I am Chinese. That is why I asked what you meant when you said "pride".

I gather you believe multiculturalism is a racist concept, the "intellectual" version, anyway, although I'm not sure why. You seem to assume that members of ethnic groups just have some kind of preference on their traditions and customs, and it is not central to their identity, and I think you would be mistaken (although I'm sure there are exceptions). I think your isolation of any particular element of culture, like food, is not a good method of understanding cultural identity, as I don't think most people have a strong identity-attachment to just food, per se. I think it is more a package deal.

As far as "pride", I think it is fair to say someone could feel that the particulars of their culture, such as wedding traditions or burying of the dead, are preferable and superior for them, but would not be for other ethnic groups. That is the distinction. Say Muslims like to bury their dead within 24 hours, and a family washing and shrouding of the body, no embalming. Do Muslims feel that this is the care for the dead for Muslims? Yes. Do they feel it is the best way for French Catholics, Jews, or Guatemalans? No. Not sure why this is racist.

[A Study On Racism In The Job Force In America.]

What does pride mean in this context? If one is proud, it must be because one sees some good. One would not be proud of being bad at something or being "just average".

I'm not defending multiculturalism, but my understanding is it has to do with group identity. Nevertheless, it is a concept that is repudiated by Objectivism, obviously.

[Rand's dismissal of the hypothetical from The Mike Wallace Intervi]

Because you came up with an impossible scenario requiring the evasion of many known facts, which aimed to sanction legalized theft. See how loaded the original question is. I still dismiss it, along with most hypotheticals, as a cheap rhetorical trick.

That's why.

I was getting the impression that you and others would undermine any proffered hypothetical by playing a semantic game, offering any imaginable reason why the hypothetical couldn't occur, and then forcing the one offering the hypothetical to essentially prove that your strained objections were not plausible. And it is impossible to prove a negative, so essentially the argument goes in circles and the evasion is successful. We could argue ad infinitum as to the plausibility of this hypothetical, but in the end an answer still must be furnished.

Hypotheticals are used by the Bush Administration to justify the use of waterboarding in interrogation, such as in the hypothetical case of the Ticking Time Bomb scenario: a captured terrorist knows the precise location of a bomb in a populated area and refuses to reveal the location. I could undermine this hypothetical as being impossible all day (e.g. you couldn't capture a terrorist before he could kill himself, he would never reveal the bomb source, terrorists use mobile explosives so there wouldn't be a price location to reveal, etc., etc.), but I would still have to answer as to whether I thought waterboarding was a legal means of interrogation.