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Sir Andrew

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Posts posted by Sir Andrew

  1. I've been thinking about this for a while now after it came up in a debate and I thought I'd post this question to see how other people answer this.

    Basically, the central question is whether or not the Israelites coming out of Egypt had a right to the 'promised land'. As I understand it, they emigrated from it to move to Egypt because of drought and famine, and then were enslaved and before being liberated generations later by god. But do they still own the property after generations and other people had already settled there and developed it, and had children?

    Now one thing I can't wrap my head around is the notion that the Israelites (a collective) owned a general area of land that was being occupied by other people. If they knew exactly whose property had belonged to whom and which descendants that property should go to, that would be a different matter, wouldn't it?

    Any thoughts?

  2. Reminds me of so many people around me, giving endless excuses for why their lives aren't the way they were "entitled" for it to be. One wonders how so many people have such an incredible "lack of luck" in their lives...

    That reminds me of the short story by DH Lawrence called "The Rocking Horse Winner", which I just wrote an essay for in my literature class.

  3. Does a viable fetus have a right to be delivered through a more traumatic or expensive procedure against the mother's wishes? I have no clue whether a late-term abortion is cheaper or less surgically traumatic, just asking.

    I don't know how the exact procedures work, so I couldn't tell you. Then again, assuming it is delivered, who will care for it?

    I need to do some more thinking about this.

  4. Also, what about when the fetus is viable within the mother's womb? If it no longer needs the mother for it's survival, but is still connected to the mother, could one still morally end its life?

    Assuming that there aren't any extenuating circumstances (where vaginal delivery or Caesarean section aren't possible), I say no. If the fetus is viable and exists as an autonomous unit that is currently existing inside the mother, then it is a person and has rights.

  5. Your statement seems to have the flavor of the 1980's "drug pusher" you might see on the Cosby Show. Dealers don't go around pointing guns at heads saying take this or you'll die, nor do people take one drink or one line of coke and immediately become hopelessly addicted with their fate sealed. Drug dealers have plenty of business in the people that find them. Drug dealers profit from drug users and their addictions, of course they do. But to act like dealers have some sort of magical ability to addict people is reminiscent of illogical "Reefer Madness" campaigns of 50 years ago.

    I recognize that at some point an individual has to choose to take drugs, but if their value system is impaired to the point of altering their means of perceiving reality, then it's no longer an individual choice.

  6. The whole premise behind this season is one of pure altruism. The US government is pursuing a policy of altruistic self-sacrifice by committing soldiers and dollars to help some third world African tribal leader defeat another tribal tyrant. And when confronted with the choice of pulling our forces back or losing American civilian lives the president is genuinely conflicted. Apparently Jack has accepted this policy as legitimate and is willing to fight for it.

    It's not entirely altruistic. The President has made it clear that for her to cave-in to the terrorists' demands would only encourage further attacks and end up with further loss of American lives in the future. As far as the policy to help Sengala, ending the genocide in Sengala would improve American security, because the dictator would not be able to fund terrorism using his country's resources (the diamond mines)

    Unfortunately, she doesn't know what we know about Jack, so she thinks that the FBI has nothing to go on to get the CIP device.

  7. While we're on the topic of money supply, I thought I would have a question understanding.

    If we existed in a laissez-faire capitalist system with the government divorced from economics, how exactly is money produced? I assume it would have something to do with banks ordering it from a minting company, but I'm not sure how exactly the process would work.

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