Chris.S

Sounds good, I'll have to look it up, especially if it's as good as Black Hawk Down. I watch that movie once or twice a month, sometimes more, sometimes less. I haven't seen Generation Kill either, or heard of it in actually. Along the lines of recent "war" movies, I really like The Kingdom and Jarhead as well.

No I haven't quite decided yet. I'm still unsure as to everything I'll be completely qualified for, but I would like to do office and condo towers. My education is geared towards the Project Management side, so I'm thinking I'll be able to run on my own as a GC with a few years experience. I've been in contact with a few Developer-GC's already and it seems like that's the area I need to break into. But there are also interesting things I'd like to do in housing - mainly custom stuff. The strip excavation and cardboard cutout houses, while ok as a business, doesn't appeal to me. Then there's industrial stuff... And I'd even like to do a bit of architecture as well. Some of the designs coming out now are incredible, specifically the Dynamic towers that are supposed to be going up in Dubai. Like I said I haven't decided, but I have 3.5 years yet to see where I'd like to go. But like Roark, I'll be happy building hotdog stands, as long as I can build. The program I'm in is pretty ambitious being a Bachelor of Tech Degree from a college, but the administration all seem very knowledgeable and very excited in teaching just about everything in the business.

I've already posted in a few sub-forums in the last couple weeks, so I thought I'd introduce myself finally. I actually forgot that there was anything other than the Political/Metaphysics-Epistemology/Aesthetics forums since I hadn't scrolled down the table of contents page for awhile. Well anyways, my name's Chris. From Toronto, 23 years old and earning a degree in Construction Science and Management. I've previously had 3 years in Biology, Chemistry, Psychology, and finally dropped out since I was less and less happy with each change. So then I floundered purposelessly around for awhile working at random jobs, trying to figure out where and how I took such a wrong turn in life. Then my first touch with Objectivism was while reading Atlas Shrugged last March or April. Something about the whole thing just resonated with me, and with some deep emotions and ideas that had been dormant probably since I entered high school, or maybe even earlier. I'll loosely paraphrase something Rand said about emotions, that they "are lightning-quick judges of morality based on the total experiences of a mind", and I think that is basically what happened to me while reading her books. And after Atlas Shrugged I found The Fountainhead, and finally chose my purpose as a builder (As an aside - I realized that I had loved building anything and everything while I was a kid, and that I had since been brainwashed to the idea that strictly being a scientist and learning how to help people was the ultimate thing a man can do. The brainwashers were helped by myself of course, in that I also wanted to help myself so I allowed their method). A few months before I read AS, I met a girl I love dearly. She's a bit more...Socialist, I guess, than I approve, but she's slowly coming around. Most of her ideas are already Capitalistic, but she has a Master's in Social Anthropology, so it might be holding her back. Or at least it's telling her to question all forms of religious and philosophical views, which in itself is pure rationality. But anyways, I chose my Purpose with building, and I chose my Dominique with her - we're getting married in May So, I guess that's all. Just wanted to say "hey, this is me" if you're looking for where I'm coming from with any of my posts. I'm still a novice with Objectivism, and still integrating and changing (or at least refining/becoming more consistent with) a lot of the ways I think about morality, politics, etc. I'll be searching the forums for topics about construction, architecture, business, law, and politics, so if you're into the same, please point me in the right direction.

Just want to add to this - you can be ticketed for driving too fast and driving too slow. So you have to obey the speed limit to the number, and magically decelerate and accelerate on speed change signs. Thank god I don't drive, but I know many people that beat traffic tickets due to impossible laws, quotas on tickets and police not showing to court. Seemingly the only things the police really enforce (traffic-wise) here in Canada are erratic driving and drunk driving.

It's not just the Arts, man. Government is in everything. And my career choice (construction) is one of the heaviest regulated industries in Canada. What I'm learning in school for the Construction business right now is basically how to build with the least interference by government and make the most money. And the funny thing with that is the best way to get back at the government is to build stuff far and away beyond their own regulations and charge huge amounts of money. The biggest things that kill construction companies nowadays are building at the bare minimum of government standards (and then the owner doesn't like what he bought), and having such low hiring practices and expectations that jobs are done very poorly to make as fast a dollar as possible. I think in your case the best way to go about stickin it to the man is to start your own theatre and/or theatre company, and draw as many Artsy-fartsy Objectivists to you as possible. That way you can have the company work as privately as you make it, and have employees that understand where you're coming from philosophically (and therefore work better). And if you really have to, follow Rearden's example. Work with them to the letter and give them nothing more than they ask (like you have a gun to your head).

Read Atlas Shrugged. Go to the part where Dagny finds Galt in his tenement building. There's your answer. Take notes.

I just read that blog as well - very good. Thanks for sharing it, I'll keep looking at it from time to time. One thing I wanted to clarify with it at the end though with the guy who likes swimming: moving to the Dominican is a sacrifice of the "third order" because it's a CPL based on a lifestyle (swimming outdoors), correct? My own CPL is "building". I hadn't realized this until I read The Fountainhead for the first time last winter, and until then I had debated with myself what I should go back to school for (after having an unsuccessful try in a program I thought I wanted). And now I'm learning all about building, and I absolutely love it. Sometimes I wonder how I got off-track.

Yeah the question was probably too narrow. In the case of the factory town, the employer would be right in his decision to do that. It would probably even increase the performance of the employees that weren't fired. This is the problem with labour unions I think. They tie up employers so that employees can do a crap job as long as they aren't late for work or steal. But Rand argues unions are good for trying to get fair working conditions or fair wages (I'm definitely misquoting but I'm at school without access to my books). So the situation with the guy trying to get a job for a lower wage probably wouldn't happen because the employer doesn't have a right to replace the first guy - in his own business!

That's what I was trying to get at with my Rearden example. Say his mills Foreman has worked for him loyally and excellently for 15 years. I guess Rearden would have to decide if that loyalty is worth less than saving $4000 over the year(s). And yeah I agree I'd want a demonstration of knowledge and skills first before weighing the offer of cheaper labour with the previous employee's work record. I think it would be stupid for an employer to sacrifice his relationship to a good employee based on $2/hr only. Like I said, I'd want a demonstration of knowledge and skills first to see his competence. And if they don't weigh out or are even equal, maybe there's another area with a bad employee to replace that I could use the new or old employee for instead.

Yeah, you guys had some good things to read So basically, his book is just "practice makes better". I thought so at first hearing him talk about it, but then I got to thinking of his language examples where people can possibly understand the meaning of another language based on how the word sounds if given the context . Somewhat similar to the European languages, I suppose.

D'oh! Yeah, I see everyones point. I hadn't thought the questions through. So another question: would another man coming into a business saying "I'll do his job for $2 less an hour" be qualification to fire the previous employee to save a few dollars an hour on labour? No man is entitled to a job, but with no other reason to fire a man, it seems petty rather than just.

How is a fair wage defined though? Shouldn't it be based on the amount of income an employee's work brings into the business? Why would any rational man go work for someone at a cheaper rate than the previous guy with the same workload and responsibilities? I don't think Rearden would outsource or hire cheaper, similarly qualified employees.

Not so much where do they fit, but how are these people accounted for? I'm having a hard time formulating a question about their situation. Also, as kind of an aside question, could these people with their differently-wired brains be precursors to human evolution? In an interview, Daniel Tammet says that he thinks most other people can develop some of the skills he has by going back to an intuitive form of learning and using math and language, rather than the current way of learning by memorization (memorizing a 12x12 math table for example). I can kind of agree with him that people should use their "feelings" or "emotions" or "intuition" more when dealing with this stuff. My experience with math getting into high school was pretty bad - if I didn't know the answer right away I'd sit there forever over-thinking the problem. So I passed, but barely. Then later in college I finally stopped trying to memorize everything and just learn the ideas and patterns behind the numbers, and everything finally clicked. I'll make another example with throwing a ball. People don't do complex calculus determining the vector and curve the ball will take, what the wind resistance is and how that will affect trajectory - they just see the ball and catch it. All it requires is hand-eye coordination, which can be made better through practice. Obviously math skills get better with practice as well, but one can't memorize how to catch a ball, and yet one can still catch a multitude of balls in a multitude of trajectories. And yet most people have trouble finding the slope of 2 points on a curve because they're too focused on a memorized answer. Maybe it's all just fruity science and thinking, but he might be on to something.

I think here it's a quality of life decision. In terms of cancer patients, chemotherapy often causes nausea and they can't keep food down. Since it's better to eat food rather than be given nutrients intravenously, the docs give the patient marijuana so that they can decrease nausea and pain caused by chemo. I didn't know AIDS patients were prescribed pot, but I imagine it's for the same reasons as with chemotherapy - that the drugs they're given have pretty serious negative effects to eating and pain etc.

"Drugs are bad, mmkay?" I've had quite a lot of friends and acquaintances that use marijuana both recreationally and habitually. I can say from my own qualitative observations that the amount of weed smoked doesn't seem to affect the individual negatively psychologically - rather that the individual's reason to smoke is the reason it can have negative consequences. If it's used in avoidance behaviour, then it will probably have pretty negative consequences psychologically. My own experience has ranged from cloudy, foggy thinking and paranoia to coughing and increased hunger. Generally, the negatives associated with pot smoking has been greater than the positives for me, so I usually turn down offers, and definitely don't go out looking for it. Same thing for alcohol, although I do enjoy a beer or whiskey and coke with dinner and stuff. My binging days are behind me, even though I'm only 24. that in itself has had negative consequences with some friends, but I'm alright with that. All I can really say is use in moderation. I think that's easier to apply in general with alcohol and marijuana, but not so much with cigarettes and other drugs where there are physiologically addictive chemicals baked inside, so that you're hooked on the first or second use. The exception with alcohol would be with people who have alcoholism, but in that case, they still had the choice not to resort to alcohol use in the first place. And I think there are people who are more susceptible physiologically to addiction in general, due to how their brain is wired. But otherwise, I think if drugs were legalized there would be safer drug use. Competition would cause drug cartels to increase product safety, purity and effectiveness or they'd go out of business. They could supply a safe environment and materials to get high, along with (possibly) help to get off serious addiction. I dream of a world where drug lords are asking for government bail-outs.

What he said. I still think the game is fun despite some of the drawbacks, like time spent = reward. I've been leveling all the classes, skilling up all the professions. I think it does lack in terms of class and spell balance (in PvP), but with a game this size that has 10 classes and each class has 3 specializations, I can't imagine the work required to balance them all. Overall though, I think the company has done a great job with WoW, and even all it's games. WoW is definitely the best MMO out there, and I may be wrong, but I think it's also has the highest number of players for any game. The only thing that can beat WoW is Blizzards next MMO, and even that is probably risky. And yeah, there seems to be an awful lot of socialist thinking guilds out there. In fact, my server has one named <COMMUNISM>, and they recruit anyone and everyone (surprise surprise).

Yes, I did mean "reject" in that way, but then said that by rejecting it like that I'm doubly screwing myself. I think we're at the same conclusion, but you're far more eloquent.

I'm glad I could amuse you I guess now I'm paying for my ignorance and laziness in not checking for myself, but that's ok. My girlfriend actually laughed at me and told me I was wrong too. Ah well... I think the rest of my argument still stands though.

These are the replies I was expecting, and the ones I came up with myself when trying to reason this out. I guess my moral dilemma was trying to integrate those 3 things into objectivist values, and the reason I posted was because I couldn't (because it's impossible). However, does being moral mean I should totally reject the entire system? I still have to pay taxes if I reject it. And then who's at the lesser advantage? Me. So it kind of seems like I should continue to pay taxes and receive the benefits therein until I can afford to move to someplace that doesn't tax it's people. Is there even such a place anywhere? Rand lived in the US and yet continued to pay taxes for the random social services did she not? As for the federal health care system efficiency here in Ontario, I've not had a long wait time for anything serious. So from my perspective it seems pretty efficient (aside from the whole gun-to-my-head thing )

Actually, I can't name one (not that I know a whole lot of 'em). But neither can I name private things that get cheaper over time - cable, internet, phones, groceries, gas (cheaper now, but over time it gets more expensive), all go up. I'm guessing that's the nature of the economy, but I would think in a truly free market, services and commodities would get cheaper over time to a minimum point. Somewhat like Galt's electricity engine driving the cost of electricity down to pennies. There is something I want to add about the economy and rising prices, but I'll start a new thread. Actually, what's kinda funny is that I haven't paid taxes other than gst/pst in 5 years. I'm going to this year so the government can't put me in jail, and I'm free to marry my Muslim girlfriend (non-practicing). And I'm not sure but I think I just shot my argument in the foot right there.

I may be irrationally biased as a recipient of nationally funded health care (Canadian resident), but is it possible that paying taxes for things like health care, education and social assistance be good for my self-interest? Even if I've never had a major hospital visit, there's always a chance that it could happen, and I would possibly need some sort of major procedure. Now is it better for me to pay a little bit in taxes to a common pool, or take a major loan and go into huge debt? Can this be expanded to include if my friends or family need expensive medical procedures - I value their life, so I think paying taxes for health care is good? Now can it also be expanded to include the population with the idea that most men are like me and have similar values; if I met them it's likely we'd be friends; and they are valuable to me in that we can trade for mutual benefit - and so paying taxes would be good? Or could all the money I pay in taxes go to a private insurance company or HMO (not sure if HMO is correct, I don't know much about private medical companies/hospitals). If there are many of these companies around in a free capitalist society, would the price and quality of medical procedures go up or down compared to a federal system, seeing as doctors deserve very good compensation? Or wouldn't the overall costs of providing medical care stay similar to a government-run system? Now can the above be applied to public education and social assistance? The reason I ask is because I'm still trying to fit my head around these 3 topics in relation to Objectivism. I've been the recipient of major surgeries without which I'd be dead; publicly educated and receiving government loans for university; and as a child my mother received social assistance for a short while until she found a job with the military. Wouldn't denouncing taxation for these be hypocritical since each has been to the good of my life? Can there ever be "voluntary taxation", or is that a contradiction in terms?

Well I guess I was misinformed. But I still think most people want "peace" no matter their religion or philosophy (however irrational it is), and the "war" is still on a select few guerillas of various countries. I've gathered that that's a dissenting opinion around here, but I find it hard to find fault or make war on an entire people who have been raised since birth to bow their backs, based on the violent actions of a few of them. If that's all they know, I'd say they're just misguided, and that time and the actions of a few rational people will eventually show them how wrong they are (similar to the theme of Anthem - Prometheus breaks away, and has plans to go back and bring the rest of humanity out of darkness). And now that I think about it, the conversation I learned that from was with a few Muslim friends of mine. They explained it that bowing to God in submission is good because God wants peace, and so submission is peaceful. My bad - the conversation was a long time ago, and iirc, I disagreed with them in that I refused to bow to anything or anyone. I couldn't explain properly why - it was before I'd heard of Objectivism.

I enjoy the story, but I think it makes an unfair assumption on the 9 people who beat up the rich guy - that they would be so enraged about inequalities in bar bill savings that they'd beat up the rich guy. Takes it to an extreme, you might say. In real life, I think the guys who were paying lower bar bills and were able to enjoy the beer would understand that it is mostly due to the rich guy - and hopefully he's agreeing to pay that much for the bill because he likes drinking with them. Maybe that's just wishful thinking. But I know within my group of friends we sometimes pay for each other's drinks, and the bar bills are uneven. And lastly, what kind of friends beat up another friend?

I realize this thread is old, but since the OP, the game has been changed fairly dramatically. There is much more "solo" content, although still repetitive. Daily quests; old world quests have been toned down in difficulty and need of a group and give increased experience (shortening game time); raids dropped from 40 people to 25 and 10, thereby increasing the need for skilled players; and Arenas are currently setup to award more skilled players on a ladder system. There is still an emphasis on group play and increased time = increased reward with dungeons, heroics, raids, battlegrounds and arenas, but just less-so. They basically made the game easier for individuals to progress their character, and by doing so, made the game much easier for group play.

Unfortunately, I think destroying Mecca would only further polarize both Islamic people and "anti-Americanists/anti-Westernists", and lead to a large increase in military and civilian casualties to the U.S., Canada, Britain and other countries serving in the Mid-east. As we've already seen since 2001, carpet-bombing these countries isn't going to get rid of the targets, nor will occupation. They certainly might help in securing an established base of operations, but not much much more than that. The militaries fighting need to change tactics - they're too used to "army vs army". This is a small group of people using a corrupt version of a peaceful ideology and guerilla tactics and our side needs to adjust. They need to use specialized agencies (CIA and what-have-you) to track down, infiltrate and assassinate the leadership - very quietly. They need to pump in propaganda to these countries and make it harder for al-Qaida to recruit men through force (brute force, brain-washing, blackmail, threatening to kill their family and giving their family money). I think the movie Body of Lies sums this up pretty well - it's a different type of war, the same old tactics won't win it. All a military occupancy in Iraq and Afghanistan does is give these guerillas easy targets for suicide bombings. And suicide bombing means they're desperate - they're losing. They don't have many people to use in their fight and can't handle a 1-on-1 fight vs an organized army, so they need their men to take as many lives as possible. If we can take the Strike in Atlas as an example - Galt had his "army" retreat and withdrew all of their resources to where the "bad guys" couldn't get to them and kill them. I'm not advocating the West pulls out and closes our borders, but it is an option. But who knows what will happen without a presence in the area? It could be the people themselves would rise up and overthrow they're radical leaders. But please remember that this fight isn't against 1 billion Muslims. It's a small group of guerillas being funded by certain anti-American countries. Economic pressure, small surgical campaigns and propaganda will be the winner of this over-time. Over-the-top actions such as bombing Mecca will just give them more reason to kill Westerners (just like bombing the WTC polarized the West into action). Also, just wanted to point this out, "Islam" literally means "Peace", and "Islamists" are "Followers of Peace". No matter how irrational religion is, the people we're fighting aren't "Islamists", but crazy, violent power-hungry war-mongers. Well, have that for some fodder As for sacrificing rights, I completely agree with Maximus' first post: