Andrew Grathwohl

If you read some of the outrageous comments at the bottom of the article, you'll find a lot of people suggesting that such a discovery comes about through physical/mental bullying and tormenting once the kids are in school. So, they claim they have a responsibility to monitor and disable a child's activity outside of class because the consequences of those actions may be brought back into the school environment. I graduated from public high school in 2007, and remember a particular case in my junior year (2005-2006) where somebody was cyber-bullying another student on MySpace and AOL Instant Messenger, and the bullier got suspended from school for a week. No school computers were used to do this, and the school's internet connection wasn't utilized in any other way. "Concerned" parents talk to the child's guidance counselor because often times the only connection the parents can draw between their child and the bullier is that they both attend the same school (and, for some reason, they do not think to contact the bully's parents). Having gone through a public school system which particularly prided itself on its "progressive" approaches to teaching, I can say with full confidence that many public schools with this type of bend believe it is the responsibility of the school system to be as involved in the child's life as much as possible. They do everything possible to force "community service" and "extra-curricular activities" on the students. I remember with particular disgust the yearly "Names Can Really Hurt Us" seminar (brought to us by the ADL) which we were forced to attend, where they attempted to tell us that it was essential to treat children with disabilities and other traits that are the subject of bullying with extra kindness. They stressed that we were all "equals because we were unique," so we were encouraged to go out of our ways to be extra nice to those who we didn't "know or understand." They put kids on a pedestal if they were weak, socially-awkward, or disabled in some way. As somebody who has Tourette's, who did suffer through some bullying to an extent during my earlier (non-high school) years, I was extremely offended to hear that not only was I apparently "better" than the "normal" kids, but I was supposed to be treated better than those who didn't have a mental condition. In fact, I find that I am a good person despite this condition, and find that it is completely irrelevant in judging the moral fibers of any individual, much less myself. We were told we could not look down upon those who practiced "different belief systems" than us, because "there's no correct answer" to those questions. They were, philosophically, not any better or worse than anybody else. I remember all of this because I wrote a very detailed letter to the school system to suggest we stop this behavior immediately, and also paid a visit to the dean to reiterate this. These suggestions all fell upon deaf ears. Cyber-bullying was a topic that was often-discussed during these seminars, and I'm sure "sexting" is part of it now too. The public school system that I was raised under found it was the responsibility of the government to "educate" us about these matters, and did so in the most disturbingly collectivist and moronic way possible. Finding that they may soon engage in monitoring kids' out-of-school behaviors and interactions, sadly, doesn't surprise me at all. What is the underlying legal principle? I wasn't able to necessarily infer one from the article, but I'm no legal expert. Of course, the private school always has the option to forbid bullying of all sorts and use it as grounds for suspension from their school. But my point was that there at least would exist the potential that a private school in NYC would not punish their students for what they do outside of the school's campus.

"Sexting" and cyber-bullying are quickly becoming a popular topic among parents throughout the country. Now that it has come to the attention of the NYC public school system, there may be yet another idiotic regulation that parents can only avoid by placing their kids in private schools. With the government moving quickly in limiting how we use our technology - whether it be in our cars, in the classroom, in the offices of our nation's ISPs, or apparently in our own bedrooms - we can be assured that future generations will never be able to enjoy the benefits of our connected world that we do now. A very saddening development...

The Strike Productions' website has a phone number where you can contact somebody (I presume this number leads to somebody/something related to the film). Perhaps we should call to see if we can get any information out of the people involved with the film's production.

The actress portraying the heroine of the film: "She graduated from Fordham University in 2006 with a bachelor of arts in acting. She then entered the graduate program at New York University to continue her acting studies, but left after her 2nd year. [1][2]"

Capitalism may save the whole problem after all: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/2...ible_use_i.html

If you're going to attempt a career in multimedia scoring, you're going to have to be able to do more than craft songs on a synth. You'll have to have a strong knowledge of DAW software, audio engineering, and strong recording and mixing skills. The only people in that industry that make it are the ones that don't have to rely on anyone else to do their job for them. This also means it is highly recommended that you be both proficient and creative on a number of instruments, if you're going to be focusing on acoustic music. Obviously, you'll need to have a strong working knowledge of sound design theory, in order to accustom oneself to the procedures and jargon in this profession. Being able to analyze the sound of a multimedia work - not just in terms of its music, but also its sound effects and dialog stems - is essential to plotting your score and producing it. Most people get into this line of work by being composers/musicians primarily, and just putting themselves out there in all ways possible. Don't limit yourself to just scoring for multimedia - if your music appeals to music publishing agencies, then that's the direction you'll go in. Something good to know is that many recently-graduated film degree holders don't have a strong knowledge in sound, and this can be a great method to work your magic and display your talents while first starting out. I personally didn't take that track, however. I was 'discovered' by a music publishing company who thought that a recently-launched campaign would be a perfect vessel for my non-published works. It's working out for me, but I did not originally intend to score films, as most of my academic involvement with this field has been in sound design. Most people I know who have reached any amount of success in this field (and believe me: it's very competitive) started off by scoring and mixing sound for independents, and simply keeping themselves constantly on the market and active in the industry.

Seriously, what are you talking about? Peter Schiff's local grassroots support has been mostly consisting of registered and active members of local Republican Town Committees. Some of the financial support for Peter's campaign has come from libertarians and Ron Paul people who agree with his economic views, but his foreign, social, and legal policies are all distinctly objective - not wacky or libertarian-leaning in any respect. There has likely never been a Senate candidate as closely related to Objectivism than Peter - down to his philosophical views, which reject altruism and support selfishness, and which reject mysticism and support atheism. I find that he leads a rather heroic life.

The Android has a single goal. The goal was to make a portable Linux-based OS that could be utilized by multiple entities on multiple platforms, with a variety of developer and user input possibilities. Open source does work, which is why the BSD-based Mac OSX commands about 5% of the market share for workstation use, and why Linux runs on ~15% of the world's servers. The popularity of other products, like Java, OpenOffice, and Firefox, should also be indicative of the open source license's ability to facilitate excellent software (and hardware) development. Linux really isn't meant to be popular. It's meant to be versatile. With that versatility comes portability. This is what makes Linux highly desirable for mobile devices. To be able to build the OS on multiple platforms while ensuring a high level of cross-compatibility means that device manufacturers need not concern themselves with hardware and software requirements that binary-based OSes like Windows and Windows CE force on us, meaning hardware innovation potential is higher, while costs are lower. It's absolutely not unreasonable for a consumer to demand that a product work seamlessly out of the box. But when that user then goes and buys faulty or dangerous applications for their device, that's (for very obvious and legitimate reasons) outside the realm of the device manufacturer's (and Google's) responsibility. As Mr. fountainhead777 pointed out, it is more a question of common sense than anything else. The average user will have no difficulty discerning a trustworthy app from a dangerous one, and capitalism does play a large role in regulating the Android Market.

Yes! The validity of asking that question comes down to what such activity accomplishes. Going around handing out fliers at an organized Tea Party rally will result in a bunch of non-Objectivists reading Objectivist literature. If this literature is regarding most subjects of politics, then these non-Objectivists are going to agree with the content and not look further. If an Objectivist happens to find his/her way to this Tea Party rally, then all you've done is reiterated something that this person already knows. The key word in my question is "potentially." The goal should not be to find potentially receptive minds - it should be to find receptive minds. If you wish to enact a certain policy that Objectivists agree with - a policy that would benefit us to have enacted - well, that's what we have the ARC for. Unless you have the level of access to potentially receptive policy-makers (and the money, organization, and influence) that the ARC has, you will never impact any meaningful change. All the time and money (not to mention opportunity cost) you've spent would be futile. I would wager that most here came upon Objectivism by means of their own discovery and searching. This is certainly how I came across it. The way to reach minds on the grassroots level is to engage in intellectual activism - publishing articles and essays, discussing Objectivism at places like this, going to your local Objectivist club, attending/giving lectures, organizing debates, etc. The receptive minds will come to you, and the way that you hook a receptive mind is by providing the intellectual content that they are looking to learn more about. The wrong way to go about it is to go on the offensive, seeking every whim-worshiping prick that decides to belittle their intellectual self-worth by going to illegitimate rallies organized by those such as the Tea Parties.

Android's open source nature allows a level of freedom that mobile platforms have never facilitated before - both on the level of the consumer and the developer/designer. The Android platform itself is quite secure, and the security risks posed in the WSJ article can easily be avoided by not being an ignorant, uninformed user.

Why are you wasting time trying to find potentially receptive minds?

The Tea Party movement is filled with religious and racist nutcases, not to mention libertarians, 9/11 truthers, pacifists, and America-apologists. The original Tea Party events organized by the Ron Paul people were scary enough - now it's a freakin' nightmare. It's no place for Objectivist ethics at the moment, and I think you'll find it extremely difficult to disengage these people from their very canned ideological views. To answer the original question: Yes, the Tea Party movement is very shallow.

I have the HTC Eris. Beautiful OS, easy development API, and much more functional than the iPhone. I highly recommend the Android platform. It will be a force to be seriously reckoned with in a few years.

Please make it a priority to check out this official campaign advertisement, and show it to everybody you know! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ANiLcD8eIM

But, in this context, legal ≠ moral. I think David is spot-on here. Unemployment compensation is taken from your previous employer if - and only if - you file a valid unemployment claim. Therefore, you - and only you - are able to prevent the government from looting that employer. You file the claim; you initiate the force.

Schiff's own account of the convention can be found on this video blog:

Newest polling data by Rasmussen (March 18th): Rasmussen 5/18/10; 500 likely voters, 4.5% margin of error Mode: Automated phone (Rasmussen release) Connecticut 2010 Senate 53% Blumenthal (D), 37% Schiff ® (chart) 50% Blumenthal (D), 39% Simmons ® (chart) 48% Blumenthal (D), 45% McMahon ® (chart) Favorable / Unfavorable Peter Schiff: 44 / 29 Richard Blumenthal: 66 / 32 Rob Simmons: 54 / 37 Linda McMahon: 54 / 42 Job Approval / Disapproval Pres. Obama: 59 / 39 (chart) Gov. Rell: 56 / 53 (chart) http://www.rasmussenreports.com/publ...te_may_18_2010 http://www.pollster.com/blogs/ct_201...mussen_518.php Some good indicators here. Schiff has a much lower disapproval rating than Blumenthal, and just won the endorsement of the CT Tea Party movement, as well as the CT Grassroots Alliance.

Schiff's support of the consumption tax is verified by context. It's pretty clear that Peter thinks taxes are immoral, but he also appears to understand that there is an unfortunate discrepancy between what we ought to do (morally) and what we are currently limited to (politically). Peter's support of the consumption tax is contingent on the current US economic system and the debt crisis we are going to face. If Peter has his way in the senate, then there's a chance that he could filibuster the raising of the debt ceiling and try to curb our problems. But, as he always says: "You can't cut taxes until you cut spending." Indeed, if we were to have a "flat tax of zero," tomorrow, that would cause a whole other string of problems. We have to remove any reason to tax before we can remove taxes themselves. Our Constitution gives the federal government powers in setting currency value, so I suppose if Peter wanted to return the fed to its original goals as it was established in 1913, then he would be following a Constitutionalist position. Is this a modification of his original position for political reasons? Most definitely. But that doesn't mean that this modification comes without benefit. The benefit of having Peter in the senate far outweighs the negativity of modifying a position for stronger talking points. Besides, Peter already receives enough flack for all of the Ron Paul morons that are supporting his candidacy out-of-state (which he obviously can't help) - tacking on the fact that Peter Schiff wants to end the federal reserve system would be a devastating blow to his chances of winning the GOP nomination.

What aspects of the issues page indicates to you that he is a Ron Paul candidate now? By the way, I should mention that Yaron Brook appears to be supporting Mr. Schiff's candidacy, as he is a friend on Peter Schiff's Facebook page.

Well, it's a campaign ad. You must admit it's a rather professional job. For a candidate like Peter, it's impressive enough that his commercials can easily rival his much wealthier (and much more mainstream-supported) opponents in the race.

Peter's first TV ad, set to air next week: https://secure.campaignsolutions.com/video/...ff/video-02.swf

Whatever you choose to consider, be it an object, an attribute or an action, the law of identity remains the same. A leaf cannot be a stone at the same time, it cannot be all red and all green at the same time, it cannot freeze and burn at the same time. A is A. Or, if you wish it stated in simpler language: You cannot have your cake and eat it, too. - John Galt

If I remember correctly, Ayn Rand had a whole essay about this in The Virtue of Selfishness. It essentially said - mind you, I'm paraphrasing - that contrary to many widely-held beliefs, the Objectivist ethics do not forbid an individual from helping others when you are able to do so. Ms. Rand was careful to explain that one should never live their lives under the impression that they will have to encounter and save a drowning child, or rescue an old man from a fire. But, in the case that one did happen to encounter such an unfortunate situation, if a moral individual is the only thing saving an individual from death, it would not only be perfectly acceptable to help this person (if you are not risking your own life to do so), it would also likely bring about an enormous sense of accomplishment to the savior. If one truly values life, then saving a stranger from trouble such as rape or murder could be a gigantic expression of one's virtues. That being said, there is a lot of context involved with cases like these, so to make a definitive statement without the proper context would be inappropriate.

You're right. I meant to say expressionist.

This, after claiming that there is no such thing as an "objective reality." Apparently the writer is fine with the Law of Identity. How do such idiots find their way into publication?!