tommyedison

This is the way I look at it. As long as you have every right to assume that the network is being offered from free, then it would be morally right to use it. For example you are near a bunch of shops offering free wifi connection and there is one of them who doesn't then if you accidentaly use that connection (without knowing it is not being offered for free), you would not be committing a moral crime. However if say you are passing by a bunch of houses, then it is very unreasonable to assume that the homeowner is offering the whole world his wifi for free. At that point, it would be morally wrong for you to use a network which you are able to access. I don't think using it for a short time, say 5-10 minutes for some very important stuff would be wrong, but using it for browsing the net or downloading say music or software definitely would be.

Let's assume that you can kill an unlimited number of people, loot an unlimited amount of money and get away with it. But it won't make you happy. It is selfishness and productive work which brings happiness - that is in the nature of human beings. If you are a parasite, actively destroying the source of your wealth, you are not being selfish. Life is a sustained effort. Materially, you may acquire a lot of money through murder. Psychologically, you will have a fear of reality, fear because you are so incompetent to deal with it that you have to rely on the effort of others to sustain yourself. Your money will not translate into happiness. It will translate into stark primitive terror hidden beneath a vast string of rationalizations. You will keep trying to make yourself believe that you are selfish and happy, that you are in control of reality and your life by for example spending a lot of money. But you will never actually believe it. Because subconsciously you will know that you are impotent to deal with reality and it is only through the productive effort of others that you can survive. I would highly recommend the essay "Comprachicos" by Ayn Rand in the book "Return of the Primitive: The Anti-Industrial Revolution". IMO, It will clear up a lot of doubts pertaining to the metaphysical impotence and psychology of evil.

Well, I dont live in America so I cant comment on day to day experiences. But from the statistics atleast, it looks like atleast a very sizeable minority (35-45%) is just waiting to be ruled. I mean the massive amount of contradictions in their lives, moral relativism and multiculturalism permeating the culture, massive support for increasing the ever increasing big government, hatred of big business especially oil companies, high divorce rates, support for abortion restrictions (some restrictions, not elimination of abortion), the disintegrated minds of the youth, just disgusting. And i disagree that the elected officials on the left display the American sense of life at all. Do you think Hillary Clinton or Ted Kennedy or the loony liberal politicians have an American sense of life?

I doubt that most Americans have the classical American sense of life left in them. In fact I doubt that even a majority have it left within them.

MIT Prof on Global Warming Controversy

Is it? ABC Poll

Science is one of the two biggest scientific journals out there (the other being Nature). While it is very much possible that the paper in Science is flawed and wrong (after all, the stem cell research by the Korean Scientist Hwang was flawed too), you can't refute an international publication by citing pop-sci books or a few websites.

And your proof? Intervensionism is definitely greater in the majority of the other countries of the world, even countries like India, etc. than the United States. If the professors were shilling for the UAE, I don't see why UAE would have a problem with them. Do you want a measure of the Islamic fundamentalism in UAE? Aside from the obvious massive human rights abuses and the sharia, just take a look at this poll. (Link) As for the UAE being economically better than the US, from the links you provided, if the UAE economy is really better, why is it placed 65th in ranking in the index of economic freedom (despite such low taxes), while USA is placed 9th? Zero taxes doesn't always mean a free for all economy. Regardless of the port deal, my point is that UAE is not a friend of the US, just like China isn't and Saudi Arabia isn't. Pumping their economies might be fatal. UAE or China or Saudi Arabia, no matter how much they liberalized their economies, would never survive with the poor human rights they have in place. Given the kind of mentality of their people (incase of Mideast and perhaps China) and leaders (incase of Mideast and China), I don't think it's wise to support them in any way.

True enough. And our interests aren't served if we increase the strength of our enemies. China is a massive threat militarily. The Arabs have already attacked us. I see no good in pumping money into their pockets. As for protecting oil interests, our govt. has spectacularly failed to do that. It did nothing when our oil fields were nationalized. The only proper solution is to invade the oil countries.

Not to mention that trade with China has only strengthened the censorship laws there. And trade with Germany in the 30s provided money to Hitler to fund WWII.

1) If you look at the history of China, they have been VERY weak militarily. They lost against the Mongols only the Great Wall of China prevented their complete defeat. They lost against Japanese invasion. Same with Russia. Russia retreated from Napoleon, it lost the crimean war, it retreated in WWII, etc. 2) If they US stopped trade with China, it's economy would collapse 3) US has much more tech than China. That's IMO, the only factor which will result in our defeat if we continue to abide by it.

I believe the Governor will sign it. I don't believe it will stand the court though it might. Either way, it is a sign that the religious right is rising and needs to be defeated.

Do you know that the House and the Senate of South Dakota have passed an anti-abortion bill that bans abortion even in cases or rape and incest?

1) Anyone who lies or steals can never be the strongest in the world. He is just a parasite feeding on people. It is the people on whom he is feeding which hold the real power because if they collapse, he collapses. 2) He is destroying his source of existence. He is acting against his self-interest. 3) Do you know why people rob and steal? It is because of a metaphysical fear of reality. Unable to handle reality, unable to take responsibility of their own life, they seek an escape. Some get that escape in destroying the mind. Some get that escape in destroying matter. Observe that a robber will go to any lengths to develop ingenious plots but will not spend an ounce of effort on real work - it is because robbery offers him an escape from the fact that he is responsible for his own life. He believes that by manipulating reality, somehow, he can get away with it. However there is no getting away with reality. He pays with his spirit. A robber is never happy. All he is is afraid. Evil isn't a monstrous towering personality able to do anything. It is a rotten, envy-filled piece of a parasite powerless to do anything, to accomplish anything. It only survives by feeding on the productive. 4) If you want a detailed explanation as to why a person gets that way, read Comprachicos by Ayn Rand, in the Anti-Industrial Revolution. 5) If you want a deeper understanding of the psychology of evil, read Fyodor Dostoevsky

Flight Simulator 2004 - It's lovely flying planes in the air. I especially love the Spitfire and the P-54 Mustang (WWII era propeller planes)

Wait, you are formulating your opinion on each and every Objectivist based on just ONE poster (no offense to JMeganSnow and no implication whether she is or not an Objectivist). And I can't understand how what JMeganSnow said is equivalent to a Christian value system.

The main premise of Dominique's philosophy was the belief that evil would eventually win. That was the mistake she made.

I called it primitivist because it glorified the savage (the ape) and potrayed wealthy New Yorkers as evil. Consider the essential story. We have the stereotypical "evil" rich capitalist who in his "evil" way wants to make money of the ape. We have a "good" poor blonde sympathetic to the ape. The ape gets mad and climbs the Empire State Building. In the end the ape dies and somehow the "evil capitalists" are to blame. It glorified barbarity at the expense of civilization. For me, a movie which does not devote itself to the wrong philosophy and has a good "sense of life", is good. But when the entire point of the movie is condemnation of the human mind, it gets very tiring. [Mod's note: I split the discussion on King Kong into a separate thread. - SN]

Titanic (Marxist) King Kong (Primitivist) Lawrence of Arabia

Have a look at this clip from Trading Spouses (http://www.break.com/articles/tradingspouses2.html).

She wrote quite a bit about the American sense of life in an essay Don't Let it Go which is published in the book Philosophy:Who Needs It.

I have only read WTL from the beginning to the end once. Though I keep reading bits of it from the middle from time to time, the ending is so depressing I have never felt the desire to read it (the ending) again.

Why don't you give Python a glance? Although I haven't tried it for game programming, they do have different engines devoted to 3d game programming (e.g. Soya) and on the first glance it looks good.

On the second thought, I think her eyes should be a bit lighter. They make her look a as though she is a conquerer of reality which is good but also a bit condescending which doesn't give a good effect.

Brilliant. Just like how she should be.