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Just curious but how much of Objectivism have you studied? Such a question implies not much.

Those assertions are meant to undercut idealism and confidence in one's mind. Ignore them. The people who assert them gave up pursuing their values and have settled for less in life.

This is not only ignorance but an outright lie. In 1948 and 1956, the Arabs invaded. In 1967, the Arabs were amassed at Israel's border. In 1973, Israel came close to losing the war. How many terrorist - Palestinians - penetrated Israel to blow up its citizens in buses, cars, and on city streets. Saddam Hussein launched dozens of scuds into Israel. Hezbollah launched thousands of rockets inside Israel during its most recent war. Hamas Palestinians constantly launch rockets into Israel. I'm tired of your lies and attempts at misrepresenting the only proper civil society in that part of the world. I will no longer respond to anything you say as your dishonesty knows no bounds.

It is clear that your intention is to eliminate the Israeli state, for your ignorance is bliss. Israelis are free to travel to Jordan and Egypt due to the peace treaties. It is only when Egypt stopped protecting tourists that tourism dried up, and it is not just tourists from Israel that have left the Egyptian economy in shambles. What country allows its citizens to visit another country while it is at war with that country?

For the last 2,000 years, every country on earth has either discriminated, harassed, restricted, murdered, forced conversions, or completely separated Jews from its own society. To state that the protection of the individual rights of these people by a government is somehow discriminatory, or apartheid, or theocracy, is evasion on a truly massive scale. To claim that Jews discriminate against Arabs when Arabs have forcibly kicked out virtually every Jew from Arab countries is a demand that Jews annihilate themselves. To claim that Israel is basically a "Jewish state" when it is the only state that allows all three major religions in the region to freely practice their beliefs is to use words without any meaning.

As a practical matter, there really can not be an emergency war conscription. It takes many months to properly train soldiers to properly fight and develop the morale for fighting. If a country is not prepared to fight known enemies, the best solution is to surrender when the enemy is overwhelming.

Objectivism is a philosophy of general principles. It does not tell you specific values to pursue. It is not a religion. It is up to you to define what values are in your interest. You have to grasp the principles of Objectivism and apply them to your life and choices. What you really need to do is study the writings of Rand first-hand and not seek to understand Objectivism through the comments of others here on this Forum.

Got it. Thanks

Helping others is not a primary ethical concern within Objectivism. The primary concern is in helping you define values that enable you to support your life and achieve happiness. How did you earn your money that you are using to donate to others? What is your ethical evaluation of your actions while you earned that money? What standard were you using to guide your actions when you were earning the money above the $10K/year? How did you choose what occupation to earn the extra money that you donate? Did you choose an occupation that made you happy or miserable? Did it make a difference to you whether you were happy or miserable when you were earning such money to give away? If your ONLY object was to give away money to others and if that is your ethical standard, then would you rob, murder, blackmail others to get such money? If not, why not? Obviously, helping others is not your only value. Who deserves greater moral praise? You, for earning the money you donate, or others, for being in need of your help?

This is a little confusing. What is "at your own expense" referring to? Just monetary value or ethical value? What does "simply because you want to" mean? That is not the standard for evaluating values.

I'd suggest you read Chapter 1 of The Virtue of Selfishness: The Objectivist Ethics for a more detailed discussion of the Objectivist view of ethics.

And what will you do with that $10K/year? Under altruism, will you use it for your own self interested values? Then you are immoral according to altruism.

That is not a "backdoor" for Objectivism. Your values are yours to choose. The difference is, do you have a right to exist, as a moral human being, if you DO NOT choose to give your money away to others and pursue your self interest in other ways besides helping others? An altruist will always answer in the negative.

Altruism, for Objectivism, is NOT helping others. Altruism is the moral code that requires individuals to act in a way that the desires, values, and interests of others are above your own, and that you must sacrifice your values to others. Altruism requires you to place these goals of others above your own interest. In any conflict between what you value and what others value, you are to sacrifice your values and pursue the values of others. Feel free to donate to whomever you want that you think furthers your values.

The existence of entities is not deduced without evidence. You offer a false alternative. "Limits of perception"? How are you going to evaluate your simulation? How did you grasp your current knowledge?

Hmmm. You start a thread that makes no sense, then assert that Objectivism is in an incomplete philosophy of "Reason". Then imply that we don't think here, but we can join your board if we are willing to think. Not to mention that you don't address or respond to comments by other posters. One has to wonder about Truth, Thought, and Reason. I don't think very much more discussion is required here.

There are already sufficient checks and balances in place. However, there can be no checks and balances when the government is being transformed from a nation of laws to a nation of men. Nothing will suffice when individual rights are simply ignored.

Try writing to ARI with those questions.

Questioner, you are getting confused between "retained by the brain" and "retained in memory". These are two different things. When you look at, let's say, a book, the light is striking your eyes revealing its color and shape and size. Yet what your perceive and retain is the percept: the book as an object distinct from its background. Your brain is automatically doing the integration. If you walk away, what you remember seeing is the book; you don't remember perceiving that your brain integrated sensations. There is no contradiction here. That you have experienced sensations, and that sensations are part of the process of perception, is a discovery that is made by abstraction well after you have conceptual knowledge of percepts, bodily sense organs, etc.

Excellent analysis.

Well, if you're starting a thread, then provide the context.

NYC has an area of 830 KM^2. LA has an area of 12,562 KM^2.

Big, but what standard? Population, area? Compared to what? Rome NY has a population of about 33,000. NYC has 7 million. What is big?

So? This is quite basic stuff, hardly the place to begin. But one example doesn't demonstrate a general statement. And why only 'men'? How and why do you get to start with deduction? Your example doesn't demonstrate your "general truth." Not all cities are big.

Social security number too?