dream_weaver

His Star Trek reference (somewhere after 36 minutes) is a little shakier when you consider the scene where Spock dies in the energy chamber stating "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few . . . or the one."

That could start to explain what designed the "designer".

Bill Britt used to declare from on stage: "Happiness is the pursuit of a worthwhile goal, not the attainment, but the pursuit." With an ideal which is always [over] the ever[-]receding horizon," happiness could only be a persistant state of being for those in pursuit of unobtainable ideals.

Everyone is "flawed"? Do you perchance have an "unflawed" specimen by which to establish a comparison?

Found another. Power-lust is a weed that grows only in the vacant lot of an empty mind.--Ayn Rand should read: Power-lust is a weed that grows only in the vacant lots of an abandoned mind.--Ayn Rand

The Starnes heirs owned the company at that time. They proposed terms of employment that were unacceptable to John Galt. He did fire ammo at them at the meeting. He said he was going to put an end to it once and for all. The only person who asked anything about it was Gerald Starnes, who did so with a one word question. "How?" Nobody moved to stop him. It has been stated that the solution is "Education or quit.". Atlas Shrugged is part of that education. The solution dramatized in the book is highly stylized to illustrate what might happen if . . . Your questioning along these lines highlights some interesting considerations, but additionally, the question "Why didn't Ayn Rand write a book that implemented egoism world wide by an invincible method of persuasion alone, rather than reliance on the invincible ally of reality?" seems to be lurking therein. (If such a power of persuasion existed, where would the lesson of disagreement be to serve as evidence of the possibility of error in thought to pave the way to discovering the epistemological tools required to discover and check such errors?)

Asteroid-Mining Project Aims for Deep-Space Colonies "A new asteroid-mining company launched Tuesday with the goal of helping humanity expand across the solar system by tapping the vast riches of space rocks. "The new firm, called Deep Space Industries, Inc., announced today (Jan. 22) that it plans to launch a fleet of prospecting spacecraft in 2015, then begin harvesting metals and water from near-Earth asteroids within a decade or so. Such work could make it possible to build and refuel spacecraft far above our planet's surface, thus helping our species get a foothold in the final frontier. <snip> "Planetary Resources could prove to be a tough competitor. It was founded by private-spaceflight pioneers Peter Diamandis and Eric Anderson, and its deep-pocketed investors include Google execs Larry Page and Eric Schmidt. Another contender, taking us from being limited to a ball of natural resources to pioneering the mining of the solar system.

"Contributing to govenment" is not a proper duty for a citizen. A citizen should (ought, duty?) pay his taxes (contribute to govenment?) ? Can you clarify?

Things are "designed" the way things are?

Mulligan's Valley was nearly self supporting. How many souls does that require? While the earth is described as "desolated", does this necessarily mean that not a single living soul remained?

After having been raptured by Crow's salient advice, I circled back and see that I missed this earlier. I notice gold and Ayn Rand share something in common. Their critics love to bash them, and anyone who breaths a word about either is granted cult access in proportion to how much they have familiarized themselves with the respective materials. Gold is held by governments, investment firms, jewelry stores and embedded in rock within the earth. Silver too, and with the exception of India, to a lesser extent. Value, on the other hand is another multi-faceted piece of the puzzle. The ratio is just one way to view a relationship between the two.

That would seem to be more correlative than causally related.

Simply, they employed a similar approach to acquiring control over the factors they could, in essence, own outright the complete production pipeline from the natural resource to the finished product. This only tends to work today on a smaller scales. In the media sense, news gathering with intent to dissemination via newspaper, radio and television in a given geographic area is heavily regulated. Microsoft was chastised for trying to integrate "too much content" into their product (the raw material of programming into a more robust finished product.) .In a way it reminds me of Rearden having to sell off his copper mine and other interests because it made him not only too efficient, but I would have to add, too independent as well.

Rockefeller, Carnegie and others would have also admonished you for that.

Would you consider moral laws to be derived from the wholly physical?

In the case of the brain is to mind analogy, it is closer to hand is to grasp than stomach is to digestion. As to actions, it is only entities which act. Reactions are processes. Actions and reactions apart from the entities which act and/or react is, at best, confusing.

Aside from personally not viewing the financial markets as the "Grand Casino", and debt free is a fine way to be (been there, done that), are you of the mindset that debt serves no practical value? For instance, if an institution is willing to give me financing on collateralized capital at just over 4% and I can command a return of greater than 5% elsewhere, do you think it prudent to pay off the financing or seek the greater returns via the financial markets?

At this point in the gold/silver ratio, wouldn't silver be the favored horse?

Considering that causality is the law of identity applied to action - if it is the brain producing the effects, how does the brain not determine the effects?

And I'll be quite content to let them prattle amongst themselves. And what laws, pray tell, does the mind, as you distinct from the brain functions, function by?

So, if the mind is wholly physical, and there is no such thing as free will, by what means does man discover the answer to any problem, much less an identification of the right stuff to ingest? Conversely, since there is such a thing as free will, are you concluding that the mind is something more (or less) than wholly physical?

It is whether the drug is beneficial or detrimental to life that in determines if the act of taking them should be evaluated as moral or immoral.

Considering the price tag on those jeans compared to the ones made of whole cloth, it is more of an expression that "I have the affluence to afford this style."

The fluctuations of those precious metal prices can be used to offset the storage costs and even increase ones underlying position in that market.

AbA, it has been suggested the 'C' word would not likely be used outside this introductory thread. As Peikoff so delicately put it: The Objectivist position is the opposite of the injunction "Judge not that ye be not judged." Our policy, in Ayn Rand's words, is: "Judge, and be prepared to be judged."