y_feldblum

It would be moral, then, to use hallucinogens, because doing so enables him to experience happiness. What you've missed are the requirements for life qua Man, meaning, for the sort of life proper to Man.

I just noticed that there is a 25-second waiting period between posts, termed flood control, in effect on this forum. Evil GreedyGapitalist trampling all over my rights to flood the forum with inane posts such as this! From another angle: is me.

If it is human nature to exist scarequotes "communally" as per NewYouth, then it is human nature to exist below subsistence, as humanity has done in all its existence as primarily community.

Back to the main point of this thread, just for a second, ... how exactly were the pyramids, aside from their being public works projects designed to create jobs in a foundering economy, in the interests of everyone?

True.

Where d comes between am and af.

Thanks. I was too lazy to go find my copy of Atlas Shrugged. It's much easier to type.

It was indeed rhetorical - because it posited the illogical. Yet the illogical is the case.

This thread has just become tied to the Microsoft thread, and I'm dealing with the facts of reality as they are now or very recently. Microsoft's actions consist of sanctioning as the morally good the theft of six hundred million dollars. It got slapped on one cheek - and now, by giving in without a word, invites all comers to slap the other.

I meant only to contrast Martha Stewart and Microsoft. Martha Stewart is fighting for her rights; Microsoft is sanctioning its own destruction. The only time one has no right to lie to the authorities is when one is in court and under oath. Martha Stewart was well within her rights not to sanction the government's unjust investigation of her stockbroker. Microsoft's actions are disgusting; the most vile system of ethics is the one consisting of turn the other cheek.

Sherlock Holmes' next case: The money-chest that robbed the barons. The biggest question: Who was he woikin' foah? ARI's AS essay contest had a question about Robin Hood and one of the characters' speeches about him. (Anyone remember who that character was?) Ash, you can take out the phrase long-range from your post. Attila doesn't deal with cause-and-effect, whether long-range or short.

My first argument consists of "nerd art thou; therefore become that which is not a nerd and drink coffee." I say it with all the seriousness of, "so the other day, Gabriel gave me a book; I can't remember exactly what he called it, but it was somthing like Karen. You know, for a book with no pictures, it sure contains a lot of graphic violence. I think I'm going to go capture Mecca tomorrow and make it a holy pilgrimage city." My second argument consists of "coffee is an absolute value because I value it; you must value it to, and therefore you will force yourself to." I say it with all the seriousness of the above. I must say, though, my taste is the opposite of Zirjin's; I don't like orange juice. I haven't had hazel nut coffee in about a year; I'll try to get some soon. Note to everyone but self: I'm only serious when I'm serious; the rest of the time I might not be.

Welcome to the rest of the forum, Fawstin.

The non-arbitrary example is: I have more information than the other party; my source can be anything from rational thinking to divine revelation, but it doesn't matter. That's why my example was legitimate, even though it was arbitrary: because nothing in the example is relevant to the moral judgment on insider trading. If the buyer knows he must beware and why, then he is downright stupid to trade without discovering all the pertinent information. It is no one's fault but his own if he gets burned. Taking things on faith is not the businessman's method. Full disclosure is the best means of convincing rational people to trade and of agreeing on price. GreedyCapitalist: Want to buy all my stock in CloneMe Corp.? Evangelist: What is the financial state of your company, including all present and projected legal actions? GreedyCapitalist: Why, excellent - and [cough] absolutely [cough] no [cough] [cough] legal troubles. A statement which I sign to. [Signs contract.] That is fraud. It is also insider trading because all trading is insider. The appelation insider is arbitrary and meaningless.

Exactly. Lawyers feel. They have no principles. They don't know what principles are like.

Martha $tewart has earned the sign of the dollar, in success and in adversity. Microsoft flops in adversity, sanctioning the bureaucrats' looting of everything it has earned, its pride foremost. Old Geezer, everything Micro$oft has done in the past has been illegal. Antitrust is a shady non-system of non-law forbidding everything to everybody except what bureaucrats at whim permit to their favorite, complying victims. And Micro$oft used to be belligerent as a victim. The only way to make money is to make it ethically (non-aggression) and to make it rationally (virtue). The primary business of any corporation is the good: to create. The worst evil any corporation can commit is to admit that to create is the evil. The EU expects Microsoft to obey: "give us billions; roll over; die." Not only is Microsoft obeying, but it is doing so with its tail wagging. Rearden obeyed; but when he stopped wagging his tail, he understood the monstrosity of his crime, and understood the contortions of claiming any moral right to his metal.

The only appropriate response is the nerd emoticon. art thou. Try treating the acquired taste of coffee, but only of good coffee, as a taste you want to acquire.

Exact and succinct; those two objections - that impartial is necessarily nonvaluing and that impartial observer is arbitrary - are the first two that came to my mind. I have one objection to add: It is the concept, specifically, of one's own life in relation to oneself that gives rise to values. The impartial observer argument steals the concept of value; one premise affirms the concept and another denies the concept's epistemological basis.

It is very rational and very self-interested, and above all very moral, depending on the context; only, one must have one's values in order and properly founded. The stance of merciless truth - of infinite justice - is the stance of reason. Man as a slave is not Man; Man as a beast is not Man; Man as a savage is not Man. Life without pride is void, and life without the mind is nothing. Life where all one's values are obliterated and all one's virtues are impossible is not worth living. Defend your freedom with all your life or be worth no more than death. The sanction of the victim, the force of non-pride and non-worth, is the only thing that permits evil to exist in this world.

Microsoft's approach is disgusting. It's called the sanction of the victim. Microsoft has a contractual obligation to keep looters from its property. Sanctioning their looting is a violation of it. By sanctioning the looters, by naming them moral, Microsoft abdicates all the good that it stands for. The invective was not emotional as primary; its irresistable logic drives the emotion, as in general it should. This is in fact a case of victim-blaming, because this is indeed a case of the victim making possible its own victimhood.

Let's say I am a prophet, and I am privy to confidential conversations with the divine. I know that disaster is about to strike a company, and sell my stock without telling anyone why. Fraud? Yes, the example is arbitrary; but it's to illustrate the point that having access to information without giving others access to it in no way implies fraudulent trade. Let the buyer beware - anyone who sells anything does so because that thing is not worth, to him, the money you are willing to pay for it.

Ash, I don't understand why Fawstin's reaction to anything affected your willingness to purchase his book. If you would buy the book for its content, Fawstin's reaction is not its content. There are plenty of overweight but good authors; does their weight change the nature of their work? It would not be that you are willing to patronize only those authors with traits you value, without regard for the content of their work. The justification "His hero is like him" is absurd. Oldsalt, condescending (according to my interpretation of M-W) is either patronizing or voluntary abdication of pride and self-esteem; and patronizing is condescending. Circe, I see no greater tendency to condescension among Objectivists than among any -ists. Rather, those for whom pride is the moral and self-esteem is the good would prefer ascension to condescension.

Evil GreedyCapitalist - existing only to exploit the downtrodden Interfering Marxists Union. (Just because it's acronym, expanded, is "I am you".) The things of spirit that exist are not such things as concepts but such things as checking accounts. Such relationships between things that exist exist; but concepts do not exist by definition.

I am having considerable difficulty imagining how chickens could ever survive in the wild. Spell-check: vegetarian, affect, acquaintance (Richard_Halley).

I'm sure the Library of Congress won't mind allowing us to satisfy our scholarly curiosity and would gladly allow ARI to publish Ayn Rand's notes on her fiction characters, perhaps on its website....