Kelly Bennett

I know the quote is out of context, BUT it really doesn't matter if he was referring to the roads or the business. The meaning is very clear in the context of the speech. More importantly, out of context or not, the phrase does represent the context of his speech more than any other line. It captures his whole philosophy w.r.t independence. The fact that people see this statement as justified by the rest of the speech is, in my opinion, an absolutely perfect example of what is wrong with the world today. Obama is not arguing for the obvious proposition that people receive help from others and benefit from the existence of roads, bridges and teachers. Such a statement, as mentioned above, would not even deserve uttering it is so trivial. His argument is a brazen attack on individualism, in a sense much much deeper than politics. The fact that his speech as a whole is regarded by so many Americans as non-controversial is a very bad sign. Obama has been a parasite so long, it's no wonder he is unable to perceive a man as an individuals even with respect to him being the creator of a business, but that the rest of our culture is also unable... The average American's philosophy has disarmed them. The second-handers claim their minds don't exist (individual thought is a myth), their philosophy has no answer. The looters claim the right to their achievements, their philosophy provides no defense. In fact, it's worse than that, their philosophy demands that they agree. And so they do. Nothing has ever reminded me so much of the passage from Galt's speech: " When they yell that it is selfish to be certain that you are right, you hasten to assure them that you’re certain of nothing. When they shout that it’s immoral to stand on your convictions, you assure them that you have no convictions whatever." In the same pattern, you can observe people (almost every economic commentator) who sense that Obama's statement is wrong, wrong in some very important way, yet the have no moral defense. We have Peter Keating and James Taggart combined into one president.

Excellent find! Please excuse my ignorance, but what is Objectivism CD?

(Uhhg... ) It just means my (goddamned) servers are down (again).. I'll try and fix it now.

"Zero/Death Worship" is a concept that intrigued me when I first started learning about objectivism, but it took me a very long time to understand exactly what Rand ment and I still haven't been able to think of a good way to articulate the concept to other people without coming across as a nut. I'm looking for some good introduction videos or audio clips (or articles) that explain the concept. Any help would be appreciated!

haha nice

haha, nice! By the way, is your name a Dr.Who reference? -oh nevermind, I just saw your icon haha

Good one! did you come up with it?

For example I like the ring of "Come hell or high water"

Why not.... YOU are evidence! We are on a planet in space. There is nothing mystical about Earth. I agree that we don't have enough evidence to know for sure, but it is not arbitrary to hypothosise that there is another ball out there among the zillions similar ours.

Oh man, I've had my eye out for the Carson interviews for a while. Never been able to find them

I agree that this would be a rational reason not to have casual sex, but in my experience the two are not correlated. In fact, if they are, the correlation might be in the other direction.

It is not just about the act of penetration - that is simply one part of it. The whole experience is pleasurable, from the first kiss up to and including the part where you cuddle and sleep. It's supposed to be multiplayer - by that I mean, fun for both players. Otherwise it's more like an attack on them that they happen to need the money enough to endure, and that does not sound fun for either party. That's an interesting point. I'll have to think about it for a while before I can respond to it.

Well, thats very strange that I got different results o_º That link does seem a heck of a lot more relevant than anything that come up when I searched. I'll check it out, thanks! One possible difference is that the act wouldn't be fun anymore if you couldn't be sure the other person was having fun. It would be like paying someone to hang out with you - it would be super awkward and unsatisfying if you knew they didn't actually want to share your company. As far as the morality of it… Not sure… I'm tempted to say it would be moral, but a bad sign psychologically. And a very bad sign for the prostitute. But I haven't given it enough thought to be sure.

Thanks for the link. While the discussion is related, I don't think it's the same as what I'm brining up here. Also, given the possibility that someone in the future might be interested in the same issues, I don't think it's a good idea to bury this topic by sidelining an old thread with my non-entierly-consistant topic. On your response to my 3rd point: Thanks for the reply! I'm of course using the word 'art' here loosely. I don't mean that you are actually creating art, but that you are performing an act that has many of the same benefits as art and could be used to achieve some of the same ends. What I really find interesting about your response is the line "it involves another person, so that to me sounds like specifically ignoring the meaning of the actual thing that makes the sex possible." I'm not 100% sure I follow the logic - what meaning is it ignoring? And anyway, sex is possible without much meaning. All you need is whatever subconscious meaning you attach to physically attractive women. Whether or not it's good sex or bad sex or rational sex or irrational sex I guess is the debate, but there is no question that it is possible.

I did that thank you. Casual sex returns exactly 9 hits - None of which are my questions. Did you even read my post? If you think my question has already been asked please tell me which of the 9 topics I should read: I fantasize about other women <-- how to find just one woman attractive, is it possible? is it just the wrong girl etc… Does how your partner views [sic] sex affect your view of… <-- person asserting that sex has 'inherent value' and upset that his GF doesn't think so Youth and Sex <-- See title People who are sexually promiscuous make me mad <-- mad that people don't think of sex like he does/ people telling him not to worry about what other people do The "how many partners have you had?" question <-- how do you respond to this question / do you answer it, does it tell you anything about someone's past or present Why are men's clothes so boring? <-- see title I'm seeing a girl who has a boyfriend<-- guy thinks girl likes him more than her BF Study finds facial features correlate with good parenting <-- obviously unrelated. Did I miss something? And by the way, most of these topics are years old.

What is the argument against casual sex? I have the following basic problems with the objectivist view (as I understand it): 1.I am in total agreement that meaningful sex with someone you love and / or admire is incomparably better than sex with someone you barely know, but that doesn't mean that the latter isn't enjoyable at all. If you're not having sex as some misguided attempt to make yourself feel more valuable or as some substitute for self-esteem, then what is the problem? Assuming you don't make it a main focus of your life, but perhaps an occasional 'treat', isn't this something that makes your life more enjoyable? 2.I am in total agreement that sex can be a deep, 'spiritual', philosophic experience, and that this improves it's quality x fold, but I also see sex as being something that can offer purely physical pleasure, like a massage, or masturbation. For guys (I can't speak for women) sex *can* be purely physical. You can be turned on by and "get off" on women you don't know anything about. Take for proof of this the immense popularity of pornography which is typically completely devoid of any 'feeling', context, or hint into the characters of the women performing. Men are simply wired to want sex, and we are wired with the ability to be aroused by simply seeing women naked. Where is the harm in having adult, consenting sex for the sole purpose of satisfying a physical desire? (Again, assuming you don't make it a major focus of your life or expect it to substitute values, or give you self esteem) Almost all objectivists agree that masturbation is OK - why then isn't this form of sex, which is essentially just multiplayer masturbation? (People get so worked up about sex, but sometimes it's really just two (or more) people rubbing their body parts together… I just have a hard time taking this kind of sex too seriously. I mean, what is there to get so upset about?) 3.Sex as interactive art : So art can give you a sense of living in your ideal world. A movie or book can give you a sense of what it would be like to reach your goals. Well, what about sex with a beautiful woman?? Can you not do a bit of role play in your head and fantasies that she is a heroine and for that moment feel some sense of what it would be like to achieve your goals? (Again assuming you don't make it a major focus of your life bla bla bla bla…). I don't believe this is evasion, any more than you could say it's evasion to believe that Ragnar Danneskjöld is a real person when you read AS. With all this sex talk I better throw in the pimp smiley

Why invite a guest on if your just going to talk over every.single.one of his answers? :dough: But Yaron did a great job despite being constantly interrupted.

I think he was trying to say " I love you, now lets not fight. " hahaha, great video

Yeah, no doubt about that, his sportsmanship is great!

Great video, I'll share

I think John Galt says it best: " If you worked as a blacksmith in the mystics’ Middle Ages, the whole of your earning capacity would consist of an iron bar produced by your hands in days and days of effort. How many tons of rail do you produce per day if you work for Hank Rearden? Would you dare to claim that the size of your pay cheek was created solely by your physical labor and that those rails were the product of your muscles? The standard of living of that blacksmith is all that your muscles are worth; the rest is a gift from Hank Rearden."

They show parts of that video in this video which was on TV with Peter Schiff:

Ron Paul has many many things right. He's far from perfect, but if everyone in congress was at least as good as him America wouldn't be in anywhere near as much trouble. End TSA! he also started the Audit the Fed bill didn't he? I wonder how that's going

Totally! He is ultra fast for a heavyweight. His knockout punch vs. Bret Rogers was like a lightning bolt, and virtually no telegraphing either. it's really a shame that he is almost unknown in America. I guess in Russia he is a superstar, Putin even attends his fights and he carried the torch for Russia during the Olympics.

haha, pro-individual and anti-individual Thanks for the tip, I'll give'm a listen