Pittsburgh

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1

So I’ve been away from the forums (a lot) lately, very busy. But I have been meeting a lot of very intellectual friends in town, and we’re just starting to form an intellectual community, but I’m the only student of Objectivism in it. I’m poking around, trying to get a Pittsburgh Objectivist Group going. I made a MySpace group for it and I’m going to make a homepage which will hopefully be updated irregularly (as opposed to not at all). I’ve contacted ARI about it, and so now I’m basically canvassing. The purpose of the group is two-fold:

  1. To create a group of like-minded people for having the good times.

  2. To create a bit of an Objectivist presence and influence in this very academic city. Pittsburgh has Duquesne University, University of Pittsburgh, and Carnegie Mellon University, three very powerful schools, each in their own right. I can think of no more advantageous place to build up an Objectivist circle (I’m sort of dreaming of an Objectivists, Pittsburgh version of the Vienna Circle), where Objectivists could most take advantage of knowledge, discussion, and academic networks in the city while at the same time creating a very visible center for ourselves.

(2) took more words to write and is more ambitious, but both are equally the purpose of the group.

For Yinzers (Pittsburghers), the point is, come hang out!

For non-Yinzers, do you have suggestions about the group–in particular, advertising?

2

I am pretty sure that there is an Objectivist Club at Carnegie Mellon University, as I remember seeing Objectivists active on the school’s messageboards when I was there about four to five years ago. For all I know, this might have extinguished by now.

Surely the University of Pittsburgh would have some good contacts, as they have a Visiting Professor who is funded by the university’s Fellowship for the Study of Objectivism.

You probably know these things already but I thought that I would mention them just in case. Pittsburgh is an interesting place for an Objectivist Club since you guys get to witness first hand the legacy of the inimitable Andrew Carnegie.

3

I actually did know about that stuff, but I never really got off my ass to do anything about it. So yesterday I actually e-mailed two of the Objectivist professors there and this morning received an e-mail from one of them (Prof. Lennox), so we will have a short conversation in the next week, I expect. I’m not really sure what he can do as I’m not a student at the uni, but I’ve been making decent progress finding O’ists in Pittsburgh outside of the University of Pittsburgh anyway. Thanks, though. Your post did get me off my ass.

4

I recently moved to the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area and I would be interested in meeting other Objectivists in the area. It may have to wait until I know my way around better (not used to mountain trails for roads!) and it may have to wait until I get a job and can pay for gasoline. So, this message is basically informing people of the Pittsburgh area that I am here and interested in an Objectivist group. Actual get-togethers may have to be put on hold, however.

5

(not used to mountain trails for roads!)

Ah, yes. Pennsylvania. Where they think they have mountains.

(And a transplanted Texan, who also doesn’t know any better.)

:smiley:

6

Yes, well I realize I am not driving on 5,000 foot mountains, but nonetheless compared to the Dallas area, the hills are very big :stuck_out_tongue: In Dallas, the roads are rather straight, aside from gentle curves or going around corners. Here in Pittsburgh, it’s like riding a roller coaster compared to there. Anyhow, I’m getting used to it, especially used to having to go down the side of a really big hill /small mountain in order to get anywhere commercial. In Dallas, commerce was everywhere, with nice wide roads. In Pittsburgh, they all look the same to me – at least the back roads – a two lane street with traffic going in both directions. Of course, I’m somewhat exaggerating, since there are bigger roads around here, but my dad likes traveling the back roads, and I get totally lost. I’m slowly but surely developing a big road map in my head for orientation, but at this rate it will be a long time before I know the streets as well as my parents :o

7

CMU Objectivist Club

8

Now, you see what I mean? A five thousand foot mountain would be 1500 feet shy of the bottom of my well and I live on the eastern plains of Colorado. Thomas, they’ve pulled the wool over your eyes.

:o

9

I recently moved to the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area and I would be interested in meeting other Objectivists in the area. It may have to wait until I know my way around better (not used to mountain trails for roads!) and it may have to wait until I get a job and can pay for gasoline.

I have a job and plenty of gasoline in my car, but I’m not going to go anywhere to do any meetups. I have met an Objectivist in the area once, Greg Salmiera, he even signed this collection I had of his:

http://www.aynrandbookstore2.com/prodinfo.asp?number=CS76M

when I met him and three others ( a medical student, an engineer, and Greg’s lovely girlfriend who was at Yale as a medical student, I think, and me, a janitor hehe) to hear him speak on his upcoming OCON presentation, it was a trial run of it, and we kind of audited it, asked questions, that sort of thing. I had a great time, Heinz Lofts was where he lived at the time (this was like 3 years ago) which is a cool building inside, and expensive rent wise. Nice place he had, huge windows, but I mainly stared at his bookselves, went over to them, since I’m not really approacheable. Probably was watching to see if I’d steal any :o just kidding. I would think by now he has gotten his Ph. D. He could go on and on about Aristotle. To actually meet someone who has vast knowledge and is talky, is an experience for me.

But as the new Marilyn Manson song goes, “I’m like a country you don’t ever ever ever ever ever want to visit again” so I don’t allow any visitors nor do I seek others out to meet. People now can say “I wish I could have met him” instead of joining the small chorus of voices out there that say, that they wished they’d never had. Fucking sick of hearing it, I’ll spare you all the displeasure of encountering me. Meeting him, then later I met a few other Objectivists in Hollywood, Linda Cordair and her husband Quent, and the director of the Monna Vanna production Joel Marquez, Linda being the most genuinely nice person I have ever encountered in my real life. She is very remarkable. I don’t even think she cared about the very torn shirt I had on. It was all about the play, fuck the attire. She saw me reading Cyrano de Bergerac there, and she said it to me, and that was when I found out how to pronounce “Cyrano” correctly. I don’t think she ever knows about that. :stuck_out_tongue: But the point is, I wasn’t interested in meeting them, I didn’t know I actually would meet them, Linda, who I recognized immediately, in a very lovely black dress, was asking the lady at the front about me if I had arrived and that’s when I spoke up and met her. It was such a surprise, and that said lady wouldn’t let me take the QCFA Gallery catalogue, only look at it there at the desk (which is the first time I saw Larsen’s Monna Vanna print and I ended up buying the very first print, btw) but Linda made a special trip to that lady and personally gave me that copy. I was treated so well, I really did not know how to act. And I wasn’t interested in meeting Greg, just hearing his lecture trial run. So hopefully, as I linked too before about the CMU Club in the other thread, that might be a good start in this area. Also, check out Talkobjectivism.com I think it is. Jason Mosely had me as a guest once on his talkcast, (but I took it over, and turned it into a speechcast hahaha, it’s stil online too, my first public announcement, and I did it just like how Galt did with his speach in the beginning, thought it was appropriate) and he has many shows he’s done, that might interest you to listenen to and so forth and perhaps find fellow O’ists that way. Real cool personailty on the show that Jason has. He’s a member on this forum, but I haven’t seen him here much. Last time I checked usually on Sundays he does his talkcasts.

10

I have a job and plenty of gasoline in my car, but I’m not going to go anywhere to do any meetups. I have met an Objectivist in the area once, Greg Salmiera, he even signed this collection I had of his:

http://www.aynrandbookstore2.com/prodinfo.asp?number=CS76M

when I met him and three others ( a medical student, an engineer, and Greg’s lovely girlfriend who was at Yale as a medical student, I think, and me, a janitor hehe) to hear him speak on his upcoming OCON presentation, it was a trial run of it, and we kind of audited it, asked questions, that sort of thing. I had a great time, Heinz Lofts was where he lived at the time (this was like 3 years ago) which is a cool building inside, and expensive rent wise. Nice place he had, huge windows, but I mainly stared at his bookselves, went over to them, since I’m not really approacheable. Probably was watching to see if I’d steal any :slight_smile: just kidding. I would think by now he has gotten his Ph. D. He could go on and on about Aristotle. To actually meet someone who has vast knowledge and is talky, is an experience for me.

But as the new Marilyn Manson song goes, “I’m like a country you don’t ever ever ever ever ever want to visit again” so I don’t allow any visitors nor do I seek others out to meet. People now can say “I wish I could have met him” instead of joining the small chorus of voices out there that say, that they wished they’d never had. Fucking sick of hearing it, I’ll spare you all the displeasure of encountering me. Meeting him, then later I met a few other Objectivists in Hollywood, Linda Cordair and her husband Quent, and the director of the Monna Vanna production Joel Marquez, Linda being the most genuinely nice person I have ever encountered in my real life. She is very remarkable. I don’t even think she cared about the very torn shirt I had on. It was all about the play, fuck the attire. She saw me reading Cyrano de Bergerac there, and she said it to me, and that was when I found out how to pronounce “Cyrano” correctly. I don’t think she ever knows about that. :slight_smile: But the point is, I wasn’t interested in meeting them, I didn’t know I actually would meet them, Linda, who I recognized immediately, in a very lovely black dress, was asking the lady at the front about me if I had arrived and that’s when I spoke up and met her. It was such a surprise, and that said lady wouldn’t let me take the QCFA Gallery catalogue, only look at it there at the desk (which is the first time I saw Larsen’s Monna Vanna print and I ended up buying the very first print, btw) but Linda made a special trip to that lady and personally gave me that copy. I was treated so well, I really did not know how to act. And I wasn’t interested in meeting Greg, just hearing his lecture trial run. So hopefully, as I linked too before about the CMU Club in the other thread, that might be a good start in this area. Also, check out Talkobjectivism.com I think it is. Jason Mosely had me as a guest once on his talkcast, (but I took it over, and turned it into a speechcast hahaha, it’s stil online too, my first public announcement, and I did it just like how Galt did with his speach in the beginning, thought it was appropriate) and he has many shows he’s done, that might interest you to listenen to and so forth and perhaps find fellow O’ists that way. Real cool personailty on the show that Jason has. He’s a member on this forum, but I haven’t seen him here much. Last time I checked usually on Sundays he does his talkcasts.

Having known Greg Salmieri via the CMU Objectivist Club, I can say w/ full confidence that he’s the future of Objectivism.