Wednesday
November 30, 2005 |
 Dreams
by Marty Lewinter
Fuel for the undaunted. (Read more...)
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 Persuasion II
by Ciro D'Agostino
The persuasion of others is used sometimes to achieve self-assurance. (Read more...)
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 Machan's Musings - Back to More Business Bashing
by Tibor R. Machan
When so many influential people still believe that business ethics is an oxymoron, it's no wonder that journalists and even those in the business community begin to let the notion go unchallenged. (Read more...)
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 Musical Innovation: Devotion or Deviance?
by Joseph C. Maurone
Without falling into the post-modern trap of relativism and denying that some composers are better than others, innovation requires deviation and diversity. The rules, once known, are begging to be broken. If one wants to see innovation in music, one needs to engage in the dialectic of devotion and deviation. (Read more...)
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Machan's Musings - Europe Clings to Its Old Ways
by Tibor R. Machan
I do not wear a sign around my neck saying “I am a champion of human liberty.” Yet I often run into other frequent travelers on the road who share my concerns about the lack of appreciation for freedom around the globe. As I have traveled on the trains in many European countries, I have found myself in conversation with fellow train riders who, in time, would lament, just as I do, the inadequate support so many throughout Europe, even among the newly liberated folks, lend to the ideal of a truly free society. (Read more...)
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On the Origins of the Taking Syndrome
by A. Robert Malcom
The psychology of the two kinds of worldview, the trading and the taking, were and are quite different from each other. The taking syndrome was tribalistic; its members were raised to consider themselves as parts of groups, a valued quality when it comes to matters of organized theft. (Read more...)
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Machan's Musings - Freedom vs. Freedom
by Tibor R. Machan
As I was driven to my hotel upon my arrival here in Santiago, I couldn’t miss all the promotional posters and billboards typical of election seasons in most Western democracies. I asked what, if any, issues are being debated in the current election here that suggest some care about liberty? The answer was that there is indeed a debate about the very nature of freedom. (Read more...)
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Saturday
November 26, 2005 |
 Vegetative Robots and Value
by Stephen Boydstun
Thought experiments are notorious for pre-packing the point to be demonstrated into the setup to be contemplated. In an essay in The Philosophic Thought of Ayn Rand (1984), Charles King raised just that sort of objection to Rand’s robot gedanken: "if the robot neither knows nor cares [what happens to things around it], the example seems uninteresting." I do not agree that the robot gedanken is without interest if the robot is devoid of thought and feeling. I will here extend Rand’s gedanken in such a way that it can inform the concept of purely vegetative value. (Read more...)
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Saturday
November 26, 2005 |
Academia is so Open-Minded, Its Brains Fell Out!
by Marty Lewinter
My college is planning a year-long theme that has to do with Muslim culture. A professor (whom I call YYYY) posted an opinion implying that the problem (ignorance) lies with us. I responded. Another professor (XXXX) attacked me. Finally, I responded. It's a jungle out there! (Read more...)
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Valliant Versus the Brandens
by Fred Seddon
Let me begin with a “thank you” to Linz for recommending (highly) James S. Valliant’s book “The Passion of Ayn Rand’s Critics,” (PARC). And while I agree with most of what our fearless leader had to say (I liked the book so much I’ve ordered a copy as a Christmas present for a friend), I do have a few thoughts I want to state for the record. (Read more...)
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Depth Perception
by John Paul Sherman
If life seemed a pebble in an unknown palm ... (Read more...)
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Thursday
November 24, 2005 |
The Corruption of Measurement
by Merlin Jetton
Measurement is a hallmark of science, reason and objectivity. It should be defended. It is too important to allow it to be corrupted by subjectivism. (Read more...)
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Thursday
November 24, 2005 |
 Quod fuerim sin pummarolam?
by Ciro D'Agostino
Almost 3000 years ago, Basil and Tomato (lovers of different flavors) decided to meet in Naples, Italy, where they would have consumed a night of passion. (Read more...)
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Wednesday
November 23, 2005 |
Why Limit Government?
by Marty Lewinter
There is only one way to safeguard rights: limit the power of the state—that is, limit the power of the group over the individual. (Read more...)
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Wednesday
November 23, 2005 |
Machan's Musings - Nanocars and Other Nifty Feats
by Tibor R. Machan
Despite wishing to celebrate some of the technical feats achieved with extorted funds, I will not. Yes, I praise the scientists, the technological whizzes (I used to literally stroke my Volvo P1800 for being such a great engineering marvel). But given that they shouldn’t have had most of the funds that enabled them to achieve these feats, I decline the invitation to celebrate. (Read more...)
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Ayn Rand? Jealous?
by Robert L. Campbell
I strongly encourage everyone who wants to see Rand’s ideas treated fairly and objectively to read The Passion of Ayn Rand’s Critics. Not because Mr. Valliant’s assessment of Rand can be counted on to be fair and objective, but because Rand’s journal entries need to be consulted by anyone who wishes to make his or her own fair and objective assessment. (Read more...)
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Machan's Musings - Back to the Animal Rights Folly
by Tibor R. Machan
As the author of a book on this subject, Putting Humans First, Why We Are Nature’s Favorite (2004)—which, surprise, surprise, was not reviewed in The New York Review of Books (even as they dutifully review Peter Singer and other animal liberation and rights promoters), I find it especially peculiar that the magazine’s chosen reviewer of Coetzee’s pro-animal rights work offers no criticism of the Nobel Prize winning novelist’s ideas. (Read more...)
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Mexican Immigrants and the "Objectivist" Center
by Adam Reed
That racist propaganda is widely tolerated among America's "Conservatives" and "Liberals" is scandal enough. That it is spread by the magazine of an "Objectivist" organization is beyond scandal. It is treason.
(Read more...)
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Daily Linz 21 - Close Encounter of the Scary Kind
by Lindsay Perigo
With my sister Sally and her husband John—with whom I’ve been living since renting out my own apartment recently— away for the weekend, I would have the place to myself, free of distractions. As I emerged from my bedroom, I was momentarily disconcerted to see the lounge curtains drawn when I was sure I hadn’t drawn them. (Read more...)
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Machan's Musings - Faith and Public Controversy
by Tibor R. Machan
One crucial reason that religiously based public policies have dubious merit is that their justification can’t be examined along lines available to us in virtue of our humanity alone. A human community, as opposed to a sectarian or religious one, can’t rest its institutions on what arises from faith—especially not if those institutions aim to be considered fairly and openly by all those who might be citizens. (Read more...)
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Hegel's Authoritarian State as the Divine Idea on Earth
by Edward W. Younkins
For Hegel, the State is the highest embodiment of the Divine Idea on earth and the chief means used by the Absolute in manifesting itself as it unfolds towards its perfect fulfillment. Hegel argued that the State is the highest form of social existence and the end product of the development of mankind, from family to civil society to lower forms of political groupings. (Read more...)
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Machan's Musings - A Risky Argument for Liberty
by Tibor R. Machan
The fact that the insistence on the basic rights of all, including the rich, to pursue their own goals—be they of great public benefit or none—also tends to benefit most people is secondary, not primary. Unless the case for the free system can be made along lines that stress the justice of the it, those on the Left will make a better case with their equation of justice and fairness. (Read more...)
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Saturday
November 19, 2005 |
Decentralisation, and Those Who Oppose It
by Peter Cresswell
What's wrong with choice, and letting people exercise it? What's wrong with a cornucopia of choices, an abundance of options, a profusion of possible housing choices? Why can't you leave people alone to choose for themselves their own manner of living? When you strip away the veneer of buzzwords surrounding the planners' latest fads, you're left with the express intent that these people don't like the choices you make about how to live, and they will make you pay any price to avoid letting you do so. (Read more...)
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Saturday
November 19, 2005 |
Machan's Musings - Some (Small) Good News
by Tibor R. Machan
Although the content of discussions of global warming in Science News has not changed much, and most of them keep suggesting that it’s all due to the greed and materialism of human beings, at least now and then a letter is allowed to voice some dissent. (Read more...)
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The Epicurean Roots of Some Classical Liberal and Misesian Concepts
by Martin Masse
Epicureanism, wrote Ludwig von Mises, inaugurated "the spiritual, moral and intellectual emancipation of mankind". One can find articles on the Internet discussing similarities between Objectivism and Epicureanism, and how Ayn Rand has been influenced by Epicurus. These are some examples of how this ancient philosophy is connected to the classical liberal and libertarian tradition. (Read more...)
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