georgedonnelly

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About georgedonnelly

  • Birthday 02/15/1971

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    http://georgedonnelly.com
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  • Interests
    photography, writing, travel, Objectivism, Libertarian Party, Unix, Colombia, reading, science fiction, golden retrievers, tea.
  • Location
    Medellin, Colombia

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  • Full Name
    George Donnelly
  • Favorite Music, Artworks, Movies, Shows, etc.
    The Shawshank Redemption
  • Description
    I'm a 37 y.o. dad, business owner, sysadmin, objectivist, writer, Libertarian Party member and University of Chicago grad from Pennsylvania who's into history, Colombia, FreeBSD, civil liberties, limited government, SciFi, Golden Retrievers, tea, optimism and dark chocolate.

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  1. nonstop baiting?! If you think all of my posts in this thread are baits then you are the one with the thin skin and chip, nay, boulder on your shoulder. I don't know how Michael will take it but that last line in your last post reads like a very sly personal attack. Michael, you insult, you misrepresent and you use underhanded tactics. It's disgusting. I'm sure you'll be thrilled to know that your actions have convinced me to unsubscribe from your RSS feed, turn off all email notifications and take a long, if not permanent, break from this website.
  2. You have demonstrated the "put-downs and mockery" very well in this thread. I couldn't ask for a better demonstration. In your world, that's all you are able to see. You criticize others for the same actions you yourself take. I guess I was unable to see your points and your quality and substance and your posts and so that's why i made so many arguably substantive posts attempting to address yours. You ridiculed me for my supposed lack of quality and/or substance. You claimed I wanted you to do my thinking. You claimed I was imagining words that you didn't say, when you actually did say them. Now you claim Brant's impression of you being patronizing was in his head, which it was not. If those don't constitute "put-downs and mockery" then you have corrupted the concept.
  3. You have demonstrated the "put-downs and mockery" very well in this thread.
  4. You make an unsupported assertion and expect Michael to accept it on faith. That doesn't look like an exercise of reason to me. You want substance and quality? Lead by example and show us proof that the exercise of benevolence causes serotonin levels in the brain to rise.
  5. You'll have to demonstrate its reality before anyone in their right mind will believe it.
  6. What about the cost of sacrificing yourself? Is that too high? You could not care less about their baseball game, but what if they DID care, and they performed this act under duress? In other words, where is your empathy for the baseball players? (only half kidding) I found a copy of the book "The Power of Intention" by Dyer. There are no footnotes and there is no bibliography. Health news is big. For example, the latest news about red wine being considered "anti-aging" got an enormous amount of play around the Internet. Just as one example, I quickly found the below article on serotonin, which is decidedly not as interesting or noteworthy as Dyer's studies would be. So why is there no news of Dyer's studies? Serotonin lower in shift workers And I easily found this, which is similar, but is about oxycontin. Empathy and Oxytocin Lead to Greater Generosity Here's what Wayne Dyer thinks of truth: Does this make sense to the same people who tear up when they read the Shaya story? If your serotonin level is rising, it's more likely because you spent that dollar on yourself than because you gave it to a homeless man. ;) btw Michael I also found those links you mention in post #72 in the original search I did (which you ridiculed), but none of them are relevant to the question of whether kindness actually causes serotonin levels in the brain to rise.
  7. *speechless with laughter* I crown you resident comedian at OL. Seriously, nicely played.
  8. The part about "religious rights" reminds me of the multicultaralism that was being advocated in the 80's. My reaction to your post is that it's: - alarmist and therefore to be taken with a lot of salt. - not well-substantiated or reasoned. There's nothing wrong with asking for halal food. Obviously initiation of force is not to be tolerated and we need a strong police force to do that. Unfortunately so much money is wasted on nonsense that funding for police is scarce.
  9. Hold on. Let's separate the religion from its practitioners. This is similar to the line of reasoning that damns Objectivism for Ayn Rand's personality foibles.
  10. Perhaps those boys wanted to continue playing their best until the end of the game. Perhaps they wanted to contest the game till the last strike of the last inning. But when the boy and his father walked up, maybe they felt obligated to cooperate. Or perhaps they felt guilty about not suffering from a learning disablity. If this is the case, then yes, they did sacrifice. A person has the potential to become more productive as his network of acquaintances grows. These aquaintances with whom one maintains relationships characterized by benevolence are potential business partners, customers, mentors and friends. Thought of this way, benevolence can be a value that follows inevitably once one accepts the idea of valuing oneself over others. Are you referring to the concept of reducing things to their essentials? That's an important thinking tool. Isn't your below statement a "central rule" that "defines life"? So you are insinuating that Objectivism is a religion? Is that your point? Do you mean monoideism ("a state of prolonged absorption in a single idea, as in mental depression, trance, hypnosis")? You see this in Atlas Shrugged, especially in negotiations between Dagny and Hank. In an altruistic environment it can be necessary to explain that your motivation is not altruistic, so people don't get the wrong idea. The only fear it is related to is a fear of being misunderstood.
  11. ... for damning her whole post/argument by damning one part of it. That is a tactic that suggests ill intentions, yes. And it certainly is not a tactic one uses when one is interested in examining ideas. By the way, I wrote about what I value and so did others. So stop pretending everyone but you is bickering or just taking up space on the page.
  12. I'm not holding you to a standard. I simply asked a question. By reacting to people who are not participating in the discussion, you diminish the quality of said discussion. I have no idea of this "interforum" whatever, but if true, why do you keep interjecting it into the conversation? For the record, this is the only Objectivist forum I participated in until today. (May change soon!) False. I answered your questions. If you have no interest in replying, that's your right, but to pretend you're talking to yourself is incorrect. That's obviously your right, but it strikes me as a low threshold for excommunication. I have taken your subtle insults about not being able to do my own thinking and imagining things in stride.
  13. I'm not sure Michael labeled anyone as evil that didn't tear up, and I'm not sure about him being smarmy, but Laure is dead on on all the other counts. Also Michael I notice you used her one questionable accusation to damn the whole lot. That strikes me as very questionable, if not ill-intentioned.
  14. Those "nameless people" and shadows are in your head, not in my words. I suppose the following 5 quotes are "in my head"? These aren't your words? 1. Pity? Religions have many people convinced they should perform acts of disinterested charity and mercy for the less fortunate. Maybe it's the fact that it involves a child, a child who will never realize the potential others take for granted. A child is by definition innocent and this one is paying for "sins" he did not commit. Perhaps people sympathize with the boy's feeling of being 'less' than others and getting left out as a result. Maybe they feel the greatest gift is that which is unearned. I really don't know why but I am not too concerned about it. I class pity right up there with guilt, negative attitudes and apathy - I try to spend as little time on them as possible. Ignoring certain aspects of nature or society is not evading reality. It is taking goal-oriented action. Just because a bear moves his bowels in the woods and I don't go and watch it, does not constitute an evasion of reality. 2. A quick search turns up assertions of this serotonin-kindness relationship, but they all appear to cite Dyer as their evidence for it. Without any kind of evidence, how can anyone reach a judgment on the matter? I can't. Regardless, I consider kindness - defined as benevolence - an important value. In fact, I think benevolence is an unstoppable consequence of the optimism that is the natural condition of human beings, and would seem to be the inescapable consequence of valuing your own life above all else.
  15. Huh? I altered a quote? Did I even quote post #37? I hate it when people make substantive edits after posting.