Even apart from its 2009 brouhaha with on-again/off-again renegade speaker Lindsay Perigo, The Atlas Society has had diminishing value for me in the past few years. While I certainly appreciate TAS's hard work for the 50th anniversary of the publication of Atlas Shrugged) -- and while I fervently hope that the Atlas Shrugged Part 1 movie is as much of a blockbuster as it can and ought to be -- on the intellectual side, I think TAS is becoming irrelevant. Not that I’m even faintly considering g
I will download, cut, insert, and visually doll up Hsieh here and maybe post to the list when I get a chance. I liked these two questions from her What I Say Goes podcast (Episode #63: Live Rationally Selfish Webcast) Forgiveness (18:07) <img src="http://www.vdoc.ca/images/teethingpain3.gif" width="44px" style="float:right">Is forgiveness necessary? Religious connotations aside, popular psychology often tells us that we must forgive those who have hurt us, even if they are no longer in o
I read Kelly Elmore's blog, Reepicheep's Coracle. She is a good writer and is both honest and sweet-hearted. If ever there was a warm and cuddly Objectivish mom (lashings of love while inculcating Objectivish virtues), this is she. Once in a while she gets handed the chore of selecting notable blog extrusions for Objectivist Roundup, and from her March 2 2011 list comes a post by Kate Yoak of Parenting is . . . Having also mentioned the bread issue at OL, I got a bit of a chill thinking that Hs
Is it true that all Objectivism stopped being created as of Rand's death? In the preface of Objectivism, the Philosophy of Ayn Rand (1991, henceforth OPAR), its author, Leonard Peikoff, wrote: We can only speculate about what OPAR would have been like, had Peikoff set aside "Ominous Parallels" and written OPAR while Rand was still alive and could guide and endorse it (as she did "Ominous Parallels"). But it still remains that, as Rand wrote in 1976 about Peikoff's lecture course on "The Philoso
I will tweak and then post this to the list. There is plenty of time to grow familiar with the electoral landscape in Egypt. You no doubt are aware of the constitutional changes pending referendum, and no doubt are aware that a raft of electoral law will need to be rescinded once new assemblies form. That's why I thought it was a good idea to see the first Islamist party out of the gates. Al Wasat has been trying to register a party since their split from the MuslimBoogeyhood. Their platform is
On the 'Boy did this one backfire!' thread, discussion has roamed over a few acres of various disputes, all tied to the Menace of Islam. At one point I wondered how Richard Wiig could be so confident about 'Sharia law in Canada.' That led to a schmozzle with Adam Selene, who forked up the first (incorrect) reference he could find . . . but eventually Wiig admitted he was wrong in his claim. But he didn't just say "I was wrong. Bite me." He added more material which led to more shmozzle in two ba
This is a placeholder for an ongoing experiment to open up discussion on OL. I am itnigued to see if anyone can answer a call to chat if we schedule an Open Mike Night or something. Some of us may be too crabby and suspicious to be right live conversation via keyboard. <a name="chatnow">OL Chatter Experiment</a> <IFRAME WIDTH="100%" HEIGHT="430PX" SRC="http://www.vdoc.ca/chat/chatIndex.php" TITLE="Chat Test WSS"> <!-- Alternate content for non-supporting browsers --> <
When I first started posting at Online O-world forums, I used 'the ick factor' to signify an unquantifiable je ne sais quoi in certain Objectivish utterances, such as the initial ARI response to the Boxing Day Tsunami. Here's a sample of what gets chatted about from Ugh, Solopassion.com, with Lindsay at the helm. An openline show with your kookiepants grandpa. Rather revolting. This is the man with the red button. Blech. Ick ick ick. 04:46:57 Lindsay Perigo You're reading me? 04:47:34 Lindsay Pe
Coming up on five years since I posted this horribly gushy [redacted] item below. Quel embarras! <div><img style="float:right" width="241px" src="http://members.shaw.ca/wsscherk/imgz/the_blog_345.jpg">Sunny Days ahead . . . I find the . . . site to be very impressive, with so many tools for communication. Props to the team. I am coming to the faith that a truly free site . . . may be like a map of the world. Looking out through the . . . window on my monitor, I do believe that the v
Off the top of my head -- make posts regularly, at least once a day -- make posts interesting -- make posts comment-worthy -- comment on what interests YOU -- comment on popular OL topics and threads -- link to interesting older OL topics and posts -- do an interview once a month with an OLer -- regular 'Friday Nite at the Corral" type chats?
I tried an experiment with an inline IFrame that inserts a live chat widget inside a post. Click link for the result. Kind of cool. Now I would like to see if I can raise some interest for a reasoned discussion/debate of Global Warming issues . . .
Principles cannot be property. An identification of "what is" or "what should be", once it has been shared with another person, is "free for all." The formulation of a number of identifications into a system of ideas is the intellectual property of the person who does the formulating. Objectivism as formulated in Galt's Speech (in For the New Intellectual, the speech is introduced with the words "This is Objectivism") is Rand's intellectual property. Objectivism as formulated by Nathaniel Bran
On February 3, 2002 on the old Atlantis email list, R. Christian Ross asked: "what, if any, ought to be the goals of Objectivism? If you were CEO of Objectivism Inc. what would you do? What is Objectivism 404?" Here are several theoretical topics in Objectivism that have long interested me, and which I think are crucial to its future viability: 1. Rand's Trichotomy. Starting with his lectures on Objectivism in 1975-76, Peikoff has warped the intrinsic-subjective-objective trichotomy, due to his
Welcome to my blog on Objectivist Living! As some of you already know, it has been my intent for over 40 years to propose and promote improvements to Objectivism, the philosophy developed by the Russian-American novelist, Ayn Rand, and her two chief spokesmen, Nathaniel Branden and Leonard Peikoff. I have done so through numerous essays published in magazines and journals since 1970, and I continue to write material for forthcoming essays and at least two books, one on false alternatives in phil
maybe you are very messy or just evrything go lost becuse you lost your memory how can you then be rational or know what you want to do to enjoye your life ?
These commentaries on Atlas will be relatively tongue and cheek. You've been warned. Marx was Right Many thinkers have noted the foundations of Rand's ideas rest a great deal on Marx. While I am no expert one immediate similarity is striking. Marx wrote that Capitalism reduces human relationships to cash transactions in the market. Old ideas like caste, chivalry, christian charity and everything else that impedes business has been wiped out. Rand capitulates and encourages this point with full g
I have been wanting to write something like this for a while and after having done a bit of thinking on Anthemgate, and looking at Art in modern society I have decided to finally put my thoughts down. One of the greatest problems in the Objectivist world today is stagnation. Put quite simply up until the election of the Emperor Mrs. Rands books and books to do with Objectivism were slowly growing in sales, however since Rand herself there have been NO major contributors to the Objectivist world.
There is a Latin saying when it comes to prayer "Lex Orandi, Lex credendi" this is often translated as the law of prayer is the law of belief. It may seem odd to speak of prayer in an atheistic context such as Objectivism, however this is to ignore the fundamental question of what is prayer. According to dictionary.com pray can mean anything from "to offer devout petition" to "thanks", "to make petition or entreaty". These definitions however are not an accurate description of what it means to p
That this even needs to be stated is a sad commentary on discourse in general. I have not found a standard formalization for defining the default scopes and definitions of terms and statements, so I am creating my own. This is all in an effort to thwart misunderstanding or intentional disruption. I'll modify the list over time. - The primary general rule is to assume the best and ask for clarification. Jumping to some conclusion will make you look silly. Getting me to clarify something dubi
As I write my first blog entry (ever!), I am reminded of the scene in "The Jerk" where Navin (played by Steve Martin) finds his name in the phone book: "Page 73 - Johnson, Navin R.! I'm somebody now!". This is not meant to disparage or diminish the postings of others, but to provide context for my own. That context is that I try not to take myself too seriously. If I manage to say something truly unique or insightful, I'll be as surprised as anyone. The purpose of making postings here is simi
This was my very first story idea as a sophomore in HS. Our regular English teacher had to take a leave of absence to care for her sick daughter. She was out for the full year (a blessing in disguise as her and I did not see eye to eye on how I should write). Ms. Lind was our substitute and stayed with us the entire year. She was a blessing. A couple months into the class, after completing a few writing exercises, she assigned us the task of writing a short story. A fault of mine is being w
