Ayn Rand Fan Club podcast

[ThatGuy]

14 minutes ago, MisterSwig said:

Our new episode is an interview with Gennady Stolyarov II, a longtime fan of Rand who is now the chairman of the Transhumanist Party, a political group that supports policies favoring life extension research and technology, with the goal of eliminating the problems of aging and death so people can live healthy, immortal lives. Check it out!

 

Stolyarov...the guy who used to used weird spellings like "filosphy" instead of "philosophy"? Something about "An Objective Filosofy of Linguistics"...

"Were I the sole individual employing the English language, I would initiate a thurow reform effort to rebuild it from the ground up.  Nevertheless, I would like to first focus attention on one adjustment, so as to reveal the basic premise behind the filosofy of linguistic innovation, which has in fact shaped language throughout the centuries, and has probably always met a tuf crowd of warrantless traditionalists and collectivist orthografers.

"The improvement of the language should be gradual, with time windows given for the proliferation and assimilation of each individual reform. The orthografic consistency of 'f' sounds should be a sufficient amelioration for at least the next three months. Afterward, further faults of the language should be pointed out and remedied. "

http://rebirthofreason.com/Forum/GeneralForum/0209.shtml#4

 

[tmj]

wehn you pnoedr it, slinpelg is not trerfalialcy iopmrnatt.

[MisterSwig]

On 10/10/2021 at 10:55 AM, tmj said:

wehn you pnoedr it, slinpelg is not trerfalialcy iopmrnatt.

You misspelled trerfaliilcy.

[MisterSwig]

On 10/10/2021 at 10:38 AM, ThatGuy said:

Stolyarov...the guy who used to used weird spellings like "filosphy" instead of "philosophy"?

That's how it probably would have been spelled had it not come from a Greek root word. Personally I appreciate the variety of English spellings for the same sound. But as long as I understand you, I don't care very much how you spell a word, unless you intentionally scramble the letters, which is annoying and a waste of my time when you bust my crow with such silliness. It takes extra time for me to unscramble longer words.   

[MisterSwig]

Our new episode is an interview with Richard Ebeling, the BB&T Distinguished Professor of Ethics and Free Enterprise Leadership at The Citadel military college. We discuss how he was introduced to Objectivism, his role in discovering the lost works of Ludwig von Mises, and his new article on Marxo-Nazism. Check it out!

 

[MisterSwig]

This episode was recorded last year, before Scott and I started doing the show together. It is him interviewing me about my background coming out of a Protestant worldview and becoming an atheist and Objectivist. Scott also asks me about his favorite subject, life extension, which takes us on several philosophical tangents.

 

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

William,

I have comments coming before too long.

Been really busy.

Wait for it. Wait for it. Wait for it....

You know you're gonna like it...

 

Michael

 

[anthony]

There is certainly - imo - an inverse relationship between duration (lifespan) and "value".

Remember Rand's "immortal, indestructible robot"?

Which can hold no values because it has no temporal limitations (along with no biology).

[MisterSwig]

Supposing it becomes possible to live forever through technological advances, we would still need to value those advances in order to keep our lives. So unless we effectively destroy our biological nature in favor of transferring consciousness to robot bodies, I don't think we'll ever stop valuing things. (Not that I believe we could actually transfer our mind into a robotic system.)

[anthony]

Values, which are identified, discovered, created, nurtured, protected, developed and so on: "the motivating power" of one's actions and essential to our "psychological as well as physical survival" (from AR).

Therefore, and self-evidently, one pays for one's values with one's resources, the currency being energy and thought and dedicated application etc. ... and time.

"A part of one's life". Rand

["Since a value is that which one acts to gain and/or keep, and the amount of possible action is limited by the duration of one’s lifespan, it is a part of one’s life that one invests in everything one values. The years, months, days or hours of thought, of interest, of action devoted to a value are the currency with which one pays for the enjoyment one receives from it". ]

Time passing by is what we know gives our activities a distinct *edge* - or urgency. The investment of a proportion of one's life time, that pays off in fine emotions when the values are worthy and objective ones.

However, given (in theory) unlimited time or lifespan, what I'd call the valuing capacity must - at some point - gradually decline. (As if one had an endless supply of counterfeit money to pay for goods with. The values gained would lose their value-significance).

Up until that point of decline, an extended while equally healthful lifespan is a desirable goal, you bet. I venture it may not (eventually) be much more than 2 x present life expectations to be biologically/technologically etc. feasible. That could be badly wrong. Developments will arrive more rapidly. While not close to the extremes of life extension you propose Mr Swig! But I am not knowledgeable on the mechanics of life extension. Rather, the nature of mind and the psychology - pertinent to human longevity - fascinate me more about this subject.

 

 

 

 

[MisterSwig]

Here's another episode for you. This time we have two guests, Andrew Bernstein and Dave Goodman, to discuss the Kyle Rittenhouse shooting and trial, the left's attacks on property rights and self-defense, and whether the collectivist left is worse than the religious right. I hope you check it out. I appreciate your responses on this thread.

 

[MisterSwig]

It was a real treat to interview the artist Michael Newberry and ask him about his paintings and thoughts on art and postmodernism. I learned a lot from his book, "Evolution Through Art," and I love his nude called "Winter." Please check out this episode!

 

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

MS,

When I came up from Brazil and first started posting online on an older O-Land forum, Michael was the first person to extend kindness toward me. I never forgot that, not even today. We were friendlier back than and I used to call him "Namesake." But we drifted in different directions, not as opponents, but as people with different interests. 

 

I met Michael in person for the first and only time at a memorial service for Barbara Brandan several years ago.

I looked at him. He looked at me. I said, "I'm Michael Kelly."

He said: "You look a lot younger than I had imagined."

I couldn't think of anything to say except harrrrumph at the time, but I kept my peace and mumbled something or the other.

Maybe I should have told him he looked older than I imagined.

 

 

btw - That's just funnin'. (It's a true story, though.  )

Michael is good people. I like him.

Some others have tangled with him at times on OL, but, hey.

This is OL. Tangling is part of what O-Land people do.

 

Michael

[MisterSwig]

22 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

He said: "You look a lot younger than I had imagined."

Maybe he was trying to pay you a compliment?

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

1 hour ago, MisterSwig said:

Maybe he was trying to pay you a compliment?

MS,

Ain't goin' there.

Ambiguity is your friend...

(Or at lease mine...)

Michael

[MisterSwig]

Is "It's a Wonderful Life" a good or bad movie? Yaron hates it. We disagree and challenge his view in this episode. We argue for a more comprehensive and favorable appreciation of this Christmas classic. Check it out!

 

[tmj]

You made it into my algorithm, opened the Youtube site and this episode was among the first six 'suggestions'

[MisterSwig]

This time we interviewed Phil Magness of AIER. He's the economic historian who got the Collins-Fauci emails through a FOIA request and exposed their unscientific attempt to smear and "take down" the Great Barrington Declaration. We also ask him about his work exposing the factual and philosophical problems with the 1619 Project. Check it out!

 

[anthony]

I was certain while events were unfolding in the US, that corona plus lockdowns were being used, by some or many, as the perceived means to unseat Trump through social chaos and the economy's dip. The same conviction continuing now into the vaccine mandates: the perceived means to get at, hurt, conservatives, "Trump supporters". You could call that political-ideological motive the main item on the menu or the side-dishes, but this is a dirty and open secret few others want to admit.

[tmj]

In America Trump supporters are obviously being targeted, but the targeting doesn’t seem isolated to the US. Governments throughout  , at least , the western world are targeting certain segments of their populations.

Authoritarianism on the rise or global out pouring of humanitarian governments? 

[anthony]

1 hour ago, tmj said:

In America Trump supporters are obviously being targeted, but the targeting doesn’t seem isolated to the US. Governments throughout  , at least , the western world are targeting certain segments of their populations.

Authoritarianism on the rise or global out pouring of humanitarian governments? 

Almost identical, allowing for different political/cultural contexts. Since, who precisely are the "certain segments of their populations"? Very broadly, they are those countries' conservatives too, who are being - selected for ostracism. An easy target today.

I know many personally and read of more from several countries. They tend without exception to greater self-reliance and self-responsibility. They object to being ordered around by authority figures. Many are family-orientated and moderately/highly religious and patriotic, others more libertarian (roughly) and individualist like my irreligious friends. Far from 'anti-science', everyone I've come across has delved into the pandemic/vaccine science. Typically, they certainly know the subject better than the knee-jerk "get the jab, you selfish morons" vaccine pushers I've heard. They are seriously more properly self-interested and knowledgeable about their and their families' health, rights and freedoms than any. 'Humanitarianism' by Govt. (and the public) is lately always accompanied by authoritarianism. We want to help! (Later): Then, we will have to force you to be helped.

[MisterSwig]

I'm often late to these conspiracy-type theories because I'm naturally skeptical of such large-scale conspiracies. But I've modified my view in that I think these things might start with a few clever people realizing the strategic political ramifications of an idea like city and statewide lockdowns, and then they advocate the idea and shape it into a form that suits their political purpose rather than, in this case, a proper public health one. (What is "public health" anyway? It's a messy concept that should also factor in the effects of lockdowns on people's health including their living and working conditions.) And since these clever people have power and influence, they inspire and direct the actions of many people who might not even consider the longterm ramifications of lockdowns. They fall under the spell of authority and accept whatever bullshit propaganda is associated with the action.

[tmj]

Those clever type people have had conferences in recent memory 'war gaming' how lockdowns would be utilized. I haven't looked to closely at their specific recommendations, but I suspect the situation they present is 'what to do in the event of an outbreak of a black plague mixed with a little ebola type contagion'. If there is sustained evidence that the world is exposed to such an event I assume the 'public' would pretty much lock themselves down and a lot of the planning needed would be more in line with how are we to safely ensure the continuance of bare minimum necessities and how to manage the safety of truly essential roles in society.

The "Two Weeks To Flatten the Curve" wasn't an entirely hard sell, it felt like Covid , at first, may have had the potential to be such an event, or at the very least erring on the side of caution wasn't the most irrational play. It 'felt' like a bottom up , all for one and one for all acquiescence/ zeitgeist.

But it wasn't too long before the evidence for the plague at scale just wasn't, it then pretty quickly changed to top down strictures , I think there could be some real room for coincidence and other such; blatant incompetence, bureaucratic mismanagement/malfeasance ect, but at some point whether or not it started top down, it certainly is now and it is also very clear, that the reaction was not/ is not commensurate with the overall threat to 'health'.

Whether "The Cabal" did it, or lots of little "cabals" did it, or the world wide cluster fuck emerged organically the biggest question is what in the fuck do we do about it now? "We" broke or let a lot of shit get broken, and it needs to be fixed.

[anthony]

On 1/9/2022 at 6:13 PM, MisterSwig said:

I'm often late to these conspiracy-type theories because I'm naturally skeptical of such large-scale conspiracies. But I've modified my view...

Me too. Because I've heard some plainly, crazy ones I have been generally skeptical. Why should they all be crazy, however? What occurred to me is that that dismissive rubric, "conspiracy theory" must also have been utilized as a cover for, indeed, some people getting together and planning/plotting a mutually desired outcome. Men always will and have co-operated, rationally, why should I assume they don't, "irrationally" (in their common 'self-interests') too?

So plenty of truths will be buried by corrupt conspirators who can simply ridicule their attackers: "those right-wing conspiracy theorists". Like calling someone "racist" or "sexist", the label sticks lacking any or little evidence, and they can escape just censure by blaming their blamers.

Then, it seems easy for me to imagine an influential person x calling up y (and others in political/corporate power he sees have the same outlook), suggesting how, by exploiting this fortunate chaos, we can discredit or rid ourselves of our hated political leader; punish his supporters; and maximize the damage to the economy; and, the global economy; ultimately therefore undermine Capitalism itself. Not that far-fetched. Not if a socialist utopia, coupled with vast wealth and absolute power for some select few to control the masses, is the perceived aspiration.

Could one trace back further, and claim a vaster conspiracy by e.g. China, initiating the predictable chain of events in the West? If not, of exploiting the presented situation, conspiratorially too? We well know the CCP's global ambitions, so the possibilities should be considered, not rejected out of hand. 

It's useful to remember that their subjective 'belief' in those destructive ends, no matter how nihilist and impossible it seems for sane people to conceptualize, is what rules such conspiracists. Maybe one can too easily dismiss as fanciful (and "arbitrary", heh) any 'conspiracy' accusations, as "unreal", made of such successful, apparently sophisticated, intelligent, well-educated individuals. One would have to place oneself in the conspiracists' subjectivist mindset to see they absolutely believe in their righteousness, of their judgments by feelings. With political, corporate and media power at their bidding to enact their beliefs, by influencing millions of minds, they are dangerous, even in their unreality.

To look at the enormity of how billions of lives and livelihoods (etc) - 'life', itself - were reckoned to be worthwhile sacrifices to a pandemic, involving holding back vital information while exaggerating the virus' severity equally for all ages, suppressing rights, getting people to imprison themselves voluntarily in their homes while businesses and many other ventures went under, deliberately restricting and ridiculing the fundamental science of herd immunity during the pre-vaccine period, and then blocking those likely life-saving medications, and so on, up to Gvts still now, making lives miserable by mandating often superfluous and ineffective (at limiting transmission) vaccines - conducted by the very experts, Pharma, journalists and 'crats who *know better* -  I think some amount of conspiratorial methods (evil, I've no hesitation naming them) - if only from minor participants sharing unspoken, tacitly-agreed upon motives -  have been at work. 

[anthony]

On 1/9/2022 at 6:13 PM, MisterSwig said:

 They fall under the spell of authority and accept whatever bullshit propaganda is associated with the action.

Those with independent minds of course aren't affected by the propaganda and "the spell of authority". Viewed as "the clash of religions", the Leftist dogma has to be swallowed wholesale and en masse for the believers to achieve their desired outcomes.

By their lights, compared to a hardcore leftist, at least, the Christian conservative is clearly far too independent. He/she have their own highest "authority" (And - possess individual "souls"). Therefore, is a threat to secular authoritarians, a feared opponent to be overcome.