Neil Parille

I've never been a huge Coulter fan, but I think she is correct here. Contrary to "open immigration" Objectivists such as Harry Binswanger, there is nothing mystical about crossing the US border that causes a change in people's culture. If Mexico has a disfunctional culture, Mexicans will tend to keep that culture here. Coulter points out in her column that there areas in the USA where the police have given up prosecuting statutory rape because the Mexican parents don't think it's a big deal for a 13 year old girl to get impregnated by a 30 year old. I don't agree with Coulter that people don't vary in their innate agression. Certainly males are more predisposed to violence than females. -NP

Valliant called into Amy Peikoff's radio show recently and said he is working on PARC 2.0. -NP

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/yaronbrook -Neil Parille

Mark from ARI watch has written an excellent examination of the ARI and Binswanger immigration position. http://ariwatch.com/OpenBordersAndIndividualRights.htm -NP

I skimmed it and NB said that he wasn't able to cooperate with Barbara in PAR because he was already working on his own book. Another PARC claim down the drain. -NP

Betsy Speicher once said that when Rand's library was sold there was a heavily annotated copy of The Critique of Pure Reason. I think this is an urban legend, but what do I know. -NP

This is so stupid you have to wonder if it was deliberate.

I can't think of a single good thing that has resulted from Islamic immigration to the west. I just saw on CNN that there have been 4 plots in recent years to attack cartoonists or newspapers by Jihadists that have been thwarted. -Neil

I enjoyed this article by Derek Parfit on the subject, http://www.lrb.co.uk/v20/n02/derek-parfit/why-anything-why-this Bill Vallicella has a good discussion of the Objectivist "arguments" against God - http://maverickphilosopher.typepad.com/maverick_philosopher/2013/07/allan-gotthelf-on-ayn-rand-on-the-existence-of-god.html -Neil

Kant is quoted to the effect that "I have restricted reason to make room for faith." Seddon said in JARS a few years ago that this quote is subject to a multiple interpretations. Well Fred says stuff like that about everything. -Neil Parille

Robert, I've seen Kant described as an atheist, agnostic and deist. It would be interesting to see how Kant was received in his life and the next generation. Did his readers think he was planning on destroying the mind, saving orthodox religion, or designing gas chambers to kill Jews (as Peikoff thinks)? -Neil

That's unlikely since Kant didn't pray, go to church, believe in miracles, and got in trouble with the established Lutheran Church of his day. Other than that he was a fine Christian. I seem to recall Barbara saying that she and LP would summarize contemporary philosophy for Rand. I don't think Rand read much philosophy from the 40s on. For example, in her discussions with Hospers (in Letters) she used the term "modern philosophy" (Descartes forward) to mean "contemporary philosophy." I seem to recall a Q&A where she understood "intentionality" to mean "volition." NP

Doris Gordon passed away recently. http://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/doris-gordon-rip/ -Neil

Am I the only one who think that Orthos like Schwartz can't write something without quoting Rand or slamming some Ortho-approved bad guys sounds a little cultish?

The discussion begins starting around 7 minutes to the end. Amy says how great The Passion of Ayn Rand's Critics is. I sent Amy an email with my a link to my essay (http://www.scribd.com/doc/9421651/The-Passion-of-James-Valliant-s-Criticism). I don't imagine she'll write me back. -Neil

Jim says he is working on updated PARC, but no date. He should have a book out co-written with someone called Creating Christ. Jim plans to do for New Testament studies what he did for Rand studies with PARC, I guess. NP

For some reason I decided to listen to Amy Peikoff’s radio show and Valliant called in and basically took over for 1.5 hours. At the final ten minutes he talks about PARC and his future writing plans. http://dontletitgo.com/2014/11/21/why-obamas-amnesty-is-worthless-to-immigrants-and-the-rest-of-us-tonight-at-8-p-m-pt-11-p-m-et/ NP

Brant, He dictated a lot more letters than Rand wrote. He conquered multiple nations. A comprehensive biography is a big deal. Rand's life was by comparison relatively simple. A few books and two or three locations (Russia, California, and NYC). Maybe Milgram is a slow writer or maybe she knows who butters her bread . . . . -Neil Parille

How long does it take to write a biography of someone? Rand wasn't Napoleon. She stayed in her apartment for the most part in her later life. Alister McGrath wrote a biography of CS Lewis in a couple years. He read everything he wrote (books, letters, etc.) in chronologal order. Not hard, unless you are concerned about who butters your bread. -Neil Parille

Once this is over CNN will have to start searching for the Malaysian plane. -Neil Parille

It's tempting to say "where there's smoke there's fire." Most rich, controversial celebrities don't get these kind of attacks. On the other hand, I have no way of knowing, just like all sorts of claims of child abuse leveled against an estranged spouse. NP

It will be interesting to see what happens when Peikoff passes away. Will the authorized bio finally be published? NP

Michael, All I meant was that when I hit right-click on my mouse in an OL comment box, instead of the usual "cut, copy, paste . . ." stuff, I get a "save page as, view background image, select all, this frame" box.

I wrote a critique of Valliant's book For some reason I can;t cut and past the URL. Just search: "Parille Valliant Passion Criticism" and you should find it. NP

Consider what would happen. Mexico has a population of around 120 million. I saw a pole recently that said something like 35% of Mexicans would come to the US if they could. The numbers for other Central American nations are as high. Even the legitimate functions of government would be overwhelmed. Binswanger says he's against anarcho-capitalism, but it seems to me that open immigration of his variety would lead to something like that. There are 2 billion Moslems in the world and they have produced 2 Nobel prize winners in the hard sciences. That's the same number as Luxembourg (population 500,000). The idea that the US is being held back by not having unlimited immigration is rather silly. -Neil Parille