Danneskjold

I don't think the term "convert" is specific to religion. To convert someone is to change their beliefs. Who cares if it's in regard to religion or philosophy?

The Prestige is hands downt he best movie I have seen that doesn't have a quote on my signature . It is about two competing magicians. They are both obsessed,in the most literal sense of the word, with their trade. The story line is truly amazing with plot twists that are VERY hard to see coming. I would suggest this movie to anyone who is willing to sit and really watch what's going on. If you don't watch you won't get it. As the movie says,

I'm currently working on a convert. The kids a republican, most of the right ideas. Doesn't put enough limits on the state government in my opinion. Smart kid really, he just needs a few nudges in the right direction. With any luck you'll see him here soon.

I have trouble finding objectivist friends. The kids at my school are predominantly people who have never earned, and therefore don't know the value of, a dollar. As a result they are more than willing to give everyone's money to somone else in the interest of the collective.

Joke Answers: Hugh Hefner (in his prime), Chuck Norris, Babe Ruth...and maybe Dimaggio while he was married to Marilyn Monroe. Real Answer: Well, this almost forces you to choose someone who was a bad person because it makes you want to make it so you could undo whatever they did. In that case, I would have be Marx and off myself before I could come up with a theory that wrought destruction and poverty wherever it was applied. If I was to choose someone who I would geniunly enjoy being for a day I really don't know who I would choose. My first choices are all baseball players because that is where my passion lies. So maybe Jorge Posada or Yogi Berra. If I was to choose a politician I'd say Reagan, a man who I can genuinly respect.

apparently

I'm the youngest. I'm about five months younger than Inky I believe. I choose to take pride in that though.

Here's a question. What would be in our self-interest about allowing the people in our country to die and suffer because of a natural disaster that was no fault of their own. (Unless you believe in Global Warming) Besides, most charitable donations are tax deductible anyways so it's not like you're taking a large chunk out of your wallet. A reason to give money that is in your self interest is because, in cases such as Katrina, a city like New Orleans is a major city with large amounts of people with large amounts of income that is lost if they are lost and die. Also, this doesn't necessarily fall into the hands of private charities. Wouldn't saving people from a natural disaster fall under the jurisdiction of a nation protecting it's people?

Jeff, 16, Oregon. Became an objectivist while reading Atlas Shrugged in 8th grade.

I ran into Atlas Shrugged while in a bookstore by complete chance back in eighth grade. Probably one of the most lucrative investments I have ever made was buying that book. After all, the increase in knowledge I gained from that book will help me make far more than the nine dollars it took me to buy the book itself. However, I am not sure about the reality of getting the average high school student to read what is essential a 1200 page tome of a book on philosophy. If a teacher were to assign it, they would either have to assign excerpts or they would have to make an entire unit out of it. That book would take the average high schooler a quarter to read. ARI is to be commended for their effort, but do you think perhaps there is a book that would affect the same change as Atlas Shrugged without the obvious downfalls?

Thank you Ellen. Now I know what happened. So what happened exactly once the split was complete? What are the differences in philosophy? I understand that Peikoff worships the ground Rand walked on, and I presume that the Brandens hold Rand in a respectable light intellectually at least. Are there any other major differences than how strictly someone follows Rand?

Unforunately for me, I strive for perfection. What this means when I'm writing a story is that I can never get past the first two pages on Word because I spend all my time editing them instead of creating new material. So here is the first bit of a story I started and am hoping to someday further. Then there were three. Just like that, one of our clique gone in the blink of an eye. I could hardly believe it was true as I saw her lying naked, dead, on the bed in the hotel room. Blood staining the linens, even splattered on the wall, result of a hard blow to the head. Cause of death: blunt force trauma. Those lifeless eyes were unceasingly staring at the ceiling, a look of fear and pain frozen onto the corpse's features. Pre-mortem bruising was showing itself all over her body. A pair of black and blue hands wrapped around her neck never loosing their grip. Here's the start: The police circled her, taking DNA samples from her body, vying to find the fingerprint of the unseen aggressor. A strange mix of horror, wonder, and sorrow swirled through my head like a hurricane sweeping every other thought away. I could scarcely control my impulses. Every muscle, bone, and fiber in me wanted to cry out all at once. They wanted to go up and shake her, the figure who was once my friend, which lay on that bed in a futile attempt to bring back what was lost. That figure had once been my best friend, once been my love. But now, it was a mass. A pile of flesh, it had no heart beat, no brain activity. The friend that I had held nearest my heart, the woman for which I desired, was no longer either of those. She had been reduced to a lifeless pile of skin, and bones. Even in death she retained her beauty, her long brown hair straightened just past her shoulder blades, the feminine perfection of her face was still apparent through the horror that seemed so out of place on what I knew to be such a happy and loving face, the curvaceous beauty of her body remained in tact. But her soft, tan skin had long since grown cold. What haunted me deepest was that I knew that all that was left of her were the memories. The now vivid recollections of her beautiful smile, unceasing wit, and gentle kindness, and a case number, had become all that was left behind to console her loved ones. That's all I have right now. I would love input on what I can do to improve. I'm debating where to go with this story though. Whether I want to turn it into a chase or a mystery and how to transition into either.

The one thing I must say about Objectivists is we seem to be extremely fascinated with our own intelligence. Now, it may not always be a bad thing to think and speak intellectually, but people here refuse to explain in layman's terms what happened with Objectivism and the whole split story. I don't know what the hell's going on with you guys. The whole split preceded my birth by about twenty years and so I have not the slightest inkling of what's going on other than that according to the Brandens they got screwed and according to one of the other groups the Brandens deserved it. Also I've drawn that Ayn Rand wanted to make sure that her philosophical discussion left no room for interpretation, which I can understand seeing as according to Objectivism there's always only one correct answer. So please, for my sake and perhaps the sake of some other members, will someone explain the split up of Objectivism in a nutshell and with words that a person with a good vocabulary but perhaps not an extremely advanced one.

Dragonfly, he should be concerned because people with little knowledge about a philosophy can be turned away from it if they see criticism of it. The shortcoming is in the person being turned away, not the philosophy in this case, and the philosophy will have lost a potential subscriber to a criticism it could have withstood.

I'll go paragraph by paragraph here. Note that I can only explain to the best of my knowledge as a young human being and young objectivist. People don't have to think in a language to have knowledge. If you couldn't think without language, then how would one go about creating a language? He wouldn't be able to think and therefore wouldn't be able to create a language. Also, I know a girl that immigrated to America from Vietnam. I once asked her what language she thought in to which she replied that she didn't know. Language is not a necessity for thought. When I'm doing a basic math problem, I don't think about it. 2+2=4. This is logic. I don't have to think about it in English to know this. This would be true, if there was something to say that the reality that we percieve and our perception of reality is different. A=A but A=B if B=A and A=A. If all variables are taken into account then it doesn't take any faith whatsoever to believe in logic. The question with logic is whether or not all the variables in an equation are present. This is why Rand said, "Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong." Because sometimes logic is applied incompletely or incorrectly.

The way I see it talent is, to a small degree, inborn. However, the talent lies not in talent for a specific thing but in general abilities. Some people are born with extremely well honed fine motor skills. I would say that girls are more likely to possess this trait than boys because I see girls who consider their drawings bad when guys think they're great. I have a particular talent for playing baseball. Baseball always came naturally to me because I was born with a sturdy bone structure, above average eyes, and have always had excellent eye hand coordination. This made it so that I have always been inclined towards being better at baseball as opposed to someone who is tall with a slimmer bone structure. The development of my muscles, the chosen path of my swing, and the accuracy of my throws are all learned traits and not natural born talent. Because of my genetics I have been inclined towards having talent, because of my work ethic I do have talent.

Hello there, I'm sorry about the fake name as the display name, but I'm only a sophomore in High School and therefore must live by the rules of my house. Parents say I shouldn't post my real name on the forum so I don't. I'm glad to find an objectivist forum that isn't full of people bowing before an idol of Rand. I don't know a lot about objectivism, but I'm hoping to learn from those here.

Correct answer: I choose to stay here. Hmm, you like rain? I would say you should move to my neck of the literal woods. I'm up in Oregon (ore gone not Or ee gone) plenty of rain, rarely now, lots of trees. In spite of my general spite directed towards it's rain (I'm a baseball player) I do have to admit that it's beautiful. Got the beach just an hour away and all. However, we're among the states that are quickly regressing towards socialism, or as much so as is possible on a state level.

I'm an INTJ loud and proud. Except my introvertedness is weird. You get me with enough people and i go extraverted but other than that I'm strong on all those. I like it. However, it's a little weird when I go on trips with my baseball team and such. I tend to be the butt of most jokes because I act unusually. For instance foruming when I could be getting with girls. O well, all in the life of a high schooler.

Wow, I can just imagine the :hug: and the :hyper: right around :santa: that time. How does this work do you just go up to someone and :poke: them with the pecker? Wow I'm bored. :devil:

Anthem was the last fiction book I read by Rand. I suppose I read them in the wrong order because I started with Atlas Shrugged and so on down the line in longest to shortest order. Reading Anthem was fun for me. I was on a two hour plane ride and was able to read it in about thirty minutes between naps. The book is well written for sure. The only problem I've ever had with the book is that you can't give it to a person in order to show them the value of Objectivist philosophy because people refuse to believe that the society in Anthem is so far removed from what we experience daily.