Dan Haggerty

The reference is to the Black Sabbath song although it is also a personal quip I use since I manage truck drivers. Managing drivers is the equivalent of herding cats at times so the concept of building purpose out of chaos fits. Actually, I don’t know who Perigo is. I just assumed Jonathan was making light of the references I alluded to in my post. The truth is I’m still navigating all of this mess in Objectivism with these personalities going off at each other. I have the bad feeling I have a lot to still catch up on to get to the “big picture”. Part of me just wants to say screw it but if I want to get involved I know I’ll need to get the 411 (and there seems to be a lot of it still). I was using the proper Doctor Who reference. I love the show although I’m rather weak on all of the classic episodes. In fact, on the other site I’ve looked up your signature several times on the lark it might read “Bow ties are cool” in Latin. Anyway, thanks man!

Thank you. Fun thing about the truck driving, I laughed outloud at dinner when I read the passage in Atlas Shrugged when Taggart is talking to the truck driver. Wonderful site you have by the way!

Greetings! The title is only part tongue in cheek… I followed a link on Objectivism Online (user name Spiral Architect) from the Ninth Doctor over to this site’s Anarcho-Capitalism debate, discovering this site in the process. And what a great site you have here! I’m impressed by the articles you have here; it is a literal El Dorado of intellectual articles and sources. I commented in that thread on what a grand debate that thread was and Dennis Hardin asked for feedback. After getting time to work up some intelligent feedback I discovered the original thread on OO locked. Not that I blame them, the original post was the silly idiocy that is Checking Premises further compounded by the original poster. I don’t want to get into the negatives of that however so I’ll save it for some other post. Bottom line is I followed the link to post a response and instead got lost exploring Objectivist Living. This site looks like it addresses one of the complaints I had made in that thread, one that I should explain. Plus it will help as an introduction. I actually read Rand for the first time back in ’89-90. Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal was first which a friend told me about then the non-fiction followed (and the rest soon thereafter). I had dropped out of college and ended up driving truck, something I did for a good chunk of the 90’s. The great part of that was the fact I got to read a ton of books, listen to tapes (Second Renaissance was a good source back then), and see the country. The bad news is that I honestly had no idea of these schisms and fighting going on. I imagined a world where all of those people were still working together and cranking out books. Yea, I was in for a surprise. I got a hint when one book mentioned Branden was no longer associated with Objectivism but I just chocked that up to friendships falling apart (it happens). It was disappointing since Branden wrote some of my favorite parts of VOS and his lecture series from the NBI days was golden, but hey things happen and who cares since there are no conflicts of interest amongst rational people, right? Besides, Branden’s later books were great, I had read them and they were solid reading that helped me out during that period. I eventually went into management at that company and moved on from there but still had no contact with any self-described Objectivists. I had some libertarian friends (I also considered myself a libertarian as well at the time) but evidently living in conservative West Michigan isolated me well from meeting Objectivists or getting up to speed on… well everything It wasn’t until I started going to Freedom Fest in the mid 00’s that I bumped into the Branden’s books (Judgment Day and the Passion of Ayn Rand) and asked the guys working the Laissez Faire Bookstore what they were about. I got caught up to speed real fast that day (in retrospect the look on everyone’s face at that table was pretty priceless). I never have read those books but I did pick up the Contested Legacy of Ayn Rand since I loved Kelly’s The Art of Reasoning, and discovered that whole mess as well. That led to “Fact of Value” which should have been a hint but I naively still didn’t get how far this had gone. No conflicts of interest, right? Recently I finally got off my rear and started really looking online to meet other Objectivists. I went through some forums and blogs (I don’t know if I saw this one or not, I think not but some of the columns look familiar) but that is where I discovered this disappointing “culture” (for lack of a better word) of Objectivists literally eating each other alive. It’s almost pathological how gleefully some people love to trash someone they likely agree 90% with. Sorry, time to head off the rant. This is still too fresh and… disappointing. Metaphorically speaking I went looking for a few people in Atlantis to talk to and got Checking Premises. Not that I expected a perfect world but I certainly thought the universe would be more benevolent, so to speak. I can only imagine what this does to new people reading the books for the first time. I think that is what I find so frustrating. Part of me is fine with all of this since I have had 20+ years to get comfortable in my skin but those exploring these ideas for the first time are going to discover a mess. Someone needs a foot up their ass. The positive is that I found a decent site in OO that seems to be neutral territory in all of this insanity and posting there led me through the Doctor to discover this site. This looks like it’s even more open to honest debate and ideas with none of the inane off limit topics or heresy people. Plus the articles I have read so far are a joy to read. To wrap this, in addition to ideas (obviously) I’m a big fan of science fiction and fantasy art, but my big passion is music. I love Rock and Roll with an emphasis on classic, hard, and heavy metal (including some extreme branches). I actually wrote a column on it for years so hopefully I can contribute someway here eventually. So hello and I’m really looking forward to reading through the site and getting to know people!