Samson Corwell

How?

That seems a little harsh.

That's a word I haven't heard outside of the Great Wiki.

This doesn't seem to fit in with Lawrence Krauss giving the foreword to your book on atheism.

Well, I happen to think that Mises' proposition is nonsense. Perhaps he meant it in a broader sense. Could counter-examples "falsify" a theory in some way?

Is there a difference between "reasonable" and "rational" here like the distinction Rawls drew?

Would you move to the Kingdom of Ends if you could, George? (Yes, I know it's not an actual place.) Also, you ever get the feeling he was playing on "Kingdom of Heaven" with that name?

This…is…so…cool! We've found the Higg's boson, we've found magnetic monopoles, and now we need to find the graviton!

I like his theories much better than Locke's.

I'm wondering if there is a name for this fallacy. I hear it all the time in politics (and sometimes from people on this board). Anyone have any ideas?

Oh, yeah. I remember that. It was a rather interesting and unique argument for it. Something about being non-universalizable, instead of the usual stuff about social instability, obedience to authority, and so forth. Could you elaborate on his social contract theory and what you mean by consent being hypothetical? I know that his view of it was that the CI morally compelled everyone to set up an "ethical commonwealth". Aside from that, though, would you say that his view of actions, them needing to treat people as ends, is inspiring?

How so?

Would you consider Kant the "most liberal" philosopher?

I think the first is meant to contain the second.

Social Democrats are just supportive of welfare and labor as far as I understand it. If the Scandinavian countries are social democracies, as is commonly held, then I don't see much resemblance to socialist countries that used to exist. (Cuba is probably the last socialist country. I don't know what to call the Hermit Kingdom, which looks like some bizarre hybrid of monarchism, military rule, and other things. It's a fascinating polity, in a morbid sort of way. North Korea certainly is not Marxist, since it holds man to be the shaper of history instead of the other way around.) It's not that social democracy is anything of particular interest to me. I find all politics and forms of government interesting. One difference I can spot between social democracy is that it is comfortable with the existence of businesses and that socialism aims at worker-organized industry. Or something like that. Labels abound. I should note I have never felt comfortable with the oh so popular sliding scale of capitalism and socialism. Never said being a social democracy is a good thing, Mortal, only that there is a difference between being one and being a socialist "republic". Sanders is wrong, I believe, to call himself a socialist. The general public doesn't seem keen on the details of certain labels. It's kind of like how free market capitalism and crony capitalism are another source of confusion, wouldn't you agree?

Every standard except the lopsided American one.

Wait, so other people do not believe in objective morality?

The idiot who said philosophy is "useless"?

Oh, for God's sake. The man is a social democrat, not a socialist. I don't care if he does call himself one.

Yeah, well what if you are a masochist? And "low-life mass men"?

Sorry about the size. Just got one more:

Boy, it's been a while since I've been here. Anyway, I wanted to start a thread about evil fictional characters, to see who you guys would nominate. There are gut wrenching villains like Hannibal Lecter and Ragyo. Then there are the more, I guess, iconic bad guys who are more about being the best villains out there. Rand's villains were pretty original, but I just don't think they were really evil. Here's someone who I think looks pretty damn cruel and hellish:

I ran across this idea recently and it's left me scratching my head. One person I was reading said that no taxation means that there is no government. This seems a little counter-intuitive to me. Do you think taxation is an necessary to that government exists? I can easily imagine, say, a small town with town hall meetings that might not have taxes. Likewise, I wouldn't be surprised if some or many of the initial settlements in America were without taxation given the lack of infrastructure.

I think it's erroneous to call the Spartan model "state education". The divide between society and state, something which I think is flawed, didn't exist as a concept back then. I don't know, it just seems to strange to project our understanding of "public" and "private" onto a situation that existed before it. If you go up to most people and talked to them, I don't think they'd see much of a divide between government and their community.

The silliness of his statement is only second to the nitwits who claim net neutrality means government can ban certain content.