ilstar

Ellen, From what I gather about these individuals, they have different identities. If we can hypothetically trust him, Bill Harris told me that Eve is his daughter, and Andie is her best friend. They came to the forums to prove to themselves that Ayn Rand and her proponents are crazy. Thank you for the recommendation, but I want to use a different method. I am currently writing up a long response to him, in hopes of shooing him off from my blog. If this won't work, I don't know what will. But banning him is a bit too strict, unless he would call me names worse than "schizophrenic." Currently, I don't see him as a "fraudulent poster" but merely as an irritating critic who doesn't read what he criticizes. There are plenty of those, you know, even among professionals. Regards, Ilya

Ellen, I'm glad that you found my blog "interesting." I have much planned for it, especially a series of posts on aesthetics. Unfortunately, I am a little (that's an understatement) teed off by a commenter on my blog who leaves acerbic cricicisms. I would have been fine if he were an Objectivist, but he is not. In fact, he is a Kantian, an anti-Objectivist, and I've had much trouble with him, considering that I haven't overcome my anti-Kantian tendencies after reading so much Rand. My year-long argument with him has spanned over 50 essay-long responses, and it is seemingly never-ending. If you want me to keep the blog alive, I ask you to help out. Your help would be in overcoming this commenter named Bill Harris. His comments are on the top two blog posts: "The cycle of the great chain of being" and "Beyond fear and powerlessness: meditation on the nature of emotions." A little background: Bill Harris is a pseudonim for an individual who frequented Objectivism Online Forum (and was banned from it). He has a PhD in anthropology and two masters degrees: in biochecmistry and philosophy (with a thesis on Kant's third critique -- of judgement). He had also visited the Marxist revolutionary forum (revleft) per my request and had been (correctly) labeled there as a positivist bourgeoisie and was banned from there as well (ironically, I think). I don't ask you to agree with anything I wrote in replies to him, since those are my personal views, but please show at least that his ideas are not welcome. I am sure you would find some of them quite distressing. Also, I do not want to ban him, since that would mean that he would have achieved victory. He needs to be overcome by more than only my views. Thank you for your time, Ilya

I was 15 when I first moved to the U.S. And it totally changed my life. Before I came here, I was more social and less intellectual. Once here, I only concentrated on academic work, and now I can't even go a day without reading something

Oh, sorry. Notifications are set to none by default on this forum. I hail from Objectivist Online Forum, and there it was different. I was born in the Soviet Union.1 In the chaos of the 90s my parents moved to the US and I joined them in the summer of 2001. I currently reside in Streamwood, IL. Honestly, the US is better in many respects than Russia. But I still feel that I belong to Russia, since I find it easier to communicate with and understand Russians. I think it has to do with how I associate myself more with Russian (Eastern/mystical) culture than with Western/objective civilization. Sadly, I prefer to live in the U.S. with no social life. 1 I originally wrote the Russian Federation, realizing now that I hail before that time.

Hi, my name is Ilya, and I am new to the forum. I am expressing my Objectivism-inspired ideas in more detail on my blog. I was hoping you would help me generate some engaged discussion there. My blog is: Beyond Ayn Rand's Objectivism: http://beyondaynrand.wordpress.com/ Just so you know, I wrote it in a linear fashion -- the top posts proceed from the bottom ones.