Why did Dagny and Hank assume the motor had been invented by a single man?


brg253

Recommended Posts

Xray -

I can't figure out how you find it so hard to read something another writes and get the meaning - whether Rand or someone on this forum. But there's no point in continuing to attempt communication with you - - - either you are unable, or you are unwilling, to have a conversation. I don't know which, and I'm done with trying to communicate or to find out what the problem is.

Bill,

I keep seeing this moment come with one person after another and that is a good thing. Sometimes just saying something does not resonate with people, especially those who think for themselves. They are not content to simply read what someone else says, then follow it. They have to experience it on some level to properly identify it and judge it. Xray allows such experience to happen.

In your specific case above, the problem is with the word "conversation." You obviously mean a two-way conversation between equals. (I mean moral equal when I say "equal" here. Obviously, there can be a difference in learning, expertise, etc.) A person has to want to communicate in that manner before it can take place.

Those who use a plethora of persuasion techniques and rhetorical baiting maneuvers (like Xray) have anything but two-way communication between equals in mind. The meaning of conversation they practice is a bit different: two-way communication between a superior and an inferior in all matters. This is their underlying premise and it impacts every word they write or say.

Some call this having an agenda, but it goes further. Look close and you will see that it is stubborn blind prejudice at the root, and just as ugly as bigotry.

I suggest you take a good look at your interaction with Xray. Seriously. Reread some of that stuff and look for the following. You treat her has an equal. She treats you as an inferior—sight unseen—and constantly seeks ways to correct you, even to the point of constantly demanding you provide examples of your erroneous thinking (and your reasons) so she can correct them. When you show signs of signing off, she baits you by totally misrepresenting something you or Rand wrote, or by using Objective hot buttons (like saying you are "evading" as in this last case for an easy example).

You presume she is correct (or at least attempting to be correct) until she says something that is flat-out wrong. At that point you try to correct her. But she presumes you are flat-out wrong about almost everything except a bone or two she sometimes throws out (that also applies to Rand) and will employ any and all rhetorical and persuasion means to get you to fall in line, starting with doubting yourself.

I like her presence on OL because she is a great practical example of how intellectual poison is spread through persuasion methods, but inept enough to be obvious. You can learn much from her, not from her ideas but from her methods. All you have to do is look at her writing from a different angle (method instead of idea) and everything—all the perplexing misunderstandings and talking past each other—neatly falls into place.

Michael

Michael -

I have dealt with people with behavior patterns like Xray before. Full of words which careful analysis, however, reveals to be devoid of meaning. Just stringing words together may (occasionally) result in grammatically correct sentences. It is even less likely to produce something meaningful. Xray's behavior is a strange mixture - - - at times, seemingly that of a child who just keeps asking "why?" Other times, she reveals herself to be a manipulator - - continually taunting others, and urging them to provide argumentation/substantiation for their disagreement with her arbitrary assertions. Frankly my point of view if that one stumbles onto OL and proceeds to demonstrate a near-pathological misunderstanding of Rand's thought and writing, they have the burden of providing some actual argumentation before they can reasonably expect someone to spend time refuting them. Just as if I were to wander into a political discussion Newsgroup full of Obamaphiles I would feel it appropriate to document the reasoning behind my contempt for Obama - not merely to say the rough equivalent of "Obama bad. He say bad things! Prove me wrong" replete with out-of-context quotes from Obama.

Xray has yet to demonstrate that she has ever attempted to understand Rand's writing. She has demonstrated the ability to lift Rand quotes out of context and understand them in ways Rand explicitly indicates are wrong.

Xray's behavior is that of someone delighting in wasting other people's time. She probably believes she is "refuting" those with whom she disagrees - because they grow disgusted and bored and walk away. When her real situation is more like that of the small, misbehaving child who is eventually ignored, in disgust, by the adults. I have no idea how aware she is of her own behavior patterns. Perhaps she is deluded and behaves she is behaving rationally, in adult fashion. Perhaps she is just playing rhetorical games. I don't know - and perhaps she isn't either. The matters being discussed are sufficiently important that they deserve serious treatment - not Xray's childlike behavior.

I would be fascinated to see any case where Xray has been able to engage in actual, respectful discourse over an extended period of time with those with whom she disagrees. I haven't seen it happening on OL.

Bill P

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 488
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Everyone’s picking on Xray again!deadhorse.gif

I don’t want to get in the middle of one of these dialogues, but I came across an emoticon that I think has metaphorical value:survivor.gif

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Everyone's picking on Xray again!deadhorse.gif

I don't want to get in the middle of one of these dialogues, but I came across an emoticon that I think has metaphorical value:survivor.gif

VERY NICE...

The Survivor reality shows.

Adam

Bows gracefully, but never like the Mad Emperor O'biwan, probably was begging forgiveness for not sending 500,000 American boys and men to their deaths or as casualties.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Everyone’s picking on Xray again!

Typical "kill the messenger" behavior. Business as usual whenever the points raised in the discussion get too close to threatening cherished beliefs.

When personal attacks multiply, it is an indicator that a crucial issue has been touched. Therefore these attacks actually serve as litmus test.

I don’t want to get in the middle of one of these dialogues, but I came across an emoticon that I think has metaphorical value:survivor.gif

The emoticon you used is right on target: the ganging up is indeed primitive tribal behavior.

Edited by Xray
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Everyone’s picking on Xray again!

Typical "kill the messenger" behavior. Business as usual whenever the points raised in the discussion get too close to threatening cherished beliefs.

When personal attacks multiply, it is usually an indicator that a crucial issue has been touched. Therefore these attacks actually serve as litmus test.

I don’t want to get in the middle of one of these dialogues, but I came across an emoticon that I think has metaphorical value:survivor.gif

The emoticon you used is right on target: the ganging up is indeed primitive tribal behavior. :D

Ms. Xray:

"...it is usually an indicator that a crucial issue has been touched." NO source and no quantification in USUALLY*** except in your mind.

***

  1. Commonly encountered, experienced, or observed: the usual summer heat.
  2. Regularly or customarily used: ended the speech with the usual expressions of thanks.
  3. In conformity with regular practice or procedure: Come at the usual time.

Adam

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Now, now. Let's giv eXray Sunday and beat on her Monday.

--Brant

Words by the same poster who wrote that if he had been in Roark's place, he would have blown up the Cortland building too, and who, IIRC, also condones nearly all other acts of physical violence in Rand's fiction.

Edited by Xray
Link to comment
Share on other sites

AS, p. 948:

Dagny dining with the "altruistic" strawmen combo at the time the TT signal system totally breaks down:

Jim Taggart, Clem Weatherby, Floyd Ferris, Eugene Lawson, Wesley Mouch, Cuffy Meigs (god, what silly-sounding names these last two are! :rolleyes: )

By giving several of her "bad guys" names which would more fit a couple of clowns, Rand brushes the realm of comedy without intending to do so. For at the same time, she presents these men as dangerous. This is an example of ambuigity which in itself does not convey a clear meaning and would therefore not fit JR's subjective criteria.

"She saw that Eugene Lawson, the humanitarian, took pleasure at the prospect of human starvation."

So "altruists" want to see people die? Is that the bizarre message Rand wants to convey?

I don't recall having read any novel with more unconvincing "adversaries" opposing the heroes.

Imo the presentation of these people is the weakest part of AS. Rand couldn't do it. The ridiculous sentences they spout produce laughter (at least it did that with me), making the sessions they have slant too close toward an absurd comedy.

But Rand did not see these creations of hers as clowns of course. She took them so seriously that she did not even recognize she had constructed strawmen here.

Strawmen she needed to build her philosophy in opposition to those so-called "altruists".

Edited by Xray
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have dealt with people with behavior patterns like Xray before. Full of words which careful analysis, however, reveals to be devoid of meaning. Just stringing words together may (occasionally) result in grammatically correct sentences. It is even less likely to produce something meaningful. Xray's behavior is a strange mixture - - - at times, seemingly that of a child who just keeps asking "why?" Other times, she reveals herself to be a manipulator - - continually taunting others, and urging them to provide argumentation/substantiation for their disagreement with her arbitrary assertions.

. . .

Xray's behavior is that of someone delighting in wasting other people's time. She probably believes she is "refuting" those with whom she disagrees - because they grow disgusted and bored and walk away. When her real situation is more like that of the small, misbehaving child who is eventually ignored, in disgust, by the adults. I have no idea how aware she is of her own behavior patterns.

Bill,

Your entire post is quite insightful and it is refreshing to see someone see what I see, but express it from another angle.

I have a small difference, though. I no longer give Xray the benefit of the doubt. After seeing how she rewrote many of her posts from months ago to conform to current arguments in order to give new readers a false more self-flattering impression, I lost my respect and goodwill for her and started looking at her character.

We look at what people say and what they do to understand them. I find what they do to be a much stronger indication of character than what they say.

I also believe that she is aware of her own behavior patterns, I believe they are intentional (although many are performed ineptly technique-wise), and I believe she is playing to an audience—both the audience of OL's normal readers and a private audience where God knows what goes on. I personally think it is a group on some kind of mission and OL is her assignment, but I admit that this is only speculation. There are so many indications that point to it, though, that it is more than reasonable to entertain the plausibility.

As an added thought, I am pretty sensitive to this last because I have spent a lifetime of building things only to watch parasites come and destroy them. They always exhibit the same behavior and it took me ages to start recognizing the patterns. This is because I used to feel deeply in my soul that all people are good, so I would always give them the benefit of the doubt. I have since learned that when a person serves some group or another, or his own vanity, as a primary, he actually does become a very bad person. Once a person is in that category, I keep a cautious eye on him.

So far, Xray is an inept Elsworth Toohey working at Wynand's newspaper. Not an exact equivalence, since OL is not yellow journalism, but I am fully aware of how Toohey took over (and destroyed) the newspaper. Rand's description has been borne out in my life by watching how the parasites do. I have real-life referents for that particular concept. Too many, in fact. The moment I believe Xray will become competent in that manner, I will simply get rid of her.

And finally, on a vanity issue, I believe she basks in these discussions of her. She certainly preens in her posts about them. I don't mind feeding that particular vanity, though. The instruction from analyzing a specimen like Xray is more valuable than getting rid of the irritation.

Michael

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Typical "kill the messenger" behavior.

deadhorse.gif

Explaining a metaphor is the height of tedium, I avoid the Xray dialogues for just this reason. Nevertheless, note that when you beat a dead horse, the horse is by definition already dead. “Threatening cherished beliefs”? No, boring as reality TV.

survivor.gif

The emoticon you used is right on target: the ganging up is indeed primitive tribal behavior.

On Survivor, contestants are voted off the show, in accordance with defined rules, hardly primitive behavior. The ceremony concludes with their torches being snuffed out, cut off from oxygen (read: the attention of other posters). There’s another thread where the qualities of the “OL Tribe” are discussed; the designation is perhaps too similar to “The Collective” for comfort, but the irony is obvious in both cases.

"She saw that Eugene Lawson, the humanitarian, took pleasure at the prospect of human starvation."

So "altruists" want to see people die? Is that the bizarre message Rand wants to convey?

"In the early 1930s an assistant of Jane Addams, the famous social worker, went on a visit to Soviet Russia and wrote a book about her experience. The sentence I remember is: 'How wonderful it was to see everybody equally shabby!' If you think you should try to appease altruists, this is what you are appeasing." Ayn Rand The Sanction of the Victims

I’m going to take Muttnik for a walk, I could do with company that provides some degree of psychological visibility.laika.jpg

Edited by Ninth Doctor
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Explaining a metaphor is the height of tedium, I avoid the Xray dialogues for just this reason. Nevertheless, note that when you beat a dead horse, the horse is by definition already dead.

I know what the icon means, which is why I deleted it when quoting your post because it does not fit.

For the issue is about 'killing the messenger', not about beating a dead horse.

If you think you should try to appease altruists, this is what you are appeasing." Ayn Rand The Sanction of the Victims

I'm not "appeasing altruists". For altruists do not exist. Every so-called altruistic behavior can be traced back to self-interest. "Altruism" exsits as an ideological doctrine only.

Edited by Xray
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Explaining a metaphor is the height of tedium, I avoid the Xray dialogues for just this reason. Nevertheless, note that when you beat a dead horse, the horse is by definition already dead.

I know what the icon means, which is why I deleted it when quoting your post because it does not fit.

For the issue is about 'killing the messenger', not about beating a dead horse.

If you think you should try to appease altruists, this is what you are appeasing." Ayn Rand The Sanction of the Victims

I'm not "appeasing altruists". For altruists do not exist. Every so-called altruistic behavior can be traced back to self-interest. "Altruism" exsits as an ideological doctrine only.

Ms. Xray:

"For altruists do not exist." Not in your tautological definitional system. However, altruists exist as soon as you typed your sentence.

They exist as concepts that we are discussing on this forum.

Adam

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Jonathan,

On the matter of art, I am not a typical Objectivist (as you probably already perceived).

I do believe objective standards can be set for art, but we cannot sever either the creator, the consumer and the work itself from the equation and still call it objective. Once any one of the three is absent, you do not really have a work of art at all. (btw - In my view, the creator can also be a consumer.)

Since art appreciation deals with the inner realities of the consumer, the nature of those realities are on the table for me. And they include a lot more than volition, although volition is included.

Michael

In what way can a standard be objective?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Jonathan,

On the matter of art, I am not a typical Objectivist (as you probably already perceived).

I do believe objective standards can be set for art, but we cannot sever either the creator, the consumer and the work itself from the equation and still call it objective. Once any one of the three is absent, you do not really have a work of art at all. (btw - In my view, the creator can also be a consumer.)

Since art appreciation deals with the inner realities of the consumer, the nature of those realities are on the table for me. And they include a lot more than volition, although volition is included.

Michael

In what way can a standard be objective?

Xray:

You first. Give us an example.

Adam

Link to comment
Share on other sites

For the issue is about 'killing the messenger', not about beating a dead horse.

If no one engaged you anymore, would you call that killing the messenger? It would in fact be weariness at deceased equine abuse.

I'm not "appeasing altruists". For altruists do not exist. Every so-called altruistic behavior can be traced back to self-interest. "Altruism" exsits as an ideological doctrine only.

I was providing a concrete example of what Rand was dramatizing. You charge that she portrays “unconvincing adversaries”, I’m giving a real life example of just such an adversary. I didn’t say that you were appeasing altruists, how did you arrive at that interpretation?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

In what way can a standard be objective?

Xray:

You first. Give us an example.

I can't give any example of an "objective" standard. Can you?

Ms. Xray:

Mirroring does not work with me as you well know.

So you ask questions which you admit cannot be answered by you.

You are sinking fast Ms. Xray and the the vines you are grasping for have no anchors.

The quicksand of your weak argumentation is pulling you down to the depths of your own irrelevance,

Adam

sawing off anchoring vines with the sharp machete of logic

Link to comment
Share on other sites

In what way can a standard be objective?

Xray:

You first. Give us an example.

I can't give any example of an "objective" standard. Can you?

Ms. Xray:

Mirroring does not work with me as you well know.

So you ask questions which you admit cannot be answered by you.

You are sinking fast Ms. Xray and the the vines you are grasping for have no anchors.

The quicksand of your weak argumentation is pulling you down to the depths of your own irrelevance,

Adam

sawing off anchoring vines with the sharp machete of logic

If that "machete of logic" you claim to possess is sharp, then you should have no difficulty arriving at the conclusion that there exist no objective standards. If you think they do exist, please give examples.

Edited by Xray
Link to comment
Share on other sites

(Xray) I'm not "appeasing altruists". For altruists do not exist. Every so-called altruistic behavior can be traced back to self-interest. "Altruism" exsits as an ideological doctrine only.

I was providing a concrete example of what Rand was dramatizing. You charge that she portrays “unconvincing adversaries”, I’m giving a real life example of just such an adversary. I didn’t say that you were appeasing altruists, how did you arrive at that interpretation?

How reliable is what Rand quoted? I always try to get back to the primary source, which in that case ould be the book by Jane Addams' assistant. Do you know the title? Also, is it known in which concrete situation the statement was made? Were these the exact words? How well did Rand remember them? Did she give them a tinge they may not a have had?

All these things we do not know, so if you can help me to track this down, TIA.

I didn’t say that you were appeasing altruists, how did you arrive at that interpretation?

I was replying to Rand's words, so to speak, whose "you" was a general you addressed to the reader.

I would have asked AR: "Ms. Rand, do you believe that there exists any such thing as altruistic behavior without the person showing the behavior being moved by self-interest? Doesn't "altruism" merely exist as an ideological doctrine?

Edited by Xray
Link to comment
Share on other sites

In what way can a standard be objective?

Xray:

You first. Give us an example.

I can't give any example of an "objective" standard. Can you?

Ms. Xray:

Mirroring does not work with me as you well know.

So you ask questions which you admit cannot be answered by you.

You are sinking fast Ms. Xray and the the vines you are grasping for have no anchors.

The quicksand of your weak argumentation is pulling you down to the depths of your own irrelevance,

Adam

sawing off anchoring vines with the sharp machete of logic

If that "machete of logic" you claim to possess is sharp, then you should have no difficulty arriving at the conclusion that there exist no objective standards. If you think they do exist, please give examples.

Ms. Xray:

Your anemic attempts to embroil me in a conversation that you are not willing to have does not work.

Actually, you have provided me with one positive, in that you give me another piece of testimonial evidence to support my arguments for abolishing public education.

You would not be teaching in my school district.

Adam

preparing to clean out the Augean stables and deciding between a high pressure fire hose or a flamethrower...

Al Pacino on the Baird School from Scent of a Woman ..."I ought to take a flamethrower to this place!"

Edited by Selene
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The OL wolfpack is busy again, a nice example of the tribal mentality here. As always the pack is busy denouncing Xray as a person and psychologizing her, not her arguments. And in the rare cases that the arguments are mentioned, they are only used for some "Gotcha!" playing and in claiming spurious victories. At such moments OL is really not better than SOLO. I do have the suspicion that they cannot answer Xray's arguments and therefore try to discredit her as a person and her methods of discussing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The OL wolfpack is busy again, a nice example of the tribal mentality here. As always the pack is busy denouncing Xray as a person and psychologizing her, not her arguments. And in the rare cases that the arguments are mentioned, they are only used for some "Gotcha!" playing and in claiming spurious victories. At such moments OL is really not better than SOLO. I do have the suspicion that they cannot answer Xray's arguments and therefore try to discredit her as a person and her methods of discussing.

Dragonfly:

I am still surprised you see it that way,but so be it. At any rate, we would have to be a wolfpack...Ms. Xray is German...I mean come on, when at Buchenwald do as the Buchenwaldans do.

Adam

trying to recruit more killer wolf cubs to the Ms. Xray Jihad!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

How reliable is what Rand quoted? I always try to get back to the primary source, which in that case ould be the book by Jane Addams' assistant. Do you know the title? Also, is it known in which concrete situation the statement was made? Were these the exact words? How well did Rand remember them? Did she give them a tinge they may not a have had?

All these things we do not know, so if you can help me to track this down, TIA.

I’m not your research assistant, and if it turned out AR misquoted someone, it would be easy enough to substitute some juicy quotes from Mein Kampf or the Little Red Book to make the point about “unconvincing adversaries” and altruism.

I’m sure someone has recommended you read the essay Isn’t Everyone Selfish? and the rest of The Virtue of Selfishness, if not, read them and then make an intelligent critique of ethical altruism vs egoism. This is newbie stuff, a crashing bore.

You were mocking the Stolen Concept in earlier posts, you can read the original essay for free here: http://www.nathanielbranden.com/catalog/articles.php?tPath=2&page=2#

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now