508 replies to this topic

[Lazarus Long]

I disagree that Science and Religion are necessary opposites of any kind, in fact the history of science demonstrates that ironically modern science owes its origins to religious attempts to achieve an "objective"or scientific understanding of God. The attempt failed but the methods have gone on to achieve some notoriety.

Regardless this is a semantic tangent and while pleasant debate it is a further distraction from the topic of this thread. The comment about science and religion is due to the comment you made that I quoted but it is not that serious an issue, and certainly not significant as an example of the thematic dialectical differences perceived to be inculcate between Capitalism and Socialism. So please proceed on that account but recognize that at the core of what is good and bad about political partisanship is that it is a Theocratic cause celeb and not actually understood by most that claim membership. The divisions into global sides is more a part of the problem then the solution for what is coming. Partisans make easier targets.

[thefirstimmortal]

...to the hope that Somewhere in our universe there exists a civilization whose inhabitants possess sole dominion over their own lives, where every individual has the ability to recognize and the courage to acknowledge reality...



... and where governments as we know them do not exist.


William C. O'Rights

[thefirstimmortal]

              So what massive changes do I want? Listen:

                     1) The same wages for ALL WORKERS

                     2) Democratic, governmental control of all fields of business

If the roads, the railways, the banks, the insurance offices, the great joint-stock companies, the universities, and the public charities, were all of them branches of the government; if in addition, the municipal corporations and local boards, with all that now devolves on them, became departments of the central administration; if the employes of all these different enterprises were appointed and paid by the government, and looked to the government for every rise in life; not all the freedom of the press and popular constitution of the legislature would make this or any other country free otherwise than in name.

[thefirstimmortal]

I've reread every post, and it would appear to me Mangala, that you have confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former promotes our happiness positively by uniting our affections, the latter negatively by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher.

Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one.

[thefirstimmortal]

whatever his errors otherwise, at least sees clearly that government is something lying outside him and outside the generality of his fellow men, that it is a separate, independent and often hostile power, only partly under his control, and capable of doing him great harm. In his romantic moments, he may think of it as a benevolent father, but he never thinks of it as part of himself. In time of trouble he looks to it to perform miracles for his benefit; at other times he sees it as an enemy with which he must do constant battle.

[thefirstimmortal]

   Please just answer this question Sophianic, do you value human happiness at all for anyone but yourself?

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Being happy is the conscious, rational effort to spend as much time as possible doing those
things which bring you the greatest amount of pleasure and less time on those which cause pain. Everyone ‘automatically makes the effort to be happy, so the keyword is “rational.”

To act rationally, and thus to experience pleasure and avoid pain on a consistent basis, you have to be aware of what you’re doing and why you’re doing it. If you are not aware, you’re not living life; you’re merely passing through. Because people always do that which they think will bring them the greatest pleasure, selfishness is not the issue. Therefore, when people engage in what appear to be altruistic acts, they are not being selfless, as they might like to believe (and might like to have you believe).
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[thefirstimmortal]

 Please just answer this question Sophianic, do you value human happiness at all for anyone but yourself?

I find it necessary to describe an old nemesis of mine, a creature who’s been running around loose on Planet Earth over the millennia, steadily increasing in number. He is the Absolute Moralist. His mission in life is to whip you and me into line. Like Satan, be disguises himself in various human forms. He may appear as a politician on one occasion, next as a minister, and still later as your mother-in-law.

Whatever his disguise, he is relentless. He’ll stalk you to your grave if you let him. If he senses that you’re one of his prey-that you do not base your actions on rational self-choice-he’ll punish you unmercifully. He will make guilt your bedfellow- until you’re convinced you’re a bad guy.

The Absolute Moralist is the creature-looking deceptively like any ordinary human being-who spends his life deciding what is right for you. If he gives to charity, he’ll try to shame you into “understanding” that it’s your moral duty to give to charity too (usually the charity of his choice). If he believes in Christ, he’s certain that it’s his moral duty to help you “see the light.” (In the most extreme eases, he may even feel morally obliged to kill you in order to “save” you from your disbelief.) If he doesn’t smoke or drink, it takes little effort for him “logically” to conclude that smoking and drinking are wrong for you. In essence, all he wants is to run your life. There is only one thing which can frustrate him into leaving you alone, and that is your firm decision never to allow him to impose his beliefs on you.

I suggest that the first thing you do is eliminate from consideration all unsolicited moral opinions of others. Morality-the quality of character--is a very personal and private matter. No other living person has the right to decide what is moral (right or wrong) for you.

[thefirstimmortal]

    The Virtue of Selfishness pg. 110

                     Notice Rand’s first criterion, “freedom of action.” Now, when she explains this concept in the next sentence she writes, “It means freedom from physical compulsion, coercion or interference by other men.” This is a contradiction that comes across so casually
                     that most people fail to notice it.

Like millions before me, I grew up cringing at the term self-interest. No four-letter word could compare in negative stature. Four-letter words were the ones you uttered secretly behind your parents’ backs. Self-interest was a term you didn’t utter at all. You learned to hiss and boo roundly anyone who proclaimed it a virtue.

Okay, without any pangs of self-consciousness, let’s get it out in the open once and for all: All people act in their own self-interest all the time. There, that wasn’t so hard, was it? Then why was it so hush-hush in the first place? What is it about self-interest that makes it such a menace to certain individuals?

The people who most dread widespread knowledge of the reality of self-interest are those who would like you to continue acting in their best interests. Rational selfishness is not a problem (i.e., selfishness that doesn’t involve forcible interference in the lives of others). The problem is the irrational selfishness of those who don’t want you to act in your best interest-who want selfishly to interfere in your life by encouraging you to do what they think is right. The individual who chastises you for being selfish is usually being irrationally selfish himself. That fact alone would not present a problem to civilization. The trouble begins when be becomes overzealous in encouraging you to do those things which give him happiness.

How can this person-an Absolute Moralist-coerce you into thinking of his needs first if you logically arrive at the conclusion that there is nothing immoral about acting in your own self-interest-that it’s perfectly normal? The answer is that he can’t. He believes that once you break the reasoning barrier and realize that to be selfish is not only natural, but virtuous, you can no longer serve his purpose.

That’s where the fallacy in his reasoning lies. The fact is that you could serve his purpose much better if he were willing to deal with you on a value-for-value basis. But that’s The catch. He is not willing to offer you equal for that which he seeks from you. He is not rational enough to understand that by appealing to your needs he could stimulate you to contribute value to his life voluntarily.

[thefirstimmortal]

    QUOTE
                        O'Rights   I want a government so small that it can't monitor my email, can't snoop in my bank account, can't tax my income, can't tell me how
                          to live.

                 Mangala    Are you a libertarian. I don't mean it in a bad way at all, I just am curious if you are.

The question of the relationship of individuals to one another and to the state has been debated for as long as we have records of human debates.

Today, as the inefficacy, indignity, and brutality of coercion become increasingly apparent to me, I am are embracing the philosophy of individual rights, civil society, and free markets.

Because of my growing disdain for government, I hold a libertarian philosophy.

[thefirstimmortal]

The advocacy of individual liberty against state power has gone by many names over the centuries, including Whiggism, individualism, voluntaryism, and radical republicanism. The meaning of the term “liberalism” had undergone a remarkable change. From a leave-us-alone (laissez faire, laissez passer) philosophy, it had come to stand for advocacy of substantial government intervention in the marketplace.

Eventually people began to call the philosophy of individual rights, free markets, and limited government-the philosophy of Locke, Smith, and Jefferson-classical liberalism.
As a supreme, if unintended, compliment, the enemies of private enterprise have thought it wise to appropriate its label.”

To younger generations, “liberal” has come to mean advocacy of big government: high taxes, the extension of the state into the realm of civil society, and massive intrusion into the personal choices of individuals. That word had long been used for the advocates of free will (as opposed to determinism), and like the word liberal, it was derived from the Latin liber, free.

We might define libertarianism as a species of (classical) liberalism, an advocacy of individual liberty, free markets, and limited government rooted in a commitment to self-ownership, imprescriptible rights, and the moral autonomy of the individual. But today any old-style liberal who believes in individual choice, private property, and the market process I suppose must by default call himself a libertarian.

[thefirstimmortal]

       So what massive changes do I want? Listen:

                     1) The same wages for ALL WORKERS

                     2) Democratic, governmental control of all fields of business

                     3) Six weeks of Vacation guaranteed to every worker every year

                     4) About the same education and medical care for every worker

                     5) Six weeks of taking some menial job for every worker in any field

Several central ideas of libertarianism: skepticism about power, the dignity of the individual, individual rights, spontaneous order, free markets, and peace, the idea of civil society, the virtue of production, and limited government.

Because libertarians respect each individual, we insist that he or she have the right to make choices and pursue projects in spite of what "massive changes" Mangala "wants".

[thefirstimmortal]

Socialism is an opponent to liberty. Because of the dominance of economic issues in our time, socialism is usually seen as the antithesis of libertarianism. Socialism, does not accept the industrial system and the liberal goals of freedom, reason, mobility, progress. Socialism does claim to accept higher living standards for the masses, but it tries to achieve these ends by the use of incompatible, conservative means: statism, central planning, communitarianism.

In practice, of course, full-blown socialism, includes the nationalization of property, so it proves the antithesis of liberty. The elimination of private property means the elimination of the principal source of resistance to state power. Socialism promises freedom, prosperity, and community but deliveres totalitarianism, poverty, and atomism.

William Constitution O'Rights

[thefirstimmortal]

The government controls all aspects of the country. That's what the freaking constitution is

The whole history and background of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights belies the assumption or conclusion that our ultimate
constitutional freedoms are no more than our English ancestors had when they came to this new land to get new freedom.

The historical and practical purposes of a Bill of Rights, the very use of a written constitution, indigenous to America, the language the framers used, the kind of three-department government they took pains to set up, all point to the creation of a government which was denied all power to do some things under any and all circumstances, and all power to do other things except in the manner prescribed.

Our Constitution may be "old", but it is not outdated, and at any rate not all old things are bad. The "evils it guards against” are "timeless."

William Constitution O'Rights

[Mangala]

You know, Lazarus, you actually may have a point here. The discussion is really starting to seem cyclical. Although I still do not believe we should start talking about wealth in terms of its ecological value or try to simplify this debate in the ways you have suggested, there suggests some sort of merit in the idea that this debate is almost entirely futile.

You see, at one point I had thought I had gotten through to someone:

Firstly I'd like to make sure it's clear that, I'm not linking you reforms to communism etc, as that involved jobs for life, no democracy, and other ideas that I am pleased to see you don't consider viable. Although (as I'm sure you're aware) your ideas would require careful supervision to ensure they did not become the first steps in a slippery slope to far more 'reforms' that could lead to complete destruction of the economy. Remembering that many revolutions started with people making more reasonable ideas, but then escalating, despite the efforts of the people orginating the initial reforms.

And of cause while the government is elected, there are many more people for individual to 'hide amoung' when responsability is called for, especially in the departments where people its not the elected people working, especially amoung civil servants. Also while the government does introduce some controls, it has a vested interest in companies making large profits, since these generate large taxes, and as aresult of the people in power being elected, they are often happy to see 'lax' controls from others, since it makes there revenure lager, and as they're elected, they often, know they when they're likely to notget in again, and so don't much care about the longer term consiquences. In all, the Companies are the ones that logically should be more worried about over exploitation of resources, )although often inexplicably they are not) since they will suffer the most from a loss of material supply, ie, they go bust.

Some independant body is needed, or more people who can see beyond, the next tax income report, or balance sheet.

Kyle65uk looked to me as if the first person to reply to my post without just clinging arbitrarily to capitalism. He seemed to actually give a reasonable, thoughtful argument about any flaws in my thinking he saw. But that one post seems to be the high point of the discussion in my opinion. This general decrease in discussion content is indicated by Mind's next comment:

I'd still rather have freedom, but that is just me.

That was the total amount of Mind's contribution to the discussion that day. It seemed to me that Mind totally disregarded everything I had said.

It's hard to have a discussion with so many variables to consider, so many good points forgotten earlier in this discussion, and of course, so many people who fully cling to capitalism when questioned about it's perfection.


The latest post by thefirstimmortal has brought me to almost a total dead stop. It runs on so many earlier discussions ignored, so many ideas forgotten, that I fail to see the justification for even trying to reply to his posts, specifically:

If the roads, the railways, the banks, the insurance offices, the great joint-stock companies, the universities, and the public charities, were all of them branches of the government; if in addition, the municipal corporations and local boards, with all that now devolves on them, became departments of the central administration; if the employes of all these different enterprises were appointed and paid by the government, and looked to the government for every rise in life; not all the freedom of the press and popular constitution of the legislature would make this or any other country free otherwise than in name.

What is it about self-interest that makes it such a menace to certain individuals?

Rational selfishness is not a problem (i.e., selfishness that doesn’t involve forcible interference in the lives of others).

The first quote has been explored fully, it's been looked at from both sides, analyzed, settled, disputed, and then left an open question. However that open question is not the same as the original argument. Socialist companies have been discussed, and democratic government interest in societal industry has been discussed. Maybe I will review it again to find out what you missed exactly.

The second quote has been answered by my friend's paper and by me many times, in which he states that self-interest can be detrimental to certain people because if it is not in someone's best interest to help someone, that hurt person will receive no help. It is true that everyone works in self-interest, but one of the main things associated with human self-interest is helping others. So self-interest goes only so far, but our ability to want to help other people can go farther. People like Sophianic have stated that the helping others element is not necessary and is deleterious to progress.

The third quote contradicts Sophianic's point about self-interest. He states that even if the person is being hurt by another person's self-interest, self-interest should still rule out. These conflicting arguments in virtually the same posts lead me to my new conclusion, that this debate needs to become something either more than just a capitalist vs. Socialist debate, OR, it might do well to end this debate, and go into individual smaller debates.

Does anyone here second my motion to agree that this debate relies on so many variables that the discussion becomes tit for tat? That anytime one person wants to make a logically proved point (from either side) anyone can just switch the subject? It might be fair to say that this thing has gone far enough, and it's time we get into the nitty-gritty. Please reply.

Sophianic, you seem to be quite bipartisan. Help me out here on your opinion.

P.S. Mr. O'Rights your size 7 font is becoming quite annoying as well as your inability to use it correctly, the two start and end font markers go on the extremes of the text, not the beginning. Your contribution to this topic should be just as valuable to anyone else here, as such please use the same size font as everyone else please.

[thefirstimmortal]

The government controls all aspects of the country. That's what the freaking constitution is

That is not what the Constitution is by any means.

The philosophy that the Constitution contains admonitions rather than definite, unequivocal prohibitions against the exercise of certain powers is wrong. I hold that if we are charged with no more responsibility than to treat the Constitution and Bill of Rights as admonitions, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights was not worth the struggle which brought it into existence.

“Absolute” power in the hands of one or many is synonymous with dictators; and “absolute” prohibition against the exercise of power in certain fields is quite the contrary.

Ultimately all questions in this argument really boil down to one-whether we will try fearfully and futilely to preserve Individual Liberty by adopting totalitarian methods, or whether in accordance with our traditions and our Constitution we will have the confidence and courage to be free.

William Constitution O'Rights

[thefirstimmortal]

The government controls all aspects of the country. That's what the freaking constitution is

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Why do the people support constitutionalism and the rule of law? Surely, some part of the answer to this question is that law, as it binds officials, is seen as a check on both executive oppression and bureaucratic caprice. “Law” takes its meaning partly from traditional and evocative precepts that in fact symbolize historic struggles for freedom from oppression: “Liberty under Law,” for example, and “A government of laws, not of men.” Surely, too, some part of the answer lies in the ancient and deep-seated belief that there are individual human rights that ought to be beyond the reach of any government, even the majority of a representative legislature. And perhaps it is not too romantic to suggest that the idea of “law” is also a response to an enduring human belief that in applying general rules to particular individuals, and also in protecting fundamental human rights against oppression by government, questions should be resolved not by force, not by the pressures of interest groups nor even by votes, but by what reason and a sense of justice tell is right.

William Constitution O'Rights

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[thefirstimmortal]

The government controls all aspects of the country. That's what the freaking constitution is

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At the risk of repeating myself, America is unique in all the history of the world. It isn't our natural resources, the character of our people, or its beauty that makes us special. Other countries can boast of similar things. The essence of America is an abundance of something rarely found in other countries: freedom from government and Individual Liberty.

America’s Founding Fathers established something unprecedented, the first government strictly limited by a written constitution to a short list of activities. The federal government was authorized to do only what was specified in the Constitution and the 14th Amendment applied that to the States as well.

The Constitution does not limit what citizens can do. Its only purpose is to spell out, enumerate, what was permissible for the Federal and State government to do. So began a momentous experiment to tame the monster that had enslaved so many people all over the world over all the centuries. And it was very clear to the fathers of the Constitution that government is a monster. As stated by George Washington "Government is not reason; it is not eloquence. It is force. Like fire it is a dangerous servant and a
fearful master."

The Constitution is the most successful attempt ever made to keep the dangerous servant from becoming the fearful master. And it made possible the freest, most prosperous country in all history. But our freedom to is under attack. Freedom and personal liberty will suffer extraordinary damage if this Mangala Socialism is allowed to be forced on all of us. His ideas intrusiveness cloaked in concerns about and emerging under the guise of improving the quality of life will slash-and-burn freedom.

We cannot spiral down and away from individual liberty and rights. We cannot reject the rights of each person in favor of the rights of the many or few. Group-rights mentality derives from the “progressive” concept that the individual must submit to what is best for everyone else or some other group of people. This concept, however, stems not from the ideal of Idividual Rights but from the well of Statism. Once we accept group theory, it becomes not only easier to reject individual rights but also actually essential that we do so.

The fires of freedom and civil liberties burn low in other lands, they must be made brighter in our own because the benefits of liberty are boundless and the tyrannies of government can be limitless as well.


Freedom, the greatest of all earthly blessings - give us that precious jewel and you may take everything else....
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[thefirstimmortal]

The government controls all aspects of the country. That's what the freaking constitution is

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In one of the most enduring liberal texts, On Liberty, John Stuart Mill set forth his principle that “the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.” (Other libertarian scholars would argue that “harm” is too vague a standard and that the better formulation would be “to protect the well-defined rights of life, liberty, and property.”) He also argued that the tasks of government should be limited-even if it might perform some task better than civil society- to avoid “the great evil of adding unnecessarily to its power.

[thefirstimmortal]

As a libertarian I have continued to examine the nature of power and to look for ways to limit it. I excoriate government as a “hostile power” but I do not hold out much hope for changing that. I fear that humanitarian impulses exercised through inappropriate means could lead even good people to wield power in dangerous ways. I take a radical view among libertarian scholars: that all coercive government is an illegitimate infringement on natural liberty and that all goods and services could be better supplied through voluntary processes than through government.

Constraining power is the great challenge for any political system. I have always put that challenge at the center of my political and social analysis.

William Constitution O'Rights

[Mind]

Mangala: When I said I'd rather have freedom. I MEANT IT IN THE PUREST SENSE. Libertarian Freedom or even Social Anarchy. I do not want reforms like you propose. They are restrictions on my freedom. I would rather live in the wild by the laws of nature than in a socialist democracy like those found in many countries of the world nowadays.

One thing I think you are forgetting is that you cannot control who is in control of the monsterous government you propose. When the person you vote for is in power, everything is good and fine, however when the power switches to a different individual or party that you disagree with...then you are up a creek. You have given the government massive powers and it may use them against you. This has been the case over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again throughout all of history. Governments have been the source of the greatest evil, the most death, and the most enormous environmental ruin throughout human history yet people continue to fork over all their rights to the government. More laws, more restrictions, bigger government, social planning. Why do people think it is going to work this time around. When it has never in the past. Why?

I am as exasperated as you on this topic.

[thefirstimmortal]

It's hard to have a discussion with so many variables to consider, so many good points forgotten earlier in this discussion, and of course, so many people who fully cling to capitalism when questioned about it's perfection.



The latest post by thefirstimmortal has brought me to almost a total dead stop.  It runs on so many earlier discussions ignored, so many ideas forgotten, that I fail to see the justification for even trying to reply to his posts,


The first quote has been explored fully, it's been looked at from both sides, analyzed, settled, disputed, and then left an open question.  However that open question is not the same as the original argument.  Socialist companies have been discussed, and democratic government interest in societal industry has been discussed.  Maybe I will review it again to find out what you missed exactly.


Mr. O'Rights your size 7 font is becoming quite annoying as well as your inability to use it correctly, the two start and end font markers go on the extremes of the text, not the beginning.  Your contribution to this topic should be just as valuable to anyone else here, as such please use the same size font as everyone else please.

I have reread everypost from the begining, I'm just warming up. Most of these topics have been anything but fully analyzed and settled. And unless I ask you a specific question, feel free to not respond, in fact if I ask you a direct question, feel free to not respond. I do so value everyone freedom to do or not do as he or she wishes.

As for font problems, for whatever reason, I can not seem to get these fonts working corectly, and I am not entirely sure that it is just my inability to use the fonts (although it may be). At any rate, if that's all it takes to annoy you, then you annoy easily.[/size][size=7]

[thefirstimmortal]

                     The second quote has been answered by my friend's paper and by me many times, in which he states that self-interest can be detrimental to certain people because if it is not in someone's best interest to help someone, that hurt person will receive no help. It is
                     true that everyone works in self-interest, but one of the main things associated with human self-interest is helping others. So self-interest goes only so far, but our ability to want to help other people can go farther. People like Sophianic have stated that the
                     helping others element is not necessary and is deleterious to progress.

That the quote on selfishness has been answered by you friend's paper and by you many times does not mean that everyone here holds to your assertions, and it does not mean that it is the end of the discussion.

One dictionary defines selfishness, in part, as “caring only or chiefly for oneself; regarding one’s own interest or advantage
chiefly or solely.” Like most dictionary definitions, this one tends to distort the issue. Whether you solely regard or chiefly regard your own interest are two different things. Again, selfishness is not the issue.
You will always act selfishly, no matter how vehemently you resist or protest to the contrary.

What you can choose is whether you will be rationally selfish or irrationally selfish. And it’s how you handle this ever-recurring choice that will determine whether your life will be filled primarily with pleasure or pain. If you’re rationally selfish, then you chiefly regard your own interests, but not solely. Simple reasoning tells you that you must regard the interests of others (though not all others) in order to obtain your objectives. Fellow human beings represent potential values to you in business or personal relationships, and the rational individual understands that to harvest those values he must be willing to fill certain needs of others. In this way, the most rationally selfish individual is also the most “giving” person, since he best understands the soundness of value-for-value relationships.

When an “unselfish” person does something for me, I'm not particularly impressed, because be “gives” to everyone regardless of his admiration or respect for them.

In fact, I fear such gifts, because I’m in the dark as to what the eventual payment-with compounded interest over a long period of time-might be. I’m not anxious to accumulate a lot of unspoken accounts payable. When, at some future date, the so-called unselfish person taps me on the shoulder and lets me know, in his own subtle way, that the due date has arrived, I may not be prepared for the shock.

Don’t fool yourself. Understand that the gifts from the professed unselfish almost always have hidden price tags-usually bigger ones than you would have been willing to pay had the price been made visible from the outset. And unknown prices have a way of coming due when you can least afford them.

[thefirstimmortal]

A Type Number One is an individual who understands and openly acknowledges that he always acts in his own self-interest. A Type Number Two is a person who understands that he always acts in his own self-interest, but tries to make you believe otherwise. A Type Number Three either doesn’t understand or doesn’t want to understand that he always acts in his own self-interest. He therefore feels very sincere when be tries to make you believe he’s thinking of you first. But, regardless of their reasons or what they profess, all three always do act in their own self-interest. And that’s the bottom line. A Type One tries to deceive no one; a Type Two tries to deceive you; a Type Three deceives himself first and unconsciously tries to deceive you second.

[thefirstimmortal]

Every word, every act and every situation is defined by, each human being subjectively, usually in such a way as to fit in comfortably with his actions and/or the circumstances of the moment.

We all are involuntary participants in the Definition Game. Because each of us is a unique human being with varying desires, tastes, prejudices, experiences and personality traits, we see things differently. The most prudent way of proceeding in life is to assume that everyone, consciously or unconsciously, uses a definition guide that looks something like this:

Good is what I do; bad is what you do.
Right is what I do; wrong is what you do.
Honest is what I do; dishonest is what you do.
Fair is what I do; unfair is what you do.
Moral is what I do; immoral is what you do.
Ethical is what I do; unethical is what you do.

And on and on the game goes. If you have an insight into how the Definition Game is played, you’ll be better equipped to look out for yourself. That’s because you won’t delude yourself into assuming that everyone else is in time with you when you think youre having a perfectly harmonious discussion. The story of life is filled with people nodding their heads in agreement, shaking bands, then facing each other in court somewhere down the road. No doubt there were many occasions when two cavemen grunted afirmatively and walked away apparently satisfied, only to end up clubbing it out a short time later when they realized they had misunderstood each other’s grunts. The two big advantages they had over us were that there were no attorneys around to make matters worse and they didn’t have to wait two or three years for their cases to come to court.

[thefirstimmortal]

                     The second quote has been answered by my friend's paper and by me many times, in which he states that self-interest can be detrimental to certain people because if it is not in someone's best interest to help someone, that hurt person will receive no help. It is
                     true that everyone works in self-interest, but one of the main things associated with human self-interest is helping others. So self-interest goes only so far, but our ability to want to help other people can go farther

but one of the main things associated with human self-interest is helping others
but one of the main things associated with human self-interest is helping others
but one of the main things associated with human self-interest is helping others


WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGH

Thus reads Big Brother’s slogan in George Orwell’s frightening novel, 1984. It is intended to be the ultimate in irrational slogans. Orwell demonstrates that people can be made to believe anything if they hear it often enough. Through slogans backed by traditional government force, all citizens in 1984 are whipped into line, conforming to the point where they’re virtually mindless, ready to accept any slogan as fact.

Governments, of course, are the masters of intimidation through slogan, simply because they have the money, the manpower and, if needed, the guns to back them up. My candidate for the most intimidating government slogan ever tossed at the American public was John F. Kennedy’s emotion-grabber: “And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.” The face was handsome, the personality pleasing, the smile captivating, but the words terrified me.

Let’s analyze this brilliantly conceived slogan carefully and logically. First of all, what is a country? It’s a geographical area composed of, in the case of the United States, over 350 million individuals. I’ve never asked 350 million people to do anything for me, except not to interfere with my right to live a peaceful life. Ask what you can do for your country? Does this mean asking each of the more than 350 million individuals what you can do for him?

No, individuals are not what Kennedy or any other politician has ever had in mind when using the word country. A country is an abstract entity, but in politicalese, it translates into "those in power." Restated in translated form, then, it becomes: “Ask not what those in power can do for you; ask what you can do for those "in power." You wouldn’t respond quite so eagerly if it were phrased in its true form, would you? On the contrary, you might laugh in disbelief.

In this way, government fraud continues each year, slowly but surely convincing the masses that hell is paradise via a never-ending stream of clouded or meaningless phrases and slogans: the good (?) of "society," your duty (?) to your “country, (?).

Remember the WIN button. (Whip Inflation Now)? We were supposed to believe that badges and words would somehow negate the government’s practice of pumping counterfeit bills into our money supply (the only true cause of inflation).

“Better dead than red”: Immediately we grab our pitchforks and lynching ropes and begin hunting for "communists" under our beds and behind our garbage cans.

"Give until it hurts": Hurts who? How much hurt? Why?

...And who shall draw the line?

[Lazarus Long]

William, it appears that in relation to the font issue it is the sequence (order) that is malfunctioning for you. Consider this something that can be quoted for the FAQ section as well. [!]

When you use the button it places too much information on the page because it puts the command for both the end of the segment and the beginning. Varying the numeric value will change the font size. The small, medium, and large choices are generic and can be altered by replacing the number {size=7} for a smaller or larger number {size=5} (notice I used a different brackett for the example). but the closure command shouldn't be left at the beginning of whatever segment being altered.

I usually erase the closure command {/size} and rewrite it manually at the end of whatever passage I am editing. Not erasing the extra closure command, or not replacing it where you want it to go will cause a default instruction that is inserted by the Word Processor program that will make it not close where you want it to and instead will recieve the automated command at the end of the entire post.

The buttons for font, color and size do not work the way the bold button does. Bold and quote only inserts half the command and allows you to move the cursor to where you want to insert the close command before applying the second half. The page edite functions are more broad and because of that are easier to confuse.

Usually the programmers believed that you would be insrting your text between the commands after apply the font, size, color choices to the entire page.

Does this work as an explaination? [*size=7] Text goes here [*/size] and I inserted the asteriks so as to disable the command.

To conclude and repeat: BOLD, Italics, Underlining, Quote, and cross through all work selectively but the page edit functions are more broadly applied so you need to micro manage the application by adding the step of correcting that close command function.

Have fun everyone and play nice.

PS. I will be doing some extended travel again so if any of you ever get around to actually responding to my posts in detail, then I might take a while before getting back to you. I am tempted to interject on Williams posts but I think for the moment I will let this false dichotomy ride until you folks resolve the minutia.

I think all economic theory can be reduced to evolutionary derived models for species related demand on environmental resource and individual concerns are AS legitimate as collective demands from a qualitative perspective but also are as vulnerable to an analysis of legitimacy as the collective's. There is the added concern that what works for individualized adaptive behavior can have devasting counter productive results if applied collectively, one such example is slash and burn agriculture. And there are some applications obviously of colective behavior that have devastating results for individuals as well, no matter how seemingly benign. The inverse is Agribusiness Industrialized farming that introduces problems with antibiotic resistence and adulterated foods that are inimical to individual health.

Again this is why I keep trying to get all of you to look at the same debate in terms of Evolutionary Psychology instead of the classic class/culture struggles that define the human perspective and tenents of the argument but ignore the larger collective perspective of ecological economy. Please take a few steps bac everyone and think about this synthetic proposal a bit. Class war will not be won by anyone but will instead function to destroy everything that humans value. All will lose by a return to a dark age for the survivors of such an apocalyptic conflict. Class war is not winnable by either the upper or the lower classes and it is an example of Mutually Assured Destruction ( MAD Warfare).

[thefirstimmortal]

Does this work as an explaination?  [*size=7] Text goes here [*/size] and I inserted the asteriks so as to disable the command.

Yes, I think that helps. We shall find out over the next several days. And thank you for your time attention on this matter, and the nice polite way that you have given me this info )

[thefirstimmortal]

             So what massive changes do I want? Listen:

                     1) The same wages for ALL WORKERS

                     2) Democratic, governmental control of all fields of business

                     3) Six weeks of Vacation guaranteed to every worker every year

                     4) About the same education and medical care for every worker

                     5) Six weeks of taking some menial job for every worker in any field

A question that has not been asked and answered.

Mangala, what if I or someone else does not want to take six weeks of what you consider a menial job? How will you enforce this on those who reject this notion? How different is this from slavery?
Who will decide what is a menial job?
Who will decide who gets what menial job?
How will this make any company more productive?

[thefirstimmortal]

Since everybody's the same, everybody has to do the jobs no one wants to do. Six weeks a year you will have to pick a job that not a lot of people have signed up for because you are not better
                     than anybody else.


I only said people who live in the socialist system would have to take time out of their work year to work as a trash man or a postal office worker.

Everyone "has to", in other words everyone will be "forced to". How free are any of us if we are forced against our will to do a job that we do not wish to do? What about the person who likes his job and doesn't even want to look even consider picking another job?

[thefirstimmortal]

From at least the time of the Levellers, libertarians have firmly defended the equal rights of all individuals. But the very term “Levellers” was a libel by their aristocratic opponents. The so-called Levellers did not want to level society, to abolish private property in order to bring about absolute equality; they wanted only to take away legal privileges and make men equal before the law. The chimera of equality has been a mainstay of socialist visionaries. Libertarians have understood that people have different talents and interests. That makes the division of labor both necessary and productive; and in turn the division of labor means that some people will prove better at satisfying the wants of others and will thus profit more in the marketplace. We cannot have a complex economy, in which people can develop their unique talents, without finding that people will achieve unequal results. Capitalism encourages the talented to prosper by “vying with one another in serving the masses” in order to make money.