 Government Holding Kids Hostage
by Joseph Rowlands
The state of California is once again having budget problems. It is spending far more money than it can extort through taxes. Instead of cutting spending, politicians have announced that without higher taxes, they will be forced to cut spending to public schools. "Your money, or your children's future!" (Read more...)
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Understanding Empiricism
by Joseph Rowlands
Empiricism, when defined, sounds somewhat reasonable. It suggests all of our knowledge comes from perceptual data. Seemingly, this is a rejection of a priori knowledge, or divine revelation, or any other form of knowledge disconnected from perception. And if that's all it was, it would be perfectly reasonable.
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Mitt Romney Was Right
by Tibor R. Machan
When during the last presidential election campaign Mitt Romney suggested that some 47 percent of Americans choose to be dependent on the government, he seems to have been right. (The exact number is probably impossible to ascertain.) And at this time, the Democrats are pretty much hoping that at least that ma... (Read more...)
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Why Justice is Good
by Joseph Rowlands
If someone hurts you, it's natural to wish that they would suffer in return. Unfortunately, many people are dismissive of this inclination. They call it revenge, treat as an animalistic tendency that humans should overcome and be ashamed of, and sometimes even refer to it as blood lust, as if it were a demand for viole... (Read more...)
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Teaching to Share
by Joseph Rowlands
One of the things that parents often do is force their children to share their toys with other children. Sometimes it is their own children, and sometime other people's children. There are many excuses given for it. One couple points out that the older child hasn't played with those toys in months or years, and is only... (Read more...)
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Question for Bernie Sanders
by Tibor R. Machan
"Would it be possible, under your socialist system, for someone to be a capitalist -- engage in production and exchange without being forced to stop doing so, just as it is possible for you to be a socialist under a substantially capitalist system?" Because socialism requires having everyone be part ... (Read more...)
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Thursday
December 10, 2015 |
Revisiting Free Will
by Tibor R. Machan
The Importance of having Free Will
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Wednesday
December 2, 2015 |
Voter Motivation
by Joseph Rowlands
Occasionally people will describe to me why they think people vote for certain candidates and policies. A popular notion is that the leftist politicians have widespread support among welfare recipients and others who are trying to get free money. And the corresponding belief is that conservatives are supported by peopl... (Read more...)
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Thursday
November 26, 2015 |
A Brief on Abortion Rights
by Tibor R. Machan
It is risky to reenter this discussion. I have entered it often and been not just criticized but also denounced for my position. This is that up to the point the cerebral cortex develops, a fetus isn’t actually but only potentially a human being. It may be useful to restate at least the outline of the ca... (Read more...)
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The Trump Idiocy
by Tibor R. Machan
So Donald Trump wants to keep "cheap" (foreign made) goods and services from reaching Americans! But the rub is that when barriers to trade are established, such as tariffs or quotas, folks are deprived of the chance to save and then purchase items they would like to have with the savings.
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Saturday
November 14, 2015 |
Entitlement
by Joseph Rowlands
There are two radically different views of altruism that are dominant in the culture. One of them sees helping other people as a form of generosity and charity. The other views it as a form of entitlement of the recipient. These views are incompatible, and have very different moral implications.
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Democracy - but only when it goes your way!
by Tibor R. Machan
Over the years of watching the democratic process I've noticed something important. People tend to reject democracy, indeed, fight it tooth and nail, when it doesn't go their way. But when it does, well, it is the tops.
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Getting Away With It
by Joseph Rowlands
It's always been known that it is easier to take what you want by force than it is to earn it. Production takes work. Theft is relatively easy. The problem for the would-be thief has always been that there are consequences. If they could just get away with it, it would be a much more attractive option. For many, that m... (Read more...)
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Government Budget Crises
by Tibor R. Machan
Geopolitics, History, and International Relations
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Wednesday
October 21, 2015 |
Controls and Powerlessness
by Joseph Rowlands
To understand some of the hostility towards free markets and appeal of government power, it's useful to think about things in terms of having control over your life. People want to have some amount of control over the things that dominate their lives. They don't want to be helpless as other people control their lives.
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Living Well
by Joseph Rowlands
Imagine you collect a group of Objectivists together and compare them to some average group within the population. To make it an even fairer comparison, lets assume the non-Objectivist group had the same average IQ as the Objectivist group, in case you assumed that the Objectivist group would normally be higher (perhap... (Read more...)
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Obama's Romance with Cuba
by Tibor R. Machan
I have always opposed the American government's policy toward Fidel Castro's Cuba. The trade and travel restrictions were wrong and un-American to boot! But I am also suspicious of President Obama's current initiative to treat Cuba as if it were some kind of benign country. It is still, as it has been for decades, a c... (Read more...)
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Why Hire Philosophers?
by Joseph Rowlands
Consider a thought experiment. Imagine universities/colleges were given up, and curriculum was decided by the students with the help of parents and advisors. In this world, you would decide what you want to learn and you'd take the appropriate classes. You wouldn't be forced to take additional classes, and every subjec... (Read more...)
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Obama and the Jihadists
by Tibor R. Machan
It puzzles many folks why Mr. Obama isn’t more vigilant about Jihadists, including domestic ones. I find his outlook uncomplicated.
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Saturday
September 12, 2015 |
From Selfishness to Rational Self-Interest
by Merlin Jetton
The title means a developmental transition. Something we learn when growing up is the existence of social morality. It consists of rules that require or prohibit action that humans direct to one another to engage in, or refrain from, certain kinds of action. This is only part of morality. There is also what makes a goo... (Read more...)
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Saturday
September 5, 2015 |
Dead End in Understanding
by Joseph Rowlands
One of the major problems with explaining anything by attributing it to a god is that it permanently severs the need to look deeper. If thunder and lightning are the products of an angry god, then you never need to look for natural causes. You have an 'answer' that tells you nothing, and suggests that any more detail i... (Read more...)
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The Social Metaphysics of Facebook
by Kevin Graham
A Canadian value investment analyst employs Nathaniel Branden's theory of social metaphysics to examine the Facebook phenomenon. (Read more...)
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Machan's Archives: Peddling the Corruption of Liberty
by Tibor R. Machan
Ever since the idea of individual liberty has achieved some measure of credibility over the world, those who would be unseated by its limited triumph had to find some way to discredit it or trump it somehow. One way was to re-christen servitude, to make it appear like an even more important kind of liberty than... (Read more...)
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Individualism in the Right Key
by Tibor R. Machan
Individualism is the view, put briefly, that human beings are identifiable as a distinct species in the natural world and have as at least one of their central attributes the capacity to be unique rational individuals. (Read more...)
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A Problem with False Dichotomies
by Joseph Rowlands
A common source of problems in philosophy is when two things are connected, but the connection is not obvious. What often happens is that some people accept one without the other, and other people accept the reverse. Each picks a side and sticks with it when they can't figure out how to have both. This is a source of f... (Read more...)
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