 Anarcho Capitalism as an Inevitable Consequence of Minarchist Libertarianism - A Personal View
by Duncan Bayne
I see the division between anarcho-capitalism and minarchist-libertarianism as false and unnecessary, because there is a natural and inevitable progression from a genuinely non-coercive minarchist-libertarian government to anarcho-capitalism. One is simply a subset of the other: minarchist-libertarianism is simply anarcho-capitalism with one provider holding a (most likely very short-lived) monopoly. (Read more...)
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Machan's Musings - Never Mind How Much Worse Things Could Get
by Tibor R. Machan
Sure, a problem with the less Draconian evils of the welfare state is partly that they could habituate people to accept coercion from governments, making the march toward a dictatorship more probable. However, that’s not the biggest problem. It is far more serious that the welfare state is a lingering political, moral, and economic malady already—it constantly violates individual rights, and people suffer from that plenty. Never mind how much worse it all could get. (Read more...)
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 Inside the Mind of a Megalomaniac
by Luke Setzer
If you still cling to the evil notion that you have the "natural right" to make your own choices about anything, rest assured that when we elect me as World Chancellor, we will adjust your attitude—permanently. (Read more...)
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Machan's Musings - Pitfalls of Predictions
by Tibor R. Machan
I think it makes sense not to be too trusting of the social scientists' way of thinking about people, as if we were simply more complicated versions of some classical physical system whose outcomes can be predicted if the parameters are known well enough. People will probably keep surprising us, for better and for worse—that, in fact, is one way they are different from the rest of the matter in the world. (Read more...)
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 Shaman, and the Evil I
by John Paul Sherman
Should one be non-transgressing, Yet have this curse hurled at his heart, The bane becomes a blessing. (Read more...)
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Daily Linz 17 - Friday Miscellany
by Lindsay Perigo
PC; Diana; MSK.
Political Correctness-loathers everywhere may be interested to learn that New Zealand’s National Party, which came within a whisker of winning power in the recent general election, has appointed the world’s first Political Correctness Eradicator. (Read more...)
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 Ayn Rand at the West Virginia Philosophical Society
by Fred Seddon
The West Virginia Philosophical Society met on Oct. 21-22 and celebrated, in part, the hundredth anniversary of her birth. Six of the twelve speakers, including the keynote speaker, addressed topics on Rand. (Read more...)
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Daily Linz 16 - Fundamental Stuff 4
by Lindsay Perigo
As Objectivists, we should hold the thought that Pythagoras’ doctrines were to resurface in Plato—to devastating effect. While there is no denying his groundbreaking, fruitful brilliance, the fact that his discoveries were steeped in mysticism set the scene for Plato’s full-on rationalism and intrinsicism, with everything that implied for the future of Western thought and civilisation. (Read more...)
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Machan's Musings - The U.S.S.R. Didn’t Fail Because of The U.S.
by Tibor R. Machan
If anything, because the U.S. and U.S.S.R. were allies against Nazi Germany for the latter part of the Second World War, the U.S.S.R. had U.S. economic support back then. That support continued for many years thereafter. In the ensuing time, until its collapse, the Soviet Union was not impeded economically by the U.S., but mostly left to its own resources. (Read more...)
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Wednesday
October 26, 2005 |
A Review of Virginia Postrel's "The Future and Its Enemies"
by Edward W. Younkins
This well-written, readable, and insightful work defies conventional political boundaries by arguing that a more politically relevant categorization is achieved by defining the ways individuals and groups view the future. Ms. Postrel's book is a must-read for anyone interested in commerce, technology, public policy, and the search for truth in a dynamic world. (Read more...)
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Wednesday
October 26, 2005 |
A View of Heaven
by Marty Lewinter
Atheists view death as it really is—the final curtain. In the realization that life does not go on forever lies the potential for heroism. To write a symphony at death's door is the badge of a brave soul in love with life. (Read more...)
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Daily Linz 15 - This Cheek's Not For Turning
by Lindsay Perigo
Michael wants to do his bit in ushering in the age of the soft-sell and bringing an end to religion-“bashing.” Well, if he were advocating clarity without dogmatism, KASS without hysteria, reasonableness without appeasement, I would agree with him. But as far as I can tell, he’s pitching for an Objectivism that is New-Aged to the point where it is not only unrecognisable as Objectivism, but is antithetical to it. (Read more...)
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Russia: Hail the Good Revolution
by Peter Cresswell
The October Revolution of 1917, commemorated today, leaves nothing to celebrate. But the October Revolution wasn't the only Russian Revolution that year, and it wasn't even a real revolution .... (Read more...)
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 The Rise and Fall of Melody in 5.1 Surround Sound
by Joseph C. Maurone
Rand's depiction of a mangled Halley composition proved to be prophetic in the wake of the technological attack on melody in modern music. (Read more...)
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Machan's Musings - Entitlements Versus Rights
by Tibor R. Machan
A great many entitlements people now have by law can be seen to be wrong whenever they involve the violation of our basic rights. In time, however, it will become evident that this is a very bad development—for example, by the emergence of enormous deficits and police actions against innocent people who simply wish to hold on to what is theirs or do what they freely choose to do. And we are beginning to witness such developments around the country and the world. (Read more...)
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To Turn or Not to Turn - A Question of Cheek
by Michael Stuart Kelly
Are religious principles like turning the other cheek really anti-Objectivism? There goes that little child inside me again. He tells me that Ayn Rand’s heroes turned the other cheek all the time in her fiction. (Read more...)
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Machan's Musings - A Backlash Against Pets?
by Tibor R. Machan
In order to reduce the likelihood they will come to my home to flex their muscles, I will try not to get a pet. More likely, I will break down because I’d like to have one. But I do not want some eager-beaver officer, installed by the likes of PETA to "protect" pets, to come and lord it over me and my home. (Read more...)
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What Might Music Yet Become?
by Joseph C. Maurone
A summary of Robert Jourdain's theory of the role of technology in music as presented in Music, The Brain, and Ecstasy. (Read more...)
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Machan's Musings - Commercial Free, Babble Full
by Tibor R. Machan
Non-commercial radio and TV broadcasters run fundraising promotional sessions two or three times a year, all of which seek money while denouncing money-seeking via commerce, where both sides get what they want and no charity is involved. Too bad. Because how on earth do all those listeners get the funds they will send to these non-commercial stations unless they themselves carry out some successful commercial undertakings? As Rand used to say, "Blank out!" (Read more...)
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Finding Happiness in Lesbos
by Jamie Kelly
Your happiness on this planet is your own business, because frankly, we’re all going to die someday, some of us sooner than others, of course. And if you die in the arms of a Seattle lesbian who loves you, well, you’re luckier than most people in the world. (Read more...)
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Machan's Musings - Paternalism at Yale and The Times
by Tibor R. Machan
This, folks, really takes the cake for me: David F. Swensen, chief investment officer at Yale University, has penned an op-ed for The New York Times, in defense of rank financial paternalism. It doesn’t surprise me a bit that this op-ed appeared in the Times, that venerable member of the fourth estate, which has become an unrestrained cheerleader for paternalism on nearly every front of human social life. (Read more...)
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Daily Linz 14 - Friday Miscellany
by Lindsay Perigo
Linz, Bidinotto and Shiraz! (Read more...)
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The Myth of Orpheus and the Future of Music
by Joseph C. Maurone
What is more beneficial to the future of music, change or tradition? The tragic tale of Orpheus may provide a clue to the answer. (Read more...)
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 Daily Linz 13 - A Salute to Joe Rowlands
by Lindsay Perigo
SOLOists, savour this guy. He is a KASS-NEM par excellence. He will have a place of honour in Objectivist history. He is living proof that the heroes in Ayn Rand’s novels not only can exist, but do exist. (Read more...)
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Wednesday
October 19, 2005 |
Daily Linz 12 - Fundamental Stuff 3
by Lindsay Perigo
Parmenides figured Heraclitus and the Milesians had got it right about there being a “fundamental stuff,” but they were wrong about what it was. It was one thing, but it was everything. As the Musketeers might have put it, all was one and one was all. (Read more...)
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