Public Teachers

Hong, you are so wrong-- and I'll prove it to you. Just watch me, and don't break my negative rights.

Post 41

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 3:46pm

Hong;

Which of my ideas do you disagree with?

(Sorry to be picky, but hopefully this will allow me to clear up any misunderstanding. Everything I've written so far doesn't seem anti-objectivist in any sense.)

Post 42

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 3:51pm

What Hong is saying is: "You guys are attacking my position as a leech to innocent productive men, I don't care about them, and I'm going to defend myself and continue performing life sustaining action!"

But now that you are exposed, maybe its not in your self interest to continue being a leech? Or maybe Ayn Rand was wrong when she said "All rationally selfish men live in harmony of interest"? Oh, here it is, here it is! Rationally selfish men do not live in harmony of interest when there are limited resources. And... well, I think Reality has a limited set of matter and energy. Mankind is not currently harvesting all of Reality's resources, life is quickly finding new ways to harvest new resources in Reality, but its not quick enough for it to seem like there are unlimited resources. Hence men live at the expense of other men. Its not a zero sum game, but its not a infinitely quickly sum increasing game either.

In America, the sum once was once increasing very rapidly, and men were living in harmony of interest. Now the sum is not increasing quickly as the ambitions of some men, so they live as looters.

The technological and information revolution is helping make the sum increase more quickly, which is why people are gaining freedom around the world. Now we have a race for intelligence, a race for information and computational power. The smartest will thrive-- unless they destroy themselves in war... then the simplest will still be around and survive.

Reality is awesome. Life is awesome.
(Edited by Dean Michael Gores
on 3/14, 4:03pm)

Post 43

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 4:06pm

So the intelligent men with little resources demand more freedom, but the intelligent men with lots of resources do not allow it, they try to stay in control. Then there are revolutions. So what degree of control is good for a life form? The best degree is when you have control, but no one else knows you have control.

I wonder, am I killing myself by revealing these ideas?

Hmmm.. I learned all of this while playing the game called "RISK". I just didn't realize how closely the game corresponds with real life.
(Edited by Dean Michael Gores
on 3/14, 4:08pm)

Post 44

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 4:20pm

Its in the advantage of the life forms with lower intelligence and more resources to promote sefishness.

Its in the advantage of the life forms with higher intelligence and less resources to promote moral rational selfishness.

Its in the advantage of the life forms with lower intelligence and less resources to promote moral self sacrifice.

Its in the advantage of the life forms with higher intelligence and more resources to promote moral self sacrifice.

Then to the degree that people are in the middle, they are less extreme towards promoting self sacrifice or rational selfishness.

I'm extremely intelligent, but I have almost no resources, hence I am an extreme proponent of rational selfishness. And that's the answer to Joseph Rowland's question of why Objectivists are poor. Ahahahhahahaha! : )

Hmmm... its also the answer to the question of why politicians live lives that are contradictory to their words!

Hmmm, maybe here is another difference between Objectivists and my generalizations above: Objectivists play the game differently, they place integrity above their own life. Or maybe they think integrity is the most important thing to have in order to live?
(Edited by Dean Michael Gores
on 3/14, 4:28pm)

Post 45

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 4:30pm

My laughter and excitement is over how I think I'm discovering very useful ideas. So now, knowing what I know now, what should I do? I'm going to learn as quickly as I can, and gain resources to defend myself as fast as I can. I have to do both at the same time.

Post 46

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 4:53pm

Dean, you have clearly gone off the deep end.

Ashley, you are so right to ask Dean how he would die if he couldn't use roads paid for by tax-looted dollars. It's obvious he doesn't have to die at all. All he has to do is go off and live in the cave that Hong recommended. Or somewhere out in the woods. Surely, being a rational, independent man, he can survive on his own or learn how to, without having to make excuses about using tax-looted services like roads.

What a hypocrite. Or an unimaginative windbag. Can't tell which.

To help us decide which, Dean, your assignment is to read (I can't believe you've already read it) Rand's essay "The Question of Scholarships" and, referring to the premises on which she bases her argument, show where either her premises are false or her logic is invalid. We will be very interested in your analysis. You are rejecting her argument, after all, so it behooves you to show in detail where it is wrong.

It's kind of a catch-22, though. If you can refute Rand's argument, then to be morally consistent, you have to go live out in the wilderness where there are no tax-looted roads. But if you can't refute her argument, you have to shut the f*** up about public school teachers, firemen, etc. Looks like win-win to me. :-)

REB

(Edited by Roger Bissell on 3/14, 4:58pm)

Post 47

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 5:15pm

Who's words should one trust, the man who is always honest, or the man who creates false identities? I'm not going to spend my time explaining my words to you because I do not think you are interested in discovering ideas consistent with reality on this subject.
(Edited by Dean Michael Gores
on 3/14, 5:18pm)

Post 48

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 5:39pm

"Ashley, you are so right to ask Dean how he would die if he couldn't use roads paid for by tax-looted dollars. It's obvious he doesn't have to die at all. All he has to do is go off and live in the cave that Hong recommended. Or somewhere out in the woods."

Hmm... How does he get there?

Post 49

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 5:57pm

Dean-

In this and the tax thread, there have been plenty of people attacking your person instead of ideas, or just wanting to tarnish your worldview into something more jaded and acquiescent. I admire you keeping your resolve and idealism in the face of it.

That said... I think somewhere in the low 40s you crossed over from healthy idealistic zeal into an incoherent hypomanic bout. If you're still up, get some sleep, and try to clarify what the heck you're talking about tomorrow.

Post 50

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 6:03pm

Dean,

Ah, my young sophomoric friend, it is time for you to learn from your seniors. Yes, young pup, let the old dogs teach you the way.

Roger's post #1 was correct as was Rand in her "The Question of Scholarships." Public education is not a proper function of government; on this we agree. But public education is not an evil unto itself.

1st) Government's proper function is the protection of its citizens' inalienable rights. Armed forces to protect its citizens from outside and internal aggression and a court system to mediate disputes can easily be funded without initiating force against its citizens. Any function assumed by government beyond this is a deviation which can only distract government from what it should be properly doing. Education, road building or even garbage collection are proper functions within society, but not of government.

2nd) In any complicated issue of ethics (and a mixed economy like ours abounds with such,) the best means of solving the problem is to identify the initiation of force. In the area of public education, the initiation of force is the taxation that is used to fund it; it is not the educator teaching your six year old to read. The initiation of force is the law that requires your child to attend public school; it is not the educator teaching geometry to your sixteen year old. The initiation of force is the federal mandate that requires schools to provide unfunded services; it is not the educator teaching ceramics to your sixty year old grandmother.

But, young one, I don't expect these brief words to sway you. Learning Objectivism is a life long undertaking. When I first began my studies, I disagreed with Rand on much but the more I studied and, more importantly, thought through her ideas, the more in agreement I found myself with her.

I have hope, young grasshopper, that you, too, shall see the error of your ways. This old grasshopper shall now slowly creak away.

Creak! Creak!

(Edited by Bob Palin on 3/15, 3:57am)

Post 51

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 7:07pm

Aaron, Bob, thank you very much for your support. I'm not crazy. : ) I'm referring to relationships which you are not currently deriving.

Post 52

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 8:16pm

Hi Dean

You are of course, quite right, Ayn Rand would be thrilled with your performance. You are, however, evading the reality of the utter chaos that would ensue, if all us "parasites" were to do the morally correct thing.

This extremism that you preach lacks prudence. Please put that brain of yours to work and find a systematic way through this conundrum. Have you considered teaching as a subversive activity? Think of those long vacations.

In the meantime, have you run across Damian Moskovitz? He's pretty brilliant as well; and has taken the time to describe the folly of your stand, in his transcribed speech: MORALISM IN OBJECTIVISM.

For me his most trenchant phrase is: "you do not lead people to virtue by contempt".

Sharon

ps. Once a grade school teacher closes the classroom door he can do as he pleases; there just aren't enough supervisors to make a teacher do what he doesn't want to do. Don't be angry.......get even.

Post 53

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 8:27pm

The Increadible Sharon Romagnoli Macdonald,

I'm not claiming that there would be chaos like you may be thinking. But yes, the amount of chaos and stability does change over time. I'd prefer maximum stability and ideal capitalism. But capitalism with whom? Every life form chooses differently whom it has a capitalist relationship with and whom it has a predator-prey relationship. Some life forms have more of a say in this than others, AKA there are degrees of freedom.
(Edited by Dean Michael Gores
on 3/14, 8:27pm)

Post 54

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 9:00pm

Dean,

In the two days you have managed to earn my pity.

Michael

Post 55

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 9:59pm

Dean,
I meant to let you go but now you accuse me of leech. Well, let me tell you who is a leech.

I came to America as a foreigner years ago with borrow money (couldn't even pay for the plane ticket), without a single family and friend. All I had was my years of education (or whatever I could get from the schools in Communist China), my brain, and my determination to work as hard I could. There is not a single day since then that I am without work. Now years later, I am the one who has been paying federal tax that's more than your gross income; who has been paying property tax that's more than your entire year's rent; and who send kid to private school even though have to pay for the public school as well.

The simple fact is that it is I who has paid for the police, the justice system and armed force of US so you are protected. It is I who has paid for the public road, schools and all the other services that you have used without paying anything. Now you are accusing me leech? What a twisted logic! Go have your brain checked before ever talking to me again.

I don't need to waste my time watching you. I have seen so many of you who at the middle age, deep in debt, drifting from work to work, earning the minimum wage, without family, without kids, complaining and blaming others for everything. Enough.

Post 56

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 10:22pm

Mr. Andrew Bowman ask me:
"Which of my ideas do you disagree with?"

Frankly, Andrew, I dread to discuss ideas with 17 years old. First, most of them don't really know exactly what ideas do they have. This reflects in the fact that they constantly change what they said two minutes ago. I'll have to apologize for I have neither the time nor duty to educate another 17 year old.

(Edited by Hong Zhang on 3/14, 10:32pm)

Post 57

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 10:55pm

Hong, I'll agree that you are leech so some and not a leech to others. I'll agree the same for me. But for you to claim that you do not live at the expense of any life form or any human is false.

I like what you are researching, and I like the results of your research. I don't like the results of you using tax money to fund it.

I never asked anyone to live for the sake of me. Have you? Right now I think that's my main concern, because even though we may hurt each other a little, we have bigger enemies and bigger problems to fight then to fight amongst ourselves.

Am I going overboard? I don't think so. We have to get rid of these "public" institutions that enable worthless net destroying looters, my biggest enemy.

I said that we are living a variable sum game. I assure you, and you can easily examine what I do, that I do make the sum increase. I hate the people who make the sum decrease.
(Edited by Dean Michael Gores
on 3/14, 10:58pm)

Post 58

Wednesday, March 15, 2006 - 12:20am

Dean, you wrote:

Who's [sic] words should one trust, the man who is always honest, or the man who creates false identities? I'm not going to spend my time explaining my words to you because I do not think you are interested in discovering ideas consistent with reality on this subject.

Well, if for some (valid) reason, you don't think it's worthwhile to accept my challenge in order to explain your opposition to Rand's (and my) view on the "question of scholarships" essay, that's fine. But are you so out of touch that you really believe that the validity of this challenge depends upon whether you or others "trust" me because of a false identity I used on this web site? You've got to be kidding. "Trust" and "truth" do have some of the same letters, but I really think you are confusing them here.

You really ought to consider the impact of your stonewalling and diversionary tactics on the others you have no excuse to scorn, those who (unlike me) have not created false identities in order to uncover embarrassing truths about my fellow Randians -- and who (like me) find it very suspicious that you are so willing to make arbitrary (unsupported) assertions that Rand's conclusion is wrong, and so unwilling to provide the actual details about why Rand's premises and/or her logic is wrong. It doesn't generate a lot of confidence in your intellectual ability or your sincerity.

We hear you labeling yourself as "the man who is always honest," but we also hear you saying "I don't have to explain my positions." We hear you insinuating that someone who creates false identities or personalities (such as Francisco d'Anconia?) is necessarily dishonest, but we also hear you saying that you should be regarded as honest, even though you are willing to make assertions (about Rand) that you are unwilling to justify.

Again, you can get all the mileage you want by bashing me for a "shady" discussion and discovery tactic I used for a specific purpose to uncover truth. Knock yourself out. But at the end of the day, you still have to look in the mirror and ask yourself if weaseling out of supporting your assertions about Rand is any less dishonest than what you claim me to be.

Well, perhaps you will choose not to ask yourself that question. But rest assured that there are quite a few people who are really wondering about you. It's in your hands to change it all and wipe away the doubts people are having. All you need to do is, as I suggested:

read (I can't believe you've already read it) Rand's essay "The Question of Scholarships" and, referring to the premises on which she bases her argument, show where either her premises are false or her logic is invalid. We will be very interested in your analysis. You are rejecting her argument, after all, so it behooves you to show in detail where it is wrong.

Just stop blowing smoke and lashing out irrelevantly for several minutes and give us your argument to refute Rand. Point out the error in her premises or logic. If you know what you're talking about, then you may win some converts to your mission to build a private school. But if you continue your intransigent refusal to come clean on this, then I can only hope that the teachers you hire for your school are not as stubborn about supporting their assertions to their students as you are to us.

REB

P.S. -- I think we should trust the man who has better spelling and punctuation. :-)

Post 59

Wednesday, March 15, 2006 - 1:52am