Ethical standards

To Daniel, replying to post 97.

If these people you have talked with really believe U.S. dollars (or euros) are worthless, I'll happily accept whatever amount of them they are willing to send me. :-)

Others have mentioned government currency is legal tender and the government require you pay taxes with its fiat currency. Just as important in my view is that the backing of fiat currency is the power to tax, not by any commodity such as gold, silver, etc. Thinking of U.S. Treasury bills, notes, and bonds might reinforce this.

It is a medium of exchange not simply because the government says it is legal tender, but because people generally do accept it as a medium of exchange. (The government requires we all wear seatbelts, but that doesn't mean everybody does so. (-: )

Post 101

Wednesday, December 23, 2009 - 7:03am

John,

> "If this sounds like a paradox, the fault lies in the
> moral contradictions of welfare statism, not in its
> victims."

I have a certain suspicion that welfare statism is going to remain with us for a long period, at least until the science-fictional concept of "Santa Claus Machines" that can print 3D objects of various sorts, including food, with no more input than bulk elements and power - which would thus, finally, allow people to be /truly/ independent of each other and able to only enter into truly /voluntary/ exchanges. (Such machines are still a long way off; one of the most advanced, the "RepRap", http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RepRap , isn't even quite able to make a copy of itself yet. Cory Doctorow's recent novel, Makers, http://craphound.com/makers/ , is partly about the spread of 3D printers, and the disrupting effects thereof.)

However paradoxical welfare statism might be, it's still an aspect of modern society that has to be dealt with, by the members of that society, and simply pointing at it and saying "Eeeevul!" is, shall we say, not a very productive response. Of course, my opinion here may conflict with the other posters, given how my point of view has been described as being based on Pragmatism rather than Objectivism, but even if that /is/ the case, well, it still /is/ my point of view.

Curtis,

I'm sorry that your conception of the purpose of this thread (eg, for me to 'admit' something) is so different from mine (eg, for me to learn things) that I will no longer be able to learn from you here.

If you /are/ still at least reading this: given how many points of agreement exist between my beliefs and those of Objectivism, I have yet to find another philosophy that is as congruent to my own as it. If-and-when I do, I'll change my self-description from Objectivist to whatever-it-is-ist. Until I do, though, I will continue to call myself Objectivist, or some derivation thereof, even if certain points of disagreement between myself and other Objectivists are known to exist. If you would like me to stop calling myself an Objectivist, then I would welcome any help in exploring what other label would better apply. (In fact, since that seems like a worthwhile discussion, I think I'll start a separate thread on it.)

Merlin,

> power to tax

> people generally do accept it

Hee. Those are precisely the two reasons I had in mind when I said that I /don't/ believe the paragraph on the valuelessness of government-fiat currency.

Post 102

Wednesday, December 23, 2009 - 2:47pm

Daniel:

I have a certain suspicion that welfare statism is going to remain with us for a long period, at least until the science-fictional concept of "Santa Claus Machines" that can print 3D objects of various sorts, including food, with no more input than bulk elements and power - which would thus, finally, allow people to be /truly/ independent of each other and able to only enter into truly /voluntary/ exchanges. (Such machines are still a long way off; one of the most advanced, the "RepRap", http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RepRap , isn't even quite able to make a copy of itself yet. Cory Doctorow's recent novel, Makers, http://craphound.com/makers/ , is partly about the spread of 3D printers, and the disrupting effects thereof.)

However paradoxical welfare statism might be, it's still an aspect of modern society that has to be dealt with, by the members of that society, and simply pointing at it and saying "Eeeevul!" is, shall we say, not a very productive response.

I find this sentiment of yours Daniel to be incredibly insulting and belittling. You're basically saying pointing out what is evil is unproductive. Actually it's not unproductive, because the alternative is sanctioning evil, which is itself evil. That you do not wish to recognize evil is not my problem. Continue burying your head in the sand if you'd like. I'm sure if we were living in Colonial America you'd be a Loyalist. No doubt you would be saying "I have a certain suspicion British monarchical rule is going to remain with us for a very long period".

I really don't give a shit if you think this way. You can present your arguments intelligently and respectfully or you can continue to insult the intelligence of the people who post here. Your choice, but I'm not going to entertain your garbage if you choose the latter approach.

Post 103

Wednesday, December 23, 2009 - 4:10pm

John, while I'm the one who said in a previous post that Objectivists are not getting agry enough over such issues as what is going on in the Congress, etc. I have maintained my anger with thrusts of logic. I'm glad to see we can get away in this forum with concluding that the kind of thinking others do here is "incredibly insulting and belittling." I agree; Mr. Boese is both, but we've let him do it.

You wrote to him:

I'm sure if we were living in Colonial America you'd be a Loyalist. No doubt you would be saying "I have a certain suspicion British monarchical rule is going to remain with us for a very long period".

And that is what I was trying to tell him when I said that if I put a gun to his head,

I'm certain you're only complaint would be that I don't have the power to do that because I'm not the government.

He thinks I'm trying to get him to admit to something that will prove him wrong. Well, he's entitled to his opinion, but you're right that doing it here is insulting. All I want him to admit is that he does think differently than we do. And he has admitted to this in post 86:

I think I've found a possible source of the disagreement I seem to be having with most other posters here: that being the perspective of the posters.

and post 91:

I wasn't familiar with the "veil of ignorance" experiment by that name, but after looking it up, I now realize that I've...absorbed it by osmosis.

and post 97:

I've had another thought that might throw a new light on the apparent differences of opinion between myself and, well, everyone else here.

and post 101:

...my point of view has been described as being based on Pragmatism rather than Objectivism, but even if that /is/ the case, well, it still /is/ my point of view.

These all indicate he doesn't think like an Objectivist, yet he insists on trying to convince us. Thank you, John, very, very much for being so blunt and telling him off. All I want for him is that he sees that his entire set of epistemic premises are not ours, and that he can argue as much as he wants but he isn't going to convince us we ought to be British Loyalists!

Post 104

Tuesday, December 29, 2009 - 10:14am