BROTHER, YOU'RE ASKING FOR IT!

Nerdery Interlude

2009-10-23T12:41:00.001-04:00

This may be the coolest thing to happen to D&D since forever...

LINK

Call and Response

2009-10-14T22:37:00.004-04:00

Here is an article which was printed in last week's edition of the Old Gold & Black student newspaper at Wake Forest University. You ought to read it first.

And here is my response to that article, which will be printed in this weeks edition of that same newspaper:

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Last week, Matt Moran discussed Ayn Rand’s Objectivist ethics and the supposed moral gap between the University’s motto, “Pro Humanitate”, and Objectivism.

After breathlessly arguing to his satisfaction that this gap is unbridgeable, Moran went on to invoke the academic godhead of Diversity and claimed that “diversity of thought is sacred and enshrined in academia.”

Despite his alleged commitment to diversity, Moran belies his true opinion when he claims that for the university to harbor students or faculty who have sympathies to Objectivism, such as the recently hired John Allison, seems contradictory and even cause for alarm.

Surely, he claims, individuals who follow Rand’s philosophy conflict with the University’s core value of humanitarianism. They ascribe to a philosophy that is “sufficiently dangerous to warrant constant opposition.” And, one might infer, that if they won’t acquiesce to whatever Moran’s interpretation of our motto might be, they don’t belong here.

As Moran would seem to have it, diversity of thought is an unalloyed good so long as you don’t disagree with the university on the really important stuff.

But is there actually any conflict here at all? Ought we believe him when Moran claims that Objectivist ethics, which advocates rational selfishness, conflict necessarily with humanitarianism?

Unequivocally, the answer is no.

The criticism that rational selfishness entails an utter rejection of concern for any other human beings is a plainly false accusation. The central meaning of selfishness, as Rand’s protagonist John Galt proudly proclaims, is the refusal to live one’s life “for the sake of another.” It is a morality based upon the notion that pursuit of one’s own rational interests is the highest moral obligation.

Moran and others like him typically describe Randian heroes – characters such as John Galt, Howard Roark, or Ragnar Danneskjöld – as narcissistic sociopaths, bent on fulfilling their own desires whatever the cost.

For someone who claims to have read so much of Rand’s work, Moran reveals a striking ignorance of her actual beliefs; this characterization is pure nonsense.

While Objectivism is diametrically opposed to what is known as the ‘ethics of altruism’ it certainly does not preclude charity, concern for one’s fellow man, or the Wake Forest motto.

Certainly helping another man when that man is need is a good and noble action. It is coercion, in all its forms, that Objectivism rejects; the notion of human life cast as a sacrifice, whether figuratively or literally, to meet the needs or desires of other human lives.

By Rand’s account, the ‘ethics of altruism’ include necessarily a conception of man as a sacrificial animal in the service of others. It is with this idea that Objectivism has issue, not service to others as such.

This is the crux of the Objectivist ethics and the crucial point Moran fails to acknowledge.

As for “philosophies that glorify the wealthy and show contempt for the poor,” Moran should recall that Rand acknowledges an intellectual debt to only one other philosopher. That philosopher is Aristotle, for whom the virtues of magnanimity and munificence (and therefore total human flourishing) were only accessible to those of high social status and considerable wealth.

Certainly I am not arguing that either Rand or Aristotle were infallible or even comparable as philosophers. But both of them ought to be read and considered carefully before issuing an offhanded dismissal of their work, as Moran seems more than pleased to do with Rand.

In any case, Wake Forest ought to be commended for hiring an individual with such extensive education and experience in business and economics as Mr. John Allison. Moran’s farcical claim that Mr. Allison’s (or anyone else’s) Objectivist sympathies oppose the commitment of the university to better mankind is childish and insulting.

Coon Song

2009-10-05T22:39:00.000-04:00

I got one good look
in the raccoon’s eyes
when he fell from the tree
came to his feet
and perfectly still
seized the baying hounds
in his dull fierce stare,
in that recognition
all decision lost,
choice irrelevant before
the battle fell
and the unwinding of his
little knot of time began.

Reality can go to hell
is what the coon’s eyes
said to me, and how simple
the solution to my problem is:

it needs only not to be.
I thought the raccoon
felt no anger, saw none
cared nothing for cowardice
or bravery, was in fact
bored by what
would ensue: the whirling growls,
exposed tenders
the wet teeth—a problem
to be solved, the taut-coiled vigor
of the hunt finally
ready to snap loose.

--Abridgment of A.R. Ammons’ Coon Song

Ten points for Science

2009-10-02T13:48:00.003-04:00

I have discovered, on the marvelously hilarious website qwantz.com, a scientific explanation for all of the powers of Kel El, known to many as the ubiquitous Superman.

Link

You should read it, especially if you are scientifically inclined. Physicists have long been in search of a Grand Unified Theory. It was Einstein's final quest before his death. Innocuously, Ben Tippett provides us with a theory of such elegance that we may finally rest our heads and call the job done.

All of Superman's powers explain by his ability to manipulate the inertia of himself and objects with which he has physical contact. Simply brilliant.

On Utilitarians and Cheeseburger Czars

2009-09-20T23:16:00.002-04:00

As an example of my proposed connection between Marxism and Utilitarianism I give you Peter Singer, utilitarian writ large. Singer is one of the few proponents of the theory willing to bite the bullets which it demands. Such bullets include its supposed support of euthanasia and strict vegetarianism, among other things.

In a recent piece for The New York Times, Singer explains with some fervor why government rationed healthcare is not only a politically driven likelihood, but a necessity.

At the outset Singer claims, as many leftist reformers have done already, that healthcare is already being rationed by price. In various forms, this rationing puts limits on who can receive treatment and on what our precious ‘public funds’ are being spent. Singer even says that debate over reform “should start from the premise that some form of health care rationing is both inescapable and desirable.” We ought to follow this premise with a pragmatic discussion on how to ration it.

Healthcare, at a fundamental level, is no different than a cheeseburger, a gold ring, or a plumber’s services. It is, according to Singer, “a scarce resource, and all scarce resources are rationed in one way or another.” These items represent limited goods and services produced by human beings for human beings. They represent a mutually beneficial exchange for the betterment and continuation of human life. By Singer’s logic even the cheeseburger is being rationed to the American public by price.

The crucial point of rationing, one which Singer misses entirely, is that what matters is who is doing the rationing. I ration my mind out to you every time I write. I have a limited supply of time and brain power to spend on this blog. It is a choice, my choice, whether I write and how much. The only thing which matters when a good or service is being dispensed is who controls the supply. In the case of this blog, I alone control the supply. In the case of healthcare, it’s not so clear.

By claiming that “all scarce resources are rationed” Singer debases the use of the word. The ultimate goal is to blur the understanding of who is controlling the supply of the service of healthcare. And the fundamental question of this debate is not ‘How?’, it is ‘Who?’. Who should control the supply of healthcare: the men and women who are providing it, or a paternalistic bureaucrat who imagines that he know more than those providers?

Singer also posits a remarkable advance in the felicific calculus of utilitarianism by which we can judge who our money is being spent: the quality-adjusted life-year, or QALY. Using this as the meter-stick for the value of life, Singer claims, we can judge the “benefits achieved by different forms of health care.” The QALY has been used for decades by economists and, again, Singer patronizingly glosses over who will actually be making the decision. As many moral theorizers have been wont to do, Singer uses the paternal ‘we’ as the one making these decisions. This rationing of healthcare which Singer supports, as part of the broader imperative to nationalize the system, will only further the removal of control from the individual and into the hands of the state.

An Unsettling Choice

2009-09-20T23:11:00.002-04:00

Morality is in a state of disarray. After the dissolution of a firm teleological background for ethics by the modern philosophers, we have been grasping at straws ever since. Utilitarianism and Kantianism have each purported to save us from our ethical bankruptcy, using two sides of the human equation: our passions, desires, and pleasures, or our rational minds, our reason.

Failing as of yet to draft a compelling argument for why a man should follow either of their theories, we are left without any external motivation for pursuing morality in any form. This dramatic expulsion of teleology, or directed purpose, has left an enormous gap in our understanding of the world and of ourselves. And since human beings, like nature, abhor a vacuum, we still speak as though a teleology still exists.

Compare this conversation between two men arguing a point of crucial moral importance:

A: “A society ought to have institutions to protect the poor and assist the underprivileged. From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.”

B: “But why should society protect the downtrodden? Surely poor people played some part in their condition. It can’t be my responsibility to take care of everyone who messes up. I’m not my brother’s keeper.”

A: “Men can’t always prevent their conditions. Medical emergencies, layoffs, and natural disasters all act without concern for individual lives. We can’t prepare for every possible contingency. A community should look out for its members.”

B: “Why should we look out for each other? If I’m an autonomous moral agent, I have no responsibility to anyone else. To whom am I accountable but myself?”

A: “But we have a responsibility to each other! What one man does effects his entire community and if members of the community don’t look out for each other, it will collapse into anarchy.”

This conversation could go on ad infinitum. But of crucial importance here is the notion that each of these men assume that they are arguing from equally correct, yet diametrically opposed, systems of morality. The first man, very loosely, might be construed as a utilitarian, the second, a Kantian.

Kantians appeal to some high sense of moral duty for determining the rightness of an action. Even experiencing pleasure from an action immediately places it in the realm of immorality or, at best, amorality. Utilitarians argue from the maxim of ‘the greatest good for the greatest number’ which hearkens rather strikingly to the Marxist creed found in the very first quote: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.”

Kantianism, in contrast, lurches inevitably toward a sterile, beige commitment to duty. Men who opt to follow Kant find themselves making the cruel choice between goodness and happiness. The autonomous moral agent is also inextricably alone in the world, as each agent finds himself without any relationship to other human beings, except as such.

What is needed is not a new intellect to come along and fix either Utilitarianism or Kantianism, but a new teleological moral system. A system with directed purpose. What I am proposing is a form of Aristotelian virtue ethics which integrates the crucial notion of human flourishing with a holistic picture of human nature. Rather than appealing to Bentham’s desires, Kant’s reason, or Kierkegaard’s choice this system find motivation in what constitutes Quality with regard to human life. The development of an ethical system around human nature, not just some slice of it, will turn mankind away from moral confusion and in the direction of, in Aristotle’s words, εὐδαιμονία.

Call Me Next

2009-09-13T23:09:00.007-04:00

The problem with really expensive, really nice smelling soap is that I always want to eat it like a brownie.

Sorry, I had to get that off my chest.

In other news, men like Whole Foods CEO John Mackey (an excellent and admirable purveyor of such fine soaps) have been getting dangerously close to getting "called out". And I've been wondering, exactly why should I care if you call me out, Mr. President?

By all accounts, if I'm making claims about health care, or education reform, or a teapot in orbit around our sun, anyone who pays attention to me does so at their own risk. My opinion might be worth a hell of a lot to me, but why should anyone else care?

I'm certainly not sitting over here in my squalid, obscure little corner of the Internet waving my arms and yelping about mandatory circumcision or death panels or whatever. But even people who are doing exactly that ought to be treated with a modicum of respect, albeit from a distance.

There is a theory of rational activity which argues that, if we are to assume that other human being exist and that we are ourselves a rational human being (two claims which I imagine most people will readily grant), then we are led to assume other people are also rational. Roughly speaking, any generalized statement you can make about yourself as a human being, you ought to be able to make about everyone else too.

And if we're all just a bunch of rational humans with different opinions on health care or teapots or whatever, then why are other people getting 'called out' for having concerns about an unnecessarily rapid shift in an enormously complex system? Because nobody wants their computer technician fixing their extremely complex system with one of these, no matter how charismatic or ideologically certain he may be.

The Object Game

2009-09-06T22:50:00.000-04:00

When I was in high school we used to play a game to pass the time before, after, and often during class. The game began when two of my friends attempted to prove their telepathic powers by guessing a number which the other one would hold in his mind. While doing little to prove such extrasensory power (and actually revealing that they were both highly predictable from day to day) the game slowly evolved from guessing numbers to guessing objects.

We called our game, unimaginatively, “Guess the Object” or, sometimes, “The Object Game.”

The game began simply enough. One member of our group – which at one point included my entire English class – would think of an ‘object’ and the rest of us would ask binary questions (Yes or No) to try and narrow down on their object.

You might think of it as a bastardized version of “Twenty Questions” which was allowed to grow to epic proportions. There were no limits; rounds sometimes went on for days. The winner was whoever managed to guess the object and then it was the winner’s turn to pick an object of their own.

Initially, a round would begin innocuously enough: we picked simple nouns: staplers, loaves of bread, Mount Rushmore. Each of slowly developed a sort of ‘personality’ within the game. We each adopted questions which we preferred to ask. Others would not waste their time asking these questions since they knew, inevitably, someone else would.

As the game progressed, we began to get more devious with our selection of objects. The Jack of Spades, the minute hand of a clock, or Tuesday became fair objects. Questions also began to get weirder: “Does the government use it?” “Would it taste good in a pie?” “Has there ever been one in your pants?” “Can I keep it inside my mouth for more than a minute?” We were heading down a very dark road.

We played this game for months, then we graduated.

Fast forward about two years, when I am sitting in a metaphysics lecture and the object game rears its deviant head. I am reminded of this black art when trying to parse the differences between substances and attributes.

You might, according to F. H. Bradley in his Appearance and Reality, divide the world into substantive things (like ‘doors’ or ‘peanut butter’) and adjectival things (like ‘hardness’, ‘blueness’, or ‘lightness’). Bradley goes on to argue that this sort of metaphysical taxonomy is flawed, but it reminded me sharply of what we felt constituted an ‘object.’

The kinds of things we began to pick in an effort to further obfuscate the whole game were things like ‘blueness’, and ‘an ampersand’, and (as my English teacher helpfully offered) ‘a grit’ – as in, one grit from a bowl of grits. Arguably, these things are objects of a sort but are they independent existents? Does blueness or angst actually exist independent of the things which possess these attributes? A metaphysical schema which describes the whole of existence surely must take the Jack of Spades or a plus sign into account.

As the game developed, we found that objects began to either get more specific (cf. our calculus teacher’s right eye) or more general (cf. heat). However, any metaphysical system must take all these things and more into account. Metaphysics is the most general of sciences, dealing with everything insofar as it exists and the axiomatic principles which everything that exists must obey.

Little did we know, as high school seniors, we were making broad metaphysical claims about what truly exists in our world. Unsurprisingly, it seems that we included a great deal as ‘existing’ in some sense. Our objects, whether they be sandals, the UN, a grit, Tuesday, lust, a ping-pong paddle, the boiling point of water, Marxism, or beauty, they really exist. It is an unfortunate fact of modern academia that our supposed safeguards of knowledge have claimed the universe to be wholly unknowable and unreal. These men and women could stand to play a few dozen rounds of the Object Game. But as it stands, their own philosophies prevent them from having any objects to guess, and that is a great tragedy.

Thank You for Saying It, Mr. Drew

2009-08-30T22:10:00.004-04:00

toothpastefordinner.com

While Drew is, or may be, right on point, Bush-bashing is certainly not the most effective method of showing where the Obama administration is going wrong. In the broadest sense, yes, Mr. Bush and Mr. Obama are both politicians who have sought to dramatically increase the level of government involvement in each of our lives. But make no mistake, Obama's healthcare, education, and economic reforms will be far more intrusive and illfated than any that were pushed through in the Bush years. Rather than quibble back in forth between liberal this, conservative that, Democrat this, Republican that, shouldn't the real question be whether the government is being run for the individual or against him? In most cases, I must, with great sorrow, report that it has been the latter. Looks like I'll be eating toothpaste for dinner tonight.

Mind / Body

2009-08-16T20:06:00.006-04:00

The human body and the human mind have, for the past several centuries, been locked in a competition for supremacy of what it means to be 'human.' The central question to this debate is whether a human is primarily a body or primarily a mind. The name of this debate is the
'mind-body duality' problem.

If a human is primarily a mind, the thinking goes, then pleasures of the flesh, concern with one's body, and even physical reality are all meaningless or ephemeral. If man is primarily a body, then the exact opposite holds: pleasure and physical reality are all there are and consciousness, abstract concepts, and metaphysical reality get tossed out in one form or another.

Without diverting down a path to try and explain the solution to this problem, I would like to touch on one way in which the two intermingle interestingly.

Current Biology recently published an article describing new ways in which researchers understand how our minds model our bodies. Under normal circumstances, the mind has a 'model' of our bodies which focuses on more sensitive areas and enables us to have a sense of proprioception: an unconscious knowledge of the movements and locations of our body using internal stimuli.

These researchers found that, when a human being is holding a tool of some sort, the brain begins to model it as though it were an extension of the body. The most interesting part of the article is the fact that you can actually deceive your brain into thinking that you've grown a longer limb, or an extra one, etc. It is a phenomenon which seems the reverse of the 'ghost limb' which amputees sometimes feel.

While this research does seem to have ramifications with regard to a mind-body duality it does not provide a definitive answer. I will not go into detail here trying to prove which of the two is the prime aspect of humanity; it seems that all we can do is shrug and say, "Both."

All Hail the King

2009-08-09T21:36:00.004-04:00

Congress currently has a bill in committee, H. J. Res. 5, which proposes an amendment to the Constitution which would abolish the 22nd amendment.

The 22nd amendment, ratified by the states in 1951, is the limitation in place on the number of terms a president may hold. The limit, as set by the precedent of the founding fathers, is two four year terms. The only president to be elected to a third term and exceed this limit was FDR, though he entered into his third and fourth terms in office before the amendment was added. It was only precedent that kept a president from holding more than two terms, though several attempted a third term, including Grant and Theodore Roosevelt.

This latest bill is not the first time such a bill entered Congress. Several similar bills have been proposed in the last two decades and each of those bills never made it past committee. The prior bills have, to the best of my knowledge, been proposed predominantly by Democratic congressmen including Rep. Barney Frank, Rep. Howard Berman, and Sen. Harry Reid. While likelihood of this bill being passed is very slim, the fact that such a bill is even being considered is a bit ludicrous.

The ramifications of such a bill are so anti-American that its very proposal ought to come as a bit of a shock. Term limitations ought to apply to politicians of every stripe; the very idea of a 'career politician' is absurd when you consider politicians as 'public servants.' A lack of term limitations protected by the Constitution would enable a president stay in that position indefinitely, a necessary requirement for a dictatorship. Luckily, most people can plainly see through the idiocy necessary to sustain this bill and it is likely to share the fate of its past brethren.

Busy, busy, busy...

2009-07-31T23:50:00.002-04:00

For all of you who have been waiting patiently all week for me to update this thing, I sincerely apologize. You'll have to wait just a little longer.

In lieu of regular updates, I've been working feverishly on two projects of my own: one on the British Idealists of the nineteenth century and another on, let's just say, the philosophy of science. Unfortunately, this has left me with precious little time to pontificate here, much less eat or sleep. So as to not lose my mind, I've decided to update on a new schedule: once a week, on Sunday. I reckon that I can maintain this as the new school year begins as well and not fail out of college. Hopefully my professors agree.

In any case, I hope you don't mind the new schedule. This new format will align "Brother, You're Asking For It!" with your week, giving you something to ponder over during your commute, or with friends, or whenever. Also, since most other websites don't update on the weekends, you'll only have mine to turn to Sundays now.

I sincerely hope that you've enjoyed the ride so far. (I assume that the readership has grown, slightly, in the past months, so now I am actually using 'you' in the plural. How exciting.)

Next post Sunday.

On Definitions

2009-07-25T00:03:00.002-04:00

To begin this post, a brief bit of background understanding is necessary. First, recalling a prior post on epistemology, we've established that a fundamental characteristic of the human mind is conceptualization: the process of noting similarities and differences in objects and thereby forming patterns. These patterns, or concepts, are the building blocks of human knowledge. The process by which we create such patterns is the goal of the science of epistemology.

Without concepts, we could never surpass a primitive, perceptive understanding of the world around us. Every new object which passes under the scope of our senses would be exactly that: a wholly new, unfamiliar object which would require our fullest attention to understand. It is by this process of pattern-creation that we recognize all cats by seeing just a few, can operate all cars by driving one, and can read all clocks by learning to read just one. Their similarities being open to us, we conceptualize an idea of 'cat,' 'car,' and 'clock' that we understand on a abstract level.

However, the above sentence is particularly revealing regarding the nature of such concepts and their creation. Language, defined as a group of audiovisual symbols which, when arranged in a particular order, denote a concept, is absolutely necessary to this process. Without a language we would have to hold extremely complicated concepts like 'cat' or 'car' actively in our minds. Denoting such concepts with words allows their preservation and their easy recollection. In this way, language is far, far more than a rudimentary tool for communication. It is necessary for thought. Language is as necessary on a desert island as it is within society.

How do we assign particular words to particular concepts? And why is it important that these definitions be precise? Without precise definitions, the words become meaningless. An easy example is simply to make up a word without assigning to it a particular concept. The word becomes nothing but noise. And concepts without words? Without an easy way of identifying concepts, trying to juggle multiple concepts in a simple thought process would be a feat only possible to the most brilliant of masterminds. Separation of concept and the word which denotes it thereby cripples not only communication and understanding, but thought itself.

Without referencing 1984 again, and the formation of Newspeak, I'd like to focus only on the deliberate alteration of words, not their obliteration. I grant that language evolves. Over time, new words are necessary to denotes new concepts and sometimes a single concept needs subdivision into multiple words. However, to alter the definition of a particular word must not come first. As concepts evolve, the words which define them follow suit. Not the other way around. If the word changes first, it is only because some force is trying to change it. Trying to engineer - or "depoliticize" - definitions, as some would like to be able to do, completely undermines the very foundation of language. Without definitions, without words that mean something, we are left with noise. And, if you'll pardon just one last 1984 reference, what we'll be left with then is a nation of Duckspeakers.

The Curse of the Ivory Tower

2009-07-22T23:00:00.006-04:00

It has recently become fashionable, and perhaps it always has been, to find oneself in the midst of idiots. The common response to such a discovery is to exclaim that "I am intelligent, rational, reasonable, and stable. I just wish that everyone else would follow my example." Alternatively, one may lapse into desperate solipsism - the belief that one's consciousness is the only thing that exists and all of perceived reality (including other seemingly rational people) stems from it. Most notably, it is the very people who in fact ARE intelligent who fall into this trap most easily. It is those who grew up constrained by their surroundings, men too large for their hometowns to contain, minds too active to settle for the banalities of everyday life, and lives which flourish uncontrollably, bearing a dynamic, blooming dissatisfaction with stagnation and limitations which are apt to be afflicted with what I am calling the curse of the ivory tower.

Despite sounding like the title of a Dungeons and Dragons campaign, I hope that the title of such a curse does not ring too heavily of the white man's burden, or any other self-induced grievance. Instead, I want to explain that it, in fact, ought not and does not exist, except in the minds of those who decide to bear it.

In the past several months I have gained an enormous respect for my fellow man. A respect which, whether because of my own willingness to carry this curse or teenage angst or something, I never really had. This respect is borne out of an understanding of what we as humans all share. It is vitally important, in the study of epistemology especially, to understand that we are all fundamentally alike in one key aspect: our consciousness. This bears a great deal of explanation, so let me begin by defining the term.

By consciousness, I do not mean the contents of our individual minds nor the organs by which we acquire sensory data. I also do not mean the methods by which we integrate our perceptions or conceptualize these integrations into knowledge. Instead, I am speaking of the tools which we all share in common which serve the purpose of enabling the pursuit. The abstractions of these tools includes logic, reasoning, and thought. Colloquially, it is the capacity to think which we all hold in common.

This does not mean that we all use it, unfortunately. Most people recognize some degree of unawareness in others in ourselves and we all must work to never voluntarily turn off our minds. However, it is the fatalistic claim that those who do not seem to be thinking (according to 'us' who we know to be thinking) probably never do; this inevitably results in the aforementioned curse. Happily, however, this is often not the case. They are simply thinking of other things. For the intellectuals, who value learning and knowledge above all else as a fundamental good, these other values may seem paltry and meaningless. This is simply the thinkers shrugging off their responsibility as a vital and particular part of a society, a responsibility which fulfills a unique role. And this role is not found in the trivial or minutiae.

Rather than directly force individuals to change, the thinkers must instead serve as both guides to and guards of our most sacred of intellectual values. The barometer of a cultural and political climate is the degree to which the thinkers do this job well. Since the general public receives higher order philosophic ideas through trickle down, not direct study, the lasting effects of its thinkers show up in the television shows, plays, music, and novels a given culture produces. So to assuage the fear of the intellectual, I claim that they ought not worry themselves about the seeming ignorance of the common man. He possesses the same tools and ultimate goals as you. Instead, concern yourself with the underlying philosophical framework upon which your society - and the common man's life - will be constructed. All else is detail.

Fundamental Premises

2009-07-15T09:08:00.002-04:00

In E. P. Wigner's Symmetries and Reflections, he describes the limitations of the human mind and the effects those limitations have had on the scope of our inquiry, both scientific and otherwise. The existence of these limitations, which essentially describe the fact that we can not know everything at once, force us to arbitrarily create 'initial conditions' from which flow physical laws.

However, it is important to understand that in any school of thought there are always initial conditions. Outside of science we usually call these fundamental premises or assumptions, and they are the hallowed core of whatever philosophy, religion, or political system which holds them. These axiomatic premises, usually small in number, constitute the very center of a philosophical doctrine. If they are black and hollow and devoid of life then the philosophy, no matter how it is presented positively, will inevitably show itself to be of the same nature.

Before committing yourself to any other person's set of ideals, before before adopting what the government says as truth, before believing what any religion says is the true nature of reality, question their fundamental assumptions. Don't look at what they'd like to accomplish or weigh the pros and cons of the consequences. Focus only on the very core of the doctrine involved. If you find it irreparably flawed, then you'll know what to do.

Sticks and Stones are Next

2009-07-13T10:20:00.003-04:00

Rather than disarming nukes or closing down superfluous military installations in other countries, Obama has decided to take a slightly, um, smaller approach in an effort to decrease violence. In a drastic shift from his grandiose plans for health care and economic recovery, Obama is now trying to micromanage what you keep in your pockets. The new legislation will bolster an already outdated law from 1958 which banned the possession of switchblades, or "any knife having a blade that opens automatically by hand pressure applied to a button or other device in the handle, or by operation of inertia or gravity." The president would like to append that any knife which can be open singlehandedly is also a "switchblade" and therefore illegal.

The ramifications of this would be that the estimated 35 million Americans who carry such knives would become felons. Hikers and hunters who cross borders into states who might adopt such a law will also be at risk. The original law, which was aimed at gangs and gang violence, will be transmuted into one which targets, well, I'm not really sure. Exactly what supposed violence is this law meant to prevent? Are there gangs of middle class Americans ready to start stabbing people with their camping knives? I don't think so. I happen to sell such knives, legally, and make a fair amount of money for my company by doing so. However, it is likely that I won't be doing that for very much longer. Microlegislation like this has unintended consequences, you see.

Hiatus

2009-06-27T17:16:00.003-04:00

I apologize for any inconvenience to you, dear reader, but I will be taking the next two weeks off for vacation. I'll be celebrating Independence Day in the nation's capital with the one closest to me, and will be unable to update regularly. I may update occasionally, or work on the layout. Check back if you like, but regular posts will not return until the week after the Fourth.

Enjoy the holiday.

Prescription for America

2009-06-24T01:38:00.001-04:00

Today at 10:00 pm Eastern Time ABC News will air "Prescription for America", allowing president Obama to answer questions concerning his plan for socialized medicine. These questions, and the individuals asking them, will be hand picked by ABC and chosen for their “divergent opinions” regarding healthcare reform.

I encourage anyone who is concerned about the future of this country and their access to healthcare to ignore it. Read a book, go for a walk, or go to bed early. Don’t waste your time on this blatant propaganda.

Republican Chief of Staff Ken McKay’s claims that the forum will be a “glorified infomercial” for the president’s hurried healthcare reform. ABC is, indeed, in complete control over the entire show and, without going into details regarding their journalistic integrity, I imagine they competed for this honor. If ABC would like to be groomed as the official Obamatron media outlet, so be it.

However, how would an inclusion of a Republican representative change anything? The Republican platform on healthcare reform is still, in many ways, interventionist. Sure, the government control might not be quite as strong as it will be when Obama’s plan is passed, but the government is still there. A truly free market is not even being considered.

America’s current quasi-free medical program is already one of the best in the world, but American citizens who are hooked on McDonald’s and Coca-Cola, among other things, fill the hospitals with cases of preventable disease. In fact, 75% of all money spent on healthcare is on chronic illnesses, many of which are preventable. Smoking, poor diet, and sedentary lifestyles being the three main culprits, we can easily see how many diseases could be averted, saving billions in healthcare costs.

But never fear, Obama is certain that his plans to help us will indeed come to pass.

In either case, Republican or Democrat, a strong sense of altruistic intervention runs throughout. Modern politicians (and the philosophers, writers, and ideologues who support them vicariously) believe wholeheartedly that we are our brother’s keepers. And federal government, the biggest brother of them all, is here to lend a helping hand when you get sick. Whether you like it or not.

Malthus' Ghost

2009-06-23T01:18:00.001-04:00

In the last half of the 20th century, a group of scientists created a batch of new fertilizers, pesticides, and agricultural techniques which more than doubled the world’s cumulative corn, rice, and wheat yields. Many of the technological advances brought about by the Industrial Revolution gave billions of people a chance at life. And it was the tremendous increase in available food allowed the exponential surge in population to subsist across the globe. This period, from the mid-1950s to the mid 1990s, was known as the ‘Green Revolution.’

Now, with the population quickly approaching 8 billion by the beginning of the next century, it is estimated that we will need yet another Green Revolution by 2030. Unfortunately, the largely averse feature of our dependence on dead dinosaurs is that nearly all of the fertilizers and pesticides used to bring about the first Green Revolution were petroleum-based. And we are running out of both petroleum and time.

Essentially two sides have arisen which each claim to know the road to food for all. I will give a summary of each, the first now and the second next Monday. Before that, however, we should analyze a few facts about which each side must consider.

To avoid a Malthusian crisis, we must either institute preventative checks on population (such as birth control or delayed marriage) or face the possibility of a ‘positive’ check (such as famine, disease, or a resource war). However, in most industrialized countries, birth rate is actually below the replacement rate of two children per family.

While a much of the world’s grain is used to feed livestock – arguably a very inefficient food source – to subsist on nothing but corn and soybeans would result in huge vitamin deficiencies and malnutrition. We are omnivorous creatures and need many different types of food to live healthily. Furthermore, with most government subsidies and research dollars falling into the hands of the grain and soybean markets, many other food sources are grossly neglected. This, in turn, drives up prices and makes a diverse diet a privilege.

Last, biofuel research – a tenuous and uncertain source of large scale energy - has raised the price of grain crops by as much as 30 percent. Using food as fuel is difficult to justify, given the rise in food prices and the ever increasing number of mouths to feed. Government regulation, with intent to solve our energy concerns, is in part to blame. The federal government is responsible for directing about 30 percent of corn for use as ethanol in 2008.

The first possible solution is favored predominantly by large scale agribusiness, which hopes to produce more food by producing, in most cases, either corn, rice, wheat or soybeans. Increasing yield in these crops will essentially mean genetic modification. Already, something like 90% of soybeans produced are already modified, and at least half of American corn is as well.

Companies like Monsanto, which do business in genetically modified crops, are hoping to squeeze every bit of life out of the genetics of crops like corn and wheat. By maximizing resistance to drought, photosynthesis rates, and nitrogen efficiency we can grow supercrops which can flourish in nearly any conditions and feed whole villages with a few acres. Hopefully.

The truth is that most GMOs currently produce no more than nominally more than standard versions. As GMO lobbyists also seek to copyright genetic sequences which their scientists develop, they make it increasingly difficult to grow standard crops. Other methods used by agribusiness, such as monocropping and dubious irrigation practices, have also been shown to poison water supplies and deplete land and make it infertile.

Despite some potentially scary consequences, GMOs are already pervasive and are certainly not going away. Though many countries are resisting it through export taxes and bans, now that the technology is here it is here to stay. The question remains: will it do us any good?

An Economic Profile: The Gift Economy

2009-06-19T02:13:00.006-04:00

A “gift economy” is a system of economics in which goods and services are routinely given to members of the community freely and without any explicit expectation of compensation. Unlike a barter or market system, the gift economy facilitates exchange of goods through acts of reciprocal altruism.

It is a way of life common to, among others, many Native American and Pacific Island cultures. Many of these cultures practice a ‘potlatch’ in which gifts are given to other tribes or leaders in a grand ceremony intended to redistribute wealth. Furthermore, many industrialized cultures practice various forms of this tradition. For instance, Wikipedia’s editing process, the Burning Man festival’s gift economy, and giving blood are all examples of microeconomies in which the participants give with no expectation of reciprocation for their efforts.

However, it is important to note that while there is no explicit agreement of repayment for these gifts, there is a heavy implicit obligation to do so.

In this case, the practice of gift giving functions as a primitive sort of insurance. By giving away all of your positions, you effectively burden your neighbors with an unpayed, implicit debt: a debt which they are morally obligated to repay. By this economy, the man with nothing is the wealthiest, and the most powerful, because everyone owes him something.

This is just one treacherous side of the altruistic motive. You can't refuse a gift. By gifting their neighbors with all sorts of valuables men force the burden of debt on each other, effectively controlling their neighbors' future. For the next several months or even years, the recipient of a potlatch must work to accumulate goods for an even more spectacular one.

Now, refocus the lens on America’s current mixed economy. As many news anchors, politicians and economists argue about the level to which America ought to be made socialist or capitalist, the executive branch is running an altogether different show. The Obama administration has dropped hundreds of billions of dollars in ‘gift’ money into the hands of various car companies, banks, and other special interests. Obama’s gift giving blows every potlatch in history out of the water. And all the way into orbit. Around Jupiter.

Even more telling is the fact that many banks are trying to opt out. BB&T, JP Morgan Chase, US Bancorp and others are trying to pay back government funds with undue haste. The government is taking back their money, almost begrudgingly it seems, and not without quite a bit of scrutiny. By giving the money back, banks can go back to being banks without, as BB&T CEO Kelly King said, “government distractions.” Here’s hoping that the government and these banks will just call it even and get on with their jobs.

Minitrue

2009-06-17T23:44:00.003-04:00

The Ministry of Truth, or ‘minitrue’ in Newspeak, is one of four government bulwarks in George Orwell’s dystopian novel, 1984. It is, for the people of Oceania, their media. It determines the content of and distributes their news, entertainment, art, and education. This utter government control on information allows them to complete rewrite history; to actually alter both the recent and far flung past. At least, the understanding of past within the minds of its citizens.

The consequences of this control are completely explicit in Orwell’s novel (which I recommend reading) and make Minitrue the most nefarious of the four ministries. Even more so than the Ministry of Love, which (spoiler alert) concerns itself with the abject suffering and torture of its residents.

In a recent statement, Senator and Chairman of the Subcommittee on Communications, Technology, and the Internet John Kerry (D-MA) made the following statement regarding the fate of the nation’s media: “If we take seriously this notion that the press is the fourth estate, or the fourth branch of government, it is time we examine the future of journalism in the digital Information Age and what it means to our Republic and to our democracy.” (my emphasis)

This statement was made in reference to the future of physical newspapers and their gradual replacement with Internet news and blogs. Kerry wants to ensure that online reporters are “treated fairly” and that as physical media begins to fade away, there are new provisions in place to keep check on the goings on online. Now that a new kind of media and advertising style, with Google leading the way, is in place, whatever is the government to do? Will our nation fail as the speech becomes freer, discussion broader, and news more widely available than ever before? While it seems that the fate of the physical news itself is tied into the fate of our nation it is, in fact, the reach of the government into all forms of media which may determine the fate of our nation.

When the news is sponsored, censored, and controlled by the government - as some claim is already becoming the case - the fate of our nation is dubious at best. If we want to fling ourselves headlong into totalitarianism, handing over objective presentation of the news is probably the best way to begin.

On Patterns

2009-06-15T19:44:00.001-04:00

After a week’s worth of pontificating on current topics, I would like to take a step back and speak a little more abstractly. I trust that you will not be offended.

The following is a bit of work I am doing on epistemology (the study of knowledge) and human nature. It is not yet complete. However, I am working this out unaided and it is wholly my creation, and I vouch for it.

I take as a starting point, in a similar fashion to Aristotle and Locke, that human beings begin their lives tabula rasa, or as a blank slate. This is to say, that we are not created with any inborn knowledge. Human beings which have never before exercised their rational capacities are not born possessing anything we might consider knowledge. And while studies have shown that genetics can impact an individual to such a degree that he may have inborn inclinations, traits, or feelings these do not constitute knowledge. The point of this idea is that all knowledge is earned. Effort must be expended in order to gain knowledge. What style and degree of effort, we will soon see.

Next, I divide (and this has a direct effect on the metaphysics which I will discuss at some later date) our understanding of the physical universe into three levels: Perception, Recognition, and Abstraction. The first level, Perception, is the level at which we physically perceive the world. We can not halt this process; it continues from birth (possibly even before) until death. It is the indiscriminate collection of data by our senses. Either purposively directed or not, without any further process (i.e. without thinking) we would be left with huge sums of data and no method by which to organize or categorize it.

Recognition, the second level of understanding, is where thinking actually begins. Human beings are, first and foremost, rational beings. As such, we are innately attuned to a sense of order, which I will describe as a pattern. What I mean by a pattern is nothing revolutionary; everyone is immediately familiar with the concept. I have not, as yet, encountered another culture where some sort of pattern recognition is not fundamental to their thinking. (and would be very interested to find such a culture). As we are presented with this huge set of sensory perception data, we begin to pick and choose patterns out of it. We associate function and design with object. We learn the patterns of Cause and Effect and Value at a very young age and learn to apply them universally. We learn what makes a human different from a chair, good food different from bad food, and begin to identify patterns in the vastness of our world.

Lastly, we begin to take these patterns to ever higher levels of Abstraction. It is at this level that we can be said to have knowledge. These might be what men call ‘ideas.’ They are owned by their creators and are an expression of his understanding of the many diverse patterns which he has come to recognize. A man must exercise is reason at this point to develop abstractions which are coherent and valid. However, not every or any abstraction is eligible to be knowledge. The abstractions which prove, time and again, to be true and, despite attempts, are never refuted approach such knowledge. We are seeking universalizable statements about the nature of patterns which are expected to continue ad infinitum, or at least so long as a discrete set of criteria are met. Laws of Physics (for natural patterns) and Ethics (for value patterns) are our highest order abstractions, and our most far reaching. These laws, though they may sometimes be in flux, constitute knowledge. Other abstractions subordinate to these Laws, and while they too can constitute knowledge, they must ultimately rely on these fundamentals.

The important thing to notice here is the fundamental difference between the patterns we recognize in nature and the abstractions we form from such recognition. The difference here is that the patterns exist, objectively, apart from any abstraction we could possibly apply to them. Statistics, mathematical formulae, architectural design: these all consist of facts. Facts which, despite any of our refutation, exist independently of us. However, ideas are often changing and rely on men to recognize deeper patterns than those which are immediately evident and apply them to a wider range of seemingly disconnected patterns and stimuli.

To some extent, even value-patterns (patterns of goodness or badness) exist independently of us. For example, a hammer which is designed to be a hammer often makes a very good hammer. A fish sandwich, which is not at all designed to be a hammer, makes a rather poor one (or it makes a rather poor fish sandwich, which has its own purpose). We can see from this example a further idea which demands later consideration: that purposive things (i.e. creatures, created things, things with direction and an intended purpose) are value-laden things. They can be said to be varying degrees of ‘good’ or ‘bad’ and they can be said to be so objectively.

To conclude, I want to concede that this process is not foolproof. It is, in fact, an idealistic look at rational man. Surely our methods of perception occasionally deceive us, we recognize patterns which do not actually exist, and our abstractions prove to be wholly inaccurate and in need of drastic revision. The point of this epistemological outline is to show the process by which we achieve greater knowledge about our world and to accentuate the fact that the thinking, abstracting process is entirely volitional. Men must choose to acknowledge the patterns which exist and use them to their advantage. Those who turn a blind eye to ongoing patterns, whether they be in nature, ecology, economics, politics, or romance are thereby defaulting on their own humanity. They are the men who choose instead to be guided by whim, by fleeting preferences (whether their own or that of others) and by the blind, chaotic, erratic ramblings of savage appetites. This is the sad fate of those who deny their own minds for the sake of their stomachs.

What You Don't Know Will Kill You

2009-06-13T02:00:00.005-04:00

With the imminent passage of the “Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act” I’d like to spend a little time acknowledging our ubiquitous friends in the Food and Drug Administration. First, for those of you who are unfamiliar with this bill, it will give the FDA even greater regulatory control over tobacco companies, including the outlaw of all flavored cigarettes and those labeled 'light' or 'low tar.' And yet, while the FDA will be given the reigns to yet another consumable product, it will be illegal to label or advertise tobacco products as being regulated at all. This is, in theory, to prevent consumers from mistakenly assuming that the FDA condones such vile stuff, or in anyway deems it to be good for you. Not that you can figure out what is good for you in the first place, or so the thinking goes.

Note: You can track the tobacco bill (H.R. 1256) here.

By their own account, the FDA is "a scientific, regulatory, and public health agency that oversees items accounting for 25 cents of every dollar spent by consumers." These items include "food products (other than meat and poultry), human and animal drugs, [and] therapeutic agents of biological origin" among other things.

Besides this new bit of law, the FDA is directly responsible for scores of legislation (if you’re interested, check out their own account of their history) The FDA is in control, among other things, of what can treat, prevent, diagnose, or cure a disease. One consequence of this is that all natural remedies – anything which is not officially a “drug” – are not allowed to be sold for their restorative properties. Instead, they are sold as supplements at best.

Furthermore, many enterprising individuals have been silenced and labeled snake oil salesmen when they try to break into such a tightly knit marketplace. The story of “No-Hunger Bread” – in which the FDA destroyed the business of a man when they identified his bread as a drug – is just one example of the kind of power the FDA holds (I’ll let you look it up). When the FDA can declare anything a drug (plants, candle wax, bread, even water) and anything a disease (obesity, forgetfulness, old age, death) then there is no end to their domain.

Instead of adopting a purely “Buyer Beware, Stupid” attitude in which companies are given free reign to cut corners and do anything they want, the government has taken the opposite stance with the FDA. We instead have excessive regulation and a government organization which can do anything they want to us ‘for our own good.’ And since it seems like every week something else that I wanted to have for supper is full of salmonella or something (pistachioes, spinach, peanut butter, just to name a few) I’m not convinced that they’re doing a very good job looking out for me. I’ll eat, drink, and smoke whatever I like, thanks.

Final Thought: If the FDA goes to all of this trouble for tobacco, a product which provides the U.S. government with millions of dollars, can you imagine the legislation they’d try to put on a truly insidious plant like marijuana? And the money they’d make?

Please Don't Go to College.

2009-06-10T14:51:00.002-04:00

Seriously. Don't go.

It seems strange doesn't it, being asked NOT to go to college? After years of being told that 'college is the way to get a job and make money,' that 'everyone can (and should) go to college,' after president Obama makes it seem almost UNAMERICAN not to attend some kind of four-year institution, how could you betray you family, your country, and your high school guidance counselor by not going!? Because, odds are, you neither want nor need to go.

Now, I understand that if you've been reading this blog up until now, you are likely either in college or already finished. Furthermore, it was or is good for you. The focus of this diatribe is not on you. It is on the American population, writ large.

In 2007, ACT scores showed that only 23% of test takers were prepared in all four categories: math, science, English, and reading (see http://www.edweek.org/rc/articles/2007/09/26/sow0926.h27.html) And while these numbers are rising, albeit slowly, president Obama has declared it a necessity to attend some sort of post-secondary education, if you are truly an American. (see http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/03/10/Obama-Post-secondary-education-necessary/UPI-20011236718384/)

Unfortunately, as more people attend college, the value of the bachelor's degree decreases. Coupled with the dubious possibly of grade inflation, the value of the bachelor's degree has been reduced to the point of being an extremely high entry fee into a work force which will not require you to utilize any of the skills which earned you that slip of paper. The consequence is that most college graduates are entering the work fore four years later than their peers, with a next-to-worthless degree, and $80,000 in debt.

With the unemployment rate currently at about 9.1% (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics) the recommended solution is more education. And more education spending. It is likely that a bright, motivated, intellectual twentysomething who is locked in the basement for four years rather than attending college will STILL make more money than his less motivated peers. However, we are made to believe that it is only be virtue of that degree that a person is capable of performing well in the marketplace.

If education grants become an entitlement like Medicare, as president Obama would like (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/03/AR2009050302251.html), then the government will be flooding universities with even more unprepared students. Instead, they ought use that money to fix the root of the problem of education: public schools. Since the U.S. government already has a near monopoly on education, especially for the lower class, shouldn't they focus on bring performance up in that area, rather then getting more involved in yet another facet of American life?

Unfortunately, the altruist morality that the government has adopted in the past several decades forbids it. They will gift us to death with billions of taxpayer's dollars and then expect to have a stake in the policy of universities. Attendance rates, racial quotas, graduation rates, minimum SAT scores, whatever they'd like will be theirs to decide.

I'm not saying that education is a bad thing. In fact, it categorically is a wonderful and beneficial thing. But if you are going to get educated, ask yourself why you are choosing to do so. Do you want to? Does something you are learning actually intrigue you? If not, then check your premises. You may be getting an education because someone told you to. If that's the case, then you haven't really learned anything at all.

Digital Socialism

2009-06-08T15:53:00.000-04:00

In their June 2009 issue, Wired Magazine is running a feature describing what they call the “New New Economy”. In one of the three parts into which the feature is divided, Kevin Kelly writes on Digital Socialism, highlighted by a graphic of perfectly generic men slowly transforming into interlocking puzzle pieces in a fashion similar to Escher’s “Sky and Water” woodcuts. However, this isn’t your grandfather’s brand of Socialism as Kelly is quick to point out, but rather the phenomenon of social networking. The rise of sites like Facebook, Twitter and, yes, even Blogger show that the entire world is quick to jump into the shimmering fray of the Internet once given the tools. Wikipedia is a free service, updated daily by anyone and everyone. Facebook now has over 100 million users and Youtube caters to 100 million users monthly in the United States alone.

Furthermore, the communal nature of these websites is undeniable. Linking people across the globe by a touch of a button, the phenomenon of online social networking has shrunk the globe more than the Industrial Revolution ever did. It has given everyone direct access to everyone else. And as these sites grow, they benefit everyone. Wikipedia would not be the ‘brain-extension’ that it has come to be. By tapping into what is essentially the combined knowledge of everyone with an internet connection, we all have access to millions of articles of information which a dead-tree encyclopedia could never hope to cover.

The crux of Kelly’s article, however, is in how he has lumped social networking and blogging sites like Facebook and Twitter together with sources and protectors of open source software. Kelly fails to mention that not long ago, sites like Myspace, Facebook, and Youtube were being publicly derided for being indicators of our fallen age. They are the harbingers of a horrifyingly narcissistic trend in American culture. And the world will be infinitely better for it.

These sites are inherently and explicitly self-centered; they allowed everyone room on the internet to be completely self-absorbed. And while they are indeed designed to allow us to contact one another and share our ideas, they are spaces (albeit small ones) for self expression. We aren’t all working toward a common goal, we are writing about ourselves. Wikipedia isn’t full of people who are each trying to write an encyclopedia, it’s full of people who are each interested in some esoteric topic and want to write about that. We are sharing our own ideas, our own 140-character thoughts and observations, our own lives. And we are doing it willingly, freely, and largely without constraint. Is it dangerous? Absolutely. Is it worth it? Absolutely.

The kinds of things being produced by social networking are revolutionary. ‘The Google Age’ is upon us, with a new brand of economics, politics, and philosophy with which to contend. But, first and foremost, the system which has given us Creative Commons, Flickr, Facebook, Twitter, Blogger, Linux, Youtube and Digg relies on autonomous, rational individuals with independent interest and ideas and who are willing to share them. Most will not see a dime for their efforts. I advertise on this site to assuage the cost of mine. But in all cases, the effort of the individual is the root cause of this explosion of creativity and production. And so long as the sanctity of that individual is protected and no other individual - even if he is wearing the mask of a corporation or of a government - tries to control him, this trend will last and our generation will create more than any who have come before.

H1N1

2009-05-03T23:52:00.000-04:00

I suppose that while everyone else is clamoring about this nonsense, a few of us reasonable individuals ought to speak up as well. I gave serious thought to ignoring the topic outright, but decided that would be irresponsible. That, and I can't go on abstractedly writing about political philosophy and economic theory forever. This has got to stay current.

To that end, I would like to say a few words about swine flu. The morning following the very first day that I heard of such a thing, I proceeded to have a breakfast consisting of no fewer than three types of pork. It was delicious. Now, I didn't go eat a turducken the last time the media was bawling about bird flu, but it is important to note that the average person does not even care about swine flu. Various media companies, pandering to the American government or the World Health Organization, have hyped up this disease which now afflicts approximately 900 individuals world wide. Contrast this number to the roughly 33,000,000 individuals living with HIV/AIDS or the thousands of tuberculosis and malaria deaths which occur every year. The WHO calls swine flu a Class 4 pandemic and suddenly there are people wearing surgical masks in airports. To put that in perspective, Class 4 is only two levels away from a full-blown pandemic: the kind of disease outbreak which could potentially kill hundreds of thousands of people worldwide.

In 1976, the American government under Gerald Ford inoculated America against swine flu. While only one American, a nineteen-year-old Army recruit, actually died from swine flu, hundreds of Americans were killed or seriously injured by the vaccination. Now that the familiar fear is back (just as fear of bird flu was all but forgotten), are Americans going to beg the government for another shot, or just keep about their business and be sure to wash up before they eat? It is extremely unlikely (on par with the likelihood that you will be struck by lightning) that if you are reading this you, your family, or anyone your family knows will die from swine flu. If we have anything to worry about, it is the fact that most people are so easily led that they will accept drugs from the government to prevent a disease that no one they know has ever had.

The Rights of Man

2009-04-28T15:08:00.000-04:00

Typically in the course of political discussion, the vague topic of 'rights' is brought to bear and often a rather heated argument ensues. This argument can take many forms and usually focuses on a particular group of human beings (blacks, women, homosexuals) or, more rarely, takes all of humanity into its fold. What are the fundamental rights that every human being possesses, simply because they are human? Many have answered this question, including the UN, whose Universal Declaration of Human Rights, at the time of this writing, has no fewer than 30 Articles describing the rights of man.

The first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution, known commonly as the 'Bill of Rights' is a more concise list of the rights of man as understood by the founders of the country. The most fundamental of these rights is given in the beginning of the Declaration of Independence: the right to Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. This strikes a chord similar to a passage from John Locke in his Two Treatises of Government, who wrote that "no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions."

Subsequently, many Americans have considered Life, Liberty, pursuit of Happiness, and Property to be the four most fundamental and inalienable rights bestowed upon mankind. These rights are a part of man's essential nature; they are an intrinsic part of his being an autonomous, rational being. To deprive a man of any one of these rights is to lower his stature as a human being, to degrade and debase him, and to treat him as a tool or a means to some end. Indeed, to do so is to debase the very concept of humanity.

I think that it is very important, as we move forward into this tumultuous political and social climate, that we remain ardent in our defense of these rights. Any attempt to discredit or destroy the foundation upon which our ability to love, live, or act freely in accordance with our own rational nature lies will ultimately ruin us, both at an individual level and as a species. To this end I implore you, whether in the marketplace or in the bedroom or in Congress, treat your fellow man as a being existing for its own sake. Otherwise, there can be no hope for our kind.

Hello.

2009-04-28T14:28:00.000-04:00

I would like to begin, by way of an introduction, by delineating the premises upon which this blog is to be built. I am in no way a learned expert in the fields about which I am going to be discussing. I have no intention of presenting to my readers an unbiased, impartial composition. That is, theoretically, what your news media ought to provide. This blog is meant to be a work of opinion, but one of the highest order: the observations and subsequent analysis of the physical world around myself. One might call it my 'philosophy of life' or perhaps 'worldview.' Specifically, I would like to focus our discussions upon the political and economic atmosphere we currently find ourselves in and my reaction to it. Essentially, I will be discussing the both the philosophical and physical impact that the actions of the American government have on the fate of the nation. You as the reader, by following closely, will become intimately acquainted with my own form of politics (though I prefer to think of it as a facet of a broad philosophical position) and may choose for yourself, as I am sure many of you already have. However, I invite you to dust off the box where you keep all of your really good ideas, spend some time thinking about and sharing your own beliefs, and perhaps we may both find that we can evolve together.