WasatchMan

It would be wrong if it were false, but it is not.

Don't know if this one has been put out there: - Claims to have a lot of male friends (this is usually just a bunch of betas circling the water).

What if circles were square? That is the same question as asking what if superstition was logic.

The point really isn't what if everyone had a gun and therefore we could repeat the end scene from "The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly". The point is what if everyone knew before instigating that the people they were planning to initiate force against had a high probability of having a gun and defending themselves with that gun. It is the deterrent that we want to promote, not the efficacy of Joe Blow in a shoot out.

J.D. Stembal - I am wondering if you are willing to defend this statement, or if you were just dropping it off and letting it ride?

So James Holmes is a crazy person, and an anomaly in a society of +300 million - an anomaly that is pretty much contained to the minds of the severely mentally deranged. Radical Islam is a self replicating meme that has been a problem to this earth for centuries (way before America's chickens left the nest). It currently infects millions of people throughout the world, convincing them that the greatest thing they could do on this earth is live their life according to the ethics of a 6th century barbarian war lord, who is now the embodiment of their Universe. You really want to try to measure up the James Holmes issue against the radical Islam issue?

You're not answering the question, would they be better off to be living in the Africa of today? Cultures are not all the same, and they happen to find themselves in a superior culture today then the mess that happens to be most of Africa. The neurosis is a result of a meme, a brain virus, that they are raised around and shapes the narrative of their view of life. A meme that tells them that they don't have to succeed on their own because their ancestors were oppressed. None of them have personally experienced slavery, and have no reason to hold white people who had nothing to do with slavery responsible. Many cultures have been able to rebound from bad events in their gene pool. But I guess we should just coddle and give excuses for their failure so they don't learn, because that hasn't been tried yet - oh wait, it is the reason for the mess.

Do you think they would be better off today living in Africa?

Is anyone else following this San Bernardino terrorist attack feel like they are living on another planet or took 10 hits of acid and are stuck in a Grateful Dead jam while watching the wizard of Oz? We just had the biggest terrorist attack on U.S. soil since 9/11 and it feels like the media is afraid to even identify it. When the story broke the immediate response was obviously to blame white people and guns - another "maladjusted angry white man (or "bouy") mass shooting". When the name of the killers came out as being obvious Muslim names, all of a sudden the story was changed to "work place violence" - how do you even make this shit up? More and more evidence is trickling through showing that they supported ISIS and were in contact with people in Syria who are likely also ISIS. Have we become that apathetic where an attack where 14 are murdered and 22 more are injured from being shot and it hardly raises any ire of anyone? OR is the media keeping a lid on this story in fear for what the black lash might be when people do find out they were just attacked again by radical Islam? OR What? Not sure if anyone else is experiencing this all, but let me know what you think.

Read Atlas Shrugged.

Sounds like some nice projection to me... Seems like this would be the more realistic case: Dear Black people who get it, It is YOUR responsibility to go get your people, to check your people, to heal your people, to address your people, to educate your people, to raise your children in a stable environment, and if necessary to take your people out. Black men and black women been out here Hella reckless for centuries! This gang violence and black on black crime, especially violent crime, is out hand. Black brutality against police officers, and your fellow brother, has always been out of hand. "The Angry Black Man" is out here losing his shit and trying to kill the world. Dear black people who get it, Go get, go check, go heal, go educate, go raise your children, go address, and if necessary go take out the the poisonous, racist, sick, evil black folks in your circles, in your village, at your job, at your dinner table, in your family, and most especially the black person you look at in the mirror every day. It's your responsibility because the violence and brutality coming out of the black community is responsible for the VAST majority of the violent crime in this country, even though you make up a minority of the population. It is your family, are your peers, are in your village, and prosper in your community. Because the cocktail of "Black Privilege " + "Black Victimhood + Black Entitlement " is and has been killing this planet, and other people of color, for centuries. And now that shit is still killing you more than any other single race. To my Black friends who get it, who check, heal, educate, address and begin to kill off the entitled racist within, I see you. I thank you. I love you. And I need you to go harder. All our lives depend on it. ‪ #BlackPeopleNeedToStopCommitingCrime #HaveABackBoneAgainstEntitledIdiotsWhoRunAroundShreakingAtYouThatYouOweThemSomethingBecauseWhatTheyAccuseYouOfIsLikelyWhatTheyPersonallyFeelGuiltyAbout

Art is the expression of a person's view of life. If it is one of disgust, they will try to pass modern art off as grand. Good art can be measured by how well it actually does reflect and inspire greatness and not weakness, sadness, ineptness, etc. This is what Rand has to say, along as much more on the subject (http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/modern_art.html, http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/art.html) ("Art and Cognition," The Romantic Manifesto)

My guess is it would have to do with the evolutionary function of dreaming. It is thought that one of the functions is to allow us to stay in deep sleep where the brain is able to be doing many other important functions like creating memories and integrating information. Therefore, your brain is in a state where it is able to just flow through thoughts without consciously stopping and analyzing them. I would guess that allowing the analytical/critical part of the brain to work wouldn't allow your brain to be completing the other functions it is while you are sleeping. Also, if being able to be skeptical during dreams actually caused you to wake, it would counteract the evolved reason for dreaming in the first place and therefore we would probably have developed another mechanism to keep us asleep other than dreaming. In other words, you are not being skeptical while dreaming because you are trying to sleep. Obviously a lot of speculation here, but it would be the place I would start looking for the reason.

Its not the only way to get there, but it is there only methodical way to get there and the only way to know once you get there it is true.

Agreed. UPB:

Would you think it right to shoot someone for improperly using a horn? I don't think so, therefore most likely not a violation of the NAP - just APA.

Your sexual opinions are aesthetic choices, not moral, making it only evil to initiate force on ANY side of the issue. Therefore, the only evil in the Russian situation is around those who support/vote for/enforce laws that are enforced against gays because of this fact - the people with just opinions may be ill-advised, but they are not acting evil.

It would be funny if it weren't so scary. They got their slogan now, their banner to rally behind - some extreme moralizing ends that will allow them to justify any means. Next trumped up "innocent" black "murder" media event that gains some traction is going to light this powder keg.

The Truth About ISIS Attacks on Paris: Climate Change..................dun dun DUNNNNN!!! The only thing sadder than this being taken seriously in a presidential debate is reading the comment section with people defending this statement.

What is the null hypothesis? What explanatory power does this hypothesis have?

Would you date/marry someone who believed and tried to convince others the world was flat? It really is no different to be a Christian - it is just more socially acceptable. Fundamentally, if you believe that Jesus came down to earth through virgin birth, preached the word of god as the son of god, was crucified and rose again three days later just so that your "spirit" can also go to heaven when you die (just as long as you believe in him as the creator!) - you are proving your willingness to submit reality to your whim as much (if not more than) someone who is willing to believe that the earth is flat. Someone who is willing to submit reality to their whim is probably not where you want to set the bar at when it comes to choosing a life partner. Why not aim higher?

Genes are plastic to the environmental so any environmental hardship (war, famine, zombie apocalypse, etc.) would result in a set of genes better suited to surviving that hardship. Does that mean smarter genes - maybe. It would also mean more ruthless/less empathetic genes. This is why philosophy is about universals and principles NOT pragmatism. It doesn't care what is better - it cares about what is right.

Opinion is not wrong by definition. An opinion is something that has not yet been, or there is insufficient knowledge for. the making the claim of a fact. Something can be an opinion and be true. Before there were mathematical and observational models that demonstrably proved that the earth rotates around the sun, and the sun is the center of a solar system, anyone who thought that this would have to say that a heliocentric model is there opinion. Even though there opinion happened to be true, they did not have the evidence to properly claim it to be a fact.

I think that the problem with this analysis, while rather well thought out, is that it puts the cart before horse. Murder is in fact the concept that describes a killing that cannot be universally preferable, however the reason this concept exists is because it describes an action that truly does exist, not just an abstraction. In other words, the killing has to not be universally preferable (by tests like the two men in a room test) to be put in the murder category, not the other way around. The concept of murder has been shown that it cannot be unverisally preferable by the type of behavior it represents. So in a way you are right if you turn the analysis on its head and predetermine that every behavior has a subset that is unwanted. However, what you first need to do is determine whether the behavior cannot be universally preferable through tests like those provided in upb. You are actually doing what you accuse upb of doing and being tautological in your analysis instead of looking at the logical proofs in how you can determine if behavior cannot be upb.