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Has anyone read this book?, I am on chapter 13 find it quite interesting. The author was Inspired by Ayn Rand work. I am in the part about sharing, I never thought that in addition to tell my son to share if he feels like it that he needs to think about not accepting things from other person that "shared" with him through coercion. But it makes sense.

I have just woken up to a really fascinating dream and I think there's potentially a lot to it. There's a lot of interesting elements that complete it as it delves into the nature of political power. Perhaps people can help me about what it means? I had woken up when the sun was out and had a dream about losing my bag with my phone at a market with my school mates before this dream. I fell back asleep. I was sitting on the first row of white pews for the lack of a better word, similar to the rows of seats you would see at a stadium but not as many seats and they weren't retractable. Only about 4 rows or so each towering above the one in front. We were inside a massive hall so big that the roof seemed non-existent. The place was completely lit up except for the details of the halls architecture as it was unimportant. I didn't care for the source of light. I was with my high school class peers but I distinctly remember only two being of my class friends being present (I am finishing year 12 right now and we have finished our last classes so I won't be seeing them at school ever again except for the one friend who I talk to in the dream when we do our chemistry exam). We were wearing casual clothes. I think I was wearing shorts. Opposite of the pews was another set of pews facing towards us. Between us laid a 10 metre wide green carpet than ran down the lane of pews to somewhere which I had not seen. In those pews were famous names. Right opposite of me was the royal family. Queen Elizabeth, Prince Phillip, etc. I assume Kate Middleton was there too. Next to them further down were politicians, intellectuals and powerful men. They all had light colourful clothes. Light blue shirts, light green shirts, etc. The men wore trousers. Some of them were making a fuss and having conversations but the royal family were silent and unified. We were located in some place in Melbourne, Australia which is my home city. Someone was making an announcement into a microphone at the end of the carpet which I never glanced towards. I didn't hear exactly what they were speaking about but I knew to stand up as everyone else was. There was slow patriotic music playing over the speaker. Everyone held their heart with their right hand and took a bow then made a flourishing gesture with both hands. I played along to fit in but I had no idea what we were making allegiance to. To me it didn't exist and it felt a little uncomfortable. We sat back down and I looked right down the pews and saw Ronald Reagan standing up making a fuss. A minute or two later my class stood up because we were about to leave the hall. My friend stood beside me and I mentioned the famous people and said, "You know, I know the names of all those people who were sitting opposite to us". He was bewildered and said "Oh reallllly?". It seemed to me that he had no idea who any one of those people were, even the queen! Then I left the hall and saw my other friend running around the place but I had no conversation with him. There were no girls, It's an all boys school. I exited the hall through the mist of the crowd not paying attention to any faces and walked to the outside to the side of the hall where there was a simple concrete building with glass panels that ran down one side above the waist and a glass door next to those glass panels. I entered inside and inside was a lounge. Simply a square room with a round table with chairs in the middle slightly off to the top right corner and I assume there was a coffee maker and snacks on the other table in the corner. There were also black couches for leisure. The room was pretty busy, many people were having conversations. In the room were many of the famous people whom were mostly chatting with us mortals having interviews and so forth. The atmosphere was very casual but busy. I entered and looked around eagerly. To my left was a couch a metre away from the wall with the glass panels and it was left to the door facing roughly towards the centre of the room. On it was an unoccupied black man (I'm european) turned away from me sitting on one of the cushions closest to me. He wore a fine business suit. I walked around and glimpsed at him and looked at the clip board which had the name "BEN CARSON" and it had extra sheets of paper for writing. I didn't need it, I put it on the other cushion and sat down next to him. I said "Hey! Ben Carson?". He smiled and calmly said "Hello". He spoke very calmly and clearly throughout. I asked him how his career was going to grease up the wheels. I can't remember exactly what he said as it was of little importance to me. We then went on and then came the moment. I said, "What do you think about libertarianism, you know neoliberalism. I know it's rather popular in the United States". He said, "Well, what does it have to do with politics?". It sounded to me that he was asserting that we need a robust political system to keep integrity and that libertarianism is loosey goosey and could never be established. Perhaps that's not what he really meant. Perhaps he was saying that all he cares about is power so he does what he can to attain power. I too was assertive. I closed my eyes in concentration and said, "Politics is a branch of philosophy concerned with the way that human behaviour is organised. Libertarian theory simply is that human behaviour is organised such that all relations are voluntary". I gulped on that last word. During the time I had said that I was trying to keep my eyes open but I just couldn't open them. I forced them open with my fingers but they only stayed open for a second and I made no eye contact with him during these two sentences. After I had said that my eyes opened and a girl about the same age as me (18) sat down on the other cushion so now all the cushions were occupied and I was in the middle. Ben Carson went on talking but I was distracted because the girl was pushing on my legs and sat strangely close. I never made eye contact with her. I saw Ben leaving with a friendly expression on his face that I should follow him so I did follow him and left the girl to sit alone. I followed Ben outside and he then turned to me and made a joke. I couldn't register it but he mentioned "Atlas Shagged" at the end and so we both laughed. We walked side by side and I mentioned Atlas Shrugged and told him it's a book he MUST read and that it is pinnacle to libertarianism. I said this despite never reading the book myself but I knew it was the most popular of Ayn Rand's books. I had just read some of The Fountainhead. We walked down the main street which I was familiar with. The sun was setting, it was about 7pm. The sky was turning orange and the restaurants had their fire lamps on. He mumbled "What are we going to do?" and I said "don't worry, we will be best friends". We both laughed. I took out a skate board. The footpaths were empty so he pushed me while I was on my skate board and I went super fast. Faster than I could go just by pushing with my legs. I stopped and skated back towards him. I only saw one pedestrian. At first I thought it was my friend whom I had not spoken to but as I got closer and he got closer I realised it was a short, skinny brown guy with dreadlocks. His eyes were wide open and he wore a colourful singlet. He pace was fast and he had an abnormal walk. It wasn't aggressive but just abnormal. He walked past us. I skated back and forth a couple times and then we passed an small anglican church that was amongst the shops and restaurants. He said "hold on" and I saw him enter the church assuming he's going in for the prayer. I waited patiently outside. Then I woke up. So I thought this dream was really fascinating as it delved into the nature of a politician and it had a little to do about me as well. I think what he said about libertarianism is very interesting. It is to do with fatherlessness? What do you think about it?

I'm reading Atlas Shrugged. This passage sent shivers down my spine. The first time I read it, I literally saw the word "terror" instead of "horror". Intolerance equates to racism, and horror originates from terrorism and the cultural demolishing of the west by radical Muslims advocating a literal intepretation of the Islamic religious text. All the meanwhile, free speec is censored for the protection of feelings in the name of tolerance, so that any rational cry for help is strangled before it even leaves the mind, lest you be called racist... It's odd, this book was written long ago, but this passage stuck out to me as though she were writing for today! Thoughts?

Saw this video posted on YouTube, and thought it worth sharing here. "I don't believe lack of knowledge is a license to start inventing fantasies." Sadly, it would seem like we are still having to debate these simple truths today.

A recent post made me remember a Ayn Rand concept that I found pretty powerful in the past. This concept is called "anti-concepts", and is defined as: Some terms that she considered anti-concepts were: consumerism, duty, ethnicity, extremism, simplistic, open and closed mind, isolationism... Are there new anti-concepts that you can think of that has have been introduced into the lexicon since Ayn Rand's days? One that immediately comes to my mind is "Islamophobia".

What better to do on New Year's Eve than to philosophize, am I right? So I am reading "Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand" by Leonard Peikoff and I want to share with you how I came to accept the axioms of Objectivism because this was a big struggle for me. Maybe this can be of help to others and perhaps I can have any potential mistakes corrected. My understanding is that there are no contradictions between the metaphysics of Objectivism and UPB. However, the approaches are distinct in that Objectivism has a focus on establishing its theoretical framework in a more formal way as can normally be found in philosophical works while UPB focuses on establishing its tenets through looking at what people do in conversation. In other words, UPB does not really contain axioms in the traditional sense other than what is self-evident when people argue. I.e., UPB takes a shortcut and I assume this is done due to it being more effective and practical in everyday life. Objectivist metaphysics, on the other hand, goes deeper in that it uses axioms that refer to our first sensation of the world. The three Objectivist axioms are Existence, Consciousness, and Identity. My error in grasping them was that I am used to evaluating concepts through the method of how one establishes arguments: Through evidence plus deductive or inductive reasoning. The challenge here is that the validation of the Objectivist axioms require no deductive or inductive reason. It is not something that is grasped through analysis. Rather, what I needed to do was to dilute my focus on the abstractions and simply look at the world around me with its various objects, actions and properties. When I focus on just looking around I have to accept that something (identity) exists (existence) of which I am aware (consciousness). This is self-evident just by perceiving the world. I am not sure whether identity are a function of existence, of consciousness, or of both, but I think that it does not fundamentally matter because without accepting this axiom I contradict myself. This because I have to implicitly rely on identity when I use concepts which I evidently do since I am writing this forum post. Another interesting thing about Objectivist metaphysics is that identity is an implicit of existence rather than something that refers to an essence that are in the things. The latter is what Aristotle stated in one of his principal works: "Metaphysics." In other words, in Objectivism existents do not have identity. They are identity. I am not sure what to make of that but I really find that fascinating. Hope that helps and please point out any errors. Happy 2015!

I loved the "The Truth About Ayn Rand" series. But when will the fourth episode come out?

I'm currently working on a tragic novel and need some help on how best to demonstrate the virtue of the lead. To give a brief synopsis the novel is a tragedy set in modern day Paris about a sculptor, Anton Duarte, a black man from Tunisia who turns to stone. The fantastical device of turning to stone is used to demonstrate his fall from virtue and fame into lies, deceit, and madness. The idea for the motif of lies turning you into stone comes from Pinnochio's nose; but as a whole my two main inspirations are the play Othello and the novel The Picture of Dorian Grey. Tragedy to be effective as a genre must have the right structure. To use Stefan's phrase, "art is an emotional argument for virtue". Tragedy in particular shows what happens when a good person is corrupted and the work acts as a kind of warning sign "don't do this", and is empathetic to people who make mistakes and get drawn into evil deeds by showing the whole context. Othello for example, at the beginning of the play is virtuous and strong (according to Shakespeare's statist values), and it is Iago's manipulation of him into thinking his wife is having an affair that turns him mad. I'm struggling with how to demonstrate Duarte's goodness according to anarchist values in the first half. I like the idea of him being a bootstrapper, building his career as a sculptor of marble from humble origins as a plasterer at the age of 18 on on Parisian building sites. But here's the thing. I've also been playing around with the idea of making him a Muslim (does not drink, is an ascetic bachelor, prays five times a day etc.). From the viewpoint of the structure of tragedy, this would seem to say that Islam is somehow virtuous and represents truth (in counterpoint to his lies turning him into stone), yet I just can't imagine Duarte being an atheist. Anyone have any thoughts or ideas about how to demonstrate his goodness according to anarchist values before the tragic downfall? Any fans of Ayn Rand welcome! **Don't know whether this topic is in the right category but there doesn't seem to be a folder for art on the boards yet.

At 42:35, Stef quotes Rand: "My characters are not recipes for living. They are ideals." Does anyone know where this quote comes from?

Hello! So, I recently bought a book on anarcho-capitalism, called The New Libertarianism: ANARCHO-CAPTALISM by J. Michael Oliver. It's an attempt to reconcile objectivism with anarcho-capitalism, and as such it explains the basics of objectivist metaphysics. I'm at the very beginning of the book, where he talks about the existence axiom, but the problem is that I don't get it. The basic argument is that we are conscious, and if we're conscious there has to be something objective (outside of our minds) that we're conscious of, but is that really true? Can't I be conscious of my own fantasies? Thank you! /Sebastian

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I wanted to give and get a few thoughts on Objectivism and post-Objectivist/Neo-Objectivist etc. philosophical work. To give a background, my first exposure to Objectivism was through an audio book version of Atlas Shrugged I had torrented (take that, Objectivist IP nerds!) I was already familiar with radical liberalism and market anarchism through various lectures and articles on Mises.org, Anti-state.com and similar websites. I think I first heard about libertarianism via a Yahoo political party search (I liked the LP platform), and had started reading economics articles on Lew Rockwell. Pretty soon I was emailing socialist parties asking them why they had such crazy ideas about international trade, but it wasn't for a while after that that I seriously investigated Ayn Rand. I think I might have heard a few of her views on metaphysics and God when researching atheism in my teens, but I didn't distinguish her in particular until I decided to give Atlas Shrugged a listen. I have a taste for pulp literature and hard boiled detective novels, both of which influenced Ayn Rand, so I generally enjoyed the story. I found it a bit weird and slow at times, but some of the dialogue was really great, and funny (Rand wouldn't appreciate that - she believed laughter was for destructive purposes!) I especially liked Hank Rearden, who's more charming as an uptight but straightforward sexy Rockefeller than the New Capitalist Man John Galt. I agreed or sympathized with many views Rand expressed in the book, but I was not especially taken in by her philosophy - probably because I had already felt many of the same influenced she had, and had already radicalized into libertarianism and egoism a bit further than she did. I am not an intensive student of Objectivism in general or Rand, but I have put some effort into reading works by Objectivists or those strongly influenced by its ideas; and as I said, I have read some of the source material that influenced Ayn Rand's own development such as Aristotle, Nietzsche and Mises. The best place to start would probably be standing on one leg. The first seems entirely reasonable to me. Although certain metaphysical theories and religious belief systems would deny or qualify this, I suspect that most Objectivists had the same experience of George H. Smith of loudly proclaiming the existence of the external world and futiley waiting for someone to argue with you. That is not to say there isn't merit in pointing this out: after all, academic philosophy and pop mysticism are rife with bizarre and contradictory standards that contrive to allow them a pretended solipsism, and following through the implications of a realist metaphysic will help us understand the relationship between ontological coherence and logical consistency: Rand, like Aristotle, wants to make metaphysics prove logic. Her arguments in favor of this are not particularly detailed. Peikoff has made more elaborate discussions, but probably the best Objectivist-Aristotilian metaphysic and ontology I have seen is in the work of George H. Smith such as Atheism: The Case Against God. I am not sure if I agree with Ayn Rand's epistemology, though it does not strike me as a crazy epistemology what I have read by her and Peikoff hasn't convinced me. In fact, it hasn't entirely stuck with me, which is why I'd like comments from others. My own epistemic views are similar to those of Roderick Long, himself an Aristotilian, and it would perhaps to be worthwhile to see what he has to say about Rand's epistemology. I know that David Gordon has a lecture on this available online, too, which I'll try to listen and pay attention to. In some literal sense every man is his own end in that only particular persons have ends or ideas about means. Rand's moral views, as I understand it ala David Kelley, is that when persons understand their nature they use their reason to assess facts and assign a value and disvalue according to some standard of life or flourishing. If that is what Rand means by 'morality' I suppose I would agree, but I have always had trouble with how she goes from this very general proposition to presuming an broad swathe of classical liberal legal virtues. I wouldn't even say that law and morality are the same thing. It reminds me of the very abstract arguments of theologians for the existence of a Benevolent Prime Mover which conclude with, "therefore Jesus." While I do believe there are plausible supports to be made for libertarian law, eudaemonian reasoning, virtue ethics, egoism, and the general advantages of an individualist, rationalist and capitalistic society I don't know that you could make any straightforward deduction of them from the fact that men must use reason in their pursuit of ends. I mean, certainly thugs do use reason.They are not 'faking reality', because the 'long run' contribution to the damage of society they make is miniscule and the benefits are rapid and direct. Arguments that being a thug leads to a poor disposition and shallow life, that you risk retaliation, etc. are all perfectly reasonable, but MAN'S NATURE just isn't going to cut it. I am a Mises U. disciple of the Austrian Priesthood, generally favoring Rothbard, Mises and Menger. I am also fond of certain elements of Joseph T. Salerno's formulations, particularly on causal realism and economic calculation. Given that, and my overall views on civil society and law, I am a firm endorser of laissez-faire capitalism and I believe that Rand had a reasonably good grasp on economics from her writings in Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal. It's not clear if she understood the Austrian theory of the trade cycle, but capital theory is obscurantist by its nature.