DaVinci Posted November 19, 2016 Posted November 19, 2016 I've been thinking about this topic in the back of my mind all day. After pondering for a while here's my two cents in the form of an analogy: Child: "Mom and Dad, why don't you ever play softball in the yard with us anymore?" Mom and Dad: "We've been busy at work." For a show that has a lot of emphasis on parenting, I don't think it is unreasonable to put "work" aside for just awhile and come spend some time with the kids. 2 1
Tyler H Posted November 19, 2016 Posted November 19, 2016 I've been thinking about this topic in the back of my mind all day. After pondering for a while here's my two cents in the form of an analogy: Child: "Mom and Dad, why don't you ever play softball in the yard with us anymore?" Mom and Dad: "We've been busy at work." For a show that has a lot of emphasis on parenting, I don't think it is unreasonable to put "work" aside for just awhile and come spend some time with the kids. So "work" is content that obfuscates a certain aspect of the show's principles in order to put a favored person into a position anathema to the proposed ideals of said show, and the "children" are the people who want that obfuscation removed?
thebeardslastcall Posted November 19, 2016 Posted November 19, 2016 I've been thinking about this topic in the back of my mind all day. After pondering for a while here's my two cents in the form of an analogy: Child: "Mom and Dad, why don't you ever play softball in the yard with us anymore?" Mom and Dad: "We've been busy at work." For a show that has a lot of emphasis on parenting, I don't think it is unreasonable to put "work" aside for just awhile and come spend some time with the kids. How do you know it isn't the opposite, the coworker asking you why you'll fallen behind on some of your projects and the parents saying they're busy spending extra time with their kids during a critical period in their life when they have extra and special demands requiring such attention? What is a philosophy show when it ignores the external demands and events of the external world for more words without actions? Not like all his other content is disappearing and taking advantage of the unprecedented election to draw in new eyeballs towards all the content he's already got stashed up over the many years that can help people without any new shows on "just philosophy" would have probably been a huge missed opportunity and loss for the people who would otherwise have taken much longer or never have found his show.
dsayers Posted November 19, 2016 Posted November 19, 2016 How do you know it isn't the opposite, the coworker asking you why you'll fallen behind on some of your projects and the parents saying they're busy spending extra time with their kids during a critical period in their life when they have extra and special demands requiring such attention? Wasn't the narrative that we had to do this one thing to avert catastrophe to buy ourselves the time to be able to have the conversations from before? What came next? 2 2
DaVinci Posted November 19, 2016 Posted November 19, 2016 So "work" is content that obfuscates a certain aspect of the show's principles in order to put a favored person into a position anathema to the proposed ideals of said show, and the "children" are the people who want that obfuscation removed? I'm sorry I don't understand what you are asking here. What do you mean "the show's principles"? That doesn't make sense. Who is the "favored person"?
Spenc Posted November 21, 2016 Posted November 21, 2016 Wasn't the narrative that we had to do this one thing to avert catastrophe to buy ourselves the time to be able to have the conversations from before? What came next? more conversations with STATIST Bill Whittle I think you raise a fair point. In other threads I have offered arguments as to why a hard focus on the political circus without the accompaniment of philosophical anarchist principles and conclusions ("without" to "conclusions" being my main, if not sole, point of contention) is a mistake, so I won't go into them here. What I will mention is this; it is often stated that this show is a customer driven enterprise. As a donator I am expressing the direction I would like the show to take. I am here to learn subject matter unavailable in any other medium. Of the first 1800 podcasts I have felt educated and enlightened (and enjoyed that education and enlightenment) by 95-99% of them. Podcasts 2300-3000 probably 80-90%. Between August 2015 and may 2016 the only podcast I can say I truly enjoyed was The Truth About Aristotle. I like philosophy and psychology and economics and politics, but not politics I can get from any other small government show with no philosophical methodology. He added his voice to theirs for a purpose, if that purpose is done I want his brain back producing content no one else can. I listen and donate because I believe that there is no other show like this one and no one else that can make the case for a free society as well as Stef. My opinion of course should carry little weight in regards to the course of the show but since what Stef wants is to be customer oriented I will voice my opinion and he can add that to the pile when weighing the demand of his listenership. This is a data point for him. I'll vote with my voice and my dollars like any good voluntarist should. I'm not going to withhold my donations over this disagreement but I will voice my opinion on what I want to hear and what I think is effective in bringing about freedom. Of course I can only speak to my perspective not others' in this camp. Thank you for your curiosity in this area. Exactly. Keep in mind that Stef used to talk about charging $.50 per episode of the podcasts. I will not revoke donations from the show until they go back to the former model, however when I make donations, I will add a note accompanying the donation that I am paying on account for the episodes I consumed from the first 4.5 volumes of the show.
Anuojat Posted November 21, 2016 Posted November 21, 2016 I would prefer stef would go back talking about peaceful parenting , good healthy family relations, spanking, the nostate vs small goverment arguements now that he has so many new eyeballs. That is what i WISH. 1 1
Guest Gee Posted November 21, 2016 Posted November 21, 2016 I would prefer stef would go back talking about peaceful parenting , good healthy family relations, spanking, the nostate vs small goverment arguements now that he has so many new eyeballs. That is what i WISH. Why? Presumably these people are too stupid to browse the back-catalog, right? I've got to think they must be far too stupid for philosophy to be of any use.
thebeardslastcall Posted November 21, 2016 Posted November 21, 2016 I'd be curious to know if they saw a bump in downloads of older episodes and which ones, from the presumed influx of new eyeballs garnered due to the election.
DaVinci Posted November 21, 2016 Posted November 21, 2016 Why? Presumably these people are too stupid to browse the back-catalog, right? I've got to think they must be far too stupid for philosophy to be of any use. From my experience the older shows can be hard to digest at first. Let me be clear. I don't mean "emotionally". I mean, actually absorbing the information. This is in part because the information is embedded in examples, and there are stories put it for context. Those things have to be stripped away to see the principles and most people don't have the time for that. Unless you are already used to taking notes (mental/written) on a subject to get to the principles you are going to be confused sometimes. It also doesn't help that most of the shows are "Stef's thoughts" and unless you understand a bit about philosophy, and/or start at the beginning of the old podcasts you might not be understanding the new material as much as you could. I'd be curious to know if they saw a bump in downloads of older episodes and which ones, from the presumed influx of new eyeballs garnered due to the election. I doubt they will tell us that.
Tyler H Posted November 22, 2016 Posted November 22, 2016 I'm sorry I don't understand what you are asking here. What do you mean "the show's principles"? That doesn't make sense. Who is the "favored person"? I inferred that you meant the "work" was Stef focusing on the election as a necessity to save western civilization, and that the play is unimportant philosophical principles that us children are clamoring for in our idyllic ignorance of the bigger picture. I'm not saying this is what you meant, only what I inferred which of course I am willing to be corrected. It was not accurate for me to say "the show's principles" as if Stef did not derive these principles from reason and evidence and are as such only principles regardless of the show's existence, thank you for pointing this out for me to clarify. But what I meant in reference to the obfuscation is their absence in many political podcasts/videos in the run-up to the election for what purpose I can only surmise is to not scare off or be dismissed by people that are the target of the information. If the analogy was to place election coverage in a position of higher importance I would have to disagree. There are plenty of people who can reveal the MSM's lies and promote Trump (the favored person to Hillary), there is nearly no one, in my opinion, that can articulate the beauty and necessity of a free society the way Stef can. Although part of me does agree with this sentiment - How do you know it isn't the opposite, the coworker asking you why you'll fallen behind on some of your projects and the parents saying they're busy spending extra time with their kids during a critical period in their life when they have extra and special demands requiring such attention? What is a philosophy show when it ignores the external demands and events of the external world for more words without actions? Not like all his other content is disappearing and taking advantage of the unprecedented election to draw in new eyeballs towards all the content he's already got stashed up over the many years that can help people without any new shows on "just philosophy" would have probably been a huge missed opportunity and loss for the people who would otherwise have taken much longer or never have found his show. I'd be curious to know if they saw a bump in downloads of older episodes and which ones, from the presumed influx of new eyeballs garnered due to the election. - I would be interested in the empirical evidence thebeardslastcall called for to back it up. Viewing the reduction in the dissemination of anarchic principles as somewhat manipulative, I am skeptical that the viewers attracted by Trump videos will be receptive to the information - somewhat controversial - in earlier shows, if they even decide to venture back that far. 2
Mister Mister Posted November 22, 2016 Posted November 22, 2016 No, but it is a damn shame that these people are railing against a symptom of the problem of institutionalized coercion, and most of us are too busy acting like we won something or mocking them for being victims of child abuse to try and help them interpret what they're feeling. We're at a flash point in human history at helping people to understand that humans do not exist in different, opposing moral categories, which would evaporate the State. Instead, we're busy trying to figure out which flavor of State will help us get to that flash point. Pro-Trump/voting FDR'ers were saying they wanted this to be able to have these conversations and here's the opportunity for as much and... mockery? You keep repeating this argument as if it's magic. If it's that easy, then lead the way. Why keep finger-wagging at the wayward Trump-libertarians when you know the magic combination of words that will evaporate the State? That said, I too look forward to the show returning to broader questions, and I imagine Stef does as well. 1
dsayers Posted November 22, 2016 Posted November 22, 2016 You keep repeating this argument as if it's magic. If it's that easy, then lead the way. Why keep finger-wagging at the wayward Trump-libertarians when you know the magic combination of words that will evaporate the State? Magic, finger-wagging... There is a reason you need to poison the well instead of engaging me in a discussion. The State doesn't exist. People only believe it does. If you truly understand this, then it is evaporated in your life, as it is in mine. I AM leading the way, no matter how many times you express your discomfort as if that offsets the truth. As somebody who believes I've strayed off of a particular path and used your words repeatedly to try and get me on that path, it is curious that you feign ignorance as to why somebody would engage in such a behavior. FDR was once a beacon for great minds and those interested in peaceful parenting. There is no telling how many people might find this argument that discomforts you and this might be the first place they see it. I will plant as many seeds as I can, even if I'm not around to see the crops they produce. Just as you try to salt the Earth behind me because if more people understood the truth, you might have to face it yourself. 1
DaVinci Posted November 22, 2016 Posted November 22, 2016 I inferred that you meant the "work" was Stef focusing on the election as a necessity to save western civilization, and that the play is unimportant philosophical principles that us children are clamoring for in our idyllic ignorance of the bigger picture. I'm not saying this is what you meant, only what I inferred which of course I am willing to be corrected. It was not accurate for me to say "the show's principles" as if Stef did not derive these principles from reason and evidence and are as such only principles regardless of the show's existence, thank you for pointing this out for me to clarify. But what I meant in reference to the obfuscation is their absence in many political podcasts/videos in the run-up to the election for what purpose I can only surmise is to not scare off or be dismissed by people that are the target of the information. If the analogy was to place election coverage in a position of higher importance I would have to disagree. There are plenty of people who can reveal the MSM's lies and promote Trump (the favored person to Hillary), there is nearly no one, in my opinion, that can articulate the beauty and necessity of a free society the way Stef can. Although part of me does agree with this sentiment - I don't think the shows Stef was doing before Trump were unimportant. As others have mentioned before I also don't think that Stef's reasons for concentrating on Trump for so long have completely lined up with his earlier stance on voting. He did a whole show not long ago on how Trump is unprecedented. But so was Ron Paul. I think the "we have to focus on Trump for now" shows have effectively run their course. He's the President. Mission accomplished. I'm not saying they should never do a show about Trump again, but at the same time I think many of the listeners have expressed an interest in getting back into the messages that brought them to FDR. I'm sure there are many new people who have found the show because of Trump, and maybe that was part of their strategy. Pull people in with Trump videos and then bait and switch, but to do that you are also performing a switch on the old listeners when you claim Trump is unprecedented and Ron Paul wasn't and do a ton of shows about a politician and voting, hence this topic and others where people are scratching their heads wondering what happened. Now maybe Stef just shrugs his shoulders and says "Eh, a couple people left, but we got 100K more subscribers which is good for page views on older stuff and donations." but how do they know which of the people they drew in who came for the political messages are actually going to stay for the anarchy, peaceful parenting, atheist etc, messages? Haven't most of the listeners up to before Trump been coming in because they were already leaning towards non-conformity with rulers? Why is the core political action crowd going to suddenly abandon politics for anarchy when their politics guy won? They see that the system works, and Stef advocated for it. So now what? 1
Guest Gee Posted November 22, 2016 Posted November 22, 2016 You keep repeating this argument as if it's magic. If it's that easy, then lead the way. Why keep finger-wagging at the wayward Trump-libertarians when you know the magic combination of words that will evaporate the State? That said, I too look forward to the show returning to broader questions, and I imagine Stef does as well. I think it is because Libertarians can't define force. It is one of the reasons that Objectivism and Libertarianism are worlds apart but because there is some overlap (economics) they get conflated by many (even on this forum). Rand btfo'd Libertarianism all the time for this reason.
Tyler H Posted November 22, 2016 Posted November 22, 2016 I think it is because Libertarians can't define force. It is one of the reasons that Objectivism and Libertarianism are worlds apart but because there is some overlap (economics) they get conflated by many (even on this forum). Rand btfo'd Libertarianism all the time for this reason. Why can't libertarians define force, or what is wrong with the libertarian definition? Or why do libertarians need their own definition, what is wrong with the definition of force? How is objectivism and libertarianism worlds apart? My current understanding is that libertarianism is quite a large umbrella that covers many different ideological belief systems, objectivism being a small subset. What are the differences between objectivism and minarchism? (My exposure to Rand is Atlas Shrugged, The Fountainhead, and The Virtue of Selfishness - I have Introduction to Objectivist Epistomolgy but have not read it yet) How would you categorize yourself in regards to these thought systems? What is BTFO'd? Bashed the f*** outta?
shirgall Posted November 22, 2016 Posted November 22, 2016 What is BTFO'd? Bashed the f*** outta? Blown the f*** out. A sports term for winning by a large margin. Why can't libertarians define force, or what is wrong with the libertarian definition? Or why do libertarians need their own definition, what is wrong with the definition of force? I have always used something akin to "actions or threats of manifest harm" as "force".
shirgall Posted November 22, 2016 Posted November 22, 2016 How is objectivism and libertarianism worlds apart? My current understanding is that libertarianism is quite a large umbrella that covers many different ideological belief systems, objectivism being a small subset. What are the differences between objectivism and minarchism? (My exposure to Rand is Atlas Shrugged, The Fountainhead, and The Virtue of Selfishness - I have Introduction to Objectivist Epistomolgy but have not read it yet) I think a core disagreement is that libertarians consider the NAP axiomatic and objectivists consider it derivative of other principles. Where this can be seen is that objectivists won't necessarily extend protection of rights to those who don't protect those rights themselves. Quite the opposite of what you say above, objectivists also consider libertarianism incomplete as it is a political philosophy without regard for other domains like ethics. You can be a libertarian about politics and have widely divergent views on other philosophical topics. Minarchism is a small piece of the range of topics encompassed by objectivism, and is considered another area where objectivists think an idea was stolen with the teeth taken out of it. 1
Tyler H Posted November 23, 2016 Posted November 23, 2016 I think a core disagreement is that libertarians consider the NAP axiomatic and objectivists consider it derivative of other principles. Where this can be seen is that objectivists won't necessarily extend protection of rights to those who don't protect those rights themselves. Quite the opposite of what you say above, objectivists also consider libertarianism incomplete as it is a political philosophy without regard for other domains like ethics. You can be a libertarian about politics and have widely divergent views on other philosophical topics. Minarchism is a small piece of the range of topics encompassed by objectivism, and is considered another area where objectivists think an idea was stolen with the teeth taken out of it.I see, thank you for clarifying.
shirgall Posted November 23, 2016 Posted November 23, 2016 I see, thank you for clarifying. Be aware that I only scratched the surface of a heck of a lot of writing by Rothbard, Rand, Peikoff, etc., and I don't identify as an objectivist so I'm putting terse words in their mouths.
dsayers Posted November 23, 2016 Posted November 23, 2016 Why can't libertarians define force, or what is wrong with the libertarian definition? Or why do libertarians need their own definition, what is wrong with the definition of force? It's been defined for him before. He quickly shoved his fingers in his ears so he could repeat the claim at a later date.
Guest Gee Posted November 23, 2016 Posted November 23, 2016 It's been defined for him before. He quickly shoved his fingers in his ears so he could repeat the claim at a later date. 2
powder Posted November 23, 2016 Posted November 23, 2016 There was absolutely nothing unprecedented about Ron Paul. and so far there's also nothing unprecedented about the people Donald is looking to appoint to positions of power
Guest Gee Posted November 23, 2016 Posted November 23, 2016 I see, thank you for clarifying. Shirgill's posts are great. But yeah, libertarianism is not objectivism. Perhaps topic worthy? Libertarians have no values. You could (Rand did) argue that libertarianism is the application of some objectivist ideas (some economics) without the foundation of ethics (without any foundations actually). (This would explain why there has been stagnation in libertarian though, and why there always will be). Libertarianism: The perversion of liberty by Peter Schwartz discusses this (Check out the audiobook version of Return of the Primitive on audible but make sure it is the Schwartz edit, predicted the sad state of the libertarians in the 1970s. When people talk about cultural libertaranism (Milo, et. al.) they mean objectivism. I actually think the alt-right is objectivist (implicitly), they (tales of the redpill) talk about going through libertaranism and discovering the lack of values which they re-invent (ish) as alt-right (objectivism + human biodiversity + leftist tactics) But yeah, even if you accept the NAP as an axiom the issue is the definition of aggression. The issue with objectivism is that Rand skipped a few steps in her derivation of ethics (check out Stef describing it here). This was the provocation for the derivation UPB.
Guest Gee Posted November 23, 2016 Posted November 23, 2016 and so far there's also nothing unprecedented about the people Donald is looking to appoint to positions of power omg! pm me the people being appointed! I live in a country where gambling is legal, we're going to clean up! 50/50 split on the profit, I'll foot the stake. 1
shirgall Posted November 23, 2016 Posted November 23, 2016 Trump will be judged by the results he produces and not the people he appoints to get various jobs done. Even this is unprecedented in a politician.
DaVinci Posted November 23, 2016 Posted November 23, 2016 Even this is unprecedented in a politician. So when could we consider Trump to not be unprecedented? At the end of his first term? When is the precedent set, and what then becomes "unprecedented" after Trump? Aliens? I mean the extraterrestrial type.
dsayers Posted November 23, 2016 Posted November 23, 2016 Trump will be judged by the results he produces Poisoning the well by pretending POTUS can accomplish anything. Or that any one man can. People of integrity judge others by things like HOW they achieve results (as in not initiating the use of force) and how they address their mistakes. That he thinks people can rule over each other is all I need to know about the man. 1 4
Guest Gee Posted November 23, 2016 Posted November 23, 2016 Poisoning the well by pretending POTUS can accomplish anything. Or that any one man can. People of integrity judge others by things like HOW they achieve results (as in not initiating the use of force) and how they address their mistakes. That he thinks people can rule over each other is all I need to know about the man. Fixed. 1
shirgall Posted November 23, 2016 Posted November 23, 2016 So when could we consider Trump to not be unprecedented? At the end of his first term? When is the precedent set, and what then becomes "unprecedented" after Trump? Aliens? I mean the extraterrestrial type. At the moment, un-Presidented as well, so I'd say the first checkpoint is approximately 100 days into his term? See you then? 1
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