Monday, December 26, 2005

Spielberg's Munich

Frontpagemag has this take on Spielberg's latest film Munich. I haven't seen it but I am not surprised by the claims that Spielberg is engaging in moral equivalency. There is nothing more pathetic than a man who works as an apologist for sub-humans who would gladly remove his head. When is the world going to relearn that the wages of appeasement are death. When you feed the crocodile, you will be eaten.

Saturday, December 24, 2005

Heroic selfishness

If you want to understand how selfishness is a virtue, go find a copy of The Fountainhead and flip to the scene where Howard Roark is offered the commission for the Manhattan Bank Building. Roark's architectural practice has been floundering and he desperately needs the commission. Mr. Wiedler fights for him, but the board keeps him waiting. Finally, they offer it to Roark, but on one condition - Roark must change the building's facade to a more conventional design. Roark believes a building should have integrity just like a man; he believes that a building's form should follow from its function. Roark refuses the commission. The board members are incredulous; Roark is on the brink of utter destitution, yet he turns down a major commission in the heart of New York City in order to protect the integrity of his design. "Do you have to be quite so fanatical and selfless about it?" they ask. And there's this wonderful moment where Roark picks up his drawings and sqeezes them to his side, then responds, "That was the most selfish thing you've ever seen a man do."

Wednesday, December 21, 2005

Creationists defeated in Dover

A judge today in Dover, PA ruled "it is unconstitutional to teach intelligent design as an alternative to evolution in a public school science classroom" on the grounds that "intelligent design is a religious view."

There is hope for mankind after all. Hallelujah!

Read the full article here.

The importance of 'should'

The culture is suffused with bad ideas. Here's an indication. In the kitchen at work today I overheard the end of a conversation between a colleague and our HR director. My colleague was expressing exasperation about some topic unbeknownst to me, and concluded by saying that someone 'should' have behaved differently. And then our cheerful HR director quipped, "There is no 'should'. There is only 'is'."

I was stunned speechless. I have never witnessed a more literal demonstration of the is-ought gap. Our HR director may not have realized it but she succinctly expressed the dominant view of ethics amongst intellectuals: namely that no rational ethics is possible. The philosophical mainstream maintains that it is impossible to move from a statement of fact to a statement of value - that is, to move from an is to an ought. This is the explanation for the moral relativism of the elites.

To understand how to bridge the is-ought gap, you should read a book called Loving Life by Craig Biddle. Or read the original source of the solution: Ayn Rand.

The incident was a powerful demonstration of how bad ideas trickle down into the culture.

Tuesday, December 20, 2005

Why I love Mad Money

Think of your typical business show. Pretty boring, right? Not so Jim Cramer's Mad Money. Mad Money is financial news and analysis on speed (or at least very heavy doses of caffeine). Jim breaks furniture, sweats profusely, and baffles his viewers with his encyclopedic knowledge of listed equities.

Most of the business professionals I know thumb their noses at Jim Cramer. They see him as a sort of financial cartoon-buffoon. And to be fair, he is a caricature of himself. However, I find enormous value in his show. I'm talking about a value beyond his financial acumen or stock picking ability - I won't comment on those. Jim Cramer is creating enormous excitement for capitalism! People who would otherwise never read the Wall Street Journal are now following with interest the fortunes of Conoco Phillips and Sirius Satellite Radio. Capitalism is not merely the only moral social system - it is also magnificent! And Jim Cramer is getting the word out! For that, I salute him.

Preying on Gatsby

I'm currently reading the Great Gatsby. I bought this book years ago but have yet to make my way past page 30. Finishing this book is not at the top of my value hierarchy, but I do intend to get to it. I could tell almost immediately that Fitzgerald subscribes to a proto-post modern philosophy. However, his writing is frequently beautiful. This quote, which was excerpted in God of Small Things, is what compelled me to buy the book in the first place:

"Gatsby turned out all right in the end; it is what preyed on Gatsby, what foul dust floated in the wake of his dreams that temporarily closed out my interest in the abortive sorrows and short-winded elations of men."

Wonderful rhetoric.

Home on the Ranj

After a brief sojourn at an msn space I am back to my original home in the blogger-sphere. Dear reader, I realize I have been infrequent in my posts for the past several months, but I intend to here resume my blogging habit with aplomb. Expect even more colorful commentary, brilliant analysis, and irreverant wit!

And with that I sound my battle cry. To the power of ideas! To the glory of man! To life extraordinary!

Thursday, March 17, 2005

In defense of reason

An excerpt from an email I received today:


Nothing has any connection to reality...or has as much as you want it to...truth is absolute...its interpretation, experience and application are subjective...so no argument really holds!


My response:

You realize that your statement “Nothing has any connection to reality” is self-contradictory. If nothing has connection to reality, then neither does your statement.

However, you have elegantly stated the dominant epistemological viewpoint in academia today: the claim that knowledge is impossible (another contradiction by the way).

That such a statement is ludicrous on its face goes some length in explaining why academics are reviled by the “ignorant masses”, who tend to have more common sense.

I revere the pursuit of knowledge, and find it particularly tragic (ominous actually) that our brightest minds have committed themselves to attacking reason, when they should be its staunchest defenders.

Contrary to the skeptic/subjectivist party line, humans are fully competent to know the facts of reality. The knowledge acquired from the senses is valid. Concepts are derived from and do refer to the facts of reality. 2+2=4 and no amount of denial or evasion will change that.

However, to understand why is not obvious. It’s the subject of the branch of philosophy known as epistemology – or the theory of knowledge.

Today most people dismiss philosophy as frivolous. They think it has no practical advice to offer them. And in regards to current academic philosophy, that assessment is perfectly understandable. Most of today’s philosophers see their field as an abstruse parlor game with no connection to reality. However, philosophy is an indispensable practical necessity. If you brush aside the subject of philosophy, you will subconsciously absorb the dominant philosophic ideas that are taught in our culture. And as we can see from its effects on art, music, literature, politics, law, history, and even physics, bad philosophy can be disastrous.

Saturday, March 12, 2005

Napoleon Dynamite and the end of mankind

If you want a sense of how bad things have become in the culture, go rent Napoleon Dynamite. I was appalled. Napoleon Dynamite is not merely awful, its essential purpose is cultural destruction. By venerating a nihilistic anti-hero, this movie not only revels in its utter bankruptcy, but seeks to undo the enlightenment and return us to the rule of the primitive. It is the ultimate expression of postmodern sophistry.

However, I did like his dance.

Saturday, January 15, 2005

Fight!

The world you desired can be won, it exists, it is real, it is possible, it's yours. But to win it requires total dedication and a total break with the world of your past, with the doctrine that man is sacrificial animal who exists for the pleasure of others. Fight for the value of your person. Fight for the virtue of your pride. Fight for the essence, which is man, for his sovereign rational mind. Fight with the radiant certainty and the absolute rectitude of knowing that yours is the morality of life and yours is the battle for any achievement, any value, any grandeur, any goodness, any joy that has ever existed on this earth.

John Galt quote that ended Ayn Rand's last public speech (New Orleans Nov 1981)

Thursday, January 06, 2005

My letter to Time Magazine

In his essay The Class system of Catastrophe, Jeffrey Sachs uses the occasion of the recent tsunami disaster in South East Asia to promote his pet agenda: increased American foreign aid to the third world. Mr. Sachs correctly notes that the scourge of natural disaster is wrought more devastatingly in poor than rich nations. However, his proposal, increased development aid to impoverished countries, is merely a band aid solution that will do nothing to rectify the underlying problem. What is desperately needed in the third world is an ethos of personal responsibility, and government that recognizes individual rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. In short, what the third world desperately needs is not more aid, but more capitalism.

Monday, January 03, 2005

Rational Selfishness

A key point of Objectivist Ethics became clear to me today. There is a crucial difference between acting selfishly and doing what you feel like. Acting selfishly, in its true and proper sense, means acting in your rational self interest according to your objective nature as man - a rational being. As man you have certain objective requirements: physical requirements like food, water and shelter; but also spiritual requirements like self esteem. Doing what you feel like may or may not promote your rational self interest. For example, you might feel like sleeping in, but if by doing so you arrive late to work and lose your job, you are not acting selfishly. This is an important distinction: the fact that you choose a particular action does not make it selfish; an action is only selfish if it is in your rational self interest.

According to Objectivist Ethics, to be moral is to be selfish. I know this is a difficult idea to swallow, so let's consider a case study. Is a bank robber selfish? A bank robber acts to satisfy his physical requirements for food, water, shelter and higher level amenities, but in the process he betrays his spiritual requirement for self esteem. He must live with the knowledge that he did not earn his posessions and can take no selfish pride in these things. Further, he is under the constant fear of being caught; every other person on the planet is now a potential threat who may turn him in. This is no way for a human being to live. It is clear that the bank robber did not act in his rational self interest. He did not act selfishly.

In contrast, consider the businessman who by his own effort and determination is able to bring a product to market and earn a profit for himself. He can take pride in his achievement and enjoy the fruit of his labors. He has promoted both his physical and spiritual needs. He has acted selfishly and morally.

The dominant morality of our day is altruism. According to altruism, an action is moral if it serves others. The bankruptcy of altruism is exposed by its inability to draw a moral distinction between the businessman and the bank robber. The same word, "selfish", is commonly applied to describe the actions of both. It is a sad commentary that our language does not draw a clear distinction between rational egoism and exploitation.

Sunday, January 02, 2005

Democracy: The Sacred Cow

Carter Laren de-mystifies democracy and reminds us that the American political system is not a democracy, but a constitutional republic. Further, he argues that the system we should be promoting in Afghanistan and Iraq is capitalism.

Saturday, January 01, 2005

Am I a conservative?

My politics are frequently branded as 'conservative'. It is not a label I abhor; nor is it one I am completely comfortable with. I must admit, I was a liberal for most of my life, and I have not completely recovered. One of the lingering effects of that malaise is a certain antipathy for the conservative label. Unfairly or not, I associate the term with traditionalism, authoritarianism, anti-intellectualism, religiosity, and a certain curmudgeonly resistance to change.

At the same time, I share much in common with conservatives. I believe in limited government. I am a capitalist. I am more hawkish than George Bush.

My problem with the term is that I find it too general. 'Conservative' is used equally well to describe the Heritage Foundation, the Christian Coalition, and mullahs in the Iranian regime. The essential question, I think, is not whether you are conservative, but what is it that you are trying to conserve? The welfare state? United Airlines? Traditional marriage? The only answer that impresses me is the one Thomas Jefferson gave: the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Which is why, in a way, I still consider myself a liberal. 'Liberal' once had nearly the opposite of its current meaning: classically, it was used to describe an advocate for freedom and limited government; now it is used to describe a proponent for every kind of state control. I think the right made a strategic error by yielding such a valuable term to the left. The right's denigration of the term 'liberal' makes counterintuitive the truth that ours is the side of political freedom. We are the true defenders of individual rights and freedom from excessive and arbitrary government. The left, in contrast, seeks freedom from reality, at the expense of the individual.