Ayn Rand is a fucking awful philosopher and an even worse writer.

Elaborate so that I might be able to give you some credit. Otherwise, you seem to be like the other million critics who critiqued her books without having read them nor understood them.

Exactly. That is the problem. It is just as stupid as nihilism. You never get anywhere with that idea. One has to believe in some sort of morality. One lives by a morality whether he wants to or not. He may constantly rebel against his supposed morality, but that only creates a new one. A morality is a set of rules to achieve a goal that one sets for oneself with his own reason. That is morality in its true sense. Most philosophers hold that one should run away from reality and admit there is no objective morality. However, then they hold that there is no such thing as the objective world. They hold that there is no defined right or wrong way to go through with an action. There most certainly is if one has a goal and one can judge it based on what is more rational to achieve his own interests.

You just choose to not think about the question of morality when you say, "Nope, there isn't a right or wrong in this situation." That is cowardly and you are letting reality dominate you. It is just as dumb as determinism in the sense that it forfeits one's life to reality.

Having a raison d'etre does not make you a moral being. This definition is beyond atrocious because it makes that assumption. One can have no drive and still be a moral person.

This is why I hate Rand's philosophy. It tosses out philosophy based on reality and logic in favor of selfish gain. In my mind what I gain from reality is far more important and precious than anything I could get out of denying it for selfish goals. The ideaology doesn't care about what actually is as long is it makes you feel good.

^This is the problem with the internet, you read of bunch of out of context bullet points some true and some not all misrepresentations of how the man thinks, never listen to him or read his thoughts expansively and then assume you have an idea of what he's about.

If you believe everything you claim about Dr. Paul is as cut and dry as you put it there you're 10x as nuts a you accuse him of being.

You act as though "millions of deaths" is what one should be afraid of. If people sign up for the military, they are choosing to fight. There goes a piece of those "millions of deaths." Next we have the government that initiated force on us. Are you telling me that it would be smart to let them use force on us as if it was nothing? Where the hell is the logic in that? The only smart thing to do is use force back. When I mean use force, I don't mean that we should be playing "find the bad guys." I mean that those who seem to support that government should go down with it. America is too nice when it comes to war and that is where the casualties come from on our side. We should be shooting those who are an enemy in war, and that includes the civilians who pose a threat. The reason wars take to long is we try to be as careful as we can, thereby avoiding the fact that war is war and the enemy needs to be completely destroyed.

The end of minimum wage is good. The end of government guaranteed sanitary conditions in the workplace is good. The end of the suppression of child labor is great. The end of government hand-outs based upon health needs is excellent. I see no problem here.

Please, do explain how one can have a morality without a goal. Just one example and I will be happy. Also, expect me to find the goal that you will probably fail to mention.

I think that you basically just said, "What I want from reality is good, but it is also stupid because it isn't as great as what I want from reality."

What actually is? What is the one thing that will induce pleasure and pain in your life? Yourself.

Rand's philosophy is the ideal for living and enjoying this reality. That is because it allows man to like living, unlike the popular philosophies of this time. It is also based in logic in that she views that man's mind is the key to unlocking reality. As she says, "A=A." This represents that man can know what is beyond him in this objective reality. You are the one who claims that man cannot know parts of reality and that is infringing on this base point of logic. You say that an objective morality is not able to be found. That is saying that logic does not work in the case of morality. That is highly illogical because you deny logic's value in that sentence.

Secondly, you have no reason to believe that your selfish goals are wrong. Give me a good reason why one should believe such a thing.

You do not know very much about war, do you?

I do. I know that you all say that the wars create new enemies and such, but that is because the way the US approaches war is too humanitarian-influenced. The point is to reduce the threat to where it doesn't become much of a threat anymore. I guess wording it as "completely destroyed" was not very good, but that is what I mean.

I don't believe in bombing the hell out of every country in the world. I just think that countries which are threatening us and using force on us should have no mercy from us.

Your one-liners are greatly appreciated though. They tell me just how smart you are because the argument from intimidation is the best argument, isn't it?

what the **** country has threatened us or used force on us since pearl harbor? and if i recall correctly our response was to bomb the hell out of them.

No, I'd be glad to have this discussion with you because you pretty clearly don't know what you're talking about on this one. It just doesn't take paragraphs and paragraphs to counter your claim, is all. The purpose of war is to achieve a political objective, it is a means to an end and not an end in and of itself. Wars of attrition (what you're suggesting) are wasteful, unnecessarily violent and generally ineffective. Those in command of the military know this, and that is why they don't engage in wars of attrition. You are playing armchair general and exposing a complete naivety to the purpose of war and the ways they should be effectively fought. Completely destroying your enemy does not end a war, achieving the political objective you sought to achieve in the first place, does. The problem with the current war is that there was never a decisive political objective and the war is essentially endless. My comment was directed at your assumption that destroying the enemy is an inherent objective of war--it isn't. That is an immature and naive understanding of the institution and it has caused countless problems for the United States both now and in the past. The United States decimated the Viet-Cong during the Vietnam war, but the North Vietnamese won that war because they achieved their political goals. It has nothing to do with destroying your enemy.

this has probably never been the reason the United States went to war.

This thread is about Ron Paul, lets get it on track or shift the discussion to the appropriate thread.