[public] You *cannot* sway opinion without some actual arguments.

[scintilla72]

From The Click Five's "Just the Girl":

She can't keep a secret for more than an hour
She runs on 100-proof attitude power

... so, it's only 50% attitude then? What kind of weak-ass statement is that?

My father just sent me and a bunch of other family this list of statements. He can't find anyone who's sure where it came from, but he says it

Comments

[contradictacat]

It seems kind of like an Objectivist primer, too. Cute, but meh.

[scintilla72]

That's one reason I want to hear arguments: because (from what I've read of it) I don't see anything majorly wrong with the Objectivist philosophy and I want to know why so many people seem to think it's crazy.

[ext_119048]

It's been argued that Objectivism produces psychological hazards (and benefits, though whether the latter outweighs the former is up for debate). See http://rous.redbarn.org/objectivism/Writing/NathanielBranden/BenefitsAndHazards.html.

For a more logical angle, there's an essay by Robert Nozick entitled On the Randian Argument (can't find a copy on Google Scholar or Books or any other such public-access service, sorry) that argues that a fundamental tenet of Objectivism -- namely, the value of self-interest, that each man is an end in himself -- contains a circular argument: that self-interest is good for men because men are interested in their own lives. Nozick points out that this doesn't address the case of a man rationally preferring death (thus shunning self-interest).

[scintilla72]

Heh, thanks for the link. Good read, though this is what I get for not actually reading anything of Rand's besides Atlas Shrugged: I didn't realize (or had forgotten?) that some of her views were quite that extreme. I suppose I've just taken the basic principles and not bothered to carry them to their logical extremes.

Would the one who rationally prefers death be considered evil, then, despite such a course of action not being out of self-sacrifice, because s/he is consciously failing to self-actualize, throwing away his/her potential? I can't think of why else it would be a problem...

[best_ken_ever]

It's a pretty weak-assed statement, but "two hundred proof" in that line doesn't quite have the same ring to it, imho.

4 and 5 seem redundant to me.

[kalium]

6. You *cannot* lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.

Reagan had something like that. What was it called again? Prickle? Fickle? Started with something-"ickle". It'll come to me. Eventually.

[scintilla72]

Are you talking about trickle-down economics? I don't think that statement is meant to be that specific (it doesn't try to assert that the best way to help employees is to help employers), but I suppose the vein is similar.

[kalium]

I've seen conservatives justify tax cuts to the wealthy by reasoning that they employ other people. That's just a thinly veiled trickle-down.

[scintilla72]

That's veiled at all?

I haven't actually heard people coming out in favor of tax cuts to the wealthy specifically, but I have heard people say that tax cuts to individuals in general helps to stimulate the economy by leaving them more to spend, and that tax cuts to corporations help to stimulate the economy by leaving them more to invest in capital expenditures (and/or raise wages, of course!).

The argument goes that the end result is actually MORE tax revenue instead of less, because profits/wages increase enough to counteract the lower proportions thereof being taxed.

And isn't that what actually happens in practice?