Some one once said that if you want to read a certain kind of book, write it yourself. That's what I did, just to enjoy the process. Hope you enjoy it, Mike.'

Jim

Ok Jim:) I'll read over the Kindle sample more slowly. I have no interest in looking for problems. I'm like the r-minute-manager, on the lookout for good things to talk about:)
Mike

Just a note, Mike, that my novel is not in the same vein as Eudaimonia's. Just a simple story of a man that is going to die and the choices he has to make to give his life... and death.... some meaning.

Eudaimonia has a post where he compiles writers from the gulch jim. consider posting your novel there and doing a general post on the book. Lots of readers in here. Thanks

Hi Jim:) I agree that just asking Why doesn't help too much. The trick is to use one's intuition to suggest an action change, perhaps a habit change, and then watch what pops up as a result. When you remove a defense, the feelings and thoughts hiding behind the defense become known, Jim. That leads you to the next thoughts and feelings and the next action to experiment with changing. That is in the realm of therapy, which is not what I will be teaching. At least not for the present. My workshop to be centers on an ability that most folks do not know they have: the ability to let go of a problem, an attitude, or a feeling. I'm not talking about abandoning one's intention to better a situation, but rather of giving up the overpush that so often occurs when one *wants* something to happen. That overpush makes it hard to see the forest for the trees, as well as hiding a bundle of feelings and thoughts.Giving up on the overpush is relatively easy to do. It can be hard and can involve experimentation and digging deep into one's feelings, but I have done this sometimes in the space of minutes, sometimes within hours, and sometimes within weeks. I looked at the sample of your book, Jim. I don't feel I understand it as yet, probably because I had to look at it briefly and quickly. I'd certainly like to check it out further. I have rewritten Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar" recently myself. I maintain poetic flow while clarifying many parts of it. The result is that when I read parts of it to others, they always seem to brighten up. Finally they understand what the Bard was trying to say! I have some notions of rewriting a number of the plays making very clear not just his obscure language at times, but also the rules of living that he discovered and inserted into his plays. Jim, what is this rule of epistemology that you've discovered? I'll let you know when the workshop comes, amigo. Mike

Which is why our dear leader wants to arm the IRS and wanted to create a civilian military that reported to only him.

I know members of the Armed Services and I echo Robbie in saying that you would see a mass mutiny in the ranks if they were ordered to fire on their own citizens. They would gladly lay down their lives in defense of our nation and I salute them for that.

"Giving her meal to a stranger while she and her child both go hungry is an altruistic, and morally reprehensible, act."

Disagree, from an entirely Christian viewpoint. In the Old Testament is one of my favorite stories - the widow of Zarapheth. She is a mother of a single child in the middle of a famine. On her last supposed day (the region is in the middle of a famine), she is about to make one last meal for herself and her child before resigning herself to fate: starvation. (Note: starvation is one of the worst ways to die). Elijah the prophet asks her to make a small cake for him first, asking her to have faith. She does so and all three survive the famine when her stores of oil and meal miraculously sustain them.

Is her action altruism? Self-destruction? Sacrifice, yes, but in the end she benefited immensely. I would strongly caution against the outright labeling of sacrificial actions as immoral because morality must necessarily then deal with ultimate right and wrong which would then necessitate a theological debate, and Rand was unabashed in her derision of organized religion.

Now please do not misconstrue this to be an endorsement of the looter mentality. It is merely a check on the hardline attitude I see prevalently here on this board which focuses so much on decrying altruism as an unmitigated evil. I echo other comments that say that fraud and deceit used to justify the taking of means from some to give to others is absolutely wrong. But to say that the willful sacrifice of one's goods/means to another is evil is to decry love for one's fellow man as evil: that selfishness should reign as the supreme motivation and ruling cause. If one wants to argue that the motivation for giving is as important as the giving itself, one can not deny that one must walk a line between sacrifice and selfishness - both extremes can lead to adverse outcomes.

Does this mean we should grant politicians the ability to tax and distribute welfare? I echo dcwilcox when unequivocally, I say NO. Such again is the product of deceit and fraud. But to label private charity in that category is simply unwarranted from a moral standpoint that allows all to participate in the market of ideas. If you choose to give to another out of charity or desire to help that person - regardless how the beneficiary then uses it - the judgement of the value of that act is for that person (and their god of choice) to determine and not for us to place an arbitrary value on (especially a value of zero). If the beneficiary goes on to waste the gift, can we then label that individual as foolish and unappreciative? Absolutely, and rightly so. Would it be justified to refuse to grant an unappreciative recipient further gifts? Sure. But I would strongly caution against labeling the initial gift a morally reprehensible thing lest you fall into a moral trap of your own device.

My assessment of Jim Taggart is that he was not evil, simply a weak-willed dupe. As to digging into one's psyche to affect change, I was a director in a state mental hospital a few years ago and also did child abuse investigations for 15 years. One fact that I realized is that "The gates of change are unlocked from the inside." After enough experience trying to "change" some bad thinking for so long, it got to the point where the law of diminishing returns reared it's ugly (but truthful) head and one realizes that we can play the semantic games, play the "why" games and rarely get to the answer. Many times, the answer for why someone does something is not knowable by either me or the other person unless and until they can accept facts, not feelings, as a starting point. Many times I confirmed it is better to start a conversation with "What do you think..." rather than "How do you feel." As a character in my novel, Paris, Wyoming ( http://www.amazon.com/Paris-Wyoming-Jim-... ), says, “One of the many burdens of age, my friend, is to make sense of the happenings that make our lives interesting.”
Jack smiled. “Which you’ve told me six or seven hundred times.”
“Oui. I’ve found that I can’t answer many of those questions so I ask them. It’s my contribution to epistemology."
Keep us posted on your workshop......

Hi Jim:)
I didn't know you were in your 70s. I'm 68 myself:)About the worth of knowing about motivations, oy veh, amigo. If you choose to try out my releasing workshop in about a month, I suspect you'll find that out in a week or two:) Looking at things somewhat more towards a Randian perspective (though when I talked with Dr. Weinberg over the phone, he told me he didn't agree with Branden's advocating of Objectivism, even though he admired the theoretical structure that Branden wove in "The Psychology of Self-Esteem") I'd like to suggest that you check out Weinberg's book "Self-Creation." Weinberg clearly shows why it is important to know one's motivation as well as look at one's external behaviors if one wishes to change the way one feels inside. You can try out his ideas of habit change in your own life, as I have--though I admit that it all goes down better when seasoned with my proposed teaching of "releasing.":) Back to Atlas, I don't see Jim Taggart as terribly fraudulent to others. He lied to himself and was a model of irresponsibility but he neither used force nor fraud most of the time in his tenure as head of TT. I except the way he attacked Dan Conway's railroad to get a monopoly on carrying oil for Wyatt! About the sanction of the victim, to me, Jim, the issue is, once you see the philosophy of not being a victim, *how* do you stop it within yourself. And then, amigo, we turn to psychology:)

Let me add, Mike, that when I preach "Never initiate force" I add "or fraud."

Toohey and Jim Taggart (and all collectivists) initiate fraud against individuals, in the name of the collective, when they promote the sacrifice of an individual's value (Roark or Reardon or Dagny). AR crystallized a lot in my mind when she elucidated the "sanction of the victim" concept. Going back to the motivation for one's choice, it is not within my purview, literally or figuratively, to influence anyone's choice to be a victim. Atlas shrugged to stop being a victim. I would wager you and I could spend hours listing people that made bad choices for good reasons ("to help the children") and suffered for it (and, unfortunately, made others suffer for their folly).

As some forgotten psychologist said, "All behavior is motivated." I find it tedious (I am 70+) these days to quibble over motivations when it is the outcome that affects a person's quality of life. Tom Sowell said don't measure intentions, measure out comes. Simplifies life, if you ask me.

Hi Jim, I hate to fall back upon the Voice of Authority, but in a way, Rand's work goes way beyond the use of force. Look at the Fountainhead, Jim. Does Toohey use force? Wynand? Yet the book clearly says that their actions were immoral. Look at Atlas Shrugged and the way Jim Taggart entered the scene with, "Don bother me, don't bother me." There is no physical force used, but there is something cleearly wrong with his character, in the sense of immoral! What thinkest? Best always, Mike

Thanks for clearing that up, Lucky.

Again,Mike, my issue is choice: forced by exogenous forces or from internal morality --whether rational or some warped sense of obligation. After that distinction is made, the discourse can take many directions. But I'm only going to assess whether force is initiated. If it is, there is something wrong; it is is not, there's no issue for me to discuss.

Anthropogenic -human caused.
that global warming as proven by the hockey schtick is due to human released carbon dioxide and not changes in radiation emitted by the sun. A hypothesis of great attraction to those who want more central government power.

Hello TexanSolar,
I know how you feel.

I like your approach to solar. Everyone that can do it when it makes economic sense and their environment they live in provides adequate sun power should consider it. Having the power companies set up solar and wind etc. systems still leaves one at the mercy of the cronies. Independent systems have much potential. I live in Michigan and we have a miserable amount of sunny days so it doesn't provide a quick ROI, but combined with a wind turbine and other energy saving measures there is still potential for those desiring that independence. I'm afraid your link only displays the first page for me. Perhaps I have something blocking more functionality... Anyway I regularly vacation in the Florida keys on an Island that uses solar. It is off grid and provides all the necessities. I am all for the freedom, independence and technology aspects of these systems. I am not for government mandates and taxpayer forced investments.
Best of success in your endeavors,
O.A.

Long time ago I heard a definition of good poetry...
It generates the most complex mental images, using the smallest number of words.

For some reason that is where my mind drifted, when I saw the number of comments on this elegantly succinct post.

Hi Jim:) I can't comment on whether or not your gift to a friend was "altruism." It would depend on how good a friend he is, and how good your financial situation is. I can comment on the importance of motivation, not just on the use of physical force. If I give from love and caring, my love and caring are affirmed. If I give from fear of disapproval, then my fear and maybe hatred are affirmed. We are talking about the difference between life and death, Jim, and that is the *core* of morality, as I understand it. If I choose voluntarily a form of suicide by giving to others while neglecting myself, would you consider that ethical? I'm not talking about a "lifeboat" situation where I have a painful disease, no hope of overcoming it, and my only honest option is to end it all by suicide. I'm talking about the day to day dribbling out of one's life energies by feeling less and less like a human being because one sacrifices one's life to folks one does not deeply care about at the expense of one's own life.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRZ5400UK...

again-this is vague. I am not challenging your premise, I would just like it articulated please

I appreciate the elucidation but, with no offense intended, I think the discourse of the differences among the motivations for altruism, charity, the moral imperative (if there is one), etc., begs the question: Is force initiated in the name of altruism or any other imperative? I was not born into this world to be altruistic or benevolent at the whim or whip of someone else. If force is initiated, it is not altruism, charity, benevolence, goodness, or morality, regardless of the intended outcome. I recently gave $1000 to a friend to help finance a titanium wheelchair. He has severe diabetes. Was that altruistic? I don't know and I don't care. All I know is that I made a personal choice without interference from anyone or anything, free from any force except that imposed on myself by myself. If a "guilt complex" or "social contract" or "moral imperative" urges someone to "give," that is their choice, no one else's.

Again, there is nothing wrong with altruism unless it is the rationale for the use of force.

Robbie, I believe you are completely correct. My late husband was an Air Force veteran and I know those enlistees did not check their morals when they enlisted. Nor have more recent enlistees. I would trust their integrity and their moral compass implicitly.

"Margaret Thatcher"

http://goo.gl/OiIfiK

Hey!