I understand your concern about labels. However, labels are ways of summarizing a number of concepts. If I want to explain Hillary Clinton's politics to someone unfamiliar with her, then saying she is democrat or a left-wing democrat or a socialist, is a lot easier and makes more sense than listing off her position on a 1000s of issues.

Actually the labels liberty vs oppression is unlikely to work for a variety of reasons. For instance, plenty of people believe that state funded health care increases their liberty and other people think taking away people's rights to their inventions or their artistic creations increases freedom.

Unfortunately, there is no short cut to the hard work of winning the war of ideas.

Not that my opinion holds much water, but frankly I believe all the concerns re who is called what or what he calls himself is totally irrelevant.

I believe if we must label ourselves and our opponents it should be "liberty vs oppression'. No other labels are needed. Labels get in our way of accomplishing even simple conversation...too many meanings to too many words. Everybody should recognize the words liberty and oppression. I am either in charge of my life or someone else is. IF someone else is, then it isn't MY life. That means I am oppressed. How much more simple can it be to know who to vote for, assuming everyone isn't lying?

I despise all the labels people make up, including the ones being discussed here. Can we not survive without all the foolishness and waste of time spent on labels and just consider freedom vs oppression? I will vote for ANYONE who is for freedom, and i will vote for NO ONE who is for oppression. Makes life so very simple.

Is this the level of your intellect? If so, I would deeply appreciate it if you do not bother me in the future with your antagonizing drivel.

You did cite him as a source. You claimed he has a "good explanation". That is citing him as a source. Shermer's and your polemical insults are not "standard methods of critical thinking".

I didn't call a Libertarian a thug. I referred to "libertarian thugs". The particular one I have in mind is a thug who called himself a libertarian. None of us caught on to what he was until later. Rand referred (famously) to "Leebertarian heepies." I'll have to agree with her, because at the time I was acquainted with libertarian activists, around 1970, they were hedonists of various flavors with little interest in Objectivist philosophy. "Mostly harmless," to borrow from Douglas Adams, ten years later. And ripe for picking by opportunistic thugs. None of my friends could see through the thugs because we had no suspicions, no idea that anyone renouncing initiation of force would take up being a criminal.

There was a lot of crazy stuff going on then among those on the fringe of Objectivism. Drugs. Loyalty oaths. Redefining Rand to match one's whims. No wonder Rand distanced herself from her "heepies".

Some of us thought Rand was paranoid in defending herself. But she could plainly see enemies whom we took to be our friends and hers. "I'll sue you!" she told one of our hippy friends.

First of all, I asked: pon what basis can you call a libertarian a thug?

You did not answer that question, you simply went off on a tangent unrelated to the question or your comment. This is to commit the fallacy of diversion.

I give up with your thinking ability. To say one will not initiate force is not the same as saying one will not defend against force initiated by another. Slef defense is far different from attacking.

Attracts them. "Ripe for picking. They say they won't initiate force against me! They'll just stand there while I frisk them. They won't suspect a thing."

I disagree with you, but what I found interesting is your term "libertarian thugs" for a group whose only common principle is one may not initiate the use of force.A thug is a violent person, especially a criminal. Upon what basis can you call a libertarian a thug?

I did not "cite" Shermer, I suggested his article because is is good. I believe, from previous exchanges with you, that you have an issue with standard methods of critical thinking. Understand what another person is actually attempting to communicate is one of them.

A non-credible person is not a source of credible accusations. He has a record. The burden of proof is on you and citing Shermer is not evidence, let alone proof. Neither is citing the ARI website as self-evident "examples".

Switches don't rewire. They temporarily change the flow. When you want Dale to turn on the living room lights do you say, "Dale would you rewire the living room so that the lights are on?" And if you got a clapper and could turn the lights on by clapping, does your hands become "a device for rewiring the living room"?

And, in any case software doesn't change switches hardware does based on reading the software. The ability to act is built into the hardware not the software. Software is just information.

And yes I've seen some of the patents that Dale writes. The fact that he expresses obvious computer algorithms as a device to get the patent office to accept them doesn't mean that they are a device or that they are even unique.

His ring buffer patent is pretty obvious. And this is a good example. I found it and his other patents on his web page when we first had this argument and reviewed it. He has taken it off of his web page and I can't find it by searching the internet since I don't know the number.

So, if I was working on a problem and needed a ring buffer solution I would probably come up with a very similar one and would not be able to find his patent even if I looked. And I would never think of looking.

As I've said, writing software is more like writing a book. The number of times that a software designed creates algorithms to solve the various problems he faces is similar to how often you come up with new events or interactions to move your plot along. It's a daily process.

The designer frequently creates new code even if existing code, in the public domain, is available because the amount of material is too great to effectively search -- and this is material specifically organized from a software point of view, not that written in the 'this is a device' language of patents with the various claims.

I have read many books and hundreds of articles on software design. Not once, and I really mean, NOT ONCE has anyone ever suggested that the programmer search the patent libraries for a solution to a technical problem. Patent's are not expanding usable knowledge in our domain.

what in the sam hill is the software DOING? in order to work, it sets switches. Switches re-wire. to call it something else is beyond absurd. How many patent applications on software do you think Dale writes?

It would be appreciated if that were coming from you. But no you got the religion.

The issue is not whether Shermer is a credible source, but whether what he says is credible. That is one of the differences between a cult and not a cult. The cultist determines truth based upon the source (fallacy of authority) and a non-cultist is more concerned with what is said as distinct from who said it.

As long as you insist on what is at best a bad metaphor for the relation between hardware and software it isn't possible to discuss it further. Software does not wire a computer to become a different circuit. You're undermining your own arguments for IP

Software is used to WIRE a computer to become a specific circuit. A circuit is patentable.

It has nothing to do with a disruptive period in invention as an excuse to deny property rights. You seem to have misunderstood. Software property rights should be protected in accordance with its specific nature as software, which is not a machine and not art, but the current approach in law is better than nothing.

now you are on this post. I go away for a couple of hours and we ....

This is all true.

Most charity can be handled more efficiently privately than through government largesse. By the way, much of what is considered to be poverty in the USA, is pretty much middle class in the rest of the world.

I agree with most of this. I see the reason for gov't as being to provide non-excludable things, things you can't opt out of paying and be excluded from the benefits. Someone might say he doesn't want to pay for armies, police, and courts, and he'll forgo the benefits of them. It's hard to turn off the benefits of having a military just for those who don't want to pay. I think there are cases where welfare, infrastructure, and education have non-excludable benefits. They tend to turn into forced charity or a gravy train for the connected, though, so I'm cautious about them. I am against them if the reason is alms. Unlike most fans of Ayn Rand, I would support some forced taxation for childhood nutrition, education, and medical programs b/c I think we all benefit from a world where childhood poverty is reduced. I'm in the minority of Ayn Rand fans on that point, but I agree the tenor of what you're saying, and I share the concern that any programs that even smack of charity take on a life of their own.

Hopefully reason and rational discussion will win.

what has will shipley provided to this site that is Objective? This is my post and I say-destructive-love destructive-they are easy to annihilate enjoy your weekend

we have been called out by admin. You won. Look at my points, william. who will win on this site?

Actually as you'll read on Dale's recent thread, I freely admit that Dale is an expert in his aspect of the industry -- I never questioned that.

In this thread I didn't actually mean to bring it up. I don't want to deliberately antagonize you two because I think that other than a single point of (white hot) disagreement we probably agree with most things.

The thread was on libertarians and Objectivists and in response to statements that libertarians don't believe in IP rights I said some do and some don't. I said I did. Somehow you thought this was a challenge and responded strongly.

It is a weakness of mine that I can't let a challenge go by.