Shannon: a) You ask, with evident sarcasm, "precisely how is an Objectivist a "better sort of person" than someone else". Any Objectivist can give you 1001 and many more reasons and arguments for this, though none of them will convince a person as you are, since you and Objectivists perceive two different universes, which renders a debate useless and senseless, as Ayn Rand herself stated in "Philosophical Detection", a comment Leonard Peikoff clearly underscored when he wrote: "If reality does not convince a person of the self-evident (Darwin's Evolution is also such a case - my comment), he has abdicated reason and cannot be dealt with any further. H. G. Wells recognized this too so many years ago when he wrote in his story "The Country of the Blind" that (one) cannot fight happily with creatures that stand upon a different mental basis to oneself.
Therefore, just for the record, I'll tell you out of the guts what makes Objectivists so special: It is well known that many ideologues, when confronted with the question, have always maintained that they are willing to die for their ideal. Most of them, however, will not do so by the time the moment of truth arrived (Rand even wrote a play on this) and we will never know if they wouldn't have retracted from their oath when the time came, since they were killed and, thus, never had to face the time when they themselves had to live (and not to rule and, thus, occupy the position of the bigwig) under the scourge they imposed on the common people. The "Che" Guevara is precisely such a case, being it well known that the Bolivians that he subjected hadn't the slightest desire to toil and suffer under his rule. Lieutenant Colonel Selich question to Guevara: "Why didn't you manage to recruit more national (Bolivian) elements, such as the peasants of the zone?" was never answered by the guerrillero, for obvious reasons. Besides, these kind of "idealists" don't care whether what they hold is correct or not. After all, they will be dead and, thus, not have to suffer the consequences of their illusions.
Well, of course, and speaking in the general understanding of the question, Objectivists are also ready to die for their ideal, but this is really a simple matter for, here too, they will be dead by the time Objectivism triumphs and don't have to take up the responsibility for any possibly resulting mischief.
What makes us Objectivists so special is something very different, something no other idealists have faced. As Rand herself explained, we are ready to LIVE for Objectivism, which means that we know the good Objectivism will accomplish and, thus, want to live, each of us individually, in an Objectivist society and participate in an Objectivist society and enjoy an Objectivist society, exactly as the T-Shirt I'm wearing on my photograph beside this massage states in bold letters: "Enjoy Ayn Rand's Objectivism".
You see, that's precisely what makes us so special, so superior if you want to put it thus, though you will never understand this.
b) Since we're at it, in http://rebirthofreason.com/Forum/ArticleDiscussions/0679_5.shtml I asked you to provide the required proof for your answer that the mind remains sober when the body gets drunk. I added that William Dwyer would surely relish your answer. However, in view of the time gone by, it's evident that you preferred to dodge the reply and remain silent instead of giving the requested explanation. There are unkind names for those who proceed thus, but I will leave this aside, merely stating that evidently courage failed you.
Further on, you thought that by mentioning the case of Christopher Reeve paralysis you had a good line of defense. However, this isn't so. You should at least notice when you yourself present a contradiction in terms. How so? Well, Reeve broke his neck during the accident (probably vertebrae C5), which destroyed the marrow that serves as a channel through which the nerve strings to and from the brain (location of the mind) run. If mind is so superior to matter and not related to it, as you and sundry religious people of all kind and types hold, it's really a great surprise that this powerful mind couldn't jump over the not much larger than 1 cm break and continue to send its orders to the lower part of the body below the separation. Why can't it use - if any material need be at all - some other means to transmit its commands? The skin, for example, or a combination of other organs. After all, the body doesn't consist only of nerves and such a superior thing as the mind is should even be able to operate without any physical means at all.
By the way, it is precisely the need for nerve strings that the mind (the brain) has to send its orders, which moved Reeve to support, through his Foundation, the search for the genetic creation of marrow and nerves starting from stems cells (a R&D issue unfortunately prohibited in most countries!).
You see, Ayn Rand clearly demonstrated, and absolutely finally, that matter AND mind (the brain) are NOT separate areas. They are VERY distinguishable and they operate in unison. No dualism exists; matter AND mind form a non-dualistic unit. They cannot be separated. Whenever they are, a most regrettable paralysis sets in. As I mentioned already in my writing "Ayn Rand, I and the Universe" (mind you, not a pep rally but a long string of arguments which, of course, you will refrain from reading) never has the time been more favorable to cure the outcome of such pitiful accidents as the one that hit Reeve, than nowadays existing material and intellectual research. You know very well that no religion would have ever been able to provide the required solution, though you won't understand this either, which puts a full final stop to this interchange of messages.
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Big government is a national security threat: it increases your vulnerability to threats like Islamism, and makes it less likely you'll be able to summon the will to rebuff it. We should have learned that lesson on Sept. 11, 2001, when big government flopped big-time and the only good news of the day came from the ad hoc citizen militia of Flight 93.
