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Earlier this month, I had set my alarm clock on WGBH, a music radio channel,
and I got woken up by the news from NPR,
the so-called |
Début février, je réglai mon alarme sur WGBH, une radio musicale,
et suis réveillé par les nouvelles de la NPR, la radio soi-disant |
Bill O'Neill, an objectivist correspondant in Holland, PA, sent me this piece about the infamous Kelo case. Of course, such a thing wouldn't make a scandal in France, where it is well understood that the government can do anything in the name of the public good. America may be becoming a Totalitarian Democracy, France already is one. Démocratie Absolue de Droit Divin. Oh well.
NB: so as to provide a disincentive for people holding political power to destroy liberties too obviously, you may join this pledge, or at least consider visiting the hotel when (and if) it is built.
by Bill O'Neill
( Read more... )My officemate, a very fine hacker if there ever were one, did a nice door hack last week. The RFID reader pad that controls the electronic door lock for the suit we're in was too high by a few inches (centimeters? wazzat?), so he removed it from the wall and put it back a few inches below; the result isn't quite as nice and clean as it used to be, but it is much more functional: if you carry your electronic key in your pocket, as every one does, a proper twist of your hip (depending on said pocket being front or back, left or right), and there the door opens -- just like it is with other doors in the company. Everyone involved is happy, and no administrative sanction is taken, sought or even considered. Correction: Everyone involved is happy, thus no administrative sanction is taken, sought or even considered. Incidentally, what the competent administrator did decide when he became aware of the change, and after seeking explanations, was to set straight the pad that had been left slightly crooked, acknowledging the enhancement, rather than putting things back with sanctions as could have been his reflex, into which a bureaucrat would have gleefully indulged. That's the power of capitalism: all consensual transactions are legitimate.
( Read more... )Here I am in a new world. Safe and rested at last after a long journey. It's a new dawn. It's a new day. It's a new life for me. And I'm feeeeling good.
( Read more... )It looks like my visa has been issued after all. Therefore, I will be able to come to Boston for a training period! Yippers!
2005-03-08 UPDATE: I got it in my mail this morning. Woohoo!
QOTD, re visas: A pretty face is not a passport, it's a visa and it runs out fast.
In a bus to NYC early in January 2005, I met this gorgeous girl who was reading a course in Economics. The textbook was open on a praise of the Fed and its role in regulating the National Economy, with an opposing page in a special color denoting higher science, that justified this role based on one macroeconomic equation by Keynes. It was too tempting, so I started a conversation.
( Read more... )While in the States, I had an argument with, of all persons, a French man. He argued for relativism, that true and false do not matter, and might not exist at all, that every situation is unique, etc. Yeah sure! His example went that everytime he heard that same Opera was unique. And my reply was that everytime he'd have to listen to the noise of a jackhammer for two uninterrupted hours would be just as unique. He was an extreme example of what Ayn Rand called the anti-conceptual mentality.
( Read more... )
When I was in the Boston subway,
I saw the following advertisement on the red line, saying that Math is Cool
.
The next day, the advertisement was gone.
Maybe math wasn't cool anymore.
But then, there were still ads for learning philosophy, teaching english, etc.
Things like that make me feel like Boston is just my kind of town.
Think about it: a giant multiversity campus with lots of fascinating museums!
I left the New World and what is left of New Amsterdam, and am now in Old Amsterdam, in the Old World. My oh my, there's a change indeed.
It's nice to have friends everywhere. Time to practice my double dutch.
I am François-René Rideau, a one-man think tank from France, and the webmaster of Bastiat.org. Since I realized tonight that time is expensive, I will be short. Iris asked me to answer the question:
What is the reaction in France to Ayn Rand's ideas?Well, the answer is quite short actually: <french accent>The reaction to what???</french accent> In France, Ayn Rand is even less known that in America. The difference is that in France, academics don't even have to find a pretense so as to dismiss the significance of Ayn Rand, that is hardly ever brought about.But the problem with the silencing of libertarian ideas goes much further. Consider that free trade was relatively popular in 1776 after Adam Smith published The Wealth of Nations. At the same time, socialism was mostly unheard of. Nowadays, free trade goes mostly undefended, while socialism is the semi-official religion of the day. So this is not just a matter of
new ideas that haven't had the time to spread.Ayn Rand insisted that the superiority of objectivist ideas resides in their rationality. Well, for an argument to be accepted, there are four steps which must be overcome: the argument must be heard; it must be listened to; it must vanquish prejudices; it must be understood. Only on the last step does rationality matter. For the rest, we must develop our skills at rhetoric if we want our ideas to compete on par with those of our opponents.
Having fun together is nice and well, and we're enjoying tonight (at least, I hope); but it only goes so far in terms of advancing Liberty. To advance Liberty is to convince other people of the nature, validity and importance of human rights. And convincing other people is a long and difficult task. It is an Enterprise of its own, to be approached as such. We have limited resources; we must manage them properly. With these resources, we must develop and market our ideas and arguments. Usual marketing techniques and pitfalls apply. We must define our targets, and cater to their needs. Most importantly, so as to survive and to extend, we must follow the bottom line: the self interest of the participating individuals, the sustainability, hence profitability, of the structuring institutions through which we advance Liberty.
Liberty will not prevail by chance. It will prevail because some people will have taken its success seriously, and will have undertaken the task of heralding it rationally. You can be among these people. You can become an activist. Or you can fund activism by people who specialize in the field. You may decide to fund my think tank, or another libertarian organization. In any case, it is your responsibility to entrust proper resources to people who will advance the cause of Liberty. Because you are the ones who know better.
Thank you for your attention.
I'm coming today. I want to be a part of it: New York, New York!
Yes, this time, it's serious. I'll be coming to NYC, after all. I'll be spending the New Year's Eve there, and leaving on the evening of Monday January 10th. I'll also be in Boston on January 2-4, and back to NYC on the afternoon of January 5. If you'll be around at these dates, maybe that's the opportunity for you and me to meet there?
A Nous Deux, New York!
Another important way in which americans are free and french are not: in public messages, whether in ads or in public venue regulations, the main way that people are enticed to do things, in the States, is you can do it
, you can help preserve the environment, you can achieve something for yourself, etc. In France, it's you must
, whether you like it or not, you cannot, because someone who knows better than you has decided it this way. Of course, this is more visible in public regulations than in private advertisements, since the latter always rely on the good will of the consumer. Still, even french ads more often than not resort to bad conscience and other forms of self-loathing. This is not something to be found in the States.
I greatly enjoyed driving on highway 101 between San Francisco and Mountain View. Part from the reason was the nice rental car. I liked its automatic gear box a lot, though I couldn't manage to use it till I had some passerby explain to me that the brake pedal also served as the clutch. All the americans I met were so very nice, except for a civil servant from MBTA (who was notably lacking niceness though without being rude). Reminds me of Japan -- however, though the japanese might have seemed even nicer, I couldn't understand what they were saying, whereas I can speak english and enjoy american niceness.
( Read more... )
I may have been out of the loop, but I was happily surprised
to see how Linux was present everywhere during my air travels.
First thing, I hear Dell spending several minutes in an on-flight radio program
explaining how it installs RedHat Linux on its servers,
or whichever other flavor of Linux suits their customers.
Next thing, Oracle bought all the ceiling ads in SEA airport
to say that Oracle makes Linux unbreakable
.
In San Francisco, Veritas puts Windows, Unix and Linux on par.
Finally, on my trip back, the in-flight entertainment system by Panasonic
reboots in Linux:
I could see the penguin on my neighbour's screen as he desperately twiddled the command pad.
Wow. Linux has gone a long way in thirteen years.
The free market works around information protectionism, slowly but surely.
I went to Boston so as to attend LL4. I was disappointed to find that none of those great PLT guys could or would come this year, but all in all, it was a nice event, with nice people, and the last session was particularly entertaining, with presentations about gooze and frink.
What was even better, I got to meet two friends that I find truly impressive, each in his own way: Jay McCarthy and Denis Auroux.
( Read more... )I'm HOME.
That is, I'm in the heart of the Silicon Valley, visiting companies and campuses full of particularly bright people, meeting like-minded friends sometimes surprisingly so, enjoying a bright blue sky and a warm weather in December, living in an extraordinarily rich country, crossing a lot of generally welcoming nice and positive-minded people. What more can you ask?
I have a unique opportunity to travel to the States, so that I'll be having my birthday party amongst my closest friends there. You are all invited to join me on the evening of Saturday November 27th, 2004, somewhere in Seattle, WA, USA. My actual birthday is on the 28th, but considering the change in timezone, it will already be the 28th in Paris while we rejoice in Seattle.
A great many thanks to Josie and Leslie, though they won't attend. Contact me for further details as they become available.
The guys from the Libertarian Party,
including their presidential candidate,
and those who follow their line of
non-interventionist nightwatchman government
fail to be libertarians in quite an important way.
I do not choose to be a common man.
It is my right to be uncommon -- if I can.
I seek opportunity -- not security.
I do not wish to be a kept citizen,
humbled and dulled by having the state look after me.
I want to take the calculated risk;
to dream and to build, to fail and to succeed.
I refuse to barter incentive for a dole.
I prefer the challenges of life to the guaranteed existence;
the thrill of fulfillment to the stale calm of utopia.
I will not trade freedom for beneficence nor my dignity for a handout.
I will never cower before any master nor bend to any threat.
It is my heritage to stand erect, proud and unafraid;
to think and act for myself, enjoy the benefit of my creations
and to face the world boldly saying,this I have done.
All this is what it means to be an American.Dean Alfange
This poem was the basis for Douglas Rasmussen's speech in Aix. I thought I should not only share it with friends, but cast it in gold into my blog. Yes, I am an American, just born in the wrong country. Actually, America is an idea, not a country. Someday, the whole world will be America: land of the free, home of the brave. In the meantime, America experiences a relative shortage of Americans.
Topic of a recent discussion with friends, anti-americanism in France (even among people with libertarian trends, as long as they are well-endoctrinated by the media). Here are stuff to read on the topic. | Sujet d'un débat récent avec des amis, l'anti-américanisme en France (même chez des personnes pourtant à tendance libérale, pourvu qu'elles soient bien endoctrinées par les médias). Voici quelques lectures sur le sujet. |
When faced with the rise of
Gubernator,
many statist minds (including the totality of the french mass media)
disparage the phenomenon as a corruption of the democratic process.
According to them, such candicacy makes a This is exactly what happened during the Middle Ages, when the priests tried to monopolize art with their sacred art, and disparaged the popular profane arts, seeking to prohibit them or otherwise hamper their popularity whenever they could. Actually, the statist intellectuals are but the clerics of the modern official religion of totalitarian statism: paid directly or indirectly with tax money to justify and extend indefinitely taxation and established privileges in the minds of the public, systematically removing resources from anyone who could question them and seek to abolish them. |
Confrontés à l'ascension du
Gubernator,
de nombreux esprits étatistes (y compris la totalité des mass media français)
présentent le phénomène avec le plus grand mépris,
comme une corruption du processus démocratique.
Selon eux, une telle candidature transformerait
en un C'est exactement ce qui se passait au Moyen-âge, quand les prêtres tentaient de monopoliser l'art avec leur art sacré, et dénigraient les populaires arts profanes, cherchant à les faire interdire ou autrement à limiter leur popularité dès qu'ils le pouvaient. En fait, les intellectuels étatistes ne sont que les clercs de cette religion officielle moderne qu'est l'étatisme totalitaire: payés directement ou indirectement avec l'argent des impôts, pour justifier et étendre indéfiniment l'impôt et les privilèges établis dans les esprits du public, en retirant systématiquement toutes ressources à quiconque remettrait en question ces impôts et privilèges et chercherait à les abolir. |
