go right back to this point here. in the first place, i didn't make them equivalent. i told chris he was espousing utilitarian individualism AND social darwinism. you took me to be saying that they were equivalent. they're not. social darwinism is absolutley a subvarient of libertarian thought or, rather, good old fashioned liberalism (see <http://www.belmont.edu/lockesmith/essay.html>
robert nozick, THE contemporary libertarian theorist, draws on spencer, the person who coined the concept "survival of the fittest". you go ahead and read the above and then maybe you might catch an errant klew.
i'm sorry to be snotty, matt, but i've been sitting here in tears for the past half hour, just astounded at the flatfooted and utterly wrong statements that are being tossed around as if they are being pissed from the digits of a being sprung from the head of zeus.
>OK, I may be guilty here. There are very specific definitions for what I
>would claim are very general phrases and I'm not aware of them, I suppose.
>I took "utilitarian individualist" in the sense of utilitarian as a
>model for morality, such that things defined as "good" are things which
>are useful for protecting sovereignty of the individual and his liberty.
but even on your definition, voting for any candidate is an individual's decision and none of your concern. you and only you can know what you want and need and no one has a right to judge.
>>>>The robot is programmed for fear,
> >
> > is this dave you're channeling here or what!?
"the programmed for fear" bit. i think you are capable of more complex thinking than to attibute people's apathy, etc to being programmed like sheep. but have it your way, life is lot like burger king you know.
>Well, this is the essence of a Wilsonian "fnord".
yeah, well someday i might actually get what "fnord" is and why i should care.
>Social darwinism is the theory in sociology that groups achieve advantage
>over others based upon genetic and biological "superiority", no?
yes, but it has nothing to do with what you're typing about. how is affirmative action an illustration of social darwinism? social darwinism argues, as spencer did, that the gov't should keep its nose out of the natural processes and let the weak die and the strong survive. in other words, he was very much in line with classical liberalism or what you call libertarianism.