11/8/15,
“Homeward Bound”
Hartsfield-Jackson
Atlanta International Airport, Georgia (ATL)
My time in
Atlanta has come to an end, and the philosophy I have heard at this conference
has left me enriched. The single most
beneficial thing I learned, without a doubt, was Yaron Brook’s idea about the
difference between lying and playing the game.
It is okay to lie when someone does not expect an honest answer. You are not profiting from that lie. Instead, you are merely playing along with
the game. The rest just reinforced ideas
I already strongly held, only act in your long-term self-interest, only engage
in relationships that are win-win for both parties, etc.
One other idea from this morning really stuck
with me, but I will address that in its due course. I woke up this morning and got ready,
deciding I couldn’t leave without going to the Waffle House for breakfast. I did just that, even at the price of missing
the first lecture. I was starving, and I
went to town. I got coffee, of course,
along with a pecan waffle, bacon, country ham, eggs, toast, and hashbrowns
“scattered, smothered, and covered.” It
was a proper Georgian breakfast. I got a
cup of coffee to go and headed to the second lecture, about regulations and
antitrust law.
He went through the usual
arguments against antitrust law, how true monopolies are not possible,
etc. I’ve heard all that before. He was preaching to the converted. A few points he raised were that law are
supposed to protect us from those who would do us harm, not punish us for doing
good or take away from us. Laws should
make our lives easier, not harder. The
government should not be in the business of regulation free trade.
I always think about the example of someone
inventing the cure for cancer (or the common cold). Reader, imagine for a moment a privately
funded scientist, working in his own lab, discovers a vaccine for cancer. One injection, and you are immune to cancer
for the rest of your life. How much
would this be worth? I make it a point
not to mention dollar amounts in this Travelogue, but think of the price you
would be willing to pay for this vaccine, for yourself, for your children. Now, multiply that by 300 million people in
the country, not even counting the rest of the world. That would make him the richest person in the
world. Reader, what chance do you think
the government would let that happen?
Surely the price he would charge for the vaccine is worth not getting
cancer, and he would not force anyone to buy it. No, the government would regulate his sale of
it.
The reason for this, as posited by
Rand, is “hatred of the good for being good.” People resent the successful and want to
shackle them merely for being successful.
That is the true reason behind people like Bernie Sanders who decry
“income inequality.” They don’t seek to
make the rise the poor to the upper levels.
They seek to bring down the rich to lower levels. The next speaker was about the mindset of the
trader. He spoke about practical
principles to use in life, but he also reiterated the Objectivist point that
all human relationships are trade, whether they are business, platonic, or
romantic, they are all about trade. Unless
the trade is win-win, it will soon fail.
Reader, what am I saying here?
People too often ask, “What is he bringing to the friendship?” while
failing to ask, “What am I bringing to the friendship?” Or relationship. I was planning on having a cigar and maybe
taking a picture at Ford Theatre, but first I had to pack. I did that and checked out before going
outside to have a cigar. It was cold and
rainy. I lit up my Jericho Hill, but I could
only smoke half of it before I was too uncomfortable and went inside.
I went up to lunch, where they had pizza and
brownies, both of which sucked. I then
found myself sucked into a debate about Schrödinger’s Cat and the Law of
Non-Contradiction. No, the cat is not
both alive and dead. It’s either alive
or dead. We just don’t know which. You can apply that to quantum physics, and, if a
particle can really be in two states or locations at once, then we need to
rewrite our laws of physics, not our laws of logic.
Next was the talk by someone who worked with
Mark Zuckerberg at Facebook. He managed
the Messenger App. I found my friend
from last night, and I sat down next to her.
We chatted a little before the lecture.
The speaker was talking about a problem with the messenger app, that it
was taking a second or two for the messages to load instead of a tenth of a
second, like the competitors. The
engineer started explaining the why of all this. Zuckerberg didn’t care. He simply asked if the engineer could fix it,
or, if it, Zuckerberg would find someone else who could. It was fixed in a matter of weeks.
The next speaker ran a series of schools. He gave an example about how he went to buy a
new school building, and there was a railing on the second floor. He determined that the railing met code, and
it would be approved for use. He was
about to leave when he realized he was asking the wrong question. Did he feel it was safe for students? That was what mattered. He then said that that was the problem with
codes and regulations. It causes us to
be so accustomed to thinking how we could comply with the law, rather than
considering what is actually safe and proper.
Next were the breakout sessions, and I sat in on the one about writing
for their newsletter. I signed up to be
considered to be a writer. Then came the
last session, a general Q&A about Objectivism. No one really asked any good questions,
except for a perennial favorite about why Rand was considered a
misogynist. Well, her view that the
proper role for a woman in a romantic relationship is to worship at the altar of
her man would be a good start to answering that question.
I was considering catching a movie at a
nearby theater before going to the airport, but I was just too tired. I thought I could make it, but I wasn’t
sure. I grabbed my bags, said goodbye to
my new friend, and walked to the train station, in the rain. The northbound train would take me to the
movie theater, southbound to the airport.
I flipped for it, heads movie, tails airport. It was tails.
In the end, I could have easily made the movie, but that would have also
meant I wouldn’t have had time at the smoking lounge. As it is, I have almost two hours before my
flight, and I’m going to try for an earlier flight.
I got to the airport, went through security,
got dinner at Popeye’s, just like I did on Friday (well, that was lunch, even
if it was almost exactly the same time), and headed to the smoking lounge,
where I lit up my Ardor and proceeded to write this entry. I now have some time to reflect on Atlanta. What to say about Atlanta.
Reader, if you have never been to Atlanta,
you won’t understand what I’m saying.
This airport, the busiest in the country, is the crossroads of the
southeast, Delta’s main hub. It is a
very poor city with some very rich corporations. It would be a great point for a socialist to
make any point he wants about income inequality. Reader, how many jobs do Coca-Cola and CNN
and GP and AT&T provide to the city of Atlanta, both directly and
indirectly? Reader, what do you think
would happen if those companies moved to Houston? How would it devastate the already fragile
economy of Atlanta?
No, reader, what
Atlanta needs is more companies, more billionaires coming to this city to make
even more money. Reader, do you think
the worker at the Waffle House is resentful of Ted Turner for making his
billions? Or does he appreciate the fact
that without the employees at CNN coming to the Waffle House for breakfast he
might not have a job? Obviously this is
an exaggeration, but it perfectly illustrates the morality of value
creation. On that note, I close. Next stop: Egypt to see the pyramids, though,
well, I’m slightly trepidatious after the news of this weekend.
No comments:
Post a Comment