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Reminder: Sunday's Rationally Selfish Webcast Posted: 14 Jan 2011 03:38 PM PST Come join my next "Rationally Selfish" webcast! It's on Sunday morning at 8 am PT / 9 am MT / 10 am CT / 11 am ET. You can watch the webcast and join in the text chat on the web page of Rationally Selfish. Greg Perkins of Objectivist Answers will be my audio co-host once again. In the webcast, I answer questions on practical ethics and the principles of living well. Each week, I select the most popular and interesting questions from the queue. Please submit your questions, as well as vote and comment on questions that you find interesting. Happily, the question widget on Rationally Selfish is working again, but you can still use the web site of Idea Informer if you prefer that. Here are the questions that I'll answer this week: How does one properly judge a person's actions and ideas? I've read that one can judge a person's ideas as good or evil based on whether they are true or false, respectively. I've also read/heard that it's usually better to judge a person's actions since people often aren't very exact in their ideas and in what they say. Should you judge a persons ideas or actions? Or both? And, what is the proper way to judge a person's ideas and actions? How can I judge people more efficiently? It would be helpful to be more efficient in judging whether certain individuals are appropriate for a friendship. Sometimes it takes me a long time to decide whether I would like to be friends with someone or not. It takes me even longer to decide whether I would like to be in a romantic relationship with someone. How can I speed this process up? What are some key factors that might help me make these types of decisions more efficiently? Why are some people such jerks on the internet? Some seemingly decent people become downright malicious bastards on the internet, particularly when posting anonymously. Why is that? What does such behavior say about a person's moral character? How can a person keep his manners, his benevolence, and his cool in full force when online? Is it always wrong to seek popularity? Because of the character Peter Keating I can't figure out in what context it would be right for an Objectivist to value or desire popularity, if at all. Are tattoos or piercings -- all of them, or just some kinds -- irrational and/or self-destructive? If so, why? From Objectivist Answers: Is it proper to date a girl who smokes pot? This woman, while not being an Objectivist, has many great qualities like being smart, attractive, funny, pro-reason and pro-man in general. She, however, likes to smoke marijuana. She says that it provides a great pleasure and relaxes her body and mind after a long day of work. What should I do about it? Confront her? Immediately break up with her? Questions that aren't answered this week will remain in the queue for me to answer in upcoming webcasts. So please go vote on questions that you find interesting -- or submit your own question. You can listen to these webcasts later as NoodleCast audio-only podcasts by subscribing in iTunes to either the enhanced M4A format or the standard MP3 format. The live webcast is a good bit of fun, so I recommend that you stop by as your schedule permits. I appreciate the immediate feedback -- serious comments, funny comments, and follow-up questions -- in the text-based chat during the broadcast. It's a lively get-together! Also, you can support the Rationally Selfish Webcast (and Podcast) contributing to our tip jar. I suggest $5 per episode, but any amount is appreciated. If you would prefer to send a check, please send it to "Diana Hsieh; P.O. Box 851; Sedalia, CO 80135." Please write "RS Webcast" in the memo field. If you're unable to contribute financially, I'd appreciate your helping me spread the word about this webcast to anyone you think might be interested. You can, for example, "like" the Rationally Selfish Page on Facebook. See you on Sunday morning!

Compare and Contrast Posted: 14 Jan 2011 07:00 AM PST Law professor Amy Chua on Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior: Chinese parents believe that their kids owe them everything. The reason for this is a little unclear, but it's probably a combination of Confucian filial piety and the fact that the parents have sacrificed and done so much for their children. (And it's true that Chinese mothers get in the trenches, putting in long grueling hours personally tutoring, training, interrogating and spying on their kids.) Anyway, the understanding is that Chinese children must spend their lives repaying their parents by obeying them and making them proud. Yup, that's the parenting philosophy that she praises. And, surprise surprise, the method of inculcating that involves a kind of ongoing psychological warfare with the child, one that sometimes becomes a pitched physical battle. Her glowing description of how she brutalized her daughter into playing a difficult piano piece that seemed simply beyond the child's capacity for two-handed coordination is just horrifying. On the same day that I read that essay, I read a rather different kind of essay by Rose on finding ways to make math and reading fun for her young daughter. Rose is a homeschooling Objectivist mom who I had the pleasure of meeting, along with her daughters, while in Boise recently. Because I played a bit with the daughter in question, I can easily see just how awful attempting to demand that the child "just sit down and learn, dammit" would have been for them ... or anyone nearby. I've seen some excellent commentaries on Ms. Chua's essay -- particularly from the devastated adults who were parented by the method she extols. It's heartbreaking to hear from people who struggle to find passion in work or life because their parents systematically destroyed any capacity to choose and pursue personally meaningful values. Thankfully, Paul wasn't raised by such parents. He would have rebelled in a major way... and knowing his stubborn streak, the results would not have been pretty.

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