Do you want to be a dad?

Here's my 20 minute run down of thoughts about being a dad.

The bad:
Cleaning a poopy diaper for the 4th time in 30 minutes.
Arriving to work 10 minutes late and realizing that you have some poop on your shirt.
Tripping over their toys for the 1000th time.
Realizing you bought all of those toys.
Struggling to keep your cool after the 10th time your child has come out of bed when he's supposed to be asleep.
Answering "why?" for the 100th time today (I usually don't mind doing this, but sometimes answers allude me or I'm just too darn tired..."Why?").
Wishing I had my evenings back.
Rocking a sick child back to sleep at 2 AM... and 4, and 6.
Worried beyond compare when your children disappear out of the backyard...they were found holding hands, walking around the block to retrieve a Frisbee thrown over the fence.

The good:
Coming home from work to a chorus of "DADDY!!!" with big hugs from all your kids.
Finding an excuse to play with toys you hadn't played with in 20 years.
Having your son fall asleep in your arms.
Getting a sweet kiss from your daughter.
Having your values and virtues tested and actualized in real time (your children are a reflection of yours, so its pretty obvious).
Seeing pure joy on your child's face.
Learning how to balance your time equally between family and work.
Realizing that life is not ending with children...its actually a lot of fun.

There's no question I'm happy I had children. They can be trying at times, but I'm quickly realizing that the biggest issues I have with fatherhood usually stem from failures on my part to live rationally. If anything, they challenge me to be a better person. And this, along with their unconditional love, are two of the greatest things that come with being a dad.

Business ethics research - a good sign

A little update on my research. With the help of a couple research partners, we developed and tested an instrument for measuring ethical perspectives. These six perspectives are altruism, utilitarianism, tribalism, Machiavellianism, Hedonism, and Rational Egoism. In the case of rational egoism, the items are consistent with Objectivism's ethical beliefs.

This instrument is designed to measure the amount participants agree or disagree with various statements consistent with each ethical perspective. Philosophers, such as Diana Hsieh, vetted the statements for accuracy (I do not presume that she supports or does not support the final version of the instrument, but she did have many valuable comments that helped to improve it).

Of over 200 business students, split evenly between undergraduate and graduate, the rational egoist perspective had the highest average ranking of the six perspectives (although most individuals still utilize mixed perspectives.)

Overall, I see this as good news. While its true that most individuals are confused about ethics, I believe that business students in particular are receptive to Objectivist ethics.

I also plan on expanding on this research stream, by improving the instrument, discovering how well it fits within current theory, and how well it predicts behaviors of business folks.