<html><head><style type="text/css"><!-- DIV {margin:0px;} --></style></head><body><div style="font-family:verdana, helvetica, sans-serif;font-size:12pt"><DIV>If it's a fiction, then why is it useful at all? One would think there must be some truth in it.</DIV>
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<DIV>This reminds me of the sort of shallow pragmatism some seem to hold -- as in "I believe X because it works." Well, the next question to ask is Why does X work? -- at least for those who don't just want to sleepwalk through life. :)</DIV>
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<DIV>Regards,</DIV>
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<DIV>Dan</DIV>
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<B><SPAN style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">From:</SPAN></B> Jeffery P. Davis <heavensblade23@gmail.com><BR><B><SPAN style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">To:</SPAN></B> ExI chat list <extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org><BR><B><SPAN style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Sent:</SPAN></B> Fri, March 5, 2010 4:11:53 PM<BR><B><SPAN style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Subject:</SPAN></B> Re: [ExI] Social implications of widespread extropian/positivist ideals<BR></FONT><BR><BR><BR>
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<DIV class=gmail_quote>2010/3/5 Jeffery P. Davis <SPAN dir=ltr><<A href="mailto:heavensblade23@gmail.com" target=_blank rel=nofollow ymailto="mailto:heavensblade23@gmail.com">heavensblade23@gmail.com</A>></SPAN>
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<DIV>I see a bit of a contradiction here. If people don't make choices, then how can they can choose to become murderers after we do away with the fiction of free-will?<BR></DIV></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>
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<DIV>"I'm not choosing to become a murderer, it's just what was fated, so I can't do anything about it and have got to be a murderer."</DIV></DIV><BR></BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV><BR>Which is why I go to on to say free will may be a fiction, but it's still a useful way of looking the world. :-) <BR></DIV></DIV><BR clear=all><BR>-- <BR>"This is a war universe. War all the time. That is its nature. There may be other universes based on all sorts of other principles, but ours seems to be based on war and games. All games are basically hostile. Winners and losers. We see them all around us: the winners and the losers. The losers can oftentimes become winners, and the winners can very easily become losers.."<BR>- William S. Burroughs <BR></DIV></DIV></div><br>
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