Comments by "bj0rn" (@TheLivirus) on "Sam Harris" channel.

  1. Regarding cosmopolitan: If everywhere is home and everyone your neighbor, the concepts lose their meaning. You're a foreign stranger.
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  2. Oh don't be silly. Automation will not lead to job shortage. As history has shown, new jobs are always invented to replace the lost ones. It's just that you'll need a longer education, which is a bit more difficult, much more costly, will be obsolete sooner, and you'll have to pay for it with barrowed money, plus interest, and when you're done there may not be jobs for you after all, because who said you were entitled to a job? So you better hurry up and create your own damn job so you can afford the interest and rent you owe me.
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  3. Regarding picking a film. It is true that the options from which we choose are limited by our ability to recall them, a process which we often feel we are not in full control of. But we may also recognize this fact and withhold our choice in order to inquire about our options. I don't think free will corresponds to our ability to understand our options as much as it corresponds to our preferences when considering a given set of options.
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  4. The belief that one's will is free influences one's process of choosing. It gives our consciousness and rational mind authority to intervene with our instinctive behaviour in order to reflect upon our options and reason about their hypothetical outcomes. If we believed in our heart that our will is not free, then we give no reason for our consciousness to intervene, rendering it a passive observer. This feedback between our choices and our belief in our freedom to choose is something I struggle to wrap my hand around.
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