You do some clever writing here and I find it difficult to engage with.
I can only ask myself "Why do I think it matters if people think there is no free will?" I then say "because it can be used as a justification for not caring about what goes on in the world we inhabit together."
...
And while here, I venture to put my radical framing of UBI (even if seemingly off-topic:
It is our money—literally!
Previous generations left the monetized benefits of modern technology to us—every living individual.
=================================================
A radical framing of Unconditional Basic Income:
—Imagine that you are a legal heir of a fabulously rich estate. But on coming of age your Guardian(s) for some reason refuse to sign over full access rights to you.
You would be fully rational in pursuing the matter through legal channels.
—Some words about the assets of the estate:
@transport, rail, road, sea, space;
@vehicles, vessels, space technology;
@energy and extractive technology (mining and electrical energy generation/distribution, use-vehicles).
—These are some of the assets that underwrite the "cost" of Unconditional Basic Income.
The economic and social benefits of UBI have been demonstrated over the past decades by the many pilot programs world-wide.
It is time for politics to yield and implement a universal social security system fit for the 21st century.
I find it more likely that people are impelled by the very self-evident realness of suffering and well-being, and care less about where these impulses come from.
If we have the impulse to avoid suffering, we will do fine without freewill, and jettison the additional flavors of suffering associated with blame and credit.
It is true that for one who has nothing stopping them from going mental on his fellow man but for the concept of free will, that presents a challenge we must factor into our plans.
Such a man is guided primarily by competition, a dominant vmPFC, and is by nature non-cooperative.
We can’t suppress such a man’s ferocity by papering it over with religion and meritocracy, because the animal always finds his way out, and to your point, Janos, he finds it in obstructing UBI, because after all, he says, “the laborers who are squandered in workaday tedium deserve it, they only have themselves to blame.”
He would argue that they alone have the God given freewill to bootstrap oneself, and merely lack the virtue to do so, and so they should pay the price with a life barely lived.
And many will believe him when he says this, because they want desperately to believe, and because social Darwinism is an irresistibly sweet forbidden fruit for any of those whom fate decrees the victors.
If you think about UBI long enough, Janos, and why people will block it, the path leads to the myth of free will and basic moral desert.
People will not run amok, no more than evolutionary theory made us regress to chimp rules. We know regression only leads to hurt.
The animals that you worry “won’t care what goes on” will have good reason to deter themselves, and if reasons elude them, they will blamelessly but efficiently be deterred or quarantined by their society.
Your patronage means the world to me; I sincerely believe we cannot advance a comprehensively normative theory of UBI without settling the issue of free will and normalizing the incoherence of it.
It is the hidden support beam of the religions and economic structures that allow animal behavior to masquerade as civilized pragmatism. The modification of vmPFCs is also fair game, but that’s another topic for another day.
But Janos, make no mistake, EVERYTHING I write is about UBI. Free will is not orthogonal to your primary enemy: those forces standing in the way of UBI.
I aim to strike a blow to the beating heart of our enemy in common by attacking free will, the geocentrism of our time. I need all the help I can get.
You do some clever writing here and I find it difficult to engage with.
I can only ask myself "Why do I think it matters if people think there is no free will?" I then say "because it can be used as a justification for not caring about what goes on in the world we inhabit together."
...
And while here, I venture to put my radical framing of UBI (even if seemingly off-topic:
It is our money—literally!
Previous generations left the monetized benefits of modern technology to us—every living individual.
=================================================
A radical framing of Unconditional Basic Income:
—Imagine that you are a legal heir of a fabulously rich estate. But on coming of age your Guardian(s) for some reason refuse to sign over full access rights to you.
You would be fully rational in pursuing the matter through legal channels.
—Some words about the assets of the estate:
@transport, rail, road, sea, space;
@vehicles, vessels, space technology;
@energy and extractive technology (mining and electrical energy generation/distribution, use-vehicles).
—These are some of the assets that underwrite the "cost" of Unconditional Basic Income.
The economic and social benefits of UBI have been demonstrated over the past decades by the many pilot programs world-wide.
It is time for politics to yield and implement a universal social security system fit for the 21st century.
I find it more likely that people are impelled by the very self-evident realness of suffering and well-being, and care less about where these impulses come from.
If we have the impulse to avoid suffering, we will do fine without freewill, and jettison the additional flavors of suffering associated with blame and credit.
It is true that for one who has nothing stopping them from going mental on his fellow man but for the concept of free will, that presents a challenge we must factor into our plans.
Such a man is guided primarily by competition, a dominant vmPFC, and is by nature non-cooperative.
We can’t suppress such a man’s ferocity by papering it over with religion and meritocracy, because the animal always finds his way out, and to your point, Janos, he finds it in obstructing UBI, because after all, he says, “the laborers who are squandered in workaday tedium deserve it, they only have themselves to blame.”
He would argue that they alone have the God given freewill to bootstrap oneself, and merely lack the virtue to do so, and so they should pay the price with a life barely lived.
And many will believe him when he says this, because they want desperately to believe, and because social Darwinism is an irresistibly sweet forbidden fruit for any of those whom fate decrees the victors.
If you think about UBI long enough, Janos, and why people will block it, the path leads to the myth of free will and basic moral desert.
People will not run amok, no more than evolutionary theory made us regress to chimp rules. We know regression only leads to hurt.
The animals that you worry “won’t care what goes on” will have good reason to deter themselves, and if reasons elude them, they will blamelessly but efficiently be deterred or quarantined by their society.
Your patronage means the world to me; I sincerely believe we cannot advance a comprehensively normative theory of UBI without settling the issue of free will and normalizing the incoherence of it.
It is the hidden support beam of the religions and economic structures that allow animal behavior to masquerade as civilized pragmatism. The modification of vmPFCs is also fair game, but that’s another topic for another day.
But Janos, make no mistake, EVERYTHING I write is about UBI. Free will is not orthogonal to your primary enemy: those forces standing in the way of UBI.
I aim to strike a blow to the beating heart of our enemy in common by attacking free will, the geocentrism of our time. I need all the help I can get.