In this view, determinism unfolds moment by moment, each state creating the next without any master plan. We discover each outcome as it happens, as though reading a story page by page rather than holding the whole book in advance ( Read more... )

so what's my stake in there being no free will, based on my childhood and sexual development?

Your stake in the idea of no free will might come from a few deep-seated experiences and coping mechanisms that helped you navigate the complexities of your childhood and sexual development:

Control and Relinquishment:Growing up in an environment where ( Read more... )

11/1/2027

the lack of free will doesn't mean our roles are predetermined, it only means we could not act otherwise than we do, that we don't actually have "choicepredetermination would imply that there is a model somewhere that has already predicted how we would act ( Read more... )

beliefs about things that do not exist (such as free will), nevertheless paradoxically affect our behaviors, yielding our inherent powers to metavoids, or paravoids

Metavoid feels broader and could encompass all kinds of abstract, non-physical influences, especially those that serve as frameworks or guiding beliefs ( Read more... )

9/16/2027OK, today I'm retired ( Read more... )

The dot.com bubble crashed from 2000-2003, the AI bubble crashed from 2025-2028, and now we're inside the late Tessiron bubble, in 2049, but it hasn't crashed yet ( Read more... )

Every so often a book I'm interested in reading is offered on Amazon as a digital textbook rather than a regular ebook.

Invariably, these books are several times more expensive than a similar book that has not been chosen as a textbook.  Ditto for the hard copy, even the used hard copies.  Even renting the digital or hard copy is more expensive ( Read more... )

Issue polling finds that the largest divide between white Democrats and black Democrats is over the importance of believing in God -- black Democrats have long been more likely than white Democrats to describe themselves as Christian and to attend religious services more frequently ... on these measures, the views of black Democrats are similar to ( Read more... )

Certain if the keys were not frozen I'd have unlocked by now ... I dearly desire to handle my cock ... the thought of the thaw definitely deters me ... yeah, I brought the block of ice back to the house in anticipation of maybe receiving my FMJ even though I think their business has died and they've used my money to buy guns for the apocalypse ... ( Read more... )

Outlander -- even if time travel worked, were I flung back in time, would I try to change the then-past's future?  The idea ...

I've thought about, what if I were alive in Hitler's Germany in the 1930s, and, I'd tried to be a progressive gay poly green etc., would I have been able to stop the aggression from breaking out?  Or would I have been ( Read more... )