Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!csd4.milw.wisc.edu!dogie.macc.wisc.edu!uwvax!rutgers!att!mtuxo!lzfme!jwi
From: jwi@lzfme.att.com (Jim Winer @ AT&T, Middletown, NJ)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: Free will and responsibility (was Re: Making fires...)
Summary: You have chosen your controller
Message-ID: <1288@lzfme.att.com>
Date: 28 Apr 89 13:49:01 GMT
References: <10333@ihlpb.ATT.COM> <3850@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu> <387@nbires.nbi.com>
Organization: AT&T, Lincroft NJ
Lines: 62

In article <387@nbires.nbi.com>, matt@nbires.nbi.com (Matthew Meighan) writes:
> 
> This argument -- that we're controlled anyway, so we should choose our
> poison -- is an extremely pernicious and evil one.  I also believe it is
> utterly insincere and cynical in that it is not put forth by those who
> would be controlled, but by those who would impose control on others.
> ... 
> This is the argument of a would-be facist dictator and nothing else.
> Look at history; they've all said this very thing.  It's morally
> equivalent to telling a rape victim, "Look, you're going to get raped
> sooner or later.  And I'm gentler than most.  So you should be glad
> this is happening to you."
> 
> People who seriously advocate this are a real danger to humanity and
> should probably be summarily imprisoned.  By their own argument, they
> can hardly complain about this -- they're going to be controlled
> anyway, so why not be in prison.  Of course, the real thrust of their
> argument is not that THEY will be controlled, but that YOU will.
> 
> The argument is utter nonsense unless we are prepared to accept its
> premise -- that we are going to be controlled anyway by a street gang
> boss, a GM exec, or somebody.  But this premise flies in the face of
> history, and to accept it takes us not only "beyond" our freedom and
> our dignity, but our humanity as well.  Skinner's title alone makes it
> plain what he is advocating -- that we give up our dignity as human
> beings and volunteer to become lobotomized slaves.
> 
> Matt Meighan          
> matt@nbires.nbi.com (nbires\!matt)

Unless you are the controlling stockholder at NBI, your behavior is
very controlled. You wear acceptable clothing to the office rather
than what you wear when you are alone. You are civil to your
co-workers even if you think they are a**holes. If you have an
original thought, you either suppress it to avoid problems, do it on
your own outside work, or present it so that your boss benefits from
it (or possibly even thinks it's his idea).

As they say, freedom of the press belongs to he who owns the
press. Well, free will belongs to he who depends on nobody and needs
nobody. You are controlled not by the orders of someone else, but by
your own need to earn a living, or by your own greed (as the case
may be). The expression of this self control is identical in effect
to following somebody else's orders -- your boss' -- unless, of
course, you own the business, in which case you're following your
customer's orders.

Wake up and recognize that the world's just a stage and your just an
actor in it following stage directions like everybody else.

Except, of course, for those few dangerous individuals who just
don't care.

Jim Winer ..!lzfme!jwi 

I believe in absolute freedom of the press.
I believe that freedom of the press is the only protection we have
	from the abuses of power of the church, 
	from the abuses of power of the state,
	from the abuses of power of the corporate body, and 
	from the abuses of power of the press itself.
Those persons who advocate censorship offend my religion.