[CLIP]
> I'm an atheist, but I don't consider my rejection of the "God meme" to
> be a conscious choice, I'm "aware" that, to me, that particular meme
> makes no sense and at whatever subconscious level, I've rejected it. To
> emphasize my point : I can't "choose" to believe that 2 + 2 = 5 even if
> I wanted to, I just "know" it's wrong. ...
I "know" 2+2=5 about as much as I "know" that (fg)' = f'g' is wrong
[from Calculus. The correct version is (fg)' = fg'+gf'.]
That is: I was programmed (by myself or others) to have a very severe
negative emotional reaction to the mistakes that I quoted. I have no memory
"where" I picked up this reaction, so I just "know" that. About as much
as a computer spreadsheet just "knows" how to do the operations you
instruct it to in the spreadsheet.
Just because I had to learn it somewhere doesn't mean I can place where I
learned it.
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/ Towards the conversion of data into information....
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/ Kenneth Boyd
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