From: Joe E. Dees (joedees@bellsouth.net)
Date: Sat May 29 1999 - 17:50:43 MDT
Subject: Re: Guns [was Re: property Rights]
To: extropians@extropy.com
Date sent: Sat, 29 May 1999 15:03:52 -0700 (PDT)
From: "Lee Daniel Crocker" <lcrocker@mercury.colossus.net (none)>
Organization: Piclab (http://www.piclab.com/)
Send reply to: extropians@extropy.com
> > People should determine what freedom really is...If some people want
> > to live in a world of chaos, murder and psychotic mindframes, then
> > so be it.
>
> That seems to be the real core of the religious argument: what is
> freedom, anyway? If you ask me, freedom /is/ chaos. Freedom is
> dangerous. Freedom is a bitch. Freedom is constant vigilance.
> The simple reality is that there are dangerous psychopaths in the
> world, and since they don't all have convenient labels ("Poor
> Impulse Control"), giving ourselves freedom means giving it to
> them as well. Until we catch them abusing it, that means watching
> your back.
>
> If you want ease, and safety, and the ability to walk the streets
> of your neighborhood without risking your life, then you're not
> interested in freedom, you want security. People will use words
> like "freedom from harm", "freedom from want", etc., but they've
> really co-opted the word for a very simple concept and used it to
> mean something else entirely.
>
> Freedom means being able to use your own talents to accomplish
> your own desires, not the expectation that anyone else is going
> to make it easy for you.
>
Just as you cannot meaure either the position and momentum of
an electron absolutely and more precision in one means more error
in another, there is no such thing as either absolute freedom or
absolute security for embodied and mortal beings. However, we
can compromise between them to obtain the maximum
simultaneous freedom and security pragmatically possible. This
has always been my purpose in advocating the reasonable,
rational, logical and limited measures which I have espoused, and
will coninue to be so.
> --
> Lee Daniel Crocker <lee@piclab.com> <http://www.piclab.com/lcrocker.html>
> "All inventions or works of authorship original to me, herein and past,
> are placed irrevocably in the public domain, and may be used or modified
> for any purpose, without permission, attribution, or notification."--LDC
>
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