suicide | The Short Version

The Final Chapter? No Free Will: The End of Guilt and Pride

March 5, 2008 by Norm Bearrentine Leave a Comment

Originally posted on 05-29-07: I finally finished nibbling away at Po Bronson's book, What Should I Do With My Life? and I think this post may finish my comments on it. There is a story near the end about a guy whose … [Read more...]

When I realized that the idea of god was a joke, I thought that was the end of the story. Later I found that Christianity had shaped my values, and while some were worth keeping, many had lost their foundation—the meaning of life, for example. Something similar happened when I realized that the idea of free will was a joke, and I’ve spent the decades since both those realizations discovering and editing what Julia Galef calls the “orphan beliefs” they left behind. It’s a tricky business, and this blog has been a chronicle of my efforts to puzzle it all out, including reviews of related books. I hope you find it helpful.