"The disagreement between Dan and myself is essentially this. We're living in a world where most people believe in Atlantis and they believe in the underwater kingdom and they read Plato closely, trying to figure out where it was. And I want to say Atlantis doesn't exist, it didn't exist, people are confused about Atlantis. Dan wants to say that Atlantis is really Sicily, and he'll give a whole argument about why Sicily answers to many of the claims that people are making about Atlantis. And I want to say, "No, they're still talking about being underwater. Sicily doesn't do that." And he says, "But Sicily is a great place and there's reasons to visit, and let's talk about Sicily." And when he and I argue about this, he begins to respond to me as though I'm saying Sicily doesn't exist. And so there's a fair amount of talking past one another in these kinds of debates. Of course Sicily exists, but the people who are talking about an underwater kingdom are, at the very least, confused, and that's the situation we're in with free will."
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Academics from the United StatesPhilosophers from the United StatesNon-fiction authors from the United StatesBiographers from the United StatesCognitive scientists
Original Language: English
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Sam Harris on the delusion of Free Will, at Festival Of Dangerous Ideas 2012, Sydney Opera House (YouTube video).
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Daniel_Dennett
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