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marcosdumayyesterday at 4:59 PM1 replyview on HN

> when part of their reasoning and authority is based on a divine mandate

If you are atheist is becomes rational to surrender to the people that are invading your house and killing your friends at random?


Replies

falcor84today at 3:42 AM

Yes.

Absolutely.

If there are invaders who are killing everybody around me and telling me that they'll stop and generally let me be if I surrender and agree to live in a democracy, I expect that I'll be very inclined to accept. Maybe afterwards, if I see it's not working out, I may still consider guerrilla resistance down the line, but I don't see the benefit of fighting and most likely dying just for the sake of defiance, and to then allow any survivors a chance to continue in their resistance for another decade or so, until eventually they might be able to start rebuilding a nation from the rabble.

In what world is surrender, keeping our lives and infrastructure, not a more rational approach?

EDIT: To be clear, while I occasionally have pacifistic thoughts on pretty spring days, I'm not arguing for pacifism here - fighting is absolutely rational when you have a clear path to victory, but if you don't, then I think it's just an absolute waste of human lives.

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