> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-extropians@extropy.org
> IAN: But we can predict human action
> based on the self-interest principle,
> just as we can predict water action
> based on the "flows down" principle.
>
Actually, predicting human action based on the self-interest principle isn't
always easy. At the individual level, there are psychological quirks which
cause people to act in ways that are detrimental to their well-being by any
reasonable standard, eg. people who spend their spare time cutting their
noses with pieces of broken glass, or people who don't change their
lifestyles and eating habits even as their weight passes the 300 pound mark.
At the macro level, you have various mass hysterias such as Holland's 17th
century tulip mania, or the more recent rise and fall of the emu
market(that's emu as in the bird, not the money) in the US, or nation-state
wars.
Bonnie
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