Harari sets up a strawman argument that because humans are influenced by external information they do not have free will. This is not what free will means or has ever meant; free will means only that external inputs (which are necessary to have thoughts at all, providing us with the objects of thought) do not fully determine our choices, that something else within us creates an opening for indeterminacy. The fine print reveals that humans just dont use free will enough by blindly following desires. This part makes sense; to blindly follow desires is to act as an animal, but humans reason about choices, and can resist desires if reason dictates that the ultimate-self interest (or what is Right) lies in not fulfilling certain desires. In short, acting like animals following impulses makes us deterministic, whereas acting as deeply rational beings makes us indeterministic, therefore free will. Self-scrutiny, suspension of judgement, careful reasoning and examining objections to our own preferences, is the secret of freewill, and the essence of humanity (understood in the Kantian sense). I again suspect that Harari’s target audience are the majority of people who do not think rationally but blindly follow the implicit instructions given to them by the news networks (or by their trusted alternative media, for those who desire to be alternative). Since the desire to be alternative is a well established human urge for a substantial percentage of human population, any corporate entity serious about “biohacking” would need to control not just the mainstream media but, necessarily, the alternative media as well. Social engineeng is in fact easier via the alternative media, where the “agents of change” naturally reside, whereas the mainstream (the naural followers) are effectively restrained and awaiting directions. Logos (reason) liberates; Desire enslaves. Behind the strawman argument against free will Harari (perhaps unwittingly, or perhaps intentionally) implicitly invites us to submit completely to corporate powers or to choose Logos, and therefore free will. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/sep/14/yuval-noah-harari-the-new-threat-to-liberal-democracy

People have limited bandwidth for consciously absorbing information, especially if the relevant information conflicts with their beliefs. Effective political movements use factually or symbolically correct, logically consistent, and relentlessly repetitive messaging: the same message or two everywhere, over and over again. Messaging is about imprinting the subconscious mind of the unthinking with the message, until they become conscious of it and compelled to reflect on its merits. Many different messages amount to no message at all, because the unthinking will not be imprinted without persistence and repetition of the same, narrowly defined content. A distinction needs to be made here between propaganda and ethical messaging (both can use the same tool for different ends): propaganda seeks to deceive whereas ethical messaging only seeks to be considered without prejudice.

Every organisation, rebel doctor or politician on Telegram is now defending the right to Informed Consent, but hardly anyone apart from NORMAL even mentions the right to Free Medical Consent, free from social-opportunity coercion or economic deprivation. Your Informed Consent is useless if you have to take the injection anyway, because you will lose your job and profession if you would refuse. To give up on Free Medical Consent is to accept that being born human is no longer a guarantee of human rights, therefore there are no human rights, only conditional privileges. Now that you are informed enough you may want to ask those champions of freedom why are they not defending your right to Free Medical Consent. Why are they dragging their feet? Is there a problem?

Those who ‘follow the science’ to dismiss ethical objections reveal themselves as unethical and pernicious.

The Golden Rule is an intuitive realisation of the ontological fact that consciousness is essentially a mirror, and every instance of subjective thought is a reflection of a reflection between Self-consciousness and Other-consciousness facing one another, giving rise to a virtually infinite depth and complexity of being, a relational virtuality becoming the fragmented (and thus objectified) substance of the real. https://philpapers.org/rec/KOWTGR

A 2000 years old symbolic representation of consciousness as a mirror, a reflexive relation binding two beings of the same kind vis-a-vis one another, the source of all being as meaning, and the transcendence ⭕️ of fragmentation though choice ➕.

Difference between Informed Consent and Free Consent

Informed Consent: I am informed of the risks and benefits of this medical procedure, and that I will lose my job and profession if I refuse it.

Free Consent: I might not fully understand the scientific merits of this medical procedure, but I know that my rights and freedoms will not be restricted if I refuse it.

It is unwise to base a legal challenge on the hope of winning a scientific argument against the experts. https://www.news.com.au/national/courts-law/maelstrom-in-a-petri-dish-cop-loses-fight-against-covid19-vaccine-mandate/news-story/ab6a3e18fdaed5620efdb8abd97f2e0d

Disagreements cannot be eradicated by force or prejudice, but disagreements can be resolved when two parties recognise one another as beings of the same moral status and subject to the same rules of reason. Tribalism of any kind rejects the first condition. The consequences of this are far deeper than just conflict or violence; it suppresses the degree of consciousness of the tribal self. It interrupts the social reflexivity of the human kind, which is the source of all meaning and of all instances of self-consciousness. By devaluing the conscious rational agency or moral status of any person just because they do not belong to ‘my tribe’ we devalue our ontological kind, and thus we implicitly devalue ourselves. We always knew this on some level (Anthropos = one who is alike; the Golden Rule) but Kant was the first to formalise the principle, his Categorical Imperative, albeit without going into the ontological consequences (that was my contribution).

Email to the Queensland Human Rights Commission (25.08.2022)

ATTN: The Commissioner of the Queeensland Human Rights Commission

I am a philosopher of ethics and the leading voice in the academic debate questioning the ethical permissibility of vaccine mandates. I recently published on this topic in the BMJ Journal of Medical Ethics (cited below).

This communication is motivated by the Dept. of Education announcing that unvaccinated QLD teachers will be penalised for their non-consent to this medical procedure.

I submit that vaccine mandates, or any systemic discrimination against the unvaccinated, infringes on human rights, including the right to life. This conclusion is based on the following grounds:

1. Vaccine mandates imply that all humans are born in a defective, inherently harmful state that must be biotechnologically augmented to allow our unrestricted participation in society, and this constitutes discrimination on the basis of healthy, innate characteristics of the human race. This devaluation of the innate human constitution is not only universally dehumanising, but it perverts the very concept of human rights; discrimination against the unvaccinated implies that our innate human constitution is no longer a guarantee of full human rights. This point derives from my paper published here: https://jme.bmj.com/content/48/4/240.

2. Any discrimination against the unvaccinated is economic or social opportunity coercion, precluding the possibility of free medical consent. The right to free, uncoerced medical consent is not negotiable, under any circumstances, because without it we have no rights at all; every other right (including the right to life) can be subverted by medical coercion. Free medical consent is the most fundamental protection against crimes against humanity being committed under the guise of healthcare (several instances of such abuses have occurred in this century).

3. Vaccines are known to occasionally cause deaths of healthy people. When an employee is required to receive vaccination as a condition of employment, that employee is economically coerced to participate in an activity where some percentage of employees are expected to die ‘in the course of employment’ as a direct result of the mandated activity. This goes against the fundamental principles of medical ethics and workplace safety. It may be objected that infectious pathogens also kill people, but these two categories of deaths are not ethically equivalent. Infection with a pathogen for which there exists a vaccine is not mandated, whereas deaths resulting from mandatory vaccination are mandated deaths, a legalised killing of some people for the prospective benefit of the majority. Critically, any discrimination against the unvaccinated amounts to a violation of the right to life by coercing people to undergo a medical procedure where a small percentage of otherwise healthy people are expected to die as a direct result of that procedure.

An earlier version of these arguments were formally submitted to the Inquiry into Public Health Amendment Bill 2021 (No 2) ACT and subsequently published here: https://jme.bmj.com/content/early/2022/04/26/medethics-2022-108229.responses#fundamental-values-are-not-defeated-by-utilitarian-calculus

I suggest that we are facing a human rights emergency and the outlined issues call for immediate administrative action, especially in regard to the actions of the Dept. of Education.

I am open to collaboration.

Sincerely,

Michael Kowalik
https://philpeople.org/profiles/michael-kowalik

Iain Benson, professor of ethics and law, argues that vaccine coercion was wrong because: a) it violated medical privacy, b) the vaccine was experimental. Professor Benson thus implies, by omission, that medical coercion would be ethical if the vaccine were fully approved and privacy were not breached. This is an intellectually evasive and ethically wrong position, a wholesale denial of human rights. If our healthy innate constitution (being born human) is not a guarantee of full human rights, then there are no human rights, only privileges. Let them know that you know. https://rumble.com/v1gva6r-covid-inquiry-2.0-22-iain-benson.html

Those who believe that human rights (including the right to equality before the law and the right to life) can be removed subject to law, when deemed necessary, implicitly agree that all past crimes against humanity would not be crimes at all if they were democratically mandated and deemed necessary.

If those who act in your name do not believe in the unconditional right to free medical consent (with no exceptions for martial law, public health emergencies or government approved injections) then you should ask yourself whether they really serve your children’s interests. Ask them.

In June, we wrote to the Australian Human Rights Commission asserting their statutory functions with respect to Covid-19, and asking them to please perform their duty for the sake of upholding the human rights protections of Australians (https://lnkd.in/dgwktP_m)

We did receive a response, in which Ms Lorraine Finlay, the human rights Commissioner, agreed that the issues in our letter are a priority for her and the Commission.

It was encouraging to see the Commissioner’s article in the Australian recently (https://lnkd.in/g6FtQdKz), as well as her submission to the ‘Independent Review of Australia’s Covid Policy Response’(https://lnkd.in/gAfT5wnV), which I noted reflects some of the issues in our letter.

Ms Finlay’s final paragraph read as follows:

"...Australians have had to live with some of the most restrictive response measures in the world and the impact on individual human rights has been substantial. Even in the middle of an emergency, human rights matter. It is essential that Australia’s pandemic response is fully and formally reviewed in terms of its impact on human rights, and that future emergency planning incorporates human rights considerations as a priority".

I, of course, completely agree with the Commissioner. A full and formal review is essential. Thankfully, as explained in our letter, it is the very statutory function of the AHRC to conduct such a review. The AHRC Act at Section 11 allows (and obligates) the AHRC to “inquire [ie; to hold an inquiry] into any act or practice that may be inconsistent with or contrary to any human right”, including the rights they agree were breached throughout the past few years.

If the AHRC did so, it would not only provide some sense of reparation to those whose lives have been torn apart, but it would meaningfully change the course of Australian history by ensuring that the rights protected under the ICCPR and other treaties and covenants are not so carelessly tossed away in future.

If those rights are to mean anything at all, they must be defended. The Commissioner is the only person in Australia with the statutory power (and function) of so defending them.

I have written to the Commissioner accordingly, noting that I stand with many others who would be willing to assist her or the Commission with an inquiry in whichever way we can.

The percentage of true information in the alternative media is no greater that in the mainstream media. The alternative media may correctly identify some untrue claim in the reports of the mainstream media but then extrapolate this element of truth towards unverifiable, speculative or ideologically motivated conclusions. Another way, mainstream and alternative media examine the same event, respectively, from the positions of the offical narrative and the counter-narrative, and both sides embellish the truth with ample untruths geared to the biases and anxieties of their audience.

A refresher course on the illegality of the governance by decree under emergency powers: https://michaelkowalik.substack.com/p/emergency-powers-and-the-who-pandemic