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Comment by bsenftner | Hacker News Reader

So don't be an idiot and "worship", be a rational balanced human and as the OP says diversify your interests. DFW tends to exaggerate to make his points, and this is an example. Nice prose, be it describes idiots and implies to the reader that everyone are such idiots.

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DFW concluded that if you don’t choose what to worship it gets chosen for you. What he’s saying is that one should be conscious and deliberate, self aware. Like much of DFW there’s a strong christian undercurrent to ‘this is water’. Far from being an argument against religion and worship the message i take is that the value of religion can be that it focuses one outward, towards community and so on.

not choosing is a choice too.

His point, I'd say, is that whatever the choice (including not choosing something consciously) should be done consciously. I.e. You should be aware that you aren't choosing anything, or that you want to pursue money, or fame, or whatever.

Can one really not chose in this situation? What one worships is somewhat synonym with what one values the most. How can a man ever not have something that he values more than other things? On what basis would he act?

DFW claims religion is immune to this effect but to me it seems like another statement to add could be: “worship god and you’ll feel like a sinner”

> worship god and you’ll feel like a sinner

Especially if you pick the wrong God.

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