A Short Conversation on Wandering Toward a Goal by Don Limuti

allo don,

thank you for making me laugh. i gave you an 8 because your paper reminded me of a student who entered an Oxbridge Exam, with this horribly complicated and contrived question, where he thought about it, sat there for an hour, and wrote "Yes". then he sat there for another hour, crossed it out and wrote, "No". towards the end of the exam he crossed *that* out and wrote, "Maybe".

He got an A for his essay and was accepted to Oxford :)

Don

A short and delightful essay.

We observe billiard balls interacting, sharing kinetic energy back and forth to one another before slowing for table and air frictions. We coin the concept of determinism.

We learn about particle physics interactions, and note that it is in many ways comparable to the billiards.

We observe that life is made up of these objects comparable somewhat to billiards and wonder if because we are made up of deterministic parts, whether determinism equals our whole?

This question is not so difficult in my mind. Billiard ball interactions are representative of a simple system, their shared causes and effects have the immediacy of the moment of contact.

Life on the other hand is not a simple system, and it has attributes which the billiards do not. Such as being freed from the limits of reacting only with immediacy, by memory which allow past experience to be drawn on and influence now or future. Also freed from immediacy by the capacity to imagine possible futures and make choices that might best lead toward perceived needs. Something special happens when a system breaks free from the limit of immediacy of interaction.

When a biological system can enter an environment and observe and rationalize many aspects of it, then make many abstract considerations based on experience of past and anticipations of future. Then from all this computed information formulate a plan that might allow for several possible predicted contingencies. Then you have a system that has become very distantly removed from the example of simple billiard interactions.

But I guess nature might have just created a mindless unconscious computer type program and been done with it. And to a large extent that is precisely what nature has done, as exampled by the human sub-conscious. But somehow, and for some reason nature seated a conscious observer type system in a seat in front of the larger computing capacity of the sub conscience. And so here we are peering through our eyes as though they are windows on the world, and talking to ourselves and also listening to ourselves within the confines of our own heads, in conscious thought.

So anyway, I feel that as soon as biology began its escape of the immediacy of interactions, it had begun migrating an ever expounding sliding scale that ends with infinity, towards choices and capacity for free will. Our experience exists somewhere along this scale, but probably not close to infinity, but also very far from being merely mindless billiard balls. So the answer is, free will does exist and is definable in terms of a sliding scale.

If you recall, you gave my essay a very generous rating and review. Thank you kindly. I have had a look at the links you provided me to your work, and I do have some questions in mind for you. I did note your prescription for dark energy acting as gravitons. Very interesting indeed. I too believe dark energy observations are closely related to considerations of gravity. We must talk about this once the contest is concluded, if you will please?

Great essay and I rate you highly

Steven Andresen

http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/2890

Don,

I enjoyed reading your essay. It is the stuff of art. Just a smile, a wink and a soft nudge of thought. I too am enamored with the stage. Here is one of mine:

(On stage there are two chairs for two students. A professor is standing in front of the chairs. At the beginning the students are in their chairs and a lecture is in progress. Both students have an open book and they are both looking at the same page.)

Professor

Yada...yada, yana, yada...da, da. Wa...wa...yayaya...yadanip...yadanip...la la...da!

First Student

Da, da, da...da.

Second Student

Yada, yada...da...yada.

(Both students turn a page in unison.)

First Student

Yaya, yaya?

Professor

Yana, yana, nip...nip, wanip, wanip...da!

(Both students close their books in unison.)

Professor (cont'd)

Now that we have finished the assigned chapter we're going to explore something outside of the textbook. For the next few minutes we're going on an intuitive journey. We're going to find the most important number in this universe.

First Student

How are we going to do that?

Professor

I'm going to ask you the questions and you are going to provide the answers.

Second Student

Are we going to change positions then? Are we going to be the professor and you the student?

Professor

No...as usual...you were not listening. I said that I will ask the questions and you will answer them.

First Student

That's not fair. This is just like a test...only; we haven't gone over the material.

Second Student

Is this actually a test? There was nothing in the syllabus about a test on this subject.

Professor

This is going to be a journey of discovery...so I'm sure that neither one of you knows the answer yet.

First Student

Do you know the answer?

Professor

I've already traveled this path. But we're having a problem taking that first step together aren't we?

First Student

Is that the first question?

Professor

We will begin when you are both sitting quietly; making direct eye contact with me and...put your pens down...this is an oral exercise.

(Pause)

Good...now the first question is...what is the most important number in the universe?

Second Student

I knew you were going to ask that question first.

Professor

Well...I'm waiting for an answer.

First Student

The most important number would have to be the smallest possible number.

Professor

Why the smallest number?

First Student

Because that's the number that would measure the elemental basic particle...the smallest thing that is the building block for everything that exists in our universe.

Professor

So the smallest number would also be the largest possible number when you sum their total.

Second Student

I don't understand that.

Professor

If the smallest number is the particle that builds everything that exists then it must also be the largest number when you count all of the particles that exist.

First Student

So it would be the most important number. It would be both the smallest and largest number in the universe.

Professor

Well maybe...but what other number could possibly be the most important?

Second Student

The number one. If you have one of something you have identified existence itself. The number one represents actual existence within the universe.

Professor

Yes, you could actually list everything that exists and they would be the ones in the universe. You could observe all of the ones in your environment and you could scientifically create the answer to the question...how does it exist? You can also increase its chances for survival within its observed changing environment. You can do all of this by studying the list of ones in the universe.

Second Student

That's really important. Survival is an absolute...if we don't exist we can't even ask a question.

Professor

Yes...survival is necessary but we're only answering the question of how does something exist when we're studying the list of ones. There's another question that preoccupies the human intellect. Why does something exist? We can't answer that question by studying the list of ones. Studying things that already exist will not answer the question of why they exist. But still, there have been many answers to the question of why that are based on observations of the list of ones. None of these answers have unified the human experience. They are all divisive.

First Student

We have limitations. There is a point in human understanding when we have to attach ourselves to terms of faith and authority.

Professor

That's because we still haven't discovered the most important number in the universe.

Second Student

You're right. We don't know the answer. What is the most important number in the universe?

Professor

There's another list of objects. In fact this list once included the list of ones.

First Student

So it is a changing list.

Professor

Yes...and it is a much larger list than the list of ones. The list of ones comes from this list.

First Student

So what does that list identify? Why is an object on that list?

Professor

Everything that exists must first come from this list.

Second Student

So if the universe was created...this is the list before the creation event?

Professor

Yes, this is the list of all objects, forces and relationships that could exist but do not exist.

First Student

I don't think I understand this. What is a list of objects that could exist but do not exist?

Professor

Take your current environment. Observe the objects in it then go back a thousand years and imagine a typical environment there. Are there objects in your current environment that didn't exist back then? And are there objects that existed back then that do not exist in your current environment?

First Student

Okay...so the list of objects that could exist but do not exist is actually the master list of all possible objects.

Professor

Yes and like the list of ones it has a number that identifies its existence on that list.

Second Student

And that's the most important number in the universe?

Professor

Yes...what number identifies the possibility of existence but not actual existence?

First Student

Well if I start out counting some object knowing that there could be some of them in the environment that I'm observing...and I don't find any of them...then my count is zero. So zero identifies the objects on that list.

Second Student

Zero is the most important number in the universe?

Professor

The list of zeros is the largest list. The list of zeros is the master list. It measures all of the possibility and potential within the list of ones and it has a physical existence within the environment of the list of ones.

First Student

There is something within our environment that represents...measures...all of the potential and possibility within our universe?

Professor

Yes, the dimension of space is the measure of all potential and possibility within our universe. Whether or not all possible consequences and results occur... the space is there to allow them to occur.

Second Student

But what good is a list of zeros?

Professor

It is the transition from the list of zeros to the list of ones where meaning is first attached to existence. The reason why an object exists is the reason why an object transitions from a zero to a one.

First Student

We create objects that didn't exist in the past. We build things that didn't exist in the past and we're ones creating other ones.

Professor

True...but you are taking ones and transforming them from one object to another object. You are not transitioning from a zero to a one.

Second Student

Still...what good is a list of zeros? We are already ones and everything we work with is already a one.

Professor

Yes the point is that before there was a list of ones there was a list of zeros. There had to be a transition from the list of zeros to the first list of ones. That's where meaning was first attached to the existence of a one.

Second Student

What created the list of zeros?

Professor

Now we are focusing on the correct list. The question of why do ones exist will be answered by observing the list of zeros not the list of ones.

First Student

How are we going to do that?

Professor

If you want to answer the question of why do ones exist...you will have to find a way to explore the list of zeros.

First Student

Are there different zeros?

Professor

Yes...

Second Student

The list of zeros was...if everything that exists transitions...evolves...from the list of zeros then the first act of creation was the creation of the list of zeros.

Professor

The list is only our model for understanding. The actual thing created was space. It will never be added to, modified or manipulated by anything other than God. The God thing that was created was space. From space everything that exists has evolved into a surviving reality.

First Student

But the creation of space does not answer why space was created.

Professor

God created space in order to create all possible objects, forces and relationships that are not a part of God. This is a nonspecific act of creation...everything possible was created.

First Student

Is this going to be on the test?

Professor

Not my test but your life itself needs the confidence of being able to understand that there is a step that will bring you closer to God...it is not a step forward...it is a step backward. In fact it is the distance between God and humanity that creates the potential for all of us to experience life as a self realizing individual.

First Student

How are we going to do that?

Professor

I have brought you both to a new frontier. How would you start exploring it?

Second Student

Is that a question or a challenge?

Professor

It will always be both.

(Bell rings signifying the end of the class. Both students get up to leave.)

First Student

Is this going to be on the test?

Professor

Have a good weekend.

Second Student

You too...

(Everyone leaves.)

Hi Don,

Full marks for saying just about everything that needs to be said! Your essay neatly sums up the whole issue in an amusing way.

Regards Lorraine

Dear Don Limuti

I appreciate your essay. You spent a lot of effort to write it. If you believed in the principle of identity of space and matter of Descartes, then your essay would be even better. There is not movable a geometric space, and is movable physical space. These are different concepts.

I inform all the participants that use the online translator, therefore, my essay is written badly. I participate in the contest to familiarize English-speaking scientists with New Cartesian Physic, the basis of which the principle of identity of space and matter. Combining space and matter into a single essence, the New Cartesian Physic is able to integrate modern physics into a single theory. Let FQXi will be the starting point of this Association.

Don't let the New Cartesian Physic disappear! Do not ask for himself, but for Descartes.

New Cartesian Physic has great potential in understanding the world. To show potential in this essay I risked give "The way of the materialist explanation of the paranormal and the supernatural" - Is the name of my essay.

Visit my essay and you will find something in it about New Cartesian Physic. After you give a post in my topic, I shall do the same in your theme

Sincerely,

Dizhechko Boris

Dear Don Limuti!

I'm very, very easy to read with online translator your essay. I hope someday you write about such a New Cartesian Physic and always with pleasure.

Sincerely,

Dizhechko Boris

Don, I enjoyed reading your essay. Short and to the point. Yet it does more than just highlight the freewill/ determinism problem. I think you show clearly that there is a difference between the goal (winning), the task planning (I will enter), the task execution (the essay written and submitted) and the outcome (yet to be, as I write this).

You demonstrate a goal that is realistic for one person eg. Don may be unrealistic for another eg. Dad. It is the task planning and execution in between that raises the probability that the imagined outcome is achieved.

Choosing to alter the probability of an outcome in the external reality is where will comes in to play. Yet the choices made can also be affected by things like neurotransmitter levels/ balance which can be reduced to chemistry and physics, or seen as the product of lifestyle and environment and social relationships. The freewill problem may come from trying to isolate goal production (will) from micro and macro environment. Yes, we can have will, yet it can never be entirely free.

I think your contribution to the contest is thought provoking. I'm glad you chose to write and enter it.

Don,

Thanks for your response above. I do think we often need careful distinction between 'causal' and 'deterministic' from reading many other essays. Yours handles it quite well.

I haven't seen you comment on mine and hope If you haven't yet read it you get to do so, comment and score it before the cut off.

Best of luck in the run in.

Peter

Hi Don,

You promised a short essay, and you delivered!! No small typed single spaced nonsense, no messy equations, no predictive power... beautiful;) 10!! It reminded me a Platonic dialogue.

Based on your essay, you are a prime candidate for liking my movie "Digital Physics". Please check it out on iTunes, Vimeo, or Amazon Prime. In some sense, you have no choice... but this does not imply you'll watch it... but please, please do!!

Oh well. Que Sera, Sera...

Jon

Starting to read your website now, and I just found "The Mother of all Demos" on youtube! Hidden gems!! I will respond more after I digest some of this stuff.

Thanks again, Don!

Don,

I love this essay. Good job with your context and your ability to keep it short with meaning.