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From: williams@kirk.DEC (John Williams 223-3402)
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Now and Then
Message-ID: <3113@decwrl.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 3-Aug-84 14:04:43 EDT
Article-I.D.: decwrl.3113
Posted: Fri Aug  3 14:04:43 1984
Date-Received: Sun, 5-Aug-84 05:29:19 EDT
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Organization: DEC Engineering Network
Lines: 51



Yes, cause and effect do exist!

The observation that certain things preceed others is easily proved.
In the time/space continuum, there is a fundamental limit of propagation.
This is the speed of light. All energy propagation is limited by this.
The phenomenon of simultaneous events is only relevant when being analyzed
in modular time samples.

For example:

When I drop a dish, I am capaple of detecting the amount of time it takes
for the dish to fall to the ground and change states. The act of dropping
the dish preceeds the the actual change that occurs. There is also a degree
of certainty that the dish will break, it might not. It may land in such a
way that the dish will be able to emit the energy without fracture. If I had
chosen to take a much longer sample as an event, say the entire interval,
then the two actions would appear to be simultaneous. If I drop the dish
from a sufficient height, then I can assure repeatability, that is, the
probability of the dish breaking is so large, that having the dish not break
is unobservable. It is important to understand that analysis depends on
sampling, and sampling requires a finitely small amount of time. The whole
field of differential calculus is aimed at making these successive samples
very small to the point of being negligable. I can describe something called
acceleration, which causes the dish to approach the floor with increasing
velocity.

My limitation of awareness excludes my perception of the future. If my
predictions of the future were ideally accurate, then I could transcend
the the direction of time. My recollections of the past are also not
accurate, although they are much more accurate than my predictions of the
future. Thus, my experience is a sample of reality. My free will determines
what choice of action I will take having interpretted the probability of
certain outcomes. When I use my intuition, I am freely admitting that I
am relying on unconcious decisions.

Because of the limitations enforced by reality, we recognize the existence
of both cause and effect, AND free will. Our living efficiency excludes
us from disregarding either aspect of finite time samples or finite
resolution. We respond to the present which we see with magnified resolution.
Cause and effect imply propagation. Free will implies limited accuracy.
The system you call your life needs them both. They both work.

( yeah, it's a monkey wrench, but it can fix your plumbing )

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