Saturday, June 7

Looking into the future

Its been a while since I saw this movie - "Next" , starring Nicholas Cage.

The movie goes by the fact that Chris can see into the future and he can do things accordingly. To change it as he sees fit. It was pretty interesting just looking into the possibilities with the ability to look into the future.

But one thing that didn't quite seem right is the ability to change upon looking into the future. Here is a quote from the movie itself.

Chris Johnson: Here is the thing about the future. Every time you look at, it changes, because you looked at it, and that changes everything else.
Now to the interesting part. Since you look into the future with the knowledge / gift of being able to look ahead in time, the very future that you see is what is a consequence of you having looked at it and your choices whence. The future you see is that which happens because of the choice you make upon seeing the future.

So even though you can look into the future the choice you make wouldn't change the future. For the choice you made was what led to the future you saw. So you are really not making a choice as you've already made it.

True that we don't have the ability to look into the future or that even if you did look into it I wouldn't be able to change anything ;). This makes me wonder. Do we really make any choices at all or is it all just a feel good factor that we are in control. May be the decisions we take in our lives are all preset.

If you are like me who doesn't quite believe in fate you probably rebuke at this very idea. At the same time I keep my mind open and not a fanatic followed of my beliefs. So lets go about it this way.

We have two possibilities -
a) The ability to look into the future exists or is feasible. So going by my observations above the future if all set and there is nothing you can do to change it :D.

b) It just ain't possible to look into the future. Now this will lead to us being able to make decisions which changes the future. Now the changed future as we see it could very well be the only future there ever will be. Although we see various possibilities depending on the choice we make.

Both these possibilities lead me to feel that choice really doesn't exist although we perceive ourselves to have it. Sounds more like the philosophy of 'The Matrix' doesn't it ;)? The oracle explaining about choice saying - "You've already made the choice. You are here to understand why you made it". Interestingly us trying to understand why we made the choice also leads to the future we are trying to comprehend and therefore not a conscious one.

So, are we all just puppets in this huge show orchestrated by the universe? Now I'd really love to hear from anyone who can catch flaws in my inferences here. Sounds horrible when you realize that you've already made all the choices in you life , doesn't it? Just like when you hear someone prove 2=1 ;). Maybe you've encountered something such in your life that substantiates our very ability to make a choice.

My second arguments sounds weak to me. But if we could just prove that it is feasible to look into the future then would it mean that you can never make a conscious choice? Thats it is all just a false perception?

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4 Comments:

At Monday, June 09, 2008 10:38:00 AM, Blogger Zeppelin said...

ippo ennangara nee?

 
At Monday, June 09, 2008 8:47:00 PM, Blogger SamY said...

the possibility that there is no such thing called choice ;)

 
At Monday, June 09, 2008 10:08:00 PM, Blogger Keshi said...

Future is best left unlooked. :)

*HUGZ*

Keshi.

 
At Tuesday, June 10, 2008 10:34:00 AM, Blogger Akshay said...

Well I almost believe that we are a result of some advanced age computer program or we exist only on some chip...but that way we will still have choices.... "0" or "1" ...

 

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