rhythm of events

saccadic

it is well – but not widely – known that our eyes move faster than our brain. conversely (and complementary), it is widely – but not well – known that to account for this lag, we must constantly make predictions about how the future will look. in this sense, we do not see the world for what it is. rather, only for the ways in which it deviates from preconceptions.

then, whether you observe life for forty years or forty thousand, lunch will follow breakfast. empire will succeed empire. in every culture, there will be bread, and it will be good. if your present is predicated on your past, would you really ever see anything new?

relevance?

if nature is to be trusted, then one might be inclined to say “no”, as in nature, there is no novelty. and i don’t mean that philosophically; however mysterious or paradoxical something may seem to us, it is a solved problem for nature, who faithfully computes her future based on the totality of her present. we, too, could come to be in possession of those facts, and every problem would simply unravel itself: we just need to figure them out by naturalistic means.

while perhaps a helpful perspective, it is not very useful. after all, the general complexity of things often renders naturalistic laws irrelevent. knowing that my girlfriend obeys coulomb’s law does not help me make her happy.

irrelevance.

however, it does raise a compelling question: is our capacity for wonder finite, if indeed we are able to innovate at all in a system which is “solved”?