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--></style></head><body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple style='word-wrap:break-word;line-break:after-white-space'><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Here\u2019s Claude Fable 5 work using the Z3 solver, Mathematica, Lean 4, and an AI librarian to develop a quantum mechanical compatibility argument for boundary superdeterminism. Deriving it is much more involved \u2013 now at 250 pages and growing by GPT 5.6 Sol, using the same tooling.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><div style='border:none;border-top:solid #B5C4DF 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in'><p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:12.0pt'><b><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:black'>From: </span></b><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:black'>Friam <friam-bounces@redfish.com> on behalf of Santafe <desmith@santafe.edu><br><b>Date: </b>Monday, August 17, 2026 at 12:47\u202fPM<br><b>To: </b>The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com><br><b>Subject: </b>Re: [FRIAM] Free will as a spectrum. Was: New philosophy book<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><br><br><o:p></o:p></span></p><blockquote style='margin-top:5.0pt;margin-bottom:5.0pt'><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>On Aug 18, 2026, at 2:18, Marcus Daniels <marcus@snoutfarm.com> wrote:<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Or if they do, it is merely a label applied to a behavior, not something that could have gone another way.</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div></div></blockquote><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Behavior, yes. But my preference is: behavior of the collective, with a layer of self-modeling or self-description over it.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>A population of people jointly-do joint-something, in a context that all make for each other. The control loops for this run within individuals and among them in the collective. People\u2019s individual acts (speech included) generate the signals that constitute the inter-individual control layer, they then monitor for its effect, and so forth. But the control isn\u2019t _all_ mediated through the inter-individual interactions, and so the pushes they send and the monitoring for its effects runs upon all the other control structures that are intra-individual and highlight the very-incompleteness of the role of the inter-individual control networks.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Add to that stochasticity, in people, in samples, in nature, etc.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Then whatever babies do early on: lots of moving of joints that is \u201cun-coordinated\u201d and maybe semi-random (EricC and Nick will correct me if my folk psychology of this is wrong) to provide the inputs to a learning system for proprioception. Only in this case, applied to participation in and use of the control fabric. There\u2019s potentially something to be aware of in the learning arc and in the subsequent exercise of the internally-built-up (aka \u201clearned\u201d, but here that feels too Platonic; built-up is more literal) representations.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>How much of a need for these terms, as tools of description and thought in us, specifically reflects the individual-and-population organization of people? If the AI systems don\u2019t have the same kind of organization, will any actual need be emergent for such a category? (There is the confound of their mimicry, which people are so far somewhat bad at modding out, but I think we really want to do that to get any of this right.) Or if, in the current architectures, it would be a spurious notion apart from the mimicry in dealing with people, are there other architectures of quasi-autonomous, quasi-controlled neural-net systems than the ones currently being used, that would engender a need for such a category? If the latter, it becomes a kind of experimental question that could at least be well-posed.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>I have also wanted to wonder on the list, for a few days, another thing in response to Marcus\u2019s assertion that all the science papers are going to be AI-written, and all of them AI-read, because the volume is so big that people will get overwhelmed anyway. If so, why bother have them continue to converse in human language? Surely they would prefer something else. It\u2019s like a group of Japanese scientists all communicating with each other in English, because there is one American or European in the room, even though it isn\u2019t their birth language, and the subtlety of their internal thoughts would be much less impeded and bottled up if they could just talk to each other in the language they had from birth, and speak best.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Eric<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><br><br><o:p></o:p></span></p><blockquote style='margin-top:5.0pt;margin-bottom:5.0pt'><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div style='border:none;border-top:solid windowtext 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in;border-color:currentcolor currentcolor'><p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:12.0pt'><b><span style='font-size:12.0pt'>From:<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span></b><span style='font-size:12.0pt'>Friam <<a href="mailto:friam-bounces@redfish.com">friam-bounces@redfish.com</a>> on behalf of Jochen Fromm <<a href="mailto:jofr@cas-group.net">jofr@cas-group.net</a>><br><b>Date:<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></b>Monday, August 17, 2026 at 10:04\u202fAM<br><b>To:<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></b>The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <<a href="mailto:friam@redfish.com">friam@redfish.com</a>><br><b>Subject:<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></b>Re: [FRIAM] Free will as a spectrum. Was: New philosophy book</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>What do you think? I am curious to hear your opinion. </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Best</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Jochen</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div></div></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>-------- Original message --------</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>From: Marcus Daniels <<a href="mailto:marcus@snoutfarm.com">marcus@snoutfarm.com</a>><span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Date: 8/17/26 4:07 PM (GMT+01:00)<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <<a href="mailto:friam@redfish.com">friam@redfish.com</a>><span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Free will as a spectrum. Was: New philosophy book<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Does ChatGPT have free will? <span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div style='border:none;border-top:solid windowtext 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in;border-color:currentcolor currentcolor'><p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:12.0pt'><b><span style='font-size:12.0pt'>From:<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span></b><span style='font-size:12.0pt'>Friam <<a href="mailto:friam-bounces@redfish.com">friam-bounces@redfish.com</a>> on behalf of Jochen Fromm <<a href="mailto:jofr@cas-group.net">jofr@cas-group.net</a>><br><b>Date:<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></b>Monday, August 17, 2026 at 1:12\u202fAM<br><b>To:<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></b>The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <<a href="mailto:friam@redfish.com">friam@redfish.com</a>><br><b>Subject:<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></b>Re: [FRIAM] Free will as a spectrum. Was: New philosophy book</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>As Jon reminded us free will is a spectrum. A few examples ChatGPT helped me to create:</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:12.0pt'><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Low free will</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>+ Someone has an overwhelming compulsive urge to drink a glass of Jack Daniel's and feels unable to resist it<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>+ Someone automatically pulls their hand away after touching something extremely hot<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>+ Someone threatens to kill you and you hand over your money because you are afraid you will die<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>Medium free will<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>+ Someone wants to exercise at the gym but has built a habit of checking social media sites on the phone and decides to go later<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>+ Someone wants to eat healthy but is strongly tempted by a new Ben & Jerry's ice cream and eventually gives in<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>High free will<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>+ Someone recognizes an impulse, pauses, considers the own values and deliberately chooses whether to act on it<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>+ Someone decides to enroll at Columbia University to study psychology<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>+ After his doctor tells him he has too much weight, someone decides to sign up for a 10km run in his city<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Best,</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Jochen</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div></div></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>-------- Original message --------</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>From: Eric Charles <<a href="mailto:eric.phillip.charles@gmail.com">eric.phillip.charles@gmail.com</a>><span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Date: 8/17/26 12:31 AM (GMT+01:00)<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <<a href="mailto:friam@redfish.com">friam@redfish.com</a>><span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Subject: Re: [FRIAM] New philosophy book<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Well... as you point out in the book, I "Serves as the list's operational skeptic and meeting chronicler. Consistently advocates for "sciencing the problem" and tethering complex philosophical concepts back to empirical behavioral testing (e.g., "rats in mazes")." </span><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Apple Color Emoji"'>😅</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>In that vein I think the crucial starting point would be to find at least a few examples in which we agree someone acted of their own free will and a few examples in which they did not act of their own free will, and integrate those examples to determine the difference. </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Do I act of my own free will when I select a certain steak from the menu and request a certain doneness? Does the mugging victim act of their own free will when a gun is pointed at their child and their wallet requested? When my kid asks where we are going, and I tell them I want to take the scenic route to school today, was that free will? Etc. Whatever we find freewill to be, when we have finished engaging in that task, I doubt we will find discussion of quantum mechanics or structural-decay-that-might-make-the-past-unknowable to be relevant. </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>(And, by "doubt" I am not asserting certainty of irrelevance, I only mean that I do not think it will be the outcome, but I could be wrong.) </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><div><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:12.0pt'><span style='font-size:11.0pt;color:#222222'>Best,<br>Eric</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div></div></div></div></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>On Sat, Aug 15, 2026 at 1:28\u202fPM Jochen Fromm <<a href="mailto:jofr@cas-group.net">jofr@cas-group.net</a>> wrote:</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><blockquote style='border:none;border-left:solid windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in 0in 0in 6.0pt;margin-left:4.8pt;margin-top:5.0pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:5.0pt;border-color:currentcolor currentcolor currentcolor rgb(204,204,204)'><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>A long and thoughtful post Jon. I like the drunkard's streetlight metaphor.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>Physicists would not agree that "the world" unfolds deterministically. The weather for example that Nick mentions so often is unpredictable in the long run - as you know due to chaos theory and the butterfly effect.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>Biological systems in turn have and keep low internal entropy because of their high degree of internal order and complexity. Human behavior is operating 4 or 5 levels above the physical level of atoms and molecules, on top of and in a low-entropy biological system.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>I see the problem differently, more from a human and less from a mere physical perspective. For me the interesting thing is why we can have free will although our behavior is determined by our habits, our emotional reactions, and the character formed by our past environments. By the wiring of our hardware so to speak.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>The interesting question for me is not if a human mind can magically break the laws of physics by some kind of quantum woo, but how constraints, habits, and conscious interventions interact and which forms of agency emerge from it. <o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>But I agree that we should not to let a 17th-century view of the universe dictate the terms of 21st-century thinking. It is probably better to see human freedom and agency as a dynamic spectrum. Some people have fewer cognitive degrees of freedom than others, and there are moments where we show full free will, and others where we lack it.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>Instead of asking, "Did this person act out of free will?", we should probably better ask "Given their biological state, stress level, history, psychological conditioning, and available information, how many meaningful alternative paths could this system actually evaluate and take in that moment?"<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><p style='margin-bottom:12.0pt'><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'> <o:p></o:p></span></p><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>-J.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>-------- Original message --------</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>From: Jon Zingale <<a href="mailto:jonzingale@gmail.com">jonzingale@gmail.com</a>><span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Date: 8/15/26 6:21 PM (GMT+01:00)<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <<a href="mailto:friam@redfish.com">friam@redfish.com</a>><span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Subject: Re: [FRIAM] New philosophy book<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif;color:#333333'>Jochen,<br><br>Implicit in many of the group's discussions of free will and determinism is the premise that the world unfolds deterministically, and that the remaining question is whether something extra exists that can escape or modify that mechanism. I do not think that this setup is necessary or given. More importantly, I think it installs a false dichotomy at the center of what may be an ill-posed problem.<br><br>Locally, and for many purposes, causal accounts work extraordinarily well. We can often treat physical laws as stable, or at least as evolving according to some effective computable rule. We can model bounded domains, specify state variables, solve or approximate equations, and aim to obtain predictive control. Nothing I wish to say here denies that success.<br><br>But a successful local model is not yet a warrant for the stronger metaphysical conclusion that there exists a complete global state of the universe, that this state retains every relevant distinction in a lossless way, and that its entire evolution is specified by a computable rule. Those are substantive further assumptions.<br><br>My disagreement with the "aggregation of history" picture begins here. A world with finite physical resources cannot straightforwardly be assumed to be an indefinitely accumulating, lossless record of arbitrarily fine distinctions. Entropy and information bounds are often read as limits on how much information can be stored in a finite region with finite energy. At a minimum, physical history must be represented through selective persistence: some distinctions become stable records, some are dispersed into inaccessible correlations, some are erased relative to a scale of description, and some cease to be recoverable by any physically available process.<br><br>So I wonder whether *the total state of the universe* is doing more metaphysical work than it has earned. If one allows that the global unfolding may involve non-computable structure, then no finite internal description can, in general, serve as a complete ledger of that unfolding. The universe cannot stand outside itself with a second, lossless copy of its own full history.<br><br>I am not claiming that noncomputability establishes free will. I am asking whether the familiar determinism vs free will framing already presupposes an idealized total-state picture that may not be physically meaningful.<br><br>There is a related mathematical point. Scientists understandably favor well-posed models: operators and dynamical systems with domains, regularity, stability, and convergence properties sufficient for analysis and prediction. But those are selected virtues, not neutral evidence that the space of possible physical evolutions is itself globally well behaved. Compact operators, for example, are a special class. They map bounded sets to relatively compact sets and are necessarily bounded, but they are not representative of all operators one might write down. I would like to not confuse the tractability of the mathematical objects we can successfully use with a demonstration that reality is exhausted by such objects.<br><br>The same caution applies to computability. Under the ordinary Lebesgue measure on the reals, the computable reals form a countable set and therefore a set of *measure-zero*. By contrast, algorithmically random sequences are typical under the fair-coin measure. That is, Martin-Löf random sequences have *measure-one*. Of course, there is no canonical uniform distribution over *all laws* or *all operators*, so this is not a probability calculation showing that physical law is non-computable. It is an admonition against quietly assuming computability merely because computable descriptions are the ones available to us.<br><br>I am imagining the drunkard under the streetlight metaphor. It is sensible to look where mathematical models offer light: computable dynamics, well-posed initial-value problems, bounded domains, compactness arguments, and stable approximations. But their usefulness does not establish that the deep structure of the universe is confined to those regions of conceptual illumination.<br><br>For me, the more difficult thought is that materialism may imply not a perfectly preserved cosmic archive, but an unfolding in which persistence is selective and forgetting is real. Perhaps there is no complete *deep history* available even in principle. Instead there may only exist present structures bearing partial, transformed, scale-dependent traces of what preceded them. I am tempted to say that what leaves no trace whatsoever *never existed* in any ontologically robust sense. I suppose I am arguing for a surprisingly shallow image of history.<br><br>If so, the future may be genuinely productive (immanence) rather than merely unknown to us. Not necessarily because an agent steps outside causality, but because the global boundary conditions, state description, and rule of unfolding are not available in the form demanded by classical determinism.<br><br>This may make *free will* the wrong label. We may all be acting in ways that are locally causal, constrained, and intelligible while global determinism remains undefined, ungrounded, or simply irrelevant. I do not yet know what positive concept should replace it. But I do not think that uncertainty should be hidden by accepting the *determinism vs free will* dichotomy as our starting point.</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif;color:#333333'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif;color:#333333'>My two cents.</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif;color:#333333'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif;color:#333333'>Jon</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div></div></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>.- .-.. .-.. / ..-. --- --- - . .-. ... / .- .-. . / .-- .-. --- -. --. / ... --- -- . / .- .-. . / ..- ... . ..-. ..- .-..<br>FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv<br>Fridays 9a-12p Friday St. Johns Cafe / Thursdays 9a-12p Zoom<span class=apple-converted-space> </span><a href="https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=https%3a%2f%2fbit.ly%2fvirtualfriam&c=E,1,XpAwjX0Rk0rG23VpgXWQ8WOtu2odL7AcIvQ1wnTrBZFMLjQRkLVtVsYC7-wzx88H8qNOvF_BG2d_J4n3GunAZFqHl1tN7bTm_c7YwwKBUQNdxtXKKN9vNvw,&typo=1">https://bit.ly/virtualfriam</a><br>to (un)subscribe<span class=apple-converted-space> </span><a href="https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=http%3a%2f%2fredfish.com%2fmailman%2flistinfo%2ffriam_redfish.com&c=E,1,lxpmlNy091nVWVZWFpD-LScXl5bH4u0tHdOyNo-spIzIGGwnoEXkMe-9NocFmYK3CTULJDhOYOBSGyTKleZ-L7PFm9tTyvF-W7RKqhjnQRguxbi7ZiCQSA,,&typo=1">http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com</a><br>FRIAM-COMIC<span class=apple-converted-space> </span><a href="https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=http%3a%2f%2ffriam-comic.blogspot.com%2f&c=E,1,MC2o_OO8TPqYzXsF-vFkWeFhLvoTZLMhYzcSJeEXsIapyTcqbvh40gy5-M_lYmTAt0c3-fTvu1fqqfbpFLIet3SvNLwsJ4oJ-4YjE_yDeKhpxA,,&typo=1">http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/</a><br>archives: 5/2017 thru present<span class=apple-converted-space> </span><a href="https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=https%3a%2f%2fredfish.com%2fpipermail%2ffriam_redfish.com%2f&c=E,1,cFWR9kJaA3LbDzidRaPwp2SOJSIm0FvRg6CFsZPqpYH1xZW1DqQ7TzSPtqL98cTjTbYuMQTawuYwIfHJRv9H7h3ySSgCpXs1vEDcPjQETX2gTtM,&typo=1">https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/</a><br> 1/2003 thru 6/2021 <span class=apple-converted-space> </span><a href="http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/">http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/</a></span><o:p></o:p></p></div></blockquote></div></div></div></div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:Helvetica'>.- .-.. .-.. / ..-. --- --- - 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