Fate

 

Does free will exist? Maybe more importantly, does free wont exist? When we speak of destiny, how much of our lives is predetermined and how much is under our control in any meaningful way? These all are kind of ways of talking about the same concept that has been a long time dialogue within human societies. Namely, the future and how much we can influence it and predict it. Maybe with of course a lot of attention and resources poured into being able to predict the future, from weather patterns to love interests to economics. Its just something humans generally across cultures seem to be interested in. 

In talking about concepts that independently show up across completely separate and diverse human societies and cultures, mythologies and methods pertaining to divining and predicting the future have a large universality across all of humanity across any time period including our own. In our world today, our models that have been tempered by empirical data and scientific methods have more accuracy at predicting the future than any time period in history. The advent and development of classical mechanics during the Renaissance allowed for incredibly precise predictions about astronomical events, including being able to predict eclipses, comets and planetary transits to an incredible accuracy even without the use of computers. This was considered an astounding accomplishment for the time and even now its pretty incredible to witness the accuracy in which we are able to predict the timing and placing of solar and lunar eclipses for example.

There's one famous example of the use of computer models in gambling on incredibly complex systems and being able to predict the outcome (namely horse races in Hong Kong) that lead Bill Benter, a physicist turned computer scientist/mathematician/gambler, to construct one of the most accurate models to predict the winner for horse races in the 90s that by the 2000's had amassed him over 1 billion dollars in winnings. Our models for the weather (weather is far more complex and chaotic a system to accurately predict than horse races) have similarly become far more accurate than any other time period in history, but they still aren't accurate enough to always rely on. 

 Economic models are similarly fallible. Its my personal intuition that a lot of our economic models rely on false assumptions about the economy that are considered bedrock foundational in construction of models for predicting the trajectory of the economy. Of course, some do work pretty effectively, and more recently (and this applies to a lot of modern methods for predicting the future) have been applying machine learning models to make more accurate predictions.

 

Of course I could maybe talk about the potential dangers of this, namely how the way machine learning works currently we are relying on autonomic feedback loops that reinforce themselves. In using these methods of constructing models we are trying to find patterns in data and then once we find these patterns we act on these predictions, and then later we make another decision based on a later prediction that's been influenced by the previous decision, and it goes back into the model. Given how much power and influence large scale economic decisions have on our culture, the potential ramifications of this is pretty startling to try to comprehend, we might have already all collectively without knowing it stepped onto a roller coaster that humanity has absolutely little to no control over. Or maybe it will just help sell more coke bottles who knows. 

The history of divination and future predicting varies across so many different cultures dramatically. Dream interpretation, tea leaf reading, tarot card divination, rune reading, astrology and many others have historically been methods humans before they employed more exact and logical mathematics and empirical discoveries to make predictions about the future. In some cases actual science and methods have arisen off of previous methods of future predicting, much like how modern chemistry arose from ancient alchemy so do did modern astronomy arise from ancient astrology. 

While most of these methods might be easy to debunk the exact methods and science of dream interpretation I think is interesting terrain in this regard. I know many people, including myself, who have had dreams that somehow accurately predicted future events before they've happened, and history is full of examples of people who've had accurately premonitory dreams about the future.  I don't think we entirely understand the mechanisms of Oneiromancy (divination based upon dreams) which doesn't necessarily mean it's all bullshit or true but I think rather represents a gap in our knowledge or at least false assumptions of how the world and reality works. (We know much about the world but the thing I love about physics is that we know some of its bullshit, but we just don't know what exactly, its just the best we can come up with collectively so far).

Most people in ancient societies who we considered to be able to employ methods to predict the future we usually elevated to some sort of upper priest or oracle class within their societies. Sometimes this would involve rigorous training in regards to the mythologies and methods to predict the future and other times it just involved being picked out at a young age as having some sort of "gift" and being raised as such. Sometimes it was based in actual astronomical understandings of the universe that only the priest class who know, knowing when the seasons would change could greatly elevate ones ability to predict harvest seasons for example and as such the knowledge to do so might be closely guarded.

One such example of this type of class that is interesting to consider was the Enarei. The Enarei were Scythian androgynous/effeminate priests and shamanistic soothsayers who played an important role in the Scythian religion. The Enarei in Scythian society were part of Artimpasa's cult and played an important political role in Scythian society as they were believed to have received the gift of prophesy directly from the goddess Artimpasa (conflated by Herodotus with Aphrodite). The Enarei wore women's clothing, performed women's jobs and customs and spoke in a feminine manner. They were accepted and revered in Scythian society.

Scythian religion included shamanism and divination, both nature and deities worship and had no temples. Scythian shamanism involved religious ecstasy through the use of cannabis, with modern authors claiming that Enarei likely performed those rites, just like "gender-crossing shamans" of other cultures. 

The method employed by the Enarei differed from that practiced by traditional Scythian diviners: whereas the latter used a bundle of willow rods, the Enarei used strips cut from the bark of the linden tree (genus tilia) to tell the future, which they did by splitting the bark and twining the strands among open fingers and using these to be able to tell a story and predict the future. This is well documented by the Greek Herodotus in writing about his time interacting with the Scythian culture. 

In all the more ancient traditions of future predicting (astrology, rune readings, stychiomancy, tea leaf reading, willow rods) in contrast to the more modern traditions of future predicting, (mathematical models, computer simulations, et al) one stark difference is made apparent between them which is that one relies more on intuitive methods relying on sort of "black box" methods relying more on feelings than exact step by step processes, whereas modern methods rely on more logical one step to another, no black box, everything open and understood of how we get from one leap of logic to another. Usually the process is more complex though.

When we can absolutely understand the logic of how to get to A to B, we can make incredibly accurate predictions about the world. However, we don't always have this capability given either we have an incorrect model or not enough information to make predictions. Its interesting to note that the ancient methods of divination, while wildly more inaccurate than modern methods of predicting the future, were not bounded by such constraints but one could also state they were not grounded in reality. They mostly relied on feelings, intuition, and storytelling. While they weren't as accurate or precise, perhaps in the end they provided a story and an easing of anxiety for many a querent about their future and course in life. (In a sense, perhaps also providing a sense of psychological therapy in a sense, when we are eased about a stressful future situation even if its not grounded in reality sometimes that's all we need at the time.)

Is the future predetermined? I'll talk about this, free will and more in my next blog post.