by Ruskin Bond
'How fast time passes!' Virendra exclaimed.
'Yes, two years here went past fast like a fleeting moment; we could not even grasp it well,' Urmi said.
'It was just the other day that we came,' Rajendra said.
'And it is already time to go. Finding it so difficult to leave the place,' Urmi said.
'And so many friends. Old teachers. I am already getting nostalgic,' Rajendra said.
'Despite the terribly bad food in the hostels every day, and despite so many deficiencies in the university?' Virendra curiously inquired.
'Despite everything, sir.' Urmi replied. 'Sir, you are the one who constantly says that nothing can be perfect for long if at all; entropy does not permit it. So some disorder is quite normal in nature. Hostel dysfunction is probably one such natural deficiency.' It seemed Urmi sought Virendra's comment, particularly when she was quoting back Virendra.
Virendra was listening to Urmi fixing his look on her face. When she finished, he noticed her slightly mischievous smile. His left cheek twitched in a smile of slight amusement, but he did not say anything.
'Sir, do you really so deeply believe in this behaviour of entropy, that you talked to us about it so many times?' Rajendra asked.
Virendra felt that the pressure was on. There was no guarantee that the topic would change if he continued his quiet. In fact he did not mind talking about that, but he would have to repeat his thoughts. Nothing new had occurred to him lately. He looked at Rajendra; Rajendra's question did not seem to be a casual overture in prolonging a conversation. It deserved an answer.
'Yes,' Virendra said. 'But I do not think very intensely about it all the time. I am not tense about it. In fact, the best part about this is, that it is quite relaxing a thought once you start believing in it. The worst part, if you say that it is the worst part, is that it shatters a lot of illusions, and that could make one passive. It has a tendency to make you docile, nonegotistic.'
'But, sir, is not the definition of entropy sort of artificial, imposed, I mean even the statistical thermodynamic one? Microstates, macrostates, etc? It seems to me that it is devoid of, at least removed from, a qualitative reality, the reality of nature.'
'True, entropy is a mental construct, but it does express some basic truth of nature. Summarily, succinctly. We will soon move away from entropy, but we can start here. No, let us not get entangled with the dry rigorous definition of microstates. I feel the truth would be clear even if you viewed it from probability. That something may exist or may not exist; that a process may occur or may not occur. That has bearing on reality. Do you agree?'
Rajendra thought for a second. 'Yes.'
'Now consider a full description of a state of nature. Call it a single state, or call it a microscopic state, as you prefer; at whatever detail you choose to describe it, howsoever large or complex the system may be. There could be fine variations possible in the attributes of such single states, thus making possible existence of a number of different single states, although at a given instant the actual system can be in only one such single state. From all such possible single states, let us now call each collection of single states that share some common property a macroscopic state.'
'Which means there could be a number of such macrostates,' Rajendra said.
'Yes. Now let us further assert that all such single states are equally probable. This then would mean that the larger the number of single states in a given macrosocopic state, the higher would be the weight of that macroscopic state and the higher the intrinsic probability of its realisation. The system therefore is more likely to be found in a macroscopic state having a larger number of single states under its domain, and at the extreme in the macrosocopic state having the largest number of single states.'
'This you have taught us. Now, a relationship between single states, macrostates, and entropy.'
'Yes. If we now say, qualitatively, that the larger the number of single states in the macroscopic state where the system at a given instant happens to be, the higher is the entropy, and we allow that the single states change their property, then we are likely to find the system moving from one single state to another, and from a macroscopic state of lower entropy to another of higher entropy, with a strong tendency of movement towards the macroscopic state of highest entropy. In other words, the system would move towards the direction of that macrostate where there is a maximum in the number of ways it can be realised. This is a probabilistic view indicating the likelihood of the system movement; don't forget that the way the specific single system we took in the beginning would actually evolve would depend uniquely on its specific initial conditions.'
'But how does this relate to free will and predestination? And, sir, what do you believe in, free will, or predestination?'
'I don't like believing in it, but more and more it seems to me that our evolution is predestined,' Virendra said. 'In the inanimate physical world, for single systems, where the evolution seems to depend clearly only on the history of the system, the behaviour is deterministic. In the biological world, which is a part of the larger physical world, we see that gene composition and interaction with the environment determine behaviour, so that world is also deterministic. So, on the whole, it is deterministic, predetermined. But the systems and inter-actions here are too complex for us to be able to make accurate predictions about the path the evolution takes.'
'You mean there is no role of free will? That is rather fatalistic! Sir, that would be like believing in astrology! No. You don't mean that! Would you yourself go to or be guided by astrologers?' Urmi asked.
'No.'
'Then would you despise those who go to astrologers?'
'No.'
'Would you encourage them?'
'Not either.'
'But do you believe heavenly bodies do control our lives?'
'No.'
'Are you going to answer all my questions in the negative?'
'No,' Virendra smiled.
'But, sir, that's what astrologers want us to believe, that movements of the planets and constellations determine how our lives would go.'
'But what if both are effects of some common cause? Perhaps you could tell someday positions of heavenly bodies looking at people's lives; perhaps some principle of reciprocity exists there, but it is just too complicated to see through it and apply practically.'
'You mean because it is predestined, both are evolving together?'
'Yes.'
'Along with the rest of the nature? And it is too complicated for us to resolve all the initial conditions and the details of the processes.'
'Yes, one could speculate that way. But despite my feeling about predetermination, I myself act as if there is free will; there is a great joy in it. Free will involves striving towards a desired objective and succeeding, apparently through effort provided, without having a priori full quantitative answer about—it is impossibly difficult to have this answer—whether it is feasible. Free will is a concept pertaining to those with consciousness, such as us. But then, if consciousness is biological in origin, free will, which is a kind of desire of the conscious, also cannot be truly random, it has to be a predictable response to some definite stimuli – we are not aware of a conscious thought which is independent of stimulus, external or internal.'
'All this then would imply something very general,' Rajendra said. 'All our free wills—all of us do seem to feel that we have free will at some time or other—are only apparent. They are actually effects of our individual histories – or for all of us together, perhaps some all-encompassing global, primordial initial conditions. All predetermined. We put efforts in; who, where, how much, that depends on initial conditions; where success comes that also can be traced back to initial conditions. Only, it seems, we cannot tell. Perhaps there are telltale signs of the initial conditions all over, just that we cannot read them.'
'If there is nothing like true free will, what do we do then?' Urmi asked.
'Well, our bodies and min
ds are not capable of accurately estimating the effect of all other systems that have a role in a given process,' Virendra said. 'So if somehow a wish is born it is very worthwhile to put all the effort in order to make it succeed; it is most unlikely to succeed if the effort is not put in. If it succeeds it may then appear to us that free will worked, although it was actually, as every phenomenon is, predestined.'
'It is a stratagem to make one work hard! Further, if it is possible to enhance the probability of realisation by a contrived free will, then everybody will do that, and it will beat predestination.'
'Not really. Not everyone can do that even if such a suggestion is given. That is the predestined part. No work can get done without effort. So if absolutely no effort is provided, it is bound to fail; little is predestined to succeed without effort. But if it is predestined to fail because of other factors than one's effort, which would not be known at the beginning, it would be wisdom to put in the best effort. What is desirable is detached attachment, detached intense involvement.'
'But one thing sir, aren't you mixing two things? If the evolution is predestined, then it just happens in only one way. That's it. It could not happen in any other way; there is no role of probability. Then why do you talk about predestined evolution and probability in the same breath? Is this not contradictory?' Urmi asked.
'You are correct. It is contradictory. I use the term probability loosely, I use it because it is convenient to use. When I say the probability of a particular result happening is low, I mean that existence of the initial conditions required for that process yielding a particular result is unlikely. We have only one system; its initial conditions are what determine the result. So when I say loosely probability, I mean probability of having the right initial conditions, and not having many systems evolving and one of them giving a certain result. As long you understand what I mean by this, there should be no confusion. Can I continue to use the word probability this way, a bit loosely?' Virendra asked looking at Urmi.
'I suppose it is all right, if you use it that way,' Urmi said. 'Sir, this detached attachment would also imply that there is some tangible meaning of hope.'
'Hope also is a mental construct wanting an actual event to take place in a certain desired way. If the mind can imagine it, there is no barrier to generate hope. But the likelihood of a hope being realised depends on how complex the processes involved are. The more steps there are in a process, the less is the likelihood of its realisation. For example, if you were born in a fisherman's family in a small fishing village on one of the coasts, what would be your chances of attending this university and now going abroad? It would not be exactly zero, but not very much more either. But it can happen. If you were in a small teacher's job in a small town in Vietnam, what would be your chances of turning out to be a military general? Not very much. But then it happened once. And it will not happen for many years to come, if ever again. If you were an apprentice in a small bookbinder's shop, what would be your chances of turning out to be a world famous scientist? Not very much. But then it happened at least once. Hope and fear both are imaginary constructs related to the nature of a future event; they hardly by themselves control the outcome, other than remotely through efforts generated, that too if predestined.'
Virendra continued, 'But then if you examined it a bit carefully you would see that there are obvious limits to how much you can do by exercising your apparent free will; there are constraints of various kinds. There are biological limitations, there are social limitations, there are limitations of every kind. Some are impossibilities and some are improbabilities. Unless they are true impossibilities, they are all improbabilities. But, however improbable, given adequate time or an adequate number of incidents, chances are that even the most improbable would happen. And the most improbable can occur at any given step, it does not wait for the last step just because it is the most improbable. The commonplace occurrence is mixed with the extraordinary; Lindbergh flies across the Atlantic, Bannister shatters the four-minute mile barrier, and the Challenger fails.'
'It means that a mixed fate is the fate of everything and everybody,' Rajendra said.
'For sure. Uniformity, perfection, they are low-probability phenomena, unless the sample size is trivially small. For example, get one monkey to behave properly. Let us say you succeed. Now try ten monkeys simultaneously! What would be your chances? We have defined entropy in a manner such that there is only one way the perfect state can be realised – all attributes just right, all initial conditions just right. That, formally, is zero entropy. But if there are a hundred attributes which have to be just right, each satisfying a certain precise criterion to make for overall perfection, then there are a hundred ways it can go wrong. And as long as there is a finite probability of going wrong, it is no longer an impossibility, but only an improbability. An improbable event is a potential reality; it can happen at any time. So there is nothing surprising.'
'So if uniformity is unnatural, then non-uniformity is the most natural thing.'
'Yes, there are so many things in nature that are very nearly uniform, but not exactly so. Take for example flowers, the petals, the sepals, very close to so many standard symmetry forms, but a close look would show the infinite nonuniformities. It is divine grace that their beauty is not affected by this non-uniformity, in fact it is enhanced. And then the system has stabilised itself into a higher entropy state than zero.'
'But, sir, this also means that nature works against quality.'
'Yes, very much so. If you define quality as something which has to satisfy narrow stringent criteria. More so if it has a number of attributes to satisfy. Sooner or later one or more will go wrong, and the quality will be lessened or destroyed. If you want quality, you have to achieve certain definite attributes, and fight to retain those attributes. The state of high quality is a state of low entropy and a tense and unstable state. Nature's relentless tendency is to get one of the attributes to falter – initial conditions slightly imperfect, and move it to a higher entropy and relaxed state. It is therefore a fundamental struggle to protect a quality against nature's actions, to protect an attribute which satisfies some stringent requirement of quality against a mixing by an attribute which satisfies only a less stringent quality. The dominant theme of this universe is mixing. A relentlessness and ruthlessness is necessary to retain quality. In our single-state view we would say, it would be difficult to come across such a quality.'
'But, sir, that is a near-Nazi precept.'
'You have made a good point. But what I said is very general in nature, and what you refer to has only a small though non-negligible bearing on my assertion. In fact, examples of fierce protection of a certain set of specified attributes against any corruption are as old as life is in the universe. This probably is due both to an intrinsic affinity of a class specified by a certain set of attributes and fear and contempt of attributes outside the fold. These attributes could be biological, geographical, social, religious, economic; in fact there is no limit to what could be the basis. But such ordered structure is intrinsically of low entropy, against nature's tendency to mix and equilibrate. This involves precepts of most if not all religions, all dogmas. Interestingly, there are various kinds of genuine quality associated with all such dogmas. They would be invariably lost, unless the urge for protection is fanatic. Because nature is unidirectional, once mixed you cannot unmix it. But an equally important truth is that you cannot win against nature. You can toil immeasurably hard and just barely hold against it and force a mere draw or simply lose. There have been wars at every level because of this. And only through defeat and reluctance have mixings been accepted, which then constituted a new set of dogmas, having their own quality, and their own fanatics to uphold those tenets. While in the living world we generally accept the existence of classes and clans without question including all their fanaticisms, among humans, in general affection for the entire human race we propagate eschewing of clannish loyalties. But classes do exist everywher
e among humans. At the present stage of human civilisation we perceive in ourselves clannish tendencies but at the same time we do not quite have that much hatred of humans of other classes. For the same reason, assertions of superiority of one race over another exist, although a larger realisation of affection for the entire human race also is there.'
'Maintenance of the purity of a class then would mean relentless purging of infringing forces.'
'Absolutely. One example close to home would be academic excellence. Any excellence is a low entropy process, because one requires various component attributes to satisfy some stringent criteria, and there are so many ways of lapsing. No matter how well one starts, decay of the standard, fall from excellence, is a natural result. So, one way to counter it is ruthless purging wherever the decay shows its head. Some western university systems is one example, where this is followed to a large extent. And it has succeeded maintaining excellent standards in many institutions. But even the very method of well-intentioned purging has its natural corruptions, so in some places the ill effects have shown. The other method of somewhat prevailing over the entropy effect is to keep the sample size very small; an example would be another occidental system. There would be so few senior professorial positions in the universities that unless you are truly good, it is impossible to get into such a position. But it leaves out many academics aspiring for promotions and not getting them, perhaps not even in their lifetime. We have managed to copy the worst aspects of both the systems; we have a rather large number of positions at the highest academic level and no ability or wish to purge. The system is humane, less tense, more equilibrated, and of higher entropy, but away from excellence. Humanitarianism and excellence are not always compatible.