"I saw cars, boats, and trains, moving, and then thought to myself, "I can see their future." When one sees a blind person walking down the street with a blind stick, heading towards some sort of obstacle, one gets a weird sense of being like God who sees his future. In the same way, from up above, one can see the future of all sorts of things. My understanding of time has always been that it is a 4th spatial dimension that our brains are not capable of comprehending. For someone who lives in a 2 dimensional world, we are like God who can see their future and the past at a single glance. From this, I’ve always concluded that our future is predetermined. Now the shuttle plane to Boston cast a doubt in me. I could see the future of those moving cars and boats. I could see what they were heading towards, the future that they themselves could not see but was clear as day from my point of view. Perhaps this is the kind of future that those of 4th dimensional world see in us. Not that it is predetermined, but it is just obvious, which means that it can be changed, just as those cars on highways could have suddenly changed their directions and unknowingly avoided the impending gridlock ahead of them."
Yes, I too used to hypothesize that [almost] everything was predetermined. How can the astrologer know what’s going to happen to you next week? How could a meditative saint who lived thousands of years ago know your entire past and future? Your reference to the "4th dimension" is very appropriate. It is a "view from the top," where time ceases to exist. There is no past, present, or future for these individuals, but rather, ONLY the present. If you exist completely in the present, then this "4th dimension" becomes apparent to you, and everything becomes rather hilarious.
A Random Comment from March 2, 2002
Dyske,
This passage really caught my eye:
"I saw cars, boats, and trains, moving, and then thought to myself, "I can see their future." When one sees a blind person walking down the street with a blind stick, heading towards some sort of obstacle, one gets a weird sense of being like God who sees his future. In the same way, from up above, one can see the future of all sorts of things. My understanding of time has always been that it is a 4th spatial dimension that our brains are not capable of comprehending. For someone who lives in a 2 dimensional world, we are like God who can see their future and the past at a single glance. From this, I’ve always concluded that our future is predetermined. Now the shuttle plane to Boston cast a doubt in me. I could see the future of those moving cars and boats. I could see what they were heading towards, the future that they themselves could not see but was clear as day from my point of view. Perhaps this is the kind of future that those of 4th dimensional world see in us. Not that it is predetermined, but it is just obvious, which means that it can be changed, just as those cars on highways could have suddenly changed their directions and unknowingly avoided the impending gridlock ahead of them."
Yes, I too used to hypothesize that [almost] everything was predetermined. How can the astrologer know what’s going to happen to you next week? How could a meditative saint who lived thousands of years ago know your entire past and future? Your reference to the "4th dimension" is very appropriate. It is a "view from the top," where time ceases to exist. There is no past, present, or future for these individuals, but rather, ONLY the present. If you exist completely in the present, then this "4th dimension" becomes apparent to you, and everything becomes rather hilarious.