"You are
moving through probability space."
"Oh no,
not this again." Ryn rolled his eyes.
"I'm serious," she said. "
You think the world exists in only the way you experience it, but it doesn't."
"And now you're going to
tell me all about objective reality right?" Ryn went back to his work.
"What if objective
reality isn't what you think it is?"
"How can anybody know, right? But
why should I care?"
"I think your oversimplifications limit your thinking," she said.
"It's good enough for me.
It's worked so far."
"Just because it's simple doesn't
make it the only possibility."
"And there are infinite other possibilities, right Kayl?"
"You can only be in
one place at a time but there are an infinite number of other positions you can be in."
"If I'm not in those other places, what does it matter to me?" Ryn was
trying not to get drawn in again.
"Just because you're not in Paris, doesn't mean Paris doesn't exist. And
if you act like it doesn't, eventually you'll run into problems."
"But
the stuff you talk about isn't just Paris not existing."
"I'm just
trying to stay open to other possibilities."
"Like the Flat Earthers?
I can't believe you put up with their insanity."
"Just because I see things one way doesn't mean
everyone sees what I see."
"Subjective reality has its limits. I think
it's you that's going to have problems if you keep acting as if the earth could be flat."
"If you were colorblind, you'd see a different color tree than I would, but does that mean
I have a more accurate description of objective reality? In the end it's still subjective."
"Okay maybe the tree could be different colors
depending on who's looking, but are you seriously going to tell me the earth could be flat?"
"Maybe they just experience it a different way. Let's say some astronomers could only use telescopes on Tuesdays, while others could only use them on Wednesdays. If some phenomena occurs only on Tuesdays, then the two groups would have entirely different views of reality,
yet neither side is wrong."
"The old blind men and the elephant thing eh?" Ryn said. "
But it's a bit far-fetched to say the earth appears flat only to some observers."
"Just because you have a simpler explanation for how reality is, doesn't make it the right one. We're always discarding older theories when we discover they were too simplistic to explain new observations. And then we move on to more complex theories. That doesn't mean the simpler theories used to be right.
They were never right."
"Well,
according to your own argument, it's possible they did used to be right at one point."
Kayl smiled. "Ha, I guess that's true. It's a possibility,
maybe not probable, but possible."
"
So you just want me to be nicer to the Flat Earthers, is that it Kayl?"
"Maybe you could think of them as colorblind, I don't know."
"What if I'm not moving through probability space, and only you are?" asked Ryn. "What if what you believe is only because the version of reality you're able to see is
different from what I've seen?"
"That's a possibility," she said. "Even if our paths have coincided so far, that doesn't mean they won't diverge in the future. In
the realm of all possibilities, there's a version of you that believes everything I believe. It's entirely possible I might even meet that version of you."
"You don't believe
we travel the same paths through probability space?"
"I suppose either version is possible," she said. "Either
we're all stuck on the same train, or we're all on our own little trains that only occasionally meet each other."
"It would be such a headache if we weren't all on the same train."
"But just
because you don't like something, that doesn't make it false."
"
Wouldn't that be nice," laughed Ryn. "Who knows, maybe the Flat Earthers even see everyone as monkeys instead of wolves."
"Ha, and here I thought I was the crazy one. I should probably get going before we both go
completely off the deep end. You going to join the pack for that thing tonight?"
"No," said Ryn. "I guess I'm more of a loner
when it comes to stuff like that."
"Alright, bye then." Kayl trotted off.
Ryn turned back to his computer. "That girl is totally crazy," he thought to himself
as he brought up his spreadsheet.