Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site spar.UUCP
Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!seismo!harvard!talcott!panda!genrad!decvax!decwrl!spar!ellis
From: ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis)
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Redefining free will?
Message-ID: <156@spar.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 2-Apr-85 13:07:40 EST
Article-I.D.: spar.156
Posted: Tue Apr  2 13:07:40 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 7-Apr-85 05:33:59 EST
References: <156@ISM780B.UUCP> <1294@aecom.UUCP>
Reply-To: ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis)
Organization: Schlumberger Palo Alto Research, CA
Lines: 19

>> 
>> >I have a side question: Must cause precede effect??
>> 
>> A friend did a lot of work in this area, and one of his conclusions was
>> that there is no coherent model of causality which allows for backward
>> causation.  That is, if you try to come up with a definition of causality
>> which subsumes common sense notions, inherent in that definition is always 
>> a directed temporal flow between cause and effect.  I don't know how to to
>> state this is a way that convinces, but the basic way to determine an 
>> answer to the above question with some degree of confidence is to *formally
>> define* the terms.

    I believe that Goedel came up with a simple universe, consistent within
    Einstein's General Theory of Relativity, that allows legal (slower than
    light) signals to eventually enter their past history cones.

-michael