[UA] Risking it - Sunbjectivity or objectivity?

James O'Rance jorance at hotmail.com
Mon May 7 19:23:09 PDT 2001


Machiavelli132 at aol.com said:

 >>>I always thought there *had* to be a risk involved, no matter what the 
adept thinks.<<<

But is the risk subjective (based on what the entropomancer can possibly 
know about the situation) or objective?

If the risk must be objective, then you could take the argument to its 
extreme and argue that entropomancy is impossible without entering 
situations that involve the Uncertainty principle. Even when you're playing 
Russian Roulette, either the gun will fire a bullet or it will not. The 
universe "knows" which will happen, and so there is no risk - there is 
certainty.

If the risk is subjective, then there's little difference between playing 
Russian Roulette (some of the chambers are loaded, some aren't) and pulling 
the trigger on an unknown gun (all of the chambers are loaded or none of 
them are).

 >>>Crossing an empty freeway blindfolded gets you no charges, as there is 
no real risk.<<<

There is a risk if you are being subjective. The entropomancer has no way of 
knowing if a car will approach before he crosses the freeway. It may be a 
very minor risk (if the freeway has little traffic at that time of day) but 
it is a risk nonetheless.

 >>>Crossing it blindfolded during rush-hour gives you a charge, as
there is a real risk of the bodybag being splattered.<<<

There is a *greater* risk. If you consider the universe to "know" all of the 
variables and be able to calculate the situation exactly, though, there is 
no objective risk - either the entropomancer gets splattered, or he doesn't.

This is one reason why I believe that UA magic *must* be subjective (there 
are many reasons).


James O’Rance
“Divine being creates petting zoo. It gets out of hand.”
- The Bible (summarised by John W. Mangrum)

http://www.geocities.com/dragon-dreamer/



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