Story time

[medico_male]

This is a parable by William Somerset Maugham known as "Appointment in Samara":

Death speaks:There was a merchant in Baghdad who sent his servant to market ro buy provisions and in a little while the servant cant back, white and trembling, and said, "Master, just now when I was i nthe market place I was jostled by a woman in the crowd and when I

Comments

[pink_sake]

That's a very interesting parable, indeed.

Perhaps, friend, that you're being too negative. While indeed, every action has a reaction, a small pebble dropped into the surf makes hardly any ripple at all. But eventually if you throw in enough pebbles and stones, you create a dam that changes the flow of things.

It's simply not enough to make a single decision and expect to see the result, we have to make consistent decisions to change our fate, perhaps even more than a single life can hold.

At least, that's what I've always liked to believe. So far I've found it to be true.

[medico_male]

You can't remove the pebbles that were dropped before you came along, though, or the ones set in place when you were a small child. They've shaped the way you think and act. Decision only shapes you if you're consistent enough to always make the same sort of choice. But which of us is that consistent throughout everything we have ever done?

I believe there is no escaping the path we walk down. Though we feel we can choose to take an umbrella out in the rain, our mind has decided before we consciously thought about it.

[pink_sake]

Consistency is always based on the average, at least. Even when we make mistakes, if we admit what we did wrong, and we sincerely seek to make amends and change ourselves such that it doesn't happen again, we can cast more pebbles to counteract the negative ones.

Ah, but we do pick our own path and our speed. I believe we can shape our minds if we are determined enough, and after that fact I agree that our minds are the force that shapes our future.

[medico_male]

By the time we decide to shape ourselves, the process has already begun. Neurons reconfigure themselves as a reflection of events around us, but most nerve connections were made before we could do much about them.

We can attempt to shape our bodies and our worlds, but there is no way to escape our ultimate path. You and I will have to agree to disagree on that point.

[pirata_bello]

I've heard that story a few different ways.

[medico_male]

Do you believe in its message?

[pirata_bello]

It implies Fate, which I don't believe in. We make our own destiny.

[medico_male]

I believe that there is no way to escape the big moments in our lives. The events leading up to them were set in motion long before we became aware that we could stop them.

[crimson_rogue_x]

Free will. It's the only thing keeping us all sane, whether it's an illusion or not.

[medico_male]

But doesn't everyone sometimes feel like a puppet with Fate pulling the strings?

[crimson_rogue_x]

Only because we don't know who's pulling the strings. People set things into motion, not Fate.

[nonimbranato]

That is a very interesting story... and to think, I had just gotten back from a small trip of my to gain a little bit of peace.

Mio, mio. How serious.

[medico_male]

It certainly provides food for thought.

[puddingfetish]

Quite a scientific manner of thinking, given that the world proceeds in a system of equal reactions to previous actions. But what then would you call the catalyst, hmmm?

[medico_male]

Doctors are scientists, after all. The ultimate cause for everything is the creation of the universe, but there is no way a human mind can trace a chain of events back that far.

[puddingfetish]

Logically, shouldn't it follow that there would be a catalyst for change here, as well? The natural world is always changing--hence mutations, adaptation, evolution. Society has never historically been any different.

[medico_male]

Everything changes, but some things seem to be unescapable. There's no way to know how things will play out.