Portents, Predictions and Probability
While vacationing at a beach in Florida and needing something to take my mind (and my eyes) off the abundant evidence that this vulgar age of conspicuous consumption has had an adverse impact on the semi-clad human physique (present company included; thankfully there are no ocean-side mirrors), I decided to dip back into the writing of Robert Anton Wilson. Many years ago I read the Illuminatus! triology, and this time I’m tackling his Schrodinger’s Cat compilation, in which he makes a number of assertions that may have a direct bearing on the practice of tarot-reading. One is “Belief is the death of intelligence,” quoted from his book Cosmic Trigger, in which he explained further: “As soon as one believes a doctrine of any sort, or assumes certitude, one stops thinking about that aspect of existence” (that is, we bin it with the “known quantities” and never give it another critical thought). In a later statement he proposed that everyone should adopt an attitude of “generalized agnosticism” or “agnosticism about everything,” in response to his “attempt to break down conditioned associations, to look at the world in a new way” in which no premise is elevated to the status of “absolute truth.” In thinking back on several previous posts about my own “healthy skepticism,” I realized that I know exactly what he’s talking about.
More to the point was his discussion of quantum mechanics, according to which every conceivable eventuality has two or more possible outcomes, and only through interaction with the world or observation by an external consciousness will it yield a singular conclusion and ignore the rest. (This sounds like the theory that the faculty of perception can alter the characteristics of a phenomenon.) I don’t pretend to be an authority on this or on Wilson in general, or to possess anywhere near his subtle, surrealistic intelligence (no doubt a product of his fascination with Burroughs and Joyce), but I will say we have several things in common (e.g. we both had polio — his was much more severe — early in life; we both flirted with Ayn Rand’s philosophy before moving on; and we both understand the “peace” mantra Om-mani-padme-hum, my personal “insomnia fix”) that might give me a leg up on appreciating him. He was clearly well-versed in the tarot but was also dismissive of its use in determining the probability of events, preferring to make sarcastic allusions to it through his bizarre characters.
The assumptions of quantum mechanics, at least in this stripped-down application, seem to speak directly to the randomness of circumstances that it is the tarot reader’s task to put in order through the act of divination in a way that permits assessing their probability of occurrence (to further quote Wilson quoting Ira Progoff, we embrace “an ordering principle that is inherent in the fact that a pattern is being formed”). Perhaps, without consciously recognizing it’s what we’re after, we’re seeking the “Hidden Variable” or master key to the secret of successful fortune-telling, or (to steal another goofy pun from Wilson) we’re just pursuing an “I-opening” experience. On the face of it, we must obviously confront the same unguessable likelihood of success or failure as Erwin Schrodinger’s famous cat that, in the realm of steady-state indeterminacy (and unless something changes at a more “macro” level of causality), might be considered both alive and dead at any given “split-nanosecond” of objective reality. There would seem to be an unbridgeable “credibility gap” in this paradox but Schrodinger apparently spanned that gulf to the satisfaction of Einstein.
Either the predictions we make will “come true” or they won’t, and we may wind up second-guessing ourselves (with “20/20 hindsight”) as to why they didn’t. For this reason and others, it’s never wise to make flat predictions because the Universe can be too fickle in its operation to submit to categorical certainty. Opportunities abound for one outcome or another (often at the same time) and it becomes a matter of finely-honed discrimination to sift through the possibilities and come up with the probable “winner.” Better to arm our querents with a number of credible options and let them bring their own sensibilities to bear on the solution; hand them all the potential tendencies and trends we can glean from the the cards, at most offering our own ranking of the prospects, and put them on the scent.
Originally published at http://parsifalswheeldivination.wordpress.com on February 6, 2023.
