16/05/2010
When we got stranded in Japan following the cancellation of our return flight to Manchester due to volcanic ash ,we were given two options by the airline officials.
Option 1. Confirmed flight to Manchester via Paris after 8 days on 25/4/10
Option 2. Confirmed flight to Rome or Madrid next day on 18/4/10 and then make your own way to Manchester by land and sea.
If fumes from Iceland volcano would clear and flights resumed by 25/4/10, then option 1 was better. But if the fumes continued for weeks or months option 2 had a lot to be preferred.
Thinking rationally option 2 seemed more attractive as no one can predict how long the volcano problem would continue and also one can travel to Manchester from Rome by modes other than air flight. We could be stuck in Tokyo for a long time as there is no other reasonable alternative to air flight to reach Manchester from here.
We took the irrational option and stayed in Japan for an extra 8 days came to Manchester on 25/4/10. It turned out to be the best option as people who chose to go to Rome got stuck there because all the trains and ferries were overbooked and when they did manage to come they had to pay quite a bit more for their transport.
Was our decision irrational or was it predetermined? Did we really had a choice to decide or the decision and the outcome both were already set.
This dilemma reminded me of the Newcomb paradox. This was put forward by William Newcomb who was a physicist in California USA. It has been discussed and dissected by not only philosophers and theologians but also by mathematicians and computer scientists.
It goes like this:
A super intelligent, super genius being who says he can see the future puts two boxes on a table. Box A is transparent and one can see $1000 in side it. Box B is opaque. Both boxes are sealed. He calls a person (say Frank) from the audience and asks him to take either box B alone or both Boxes A and B. The being says to frank"if you choose only box B you will find that it has $1000000. But if you choose to take both boxes then the box B will not have any money in it." The being also said that in past he has never been wrong in prediction.
What should Frank do? Rationally he thinks: the boxes are sealed so whether Box B contains one million dollar or nothing is already there. So if he takes both boxes he will be $1000 better off. If box B contains a million dollar he would have this and the $1000 from the Box A. if there is no money in Box B, at least he would have $1000 from Box A.
Then he thinks that the super being had never been wrong in past in his predictions, on that basis he should only take Box B because otherwise he would certainly lose $999000.
People ask how the Being can change the amount of money in the box B as it had been sealed before Frank made the decision. The answer is that being has already predicted which option Frank would take and has put the money accordingly in Box B. If Frank believes that the Being has seen the future and saw him taking one or the other option, then he should take only Box B.
But as Box B is already sealed then what Frank would do is already determined before Frank makes the decision. If he believes the being then really frank does not need to agonise over decision making as he has no choice. It is very easy to see the Being as God and the theologians have discussed Newcomb paradox in that context to debate the age old problem of predeterminism v/s free will.
There is no right or wrong, better or worse option per se. We were just lucky that we chose to stay in Tokyo. Or was it already chosen for us?
References:
http://www.leaderu.com/offices/billcraig/docs/newcomb.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newcomb's_paradox
