PREDICTIONS – 10 Years Later - Santa Fe Institute

10. IF I CAN, I WANT
ability becomes a cause more often explain their actions in terms of
conventional social behavior.
Another application of the ergodic theorem is a fact that is common
knowledge among business managers: People at their jobs tend to do
what they can rather than what they were hired for. It may sound chaotic,
but some companies have become successful by allowing their
employees freedom to shape their own jobs. Employees are happier that
way. The law says that if they can do something, they will eventually do
it, which means there will be a force—a desire—driving them in that
direction. Blocking the realization of that desire can result in frustration,
which may or may not be openly expressed.
What one can do changes with age, however, and so does the desire
to do it. I was the supervisor of a man who smoked two and a half
packs of cigarettes a day. Being an ex-smoker myself, I suggested he
quit. “I am still young,” was the reply. It becomes easier to stop smoking
as one gets older. This happens not because age enhances
willpower but rather because the harmful physical effects of tobacco
are tolerated less by a weakened organism. In other words, older
people are less able to smoke. At the same time, they do more of what
they can do.
We are constantly faced with a multitude of things we can do. Our
desire to do them is usually inversely proportional to the difficulty involved.
Where does this argument lead?
• • •
Ever since he was a little boy, Tim Rosehooded was drawn
to mathematics. As a young man he became fascinated with
the ergodic theorem and decided to give a deserving name to
the law behind it: Dum Possum Volo, (as long as I can, I
want.) Tim was also a seeker after knowledge across disciplines,
philosophical schools of thought, and spiritual
experiences. He searched beyond science, in metaphysics,
esoterism, and the miraculous. When he found a group of
people who had been working on fragments of what he
thought was real knowledge, he began associating them and
diverted some of his time and energy toward the development
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