One Kafka Too Many

It looks like there's a race to be the next writer published in Velosophy.

And catastrophically, the main contenders are both Kafka.

To clarify, one is the real Kafka; the other Kafka is Pliny the Elder. Who will be the first to get his story to the office of the editors?

Let's look over the shoulders of the two would-be Kafkas, and see how they're getting on.

Here is the real Kafka hunched over his exercise book writing feverishly. He is continually being interrupted by members of his family walking back and forth between the bedroom and the dining room, for his bedroom is just a passage, with a bed in it. So what is he writing?

........K carried the tiny bicycle under his arm all the way to the Post Office, one pedal jammed uncomfortably against his ribs. He entered, to be confronted by a scowling woman behind the counter. It's forbidden to bring a bicycle into the Post Office, she said, waving a sheet..........

Mmm. Hard to tell where he's up to, but it seems to be somewhere in the middle. Let's go and spy on Pliny the Elder.

Here is Pliny the Elder hunched over his Notebook, typing away like the clappers, stopping occasionally to refer to a library book, " Franz Kafka: A Biographical Essay". It's not the type of library book, he usually reads. Perhaps it was borrowed from the library by somebody else. Let's see what he's writing.

.......a giant beetle, or cockroach or, as K originally referred to it, Ungeziefer. The actual measurements of the creature were not given, therefore it was not possible to ascertain whether it was likely to have been squashed when ridden over by an ordinary-sized bicycle, or whether it had to be something larger. However, K concluded........

Concluded! Pliny's going well! He could turn out to be the faster Kafka.

Free Will

So much for Free Will , said Pliny ruefully. Someone else's readiness potential pipped your intention. I really wanted to finish that library book.

Well, it didn't matter all that much to me, I said. I'd finished reading it. Anyway, the issue of Free Will isn't about whether you can do what you want to or not.

Yes it is, said Pliny. It's about whether your actions are predetermined or not. Your action of trying to extend your library book was predetermined by ......wait a minute, I thought you said you'd finished it?

I had. But I hadn't finished my other library book. So I tried to get an extension for them both.

So your action was predetermined by your having not finished another book. And your not being allowed to extend either book was predetermined by someone else having reserved one of them.

No, I was allowed to extend the other book.

Well, lucky you, said Pliny. But the fact remains I have been prevented from reading the last two chapters of that book by the actions of others. There is therefore no such thing as my Free Will in this case.

Yes, I said, that is indisputably true. And the reason is you didn't tell me you were reading it. Has it occurred to you that even though it was due back yesterday we could have kept it for another 2 weeks without having to pay a fine?

Can we phone the library then, and ask to have it back?

No, predetermination doesn't work in reverse.