Precisely, just bits of memetic programming/memetic agents interacting.
Tell me, can you predict the exact results of, say, the Amazon river
basin, over the next thirty-thousand years? Its /just/ filled with a
large number of biological agents with a fairly limited number of
possible interactions. Can you predict what its content will be /5/
years from now? Interaction in the memetic millieu occur /extremely/
quickly.
Can you predict what a Tierran environment will look like after
50,000,000 generation? Its just a very clever programme, after all ...
how about we throw in a `source of energy' that varies semi-randomly
with the amount of light seen through an open window. Care to guess
now?
What I'm trying to convey, clumsily, is that `free will' is a misnomer;
there /is/ no `free will,' there is no `will' even. There /is/
interaction between your myriad memetic components, but its
unpredictible and, for all intents and purposes, has `free will' via
being too complex to predict.
--
Alexander Williams{thantos@alf.dec.com/zander@photobooks.com}
The Mekton is a powerful tool, both physically and emotionally.
There is something that happens to an enemy when he sees his home
and family stepped on by a hundred ton metal man. -- Arkon Verian
====================================================================
Of all the weapons of the Empire, the greatest and most respected
were the Metal Knights. These Knights had served the leaders of the
Bendar for Generations, righting wrongs and bringing fear to the
Empire's Enemies. It is said that these metal giants were shaped
like men so that the alien servants of Evil would know that it was
Man who defeated them.
-- Scribings from the Murian Archives