Afterlives of a Misunderstanding: Dialogue V — On Interpretations Themselves

Characters:

Professor Quillibrace

Mr Blottisham

Miss Elowen Stray

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Blottisham:

I must protest. First the cat, then the friend, the hidden manuals, the branching worlds… What next?

Quillibrace:

Next is reflection. On ourselves rather than the physics.

Elowen Stray:

So the interpretations are… symptoms?

Quillibrace:

Precisely. They are our attempts to force the theory into a story we could tell comfortably.

Blottisham:

I insist that some of them have merit!

Quillibrace:

Merit as entertainment, yes. Merit as necessity? Not a jot.

Blottisham:

But what about all those learned debates?

Quillibrace:

They are debates about questions that the theory declined to answer.

Elowen Stray:

So the trouble with interpretations…

Quillibrace:

…is that they confuse human impatience for physical requirement.

Blottisham:

And the universe continues unbothered?

Quillibrace:

Completely. It performs its instantiations quietly, with no regard for our metaphors.

Blottisham:

So every cat, every friend, every secret variable and branching world…

Quillibrace:

…lives only in imagination.

Elowen Stray:

A very lively imagination.

Blottisham:

I suppose that makes me indispensable.

Quillibrace:

You are, indeed, an indispensable witness to folly.

Blottisham:

Then I shall continue to invent them, posthumously if necessary.

Quillibrace:

Posthumously or while alive, imagination remains generous.

Elowen Stray:

So physics doesn’t punish mistakes.

Quillibrace:

It merely refuses to reward them.

Blottisham:

Then the moral of this series…

Quillibrace:

…is that the trouble was never the physics. It was our stories.

Elowen Stray:

And our inability to distinguish constraint from drama.

Blottisham:

I see. Perhaps I can retire my catastrophes.

Quillibrace:

Or at least assign them proper roles: entertainment, pedagogy, and mild complaint.

(A pause. Blottisham smiles, Elowen nods, and Quillibrace sips his tea with serene satisfaction.)