Blottisham at the Relational Dinner Party

(Guests seated. Candles flicker. Quillibrace sips quietly. Elowen looks mildly amused. Blottisham is bristling.)

Blottisham

I must insist — this soup is cooling far too rapidly! Surely the laws of thermodynamics require that it maintain optimal heat for consumption!

Quillibrace

Depends what you mean by “require.”

Blottisham

Require! Clearly! Hot soup is the natural state! It is against the laws if it grows tepid!

Elowen

Or, more precisely, the soup is simply exploring configurations with high relational availability. Some of those happen to be cooler than others.

Blottisham

Exploring? The soup does not explore! It does not choose! Laws! Laws!

Quillibrace

Ah, but if you examine the possibilities, you’ll see it doesn’t need to choose. The configurations compatible with a tepid state vastly outnumber those that preserve perfect heat. The arrow of tepidness points downhill without anyone pushing.

Blottisham

Outnumber?! Arrow?! This is nonsense. Nonsense!

(A nearby guest picks up a sugar cube.)

Guest

I suppose then that my sugar cube will never spontaneously return to the packet.

Blottisham

Exactly! That is what I am trying to tell you. The universe has intent!

Elowen

Or… it just has an immense number of micro-configurations. Some continuations are astronomically more probable than others.

Blottisham

Probability does not explain it. There must be a force. A push. A divine nudge.

Quillibrace

No. Only availability. And tea. Mostly tea.

Blottisham

And the wine?

Elowen

Wine, fortunately, obeys the same combinatorial rules. It is not lost. It merely becomes slightly harder to pour without spilling.

Blottisham

Spill… combinatorial… I feel my worldview unravelling…

Quillibrace

It depends what you think is unravelling.

Elowen

Do not worry, Mr Blottisham. The universe will continue to behave in perfectly normal ways. It’s just that your understanding of “normal” must catch up.

Blottisham

Catch up? I refuse! I insist on proper causal metaphysics! Soup cannot cool without being pushed!

Quillibrace

Of course it can. It does, every day, without anyone pushing.

Blottisham

This is deeply, profoundly, scandalously unfair.

Elowen

It’s actually rather elegant. And your soup is now just the right temperature for eating.

Blottisham

I… I suppose I must eat it. But I do so under protest. And mild indignation. And possibly a small existential crisis.

(Everyone else smiles quietly. The soup is eaten. The universe continues to behave as it always has.)