Not Impossible, Just Improbable

For all you sci-fi movie fans out there, you will probably remember this one ever-so-famous quote: “if you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything.” For those of you who are naïve about this quote, let me go ahead and enlighten you about it. It’s from the movie, Back to the Future, where Doc Brown, played by Christopher Lloyd, gives advice to his friend, Marty McFly, starred by Michael J. Fox, about how he became as accomplished as a character and because of so was able to design a car that could travel through time. Congratulations, now you know where the quote came from – at least, where I think it originally came from. Anyways, now let’s think about that quote. If you really think about it, you’ll soon realize that the quote doesn’t just apply to some imaginary character in an 80’s movie; it applies people in real life. In fact, some of the world’s greatest contributors, such as Albert Einstein, had mindsets similar to the meaning of that quote. Those mindsets, in turn, fueled ambition. The quote also, in a sense, has a meaning of breaking up the wall, so to speak, that separated the impossible from the possible.

Contemplate that particular meaning of the quote for a moment. Doesn’t that last meaning really make a lot of sense? Just think about it. A lot of things that we declare in this world to be “impossible” are just things that are highly improbable. Don’t believe me? Let’s check out a few hypothetical scenarios that justify my point in our general classification of “impossible” stuff. First off, let’s take a bunch of chimpanzees and have them start typing random characters on paper, nonstop. Assuming that they continuing typing indefinitely, it can be understood that eventually one chimp would come out with an elaborate story, like Paradise Lost. And by eventually, I mean eons, but that does not change the fact that there is still a definite amount of time that passes before the clueless chimps eventually create one of the most complicated works in human history. Therefore, the desired result can be reached, and furthermore, the seemingly impossible is technically possible. But let’s not just stop at that scenario; let’s also talk about more bizarre scenarios that prove the same point. Let’s go to a more, ahem, “lighthearted” subject: quantum mechanics. Don’t worry, I’m not going to bombard you with a bunch of technical facts, so don’t freak out if you’re one of those kinds of people. Anyways, let me lay it on the line: according to the latest understandings of theoretical quantum physics, matter itself pops around to different parts of the universe over instantaneous durations. In other words, it is theoretically possible for one to randomly teleport to, say, another planet. But the thing is that it’s highly improbable. Such an event would take longer than the age of the universe itself, according to Michio Kaku. But still, the point has not changed. Though the duration for waiting is incredibly long, it does not move the fact that it would still be definite. Therefore, once again, it is “possible” to spontaneously teleport. But there is one thing that is pretty unique, that helps makes much of the “impossible” “possible.” For that, let’s go back to our world’s major contributors.

If you really think about it, all of the world’s major contributors have one thing in common: they are angered by what’s considered “impossible”, and impatient on proving much of the impossible possible through the sole method of waiting for improbability to give in. In another sense, they’re the accelerator that pushes down the duration of time for the improbable to happen. Using intelligence and enhanced intellect collectively, they have, and are still, removing as many variables that inhibit the incident of an improbable event, allowing the once improbable to become more probable. For example, some of the world’s top scientists are not just sitting around and watching a primordial soup form primitive life once more. That would just take way too long. Instead, they are trying to recreate the most perfect set of circumstances, with virtually nothing in the way, for life to come about. I speculate that life will once again emerge out of inanimate matter, only this time in much less time, due to us.