Inside some library, a young man named Sam is reading. Sam is situated within a cornfield of bookshelves, and, despite his inability to see a way out of those shelves, he knows his exact location within them. A large void exists between Sam’s head and the ceiling where there hang countless copies of the same ornate chandelier. At some point in history, carpenters built this space, but he often forgets that fact, thinking its perfection could not be the product of man’s labor. The geometric precision and incomprehensible magnitude evoke a particularly daunting thought in Sam: his own finitude within a boundless pasture of information.

As the sun sets, this feeling of atomic insignificance intensifies, and the library’s light and grandness diminish. A lamp’s yellow hue shines brighter as the bookshelves dim into darkness. Under the lamp is a copy of Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment. Gradually, Sam becomes the center of the universe, and Raskolnikov becomes the center of Sam’s universe. 

Sam’s consciousness is defined by Raskolnikov. He is confident, even qualified, to make sense of the enigmatic protagonist and his “extraordinary” act of transgression: murdering the old pawnbroker. But all Sam has to make sense of are words. 

Sam observes Raskolnikov’s restlessness: one moment, he is plagued by a burning sweat and begs for divine mercy. The next, Raskolnikov sees himself as a liberated and infallible soul, entitled to grant mercy, not receive it. There are two opposed forces present, each fighting for control of a single consciousness. Sam feels the wrestling spirits of Raskolnikov in the pit of his stomach, but quickly shakes off those superstitious liabilities. How can those spirits be verified? He has never seen them, nor has anyone else. 

Sam asks himself, what is the root cause? Perhaps it is narcissistic personality disorder. But Sam has known narcissists, and none have resorted to murder. Some are the result of abuse, others neglect. Regardless, he concludes that there are countless varieties of narcissism, yet they are all treated as one. He resolves that the psychologist will label all narcissists the same, and consequently, lose all clear distinctions through premature reduction. 

As Sam turns the page, a fly launches from the lamp into his cheek, causing his neck to jolt. His heart rate spikes, attention diverts, and he begins contemplating how a fly, light as air, could exert enough force on his head to make it move as such. It must be that the fly flips a switch in the mechanism that is called Sam, leading to a cascade of other switches being flipped, culminating in the jerk of his neck. But how could Sam possibly decode all those switches? He uses it as a reminder that the flip of a switch is sometimes hidden. Yet even hidden, a switch has been flipped. He concludes that fuzzy answers are just hidden switches. 

What switches flipped in Raskolnikov? He proposes bipolar disorder: a reduction of gray matter in the prefrontal cortex and neurotransmitter dysregulation, among other physiological conditions. This molecular approach dwarfs the behavioural approach. Now, he can further distinguish Raskolnikov from the narcissists. But even then, Sam once knew a bipolar man who would scold his children for killing even an ant: this man could not be more different than Raskolnikov. Could the words give him any clue? Sam settles that the words are indeed insufficient for what he seeks. But what then would be sufficient?

Pondering those various explanations, there is a coarse wave of anxiety in Sam. Such explanations blur distinctions, and when distinctions are blurred, they collapse into a fuzzy paradox. But these phenomena do occur, so there must be an answer. 

Sam cannot resolve how these things occur but defy reason. If he cannot explain Raskolnikov, he cannot explain himself, or anyone, or anything for that matter. Sam’s trembling escalates as he feels his own paralyzing blindness to the next event that will occur. As Sam’s leg uncontrollably shakes, he finds that asking the question at all renders him all the more futile.

While Sam is pained by earthly ignorance, he continues to grind through other options. Where the truth must exist within the physical universe, perhaps if he had access to every physical variable in the universe, then he could sufficiently explain Raskolnikov. At this point, “Sam” and “Raskolnikov” cease to exist, as they are just the flow of energy and cycling of matter. Raskolnikov murdering an old pawnbroker is physical, as is the judgment and punishment that follows. Sam knows that even his thinking about Raskolnikov is merely a physical process.

Maybe the particular physical processes that produced his actions are hidden, but he knows it to be the root cause. One day, through rigorous observation and experimentation, Sam will discover the precise switches being flipped. But for now, he can rest assured knowing that Raskolnikov is merely a puzzle of the physical world—and nothing more. Just switches being flipped.

Somewhere else in the world, another young man named Sami rests on the top floor of a windowless concrete building. Sami is located inside a tight room, enclosed by white walls with peeling paint and a stained tile ceiling. The ceiling shines a sterile white light down on a large chalkboard. Across from the chalkboard is a cheap veneered desk with rubber edge banding.

Towers of books line the room, yet there is little diversity in genre. It is mostly restricted to works on physical and mathematical theory. On Sami’s desk, there are two piles of books. To the left is a set of Griffith’s books on electrodynamics and quantum mechanics. To the right is a deteriorating copy of the Bible and some commentaries.

Sami’s hands are covered in chalk dust as he battles a partial differential equation. At the summit of a six-hour fight with Schrödinger, he glares up at his work in disappointment. For all his hours of strife, he is left only with probabilities. Confronted with the uncertainty that follows from unquestionable premises, Sami finds himself itching for some more stable footing. How could the most complete scientific theory mankind has developed stand on uncertainty? Unsettled by that fact, Sami questions the dogmatically accepted premises.

Perhaps Planck discovered the smallest unit of energy exchange, but how can there be a lower bound? Einstein may have discovered the fastest speed in the physical universe, but how can there be an upper bound? They say the universe is constantly expanding, but expanding into what? Our mathematical intuitions suggest we may forever divide towards absolute nothingness or multiply towards absolute infinity, yet here we are: finite beings whose imaginations are certain of eternity, but whose reality has never witnessed it.

Sami circles back to his mathematical labor and finds it just short of sublime. As he transforms the meticulously inscribed chalk marks into dust that permeates the air, a feeling of unrest creeps further up on him. He knows, and believes, that the chalk is composed of atoms, but were those intricate chalk marks reducible to its atomic makeup, or did it represent something greater—something non-physical?

As Sami finally takes a seat, his sore joints relax, but his chest tightens, and his foot convulsively shakes as this paradox continues to rob him of much-needed break. There is energy and matter, but sustained by what? If particles are in a superposition of all possible states, what forces them into a distinct state? And what decides the next state? 

Without decision, it all grinds to a halt, and there ceases to be anything at all. Panic escalates in Sami. What is to say he does not drop dead in a moment? What if he is to dissolve out of existence as the chalk does into the air so effortlessly? If both he and the chalk are matter and energy, what stops him from meeting that same fate in just a moment?

As Sami feels pulses of energy unwillingly navigate their way around his body, he forgets what the problem was all about. In fact, he forgets what anything is all about. His stomach is empty, his mind depleted of thought, until suddenly, a new, more passionate wave of energy possesses him.

As the chalk dust floats in the air, Sami blows out a gust of air, and the dust is reshaped accordingly. He blows the breath of life into the dust, but not the other way around. The chalk may cause him to cough, but only on the condition of his blowing it. Sami concludes not only that there must be a difference between him and the chalk, but he also knows what that difference is. Dubious probabilities are just latent breaths.

Finally looking away from the limiting material world, he now looks inward. It is there that he sees what decides the next state—himself. Sami is the one who determines what no equation is capable of predicting with certainty. He is the will outside of the physical that steers the trajectory of the physical. 

Yet, with infinitely many ways Sami could exercise his will, he does not know how it ought to be exercised. Without knowing what he ought to will, he exists in a state of paralysis, unable to steer the physical. Consequently, knowing what to will is the highest truth he could attain. Not equations or experiments, but what to will. But where could he possibly find the answer?

What he needs are the words, and fortunately, the words lie there on his desk, contained within a single book. Yet, while the answer lay in plain sight, it was also hidden in plain sight. The words were crystal clear until they were contradicted. But Sami resolved to sit with the contradictions, believing the text to be infallible. For now, he can rest assured that the chalk is his will, and he possesses the key to how it ought to be willed. The key did not make sense to Sami, but it certainly was the key. 

It was on this day, as on every other day, that victory was declared from both sides. As Sam’s attention expanded from Raskolnikov to his own self-consciousness, so did his own being from atomic composition to a whole, unhindered intellect. Sam resolved to embrace his own lack of agency, but still distinguished himself in virtue of this necessary knowledge. Every switch of his being was part of some intricate mechanism that was set in motion by all before it. He could declare himself a man with clear sight and a free spirit. 

Meanwhile, as Sami’s attention shrank from cosmic magnitude to his own subatomic composition, his fate changed from uncontrollable chaos to a decidedly reserved seat in the kingdom of heaven. Sami internally declared his uncontained love for God, which was by his own choice. He submitted his whole being to God, and in doing so, secured what was most important—his own salvation.

Sam and Sami then stepped outside. The stars were bright and the air fresh as they glared up into the hollow sphere consuming them. Sam felt an imminent possession of all that went on under the night sky, even that which he could not see until turning his head. Sami felt an imminent possession of all that went on above the night sky, that which he had never seen before. 

Sam then thought of his distinguished status as a man aware of his own finitude. He pitied men like Sami who would live under the mirage of a constructed creator who rewarded arbitrary obedience over sensible principle; it was folly at its highest order. And Sami thought of men like Sam who denied the existence of what was most real and were bound for the highest degree of eternal suffering.  

Yet, in all their contemplative toil and exaltation, both men looked up at the same sky and breathed in the same air. As they made their way home, more thoughts awaited them. Both conscious of their own extraordinary essence, exhaustion drew them to bed, and falling into dreams was almost like letting one thing go and another thing in. Sam lost his perspective from the outside, and Sami lost his will from the inside, and both let in the prospect of total collapse. 

But it did not matter. The universe—both determined and willful—continued to turn as it always had.