Moment:Enlightenment

Salam,

I suddenly remembered an entry and immediately felt the urges to share with many of you. InsyaAllah. This is a brother blog, who used to be my junior of the same course, going through Architecture Diploma in one of our local university, here in Malaysia. I never talked to him when we were in 'school', but i knew who he was.

A friend and a sister of mine, also a junior from the same period, introduced me to his blog. This entry in particular caught my admiration, at the level of detail depth, that his mind went through. How a brother, went through from playing computer games through figuring about the 'system' and the 'bigger picture'.

The system

We were playing Pro Evo Soccer (PES) on the PS3 the other day. After each match we became increasingly competitive about who wins, forcing us to do our best every time we play. Nevertheless, some times it seems like it just wont hit the back of the net no matter how hard we try. No matter how precise we setup the opportunity.

Which begs the question "why??!!!"

Then my friend mentioned "its all in the system". I had no idea what 'the system' meant at that moment.

I retreated into myself for some time trying to figure out what 'the system' means. Obviously its referring to the PES system. What is the 'PES system'??

well, its a system that allows me to input my decision (via action) into the system to produce an outcome or consequence that affects the PES match.

Does that mean that im part of 'the PES system'?

Then again, my opponent had to input his decision in order to make the same outcome possible.

Does this mean that we are part of 'the PES system'??

We are designed into the system as the system was designed to allow us to input our decision.

Following defeat in a match, we naturally wanted something to blame. Therefore we would blame it on the 'PES system'... (ignoring the fact that we are in fact part of the system. I decided on my actions and affected whether i won or lost) .The system that was designed to decide who wins or who loses in any particular match.

Then i started to wonder deeper into my thoughts,

The guy who made the 'PES system' must have been a genius to produce a system that enabled me to decide on something and let my decision affect the outcome of the match. He designed it so that when i decide to press shoot, the player would shoot the ball and hopefully the ball would hit the back of the net.

But the system was designed in the limited context of a football match. I could not have punched another player in the face even if i wanted and decided to.

In order for that to happen, the games designer would have to design a new system that allow me to punch another player when i decide to. The more opportunity for me to make my own decision, the more real the game becomes.

For a game to be totally real, the system would have to be designed so that we could do whatever we feel like doing. Which is actually doable in real life; We could do whatever we want to do.

So is real life a system?

Real life is still a system because it allows me to decide on something and let my decision affect the outcome.

You cant argue that there is no system, because there is a system that allows us to make our decision. The act of making a decision is within the design of the system....(read more @ Adam Is as Adam Does)