The Frost Diamond

How are prior events linked to subsequent events? This problem occupied the greatest scientific minds of the 20th century, including Einstein, Schrödinger, Bell…and Robert Frost. Yup, at the same time Einstein was tinkering with Relativity, Frost was walking through the backwoods of New Hampshire.

In his most famous poem, The Road Not Taken, Frost offers a de minimus model of process:  “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, and sorry I could not travel both and be one traveler, long I stood…Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back.”

Events are rooted in choice and choice cannot equivocate, nor can it be revoked. Every event expands Universe by one, but also strengthens the bonds of solidarity. Every event marks both a convergence (Ω) and a divergence (A). 

Frost’s initial position (A) and final destination (Ω) are fixed. Everything in between is TBD. Frost offers a flesh and blood enactment of Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle. Initially, we know everything there is to know about his location…and nothing about his momentum (direction). 

But once Frost has chosen a path and begun his journey, we know everything about his momentum and ‘nothing’ about his position. (Any knowledge Frost may have about his geographic location while walking must come from an extraneous source; for example, memory, GPS, or a map. For our purposes, that’s just noise.)

Frost is blessed (or cursed) with free will. Free will is ‘will’, not ‘magic’; it can only do what can be done. I cannot use my ‘free will’ to leap tall buildings in a single bound. Frost can only exercise his free will on actual pathways, and in Frost’s minimalist model, there are only 2 paths available to him. 

So Frost models a quantum of process which I have, less poetically, expressed as a diagram:

A

↙        ↘

x                x

↘           ↙

Ω

This model does not consider the possibility that Frost will encounter other forks along his chosen path that do not lead to his desired destination. IRL, things can get crazy quickly:

↘           ↙

A

↙        ↘

x                x

↙     ↘         ↙    ↘

Ω

↙        ↘

One event’s Ω is another event’s A. Same goes for God, but God is ‘special’ in one way: Every event is part of a chain of events whose primordial (initial) event includes God as it’s A point and whose consequent (final) event includes God as its Ω point.

To generalize Frost’s model, I have developed a broader representation of process which I call, appropriately I think, The Frost Diamond:

A

↙        ↘

x                x

↙       ↘     ↙      ↘  

x                x               x

↙      ↘        ↙     ↘      ↙    ↘     

x                 x                x           x

   ↘           ↙    ↘       ↙     ↘    ↙    

x                 x                x

↘        ↙     ↘       ↙         

x                x

↘           ↙

Ω

This diagram illustrates a process 6 steps long; but the pattern can expand indefinitely to accommodate any number of steps.

The Frost Diamond is the paradigmatic structure of an event, any event. Every event begins as a choice between at least two options. Relative to any proposed destination, there are always at least two pathways. 

The choice and execution of a single route, forsaking all others, is what turns mere activity into an event. Being an event is 99% exclusion. Absent choice (e.g., if A → B), AB is a single event, which is no event at all. (Nothing’s happening, everything just is – so no event!)

The World is a funny place! On the one hand, nothing ever seems to change, and the more things do change, the more they seem to stay the same (to coin a meme). On the other hand, I have no idea whatsoever what tomorrow will bring. Or even this afternoon. Or…wait for it…now! We are all always just a micron or millisecond away from a life altering catastrophe. 

What we call living is the ultimate sobriety test. “Walk a straight line between crushing boredom and devastating tragedy…or just hand over your license right now.”  No wonder everyone is anxious all the time!

Why is the World like this? The 20th century British philosopher, Alfred North Whitehead hinted at an answer. Any world that is, or ever could be, must include three irreducible and undefinable categories: One, Many, Creativity. The one becomes many and the many becomes one. That’s the creative process. That’s what a ‘world’ is.

Whitehead’s minimum conditions closely track Frost’s Diamond. Every Alpha (A) births two or more divergent pathways, two or more of which re-converge - at an Omega (Ω). For every Alpha, there is at least one Omega, and vice versa. What goes around goes around. That is what constitutes the solidarity of Universe. 

David Cowles is the founder and editor-in-chief of Aletheia Today Magazine. He lives with his family in Massachusetts where he studies and writes about philosophy, science, theology, and scripture. He can be reached at david@aletheiatoday.com.

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