The Metaphysics and Paradoxes of "Minority Report"

Concerning Possibility 1:

When I ask whether the human failure to predict the future is “epistemological,” I mean simply: does our failure to predict what is to come equate to a failure to know something that is in principle knowable? If this supposition is true, the future is actually a thing already laid out fully formed in some “fourth” dimension, or is at least something all of whose necessary conditions are already fully laid out, so we are merely playing out roles that are constantly bringing it into fruition. The issue in either case is that we humans just do not happen to know this future, because of our lamentable epistemic limitation or “finitude.” Beings who are not finite like us, however, like God, angels, or the pre-cogs in Minority Report, could conceivably have the epistemic equipment—or as Kant might say the “intellectual intuition"—to know it.

Concerning Possibility 2:

The second option raised is a more radical one. It is that our human failure to know the future is ontologically revealing. This failure is not something to be lamented, because it indicates something about the nature of the spatio-temporal universe. What it indicates, quite simply, is that the future is not the kind of thing any creature could ever know, and for the very best reason: namely, because it does not exist as a fully pre-formed set of actualities that could ever be known by anyone or anything.

- Matthew Sharpe, PhD in Is there a Minority Report? or what is Subjectivity?

Minority Report is one of my all-time favorite films for numerous reasons, one of them primarily making me rethink film as a narrative and artistic medium (as well as opening up my love for classic and modern film noir). The premise is this: in 2054 Washington D.C., murder has become a relic of the past thanks to the Precog program, a program which consists of three precogs – children with the ability to predict future murders, homicides and killings – that acts preemptively to prevent would-be killers from committing their crimes. John Anderton (played by Tom Cruise) is the head of the pre-crime unit, leading a routine life until one day, he is preemptively accused of killing a man he has never met. The movie takes off with John trying to prove his own innocence while diving into the truth about the Precog program and the nature of a minority report. 

Minority Report’s premise presents interesting ideas about the ontological paradoxes regarding future predictions – so much so that I felt compelled to write about one of the most fascinating scenes is at the very end (here’s the video link): 

John openly confronts Lamar (the Precog director) about the corruption behind the pre-crime program, bellowing out in rage and fury for everything that has cumulated up until now. The precogs, sensing Lamar’s murderous intent, begin narrating the future yet to unfold, and very closely so to when the actual events are occurring that at one point, John and a precog overlap in what they are saying. This presents some additional paradoxes about the nature of a precog for reasons I will attempt to illustrate here: 

This is a little schematic I drew up to demonstrate how closely the precog’s prediction is in conjunction to the actual event taking place:

• Events (i.e. dialogues) are denoted by letters A through E
• t = 0 is the event occurring during "real-time,” t = +1 is the event being predicted by the precogs, and t = –1 is the event told after fact (which does not apply here)
• ∆y is the time difference between what the precogs predict and when the prediction occurs
• The blue line designates on what time frame (i.e. future or real-time) the precogs narrate what eventually occurs real-time: therefore, the smaller ∆y becomes, the sooner the precog’s prediction comes true; additionally, if ∆y = 0, then the precogs are narrating the events in real-time as they occur (eg. event D)

To better illustrate what I’m trying to get at, here are the events (dialogues) and their corresponding screenshots, and for clarity’s sake overlapping dialogue will be bolded (note: it’s much easier to see what I’m talking about if you watch the video beforehand): 

…

Dialogue A: the precog’s prediction is preemptive before the actual event (Lamar’s and John’s dialogue), as inferred by how the dialogue of the precog and real-time subject (i.e. Agatha and Lamar) do not overlap. 

Precog 1 (Agatha): “Think about all the lives that little girl has saved" 

 

Lamar: ”Think about the lives that little girl saved. Think about all the lives she will save. Let her go. She could have saved Sean.“

John: "Don’t you EVER say his name!!!”

…

Dialogue B: Precog #2 takes over the narrative prediction, which is still preemptive relative to the real-time event (John yelling) taking place. 

Precog #2: “You used the memory of my dead son to set me up”

John: “You USED the memory of my dead son to set me up! That was the ONE thing you knew that would drive me to murder…”

…

Dialogue C: Precog #3 takes over the narrative prediction, which is still preemptive. Note however that ∆y (the time between the prediction and real-time) is shorter, i.e. the cut between the prediction (precog) and event (John). 

Precog #3: “What are you gonna do now, Lamar?”

John: “What are you gonna do now, Lamar?”

…

Dialogue D: This is the most interesting portion of the preemptive narration of the precogs. Here, the precog’s prediction overlaps with the real-time event – that is, both the precog and John say the same line at the same time. This is jarringly different than the nature of the precog’s presented beforehand, which has always been preemptive, and additionally presents another paradox regarding the precogs’ nature (which I will discuss shortly below). 

Precog #3: “How are you gonna – ”

John: “ – shut me up?!”

…

Dialogue E: the precogs revert back from real-time narration to their normal preemptive narration; notably, ∆y is larger than original (unfortunately this is not up to scale in my first schematic) because Lamar and John are not yet together on the patio/rooftop. 

Precog: “Forgive me, John." 

Lamar: "Forigve me, John.”

…

Some may argue that this extends to an argument of pre-destination versus freedom of will, and that our inability to predict the future is a necessary quality: all this and considering what’s presented in Minority Report, I’d say we have for ourselves an interesting case of where narration within the universe – as opposed to the traditional narrative speaking outside of the universe – functions as another unique paradox within the film’s universe; that is, the precogs are simultaneously narrating to us the viewer what is going on and to the people within precrime, and eventually at a small paradoxical point in time the precog is essentially rehearsing what is occurring real-time. Additionally, we can consider how this works from a metaphysics/modern physics POV, and what paradoxes (or impossibilities) arise as a result of the precogs preemptive narrative nature: 

Some notes about this schematic of the future and past light cones: 

• y-axis = time t from event A, x-axis = distance r from event A
• event A occurs at (0,0) 
• 1/c = the limit, derived from rise/run = ∆y/∆x = ∆t/∆r = 1/velocity = 1/speed of light (speed of light notated as c)
• Above x-axis = the future, below the x-axis = the past
• r distance is a function of t time, r(t)

Now, to illustrate what occurs before event A (past light cone) and after event A (future light cone): 

1. The shaded yellow area below the x-axis = all cumulative events leading up to the occurrence of event A
2. Event A occurs
3. At t₁, subject at rᵢ away from event A is affected (r₁ ≤ rᵢ)
4. The shaded dark green area above the x-axis = all events possibly affected by event A up until t₁
5. The light green area above the x-axis = all events possibly affected by event A past (and inclusive of events prior to) t₁
6. All of these events – past and future - demonstrate the core concept of causality: events prior to event A cumulate into the occurrence of event A, and the occurrence of event A affects all possible future events afterwards. 

Some important notes to consider regarding modern physics: 

• The information of event A travels at the speed of light along the limit 1/c
• Light always travels  forward, therefore the information of event A progresses forward as well (aka you cannot jump back to the past light cone once you have crossed the x-axis into the future light cone); by extension, information cannot be “time traveled” backwards
• EVERYTHING is dependent on event A
• EVERYTHING is in the same frame of reference (aka everything occurs during the same relative time)
• r is always less than or equal to rᵢ because nothing travels faster than the speed of light
• 1/c is on both sides of the y-axis because the information of event A travels in opposite and complementary directions (i.e. if I snap my fingers between you and I, the sound of the snap would travel towards me and towards you at the same time) - thus, the light cone shape results on a 2D scale
• The value of 1/c is VERY small, thus indicating that at a given, small interval of time, the information of effect A has traveled much farther with respect to r – that is, for a small about of t, you travel a large amount of r with respect to the limit 1/c that dictates how information of the event traverses forward in time. To scale, t is short and r is large
• Anything that occurs outside the shaded areas of yellow, dark or light green are caused by a different event other than event A

With all of this in mind, we can now see why the precogs, by default of their predicting nature, violate the principle of causality with their Mode of Operation (M.O.): 

1. Before the precogs are stimulated by a murderous vision (event A), they exist before event A takes places, and are as unaware of its possibility as anyone else (they exist below the x-axis at t = -1)
2. Once the precogs are stimulated by the murderous vision (event A), they essentially jump towards the future where event A has already occurred (they experience above the x-axis at t = +1) and learn of the information regarding event A
3. The precogs then jump back below the x-axis back to the past light cone from the future light cone to pre-event A, yet still remember the information they retained from post-event A and are now able to narrate the occurrence of event A
4. During the unique event D, the precog narrates what’s occurring real time (they are at t = 0), yet continue to violate causality since they are at a r distance away from event D, which occurs at t=0, r=0 - that is, how the precogs are perceiving the event is occurring faster than the speed of light c 

This presents a lot of paradoxes and problems within the realm of modern physics since accordingly, you cannot know of an event’s occurrence until after the event has occurred by virtue of light (and by extension information) progressing forward only: to predict the future is to essentially “time travel” from before to after and then back to before the event occurs and retain information, which would mean you made information “progress backwards” - which is impossible from what we currently understand with modern physics. 

The precogs essentially violate the nature of causality by their own preemptive nature, which adds another interesting question of whether or not they included themselves in the occurrence (or not) of event A: 

The acknowledgment of this evident paradox raises what is decisive in terms of our trying to decide the philosophical issue of freedom-necessity raised by the film, both within it and “for ourselves.” It shows that each of the pre-cogs’ predictions in Minority Report represents a phenomenon exactly akin to Bertrand Russell’s famousparadoxical list. As you may know, this is a list that aspires to list all the lists that have ever existed that did notinclude themselves in what they inventoried. As Russell reasoned, when we try to think about such a list, and specifically about whether it might ever be completable, we soon run into an aporia.

– Matthew Sharpe

Based on the metaphysical extrapolation of the precogs functions, they are essentially entities that are within and external to progression of time within the universe of Minority Report yet still adhere to the same frame of reference relative to the same universe: they can predict an accurate future without including themselves as a cumulative effect into whether or not effect A occurs, yet at the same time are very much embedded within the past light cone that filters into effect A even occurring all. By nature, they are the perfect paradox that breaks any “rule” or “limit” of modern (but not theoretical) physics: they’re both humans and Gods, effectively. 

The precogs really present a inherent paradox to the metaphysics of accurate prediction, and whether or not the ontological paradox really exists if the precogs do not factor themselves as entities also cumulating into the occurrence (or not) of any given event – all of which makes Minority Report a fascinating film to consider from a metaphysical, philosophical and narrative POV. 

*Note: I learned ALL of the (meta)physics after two hours of consulting from a nuclear engineer and previous knowledge. All qualms with my mistakes should be shot at me, slingshots and all. 

Two hours were spent on this whiteboard as I (re)learned aspects of light cones, special relativity, and the limits of light, time and information progression.