Determined is a novel by Robert M Sapolsky who also wrote the novel Behave! The beginning of the novel tells about the story of Psychologist William James and the quote; “turtles all the way down”!
Many would have used such an option in day to day life!
It is like how when I was very young I asked my father the name of his grandfather and then his father and so on! After some known names he was getting the gist where I was going!
So he finally told me that it is a combination of Venkitasubban and Subramanian in alternate infinite progression till we reach Kaushika or Vishwamithra who was our first proper ancestor! It was literally turtles all the way down (or Up in this case!)
The story about turtles is similar!
In the William James story, after explaining the Earth orbits the sun, an elderly lady tells James the world rests on a turtle!
James then politely asks a woman what the earth stands on after she claims it rests on a turtle! She replies, “on another turtle,” and when pressed, concludes, “It’s no use, Mr. James, it’s turtles all the way down!”.
The story highlights the concept of infinite regress—the failure to find a foundational, ultimate cause!
Apparently while widely attributed to William James, the story is often associated with Bertrand Russell, and some sources note that James actually used a similar phrase involving “rocks all the way down”!
In any case “Turtles all the way down” refers to an infinite regress, describing a situation where a foundational explanation requires another explanation, which needs another, ad infinitum. It represents a problem of circular logic or a lack of a final, solid foundation for a belief, theory, or structure!
It is used in philosophy (specifically epistemology), science, and daily conversation to describe an endless chain of questions or causes!
It is literally the answer to the continuous ‘why’ or ‘how’ of a toddler!
In fact the concept is described in another novel by John Green which is called; “Turtles All the Way Down”! In the novel though the phrase is a metaphor for obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). It describes the feeling of being trapped in a “thought spiral” where one intrusive thought leads to another infinitely!
In fields like computer science, it can refer to layers of abstraction where each level of code or hardware relies on a deeper layer, seemingly without end!
Talk about being stuck between a Rock and a Turtle!
Now that’s like the lyrics written by Shitala Pandey! You may know him as Sameer!
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