To clarify Phoenix’s light travel time: the spacecraft did not
cruise straight to Mars but took a longer path following an
elliptical orbit around the sun, with Mars at the aphelion.
Because the distance from Mars to Earth was about 250 million
kilometers during the mission, the one-way light travel time was
a little less than 15 minutes. “Thought Experiments,” by Joshua
Knobe, describes the question of free will versus determinism. I
think it’s impossible to determine (pun intended) whether we
live in a deterministic or free-will world. I believe I have
free will. But suppose I’m wrong. Then it’s determined that I
will believe that I have free will. We can conduct the
experiments that Knobe talks about, but doing so assumes free
will. Otherwise, the outcomes are determined. Berkeley Heights,
N.J. There is another way of thinking about morality than the
one put forward by Knobe. Instead of it being essentially
altruistic, noble and somehow emanating from inside us, we can
think of it as focused largely on how