Précis of the origins of reality

This essay provides a précis of my recent work on the foundations of physical and biological reality. It is based on two publications, one on physics and cosmology ("From nothingness to time, Planck's constant, and endless accretion" philpapers VANFNT-3) and one on life and mind ("The estimator theory of life and mind: how agency and consciousness can emerge" philpapers VANTET-8). The main ideas are explained here in an accessible form by avoiding jargon and by using analogies and metaphors wherever possible. The reason for writing a combined précis of the two works is that they are interdependent. The theory of mind identifies components that could not participate in fundamental physical reality because they have a biological origin. The theory of fundamental physics follows from eliminating these components. Conversely, the biological components have evolved to exploit physical indeterminacy, which is indeed present fundamentally. [This is version 3, a minor revision with improved structure and clarity]