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Regina provided a wonderful summary of the looping theme of the institute,  and used it, as it should be used, to raise a new question: could there be something else with which we're interacting?  some "additional entity/force," something beyond the external material world, interpersonal interactions, and culture?  Maybe something who existence is expressed through randomness?  Her session very much exemplified the spirit of co-constructive inquiry/conversation, not only in what Regina laid out but in the group's response to it.  Yes, there are differences among us in the degree to which we "believe' in an "additional entity/force," and those were well talked about.  But there also emerged an interesting commonality: a preference to have a story that provides each of us room/opportunity to be ourselves a creative force in our own lives, and in the lives of others around us.
Could randomness be, as Regina suggested it might, be evidence for an "additional entity/force," a concept that masks our ignorance of things that influence us?  Yes, of course.  But there is a significant difference between randomness as I used the term and an "additional entity/force" as many people us that idea.  Randomness, in my conception, is ... without pattern, without intent, without meaning, whereas most people expect an "additional entity/force" to act in ways that are orderly and have intent/meaning even if we don't understand it.  In these terms, my question about a fifth loop is not whether it exists but whether it reflects intention/represents meaning.  Yes, we are being acted on by things we don't fully understand.  The question for me is whether those things do or don't have intention/meaning.  And, it seems to me, the more they do, the less room there is for each of us to be ourselves a creative force.  It is, in my mind, the very meaninglessness of the "additional force/entity" that gives us space to be creative forces ourselves.
I was intrigued too by by Regina's pointing out that "we are in the center of all the loops.  If our brain is constructing reality for us, then we are the center of our private universe.  Everything else revolves around us."  I suspect that may indeed be the case, no matter how many loops one adds (cf "The significance of the story teller ..." in my 6 May 2006 conversation with an art historian).   While the notion that we are each at the center of our own universe may be a little dizzying or disturbing at first glance, it is what gives each of us the wherewithal to both contribute to and learn from our differences with others.  In this sense, it is not permission to live lives disconnected from others but rather encouragement to connect with others, to engage in co-constructive dialogue/inquiry.  Recognizing that we are each at the center of our own universe is, like not finding meaning in the non-human world outside ourselves, part of the incentive to make common cause with others in the creation of meaning.