I found these
pages in a series of handwritten notebooks in a box of material left in a
remote storage facility I had rented. They are interesting enough for
me to retype and post here, which will occur as I am able.
I
have tried googling and binging and other search engines to find out
more about the author or subject matter, but nothing appears, which may
mean nothing or everything, as you will find out if you read further.
The earliest post, the one to start with, is here -- a July 1 entry which is the date I typed it and posted it here. The notebook pages themselves lack dates.
Sunday, December 8, 2013
ED. NOTE ...
This note is ONLY for those who have been going from earliest entry to now...a guidepost if you will..
---
If you are keeping track overall, the structure is:
- earliest entry, which started this story, in this blog here,
- then I started the second blog here and this blog continues here, both in tandem for two entries,
- then the second blog only continues the story here,
- and now the story reverts back to this blog here.
---
If you are keeping track overall, the structure is:
- earliest entry, which started this story, in this blog here,
- then I started the second blog here and this blog continues here, both in tandem for two entries,
- then the second blog only continues the story here,
- and now the story reverts back to this blog here.
17:35
I am tired of writing. I am tired of this. Hell isn’t other people, or burning in eternal
torment. Hell is nothing. No contact, no stimulation, no interaction
with the world. Hell is being trapped in
a box. Hell is something I’ve designed
for myself, carefully and with all the resources I could.
The third book Jim put in the box was lying
underneath the Sartre book. Descartes’ Meditations on First Philosophy. I had read this years ago. I still remember cogito ergo sum. I think therefore I am. I can’t think here anymore, too much despair. Does that mean I am not?
20:02
I’ve been trying to rouse my
spirits. I will solve this I will. I will get out of here soon and solve it.
24:49
I am without much sleep or pretty much anything
else. And I am only halfway…I will go crazy
in here. I will.
28:14
I haven’t been able to find a mathematical
solution. The is a little more than a
day left to my unboxing. I am tempted to
forget trying. At this point it is a
matter of challenging the best minds of the past 100 or so years, from Einstein
to Bohr, Rutherford to Pauli, Feynman to Hawking to Penrose.
Entanglement is an outcome of their
thought. How can I challenge it?
-- TEAR OUT PAGE --
“You know why we will never be
together, right?” she asked as we woke up one summer morning the sun streaming
into her happy room. “Because you,” and
she turned to look at me across the pillow, “ are too much of a reductionist. You are too … digital.”
“It is a scientific position,” I said.
“No it isn’t” she said. “It lacks any
analog dimension. It’s short sighted. Love is analog. There is no love in your system.”
She was right of course but I couldn’t
admit it then.
“You think because you got damaged you
could ignore love. ”
“Not exactly,” I said.
“Yes, exactly. Because you don’t love. You like.
But you don’t love. And that
doesn’t make sense because love is everywhere.
In ways that simply don’t compute in your system. “
“I don’t think …”
But she wouldn’t let me even
start. “We have talked about this a
million times. And its cool. But realize the human race selected for love
too – it is something that gives the organism survival value. But you can’t recognize that. And that’s cool too. But I can’t tell you a slightly prickly
personality without love is someone I want to hang with. I love you but I cannot create love in
you. That is up to you. You have to decide you will love. You have to decide you will reach out, break through
your box, and do it without calculation to every single person. And to me.”
She slowly smiled, a sad smile, at me,
got up and kissed my head. ”Love you.”
34:54
After my depressing sleep and thoughts
about purgatory I tried to do some work, to analyze my situation a little more.
I’ve focused on some very particular
math to see if we can keep away from forming the entangled quanta – particles
have shown to be entangled but we have come in below the particle level. As I explained before nano are like pieces of
math, and if there is some way to create an alternate configuration maybe we
can build a new particle out of Mark’s existing particles. I wonder – I assume he is thinking the same
as me still. He had another week to
engage with the world without me but I am not sure that would Mark him (ha-ha
get it?) as different from me…and now he is in his box too. Coming to the same resolution I assume –
after all he and I think the same.
And that is doesn’t really help up
solve the current problem. Two of
me. One of me failed to see the problem
and two of us will just double our lacunae.
Rather what’s need is a complimentary person – someone to fill the gaps
in what I didn’t see what areas I skipped over.
38:22
Shit.
I had fallen asleep. None of this
was there, as I slept, and I can’t remember my dream but I was happy and
content and at peace. Now I am up, and a
little groggy, and back in my depressing depressing state.
No interaction. No people.
I’ve done something unique answered so many questions and get to suffer
in purgatory as a result.
When I went to Catholic School, when I
was young, we had a discussion of purgatory.
Our teacher was a good guy, the kind of priest that truly seemed to care
– he helped me in couple ways back then.
He was kind of an Irish alky too though (no offense Jim!) amiable, we
called him Father Bleary though if memory serves his name was Leary.
“Purgatory, children, is kind of halfway
point for some people. We pray for the
souls in purgatory because even though they are in grace and friendship with
God, and they are saved, they still aren’t quite pure. They go to purgatory for
purification before they enter God’s presence, because nothing unclean can
enter God’s presence.”
What do you do in purgatory? Someone asked. “pray?”
“We don’t know. It’s not like heaven, where you are in God's
presence, or like hell, where you undergo constant punishment and torment. We don’t know”
The class was quiet as we all contemplated,
in our fourth grade minds, the question of being purified in purgatory. I remember thinking what would you do? Maybe not fire like in hell, but maybe it’s
kind of hot? How do you get purified? What if you don’t? Off to hell with you?
Me, now, in purgatory? Maybe I, after all, invented a purgatory on
earth. Halfway between heaven and
hell? How do I get purified?
-- TEAR OUT PAGE --
I wonder if nano Mark is controlling me
thru entanglement. Making me do stuff to
be the opposite of his…
41:51
I just realized something about Mark
and I. Since we are entangled, we have
to respect the other. We both have to
make sure that we are and the other is, healthy.
Second is that it isn’t even. Nano particles have more power over me than I
have over them. In other words,
apparently the default is nano Mark being conscious and me unconscious. Or is that the default? Can it be reset?
However we are looking at it it isn’t
good.
41:54
This wait is driving me crazy. I am lying in the bed trying to shut
down. But I can’t. I wonder if nano Mark is feeling this
way. Or the opposite.
42:14
Time is crawling. I wonder if nano Mark is experiencing it whizzing by. If a feeling is the opposite too.
-- TEAR OUT PAGE --
Not to mention that the thing I have
never liked to do all that much, interact with people, is what I cannot do now
– because I have attempted to sidestep God’s Order, by nanocloning me.
Is that right?
I’ll never be able to interact with
people again. I will go comatose if I
try because of entanglement. But that
means a life of loneliness. Unless we
solved the problem. And one solution is
to destroy nano Mark. Rip apart the
nanoparticles of him, so they are no longer entangled with mine. And I’d be free.
But that destruction of him might lead
to destruction of me. If his particles experience
destruction who knows what mine might experience. If his particles experienced Hell would mine
heaven? Or the latter… and am not
speculating --- I think there is room for God and an afterlife and all that. After all the existence of an eternal God
with a timeless plan has not been disproved.
So I can’t just destroy him unless I
want to risk destroying me.
I hope he thinks of that too, and I
guess he will, because I know we must think alike, and the gap of a few days
probably hasn’t diverged us that much. I write it in the regular diary/mention it to
Jim when I get unboxed so Jim gets it too. So that nano Mark does realize there is no benefit
to him to killing me either if it came to that.
So we are cool.
43:40
I am dating these entries differently
now, according to the time on the clock.
So they will be going backwards to opening time, which is the way I have
started to think about it.
Only a little time gone by now. It is beginning to wear on me. Being unable to communicate at all, with
anyone. See a face, talk, touch. Not that I touched all that much lately. But I could.
Maria and I had a relationship for a
long time, and never really broke up.
But we never got closer either.
Which was okay anyway because we had known each other for so long and
were very comfortable. But I wasn’t sure
about what she did or was doing in her job; in a way she was as private as me. I miss you.
And Jim too. Hi buddy!
We’ve known each other for a long time too. You are my closest friend no question, and
have done so much for me for so long.
Thank you.
Wow.
Look how maudlin I am getting.
I haven’t heard anything from the outside
about solutions. I would think Jim and
the rest are working furiously. And nano
Mark must be in his box; otherwise I would be unconscious.
Why did he keep his consciousness when
I lost mine? There was something in the
process that gave him a consciousness spin but not me? Could I figure that out? Can I reverse it? Can Jim and the others?
But there is no noise, no noise from
the outside world and I imagine, none from me.
No sense of others around because, if they sense me I’ll go back into my
coma and, if I sense them only, like looking through a one sided mirror, I think
I’d soon go crazy seeing but not touching, not being able to communicate with
them.
It’s ironic I’ve gone from trying to do
too much to trying to do something, anything.
It’s probably even more ironic that I can’t use technology to do
anything – when all my life I’ve worked with it and created it and understood
it.
-- TEAR OUT PAGE --
--- TEAR OUT PAGE ---
One of the dreams I had when I was out came
to mind. It was Bleary again, in the
classroom. “So Jesus experienced
suffering. And loneliness. And everyone ran away. And Dante said hell is nothing – no
connectedness, nothing. Frozen. So Jesus was experiencing something that
Dante later described as hell.
“Imagine that,” he said. “No one there. No one to share your suffering. No one to reach out to you. Some of you may feel that now.” And I steeled myself for him to look at me
but he didn’t. And I sensed Maria
looking at me from my left, from her seat.
“What do you think?“ And now he called
on me, and I opened my mouth to speak and everyone was looking at me but I
couldn’t the words wouldn’t come out, and suddenly we were out at recess and someone
yelled at me “C’mon Mark throw the ball” but I just stared at it. And Maria, but adult Maria, walked up to me
her eyes beautifully dark. It was night. And she wore nothing/everything.
December 1
I woke up suddenly this morning. In a room that I thought at first was the copying
room. It was soothing, with wood and
leather. But I was in a bed, with wires
and tubes attached to me.
I sat up suddenly and they all broke
off when I did.
A note was on a table next to me. “Dear Mark,” it began, and I read about the past
few days. “…We are working on the
solution,” it said as it came to its end.
“In the meantime, we were worried about you. So you and nano Mark are isolated now to permit the superprobabilities and,
hopefully, keep each of you in a conscious state. Two of you, working on this, will probably
solve it quicker than all of us on the outside.
“Love you buddy. I will see you soon. Jim.”
A pile of books was next to the
note. “No Man Is An Island” by Thomas
Merton was on top. Bastard.
I knocked them off, pissed at what had
happened. The most incredible fucking development. I am in a fucking box. A large fucking box. No one knows if I am awake or asleep. No one knows if I am alive or dead. I am Schrodinger’s fucking cat, writ large.
I don’t even now if it’s worth writing
this. Will any one read it?
I got up and explored the rest of the
room.
There is a bed and the usual stuff
here, and the other rooms have food and more books and a bathroom and in the
back there is water recycling equipment like the astronauts have and workout equipment
and food and food and food cause I’m not gonna be able to show anyone out there
that I am consuming anything, that water is running into here, that electricity
is being used, that the Internet is
active, that I am accessing websites, etc. etc. etc. that I am taking a shower or peeing or eating
cause any knowledge would collapse the probabilities.
Or at least Jim and the others
think. I am back now reading the
synopsis again more carefully and slowly.
“We have taken probably excess precautions to make sure that you are
safe,” Jim wrote. “Mark is in another
room just like this one; we set both up in an attempt to isolate you as much as
humanly possible. No one has said it
outright, but we are worried that entanglement could be life threatening to you. We can’t have your consciousness deteriorating.”
“Hopefully you can read this. We had put you in the room on life support
that was designed to break away if you woke.
The difficult thing is that we won’t have any indication if you have
and, speaking for me, I can’t really let you go on without even knowing your
state. You might be pissed at that, interfering
with your experiment and all, but I can’t let you go on without knowing, consciously,
the alternatives. So after a lot of
thought I’ve told everyone we are going to break the seal two days from when
you’ve been put in here, which is the only way we can ascertain if you have
recovered. But we aren’t going to break
Mark’s seal then, hoping that, if we are right, you will be conscious. He probably will collapse then because the entanglement
will work in reverse – you will be up and he will be in a coma state. He knows, and we have identical times in each
room, so he doesn’t just collapse on the floor, he’ll know to get someplace
comfortable when he can pass out. If all
goes well I will talk to you about two days from when you read this. The timer is on the wall. “
I glanced up. 47:32 it read in big red numerals.
“All my best bud. You will be pleased to know that aside from
this small glitch, every other thing has gone right. There are no anomalies whatsoever.”
Right.
No anomalies. I am a fucking rat
in a cage – no a fucking cat in a box – and he says there are no anomalies. I threw his fucking note down.
November 1 later (44:12)
I’ve been pacing through the rooms. I should try to start to get to work but I’ve
been pacing. Back and forth back and
forth. What the fuck? Of all the things that could go wrong, of all
the things we planned for, it’s entanglement?
Really? And entanglement as cause
of consciousness? Fuck me. Fuck fuck me.
I am the probably absolute reductionist. We are nothing but bits and pieces of matter,
thrown together at random over 4 billion years, forces beyond our
comprehension.
And that is all life is too, the mice
proved that. When we copied Jekyll and
made Hyde we proved that too, that life was just a set of reactions we could
copy. And man is just an animal writ
large.
There is no noise, no noise from the outside
world and I imagine, none from me. No
sense of others around because if they sense me I’ll go back into my coma and,
if I sense them, the experts think, like though an undetectable one way mirror
a video feed over the internet, I will soon go crazy seeing but not touching,
not being able to communicate with them.
We can’t even communicate on a time
delayed manner, sending them this notebook, using a computer or anything
else…even time delayed communication would collapse the probabilities,
according to entanglement theory. It
even works through time and probably on an indeterminate basis – we wouldn’t
know exactly how then would affect now aside from probably random
blackouts. Oh efff me.
Friday, July 26, 2013
TEAR OUT PAGE
And so here it is, my creation, and me. What now? No longer alone, someone separate from me who yet is me. Will that alleviate loneliness? The loneliness of the sufferer? The loneliness that Christ Himself underwent on the Cross when all had turned away from Him, even Peter His Rock, even God His Father: “My God, My God why hath Thou forsaken me?” The gray aloneness, the horrific nothing, no one, they can listen but even then they are all too willing to offer advice.
You must have done something they will say. It is your behavior. You enticed him on. ARGGHHHH! Listen to me and share my suffering. Wow, I guess Christ thought that too…
The room had gotten so quiet. Even Maria was quiet. Outside was grey and cloudy. Inside Father Bleary, who kept every other bank of florescent lights off, for some reason, moved slowly in the semi-gloom, up and down the rows of silent, afraid children, at the chairs fixed to their desks, unmoving, waiting to see what he was going to say.
“What about the suffering of the innocents?” he repeated into the silence. He slowed as he got near me. “Why has God let us on earth be hurt? Why has Jesus broken His Promise? We are being hurt, some of us in this very room. Why?” He stopped above me. His words just hung there in the air, in the grey. The room was tense, wanting something, anticipating something, some relief of this tension, four graders holding their breath, a priest asking the questions that no one else would even ask, staying away from the ugly truths.
“There is no solution for us to the suffering of the innocents,” he finally said, gently, “none at all.” And the room let out a collective breath, not so much at the answer but at the fact he had said something, anything. But as the meaning of his statement came clear, as it penetrated our young minds, our tension lessened but we started to get confused. How could a priest say this? What is he trying to do?
He went on. “You know, some people think the worst part of suffering is the loneliness. Some people who suffer can’t tell anyone, or if they do, they aren’t believed, or, if they do, they are believed, but the people they tell think it’s their fault, that the sufferer cause the suffering, or the people they tell simply run away.” And his hand fell on my shoulder, briefly as if it was just a casual touch, and I could tell, I could feel, that Maria noticed it.
“Isn’t that what happened to Jesus? On the cross? Didn’t everyone run away, even Peter? Only a week earlier He was being greeted as king of the world, riding into Jerusalem people singing Hosannas to Him, praise echoing in his ears, but behind the scenes people were working to bring him down, to kill him. Probably some of those same people who were in the crowd praising him were planning to kill him.”
And we went silent again.
“Everyone had run away from Him. No one listening.” He went up to the front of the room and turned around. “Even his Father, his God. God running away from God. My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?”
“Haven’t we felt that? Just like Jesus? When we, the innocents, suffer?”
His words hung there in the air, we were holding our breath again, give us an answer Father we silently pleaded, relieve our tension, something anything, make it simply, make it understandable.
“There is no reason we can understand for the innocents to suffer,” he finally said. “No reason even Jesus could understand. My God, he cried out. Why have you given up on me? Why have you forsaken me? Suffering can be so great. It can destroy you.”
He looked all around now. Everyone was fixed on him.
“But it won’t,” he said. “It won’t.” And we breathed again. “Because like Jesus, you can still call on God. You can still say God, why am I suffering. And remember we studied Job last fall, and Job suffered too, and he called on God too, and God’s answer there was you don’t understand Job, you don’t understand me, or what I am, or what is happening to you.”
“We know a little more about how Jesus suffered, and we know he was God, and even God suffered on this Earth, on His Earth. He suffered, died and was buried. And He was alone. Even God was alone and I think aloneness makes suffering worse, much much worse.“
The bell rang but none of us wanted to leave. We wanted a resolution, a tidy resolution, something to send us home feeling good, but Father Bleary just turned to his desk to his books and started tidying them up, ignoring us.
We slowly got up and got our things.
“One more thing,” he said suddenly, and his words rang out in the silence and gloom and everyone stopped moving, hopeful this was the resolution. “Jesus said My God, my God. He knew God was still there. Even though God was silent. He still had faith. Even though God wasn’t answering. And that is the only solution I can give to you. All of you. Keep your faith. God is there. Keep your faith,” he repeated one more time looking at me again, and we all left.
END TEAR OUT PAGE
And so here it is, my creation, and me. What now? No longer alone, someone separate from me who yet is me. Will that alleviate loneliness? The loneliness of the sufferer? The loneliness that Christ Himself underwent on the Cross when all had turned away from Him, even Peter His Rock, even God His Father: “My God, My God why hath Thou forsaken me?” The gray aloneness, the horrific nothing, no one, they can listen but even then they are all too willing to offer advice.
You must have done something they will say. It is your behavior. You enticed him on. ARGGHHHH! Listen to me and share my suffering. Wow, I guess Christ thought that too…
The room had gotten so quiet. Even Maria was quiet. Outside was grey and cloudy. Inside Father Bleary, who kept every other bank of florescent lights off, for some reason, moved slowly in the semi-gloom, up and down the rows of silent, afraid children, at the chairs fixed to their desks, unmoving, waiting to see what he was going to say.
“What about the suffering of the innocents?” he repeated into the silence. He slowed as he got near me. “Why has God let us on earth be hurt? Why has Jesus broken His Promise? We are being hurt, some of us in this very room. Why?” He stopped above me. His words just hung there in the air, in the grey. The room was tense, wanting something, anticipating something, some relief of this tension, four graders holding their breath, a priest asking the questions that no one else would even ask, staying away from the ugly truths.
“There is no solution for us to the suffering of the innocents,” he finally said, gently, “none at all.” And the room let out a collective breath, not so much at the answer but at the fact he had said something, anything. But as the meaning of his statement came clear, as it penetrated our young minds, our tension lessened but we started to get confused. How could a priest say this? What is he trying to do?
He went on. “You know, some people think the worst part of suffering is the loneliness. Some people who suffer can’t tell anyone, or if they do, they aren’t believed, or, if they do, they are believed, but the people they tell think it’s their fault, that the sufferer cause the suffering, or the people they tell simply run away.” And his hand fell on my shoulder, briefly as if it was just a casual touch, and I could tell, I could feel, that Maria noticed it.
“Isn’t that what happened to Jesus? On the cross? Didn’t everyone run away, even Peter? Only a week earlier He was being greeted as king of the world, riding into Jerusalem people singing Hosannas to Him, praise echoing in his ears, but behind the scenes people were working to bring him down, to kill him. Probably some of those same people who were in the crowd praising him were planning to kill him.”
And we went silent again.
“Everyone had run away from Him. No one listening.” He went up to the front of the room and turned around. “Even his Father, his God. God running away from God. My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?”
“Haven’t we felt that? Just like Jesus? When we, the innocents, suffer?”
His words hung there in the air, we were holding our breath again, give us an answer Father we silently pleaded, relieve our tension, something anything, make it simply, make it understandable.
“There is no reason we can understand for the innocents to suffer,” he finally said. “No reason even Jesus could understand. My God, he cried out. Why have you given up on me? Why have you forsaken me? Suffering can be so great. It can destroy you.”
He looked all around now. Everyone was fixed on him.
“But it won’t,” he said. “It won’t.” And we breathed again. “Because like Jesus, you can still call on God. You can still say God, why am I suffering. And remember we studied Job last fall, and Job suffered too, and he called on God too, and God’s answer there was you don’t understand Job, you don’t understand me, or what I am, or what is happening to you.”
“We know a little more about how Jesus suffered, and we know he was God, and even God suffered on this Earth, on His Earth. He suffered, died and was buried. And He was alone. Even God was alone and I think aloneness makes suffering worse, much much worse.“
The bell rang but none of us wanted to leave. We wanted a resolution, a tidy resolution, something to send us home feeling good, but Father Bleary just turned to his desk to his books and started tidying them up, ignoring us.
We slowly got up and got our things.
“One more thing,” he said suddenly, and his words rang out in the silence and gloom and everyone stopped moving, hopeful this was the resolution. “Jesus said My God, my God. He knew God was still there. Even though God was silent. He still had faith. Even though God wasn’t answering. And that is the only solution I can give to you. All of you. Keep your faith. God is there. Keep your faith,” he repeated one more time looking at me again, and we all left.
END TEAR OUT PAGE
July 26 9 pm
Holy crap indeed. Some philosophers might well characterize matter that way.
But he was/I am functioning (so far!) and although every one wanted to rush into the room and start testing both of us, we needed a minute, ignoring the many many observations that were being made of us, and simply staring at each other, absorbing the other.
I backed away from the door and he did too and we smiled, both of us wanting the other in “their” room. It shouldn’t matter, this territoriality, after all we were made of the same genetic stuff, but I still perceive him now as another.
Wow Maria! What now?
And all that went though my head in a second, as he waited on the other side of the connecting door and I decided then and there, because I was here first, and it would only be polite after all to him define the territory and so strode through into “his” room, and so come closer to him.
I had never seen myself this close before, seen myself as others see me, and the heightened anticipation, the adrenaline, enhanced my perception and for him too as we reached out and grasped each other’s hands and held them for a minute. Reasonably firm grip, skin fairly soft. He rotated my hand and looked at the backside of it, and then I did it back again it was a very odd thing because it was the same hand, two of them, in full mirror image, the back of my hand, with its hairs and veins and finger ligaments and knuckles and his fingertips wrapping around them with their visible nails, and rotating the hand, slowly and the wrinkles where the skin is and the color slowly changing to from the lighter palm on mine to the darker skin and just the reverse on his, thumb and forefinger meeting at the exact same angles, on either hand, and looking like a mirror image exactly but in 3D and over to the back of his hand, and every single thing looking the same once I rotated it in my mind, ever hair and vein and ligament and knuckle in the right place but rotated wrong until I figured it out, and then it snapped into place it was exactly the same as mine, wow. An intellectual construction, the nano, essentially little equations putting themselves together into something here and tangible something I could now see and feel and that looked just like me. Wow wow. I was weak all of a sudden and looked around for a chair and he did too, after all we were probably having the exact same reactions.
I have made this. This is another who is thinking the same as me right now, feeling the same. “Right?” I asked, and he said it at almost the same time, and we both smiled. Jim looked at us, and I shook my head now, but on the other hand it would be valuable to us, to science to record it now, so I stood up and he did at the same time walked into my room to get my notebook and when I came back he had his in hand and was sitting and had started writing already. I sat and started too, and so these pages.
But he was/I am functioning (so far!) and although every one wanted to rush into the room and start testing both of us, we needed a minute, ignoring the many many observations that were being made of us, and simply staring at each other, absorbing the other.
I backed away from the door and he did too and we smiled, both of us wanting the other in “their” room. It shouldn’t matter, this territoriality, after all we were made of the same genetic stuff, but I still perceive him now as another.
Wow Maria! What now?
And all that went though my head in a second, as he waited on the other side of the connecting door and I decided then and there, because I was here first, and it would only be polite after all to him define the territory and so strode through into “his” room, and so come closer to him.
I had never seen myself this close before, seen myself as others see me, and the heightened anticipation, the adrenaline, enhanced my perception and for him too as we reached out and grasped each other’s hands and held them for a minute. Reasonably firm grip, skin fairly soft. He rotated my hand and looked at the backside of it, and then I did it back again it was a very odd thing because it was the same hand, two of them, in full mirror image, the back of my hand, with its hairs and veins and finger ligaments and knuckles and his fingertips wrapping around them with their visible nails, and rotating the hand, slowly and the wrinkles where the skin is and the color slowly changing to from the lighter palm on mine to the darker skin and just the reverse on his, thumb and forefinger meeting at the exact same angles, on either hand, and looking like a mirror image exactly but in 3D and over to the back of his hand, and every single thing looking the same once I rotated it in my mind, ever hair and vein and ligament and knuckle in the right place but rotated wrong until I figured it out, and then it snapped into place it was exactly the same as mine, wow. An intellectual construction, the nano, essentially little equations putting themselves together into something here and tangible something I could now see and feel and that looked just like me. Wow wow. I was weak all of a sudden and looked around for a chair and he did too, after all we were probably having the exact same reactions.
I have made this. This is another who is thinking the same as me right now, feeling the same. “Right?” I asked, and he said it at almost the same time, and we both smiled. Jim looked at us, and I shook my head now, but on the other hand it would be valuable to us, to science to record it now, so I stood up and he did at the same time walked into my room to get my notebook and when I came back he had his in hand and was sitting and had started writing already. I sat and started too, and so these pages.
ED. NOTE ...
As you can see, the last entry immediately below is pretty intense. And this is where it gets really intense, because I also found a second series of handwritten notebooks in the same box that started with a post that is a lot like the last entry below. The handwriting looks almost identical to my non-expert eye between the two series of notebooks, but I believe, as you will no doubt note, the second notebook deserves a separate blog, which according to the spirit of the subject matter, I have called http://renanocopying.blogspot.com
I have kept up my Internet searching because, as I continue to go through these notebooks, and as you will see (because I confess I have read ahead a little) the technology seems sufficiently advanced enough for there to be some mention somewhere on the Internet, but I still haven't found anything. If anyone reading this does see something that might constitute some kind of information, please let me know so I can provide the links.
July 26
Finally the day is here. I’m sort of numb now rather than nervous - if this thing works it will be earth shattering. We have worked long and hard and tried to anticipate everything. I should be ready. But boy am I nervous. The funny thing is if I was running it from the outside I don't think I'd be nervous like this. My own involvement is what makes this tough. I wonder if it will change the experiment? That is, will my observation change my experimental trajectory? Kind of like quantum mechanics…
I want to focus on the positive – after all who wants to come into the world bummed out? Babies cry of course, but who knows if they are happy or sad? Probably sad – being ripped out of that nice warm womb into the cruelty of the world. And this is the first time if all goes well and God Willing (ha!) that we are going to create a person without a baby, without a mom, without so many things. Wow. I am a little freaked. It all seemed so theoretical, so easy, and now we are doing it.
I got up and went to take a leak. Gotta keep all those functions moving this morning. It would stink coming into the world and having to take a leak right away. Better eat something too. We had planned all that out and I should be keeping a dairy but I need to have a little looseness right now.
I looked in the mirror at myself, trying to read my own face. But the control mask I put on long ago is still firmly in place. I can’t read a thing.
I get to the lab early. The lot is full of cars. It looks like everyone – from workers to investors -- is there early too. I pull right up into one of my two spaces. The other has a car just like mine already in it. If nano me wants to drive.
Jim is waiting, kind of looming – no better way of putting it – my perception is a little hazy – not quite foggy – just a little dream like, with Jim’s face in ultra relief and the rest of the world cloudily present behind.
“You ok?” he asks, little concerned but alert scanning my face for anomalies, treating me a little like a piece of meat, a specimen, not really caring (although he does) but being clinical about his observation. I am his patient more than his friend now, his subject. I tried to scan his face for the effects of last night but he showed nothing. Hmmm….
“So, what happened?” I asked. “Were they twins or what?”
He smiled despite himself. “Well they had certain…similiarities. Now c’mon,” he siad, grabbing my arm to move me along, ”we have to get to work. Di you take you vitals? What was your BP…” and his voice faded as I answered him automatically, allowign him to manuveur me though an unmarked door and directly into the nano room. We had planned for me to be stressed, so Jim is the only one to communicate with me for now. I assume the rest are scurrying about, but his job is simple. Me.
The nano room has dim lighting and water and wood and big dark one way glass and my connecting door to the next room. I sit and feel a little better. He leaves to let me alone. I have this notebook and pull it out and bring it up to date. I’ve been taped and observed since I woke up this morning at home and I’m not thinking really about the faces staring at me behind the glass. The chair I am sitting in has sensors measuring everything that can be measured, as unobtrusively as we could, and the needle to place the implant in me. I am feeling better here in the semi-darkness. I am thinking about what I do. But there isn’t much. I sit, think happy thoughts, get flooded by nano. The nano mold forms, they pull it out, move it to next door, an identical room, flood it with nano there, and nano me is created and takes his first breath and we are done. The nano me then will start thinking too. Will there be a gap for him? For me? We have a book there for him too to start writing right away. No one will talk to him. Except Jim. He will move into the other room when nano me is created. No one else. Not even me at first.
I’m starting to feel a little bloated. Or is that my imagination. Don’t want to lose my cool. This is history. The tapes will be played over and over. If I freak I’ll look like an ass. I’m cool, I’m cool, I’m cool. I start to hear my heart. Crap, what do I think about. “Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name” I lose focus, and random thoughts crowd through my mind, too fast to stop, what if the nano isn’t passive, what if Jim doesn’t come back, what if there is a God, whoa, whoa, where did that one come from, what if this doesn’t work, that water sound is starting to get on my nerves after all, I am sweating a little too much in this chair, I wonder what Maria’s doing? Maybe if I focus on sex that will help…
“Ok, you’re done,” Jim comes in quickly and I jump. “Ow,” the needle implants the code.
“That was too quick, something’s wrong.”
“No we’re cool sunshine, you just lost it a little, you might have fallen asleep, which wouldn’t be surprising considering the neural flooding of your system.”
“Of course not, “ he says, and leaves, to go to the other room.
I sit.
I want to focus on the positive – after all who wants to come into the world bummed out? Babies cry of course, but who knows if they are happy or sad? Probably sad – being ripped out of that nice warm womb into the cruelty of the world. And this is the first time if all goes well and God Willing (ha!) that we are going to create a person without a baby, without a mom, without so many things. Wow. I am a little freaked. It all seemed so theoretical, so easy, and now we are doing it.
I got up and went to take a leak. Gotta keep all those functions moving this morning. It would stink coming into the world and having to take a leak right away. Better eat something too. We had planned all that out and I should be keeping a dairy but I need to have a little looseness right now.
I looked in the mirror at myself, trying to read my own face. But the control mask I put on long ago is still firmly in place. I can’t read a thing.
I get to the lab early. The lot is full of cars. It looks like everyone – from workers to investors -- is there early too. I pull right up into one of my two spaces. The other has a car just like mine already in it. If nano me wants to drive.
Jim is waiting, kind of looming – no better way of putting it – my perception is a little hazy – not quite foggy – just a little dream like, with Jim’s face in ultra relief and the rest of the world cloudily present behind.
“You ok?” he asks, little concerned but alert scanning my face for anomalies, treating me a little like a piece of meat, a specimen, not really caring (although he does) but being clinical about his observation. I am his patient more than his friend now, his subject. I tried to scan his face for the effects of last night but he showed nothing. Hmmm….
“So, what happened?” I asked. “Were they twins or what?”
He smiled despite himself. “Well they had certain…similiarities. Now c’mon,” he siad, grabbing my arm to move me along, ”we have to get to work. Di you take you vitals? What was your BP…” and his voice faded as I answered him automatically, allowign him to manuveur me though an unmarked door and directly into the nano room. We had planned for me to be stressed, so Jim is the only one to communicate with me for now. I assume the rest are scurrying about, but his job is simple. Me.
The nano room has dim lighting and water and wood and big dark one way glass and my connecting door to the next room. I sit and feel a little better. He leaves to let me alone. I have this notebook and pull it out and bring it up to date. I’ve been taped and observed since I woke up this morning at home and I’m not thinking really about the faces staring at me behind the glass. The chair I am sitting in has sensors measuring everything that can be measured, as unobtrusively as we could, and the needle to place the implant in me. I am feeling better here in the semi-darkness. I am thinking about what I do. But there isn’t much. I sit, think happy thoughts, get flooded by nano. The nano mold forms, they pull it out, move it to next door, an identical room, flood it with nano there, and nano me is created and takes his first breath and we are done. The nano me then will start thinking too. Will there be a gap for him? For me? We have a book there for him too to start writing right away. No one will talk to him. Except Jim. He will move into the other room when nano me is created. No one else. Not even me at first.
I’m starting to feel a little bloated. Or is that my imagination. Don’t want to lose my cool. This is history. The tapes will be played over and over. If I freak I’ll look like an ass. I’m cool, I’m cool, I’m cool. I start to hear my heart. Crap, what do I think about. “Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name” I lose focus, and random thoughts crowd through my mind, too fast to stop, what if the nano isn’t passive, what if Jim doesn’t come back, what if there is a God, whoa, whoa, where did that one come from, what if this doesn’t work, that water sound is starting to get on my nerves after all, I am sweating a little too much in this chair, I wonder what Maria’s doing? Maybe if I focus on sex that will help…
“Ok, you’re done,” Jim comes in quickly and I jump. “Ow,” the needle implants the code.
“That was too quick, something’s wrong.”
“No we’re cool sunshine, you just lost it a little, you might have fallen asleep, which wouldn’t be surprising considering the neural flooding of your system.”
“Of course not, “ he says, and leaves, to go to the other room.
I sit.
We are almost there. Another day now. Thank God it’s coming soon – I am going to stroke out. I mean I’m cool, and everything will be fine, but wow, this is a little nerve wracking.
Last night I went out. I sat at a bar and stared at me in the mirror. Lot of me staring at me yesterday. The bar mirror me is even different than the regular mirror me and of course -- like I said above -- the video me. In fact, I’ve probably spent more time staring at the bar mirror me than any other me but I am still not sure why. Alcoholism?
I looked through the bar mirror me to others in the bar. Not many others were staring at themselves. But they were in their own little incisive mini dramas. Which is kind of like staring at themselves. Mostly the girls. It seems to me a girl on a night out can be one long calculated impression – the neurons must be firing constantly.
I caught the eyes of a girl with long dark hair as I stared at her through the mirror. Her date didn’t notice. She smiled at me, tossed her hair back, and kept looking. She kept a little half smile on as I watched her scan the room. She was liking my attention. She was cute.
Oops, her boyfriend stopped talking. She brought herself back to him, took on a concerned look, and he was reassured. He started talking again. She took his hand across the table and went back to him.
Wow, I thought. What a juggling of inputs, variables and outputs. But she wasn’t totally done with me yet. She took the straw out of her drink and sucked on it slowly. Wow, wow, wow.
Some people came in and took the seats next to me but I didn’t notice. I felt someone sit next to me and then something wet in my ear and jumped. I heard laughter.
“Not really with us, are you?” Maria, the owner of the tongue, said.
“Hey, how are you?” I said, and stood up and enveloped her in my arms. She held her pretty little face up and I kissed her, long and feelingly. What happens to her? And us?
“Hey WE are doing great,” a loud voice said. I broke it off and reached around Maria and shook Jim’s hand, “How are you Doctor?”
"I am doing just great Doctor, just great,” Jim said, looking around me for the bartender. “Another day another appendix. As long as the Board doesn't catch up with me. Hey let me have a Sapphire and Tonic, Marie will have a Chardonnay and ladies," Jim turned to two others that had come in with him, “What can I get you?”
“You know,” one of the two said, and the other said “you should!”
“Oh right,” Jim said, “cosmos, pink ones, I think” and the girls nodded their heads, at about the same time. They kind of looked like twins.
"Mark, this is Sharon and Karen." Jim said, introducing the other two. "They're going to be a social worker. Ha, get it? Sharing and Caring."
The girls hit him.
"So, what are we planning tonight? Three of you, two of us, I sense magic in the air." Jim said.
The girls giggled again.
"Well, I am afraid I'm with someone exclusively," Maria said.
"Lose him!" Jim commanded. "We have no room for extras."
Maria smiled and hit Jim.
"What about your friend, doesn't he talk?" Karen said teasingly.
"Oh, he talks,” Maria said, and put her arm through mine. “He talks…the language of love.”
“Ohhhh,” they said, together.
"Do you want to go somewhere?" she asked me. She knew tomorrow was a big day, but I had been a little vague as to why. I looked in her eyes. They were smiling into mine, her eyes bright and beautiful, her face, her expressions so known to me, through years and years and years. Wow times infinity. If this isn’t love what is? And if there are two of me will that be better for her? Or not?
I pulled myself back to her, to the here and now. "I can think of one place," I said honestly.
She smiled even more at me. "Really? Gee, I can't imagine where that would be."
"Now kids," Jim broke in, "this is a public place.”
He turned.
“Ladies," he addressed the others, "These children are in the midst of the joy of love. I leave it to you. Shall we allow them the joy of being with each other in privacy, or shall we see if they can maintain a relationship under real world stress, which to my mind, would only strengthen it – as Nietzsche said of course what doesn’t destroy me makes me strong – and which goes to relationships too I think as in What doesn’t destroy them makes them strong. What should we do? What should we do? Sharon, your vote?"
The smaller of the two, or maybe not, they appeared identical, nodded solemnly. "Oh I think we have to stress them. Maria would do it for me, wouldn't you dear?" She smiled at Maria, a little maliciously. "Remember my engagement night, Maria?"
Maria laughed.
"No, viciousness now girls, no dirty laundry." Jim cried. "And you Karen?"
"Oh I agree absolutely,” the other one said, and I swear they were identical – or else sisters, or else friends who looked exactly alike (why do girls do that but not guys? Have friends who look almost exactly like them? A grouping instinct?) “I think it's our duty to stay and help them."
Jim said, "Another round Bartender, and any help you can provide in getting these two lonely kids together would be appreciated."
"So, Karen," Jim kept on, "Tell me about yourself. Your hopes, your fears, your aspirations. What do you do, who do you see, where do you go? Is there anyplace you'd rather be, anyone you'd rather see? My God," he said to the others, "I'm on a roll, spouting poetry. Don't stop me. Aren't I romantic?" he finished, leaning over and leering at them.
"And this man was my thesis advisor," Karen said, giggling.
"That's right my dear." Jim took her hand, "and now that we no longer have a professional relationship," he stressed "professional" and paused, "perhaps we can have another, more fulfilling sort of contact."
"Oh you can have that sort of contact and still have a professional relationship with her," Maria said laughing.
"Maria!" Sharon, Jim and Maria started talking at each other about Karen's virtues. I sat back and watched Maria argue. Her hair shone, her eyes were lit. She spoke with her body and her voice. She had a simple dress of some kind of shiny material. It rose to mid thigh as she sat. Her legs were crossed. They started from a pair of shiny high heels and were sheathed in dark stockings. I looked back up at my drink. Quickly. I didn't want to stare too long at the place where the legs disappeared under the skirt. Maybe one more quick look. I looked down again, quietly. Her skirt had moved up her leg a little.
"See anything you like?" she asked, catching me, and laughing at me again.
I was embarrassed. Usually I was much more subtle. Hard to control my lust now.
The rest of the evening passed wonderfully. At the end, I told Maria I couldn’t go home with her that night, or for the next few nights. She understood and kissed me long and hard. “Take care of yourself,” she said. Jim shook my hand, said, “see you tomorrow” and walked out, one arm around each of the girls.
Last night I went out. I sat at a bar and stared at me in the mirror. Lot of me staring at me yesterday. The bar mirror me is even different than the regular mirror me and of course -- like I said above -- the video me. In fact, I’ve probably spent more time staring at the bar mirror me than any other me but I am still not sure why. Alcoholism?
I looked through the bar mirror me to others in the bar. Not many others were staring at themselves. But they were in their own little incisive mini dramas. Which is kind of like staring at themselves. Mostly the girls. It seems to me a girl on a night out can be one long calculated impression – the neurons must be firing constantly.
I caught the eyes of a girl with long dark hair as I stared at her through the mirror. Her date didn’t notice. She smiled at me, tossed her hair back, and kept looking. She kept a little half smile on as I watched her scan the room. She was liking my attention. She was cute.
Oops, her boyfriend stopped talking. She brought herself back to him, took on a concerned look, and he was reassured. He started talking again. She took his hand across the table and went back to him.
Wow, I thought. What a juggling of inputs, variables and outputs. But she wasn’t totally done with me yet. She took the straw out of her drink and sucked on it slowly. Wow, wow, wow.
Some people came in and took the seats next to me but I didn’t notice. I felt someone sit next to me and then something wet in my ear and jumped. I heard laughter.
“Not really with us, are you?” Maria, the owner of the tongue, said.
“Hey, how are you?” I said, and stood up and enveloped her in my arms. She held her pretty little face up and I kissed her, long and feelingly. What happens to her? And us?
“Hey WE are doing great,” a loud voice said. I broke it off and reached around Maria and shook Jim’s hand, “How are you Doctor?”
"I am doing just great Doctor, just great,” Jim said, looking around me for the bartender. “Another day another appendix. As long as the Board doesn't catch up with me. Hey let me have a Sapphire and Tonic, Marie will have a Chardonnay and ladies," Jim turned to two others that had come in with him, “What can I get you?”
“You know,” one of the two said, and the other said “you should!”
“Oh right,” Jim said, “cosmos, pink ones, I think” and the girls nodded their heads, at about the same time. They kind of looked like twins.
"Mark, this is Sharon and Karen." Jim said, introducing the other two. "They're going to be a social worker. Ha, get it? Sharing and Caring."
The girls hit him.
"So, what are we planning tonight? Three of you, two of us, I sense magic in the air." Jim said.
The girls giggled again.
"Well, I am afraid I'm with someone exclusively," Maria said.
"Lose him!" Jim commanded. "We have no room for extras."
Maria smiled and hit Jim.
"What about your friend, doesn't he talk?" Karen said teasingly.
"Oh, he talks,” Maria said, and put her arm through mine. “He talks…the language of love.”
“Ohhhh,” they said, together.
"Do you want to go somewhere?" she asked me. She knew tomorrow was a big day, but I had been a little vague as to why. I looked in her eyes. They were smiling into mine, her eyes bright and beautiful, her face, her expressions so known to me, through years and years and years. Wow times infinity. If this isn’t love what is? And if there are two of me will that be better for her? Or not?
I pulled myself back to her, to the here and now. "I can think of one place," I said honestly.
She smiled even more at me. "Really? Gee, I can't imagine where that would be."
"Now kids," Jim broke in, "this is a public place.”
He turned.
“Ladies," he addressed the others, "These children are in the midst of the joy of love. I leave it to you. Shall we allow them the joy of being with each other in privacy, or shall we see if they can maintain a relationship under real world stress, which to my mind, would only strengthen it – as Nietzsche said of course what doesn’t destroy me makes me strong – and which goes to relationships too I think as in What doesn’t destroy them makes them strong. What should we do? What should we do? Sharon, your vote?"
The smaller of the two, or maybe not, they appeared identical, nodded solemnly. "Oh I think we have to stress them. Maria would do it for me, wouldn't you dear?" She smiled at Maria, a little maliciously. "Remember my engagement night, Maria?"
Maria laughed.
"No, viciousness now girls, no dirty laundry." Jim cried. "And you Karen?"
"Oh I agree absolutely,” the other one said, and I swear they were identical – or else sisters, or else friends who looked exactly alike (why do girls do that but not guys? Have friends who look almost exactly like them? A grouping instinct?) “I think it's our duty to stay and help them."
Jim said, "Another round Bartender, and any help you can provide in getting these two lonely kids together would be appreciated."
"So, Karen," Jim kept on, "Tell me about yourself. Your hopes, your fears, your aspirations. What do you do, who do you see, where do you go? Is there anyplace you'd rather be, anyone you'd rather see? My God," he said to the others, "I'm on a roll, spouting poetry. Don't stop me. Aren't I romantic?" he finished, leaning over and leering at them.
"And this man was my thesis advisor," Karen said, giggling.
"That's right my dear." Jim took her hand, "and now that we no longer have a professional relationship," he stressed "professional" and paused, "perhaps we can have another, more fulfilling sort of contact."
"Oh you can have that sort of contact and still have a professional relationship with her," Maria said laughing.
"Maria!" Sharon, Jim and Maria started talking at each other about Karen's virtues. I sat back and watched Maria argue. Her hair shone, her eyes were lit. She spoke with her body and her voice. She had a simple dress of some kind of shiny material. It rose to mid thigh as she sat. Her legs were crossed. They started from a pair of shiny high heels and were sheathed in dark stockings. I looked back up at my drink. Quickly. I didn't want to stare too long at the place where the legs disappeared under the skirt. Maybe one more quick look. I looked down again, quietly. Her skirt had moved up her leg a little.
"See anything you like?" she asked, catching me, and laughing at me again.
I was embarrassed. Usually I was much more subtle. Hard to control my lust now.
The rest of the evening passed wonderfully. At the end, I told Maria I couldn’t go home with her that night, or for the next few nights. She understood and kissed me long and hard. “Take care of yourself,” she said. Jim shook my hand, said, “see you tomorrow” and walked out, one arm around each of the girls.
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
ANOTHER TEAR OUT PAGE
Why am I going back to this? I thought I had made my peace with it a long time ago. Or at least buried it. It’s too damn disruptive – can’t think with it in my head. And I have to think now.
Is it the stress of what’s about to happen? The copying? The thoughts? That’s why I went into science in the first place. It was sure. One plus one equals two – and it didn’t really matter what Gödel said about proofs. But now I stand on the edge of an awesome experience and I guess, thinking rationally (which has been my salvation) (can I guess and think rationally?) the strain is taking me to places I haven’t been in forever and thought I had covered up long ago. Let’s try to get back to where I started this.
Hmmm. Nano plastic surgery. But that might be a little tough if we start messing with too much – the law of unintended consequences might rear its ugly head. And me 1.0 is ok in many ways. But maybe me 1.0 could be a little better in the non scientific side – like in emotion and caring, and those kind of things that I let slip all too often because of work. But we can’t engineer for those now anyway. And since nano me is a copy of a functional organism – me – the law of unintended consequences shouldn’t come into play.
But love created me I think. What happened later in my house didn’t change that. My mom told me that more than once, that she was in love and I was a creation of that love. So maybe it is just an extension of love for me to create another me and/or improve the other me so much that it becomes another person. But Nature has settled on its method of reproduction – not to mention God, who I am not sure about – to in part I think include two sets of DNA which increases the mixing and matching and the variety of the organisms. Although I have wondered why Nature stopped at two. Why not really mix it up with three or four or five sets of DNA? That and certain other anomalies makes me wonder about evolution as a science. And of course it is not predictive either. We can’t predict what changes may occur in the future using evolution – and predictability is supposed to be the hallmark of scientific theory.
And this is where it gets really odd. If, according to sociobiology, the genes only desire to propagate, and adaptations are precisely to accomplish that desire (but honestly I could never figure out where that desire was supposed to be – it is stored exactly where on the gene?) haven’t my genes reached unimaginable heights, by now being able to reproduce repeatedly, without love. Which also means without dilution by another’s DNA, so doesn’t that mean that my DNA have “won”!?! They have reached the ultimate pinnacle? They have exactly reproduced themselves, or will once we make nano me, without any other DNA getting involved – without watering themselves down? And once we build the nano mold my genes can reproduce as much as they want because one mold can be used for a theoretically unlimited number of copies as long as you have the nano. On the other hand, I can’t have the first set of genes that tried to reproduce asexually – don’t planaria or something do it? Maybe – and I’m assuming I am a higher life form (see modesty above) – maybe no other higher life form got the ability for a reason, it was selected against, and if so why not? Is there some issue with it, some reason it was selected against? I know by mixing more variation is achieved and likely more adaptability which is why it is seen as an advantage – but if that’s the case, why not three or four or eight mixing together? That would introduce even more variety, not to mention legitimizing orgies.
On the other hand, if we just could reproduce asexually life there would just be one of us and that one could, if it had any environmental survival skills at all, take over everything. After all, the supremacy of the hive or group think has long been touted – such as ants and bees and even the Borg (ok that last was a fictional reference…) The ultimate group think would be a colony of the exact same person – of course they would all think the same way. And, on a philosophical note, the whole private language thing kind of gets blown away – each copy would understand his other (or hers!! What would gender be anyway??) copies implicitly. (And on that private language thing it’s doubtful anyway – especially because close couples and lovers and friends have a private language – and frankly Wittgenstein and most of philosophers I know don’t have anyone they are especially close to in an emotional way – don’t even recognize the worth of emotion in communication -- so they blew that one I think, but I will be able to scientifically prove they did once we make me 2.0.)
And one more thing too. Wouldn’t it be an advantage not to go through the whole courtship thing? Not to waste time chasing after another, and using resources and neurons etc. to do all that? What if we didn’t need any of that to attract a mate? Would love and cooperation and altruism – all the things the sociobiologists think comes from our genes because we need to attract others, go away? So aside from blowing away Wittgenstein aren’t we proving (or not) all that genetic theory too?
Wow I thought this would calm me down, but not. I really am nervous.
Back to the problem right in front of me. Changes to nano me to make me a better me. I can’t change things too much till I solve the code that will let me change the nano once set. And that code is proving very tricky. Another me, another mind like me, might help there. So maybe nano me can help improve himself. Which is a fine and calming thought to end this tear out section with.
END TEAR OUT PAGE
Why am I going back to this? I thought I had made my peace with it a long time ago. Or at least buried it. It’s too damn disruptive – can’t think with it in my head. And I have to think now.
Is it the stress of what’s about to happen? The copying? The thoughts? That’s why I went into science in the first place. It was sure. One plus one equals two – and it didn’t really matter what Gödel said about proofs. But now I stand on the edge of an awesome experience and I guess, thinking rationally (which has been my salvation) (can I guess and think rationally?) the strain is taking me to places I haven’t been in forever and thought I had covered up long ago. Let’s try to get back to where I started this.
Hmmm. Nano plastic surgery. But that might be a little tough if we start messing with too much – the law of unintended consequences might rear its ugly head. And me 1.0 is ok in many ways. But maybe me 1.0 could be a little better in the non scientific side – like in emotion and caring, and those kind of things that I let slip all too often because of work. But we can’t engineer for those now anyway. And since nano me is a copy of a functional organism – me – the law of unintended consequences shouldn’t come into play.
But love created me I think. What happened later in my house didn’t change that. My mom told me that more than once, that she was in love and I was a creation of that love. So maybe it is just an extension of love for me to create another me and/or improve the other me so much that it becomes another person. But Nature has settled on its method of reproduction – not to mention God, who I am not sure about – to in part I think include two sets of DNA which increases the mixing and matching and the variety of the organisms. Although I have wondered why Nature stopped at two. Why not really mix it up with three or four or five sets of DNA? That and certain other anomalies makes me wonder about evolution as a science. And of course it is not predictive either. We can’t predict what changes may occur in the future using evolution – and predictability is supposed to be the hallmark of scientific theory.
And this is where it gets really odd. If, according to sociobiology, the genes only desire to propagate, and adaptations are precisely to accomplish that desire (but honestly I could never figure out where that desire was supposed to be – it is stored exactly where on the gene?) haven’t my genes reached unimaginable heights, by now being able to reproduce repeatedly, without love. Which also means without dilution by another’s DNA, so doesn’t that mean that my DNA have “won”!?! They have reached the ultimate pinnacle? They have exactly reproduced themselves, or will once we make nano me, without any other DNA getting involved – without watering themselves down? And once we build the nano mold my genes can reproduce as much as they want because one mold can be used for a theoretically unlimited number of copies as long as you have the nano. On the other hand, I can’t have the first set of genes that tried to reproduce asexually – don’t planaria or something do it? Maybe – and I’m assuming I am a higher life form (see modesty above) – maybe no other higher life form got the ability for a reason, it was selected against, and if so why not? Is there some issue with it, some reason it was selected against? I know by mixing more variation is achieved and likely more adaptability which is why it is seen as an advantage – but if that’s the case, why not three or four or eight mixing together? That would introduce even more variety, not to mention legitimizing orgies.
On the other hand, if we just could reproduce asexually life there would just be one of us and that one could, if it had any environmental survival skills at all, take over everything. After all, the supremacy of the hive or group think has long been touted – such as ants and bees and even the Borg (ok that last was a fictional reference…) The ultimate group think would be a colony of the exact same person – of course they would all think the same way. And, on a philosophical note, the whole private language thing kind of gets blown away – each copy would understand his other (or hers!! What would gender be anyway??) copies implicitly. (And on that private language thing it’s doubtful anyway – especially because close couples and lovers and friends have a private language – and frankly Wittgenstein and most of philosophers I know don’t have anyone they are especially close to in an emotional way – don’t even recognize the worth of emotion in communication -- so they blew that one I think, but I will be able to scientifically prove they did once we make me 2.0.)
And one more thing too. Wouldn’t it be an advantage not to go through the whole courtship thing? Not to waste time chasing after another, and using resources and neurons etc. to do all that? What if we didn’t need any of that to attract a mate? Would love and cooperation and altruism – all the things the sociobiologists think comes from our genes because we need to attract others, go away? So aside from blowing away Wittgenstein aren’t we proving (or not) all that genetic theory too?
Wow I thought this would calm me down, but not. I really am nervous.
Back to the problem right in front of me. Changes to nano me to make me a better me. I can’t change things too much till I solve the code that will let me change the nano once set. And that code is proving very tricky. Another me, another mind like me, might help there. So maybe nano me can help improve himself. Which is a fine and calming thought to end this tear out section with.
END TEAR OUT PAGE
TEAR OUT PAGE
But then me 2.0 might be better than the me 1.0. And then I will get jealous of me 2.0 (EVEN THOUGH ME 1.0 CREATED ME 2.0 – LET’S NOT FORGET THAT, 2.0 IN CASE YOU AND I HAVE ISSUES, SHALL WE?) Like God got jealous of Adam and Eve once they ate from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil becoming like Him. But He knew they would, since he knows Man in The Womb. So He created someone who He Knew was flawed. Hmmm.
“So, children,” I remember Father Bleary saying, one day, “from Jesus to the flood, how come God killed his own creations?”
Maria raised her hand because she was often the first and most prepared. “He didn’t Father, it was people who killed Jesus. And God brought the flood because people were evil.”
“But,” the good father said, “Didn’t He make them? Didn’t He know what they would do? And is it their fault He made them evil?“
No one, even Maria, said a word. We didn’t know what Bleary was doing. We didn’t know what to think.
“What about the people the evil ones hurt and killed before God killed them?” and he seemed to be looking at me, but I was having trouble focusing. I had thought that a lot at night at home before they came for me. Praying that they wouldn’t. Oh God stop them now, why me, You promised this wouldn’t happen, why me?
And now the priest dropped his voice, “and didn’t Jesus promise no one under His care would hurt or be hurt? How could that happen?”
And now I was sure he was looking at me.END TEAR OUT PAGE
But then me 2.0 might be better than the me 1.0. And then I will get jealous of me 2.0 (EVEN THOUGH ME 1.0 CREATED ME 2.0 – LET’S NOT FORGET THAT, 2.0 IN CASE YOU AND I HAVE ISSUES, SHALL WE?) Like God got jealous of Adam and Eve once they ate from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil becoming like Him. But He knew they would, since he knows Man in The Womb. So He created someone who He Knew was flawed. Hmmm.
“So, children,” I remember Father Bleary saying, one day, “from Jesus to the flood, how come God killed his own creations?”
Maria raised her hand because she was often the first and most prepared. “He didn’t Father, it was people who killed Jesus. And God brought the flood because people were evil.”
“But,” the good father said, “Didn’t He make them? Didn’t He know what they would do? And is it their fault He made them evil?“
No one, even Maria, said a word. We didn’t know what Bleary was doing. We didn’t know what to think.
“What about the people the evil ones hurt and killed before God killed them?” and he seemed to be looking at me, but I was having trouble focusing. I had thought that a lot at night at home before they came for me. Praying that they wouldn’t. Oh God stop them now, why me, You promised this wouldn’t happen, why me?
And now the priest dropped his voice, “and didn’t Jesus promise no one under His care would hurt or be hurt? How could that happen?”
And now I was sure he was looking at me.END TEAR OUT PAGE
Sunday, July 7, 2013
We are trying to plan for all contingencies, so today I am looking at myself. I am on a camera and output to a screen so I can see myself as others see me – not as I see myself in a mirror. When my nano person comes out, I want to be used to looking at me so I don’t freak when I see me in nano. A view in a mirror is different than a view in a camera, and since we are more familiar with a mirror view we don’t like picture views. So if I don’t like pictures of me, I probably really won’t like looking at nano me. Or will I? After all, identical twins like each other.
That is why we didn’t proceed beyond Jekyll. We thought that anything beyond a mouse would have freaked out (to use a scientific term) if he or she had viewed himself or herself in the flesh. A dog, if we had Nano’s a dog, would have freaked out (scientific word) if it saw himself or herself opposite him or her; another dog with the same smell, tail and whatever dogs use to communicate. We figured, without knowing truly what animals may understand (after all didn’t Wittgenstein say something about a bat or a lion or something regarding our total inability to understand them?), that a mouse was about as far as we could get in a complex CNS (“Central Nervous System”) without fucking the animal’s mind.
People are animals too, of course, but we do think that we will be able to overcome with rationality (or “free will”) such freaky things as seeing ourselves opposite us. That is why I think I can tolerate seeing me.
I want to have the memory of looking at me too, for my nano me, so that he can be as familiar as I am with looking at me. Like I said above, what is in my mind should be in his mind…we should be just about the same person once we make him.
But we can’t be the same person. That would be impossible. He will be a different person but me in body and mind. And soul if we have one or if nano will copy that too. Of course, if he has no soul and I do that would be rough on him and he would be different although query if you were missing a soul would you know it? The Catholic church which might be the best authority we have or at least the oldest, would say that a soul is not matter, so we won’t be able to reproduce a soul by simply copying matter though nano. But the Catholic Church believes in God too, in a physical manifestation of God that walked this planet – made of God nano? Hmmm, this is the first time I’ve thought about it but it seems that the closest analogy to what we are doing IS the Trinity, Three Persons in One Godhead. Of course, I do know that the Roman Catholics believe Nature (or (“God-ness”) came first and Personality came second, while the Greek Catholics believe Personality came first and Nature comes from Personality. So under Roman Catholic theology I will share my nature with nano me and only second are we separate persons, while under Greek Catholic theology I will be separate people and have separate natures…
Awesome. I am going to delve into the nature of the Godhead by this experiment. And figure out if Man has a soul. But at the least we should be able to create a me of nano, just like Hyde is like Jekyll. And Hyde seems happy enough – even if he doesn’t have a soul. (And I know animals aren’t supposed to have souls so maybe I can’t use them as a precursor experiment to me.)
So that leaves the questions of whether nano me will have a soul and of course assuming there is such a thing, which science theoretically had settled long ago. Kind of like math had settled the universal consistency of numbers. Or didn’t. That is a dig at my friends the mathematicians who like to pretend their “queen of the sciences” is settled. It isn’t. And I still think one day everything will come crashing around down our ears because Pythagoras or Euler or Hilbert or someone made a basic logical error.
But it hasn’t yet. And we were able to use math to construct our quite miraculous nano. And whether or not the me who assumedly has a soul will recognize the me who assumedly doesn’t as me or even as human is an interesting question, but I don’t think the soul question will lead to disaster like the math question could. (Cue Adam and Eve and their attempt to know good and evil…or Icarus and his pride…or Oedipus, or Doctor Faust, etc. etc. But I really don’t think that will be an issue…)
And then we are also attempting to gain insight into the nature or nurture question – nano me’s nature and nurture will be essentially the same, but environmental variables will soon be different. I guess to truly answer that question I would have to nano a baby…hmmm…but for right now it is enough to track the environmental variables which may well give insight to the question. How soon will he start being different? Will he ever be different?
And that brings us full circle more or less to what I am doing right now. I am writing this and occasionally looking up, at the life size me in the screen opposite. I am looping a previous movie I took, of me writing in another notebook. I see my head bent down and the top of my mostly black haired head. Getting a little thin up there. I remember once I asked a barber if it was getting thin and he said it’s “not that bad”. “Not that bad”! “Damn No!” would have been the right answer! I don’t care what the evidence showed, I wanted to hear “Damn No!” With the exclamation point. I never went back.
Maybe I can patch it in with little nano. We make people and replace hair too!
Me on the screen looks up and stares straight ahead. At me here without seeing. I freeze the image. I stare at me, the me on the screen unconscious of me staring at me. I get up and look at me closer. Regular enough features. Dark eyes. Afore (lawyer word!) mentioned hair. We’ve recorded this and other movies for another reason. Teams are ready to record nano me and compare every gesture and every movement to me-me. Will there be any differences? Poor nano me. He will have to get used to that too. But he already did as me-me. Till I revolted and killed the feed – jammed it. Couldn’t think with constant observation. Nano me should be able to last though as long as I did –two weeks. To make it fair to him I’ll record me, as long as he does. Hopefully we can get him to keep a notebook too, and I will too, so we can compare those too. Because we still aren’t sure – but we think – the copying operation leaves no mark. But it is good science to make as many observations as possible.
I am getting a little nervous about all this. Got to watch that. It helps no one. And if I am nervous going in then nano me will have a nervous pattern coming out. Will that impact nano me?
And for God’s sake we need a better name for nano me. I don’t want to be called anything but me and if someone tries it will get old real quick. We couldn’t think of a good name for him so I have proposed we do the decent thing. Let him name him.
I have also tried to make sure that other things that would drive me nuts upon first arrival are taken care of to the extent we can. So for the record (as you lawyers say) it should be clear that nano me is inheriting half my property. Half of everything I own goes to him upon completion – upon his first breath. The lawyers have obtained an opinion from a judge that this transfer is legally recognizable. But there is no transfer of my remaining share ever – why tempt nano me to off me-me? But nano-me wouldn’t off me-me cause I am nano-me too up to this point or a little further till we actually create him and I wouldn’t off me-me or nano me. After all I created nano me. Or would I? After all God offed his creations, and let them suffer and be tortured.
I looked at me again. Looking at every line hair and pore on the screen. My vision is still good and I still look good. Thirty two and too much work hasn’t dented me yet. Otherwise I would do nano surgery on me. We make people and replace hair and fix vision too! We can do nano plastic surgery too. So why not tune up the face and/or body?
There will be one difference between me and him, so we and everyone else can tell us apart. Not for us one of those mistaken identity things in movies. I will have a unique radioactive signature, a small implant, placed under my skin in my right hand as soon as the copying is done. He won’t. And the implant will be as unique as possible, locked by a code that will take something like 10 to the 128th power to unlock. So we will be able to be uniquely id’d.
That is why we didn’t proceed beyond Jekyll. We thought that anything beyond a mouse would have freaked out (to use a scientific term) if he or she had viewed himself or herself in the flesh. A dog, if we had Nano’s a dog, would have freaked out (scientific word) if it saw himself or herself opposite him or her; another dog with the same smell, tail and whatever dogs use to communicate. We figured, without knowing truly what animals may understand (after all didn’t Wittgenstein say something about a bat or a lion or something regarding our total inability to understand them?), that a mouse was about as far as we could get in a complex CNS (“Central Nervous System”) without fucking the animal’s mind.
People are animals too, of course, but we do think that we will be able to overcome with rationality (or “free will”) such freaky things as seeing ourselves opposite us. That is why I think I can tolerate seeing me.
I want to have the memory of looking at me too, for my nano me, so that he can be as familiar as I am with looking at me. Like I said above, what is in my mind should be in his mind…we should be just about the same person once we make him.
But we can’t be the same person. That would be impossible. He will be a different person but me in body and mind. And soul if we have one or if nano will copy that too. Of course, if he has no soul and I do that would be rough on him and he would be different although query if you were missing a soul would you know it? The Catholic church which might be the best authority we have or at least the oldest, would say that a soul is not matter, so we won’t be able to reproduce a soul by simply copying matter though nano. But the Catholic Church believes in God too, in a physical manifestation of God that walked this planet – made of God nano? Hmmm, this is the first time I’ve thought about it but it seems that the closest analogy to what we are doing IS the Trinity, Three Persons in One Godhead. Of course, I do know that the Roman Catholics believe Nature (or (“God-ness”) came first and Personality came second, while the Greek Catholics believe Personality came first and Nature comes from Personality. So under Roman Catholic theology I will share my nature with nano me and only second are we separate persons, while under Greek Catholic theology I will be separate people and have separate natures…
Awesome. I am going to delve into the nature of the Godhead by this experiment. And figure out if Man has a soul. But at the least we should be able to create a me of nano, just like Hyde is like Jekyll. And Hyde seems happy enough – even if he doesn’t have a soul. (And I know animals aren’t supposed to have souls so maybe I can’t use them as a precursor experiment to me.)
So that leaves the questions of whether nano me will have a soul and of course assuming there is such a thing, which science theoretically had settled long ago. Kind of like math had settled the universal consistency of numbers. Or didn’t. That is a dig at my friends the mathematicians who like to pretend their “queen of the sciences” is settled. It isn’t. And I still think one day everything will come crashing around down our ears because Pythagoras or Euler or Hilbert or someone made a basic logical error.
But it hasn’t yet. And we were able to use math to construct our quite miraculous nano. And whether or not the me who assumedly has a soul will recognize the me who assumedly doesn’t as me or even as human is an interesting question, but I don’t think the soul question will lead to disaster like the math question could. (Cue Adam and Eve and their attempt to know good and evil…or Icarus and his pride…or Oedipus, or Doctor Faust, etc. etc. But I really don’t think that will be an issue…)
And then we are also attempting to gain insight into the nature or nurture question – nano me’s nature and nurture will be essentially the same, but environmental variables will soon be different. I guess to truly answer that question I would have to nano a baby…hmmm…but for right now it is enough to track the environmental variables which may well give insight to the question. How soon will he start being different? Will he ever be different?
And that brings us full circle more or less to what I am doing right now. I am writing this and occasionally looking up, at the life size me in the screen opposite. I am looping a previous movie I took, of me writing in another notebook. I see my head bent down and the top of my mostly black haired head. Getting a little thin up there. I remember once I asked a barber if it was getting thin and he said it’s “not that bad”. “Not that bad”! “Damn No!” would have been the right answer! I don’t care what the evidence showed, I wanted to hear “Damn No!” With the exclamation point. I never went back.
Maybe I can patch it in with little nano. We make people and replace hair too!
Me on the screen looks up and stares straight ahead. At me here without seeing. I freeze the image. I stare at me, the me on the screen unconscious of me staring at me. I get up and look at me closer. Regular enough features. Dark eyes. Afore (lawyer word!) mentioned hair. We’ve recorded this and other movies for another reason. Teams are ready to record nano me and compare every gesture and every movement to me-me. Will there be any differences? Poor nano me. He will have to get used to that too. But he already did as me-me. Till I revolted and killed the feed – jammed it. Couldn’t think with constant observation. Nano me should be able to last though as long as I did –two weeks. To make it fair to him I’ll record me, as long as he does. Hopefully we can get him to keep a notebook too, and I will too, so we can compare those too. Because we still aren’t sure – but we think – the copying operation leaves no mark. But it is good science to make as many observations as possible.
I am getting a little nervous about all this. Got to watch that. It helps no one. And if I am nervous going in then nano me will have a nervous pattern coming out. Will that impact nano me?
And for God’s sake we need a better name for nano me. I don’t want to be called anything but me and if someone tries it will get old real quick. We couldn’t think of a good name for him so I have proposed we do the decent thing. Let him name him.
I have also tried to make sure that other things that would drive me nuts upon first arrival are taken care of to the extent we can. So for the record (as you lawyers say) it should be clear that nano me is inheriting half my property. Half of everything I own goes to him upon completion – upon his first breath. The lawyers have obtained an opinion from a judge that this transfer is legally recognizable. But there is no transfer of my remaining share ever – why tempt nano me to off me-me? But nano-me wouldn’t off me-me cause I am nano-me too up to this point or a little further till we actually create him and I wouldn’t off me-me or nano me. After all I created nano me. Or would I? After all God offed his creations, and let them suffer and be tortured.
I looked at me again. Looking at every line hair and pore on the screen. My vision is still good and I still look good. Thirty two and too much work hasn’t dented me yet. Otherwise I would do nano surgery on me. We make people and replace hair and fix vision too! We can do nano plastic surgery too. So why not tune up the face and/or body?
There will be one difference between me and him, so we and everyone else can tell us apart. Not for us one of those mistaken identity things in movies. I will have a unique radioactive signature, a small implant, placed under my skin in my right hand as soon as the copying is done. He won’t. And the implant will be as unique as possible, locked by a code that will take something like 10 to the 128th power to unlock. So we will be able to be uniquely id’d.
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