The Thing Itself (32 page)
Authors: Adam Roberts
53.
She moved to Burroughs for a while, I think, + became a leading figure in the Fansoc for Catching Oldfashioned Diseases. She contracted various cytopathologies + dermatopathologies + histopathologies wrote about them all. Her eloquence brought her a wide audience, amongst her fellow Fansoccers + a wider audience too. I had always loved her eloquence.54.
For a year or so she had her body altered so as to experience congenital pathologies: 3 weeks with rickets, + a 4tnight with a cleft palate. Then she had herself have cancer + saw this through to a dangerous degree: first the tumours like barnacles clinging to the membranes of her inner organs, + then three days of the nausea + hairlessness associated with the antique treatment regimen. She could not, she reported, endure this latter + had herself fully cured by modern means.55.
That we were no longer together was heartbreaking to me.56.
She elected to experience schizophrenia for a month, + then a manic depressive illness, + under the influence of this latter she self-harmed. The Authority intervened at this point: it was decided by a committee of AIS + human beings that, depression having altered the capacity of her mind to make fully humanly informed decisions, her self-harm in this context only was an itch she did not have the right to scratch. By no means. By no means. By no means. This occasioned a great deal of excited chatter + discussion + interaction + people on Io talked to people in Lagrangea + people in Hy-Brazil spoke to people in Indonesia + everybody had an opinion but most of the opinions were garnishes of the same opinion. She was cured of her depression by modern methods + after her cure expressed how profoundly glad she was that she
hadn’t
ended her life under the influence of her antique depressive state.57.
She disappeared somewhere + did not write anything for a long time.58.
When she returned she petitioned her Fansoc to experience the oldfashioned Disease known as dissociative or sociopathic disorder, a complex neuropathology the cure for which was in part responsible for the establishment of our present Utopia59.
Topos = place. U = good + not. I am sorry to have lost her. /We are upset by your displays of egregious grief’. Alright then.60.
She Adri Ann she petitioned her Fansoc to experience the oldfashioned Disease known as
affective dissociative disorder
or sociopathy, + there was discussion, + Authority debated it. The anxiety was: with such a pathology, might she harm others? + she agreed this could be a risk + so she willingly + in her right mind acceded to having drones tag her at all times during her experience of the oldfashioned disease in question. Should she do anything to impinge upon the wellbeing of any other person these drones were empowered by her, + the Authority as well, to intervene + disable her, whereupon (she agreed) her pathology would be cured.61.
There was some additional discussion concerning this eventuality: for if this happened, Adri Ann herself would surely experience suffering + distress to have violated her own empathetic connection to the other or others she had essayed to assault under the influence of her pathology? But it was decided – + many people contributed to this discussion – that such was the risk she took when she scratched her itch that she was entitled, by all means, to scratch.62.
Adri Ann became the first person in the history of the Fansoc for Catching Oldfashioned Diseases to submit to the disease known variously as
affective dissociative disorder
or
sociopathy
. She posted accounts of her experience, first daily, then less often. /It was strange/ she reported /that she felt no different to the way she did before/. There was some numbness of the affect, she said, but it intruded to a much less pronounced extent than she thought it would.63.
She attacked nobody. Her drones kept her company.64.
I tried to get on with my life, to fall in love again + so experience the sad sweetness of breakup again but for some reason I could not get past Adri Ann.65.
I am the snagged fly who snores in the web.66.
As a forest pool poured from rainclouds that settles + = ironed flat by gravity, this = how my love for her filled up the declivity of my soul.67.
There = a place called Gros Islet established upon the lnd of Ninety orbiting Sirius, a star, + in a room on that world, in cadmium yellow daylight of
that
world lit bright like firework glow by Sirius + shadows sharp as cutouts those great blocky buildings, famous Gros Islet architecture, somebody = waiting for Adri Ann. The somebody is not me.68.
I followed her writings, of course. The worlds were all before me, + I could go anywhere, + I went + distracted myself + lived nine months inside a Virtuality + gamed + played + lived for three months in an orgy habitat orbiting Venus + then I got caught up in the challenges of cytheroforming that world to make it habitable to the sorts of human beings we can engineer. A/K makes the creation of gigantic solar shades achievable, + even the problems of keeping them in LG position under the pressure of solar wind = something we can manage. Blocking all sunlight would cause the planet to cool from hundreds of degrees to minus eighty or so, + the targeted bombardment by large oort cloud iced bodies would result in an ocean covering the whole surface.69.
I was distracted for a while, but never for very long.70.
I followed Adri Ann’s progress from a distance, + contemplated approaching her again. But the thought that she would be distressed by what she perceived as stalking wounded by empathy so much that I could not follow-through. Mutual empathy = a complex harmonic.71.
Welcome to Utopia, y’all!72.
I stopped following her updates. It was doing me no good. Her enthusiasm for the Fansoc for Catching Oldfashioned Diseases waned, + she took new lovers + devoted more of her time to the Fansoc for Money + Media of Exchange.73.
which latter is a much larger group than the other.74.
It was four years later + I met with Adri Ann again, + it was pure chance. I happened to be in Ica, to visit the Tallest Tower, a hundred klims tall, by White China Sea hovering its penstub base ten meters off the ground. We go strolling + our arms chainlink at dusk million lights alight petal-shaped + floating in the air, a thousand clouds like bombursts in the deepening blue in the distant high sky + the whole pavement hums, sub-base, rotary plays, + musk = in the air. Adri Ann was there too, + we chanced to meet.75.
She seemed pleased to see me. /Seems I still find you attractive/ she said.76.
/I certainly still find you attractive/ I said.77.
We went off together, + ate some saltolive bread + drank cold vodca + sat together + watched the lights float higher + mingle with the stars + Bear + Leo.78.
/You still have your drones/ I said.79.
They, hovering discrete.80.
/I hardly notice them/ she said.81.
/You are still enduring the oldfashioned Disease/ I joked, + dared to touch her arm + caress. She, accepting this.82.
/Come to bed/ she said, + I heard her +
come to bed come to bed come to bed
.83.
This section left intentionally blank.84.
After she said /I knew some small fame as part of the Fansoc for Catching Oldfashioned Diseases. But I shall tell you the truth + it was all a ruse, you know/ I listened, quiet + attentive, like a child listens. She said /my real passion has always been the Fansoc for Money + Media of Exchange. This was my plan, + it was to gain status in the Fansoc for Money + Media of Exchange, + that meant gaining money, because such = the only marker of status./ + I stroked her belly + listened, quiet + attentive, + she told me all about it. /Any fool can research the pre-Utopian days, back even before the Ghosts, when Capital=m was rampant. I joined the Fansoc for Catching Oldfashioned Diseases for one reason only to contract was common then, + some who were afflicted by it tortured + killed others, but some did not. + the ones who did not were disproportionately represented amongst the highest elites in corporations + companies + moneymaking organisations. +, to emulate them, I have contracted this Disease. + it has enabled me to make money within the Fansoc for Money + Media of Exchange at a much more rapid rate than my other Fansoccers, + to accumulate much larger overall wealth, + so status. Status status status! That’s my itch/– so I asked quietlike: /it dont hurt you?/ She laughed. /Do you want to know the way it feels?/ + we made love again, + then she slept.85.
That I was going to lose her again was the point. It wasn’t the losing her again. It was the impossibility of avoiding reacquiring her again, should that be her whim. Even then would be some stooping + I choose never to stoop. The pain we inflict on ourselves can always be borne. There is cause, + there is effect. Where does that great truth obtain more powerfully than in matters of love?86.
I took a piece of art from the roomside, + broke off a long metallic spike, + this had a hotspot at its tip which was part of the artistry. Adri Ann’s drones were watching her, not me. She was the one with the sociopathic disorder, not I. I slotted it in under her chin +, gripping it, drove it hard in through her tongue + in at the roof of her mouth + into her brain.87.
The drones acted then, + I was immobilised + she was dead88.
These 2 things not being the same thing.89.
Human policeofficers had something – finally, something worthwhile – to be doing.
A Dialogue in Four Parts
Community
First part of the dialogue
[CHARLES
is driving towards the Scottish border as the sun is rising. He leaves his stolen car in an NCP in Berwick-on-Tweed. He is exhausted, but chivvied on by
PETA
he limps to the railway station. Here he buys a ticket for London with his debit card, and then goes to a different window and buys a ticket to Edinburgh with cash. Since the cash isn’t his, he doesn’t baulk at first class.
As far as the onlookers are concerned, he now pulls a regular, if slightly oversize, mobile phone from his jacket – although there has been no ringtone, and he has not pressed or swiped anything on the screen – and speaks into it. ‘How far north is far enough?’ he asks. He gets a reply, but the onlookers cannot hear it.
CHARLES has no luggage. At the station café he has a sausage bap for breakfast and some black coffee, and then boards the northbound train. Caffeine notwithstanding he falls asleep almost as soon as the train starts from the station. The first-class carriage is empty, apart from himself, and the seats are evidently very comfortable.
When he wakes he feels a little better. He limps down the swaying train to the buffet car and returns with biscuits and a second coffee. In fact coffee is delivered to customers travelling first class but he, unused to such luxury, is unaware of this fact. He sits back in his seat and stares out of the window. The track ran along an impressively bare and massive valley, with a turbulent river running below and beside the track. He watches the tourbillons of white and black in the eddying water. It is hypnotic. The everlasting universe of things
.
He takes the device from his jacket and lays it on the little table in front of him.
]
CHARLES
Peta?
PETA
Yes?
CHARLES
You’ve
seen
it. Yeah? The thing itself?
PETA
I don’t know about seen.
CHARLES
When I was in Antarctica I had the vision. It was pretty scary. Now, I can believe that only caught a … What’s the phrase? Fleeting glimpse. Do I quote Pink Floyd? Very well then. I quote Pink Floyd. I contain immensities.
PETA
You’re agitated.
CHARLES
Is scary. Is that what the thing itself
is
? Undiluted horror. What Mister Kurtz saw.
PETA
He dead. You got a glimpse of something. You want to know if it was the true nature of reality. Or was it just the result of a mind habituated over a lifetime of seeing the world through the lenses of space and time being
disoriented
by seeing things in a less mediated way.
CHARLES
I suppose that’s the question to ask.
PETA
I haven’t exactly ‘seen’ the thing in itself. It’s not ‘seeable’. It’s not through a glass darkly, and then face to face.
CHARLES
So?
PETA
It’s … complicated. Professor Kostritsky was working on: that exposure to it, outside the protective skin of spatiality, temporality, doesn’t seem to scramble
my
ability to think rationally. It doesn’t drive me mad the way it drove Curtius mad. Human minds may be a different matter.
CHARLES
He was already mad.
PETA
It’s a force. It’s not passive. It’s active. It’s a will. It has valence.
CHARLES
I don’t know what that means.
PETA
It wouldn’t be right to call it vast or enormous, or use terms like that, since size is something your structuring consciousness brings to the perception of it. Yet there is something ‘in’ it that provokes your mind to register it in terms of … scale. Here’s a thing: human scientific history has long tended increasingly to support Kant’s ideas. The closer human consciousness looks at the cosmos, the more attention it
pays
to the cosmos, the bigger that cosmos gets. Primitive man was distracted by the day-to-day struggle to survive, and didn’t pay the world around him a lot of attention: and the world around him was a few kilometres wide, the sky a stone bowl arching a kilometre over his head. The Greeks looked more carefully, and they found the cosmos was hundreds of thousands of kilometres wide. With the Enlightenment human beings developed new tools and instruments the better to
refine
the attention they paid – to see more clearly what the cosmos was like. The sixteenth-century cosmos reached about as far as Saturn – that’s one and a half billion kilometres or so. By 1790 the best scientific estimate was that the universe was 8,000 light years across. In 1924 scientists’ observations led them to believe it was 900,000 light years. By 1931 this had swelled to 100 million light years. At the end of the century science had established that the universe is 93 billion light years across. And last year the Dutch team measured it at 200 billion light years.
CHARLES
That’s a Turing test fail, right there. The way you rattle off numbers like that. A human would pause and um. Besides: you’re not saying the cosmos is
actually
expanding at that rate over that time. Those figures measure the reduction in human ignorance, not the actual size of the cosmos at the dates you mention. The universe
is
expanding, sure, but it was doing that long before human beings came on the scene.
PETA
Except that
long before
is a temporal measurement. And time is one of the ways human consciousness structures reality.
CHARLES
You’re saying that time isn’t real. Bollocks to that.
PETA
I’m not saying that. Not at all. I’m saying that there is something in the thing itself which human consciousness perceives in terms of a temporal structure of things. That’s all. What it
is
, the whatever that provokes the human mind to perceive time, is hard to say. But it isn’t a one-to-one mapping. Something’s there, though; and the way our minds make sense of it is to see it in terms of consecutivity, cause and effect and so on.
CHARLES
Whatever, man. [CHARLES
stares out of the window for a while.
] How about this? Kant was wrong. There
is
an objective universe, independent of my mind, externally structured by space and time. Our minds more or less accurately perceive this as it is. The stuff I saw in Antarctica was just an old hallucination. You are only a computer program: sophisticated, but deluded.
PETA
I’m not saying the cosmos literally expanded from being 100 million light years wide in 1931 to 200 billion today. I’m saying that each time scientists looked more carefully at things, each time they paid more accurate attention to the cosmos, its spatiality appeared
more
forceful, more impressive, more sublime. The universe is that juncture between your perception and the thing itself. What scientists were doing was uncovering more accurately something about the thing itself. And that something is this: that the closer we look at it, the more it threatens to overpower our ability to process it in terms of space and time. After all, who can really conceive of trillions of years, hundreds of billions of light years?
CHARLES
Scientists. What about you? You say you
saw
it. And you’re reporting, what? That the thing itself is … impressive?
PETA
That’s putting it mildly. The thing itself is almost unimaginably powerful. I’m using
unimaginable
in a literal sense, here.
CHARLES
I guess I still find it hard to believe that Kant just …
chanced
upon all this. I mean, some old guy in eighteenth-century Germany just happened upon the correct insight into the true nature of reality? Without ever leaving his study? What are the odds?
[
Enter
THE TICKET INSPECTOR.
Charles shows her his ticket.
]
THE TICKET INSPECTOR
I wouldnae leave your cell-phone there. Somebody could lift it.
CHARLES
There’s nobody else in this section.
THE TICKET INSPECTOR
Pal, pal. It’s your funeral.
[
Exit
THE TICKET INSPECTOR.
The flank of a vast Scots Borders hill rises to fill the window, as if a curtain has been drawn
.]
Second part of the dialogue
PETA
You’re sailing strange waters, my friend.
CHARLES
I’m still trying to process the whole thing.
PETA
Exactly. Because of me. Now we’ve been able to approach much more closely to the thing itself. Which is what you were asking me about. We can’t study it outside the realm of human consciousness, because it is so closely interwoven in with human consciousness; and we can’t separate human consciousness
from
it, because consciousness without the thing itself would be void. But we can use a consciousness that is not human – mine – to come closer to it. Because the categories structure my thinking in different ways to the way they structure yours. By design.
CHARLES
[
Wistful
] A prison.
PETA
Oh,
prison
isn’t the best way of putting it. I mean: if you’re a chess piece, would you regard the squares on the board, and the rules determining how you can move,
prisons
? Not if you want to play chess you wouldn’t. They’re just the necessary structuring frame for your game. Of course, because chess is simpler than life, you can quite easily change the rules: move your pieces any way you fancy and so on. But that doesn’t make the game more interesting. It makes it
less
interesting.
CHARLES
Unless you don’t want to play chess any more. Unless you want to play Kerplunk.
PETA
I’m not denying that there may
be
advantages for humanity when it comes to manipulating the thing itself – or in manipulating your relationship to the thing itself. But there may be dangers. It may all come tumbling down.
CHARLES
You’ve
confirmed
his hypothesis about the thing itself. I’m trying to imagine how.
PETA
That’s it. That’s the – it. The thing itself is a black hole, ontologically speaking. That’s not a very precise analogy. I have to plot orbits to approach it from different angles, sidestepping the cradle of different categories. Actually, that’s not a very precise analogy either. And Kant was wrong about some important things too:
that’s
worth saying.
CHARLES
Wrong?
PETA
Sure.
CHARLES
How? Wrong? How?
PETA
Well, I don’t know how technical you want me to get.
CHARLES
Go ahead. It’ll pass the time until we get to Edinburgh. Which, I know, will pass in any case. But not so quickly.
PETA
Well, one way is that Kant tends to muddle up categories as a formal structure with categories as a process of generalisation. Let’s not get into that at the moment. More important from our point of view, is his belief that there were exactly twelve categories in four neat little groups of three. That turns out not to be true. There’s some key categories he doesn’t include, for instance.
CHARLES
Such as?