these sentence fragments—
A little warily I recited Presley’s three thought fragments, then mine, without telling him that they belonged to two different people.
TOM:
Can you tell me more about these fragments, Frank? Where are they from?
Had Tom’s voice softened? Was he getting nosy?
FRANK:
No, for now just tell me, what do you make of them? What do they say to you? Give me some narratives that connect them, Tom.
Tom came up with an endless list of scenarios using those fragments, and I gave up.
FRANK:
Okay. Thanks. Bye, Tom.
TOM:
If you tell me a little more about where they come from, Frank, I could narrow the number of narratives by a factor of ten or even a hundred.
FRANK:
Bye, Tom.
At this stage, I had begun to suspect, I could have narrowed down the number of possible narratives even further than Tom could. Intuition is one thing a human has that an electronic mind doesn’t. A feeling in the gut. Or does the Cyliton have even
that
capacity nowadays?
NINE
OVER THE DAYS THAT FOLLOWED , chaotic Maskinia continued to grab the headlines. Holly Chu’s abduction was shown constantly on the tube, the background roll to any discussion of Over There and Over Here. The now standard depiction of the gruesome scene had been cut in such a way that the dark space into which the girl was pulled while walking on that slum street was projected starkly in front of you, a pitch-blackness in your room inside which gleaming eyeballs and grinning white teeth flitted and floated about. It could have been comical, but for that short, chilling scream, the meaning of which you were only too aware. You were warned, of course, of the scene’s disturbing content, which was why many of us returned to watch it in the first place. To be shocked and to wonder, yet once again:Can this truly happen? And there she is, our Holly, snatched away before our own eyes, what are we going to do about it? Who are those people who do this kind of thing? Who are these cannibals?
Of course Holly Chu was also now entertainment, tonic for media ratings, bait for pundits to come and dissimulate. Consider this:
As I sit watching, the scene before me fades out and the brightly lit set of
The Daily Goode
appears. And there stands the mauveine-haired Bill Goode with doughy white face and trademark strip of a grin. He’s wearing a green blazer over a red golf shirt; on his lapel is pinned a small yellow ribbon under a white flower. The background music is as always cheerfully suspenseful, following the rise and fall of the applause. As the sound subsides, the host announces,
—Folks. Today’s subject is simple:
Why?
Now don’t ask me—
He turns on his mischievous grin, and the audience—those shown in the mock studio, at least—cracks up. We’re all encouraged to join in.
—Consider this—he begins,—and don’t get me wrong, I’m not advocating…
As we know he has a way with his hands—he holds them down at the sides, palms out; he points a finger at you; he joins both palms together in front of him; he pulls them back over his shoulders in a mock gesture of something and then turns and performs a golf swing.
—I’m dead serious. We want to understand why this kind of incident—the one you just saw to remind you—hasto happen—how it can happen in this day and age—and we have a guest today to help us understand. Folks, let’s welcome Peter Crawford, psychologist!
The audience applauds as Bill steps forward, extending a handshake, then with a warm gesture guides the guest to the chair next to the host table.
Peter Crawford is the author of the recent book
Between Here and There: Are We Still on the Road?
Short and thickset, sporting tinted retro glasses, he too wears a yellow ribbon on his lapel and there’s a twinkling smile on his smooth, flushed face.
—Thank you, Bill, he says in a somewhat high-pitched voice and looks around.—It’s really nice to be here. Thank you for having me.
Bill replies graciously,—It’s
A little warily I recited Presley’s three thought fragments, then mine, without telling him that they belonged to two different people.
TOM:
Can you tell me more about these fragments, Frank? Where are they from?
Had Tom’s voice softened? Was he getting nosy?
FRANK:
No, for now just tell me, what do you make of them? What do they say to you? Give me some narratives that connect them, Tom.
Tom came up with an endless list of scenarios using those fragments, and I gave up.
FRANK:
Okay. Thanks. Bye, Tom.
TOM:
If you tell me a little more about where they come from, Frank, I could narrow the number of narratives by a factor of ten or even a hundred.
FRANK:
Bye, Tom.
At this stage, I had begun to suspect, I could have narrowed down the number of possible narratives even further than Tom could. Intuition is one thing a human has that an electronic mind doesn’t. A feeling in the gut. Or does the Cyliton have even
that
capacity nowadays?
NINE
OVER THE DAYS THAT FOLLOWED , chaotic Maskinia continued to grab the headlines. Holly Chu’s abduction was shown constantly on the tube, the background roll to any discussion of Over There and Over Here. The now standard depiction of the gruesome scene had been cut in such a way that the dark space into which the girl was pulled while walking on that slum street was projected starkly in front of you, a pitch-blackness in your room inside which gleaming eyeballs and grinning white teeth flitted and floated about. It could have been comical, but for that short, chilling scream, the meaning of which you were only too aware. You were warned, of course, of the scene’s disturbing content, which was why many of us returned to watch it in the first place. To be shocked and to wonder, yet once again:Can this truly happen? And there she is, our Holly, snatched away before our own eyes, what are we going to do about it? Who are those people who do this kind of thing? Who are these cannibals?
Of course Holly Chu was also now entertainment, tonic for media ratings, bait for pundits to come and dissimulate. Consider this:
As I sit watching, the scene before me fades out and the brightly lit set of
The Daily Goode
appears. And there stands the mauveine-haired Bill Goode with doughy white face and trademark strip of a grin. He’s wearing a green blazer over a red golf shirt; on his lapel is pinned a small yellow ribbon under a white flower. The background music is as always cheerfully suspenseful, following the rise and fall of the applause. As the sound subsides, the host announces,
—Folks. Today’s subject is simple:
Why?
Now don’t ask me—
He turns on his mischievous grin, and the audience—those shown in the mock studio, at least—cracks up. We’re all encouraged to join in.
—Consider this—he begins,—and don’t get me wrong, I’m not advocating…
As we know he has a way with his hands—he holds them down at the sides, palms out; he points a finger at you; he joins both palms together in front of him; he pulls them back over his shoulders in a mock gesture of something and then turns and performs a golf swing.
—I’m dead serious. We want to understand why this kind of incident—the one you just saw to remind you—hasto happen—how it can happen in this day and age—and we have a guest today to help us understand. Folks, let’s welcome Peter Crawford, psychologist!
The audience applauds as Bill steps forward, extending a handshake, then with a warm gesture guides the guest to the chair next to the host table.
Peter Crawford is the author of the recent book
Between Here and There: Are We Still on the Road?
Short and thickset, sporting tinted retro glasses, he too wears a yellow ribbon on his lapel and there’s a twinkling smile on his smooth, flushed face.
—Thank you, Bill, he says in a somewhat high-pitched voice and looks around.—It’s really nice to be here. Thank you for having me.
Bill replies graciously,—It’s
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