man is man. A free creature. The master of his fate and his actions. And
that freedom began long before all the rebellions and revolutions, on that
distant day when a humanlike ape thought: 'I can climb up the tree to get
the fruit but I can also knock it down with the stick in my hand. Which is
better?' It wasn't just thinking, that ape-it had seen storms make branches
knock down fruit. Freedom was the opportunity to choose a variant of
behavior based on knowledge. From that day every discovery, every invention
has given people new opportunities, made them even freer.
"Of course, there have been discoveries (not many) that told people:
don't! You can't build perpetual motion machines; you can't pass the speed
of light; you can't accurately measure the speed and position of an electron
simultaneously. But our discovery forbids nothing and doesn't change
anything. It says: go ahead!
"Freedom. It's not easy to recognize your freedom in our modern
society, and pick variations of your behavior wisely and well. Millions of
years of the past hang over man when biological laws determined the behavior
of his ancestors and everything was simple. And now he is still trying to
lay the blame for his mistakes on circumstances, on cruel fate, and to place
hopes in God, on a strong personality, on luck-just so it's not him. And
when the hopes shatter, man looks and finds a scapegoat: the people who had
raised the hopes are free of guilt. In essence, people who take the path of
least resistance do not know freedom."
The peephole in the door opened, letting in a ray of light; it was
blocked by the guard's face. They were probably checking to see if he was
planning another break. Victor Kravets laughed silently: naturally the clink
was the best place to meditate on freedom! He acknowledged with pleasure
that despite all the recent hassles he hadn't lost his sense of humor.
Double Adam-Hercules was sitting and reminiscing on a bench at the bus
stop on an empty street. Yesterday, as he was coming from the railroad
station, thinking about the three currents of information (science, life,
art) that affect man, he had the beginnings of a vague, but very important
idea. He was interrupted by the three men with the demand to show his
papers, those so and so's.... He was left with the feeling that he had been
close to a valuable guess. He would have been better off without it, that
feeling. Now he wouldn't get any sleep!
"Let's try it again. I was thinking about what information can be used,
and how, to ennoble man? Krivoshein had the idea of synthesizing a knight
'without fear or flaw.' And now I've got it and I can't reject it. I ruled
out information from the environment and from science, because their
influence on man can be equally good or bad. There is only the method of
awakening good thoughts with a lyre-art.
True, it does awaken them, but the lyre is an imperfect instrument;
while it's being plinked, man is ennobled, but when it stops, so does the
effect. There is something left, of course, but not much, just a superficial
memory of seeing a play or reading a book. Well, all right, what if we
introduce this information into the computer-womb during the synthesis of
man. What if we record the contents of many books, show several excellent
movies? It would be the same thing: it would remain in the superficial
memory-and that's all. After all, the book's not about him!
"Aha, that's what I was thinking about: there is a transparent wall
between the source of art information and its receptor-a concrete human
being. What is that wall? Damn it, will life experience always be the main
factor in the formation of the personality? Do you have to suffer yourself,
to understand the suffering of others? Make mistakes to learn the right way?
Like a child who has to burn himself to keep from sticking his hand in the
fire. But that's a hard way to learn, life experience, and not everyone can
master it. Life can ennoble you but it can also make you bitter and stupid."
He lit a cigarette and paced back and forth in front of the bench.
"Information from art is not processed thoroughly enough by man so that
he can use it to solve his own problems in life. Wait! The information is
not processed to the point of problem solving.... I've heard that before!
When? In the beginning of the experiment: the early complex sensors-crystal
unit-TsVMN-12 did not absorb my information-Krivoshein's information-it's
the same thing! And then I used feedback!"
Adam was no longer pacing; he was running on the spit-covered pavement
from the wastebasket to the lamp post.
"Feedback, that's what I want! Feedback, which increases the
effectiveness of information systems a thousand times. That's why there's a
wall. That's why the effect of art information is so low-there is no
feedback between the source and the receptor. There is some, of course:
reviews, readers' conferences, critical magazines, and so on, but that's not
it. There has to be direct, technical feedback, so that the information from
art that is being introduced into a person can be changed to suit his
individuality, character, memory, abilities, even appearance and biography.
In that way his own behavior in critical situations can be played for him
during synthesis (let him make his mistakes, learn from them, seek the
correct solutions!); he can be displayed to himself-instead of an invented
hero-with his spiritual world, abilities, qualities, and flaws. He can help
him find himself.. and then that great information will become his life
experience. It will take on the universal force of truth that comes from
scientific information. This will be a new kind of art-not written, not
acted, not musical-everything together, expressed in biopotentials and
chemical reactions. The art of synthesizing man!"
Suddenly he stopped. "Yes, but how do you do that in the computer-womb?
How do you create that kind of feedback? It won't be easy. Well-experiments,
experiments, and more experiments-we'll do it! We managed to create feedback
between the parts of the complex. The important thing is we have the idea!"
Vano Aleksandrovich Androsiashvili wasn't sleeping either, in his dacha
outside Moscow. He was standing on the veranda, listening to the rustle of
the rain. Today at a department meeting they discussed the work of their
students. Krivoshein came out looking the worst: in a year's time he hadn't
taken a single exam; lately his attendance at lectures and labs had been
erratic; and he hadn't chosen a topic for his dissertation. Professor
Vladimir Veniaminovich Valerno expressed the opinion that the man was taking
up a place in the graduate department for nothing, getting a fellowship, and
that it wouldn't be a bad idea to free that spot for someone more deserving.
Vano Aleksandrovich had wanted to say nothing, but lost his temper, and said
many rash and angry things to Vladimir Veniaminovich about condescension and
disdain in judging the work of young researchers. Valerno was stunned, and
Androsiashvili himself felt bad: Vladimir Veniaminovich didn't deserve that
kind of rebuke.
Vano Aleksandrovich had spent many an evening pondering the miraculous
healing of the student after he was hit by the icicle, remembering their
conversation about controlling metabolism in the organism, and came to the
conclusion that Krivoshein had discovered and developed the ability to
regenerate tissue rapidly, an ability characteristic of the simplest
coelenterates. He couldn't imagine how he had done it. He was waiting for
Krivoshein to come and tell him: Vano Aleksandrovich was willing to forget
his injured feelings and promise silence, if necessary. He'd do anything to
find out! But Krivoshein was silent.
Now Androsiashvili was mad at himself for not finding out why the
police were holding the student when he had talked to them yesterday on
their videophone. "Has he done something? When did he have time? He came by
the department in the morning to announce that he had to go to Dneprovsk for
a few days. Krivoshein's second mystery." The professor chuckled. But the
anxiety didn't go away. All right, there might have been a mishap, but what
if it was something serious? Say what you will, but Krivoshein was the
discoverer and bearer of an important discovery about man. That discovery
must not perish.
"I have to go to Dneprovsk," the thought suddenly came to him. But then
the proud blood of a mountain dweller and corresponding member of the
Academy boiled over: he, Vano Aleksandrovich Androsiashvili, would rush to
help out a graduate student who had gotten into a mess! A student that he
took into the department out of pity and who had hurt him deeply with his
lack of trust?
"Yes, rush off!" Vano Aleksandrovich shook his head, calming himself.
"First of all, you, Vano, don't believe that Krivoshein committed any crime.
He's not the type. There's some problem or misunderstanding there, that's
all. You have to help him. Second, you've been dreaming of a way to gain his
confidence and get closer to him. Well, here it is. Maybe he has good reason
for hiding. But don't let him think that Androsiashvili is a man that can't
be counted on, who withdraws from petty irritations. No! Of course, even in
Dneprovsk you won't begin to question him-he'll tell you if he wants to. But
that discovery must be saved. It's more important than your pride."
Vano Aleksandrovich felt better because he had overcome himself and
reached a wise decision.
Graduate student Krivoshein wasn't sleeping either. He was still
reading the diary.
According to the teachings of Buddha, the way to rid yourself of
suffering is to rid yourself of ties. Won't someone tell which ties 1 must
sever to stop my eyetooth from aching? And hurry!
-K. Prutkov-enzhener, an unumbered thought
January 5. Here I am in the position of a human rough draft for a more
perfect copy. And even though I'm the creator of the copy, it's still
nothing to be happy about.
"You know, your nephew is very attractive," Lena said to me after I
introduced them at a New Year's party. "Simpatico."
Back at home, I spent a whole hour staring at myself in the mirror: a
depressing sight. And he was good at small talk; I was no match for him.
No, Victor Kravets was behaving himself like a gentleman with Lena.
Either earlier memories are having an effect or he's just feeling out his
possibilities in breaking hearts, but he appears to be uninterested in her.
If he made the effort, though, I'd never see Lena again.
When he and I walk around Academic Town or along the institute grounds,
girls who never nodded to me before greet me loudly and joyously: "Hello,
Valentin Vasilyevich!"-with an eye on the handsome stranger next to me.
And he's so good on skis! The three of us went out of town yesterday,
and he and Lena left me far behind.
And how he danced at the New Year's ball!
Even Ninochka, the secretary, who didn't know the way to the lodge
before, always seems to be dropping by with a paper from the office for me.
"Hello, Valentin Vasilyevich! Hello, Vitya... oh, it's so interesting
here, all these tubes!"
In a word, I now can observe myself every day the way I am and myself
the way I would be if only... if only what? If only it weren't for the
hunger during and after the war, the strong resemblance to my father
who-alas!-was not too handsome ("Pudgy-faced, just like his father!" the
relatives used to say, cooing over me), the bumps and potholes in the road
of life. If only it weren't for my rather unhealthy life-style: the lab, the
library, my room, conversations, thinking, the miasmas from the reagents-and
no physical recreation. Really, I didn't try to become an ugly, fat, stooped
egghead-it just happened.
In principle, I should be proud: I beat Mother Nature! But something
gets in the way....
No, there's something damaging about this idea. Let's say we perfect
the method of controlled synthesis. And we create marvelous people-strong,
beautiful, talented, energetic, knowledgeable-you know, masters of life from
advertising posters like "We saved at the bank and bought this
refrigerator!" But what about the people that were used as a basis for
them-does that mean that they were nothing more than rought drafts sketched
by life? Why should they be demeaned? That's a fine reward for their lives:
regret for your imperfections, the thought that you will never be perfect
because you were made by a regular mama and not a marvelous contraption? It
turns out that with our system people will still be pitted against people.
And not only against bad ones-against everyone, since we all have some
imperfections. Does that mean that good but ordinary people (not artificial)
will have to be crowded out of life?
(There! That's just like you, Krivoshein-you're so thick-skinned. Until
it affects you personally you don't think about it. "Whup him with a
two-by-four," as your daddy used to say. But all right, I got it now. That's
the important thing.)
There's plenty to think about here. I guess all human flaws have a
common nature-they're exaggerations. Take a quality that's pleasant to have
in people around you: simplicity. We're inculcated with it from childhood.
But if nature flubs it, or your upbringing spoils it, or if life goes the
wrong way-you end up with sleepy stupidity instead of simplicity. You can
also get cowardice instead of reasonable caution, false conceit instead of a
necessary confidence, cynicism instead of sober daring, or sneakiness
instead of brains.
We use a lot of words to hide our impotence in the face of human
imperfections: jokes ("A bear stepped on his ear," "He was dropped as a
baby"), scientific terms ("anemia," "personality breakdown/' "inferiority
complex"), and homilies ("That's not for him," or "He has a gift for
that...."). We used to say "God's gift." Now in our materialistic age we say
"nature's gift," but basically, it's the same thing: man has no control.
Some have it and some don't.
And you can guess why some don't. In primitive societies and later
social formations man's perfection was not compulsory. If you knew how to
live, work, multiply, and be a little crafty-fine, it was enough! Only now,
when we have a constructive idea of communism, and not just a Utopian one,
we are developing real demands to be made on man. We are taking man's
measure for this marvelous idea-and it's painful to see the things we hadn't
noticed before.
January 8. I shared my thoughts with Kravets.
"You want to employ the synthesis method on ordinary people?" double
number 3 quickly deduced.
"Yes. But how?" I looked at him hopefully. Maybe he knew?
He understood my look and laughed.
"Don't forget that I'm you. On the level of knowledge, anyway."
"But maybe you have a better idea of what that liquid is?" I pointed at
the tank. "You came out of it after all... like Aphrodite from the sea
spray. You know, its composition and so on."
"In two words?"
"You can use three."
"All right. That liquid is man. Its composition is the composition of
the human body. Besides that, the liquid is a quantal-molecular biochemical
computer that can teach itself and has a huge memory, and each molecule of
the liquid has some unique bit of information. In other words, do what you
will, the liquid of the computer-womb is merely man in a liquid state. You
can draw scientific, practical, and organizational conclusions based on that
fact."
I had the feeling that this new problem hadn't captured him the way it
had me. I tried to stir up his imagination.
"Vitya, what if this method is really 'it? It's for ordinary people,
after all, and not-"
"You go to-(tsk, tsk, and an artificial man at that!). I absolutely
refuse to look at our work from the 'it-not it' point of view and in keeping
with a vow I never made. Nowadays you should have a much cooler view of
vows! (Well, if you call that a cooler view....) You want to use the
discovery to transform people?"
"Into angels." I threw fat on the fire.
"The hell with angels! An informational transformation of homo
sapiens-and that's it! You have to look at the problem from the academic
point of view!"
It was my first opportunity to see him lose control and turn into ...
me. No matter how you try to hide it, the Krivoshein personality surfaces.
But at least he was churned up. That's the most important thing when you
begin a new research project-to get churned up and hate the work.
As a result of a six-hour conversation with a dinner break we made four
steps in the realization of the new problem.
Step 1: Artificial and natural people, judging by everything (well,
even by the fact that ordinary food wasn't poison for the double) are
biologically identical. Therefore, everything that the computer-womb does
with the doubles, can in principle (if you forget about the difficulties of
technical realization, as they say in articles) be extended to ordinary
people.
Step 2: The computer-womb obeys commands on alternations in the tank
without any mechanical apparatus or control equipment. Therefore, the liquid
in the control circuit is the executive biochemical mechanism; it performs
controlled metabolism, as the biologist would say, in the tank-
-"Damn it!" the student muttered and smoked nervously.
-or more accurately, transforms external information into structured
encoding in matter: organic molecules, cells, corpuscles, tissue....
Step 3: In principle, how can a person be transformed in the
computer-womb? An artificial double is born in it as an extension and
development of the machine's circuitry. In the transparent stage he already
senses and feels like a person, but cannot function actively (the experience
with Adam and Kravets's confirmation). Then the double continues to the
nontransparent stage, detaches himself from the liquid circuit of the
computer-womb (or it from him), takes control of himself, and climbs out-no,
no, this must be academic sounding-and unplugs from the computer. With an
ordinary person, apparently, we would have to operate in reverse, that is,
plugging the person into the machine first. Technically: immersing the man
in the liquid.
Step 4: But can a person be plugged into the computer-womb? After all,
what's needed here is no more and no less that-I do know something about
neurophysiology; I've read Ashby-total contact of the entire nervous system
with the liquid. Our conductor-nerves are isolated from the external
environment by skin, tissue, and the skull. In order to get to them the
liquid circuit would have to penetrate the person.
We decided that it could penetrate. After all, man is a solution. Not a
water solution (otherwise people would dissolve in water); there's not that
much free water in a person. It's that damn quantitative analysis that
confuses everything, the hypnosis of numbers that comes when you take apart
human tissue and get these figures: water 75 percent, protein 20 percent,
fat 2 percent, salt 1 percent, and so on. Man is a biological solution, and
all his components coexist within him in unity and interrelation. The body
contains "liquid liquids": saliva, urine, blood plasma, lymph, stomach
acids-they can be poured into a test tube. Other liquids fill the cell
tissues-the muscles, nerves, brain-and here each cell is a test tube itself.
Biological liquids even permeate the bones, as if they were sponges. Thus,
despite a lack of proper vessels, man has much more reason to consider
himself a liquid than, say, does a forty-percent solution of sodium hydrate.
To be even more precise, man is information recorded in a biological
solution. Beginning with the moment of conception, transformations take
place in this solution; the muscles, intestines, nerves, brain, and skin all
form. The same thing-but faster and in a different way-takes place in the
liquid of the computer-womb. So, however you look at it, the two liquids are
closely related, and their mutual penetration is quite possible.
No matter how much we wanted to check every hypothesis as soon as
possible in the computer-womb, we controlled ourselves and spent the whole
day on theory. We've played enough with chance. This time we'll plan
everything thoroughly.
So, the first thing is to plug in.
February!. Ah, those were good theories that we were tailoring to fit
what had already been done! The building block game, the mathematics of
"it-not it"... it's nice to look back on how smoothly it all went. Build a
theory to help you achieve new results that are much more complex.
For now the theoretical liquid (the liquid circuit) in the tank is
behaving like vulgar water. Just thicker.
Do I need to write how the very next day we ran to the lab bright and'
early, and in trepidation and anticipation, stuck our fingers into the
tank-"plugging in." And nothing. The liquid wasn't warm or cool. We stood
around like that for an hour: no sensation, no changes.
Do I need to describe how we bathed the last two rabbits in the liquid
trying to plug them into the computer? The computer-womb didn't obey the
order "No!" and didn't dissolve them. It ended with the rabbits drowning,
and we couldn't save them by pumping them out.
Do I need to mention that we lowered conductors into the liquid and
watched the movements of floating potentials on the oscillograph? The
potentials vacillated and the plotted curve looked like a jagged
electroencephalogram. And so what?
That's the way it always is. If I were a novice, I'd quit.
February 6. An experiment: I lowered my finger into the liquid, Kravets
put on Monomakh's Crown and began touching various objects with his finger.
J could feel what surfaces he was touching! There was something warm (the
radiator), something cold and wet (he stuck his finger under the tap).
That meant my finger was plugged in! ? The computer was giving me
information about external sensations through my finger. Yes, but they're
the wrong ones. I need signals (even in sensations) of the work of the
liquid circuit in the tank.
February 10. A small, innocent, trifling result. In scope it's inferior
even to making the rabbits. Simply, I cut the fleshy part of my palm today
and healed the cut.
"You see," Kravets said meditatively in the morning, "for the liquid
circuit to have the sensation of working, it has to work. And what is it
supposed to work on, I ask you? Why should it plug into you, or me, or the
rabbits? We're all complete. Everything is in informational balance."
I don't know if I really figured it out faster than he did (I flatter
myself into thinking yes) or whether he just didn't want to hurt himself.
But I began the experiment: I destroyed the informational equilibrium in my
organism.
The scalpel was sharp and inexperienced. I sliced through my flesh all
the way to the bone. Blood drenched my hand. I put my hand in the tank and
the liquid turned crimson around it. The pain didn't disappear.
"The crown-put on the crown!" Kravets shouted.
"What crown? What for?" The pain and the sight of blood kept me from
thinking straight.
He pushed Monomakh's Crown on my head, clicked the dials-and the pain
disappeared instantly; in a few seconds the liquid was clear of blood. My
hand was enveloped in a pleasant tingle-and the miracle began: my hand
became transparent before my eyes!
First the red plaits of the muscles showed. A minute later they had
dissolved, and the white bones of the fingers showed through the red jelly.
A violet blood vessel, thickening and thinning, pushed blood near the sinews
in my wrist.
I grew scared and I pulled my hand out of the tank. Immediate pain. The
hand was whole, but it shone as if it had been oiled; heavy drops dripped
off from the tips of my transparent fingers. I tried wriggling my fingers
but they wouldn't obey. And then I noticed that my fingers were thickening
into droplet-shaped forms. That was terrifying.
"Put it back or you'll lose your hand!" Kravets shouted.
I put it back and concentrated on the cut. There was a delicious ache
there. "Yes, computer ... that's it. That's it," I repeated. The tingle
weakened and the wrist was losing its transparency. Sighing in relief, I
took out my hand: there was no more cut, just a big reddish blue scar. A few
transparent drops of ichor oozed in the crack. The scar itched and buzzed
unbearably. This probably wasn't the end, then. I put my hand in the liquid
again. Again-transparency, tingling. "That's it, computer. That's it."
Finally the tingling stopped and the hand was no longer transparent.
The whole experiment lasted twenty minutes. Now I couldn't show you
where I cut myself with the scalpel.
I have to figure this out. The most interesting aspect of this was that
I didn't have to give the computer-womb any special information on how to
heal a cut-as if I could. Probably my little encouraging that's it's were
superfluous. The feeling of pain had given rise to rather eloquent biowaves
in my brain as it was.
It looks like the computer-womb plugs into a person with a signal of
imbalance in the system. But this signal wouldn't necessarily have to be
pain: it could be a willed command to change something in yourself or a
dissatisfaction ("not it"). And then it could be controlled with sensation.
A minor, ineffective experiment compared with everything that came
before it. After all the cut could have been doused with iodine, bandaged,
and it would have healed on its own.
But it's the most important experiment we've done in a year's work! Now
our discovery can be used not only to synthesize and perfect artificial
doubles but to transform complex informational systems that are contained in
a highly complex biological solution, which we simply call man. The
transformation of any person!
February 20. Yes, the liquid circuit plugs into a human organism on a
willed command, too. Today I removed the hair from my arm up to my elbow
this way. I put my hand in the tank, put on the crown. "Not it,"
concentrating on the hair. The prickling and itching increased. The skin
became transparent. A minute later the hair had dissolved.
Kravets used the method to grow nails on his pinky and index finger
that were over an inch long. He dipped both plams into the liquid and
changed his usual fingerprint sworls into something resembling the tread on
a winter tire. Then he tried to restore the original pattern, but he didn't
remember what it looked like.
Now I see why nothing worked with the rabbits-they have no
consciousness, no will, no satisfaction with self. This is a method for man.
And only for man!
Graduate student Krivoshein skimmed the rest, to memorize it. He
flipped through the pages of the diary, photographing them with his memory.
It was clear to him: Krivoshein and Kravets had reached the same thing a
different way-they could control metabolism in man. But they needed a
computer.
And it was important that they needed mechanical help. Now his
discovery wasn't unique, a freak, but knowledge on how to alter oneself. It
wasn't enough to have a method of transformation-you had to have complete
information on the human organism. They didn't have it and couldn't possibly
have it. And his "knowledge in sensations" could be encoded into the
computer and passed on to the world. To every human being. And every human
being could have unheard-of power.
The student slitted his eyes in thought, and leaned back in the chair.
The fight against disease would soon be forgotten! The elements would be
subordinate to man without machines.
The blue ocean depths, where he will go without diving gear or
bathyscaphe. A human dolphin will be able to grow fins and gills at will and
enjoy the water environment, live in it, work in it, travel through it.
If he wants to go into the air, he can grow wings and fly, soar like an
eagle on the warm air currents.
Hostile alien planets: the poisonous atmosphere of chlorous gases,
heated by the sun and the uncooled magma or chilled by the cosmic cold, full
of fatal bacteria. And man will be able to live there as freely as on earth,
without special suits or biological shields. He will merely transform his
organism to breathe chloride instead of oxygen and perhaps change the usual
protein of his body to an organosilicon one.
The important thing about man is not that he breathes oxygen. Not his
arms and legs. You can develop fins, gills, wings, breathe fluorine, replace
protein with organosilicon, and still be man. And you can have normal
extremities, white skin, a head, and papers-and not be one! "Yes, but...."
Krivoshein leaned on the desk. His eyes fell on his original's notes.
Disease and freakishness will disappear. Wounds and poisons will be no
threat. Everyone will be able to become strong, brave, beautiful, will be
able to mobilize the resources of his organism to do work that once seemed
impossible. People will be like gods! Well, what are you smiling wisely for?
This is really the method for the limitless perfection of man!"
"I'm wise, so I'm smiling," Kravets answered coldly. "You're flying off
somewhere again. That's not the only possibility."
"Oh, come on! Doesn't every person strive to become better, more
perfect?"
"Strives in keeping with his concepts of good and perfection. For one
thing, you might end up with "Krivoshein's cosmetic baths. "
"What baths?"
"You know... five rubles a session. A citizen shows up, undresses
behind a screen, and sinks into the biological liquid. The operator-some
Zhora Sherverpupa, former hairdresser-puts on Mono-makh's Crown and asks:
'What would you desire?' This time I want to look like Brigitte Bardot,' his
client orders. 'But make sure my eyebrows are thicker and darker. My guy
really likes 'em dark.' Why are you frowning? She'll even give Zhora a tip.
And the male clientele will be turning themselves into Alain Delon or the
Nordic handsomeness of an Oleg Strizhenov. And then next season the fashion
will be for Lollabrigidas and Vitaly Zubkovs, as seen in the picture...."
"But we could program a minimal retrieval of information for the
computer-womb... some kind of filter for banality and stupidity. Or program
it to-"
"-simultaneously instill inner qualities in the mass consumer? What if
he doesn't want any? Doesn't he have the right not to want any for his
money? 'What am I,' some little lady will ask, 'abnormal or something. Why
do you think you should change me? You're the weirdos!' You see, the
reinforced concreteness of the position of the middle-class boob stems from
his absolute certainty that his own behavior is the norm."
"But we can make sure it's not the norm for the computer-womb."
"Hmmm... I suggest a simple experiment. Please put a finger into the
liquid."
"Which one?"
"Whichever one you won't miss."
I dipped my ring finger into the liquid. The double put on the crown
and went over to the medicine chest.
"Attention!"
"Ow, what are you doing?" I pulled out the finger. It was cut and
bleeding.
Victor Kravets sucked his ring finger and then wiped the blood from the
scalpel.
"Do you see now?" The computer has no norms of behavior. It doesn't
give a damn about anything. Whatever you command it to do, it does."
We healed the cuts.
Kravets brought me down from the heavens-headlong down a steep flight
of stairs. We're a dreamy lot, inventors. And Bell probably thought that
people would use his telephone only for pleasant or necessary news, and
certainly not for gossip, or anonymous denunciations, or for sending an
ambulance to perfectly healthy friends as a joke. We all dream about the
good thing, and when life turns our inventions inside out, we just slap our
sides, like loggers in a forest, and ask: "What are you doing, people?"
The hellish part of science is that it creates methods and nothing
else. So we will have a "method for transforming information in a biological
system." You can turn a monkey into a man. But you could also turn a man
into a donkey.
But I can't, I can't believe that after our discovery things would go
on as they were! Not for the sake of science-for the sake of life. Our
discovery was intended for life: it doesn't shoot; it doesn't kill-it
creates. Maybe we're looking in the wrong place-the problem isn't in the
computer but in man?
Graduate student Krivoshein finished reading the diary to the inner
accompaniment of these troubling thoughts. Had they worked for nothing? Was
their discovery too soon, ahead of its time, and could it harm mankind? In
Moscow he hadn't given much thought to it: the discovery was only within
him-it had nothing to do with anyone else-and he just explored it to his
heart's content and said nothing. Of course, after his bath in the pool of
the reactor he was bursting to share his knowledge and experiences with
Androsiashvili and the guys in the form: radiation and radiation sickness
can be overcome! But this knowledge was top secret... "because of the
dregs!" Krivoshein was angry. "Because of the dregs, of whom there are maybe
one in a thousand and for whom that prostitute science prepares methods of
destroying cities and nations! Only methods. I guess we'll have to just wipe
out those vipers. No one would catch me or shoot me... but then I'll be just
like them. No, that's not it, either.
The student shut the diary and raised his eyes. The table lamp was lit
without illuminating anything. It was light. Beyond the window the matching
yellow faces of the buildings of Academic Town stared into the sun; it
looked like the herd of houses would take off after the light any second.
The clock said 7:30 in the morning.
Krivoshein lit up and went out on the balcony. People were gathering at
the bus stop. A broad-shouldered man in a blue raincost paced under the
trees. "Well, well!" Krivoshein was amazed by his tenacity. "All right, I
have to save what can be saved."
He went back inside, undressed, and took a cold shower. Then he opened
the closet, critically eyed the meager selection of clothes. He chose a
Ukrainian shirt with embroidery. He gave the worn suit a dubious stare,
sighed, and put it on.
Then the student trained in front of the mirror for fifteen minutes and
left the apartment.
"Hey! Stop! Don't be a jackass!"
"Easier said than done,..." muttered the jackass, and
rambled on.
-A contemporary fable
The man in the raincoat noticed Krivoshein, turned to him, and stared.
"God, what a bumbling amateur detective!" Krivoshein thought to
himself. "None of this watching my reflection in store windows or hiding
behind a newspaper-he's pushing his way toward me like a preneanderthal on a
county bus! Don't they train these guys? They should at least read comic
books to improve their technique. A guy like this is really going to solve a
crime, hah!"
He was angry. He walked right up to the man.
"Listen, don't you ever get relieved? Doesn't the seven-hour workday
law apply to detectives?"
The man raised his eyebrows quizzically.
"Val,..." he said in a soft baritone. "Val, don't you recognize me?"
"Hm...." Krivoshein blinked, stared, and whistled. "I see... you must
be the double Adam-Hercules? So that's it! And I thought...."
"And then, you're not Krivoshein? I mean, you are Krivoshein, but the
Moscow one?"
"Right. Well, hello ... hello Val-Adam, you lost soul!"
"Hello."
They shook hands. Krivoshein examined Adam's wind-burned, tanned face:
the features were coarse, but handsome. "Val did a good job, just look at
him!" But the light eyes behind the bleached lashes hid a certain temerity.
"There's going to be an awful lot of Valentin Vasilyevich Krivosheins
around here."
"You can call me Adam. I think I'll adopt the name."
"Where have you been, Adam?"
"In Vladivostok. God...."He chuckled, as though not sure whether he had
the right to joke or not. "In Vladivostok and its environs."
"Really? Teriffic!" Krivoshein looked at him enviously. "Did you work
on the ships?"
"Not quite. I blew up underwater cliffs. And now I'm back to work
here."
"And you're not scared?"
Adam looked into Krivoshein's eyes.
"I'm scared, but... you see, I have an idea. Instead of synthesizing
artificial people I want to try to transform regular ones in the
computer-womb. Well... you know, put them in the liquid and act on them with
external information. I guess that's possible, no?"
Adam was too diffident, he knew he was, and was sorry that he put the
idea so clumsily.
"It's a good idea," the student said. He looked at Adam with new
interest. "I guess we're not that different," he thought. "Or is it just the
internal logic of the discovery?" He went on. "But it's been done, Val. They
put various parts of their bodies into our native element. I think they've
even gotten in completely."
"Is it working?"
"It's working... only I'm not sure about the last experiment."
"That's marvelous! You see... then... then we can introduce art
information into man with retrieval on a feedback basis." And Adam, still
shy and confused, told Krivoshein his plan for ennobling man through art.
The student understood.
He quoted from Krivoshein's diary: "We have to base our work on the
fact that man strives for the best, that no one, or almost no one,
consciously wants to perform vile or stupid deeds, that such deeds are a
result of misunderstanding. Things are complicated in life; you can't figure
out right away whether you're behaving the right way or not. I know that
from my own experience. And if you give a person clear information that his
psychology can respond to-about what's good, what's bad, what's stupid-and a
clear understanding that any of his vile or stupid acts will eventually turn
against him, then you don't have to worry about him or his behavior. This
information could be introduced into the computer-womb as well-"
"He's done that, too?" Adam was surprised.
"No. There was only a vague idea that it was necessary. That the rest
would be meaningless without it. So your idea is right on the mark. It fills
in the blank, as we say in academic circles. Listen!" Krivoshein suddenly
realized. "And with an idea like that you walked around, following me like a
detective instead of just hailing me or coming up to the apartment?"
"You see," Adam tried to explain, "I thought that you... were him. You
walked right past me, didn't recognize me, didn't acknowledge me. I thought
you-or rather he-didn't want to see me. We parted unpleasantly...." He
lowered his head.
"Yes.... Have you been to the lab?"
"The lab? But I don't have a pass. And my papers are Krivoshein's, they
know them there."
"How about over the fence?"
"Over the fence?" Adam shrugged in embarrassment. The idea hadn't
occurred to him.
"The man develops the most audacious, daring ideas but in real life ...
my God!" Krivoshein shook his head in disapproval and tried to explain: "You
have to get rid of that lousy temerity before life, before people or we'll
be lost. And the work will be lost. Well, all right." He handed him the
keys. "Go make yourself at home and get some rest. You've been hanging
around all night; you need it!'
"Where is... he?"
"That's what I'd like to know: where he is, and what happened to him."
The student looked worried. "I'll try to clear all that up. I'll see you
later. So long." He smiled. "It's really terriffic that you came."
"No, a person can't be thrown off the track that easily!" Krivoshein
thought as he headed for the institute. "A great project, a major idea can
subjugate anything, can make you forget insults and personal goals, and
imperfections. Man strives for the best: he's absolutely right!"
Overcrowded morning buses rushed past him. The student noticed Lena in
one of the them: she was sitting by the window and staring abstractly into
space. "Ah, Lena, Lena, how could you?" Reading the diary had a tremendous
effect on him: he felt that he had spent that year in Dneprovsk. Now he was
simply Krivoshein and his heart contracted with the memory of the pain that
that woman had caused him (yes, him!).
I know what our research is leading up to, there's no point in kidding
ourselves: I have to get into the tank. Kravets and I are performing minor
educational experiments with our extremities. I even used the liquid circuit
to fix up my knee tendons, torn so long ago, and now I don't limp. All this
represents marvels in medicine, but we're aiming for something bigger-the
transformation of an entire person! We can't putter around here, or we'll
spend another twenty years around the tank. And I'm the one who has to go
in, an ordinary, natural person. There's nothing more for Kravets to do in
the tank.
Actually, I'll be testing myself, not the computer-womb. All our
knowledge and usage of the word "good" isn't worth a thing if man won't have
the will power and determination to undergo informational transformation in
the liquid.
Of course, I won't come out of the bath transformed. First of all, we
don't have the necessary information to make substantial changes in the
organism or intellect; and secondly, we don't need that for a beginning.
It's enough to experience being plugged into the computer-womb, to prove
that it's possible and not dangerous-and, well, to change something in me.
Make that first orbit around the earth, so to speak.
Is it possible? Is it dangerous? Will I return from the orbiting
capsule, from the experiments? The computer-womb is a complicated thing.
We've discovered so many new things in it, and we still don't know
everything about it. I'm not too comfortable with the shining prospects of
our research.
This is the very time I should get married. The hell with my careful
relations with Lena; I need her. I want her to be with me, take care of me,
worry about me, yell at me when I come home late, but give me dinner first.
And (since everything is clear with the synthesis of doubles) let future
Krivosheins appear not from the computer but as a result of good, highly
moral relations between parents. And let them complicate our lives-I'm for
it. I'm getting married! Why didn't I think of it before?
Of course, to get married now when we're about to do this experiment
... well, at least there'll be a permanent reminder of me-a son or daughter.
People used to go to war, leaving wives and children behind. Why can't I
behave in the same way?
This may not be on the up and up-getting married when there is a
possibility of leaving a widow behind me. But let those who have done what
I'm doing condemn me. I'll accept it from them.
May 12. "Marry me, Lena. Let's live together. And we'll have children
as beautiful as you and as smart as me. Hummmm?"
"Do you really think you're smart?"
"Why not?"
"If you were smart you wouldn't make suggestions like that."
"I don't understand."
"There, you see. And you think you'll have smart children."
"No, tell me. What's wrong? Why won't you marry me?
She stuck the last pin into her hair and turned from the mirror to me.
"I love it when you pout. Darling Val! My lovely red-haired bear. You
mean you've developed some honorable intentions? You sweetie!"
"Wait! Are you agreeing to marry me?"
"No, my love."
"Why not?"
"Because I understand a little more than you do about family life.
Because I know nothing good will come of it for us. Just think back. Have we
ever talked about anything serious? We just meet, spend time.... Think.
Haven't there been times when I come to see you, and you're busy with your
thoughts and you're not happy, even angry, that I'm there? Of course, you
make believe-you try hard, but I can tell. What will happen if we're
together constantly?"
"Do you mean-you don't love me?"
"No, Val," she looked at me sadly. "And I won't fall in love with you.
I don't want to. I used to ... to tell the truth, I worked at this
that freedom began long before all the rebellions and revolutions, on that
distant day when a humanlike ape thought: 'I can climb up the tree to get
the fruit but I can also knock it down with the stick in my hand. Which is
better?' It wasn't just thinking, that ape-it had seen storms make branches
knock down fruit. Freedom was the opportunity to choose a variant of
behavior based on knowledge. From that day every discovery, every invention
has given people new opportunities, made them even freer.
"Of course, there have been discoveries (not many) that told people:
don't! You can't build perpetual motion machines; you can't pass the speed
of light; you can't accurately measure the speed and position of an electron
simultaneously. But our discovery forbids nothing and doesn't change
anything. It says: go ahead!
"Freedom. It's not easy to recognize your freedom in our modern
society, and pick variations of your behavior wisely and well. Millions of
years of the past hang over man when biological laws determined the behavior
of his ancestors and everything was simple. And now he is still trying to
lay the blame for his mistakes on circumstances, on cruel fate, and to place
hopes in God, on a strong personality, on luck-just so it's not him. And
when the hopes shatter, man looks and finds a scapegoat: the people who had
raised the hopes are free of guilt. In essence, people who take the path of
least resistance do not know freedom."
The peephole in the door opened, letting in a ray of light; it was
blocked by the guard's face. They were probably checking to see if he was
planning another break. Victor Kravets laughed silently: naturally the clink
was the best place to meditate on freedom! He acknowledged with pleasure
that despite all the recent hassles he hadn't lost his sense of humor.
Double Adam-Hercules was sitting and reminiscing on a bench at the bus
stop on an empty street. Yesterday, as he was coming from the railroad
station, thinking about the three currents of information (science, life,
art) that affect man, he had the beginnings of a vague, but very important
idea. He was interrupted by the three men with the demand to show his
papers, those so and so's.... He was left with the feeling that he had been
close to a valuable guess. He would have been better off without it, that
feeling. Now he wouldn't get any sleep!
"Let's try it again. I was thinking about what information can be used,
and how, to ennoble man? Krivoshein had the idea of synthesizing a knight
'without fear or flaw.' And now I've got it and I can't reject it. I ruled
out information from the environment and from science, because their
influence on man can be equally good or bad. There is only the method of
awakening good thoughts with a lyre-art.
True, it does awaken them, but the lyre is an imperfect instrument;
while it's being plinked, man is ennobled, but when it stops, so does the
effect. There is something left, of course, but not much, just a superficial
memory of seeing a play or reading a book. Well, all right, what if we
introduce this information into the computer-womb during the synthesis of
man. What if we record the contents of many books, show several excellent
movies? It would be the same thing: it would remain in the superficial
memory-and that's all. After all, the book's not about him!
"Aha, that's what I was thinking about: there is a transparent wall
between the source of art information and its receptor-a concrete human
being. What is that wall? Damn it, will life experience always be the main
factor in the formation of the personality? Do you have to suffer yourself,
to understand the suffering of others? Make mistakes to learn the right way?
Like a child who has to burn himself to keep from sticking his hand in the
fire. But that's a hard way to learn, life experience, and not everyone can
master it. Life can ennoble you but it can also make you bitter and stupid."
He lit a cigarette and paced back and forth in front of the bench.
"Information from art is not processed thoroughly enough by man so that
he can use it to solve his own problems in life. Wait! The information is
not processed to the point of problem solving.... I've heard that before!
When? In the beginning of the experiment: the early complex sensors-crystal
unit-TsVMN-12 did not absorb my information-Krivoshein's information-it's
the same thing! And then I used feedback!"
Adam was no longer pacing; he was running on the spit-covered pavement
from the wastebasket to the lamp post.
"Feedback, that's what I want! Feedback, which increases the
effectiveness of information systems a thousand times. That's why there's a
wall. That's why the effect of art information is so low-there is no
feedback between the source and the receptor. There is some, of course:
reviews, readers' conferences, critical magazines, and so on, but that's not
it. There has to be direct, technical feedback, so that the information from
art that is being introduced into a person can be changed to suit his
individuality, character, memory, abilities, even appearance and biography.
In that way his own behavior in critical situations can be played for him
during synthesis (let him make his mistakes, learn from them, seek the
correct solutions!); he can be displayed to himself-instead of an invented
hero-with his spiritual world, abilities, qualities, and flaws. He can help
him find himself.. and then that great information will become his life
experience. It will take on the universal force of truth that comes from
scientific information. This will be a new kind of art-not written, not
acted, not musical-everything together, expressed in biopotentials and
chemical reactions. The art of synthesizing man!"
Suddenly he stopped. "Yes, but how do you do that in the computer-womb?
How do you create that kind of feedback? It won't be easy. Well-experiments,
experiments, and more experiments-we'll do it! We managed to create feedback
between the parts of the complex. The important thing is we have the idea!"
Vano Aleksandrovich Androsiashvili wasn't sleeping either, in his dacha
outside Moscow. He was standing on the veranda, listening to the rustle of
the rain. Today at a department meeting they discussed the work of their
students. Krivoshein came out looking the worst: in a year's time he hadn't
taken a single exam; lately his attendance at lectures and labs had been
erratic; and he hadn't chosen a topic for his dissertation. Professor
Vladimir Veniaminovich Valerno expressed the opinion that the man was taking
up a place in the graduate department for nothing, getting a fellowship, and
that it wouldn't be a bad idea to free that spot for someone more deserving.
Vano Aleksandrovich had wanted to say nothing, but lost his temper, and said
many rash and angry things to Vladimir Veniaminovich about condescension and
disdain in judging the work of young researchers. Valerno was stunned, and
Androsiashvili himself felt bad: Vladimir Veniaminovich didn't deserve that
kind of rebuke.
Vano Aleksandrovich had spent many an evening pondering the miraculous
healing of the student after he was hit by the icicle, remembering their
conversation about controlling metabolism in the organism, and came to the
conclusion that Krivoshein had discovered and developed the ability to
regenerate tissue rapidly, an ability characteristic of the simplest
coelenterates. He couldn't imagine how he had done it. He was waiting for
Krivoshein to come and tell him: Vano Aleksandrovich was willing to forget
his injured feelings and promise silence, if necessary. He'd do anything to
find out! But Krivoshein was silent.
Now Androsiashvili was mad at himself for not finding out why the
police were holding the student when he had talked to them yesterday on
their videophone. "Has he done something? When did he have time? He came by
the department in the morning to announce that he had to go to Dneprovsk for
a few days. Krivoshein's second mystery." The professor chuckled. But the
anxiety didn't go away. All right, there might have been a mishap, but what
if it was something serious? Say what you will, but Krivoshein was the
discoverer and bearer of an important discovery about man. That discovery
must not perish.
"I have to go to Dneprovsk," the thought suddenly came to him. But then
the proud blood of a mountain dweller and corresponding member of the
Academy boiled over: he, Vano Aleksandrovich Androsiashvili, would rush to
help out a graduate student who had gotten into a mess! A student that he
took into the department out of pity and who had hurt him deeply with his
lack of trust?
"Yes, rush off!" Vano Aleksandrovich shook his head, calming himself.
"First of all, you, Vano, don't believe that Krivoshein committed any crime.
He's not the type. There's some problem or misunderstanding there, that's
all. You have to help him. Second, you've been dreaming of a way to gain his
confidence and get closer to him. Well, here it is. Maybe he has good reason
for hiding. But don't let him think that Androsiashvili is a man that can't
be counted on, who withdraws from petty irritations. No! Of course, even in
Dneprovsk you won't begin to question him-he'll tell you if he wants to. But
that discovery must be saved. It's more important than your pride."
Vano Aleksandrovich felt better because he had overcome himself and
reached a wise decision.
Graduate student Krivoshein wasn't sleeping either. He was still
reading the diary.
According to the teachings of Buddha, the way to rid yourself of
suffering is to rid yourself of ties. Won't someone tell which ties 1 must
sever to stop my eyetooth from aching? And hurry!
-K. Prutkov-enzhener, an unumbered thought
January 5. Here I am in the position of a human rough draft for a more
perfect copy. And even though I'm the creator of the copy, it's still
nothing to be happy about.
"You know, your nephew is very attractive," Lena said to me after I
introduced them at a New Year's party. "Simpatico."
Back at home, I spent a whole hour staring at myself in the mirror: a
depressing sight. And he was good at small talk; I was no match for him.
No, Victor Kravets was behaving himself like a gentleman with Lena.
Either earlier memories are having an effect or he's just feeling out his
possibilities in breaking hearts, but he appears to be uninterested in her.
If he made the effort, though, I'd never see Lena again.
When he and I walk around Academic Town or along the institute grounds,
girls who never nodded to me before greet me loudly and joyously: "Hello,
Valentin Vasilyevich!"-with an eye on the handsome stranger next to me.
And he's so good on skis! The three of us went out of town yesterday,
and he and Lena left me far behind.
And how he danced at the New Year's ball!
Even Ninochka, the secretary, who didn't know the way to the lodge
before, always seems to be dropping by with a paper from the office for me.
"Hello, Valentin Vasilyevich! Hello, Vitya... oh, it's so interesting
here, all these tubes!"
In a word, I now can observe myself every day the way I am and myself
the way I would be if only... if only what? If only it weren't for the
hunger during and after the war, the strong resemblance to my father
who-alas!-was not too handsome ("Pudgy-faced, just like his father!" the
relatives used to say, cooing over me), the bumps and potholes in the road
of life. If only it weren't for my rather unhealthy life-style: the lab, the
library, my room, conversations, thinking, the miasmas from the reagents-and
no physical recreation. Really, I didn't try to become an ugly, fat, stooped
egghead-it just happened.
In principle, I should be proud: I beat Mother Nature! But something
gets in the way....
No, there's something damaging about this idea. Let's say we perfect
the method of controlled synthesis. And we create marvelous people-strong,
beautiful, talented, energetic, knowledgeable-you know, masters of life from
advertising posters like "We saved at the bank and bought this
refrigerator!" But what about the people that were used as a basis for
them-does that mean that they were nothing more than rought drafts sketched
by life? Why should they be demeaned? That's a fine reward for their lives:
regret for your imperfections, the thought that you will never be perfect
because you were made by a regular mama and not a marvelous contraption? It
turns out that with our system people will still be pitted against people.
And not only against bad ones-against everyone, since we all have some
imperfections. Does that mean that good but ordinary people (not artificial)
will have to be crowded out of life?
(There! That's just like you, Krivoshein-you're so thick-skinned. Until
it affects you personally you don't think about it. "Whup him with a
two-by-four," as your daddy used to say. But all right, I got it now. That's
the important thing.)
There's plenty to think about here. I guess all human flaws have a
common nature-they're exaggerations. Take a quality that's pleasant to have
in people around you: simplicity. We're inculcated with it from childhood.
But if nature flubs it, or your upbringing spoils it, or if life goes the
wrong way-you end up with sleepy stupidity instead of simplicity. You can
also get cowardice instead of reasonable caution, false conceit instead of a
necessary confidence, cynicism instead of sober daring, or sneakiness
instead of brains.
We use a lot of words to hide our impotence in the face of human
imperfections: jokes ("A bear stepped on his ear," "He was dropped as a
baby"), scientific terms ("anemia," "personality breakdown/' "inferiority
complex"), and homilies ("That's not for him," or "He has a gift for
that...."). We used to say "God's gift." Now in our materialistic age we say
"nature's gift," but basically, it's the same thing: man has no control.
Some have it and some don't.
And you can guess why some don't. In primitive societies and later
social formations man's perfection was not compulsory. If you knew how to
live, work, multiply, and be a little crafty-fine, it was enough! Only now,
when we have a constructive idea of communism, and not just a Utopian one,
we are developing real demands to be made on man. We are taking man's
measure for this marvelous idea-and it's painful to see the things we hadn't
noticed before.
January 8. I shared my thoughts with Kravets.
"You want to employ the synthesis method on ordinary people?" double
number 3 quickly deduced.
"Yes. But how?" I looked at him hopefully. Maybe he knew?
He understood my look and laughed.
"Don't forget that I'm you. On the level of knowledge, anyway."
"But maybe you have a better idea of what that liquid is?" I pointed at
the tank. "You came out of it after all... like Aphrodite from the sea
spray. You know, its composition and so on."
"In two words?"
"You can use three."
"All right. That liquid is man. Its composition is the composition of
the human body. Besides that, the liquid is a quantal-molecular biochemical
computer that can teach itself and has a huge memory, and each molecule of
the liquid has some unique bit of information. In other words, do what you
will, the liquid of the computer-womb is merely man in a liquid state. You
can draw scientific, practical, and organizational conclusions based on that
fact."
I had the feeling that this new problem hadn't captured him the way it
had me. I tried to stir up his imagination.
"Vitya, what if this method is really 'it? It's for ordinary people,
after all, and not-"
"You go to-(tsk, tsk, and an artificial man at that!). I absolutely
refuse to look at our work from the 'it-not it' point of view and in keeping
with a vow I never made. Nowadays you should have a much cooler view of
vows! (Well, if you call that a cooler view....) You want to use the
discovery to transform people?"
"Into angels." I threw fat on the fire.
"The hell with angels! An informational transformation of homo
sapiens-and that's it! You have to look at the problem from the academic
point of view!"
It was my first opportunity to see him lose control and turn into ...
me. No matter how you try to hide it, the Krivoshein personality surfaces.
But at least he was churned up. That's the most important thing when you
begin a new research project-to get churned up and hate the work.
As a result of a six-hour conversation with a dinner break we made four
steps in the realization of the new problem.
Step 1: Artificial and natural people, judging by everything (well,
even by the fact that ordinary food wasn't poison for the double) are
biologically identical. Therefore, everything that the computer-womb does
with the doubles, can in principle (if you forget about the difficulties of
technical realization, as they say in articles) be extended to ordinary
people.
Step 2: The computer-womb obeys commands on alternations in the tank
without any mechanical apparatus or control equipment. Therefore, the liquid
in the control circuit is the executive biochemical mechanism; it performs
controlled metabolism, as the biologist would say, in the tank-
-"Damn it!" the student muttered and smoked nervously.
-or more accurately, transforms external information into structured
encoding in matter: organic molecules, cells, corpuscles, tissue....
Step 3: In principle, how can a person be transformed in the
computer-womb? An artificial double is born in it as an extension and
development of the machine's circuitry. In the transparent stage he already
senses and feels like a person, but cannot function actively (the experience
with Adam and Kravets's confirmation). Then the double continues to the
nontransparent stage, detaches himself from the liquid circuit of the
computer-womb (or it from him), takes control of himself, and climbs out-no,
no, this must be academic sounding-and unplugs from the computer. With an
ordinary person, apparently, we would have to operate in reverse, that is,
plugging the person into the machine first. Technically: immersing the man
in the liquid.
Step 4: But can a person be plugged into the computer-womb? After all,
what's needed here is no more and no less that-I do know something about
neurophysiology; I've read Ashby-total contact of the entire nervous system
with the liquid. Our conductor-nerves are isolated from the external
environment by skin, tissue, and the skull. In order to get to them the
liquid circuit would have to penetrate the person.
We decided that it could penetrate. After all, man is a solution. Not a
water solution (otherwise people would dissolve in water); there's not that
much free water in a person. It's that damn quantitative analysis that
confuses everything, the hypnosis of numbers that comes when you take apart
human tissue and get these figures: water 75 percent, protein 20 percent,
fat 2 percent, salt 1 percent, and so on. Man is a biological solution, and
all his components coexist within him in unity and interrelation. The body
contains "liquid liquids": saliva, urine, blood plasma, lymph, stomach
acids-they can be poured into a test tube. Other liquids fill the cell
tissues-the muscles, nerves, brain-and here each cell is a test tube itself.
Biological liquids even permeate the bones, as if they were sponges. Thus,
despite a lack of proper vessels, man has much more reason to consider
himself a liquid than, say, does a forty-percent solution of sodium hydrate.
To be even more precise, man is information recorded in a biological
solution. Beginning with the moment of conception, transformations take
place in this solution; the muscles, intestines, nerves, brain, and skin all
form. The same thing-but faster and in a different way-takes place in the
liquid of the computer-womb. So, however you look at it, the two liquids are
closely related, and their mutual penetration is quite possible.
No matter how much we wanted to check every hypothesis as soon as
possible in the computer-womb, we controlled ourselves and spent the whole
day on theory. We've played enough with chance. This time we'll plan
everything thoroughly.
So, the first thing is to plug in.
February!. Ah, those were good theories that we were tailoring to fit
what had already been done! The building block game, the mathematics of
"it-not it"... it's nice to look back on how smoothly it all went. Build a
theory to help you achieve new results that are much more complex.
For now the theoretical liquid (the liquid circuit) in the tank is
behaving like vulgar water. Just thicker.
Do I need to write how the very next day we ran to the lab bright and'
early, and in trepidation and anticipation, stuck our fingers into the
tank-"plugging in." And nothing. The liquid wasn't warm or cool. We stood
around like that for an hour: no sensation, no changes.
Do I need to describe how we bathed the last two rabbits in the liquid
trying to plug them into the computer? The computer-womb didn't obey the
order "No!" and didn't dissolve them. It ended with the rabbits drowning,
and we couldn't save them by pumping them out.
Do I need to mention that we lowered conductors into the liquid and
watched the movements of floating potentials on the oscillograph? The
potentials vacillated and the plotted curve looked like a jagged
electroencephalogram. And so what?
That's the way it always is. If I were a novice, I'd quit.
February 6. An experiment: I lowered my finger into the liquid, Kravets
put on Monomakh's Crown and began touching various objects with his finger.
J could feel what surfaces he was touching! There was something warm (the
radiator), something cold and wet (he stuck his finger under the tap).
That meant my finger was plugged in! ? The computer was giving me
information about external sensations through my finger. Yes, but they're
the wrong ones. I need signals (even in sensations) of the work of the
liquid circuit in the tank.
February 10. A small, innocent, trifling result. In scope it's inferior
even to making the rabbits. Simply, I cut the fleshy part of my palm today
and healed the cut.
"You see," Kravets said meditatively in the morning, "for the liquid
circuit to have the sensation of working, it has to work. And what is it
supposed to work on, I ask you? Why should it plug into you, or me, or the
rabbits? We're all complete. Everything is in informational balance."
I don't know if I really figured it out faster than he did (I flatter
myself into thinking yes) or whether he just didn't want to hurt himself.
But I began the experiment: I destroyed the informational equilibrium in my
organism.
The scalpel was sharp and inexperienced. I sliced through my flesh all
the way to the bone. Blood drenched my hand. I put my hand in the tank and
the liquid turned crimson around it. The pain didn't disappear.
"The crown-put on the crown!" Kravets shouted.
"What crown? What for?" The pain and the sight of blood kept me from
thinking straight.
He pushed Monomakh's Crown on my head, clicked the dials-and the pain
disappeared instantly; in a few seconds the liquid was clear of blood. My
hand was enveloped in a pleasant tingle-and the miracle began: my hand
became transparent before my eyes!
First the red plaits of the muscles showed. A minute later they had
dissolved, and the white bones of the fingers showed through the red jelly.
A violet blood vessel, thickening and thinning, pushed blood near the sinews
in my wrist.
I grew scared and I pulled my hand out of the tank. Immediate pain. The
hand was whole, but it shone as if it had been oiled; heavy drops dripped
off from the tips of my transparent fingers. I tried wriggling my fingers
but they wouldn't obey. And then I noticed that my fingers were thickening
into droplet-shaped forms. That was terrifying.
"Put it back or you'll lose your hand!" Kravets shouted.
I put it back and concentrated on the cut. There was a delicious ache
there. "Yes, computer ... that's it. That's it," I repeated. The tingle
weakened and the wrist was losing its transparency. Sighing in relief, I
took out my hand: there was no more cut, just a big reddish blue scar. A few
transparent drops of ichor oozed in the crack. The scar itched and buzzed
unbearably. This probably wasn't the end, then. I put my hand in the liquid
again. Again-transparency, tingling. "That's it, computer. That's it."
Finally the tingling stopped and the hand was no longer transparent.
The whole experiment lasted twenty minutes. Now I couldn't show you
where I cut myself with the scalpel.
I have to figure this out. The most interesting aspect of this was that
I didn't have to give the computer-womb any special information on how to
heal a cut-as if I could. Probably my little encouraging that's it's were
superfluous. The feeling of pain had given rise to rather eloquent biowaves
in my brain as it was.
It looks like the computer-womb plugs into a person with a signal of
imbalance in the system. But this signal wouldn't necessarily have to be
pain: it could be a willed command to change something in yourself or a
dissatisfaction ("not it"). And then it could be controlled with sensation.
A minor, ineffective experiment compared with everything that came
before it. After all the cut could have been doused with iodine, bandaged,
and it would have healed on its own.
But it's the most important experiment we've done in a year's work! Now
our discovery can be used not only to synthesize and perfect artificial
doubles but to transform complex informational systems that are contained in
a highly complex biological solution, which we simply call man. The
transformation of any person!
February 20. Yes, the liquid circuit plugs into a human organism on a
willed command, too. Today I removed the hair from my arm up to my elbow
this way. I put my hand in the tank, put on the crown. "Not it,"
concentrating on the hair. The prickling and itching increased. The skin
became transparent. A minute later the hair had dissolved.
Kravets used the method to grow nails on his pinky and index finger
that were over an inch long. He dipped both plams into the liquid and
changed his usual fingerprint sworls into something resembling the tread on
a winter tire. Then he tried to restore the original pattern, but he didn't
remember what it looked like.
Now I see why nothing worked with the rabbits-they have no
consciousness, no will, no satisfaction with self. This is a method for man.
And only for man!
Graduate student Krivoshein skimmed the rest, to memorize it. He
flipped through the pages of the diary, photographing them with his memory.
It was clear to him: Krivoshein and Kravets had reached the same thing a
different way-they could control metabolism in man. But they needed a
computer.
And it was important that they needed mechanical help. Now his
discovery wasn't unique, a freak, but knowledge on how to alter oneself. It
wasn't enough to have a method of transformation-you had to have complete
information on the human organism. They didn't have it and couldn't possibly
have it. And his "knowledge in sensations" could be encoded into the
computer and passed on to the world. To every human being. And every human
being could have unheard-of power.
The student slitted his eyes in thought, and leaned back in the chair.
The fight against disease would soon be forgotten! The elements would be
subordinate to man without machines.
The blue ocean depths, where he will go without diving gear or
bathyscaphe. A human dolphin will be able to grow fins and gills at will and
enjoy the water environment, live in it, work in it, travel through it.
If he wants to go into the air, he can grow wings and fly, soar like an
eagle on the warm air currents.
Hostile alien planets: the poisonous atmosphere of chlorous gases,
heated by the sun and the uncooled magma or chilled by the cosmic cold, full
of fatal bacteria. And man will be able to live there as freely as on earth,
without special suits or biological shields. He will merely transform his
organism to breathe chloride instead of oxygen and perhaps change the usual
protein of his body to an organosilicon one.
The important thing about man is not that he breathes oxygen. Not his
arms and legs. You can develop fins, gills, wings, breathe fluorine, replace
protein with organosilicon, and still be man. And you can have normal
extremities, white skin, a head, and papers-and not be one! "Yes, but...."
Krivoshein leaned on the desk. His eyes fell on his original's notes.
Disease and freakishness will disappear. Wounds and poisons will be no
threat. Everyone will be able to become strong, brave, beautiful, will be
able to mobilize the resources of his organism to do work that once seemed
impossible. People will be like gods! Well, what are you smiling wisely for?
This is really the method for the limitless perfection of man!"
"I'm wise, so I'm smiling," Kravets answered coldly. "You're flying off
somewhere again. That's not the only possibility."
"Oh, come on! Doesn't every person strive to become better, more
perfect?"
"Strives in keeping with his concepts of good and perfection. For one
thing, you might end up with "Krivoshein's cosmetic baths. "
"What baths?"
"You know... five rubles a session. A citizen shows up, undresses
behind a screen, and sinks into the biological liquid. The operator-some
Zhora Sherverpupa, former hairdresser-puts on Mono-makh's Crown and asks:
'What would you desire?' This time I want to look like Brigitte Bardot,' his
client orders. 'But make sure my eyebrows are thicker and darker. My guy
really likes 'em dark.' Why are you frowning? She'll even give Zhora a tip.
And the male clientele will be turning themselves into Alain Delon or the
Nordic handsomeness of an Oleg Strizhenov. And then next season the fashion
will be for Lollabrigidas and Vitaly Zubkovs, as seen in the picture...."
"But we could program a minimal retrieval of information for the
computer-womb... some kind of filter for banality and stupidity. Or program
it to-"
"-simultaneously instill inner qualities in the mass consumer? What if
he doesn't want any? Doesn't he have the right not to want any for his
money? 'What am I,' some little lady will ask, 'abnormal or something. Why
do you think you should change me? You're the weirdos!' You see, the
reinforced concreteness of the position of the middle-class boob stems from
his absolute certainty that his own behavior is the norm."
"But we can make sure it's not the norm for the computer-womb."
"Hmmm... I suggest a simple experiment. Please put a finger into the
liquid."
"Which one?"
"Whichever one you won't miss."
I dipped my ring finger into the liquid. The double put on the crown
and went over to the medicine chest.
"Attention!"
"Ow, what are you doing?" I pulled out the finger. It was cut and
bleeding.
Victor Kravets sucked his ring finger and then wiped the blood from the
scalpel.
"Do you see now?" The computer has no norms of behavior. It doesn't
give a damn about anything. Whatever you command it to do, it does."
We healed the cuts.
Kravets brought me down from the heavens-headlong down a steep flight
of stairs. We're a dreamy lot, inventors. And Bell probably thought that
people would use his telephone only for pleasant or necessary news, and
certainly not for gossip, or anonymous denunciations, or for sending an
ambulance to perfectly healthy friends as a joke. We all dream about the
good thing, and when life turns our inventions inside out, we just slap our
sides, like loggers in a forest, and ask: "What are you doing, people?"
The hellish part of science is that it creates methods and nothing
else. So we will have a "method for transforming information in a biological
system." You can turn a monkey into a man. But you could also turn a man
into a donkey.
But I can't, I can't believe that after our discovery things would go
on as they were! Not for the sake of science-for the sake of life. Our
discovery was intended for life: it doesn't shoot; it doesn't kill-it
creates. Maybe we're looking in the wrong place-the problem isn't in the
computer but in man?
Graduate student Krivoshein finished reading the diary to the inner
accompaniment of these troubling thoughts. Had they worked for nothing? Was
their discovery too soon, ahead of its time, and could it harm mankind? In
Moscow he hadn't given much thought to it: the discovery was only within
him-it had nothing to do with anyone else-and he just explored it to his
heart's content and said nothing. Of course, after his bath in the pool of
the reactor he was bursting to share his knowledge and experiences with
Androsiashvili and the guys in the form: radiation and radiation sickness
can be overcome! But this knowledge was top secret... "because of the
dregs!" Krivoshein was angry. "Because of the dregs, of whom there are maybe
one in a thousand and for whom that prostitute science prepares methods of
destroying cities and nations! Only methods. I guess we'll have to just wipe
out those vipers. No one would catch me or shoot me... but then I'll be just
like them. No, that's not it, either.
The student shut the diary and raised his eyes. The table lamp was lit
without illuminating anything. It was light. Beyond the window the matching
yellow faces of the buildings of Academic Town stared into the sun; it
looked like the herd of houses would take off after the light any second.
The clock said 7:30 in the morning.
Krivoshein lit up and went out on the balcony. People were gathering at
the bus stop. A broad-shouldered man in a blue raincost paced under the
trees. "Well, well!" Krivoshein was amazed by his tenacity. "All right, I
have to save what can be saved."
He went back inside, undressed, and took a cold shower. Then he opened
the closet, critically eyed the meager selection of clothes. He chose a
Ukrainian shirt with embroidery. He gave the worn suit a dubious stare,
sighed, and put it on.
Then the student trained in front of the mirror for fifteen minutes and
left the apartment.
"Hey! Stop! Don't be a jackass!"
"Easier said than done,..." muttered the jackass, and
rambled on.
-A contemporary fable
The man in the raincoat noticed Krivoshein, turned to him, and stared.
"God, what a bumbling amateur detective!" Krivoshein thought to
himself. "None of this watching my reflection in store windows or hiding
behind a newspaper-he's pushing his way toward me like a preneanderthal on a
county bus! Don't they train these guys? They should at least read comic
books to improve their technique. A guy like this is really going to solve a
crime, hah!"
He was angry. He walked right up to the man.
"Listen, don't you ever get relieved? Doesn't the seven-hour workday
law apply to detectives?"
The man raised his eyebrows quizzically.
"Val,..." he said in a soft baritone. "Val, don't you recognize me?"
"Hm...." Krivoshein blinked, stared, and whistled. "I see... you must
be the double Adam-Hercules? So that's it! And I thought...."
"And then, you're not Krivoshein? I mean, you are Krivoshein, but the
Moscow one?"
"Right. Well, hello ... hello Val-Adam, you lost soul!"
"Hello."
They shook hands. Krivoshein examined Adam's wind-burned, tanned face:
the features were coarse, but handsome. "Val did a good job, just look at
him!" But the light eyes behind the bleached lashes hid a certain temerity.
"There's going to be an awful lot of Valentin Vasilyevich Krivosheins
around here."
"You can call me Adam. I think I'll adopt the name."
"Where have you been, Adam?"
"In Vladivostok. God...."He chuckled, as though not sure whether he had
the right to joke or not. "In Vladivostok and its environs."
"Really? Teriffic!" Krivoshein looked at him enviously. "Did you work
on the ships?"
"Not quite. I blew up underwater cliffs. And now I'm back to work
here."
"And you're not scared?"
Adam looked into Krivoshein's eyes.
"I'm scared, but... you see, I have an idea. Instead of synthesizing
artificial people I want to try to transform regular ones in the
computer-womb. Well... you know, put them in the liquid and act on them with
external information. I guess that's possible, no?"
Adam was too diffident, he knew he was, and was sorry that he put the
idea so clumsily.
"It's a good idea," the student said. He looked at Adam with new
interest. "I guess we're not that different," he thought. "Or is it just the
internal logic of the discovery?" He went on. "But it's been done, Val. They
put various parts of their bodies into our native element. I think they've
even gotten in completely."
"Is it working?"
"It's working... only I'm not sure about the last experiment."
"That's marvelous! You see... then... then we can introduce art
information into man with retrieval on a feedback basis." And Adam, still
shy and confused, told Krivoshein his plan for ennobling man through art.
The student understood.
He quoted from Krivoshein's diary: "We have to base our work on the
fact that man strives for the best, that no one, or almost no one,
consciously wants to perform vile or stupid deeds, that such deeds are a
result of misunderstanding. Things are complicated in life; you can't figure
out right away whether you're behaving the right way or not. I know that
from my own experience. And if you give a person clear information that his
psychology can respond to-about what's good, what's bad, what's stupid-and a
clear understanding that any of his vile or stupid acts will eventually turn
against him, then you don't have to worry about him or his behavior. This
information could be introduced into the computer-womb as well-"
"He's done that, too?" Adam was surprised.
"No. There was only a vague idea that it was necessary. That the rest
would be meaningless without it. So your idea is right on the mark. It fills
in the blank, as we say in academic circles. Listen!" Krivoshein suddenly
realized. "And with an idea like that you walked around, following me like a
detective instead of just hailing me or coming up to the apartment?"
"You see," Adam tried to explain, "I thought that you... were him. You
walked right past me, didn't recognize me, didn't acknowledge me. I thought
you-or rather he-didn't want to see me. We parted unpleasantly...." He
lowered his head.
"Yes.... Have you been to the lab?"
"The lab? But I don't have a pass. And my papers are Krivoshein's, they
know them there."
"How about over the fence?"
"Over the fence?" Adam shrugged in embarrassment. The idea hadn't
occurred to him.
"The man develops the most audacious, daring ideas but in real life ...
my God!" Krivoshein shook his head in disapproval and tried to explain: "You
have to get rid of that lousy temerity before life, before people or we'll
be lost. And the work will be lost. Well, all right." He handed him the
keys. "Go make yourself at home and get some rest. You've been hanging
around all night; you need it!'
"Where is... he?"
"That's what I'd like to know: where he is, and what happened to him."
The student looked worried. "I'll try to clear all that up. I'll see you
later. So long." He smiled. "It's really terriffic that you came."
"No, a person can't be thrown off the track that easily!" Krivoshein
thought as he headed for the institute. "A great project, a major idea can
subjugate anything, can make you forget insults and personal goals, and
imperfections. Man strives for the best: he's absolutely right!"
Overcrowded morning buses rushed past him. The student noticed Lena in
one of the them: she was sitting by the window and staring abstractly into
space. "Ah, Lena, Lena, how could you?" Reading the diary had a tremendous
effect on him: he felt that he had spent that year in Dneprovsk. Now he was
simply Krivoshein and his heart contracted with the memory of the pain that
that woman had caused him (yes, him!).
I know what our research is leading up to, there's no point in kidding
ourselves: I have to get into the tank. Kravets and I are performing minor
educational experiments with our extremities. I even used the liquid circuit
to fix up my knee tendons, torn so long ago, and now I don't limp. All this
represents marvels in medicine, but we're aiming for something bigger-the
transformation of an entire person! We can't putter around here, or we'll
spend another twenty years around the tank. And I'm the one who has to go
in, an ordinary, natural person. There's nothing more for Kravets to do in
the tank.
Actually, I'll be testing myself, not the computer-womb. All our
knowledge and usage of the word "good" isn't worth a thing if man won't have
the will power and determination to undergo informational transformation in
the liquid.
Of course, I won't come out of the bath transformed. First of all, we
don't have the necessary information to make substantial changes in the
organism or intellect; and secondly, we don't need that for a beginning.
It's enough to experience being plugged into the computer-womb, to prove
that it's possible and not dangerous-and, well, to change something in me.
Make that first orbit around the earth, so to speak.
Is it possible? Is it dangerous? Will I return from the orbiting
capsule, from the experiments? The computer-womb is a complicated thing.
We've discovered so many new things in it, and we still don't know
everything about it. I'm not too comfortable with the shining prospects of
our research.
This is the very time I should get married. The hell with my careful
relations with Lena; I need her. I want her to be with me, take care of me,
worry about me, yell at me when I come home late, but give me dinner first.
And (since everything is clear with the synthesis of doubles) let future
Krivosheins appear not from the computer but as a result of good, highly
moral relations between parents. And let them complicate our lives-I'm for
it. I'm getting married! Why didn't I think of it before?
Of course, to get married now when we're about to do this experiment
... well, at least there'll be a permanent reminder of me-a son or daughter.
People used to go to war, leaving wives and children behind. Why can't I
behave in the same way?
This may not be on the up and up-getting married when there is a
possibility of leaving a widow behind me. But let those who have done what
I'm doing condemn me. I'll accept it from them.
May 12. "Marry me, Lena. Let's live together. And we'll have children
as beautiful as you and as smart as me. Hummmm?"
"Do you really think you're smart?"
"Why not?"
"If you were smart you wouldn't make suggestions like that."
"I don't understand."
"There, you see. And you think you'll have smart children."
"No, tell me. What's wrong? Why won't you marry me?
She stuck the last pin into her hair and turned from the mirror to me.
"I love it when you pout. Darling Val! My lovely red-haired bear. You
mean you've developed some honorable intentions? You sweetie!"
"Wait! Are you agreeing to marry me?"
"No, my love."
"Why not?"
"Because I understand a little more than you do about family life.
Because I know nothing good will come of it for us. Just think back. Have we
ever talked about anything serious? We just meet, spend time.... Think.
Haven't there been times when I come to see you, and you're busy with your
thoughts and you're not happy, even angry, that I'm there? Of course, you
make believe-you try hard, but I can tell. What will happen if we're
together constantly?"
"Do you mean-you don't love me?"
"No, Val," she looked at me sadly. "And I won't fall in love with you.
I don't want to. I used to ... to tell the truth, I worked at this