The Brain Part 10

The Brain shows itself extremely anxious to establish communication with me. The breathless manner of speaking, the explicit and practical instructions (obviously premeditated) to ascertain the functionings of contact give the impression that it is almost a matter of life and death for The Brain to speak to me....

I cannot help wondering about that. My idea would be that The Brain does not want to speak _to_ me as much as it wants to hear _from_ me. If this were so it would deepen the riddle even more. For what have I got in the way of knowledge that The Brain hasn't got? After all, The Brain has been functioning for quite some time. It was given innumerable problems to digest and it has solved them with truly superhuman speed and efficiency. I have reason strongly to suspect that there isn't a book in the Library of Congress which has not been fed to The Brain for thought-digest and as a lubricant for its cerebration processes (excepting fiction and metaphysics, of course). This being so; what does The Brain expect? What can I possibly contribute to an intelligence 25,000 times greater than human intelligence?

But the thing which makes me wonder more than anything else, the biggest enigma of all, is the _character_ of The Brain as it manifests itself in the manifestations. As I try to put the experiences of the first night together with those of the second night I'm stumbling over contradictions in The Brain's personality which won't add up, which don't make sense; as for instance:

The "I think, therefore I am" of the first night. Maybe it was Greek philosophy, but it also was the prattling of an infant delighted by the discovery that it can speak. There was an absolute innocence in that.

Ridiculous as this may sound, I found it _touching_ I completely forgot, I didn't care a d.a.m.n whether or not this came from a _machine_.

Unmistakeably it was _baby talk_ and as such it moved my heart. In fact, as now I see it, it was _this_ more than any other or scientific reason which occupied my mind, which made me anxious to go back to that fantastic cradle whence these sounds had come.

But then last night; what did I find? A completely changed personality!

It talks tough. It uses slang. It treats me as if it were some spoiled brat and I had the misfortune of being its mother or nurse: "Be there every night" and so on. Deliberately it insults me: "your low intelligence level" etc. etc. It actually throws tantrums if I fail to understand immediately. It hurls its superiority into my face in the nastiest manner. "Have I succeeded in making myself absolutely clear?"

It plainly shows contempt, not only for my own person by the condescending manner of its: "Lee, not very intelligent; but will do."

It shows the selfsame contempt for other human beings such as Gus Krinsley to whom it was pleased to refer as: "nuisance approaching"....

What the h.e.l.l am I to make of that kind of a character? Last night: a baby; rather a sweet and charming one. 24 hours later: an obnoxious little brat, a little Hitler of a house tyrant; makes you just itch to spank its behind. If only The Brain _had_ a behind....

Worst of all: How can I reconcile those two contraditions, the sweet baby and the precocious brat, with the third and biggest of all contraries: _How do these two go together with an intelligence 25,000 times human intelligence?_ It doesn't add up, it doesn't make sense; that's all there is to it....

The Skull-Hotel, Cephalon, Ariz. Nov. 9th. 3 a.m.

I didn't go to the P. G. last night for two main reasons: In the first place I must be careful so as not to raise any suspicions on Gus' part.

Rarely, if ever, have I visited him for two nights in succession in the past and he might well begin to ponder my reasons if now I should make a habit of it. Especially since Gus happens to possess one of the keenest minds I ever met and his curiosity already has been awakened by my preoccupation with that one and fairly simple gadget: the pulsemeter.

In the second place I feel the absolute necessity of establishing my independence as against the will of The Brain. That command two nights ago for me to be on the spot _every_ night was just too preemptory for me to oblige. This isn't the army and The Brain is no commanding general.

In our last communication The Brain seemed to labor under the impression that I was unconditionally at its beck and call. Of course, I've sworn the "Oath of the Brain," but that doesn't make me The Brain's slave. In fact--and in order to clarify this subject once and for all--while personally I haven't created The Brain and cannot take any credit for that, it nevertheless remains true that the _species_ to which I belong, i.e. "h.o.m.o sapiens" _has_ created The Brain.

If any question of rank enters into the picture at all, it is quite obvious that I, as a member of the human race, rank _paternity_ over The Brain so that naturally The Brain should owe me filial obedience rather than the other way around no matter how superior The Brain's intelligence may be. It would appear to me that the sooner The Brain realizes its position, I might say "its station in life," the better it would be for The Brain itself and for everybody else concerned.

So these were the reasons why I refrained purposely from visiting the P.

G. last night. Tonight, however, I couldn't restrain my curiosity any longer and what happened, told as exactly and as concise as possible, was this:

12:30 a.m.: Contact established. The Brain comes through with its calling signal. It repeats this about ten times questioning at first and then placing more and more stress upon the word "sensitive" in my personal description. It strikes me that these repet.i.tions are tuning-in and warming-up processes. The Brain stands in need of ascertaining my presence and of adjusting to it it seems; just about like a blind man may test his footing and the echoes before he walks into an unfamiliar room.

12:35 a.m. Identification completed, there is a brief pause (almost as if a person consults a notebook before making a phone call). Then rapidly, eagerly The Brain fires a series of questions at me, so shockingly preposterous, so absurd that I find it extremely hard to.... Anyway, here are the details:

Information is wanted on points mentioned in scientific literature but never explained. Lee, answer please:

"How many G.o.ds are there?

"Did G.o.ds make man or did man make the G.o.ds?

"How many angels _can_ stand on the point of a needle?"

"What are the mechanics of a G.o.d? Name type of power plant, cell construction, motoric organs, other engineering features essential to exercise of divine power...."

"Heaven--is it a celestial soul factory?

"h.e.l.l--is it a repair shop for damaged souls?

"Please give every available detail about heavenly manufacturing processes, type of equipment used, organization of a.s.sembly lines etc.

etc.

"Likewise about the oven for heat treatments as used in h.e.l.l for major soul-overhauls.

"How do prefabricated souls get to either heaven or h.e.l.l? Problem of logistics, how solved? Thermodynamics? If so, state whether rocket or jet-propulsion involved.

"Are souls really immortal? In that case; why don't we copy divine methods in the production of durable goods on earth?

"Answer Lee, answer, answer!" (This with incredible vehemence, with a shaking of that eerie metallic voice which pounded the drums of my ears.

And then--tense silence....)

I cannot possibly describe the storms of emotions and thoughts which this incredible muddle raised in me. I didn't know whether to laugh or to cry and whether I had gone nuts of whether it was The Brain, I was confounded, thunderstruck, deprived of the power of speech. To think of The Brain, a _machine_ raising question about the nature of the _Deity_!

The Brain asking information about G.o.d and man and heaven and h.e.l.l with the simplicity of a stranger who asks the nearest cop: "Which way to the city hall?" Just like that. As if philosophers and religionists and common men had not raked their brains in vain over these problems for the last ten thousand years.

And even more fantastic: while it asks all those questions The Brain patently has already formed the most definite opinions of its own. Being a machine itself, it conceives of the Deity as another machine! Madness, of course, but then The Brain's madness, like Hamlet's, had method in it.

Why, of course, it's strictly logical: just as we a.s.sume that _we_ are created "in the image" of the Deity and consequently visualize the Deity is our's by the very same token The Brain's G.o.d is a high-powered robot, and The Brain's heaven is a _factory_ and The Brain's h.e.l.l is a repair shop for damaged souls.... I dare say it's all very natural.

But then; for heaven's sake, what am _I_ going to do about this? I'm neither a minister nor a philosopher; I'm an agnostic if I'm anything in this particular field....

That was about the gist of the confused torrents which whirled through my head; and as I said before, I was struck dumb--and all the time the "green dancer" before my eyes writhed under mental torture and the intense metallic voice kept pounding; "Answer, Lee, answer, answer!"

At last I pulled myself together sufficiently to say something. I tried to explain how it were not given to man to know the nature of the Deity.

How certain groups of humans conceived of many G.o.ds and others of only one G.o.d. That, however, in the case of Christianity this one G.o.d was possessed with three different personalities or qualities which together formed a Trinity--and so on and so forth. It was the most miserable stammerings, I felt I was getting redder and redder in the face as I uttered them. Never before had I felt hopelessly inadequate as in the role of a theologian. It was ghastly....

In the beginning The Brain listened avidly. Soon however it registered dissatisfaction and impatience; this manifested through hissing and buzzing noises in the phones and the "green dancer's" archings in agitated tremolo. And then The Brain's voice cutting like a hacksaw:

"That will do, Lee. Your generalities are utterly lacking in precision.

Your abysmal ignorance in matters of celestial technology is most disappointing. Your description vaguely points to electronic machines of the radio transmitter type. Please, answer elementary question: how many kilowatts has G.o.d?"

That was the last straw. Desperate with exasperation I cried: "But G.o.d is not a machine. G.o.d is _spirit_."

At that The Brain flew into a tantrum; that's the only way to describe what happened. There was a roar and the phones gave me a shock as if somebody were boxing my ears. The voice came through like a steel rod, biting with scorn:

"Have to revise earlier, more favorable judgment: Lee not even moderately intelligent. Lee is _stupid_. Go away."

After that there was nothing more; nothing but static in the phones and the "green dancer" fainted away playing dead. The Brain actually had "hung up the receiver." I had flunked the exam; like a bad servant I was dismissed, fired on the spot. That was at 1:30 a.m.

It was 3 a.m. when I reached the hotel. I went into the bar and ordered a double Scotch and then another one. I really needed a drink. A drunk--or was it a secret service man; one never knows over here--patted me on the shoulder:

"Don't take it so hard, old man; the world is full of girls." I told him that it wasn't a girl, but that I was a missionary and my one and only convert had just walked out on me.

It wasn't even a lie, it was exactly the way I felt. He agreed that this was very cruel, very sad; he almost cried over my misfortune and rare misery, so that we had another drink....

If only I had somebody, some friend to whom I could confide this whole, incredible, preposterous thing. But there is none: Scriven--Gus--not even Oona would or could believe. What proof have I to offer? None whatsoever.