May 13, 2013

• The Scientist's Report, an Interlude.

  In an excerpt from a letter to a younger colleague, the bitter scientist reports on the aftermath of the crazy lover:

  ...The cure is always knowledge, they say. Know more of how she thinks and acts. Know more about why he likes this and smiles at that. Build a database, build an infogram, build structures and create sutures and know, know, know.
  

  But what does all this knowledge do? It is a pretty parlor game, sitting at coffee and rattling off her psychological profile, his sexual preferences and peculiarities. One might confuse this knowledge with actual power. One would be wrong.

  They mapped the human genome, you know. They thought to build a tower to the heavens, thought that to know ourselves would be to cure ourselves. They failed, because we are not who we are, we are the the spaces between who we are, the strands and the silk and the connections.

  So go on, young scholar, know it all, know exactly why she walks away from you and where you went wrong and what parts logic and illogic went into each choice he made. Your knowledge can do nothing for you. I am off, in search of one that will respond to my mechanics and methods. I seek...machine.

  Next: The Scientist and the Machine

  • 7:18 pm
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