15. The Lost Theory of Love
Ransom stood in a field of tall grasses that came up to his waist. At Ground Zero in The West Bank, the blue-green plants were tended and irrigated with an effort usually reserved for agricuetical cash crops. But Ransom knew that these GMO plants contained no advanced drugs, not even grains for food. The plants were basically nothing more than weeds. But even weeds have their purpose.
A woman approached him. Graceful Ashkenazic features. Early-thirties, but she looked younger. Tall, and so impossibly thin that she looked like one of those models straight out of a fashion magazine from the nineteen-nineties. Ransom knows that both she and her husband preach the gospel of a calorie-restricted diet and apparently practice what they preach.
"My good friend." She said. "Come to visit little me at my home."
"Good to see you, Tamara."
"Good to see you. I'm glad to see you spending more time telepresent on the Net. You virtually disappeared after your friend died."
"He didn't die."
"Oh. That's right. I knew that. Sorry"
"It's okay," he said, "believe me." He caused his graphic representation to brush the grasses with his arm. "This is new. You made your home site look like Ground Zero."
"My server uses a live video feed to keep the environment up to date by refreshing every couple days or so. Of course, the server uses fractal algorithms to guess where every individual plant, rock, leaf, or piece of glass goes. But this is pretty much what it looks like.
Ransom had met Tamara about three years earlier at The Parthenon, one of the first massively multi-user telepresence forums available to the public. It was a crowded primitive place contained in a pixilated artificial looking environment where everyone's avatar looked like either a male or female generic toga-wearing philosopher whose appearance could be only be customized with a dozen or so variables.
On a particularly crowded day at The Parthenon, some people gathered in a corner to discuss the evolution of human consciousness. Tamara accosted Ransom when he made the mistake of saying the words, "intelligent design," a loaded phrase that unfairly conjures up memories of ignorance and theopathy. Before Ransom had a chance to explain that he was the farthest thing from a seven-day creationist, Tamara attacked his opinions with an awe-inspiring viciousness. Ransom was impressed, and felt he had no other choice but to fight back in kind. Unfortunately, Ransom was relatively new to internet argumenteering, and he didn't come off too well.
The next day, at 1AM EST, Ransom just happened to be up and online. She called him and apologized, explaining that his views had some merit. They stayed up all night talking and stayed fast friends ever since.
"Isn't this kind of depressing." asked Ransom. "I mean, twelve thousand people died here."
She shook her head. "I think it's wonderful what we're doing here. The most ambitious phytoremediation project in history. A generation ago, the Jewish people bragged about what they did with their homeland. We made a desert bloom, they said. Always looking to outdo ourselves, now we're going to see if we can do the same with a nuclear wasteland."
"I'm surprised you can even get anything to grow out here. Are these the same plants you and your husband worked on?" She nodded, smiled, and widened her green eyes. Not a murky green, like Ransom's. A bright eerily iridescent emerald green which Tamara had once revealed to him that she wasn't born with. Her enthusiasm was infectious. Ransom loved to hear intelligent women talk. "Tell me how it works again."
"First, the ground was irrigated with an organic solution that seeped deep into the soil. The solution was cultured with bacteria that was biohacked by a different team on this project. The bacteria oxidized the radioactive metals in the soil, converted them into a form that can be readily absorbed into vegetable matter. Next came these plants. The team that Eliezer and I worked on engineered these plants to be hyperaccumulators of the specific metals that have poisoned this land. A hyperaccumulator absorbs certain minerals in quantities much greater than other plants. The roots will pull the radioactive metals out of the soil and into the blades of grass. This crop here is almost done. We'll pull up the plants and send them to the incinerator. We seed the ground again and grow another crop. Repeat steps A and B until the geiger counters stop clicking."
"Sounds easy enough."
"Easy! Screw you, pal. There's nothing easy about botanical biohacking. I am constantly in awe of mother nature's creativity. In comparison, computer science is easy."
"Oooo. Jesse would argue that with you tooth and nail." he said.
"Look, machine intelligence is easy. You write a piece of code, you tell it what to do. It does it. It's a different story with biological systems. Whether you're talking about genetic codes, or neurological networks, or whatever. There's a certain level of unpredictability."
"Why?"
"It's because there still so much we don't know about life. The genetic code is so densely complex, it's truly humbling. Single genes have multiple different functions. Sometimes they express themselves, and sometimes they don't for reasons yet unknown. And different hereditary factors can be influenced by many, many different genes. Sometimes a gene that you would never suspect can influence alleles in unsuspected ways. The nuances and idiosyncracies of DNA will take decades to understand. Lifetimes."
"Jesse's solution to that would be to create a robot that could figure it out for you." said Ransom.
"Right, Typical Superhumanist response. Let the singularity take care of it."
"Okay. But what if the singularity does take care of it?"
"If the Singularitarians are right, hey, I'll buy them all a drink. I just never bought into the concept. I mean, it's very impressive that computer processor speed doubles every year and a half. But I fear that Moore's Law is about to hit a plateau. How are they going to make processors any faster once the circuits are the size of molecules? And yes, computer hardware will very soon be theoretically as powerful as the human brain. But the software is still as dumb as dirt. The so-called artificial intelligences are just really fancy directories. It just seems so disingenuous, looking for the final discovery that will end all technology and solve every problem."
Ransom replied, "Yeah, there are way too many problems." Ransom stared out over the field. "This place makes me feel kind of ashamed. So many people died here. But I get so upset about the problems of a few people. When that bomb exploded, I don't remember feeling sad at all. I thought that yeah, it sucked that twelve thousand people died. But I didn't know any of them. And in a way, it's good for the dead, cause now their problems are over."
"That's a perfectly natural way to feel." she said. "When it happened, I lost an aunt, and uncle, and three cousins. I cried for days. But I can't imagine myself getting so upset if I hadn't have lost family. This is the human way to act. It's human to think about the one we lost, not the thousands we didn't know.
"Now think about what happened. A small conspiracy of muslim extremists combined ingenuity, luck, and evil obsession to build their so-called, dirty bomb. After they detonated it in this crowded suburb, the evil people of the world rejoiced. In their ignorance and wickedness, they danced in the streets. It wasn't just another bombing. Someone had finally broken the single day kill record set back in 2001. And they would cheer every time the death toll got higher."
"Then, there were these other people, they didn't have the bloodlust and murder in their heart, but they were still morally reprehensible. They used the bombing as a political liability. They talked about how sad and terrible it was that so many died. Then they looked for places to lay the blame. They blamed Israel. They blamed The United States. They blamed capitalism and the corporations. A few idiots said it was God's punishment for tolerating pornography, teledildonics, and homosexuals. Sometimes they were blunt. And sometimes they were quite subtle about their insinuation that the blood of twelve thousand people are on your hands. Can you see where I'm going with this?"
"Yeah, I guess. Only the bad guys talk about numbers." said Ransom.
"The Talmud says that killing one man is like killing the world. Statistics have their place. But they are of no help when dealing with grief."
"And how did you deal with your grief, Tamara?" he suddenly became embarrassed with himself. "I'm sorry. I'm not asking too much, am I?"
"No, it's okay. Grief and mourning are a good thing, as long as they have their place. There are specific periods and times for grief set up by God that allow time for healing."
"Set up by God? Aren't you an atheist?"
"Well, number one, I'm agnostic. And number two, I may not believe in God, but I'm still Jewish."
Ransom nodded, hoping he didn't just make another faux pas.
"For thirty days I avoided parties, bars, music, movies, et cetera. I said the Kaddish prayer every morning. Though I don't believe in the God of the Bible, I said the prayer as more of a confirmation in my belief that life moves, onward and upward. Afterwards, no more formal mourning is to take place, except on the anniversary. So I can't use sorrow as an excuse to get out of working. I believe that man was meant to work. Meaningful work is where we get our greatest joy. And barring the deus ex machina of a superhuman cyber-intelligence that will make us all obsolete, I see a whole universe to discover and explore."
"Hopefully, Tamara, work isn't the only thing to look forward to."
"Oh, of course not. All work and no play... you know."
"Which brings me to the ulterior motive of why I came here." he said. "Um... I need your advice, Tamara."
"My advice as an agnostic Jew, or as an experienced biohacker?"
"I need your advice as a woman."
She nodded her head once in a look of astonishment."Oh, okay. And I assume this is about Jesse, the robot worshipping Superhumanist. The girl you like."
"I never said I liked her."
"You don't have to. It's, like, sooo obvious." She started to swing her lithe hips from left to right while pumping here hands in the virtual air in front of her. "Ransom has a girlfriend. Ransom has a girlfriend."
"Stop." He was completely deadpan.
She stopped. "Ransom, you don't look happy."
"I haven't been happy in a long time. But you're right, I do like her. I think we look good together. I just wish I knew what she was thinking. She says she's not interested in a relationship at this point in her life. But, you know, people change their mind."
"So what's your question?"
He took a long breath. "How important is sex to a relationship, for the woman?"
She looked down her nose at him with disappointment. For a moment she almost lost her youthful appearance and looked like the old crone that had taught Ransom fourth grade arithmetic so long ago. "How important is it to you?"
"Important."
"Well, don't expect a woman to think that much different than you. Really, Ransom, what kind of a question is that? You don't hold some medieval patriarchal notion that sex only benefits the man?"
"No. I just want to know if a relationship is doomed if there's no sexual connection. If the man can't satisfy the woman."
"I think a relationship like that is definitely in danger. If there's a problem where they can't connect physically. When a couple realizes this, it might not be a bad idea if things don't go any further. What I don't understand is why so many fundies insist that there be no sex before marriage. It's crazy, like buying a house sight unseen. What a minute... did you and Jesse, you know, make a connection?"
Ransom answered without looking at her, "Yeah, sort of."
"Sort of? What do you mean sort of? Did you, or did you not stick you penis inside of her?"
Ransom groaned.
"Ransom, we're friends. If you want my advice, I'm gonna give it to you completely uncensored."
He crossed his arms. "Yes, but only into her oral cavity. There."
"Did you go down on her?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"There wouldn't have been much point."
"You selfish bastard! Why didn't you guys fuck?"
"There wouldn't have been much point in that either. She wouldn't have felt anything."
"Why not? Are you like, really small? Science has made tremendous strides in the area of male enhancement."
Ransom knew that saving that detail until last would be unnecessarily dramatic. But he felt the dilemma deserved more than stoic detachment. He told her about Jesse's paralysis.
"Wow, Ransom, that's different. I think that though sex would be problematic, I do think a relationship could work out if the two of you really love each other."
"You really think so?"
"Yes, I do."
Ransom was frustrated. Why did it seem that no one else wanted to make a big deal of this? There's this great wrong in the Universe that everyone else wanted to shrug off or ignore completely.
"Really, Tamara, I'm surprised. I expected a non-mystical answer from a free thinker as yourself. What is this, love, you speak of?"
"Ransom, it isn't mystical." He had abruptly put her on the defensive. She looked annoyed. "Love is a feeling between two people. It's biological."
"Then maybe you can explain why sex needn't matter when love is involved."
"I can't. I just got finished explaining to you how complex biological systems are."
"It may be hard. But it can be done. Love might be complex, but it's not holistic. If Cupid is biological, then it can be reduced. It can be broken down into rules and steps of cause and effect."
A habit when she's contemplating, she used her perfectly white teeth to play with the stud in her tongue. The piece of jewelry functioned as a bio-sensor wand. It monitored her diet and her intake of toxins; bacteria, trans-fatty acids, dioxins, nitrosamines.
"Okay then. Marriage is about more than sex. It's about intimacy, physical as well as emotion. It's about psychological support."
"So what you're saying is, love is about support? It's about need?"
"Right. Let's say, God forbid, that Eliezer had an accident and ended up in a wheelchair with paralysis that won't respond to treatment. Sex would be hard, but we would stay together."
"Because you need his support."
"Yes."
"So then you would leave him if he were unable to give you support. Right?"
"Not necessarily."
"Okay, what if he lost his job, gained a bunch of weight, and became a big fat loser?" Ransom had just described himself at age twenty-one, after his first major bout with the malaise of adulthood.
"I don't know."
"What if he becomes a drug addict? I mean, you say that love is complicated on one hand, and then you make it so cut and dry on the other."
She sighed. "These hypotheticals are pointless. I wouldn't know unless I was in that specific situation. Love is not easy. And I think that you are the one looking for easy answers."
Ransom smirked to hide the fact that he had no reply. But he wondered, what's so wrong with wanting a simple answer?
"Any more questions on the mystery that is woman you'd like me to answer?"
"No." he said
She was gracious. "Not even a question for an agnostic Jewish botanical biohacker? I would be happy to answer, friend."
Not wanting to stop talking, he asked the first question that popped into his head. "Is it true that the Jewish people advocate eugenics?"
"Throughout history, we have been the victims of eugenics, not vice versa."
"But is it true that Jews with undesirable traits are encouraged not to procreate?"
"Um... well, there's this program in Israel. It a genetics counseling program. I don't know if I would call it eugenics."
"How does it work?"
"I'm not sure." She turned her head and addressed her server. "I request audience with Hippocrates." The old greek doctor appeared instantaneously in a white toga and sandals.
"Holy crap!" he said. "I had to wait two days just to talk to this guy."
"Yes. One of the perks of being a scientist." She addressed the philosopher-bot. "Tell Ransom here about the government of Israel's eugenics program."
"Israel does not have a eugenics program." said the bot.
"Cut the politically correct bullshit and just tell us about how they prevent genetic disease." said Ransom.
"Ahem... eugenics is an offensive term, and forbidden for use by government employees and contractors. The genetic counseling program is a highly successful way of preventing genetic diseases. The program offers genetic screening free to anyone who requests it. The testing screens for carriers of a number of hereditary diseases, most notably, Tay Sachs disease. Since 2010, there has not been a single case of a Tay Sachs child born to a newlywed couple in all Israel. The results of the screening are confidential, even to a person's spouse. However, most engaged couples insist on genetic counseling before marriage."
"So basically, if we can get the right people to fuck, then we can get rid of a lot of the genetic disease out there. Then we won't have to spend so much money on treating these diseases, or even bother to find a cure. We can just wait for all the unlucky ones who already had faulty genes to just die out."
Hippocrates-bot stood silent for a good while. Ransom was sure that the semantics of his question was too much for it, and it wouldn't give him an answer. But surprisingly, the bot answered. "I think so."
Tamara shook her head. "So cynical. Cures for disease will still be sought. You know as well as I do that not all disease is caused by genetics. You can't screen for spinal cord injury."
"No, you can't." said Ransom. "But you can screen for birth defects of the spine, can't you? Hey, bot. Is there a genetic cause for spinal birth defects?"
"Yes. Neural tube birth defects, such as spina bifida, can have many causes, some genetic. Scientists have isolated genes that increase the chances of parenting a child with a neural tube birth defect. These genes are most prevalent in people of Irish and Welsh descent. Per one thousand births, spina bifida occurs more frequently in The United Kingdom than any other nation."
"And do they screen for these genes in The UK?"
"No, not usually."
"Why not?"
The bot was silent for a few seconds as he thought it out. "As I said, the genes only increase the chance of a neural tube defect. Spina bifida can only be positively detected after several stages of development. There are several causes of neural tube defects, some still not understood. With the potential stress caused by one discovering that they carry a mutant gene, it may be best to only test for genes that definitely cause disease."
"That's crazy. More children are born with spina bifida in The UK than any other nation, and the government won't do anything about it?"
"I cannot answer that query because it contains false axiom. Per one thousand births, more children are born with spina bifida in The United States than any other nation."
"No, you mean The United Kingdom."
Without the least hint of irritation, the bot said, "No, I mean The United States."
Hinting heavily at irritation as he pulled up video from a minute ago, Ransom said, "Get ready for a paradox crash, stupid bot. Cause just a few seconds ago, you said spina bifida occurs more frequently..." Then he answered his own question before he finished asking it. "Oh... abortion."
"Please try a different wording for your query."
"Abortion to prevent possible birth defects is used more often in the United Kingdom than in The United States."
It took a few seconds. "Yes."
"Go away, bot."
Hippocrates disappeared. Tamara said she had to leave to. "Peace be upon you, my friend. Good luck with Jesse. And don't give up hope."
She turned into a cloud of dust, or pollen, or something; and blew away in the wind as it made waves in the field of grasses. Once again Ransom was alone. The only sound was the wind.
A woman approached him. Graceful Ashkenazic features. Early-thirties, but she looked younger. Tall, and so impossibly thin that she looked like one of those models straight out of a fashion magazine from the nineteen-nineties. Ransom knows that both she and her husband preach the gospel of a calorie-restricted diet and apparently practice what they preach.
"My good friend." She said. "Come to visit little me at my home."
"Good to see you, Tamara."
"Good to see you. I'm glad to see you spending more time telepresent on the Net. You virtually disappeared after your friend died."
"He didn't die."
"Oh. That's right. I knew that. Sorry"
"It's okay," he said, "believe me." He caused his graphic representation to brush the grasses with his arm. "This is new. You made your home site look like Ground Zero."
"My server uses a live video feed to keep the environment up to date by refreshing every couple days or so. Of course, the server uses fractal algorithms to guess where every individual plant, rock, leaf, or piece of glass goes. But this is pretty much what it looks like.
Ransom had met Tamara about three years earlier at The Parthenon, one of the first massively multi-user telepresence forums available to the public. It was a crowded primitive place contained in a pixilated artificial looking environment where everyone's avatar looked like either a male or female generic toga-wearing philosopher whose appearance could be only be customized with a dozen or so variables.
On a particularly crowded day at The Parthenon, some people gathered in a corner to discuss the evolution of human consciousness. Tamara accosted Ransom when he made the mistake of saying the words, "intelligent design," a loaded phrase that unfairly conjures up memories of ignorance and theopathy. Before Ransom had a chance to explain that he was the farthest thing from a seven-day creationist, Tamara attacked his opinions with an awe-inspiring viciousness. Ransom was impressed, and felt he had no other choice but to fight back in kind. Unfortunately, Ransom was relatively new to internet argumenteering, and he didn't come off too well.
The next day, at 1AM EST, Ransom just happened to be up and online. She called him and apologized, explaining that his views had some merit. They stayed up all night talking and stayed fast friends ever since.
"Isn't this kind of depressing." asked Ransom. "I mean, twelve thousand people died here."
She shook her head. "I think it's wonderful what we're doing here. The most ambitious phytoremediation project in history. A generation ago, the Jewish people bragged about what they did with their homeland. We made a desert bloom, they said. Always looking to outdo ourselves, now we're going to see if we can do the same with a nuclear wasteland."
"I'm surprised you can even get anything to grow out here. Are these the same plants you and your husband worked on?" She nodded, smiled, and widened her green eyes. Not a murky green, like Ransom's. A bright eerily iridescent emerald green which Tamara had once revealed to him that she wasn't born with. Her enthusiasm was infectious. Ransom loved to hear intelligent women talk. "Tell me how it works again."
"First, the ground was irrigated with an organic solution that seeped deep into the soil. The solution was cultured with bacteria that was biohacked by a different team on this project. The bacteria oxidized the radioactive metals in the soil, converted them into a form that can be readily absorbed into vegetable matter. Next came these plants. The team that Eliezer and I worked on engineered these plants to be hyperaccumulators of the specific metals that have poisoned this land. A hyperaccumulator absorbs certain minerals in quantities much greater than other plants. The roots will pull the radioactive metals out of the soil and into the blades of grass. This crop here is almost done. We'll pull up the plants and send them to the incinerator. We seed the ground again and grow another crop. Repeat steps A and B until the geiger counters stop clicking."
"Sounds easy enough."
"Easy! Screw you, pal. There's nothing easy about botanical biohacking. I am constantly in awe of mother nature's creativity. In comparison, computer science is easy."
"Oooo. Jesse would argue that with you tooth and nail." he said.
"Look, machine intelligence is easy. You write a piece of code, you tell it what to do. It does it. It's a different story with biological systems. Whether you're talking about genetic codes, or neurological networks, or whatever. There's a certain level of unpredictability."
"Why?"
"It's because there still so much we don't know about life. The genetic code is so densely complex, it's truly humbling. Single genes have multiple different functions. Sometimes they express themselves, and sometimes they don't for reasons yet unknown. And different hereditary factors can be influenced by many, many different genes. Sometimes a gene that you would never suspect can influence alleles in unsuspected ways. The nuances and idiosyncracies of DNA will take decades to understand. Lifetimes."
"Jesse's solution to that would be to create a robot that could figure it out for you." said Ransom.
"Right, Typical Superhumanist response. Let the singularity take care of it."
"Okay. But what if the singularity does take care of it?"
"If the Singularitarians are right, hey, I'll buy them all a drink. I just never bought into the concept. I mean, it's very impressive that computer processor speed doubles every year and a half. But I fear that Moore's Law is about to hit a plateau. How are they going to make processors any faster once the circuits are the size of molecules? And yes, computer hardware will very soon be theoretically as powerful as the human brain. But the software is still as dumb as dirt. The so-called artificial intelligences are just really fancy directories. It just seems so disingenuous, looking for the final discovery that will end all technology and solve every problem."
Ransom replied, "Yeah, there are way too many problems." Ransom stared out over the field. "This place makes me feel kind of ashamed. So many people died here. But I get so upset about the problems of a few people. When that bomb exploded, I don't remember feeling sad at all. I thought that yeah, it sucked that twelve thousand people died. But I didn't know any of them. And in a way, it's good for the dead, cause now their problems are over."
"That's a perfectly natural way to feel." she said. "When it happened, I lost an aunt, and uncle, and three cousins. I cried for days. But I can't imagine myself getting so upset if I hadn't have lost family. This is the human way to act. It's human to think about the one we lost, not the thousands we didn't know.
"Now think about what happened. A small conspiracy of muslim extremists combined ingenuity, luck, and evil obsession to build their so-called, dirty bomb. After they detonated it in this crowded suburb, the evil people of the world rejoiced. In their ignorance and wickedness, they danced in the streets. It wasn't just another bombing. Someone had finally broken the single day kill record set back in 2001. And they would cheer every time the death toll got higher."
"Then, there were these other people, they didn't have the bloodlust and murder in their heart, but they were still morally reprehensible. They used the bombing as a political liability. They talked about how sad and terrible it was that so many died. Then they looked for places to lay the blame. They blamed Israel. They blamed The United States. They blamed capitalism and the corporations. A few idiots said it was God's punishment for tolerating pornography, teledildonics, and homosexuals. Sometimes they were blunt. And sometimes they were quite subtle about their insinuation that the blood of twelve thousand people are on your hands. Can you see where I'm going with this?"
"Yeah, I guess. Only the bad guys talk about numbers." said Ransom.
"The Talmud says that killing one man is like killing the world. Statistics have their place. But they are of no help when dealing with grief."
"And how did you deal with your grief, Tamara?" he suddenly became embarrassed with himself. "I'm sorry. I'm not asking too much, am I?"
"No, it's okay. Grief and mourning are a good thing, as long as they have their place. There are specific periods and times for grief set up by God that allow time for healing."
"Set up by God? Aren't you an atheist?"
"Well, number one, I'm agnostic. And number two, I may not believe in God, but I'm still Jewish."
Ransom nodded, hoping he didn't just make another faux pas.
"For thirty days I avoided parties, bars, music, movies, et cetera. I said the Kaddish prayer every morning. Though I don't believe in the God of the Bible, I said the prayer as more of a confirmation in my belief that life moves, onward and upward. Afterwards, no more formal mourning is to take place, except on the anniversary. So I can't use sorrow as an excuse to get out of working. I believe that man was meant to work. Meaningful work is where we get our greatest joy. And barring the deus ex machina of a superhuman cyber-intelligence that will make us all obsolete, I see a whole universe to discover and explore."
"Hopefully, Tamara, work isn't the only thing to look forward to."
"Oh, of course not. All work and no play... you know."
"Which brings me to the ulterior motive of why I came here." he said. "Um... I need your advice, Tamara."
"My advice as an agnostic Jew, or as an experienced biohacker?"
"I need your advice as a woman."
She nodded her head once in a look of astonishment."Oh, okay. And I assume this is about Jesse, the robot worshipping Superhumanist. The girl you like."
"I never said I liked her."
"You don't have to. It's, like, sooo obvious." She started to swing her lithe hips from left to right while pumping here hands in the virtual air in front of her. "Ransom has a girlfriend. Ransom has a girlfriend."
"Stop." He was completely deadpan.
She stopped. "Ransom, you don't look happy."
"I haven't been happy in a long time. But you're right, I do like her. I think we look good together. I just wish I knew what she was thinking. She says she's not interested in a relationship at this point in her life. But, you know, people change their mind."
"So what's your question?"
He took a long breath. "How important is sex to a relationship, for the woman?"
She looked down her nose at him with disappointment. For a moment she almost lost her youthful appearance and looked like the old crone that had taught Ransom fourth grade arithmetic so long ago. "How important is it to you?"
"Important."
"Well, don't expect a woman to think that much different than you. Really, Ransom, what kind of a question is that? You don't hold some medieval patriarchal notion that sex only benefits the man?"
"No. I just want to know if a relationship is doomed if there's no sexual connection. If the man can't satisfy the woman."
"I think a relationship like that is definitely in danger. If there's a problem where they can't connect physically. When a couple realizes this, it might not be a bad idea if things don't go any further. What I don't understand is why so many fundies insist that there be no sex before marriage. It's crazy, like buying a house sight unseen. What a minute... did you and Jesse, you know, make a connection?"
Ransom answered without looking at her, "Yeah, sort of."
"Sort of? What do you mean sort of? Did you, or did you not stick you penis inside of her?"
Ransom groaned.
"Ransom, we're friends. If you want my advice, I'm gonna give it to you completely uncensored."
He crossed his arms. "Yes, but only into her oral cavity. There."
"Did you go down on her?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"There wouldn't have been much point."
"You selfish bastard! Why didn't you guys fuck?"
"There wouldn't have been much point in that either. She wouldn't have felt anything."
"Why not? Are you like, really small? Science has made tremendous strides in the area of male enhancement."
Ransom knew that saving that detail until last would be unnecessarily dramatic. But he felt the dilemma deserved more than stoic detachment. He told her about Jesse's paralysis.
"Wow, Ransom, that's different. I think that though sex would be problematic, I do think a relationship could work out if the two of you really love each other."
"You really think so?"
"Yes, I do."
Ransom was frustrated. Why did it seem that no one else wanted to make a big deal of this? There's this great wrong in the Universe that everyone else wanted to shrug off or ignore completely.
"Really, Tamara, I'm surprised. I expected a non-mystical answer from a free thinker as yourself. What is this, love, you speak of?"
"Ransom, it isn't mystical." He had abruptly put her on the defensive. She looked annoyed. "Love is a feeling between two people. It's biological."
"Then maybe you can explain why sex needn't matter when love is involved."
"I can't. I just got finished explaining to you how complex biological systems are."
"It may be hard. But it can be done. Love might be complex, but it's not holistic. If Cupid is biological, then it can be reduced. It can be broken down into rules and steps of cause and effect."
A habit when she's contemplating, she used her perfectly white teeth to play with the stud in her tongue. The piece of jewelry functioned as a bio-sensor wand. It monitored her diet and her intake of toxins; bacteria, trans-fatty acids, dioxins, nitrosamines.
"Okay then. Marriage is about more than sex. It's about intimacy, physical as well as emotion. It's about psychological support."
"So what you're saying is, love is about support? It's about need?"
"Right. Let's say, God forbid, that Eliezer had an accident and ended up in a wheelchair with paralysis that won't respond to treatment. Sex would be hard, but we would stay together."
"Because you need his support."
"Yes."
"So then you would leave him if he were unable to give you support. Right?"
"Not necessarily."
"Okay, what if he lost his job, gained a bunch of weight, and became a big fat loser?" Ransom had just described himself at age twenty-one, after his first major bout with the malaise of adulthood.
"I don't know."
"What if he becomes a drug addict? I mean, you say that love is complicated on one hand, and then you make it so cut and dry on the other."
She sighed. "These hypotheticals are pointless. I wouldn't know unless I was in that specific situation. Love is not easy. And I think that you are the one looking for easy answers."
Ransom smirked to hide the fact that he had no reply. But he wondered, what's so wrong with wanting a simple answer?
"Any more questions on the mystery that is woman you'd like me to answer?"
"No." he said
She was gracious. "Not even a question for an agnostic Jewish botanical biohacker? I would be happy to answer, friend."
Not wanting to stop talking, he asked the first question that popped into his head. "Is it true that the Jewish people advocate eugenics?"
"Throughout history, we have been the victims of eugenics, not vice versa."
"But is it true that Jews with undesirable traits are encouraged not to procreate?"
"Um... well, there's this program in Israel. It a genetics counseling program. I don't know if I would call it eugenics."
"How does it work?"
"I'm not sure." She turned her head and addressed her server. "I request audience with Hippocrates." The old greek doctor appeared instantaneously in a white toga and sandals.
"Holy crap!" he said. "I had to wait two days just to talk to this guy."
"Yes. One of the perks of being a scientist." She addressed the philosopher-bot. "Tell Ransom here about the government of Israel's eugenics program."
"Israel does not have a eugenics program." said the bot.
"Cut the politically correct bullshit and just tell us about how they prevent genetic disease." said Ransom.
"Ahem... eugenics is an offensive term, and forbidden for use by government employees and contractors. The genetic counseling program is a highly successful way of preventing genetic diseases. The program offers genetic screening free to anyone who requests it. The testing screens for carriers of a number of hereditary diseases, most notably, Tay Sachs disease. Since 2010, there has not been a single case of a Tay Sachs child born to a newlywed couple in all Israel. The results of the screening are confidential, even to a person's spouse. However, most engaged couples insist on genetic counseling before marriage."
"So basically, if we can get the right people to fuck, then we can get rid of a lot of the genetic disease out there. Then we won't have to spend so much money on treating these diseases, or even bother to find a cure. We can just wait for all the unlucky ones who already had faulty genes to just die out."
Hippocrates-bot stood silent for a good while. Ransom was sure that the semantics of his question was too much for it, and it wouldn't give him an answer. But surprisingly, the bot answered. "I think so."
Tamara shook her head. "So cynical. Cures for disease will still be sought. You know as well as I do that not all disease is caused by genetics. You can't screen for spinal cord injury."
"No, you can't." said Ransom. "But you can screen for birth defects of the spine, can't you? Hey, bot. Is there a genetic cause for spinal birth defects?"
"Yes. Neural tube birth defects, such as spina bifida, can have many causes, some genetic. Scientists have isolated genes that increase the chances of parenting a child with a neural tube birth defect. These genes are most prevalent in people of Irish and Welsh descent. Per one thousand births, spina bifida occurs more frequently in The United Kingdom than any other nation."
"And do they screen for these genes in The UK?"
"No, not usually."
"Why not?"
The bot was silent for a few seconds as he thought it out. "As I said, the genes only increase the chance of a neural tube defect. Spina bifida can only be positively detected after several stages of development. There are several causes of neural tube defects, some still not understood. With the potential stress caused by one discovering that they carry a mutant gene, it may be best to only test for genes that definitely cause disease."
"That's crazy. More children are born with spina bifida in The UK than any other nation, and the government won't do anything about it?"
"I cannot answer that query because it contains false axiom. Per one thousand births, more children are born with spina bifida in The United States than any other nation."
"No, you mean The United Kingdom."
Without the least hint of irritation, the bot said, "No, I mean The United States."
Hinting heavily at irritation as he pulled up video from a minute ago, Ransom said, "Get ready for a paradox crash, stupid bot. Cause just a few seconds ago, you said spina bifida occurs more frequently..." Then he answered his own question before he finished asking it. "Oh... abortion."
"Please try a different wording for your query."
"Abortion to prevent possible birth defects is used more often in the United Kingdom than in The United States."
It took a few seconds. "Yes."
"Go away, bot."
Hippocrates disappeared. Tamara said she had to leave to. "Peace be upon you, my friend. Good luck with Jesse. And don't give up hope."
She turned into a cloud of dust, or pollen, or something; and blew away in the wind as it made waves in the field of grasses. Once again Ransom was alone. The only sound was the wind.
posted by Graham at 4:51 AM
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