The Müller-Fokker Effect by John Sladek Read Free Book Online

is doing all its thinking at the same time, maybe there isn’t any ‘time’ here…
    SO MANY DYNAMOS!
    ‘I’m glad you asked me that, Bob. “Are minds mechanistic?” Gee, that’s pretty tough. As I’ll mention before, there’s a little shell game you can play with machines. For any machine there is at least one question you can ask, which the machine can fully comprehend, but which it cannot answer, and to which
you
can see the answer at once.
    ‘Specifically, it is possible to make up a formula which represents the statement “this formula is not provable (in the machine)”. Then you ask the machine to prove (or disprove) the formula. If it proves it, the formula is true and the statement must be true, so the machine is contradicting itself. If it doesn’t prove it, the statement is true which you know but the machine can’t. And that’s the difference between a mind and a machine.’
    ‘But suppose someone comes along and alters the machine so it can prove the formula, or at least see the statement is true?’
    ‘Well then it ain’t the same machine, are it? So for this new machine you can construct a new formula of this same type. And as often as the machine is altered—or alters itself—you can do the same.’
    ‘But what’s the difference? I mean, I’m sitting there thinking up questions and the machine is sitting there thinking up answers—the
machines
, then—so maybe a mind is just a self-altering machine after all.’
    His face starts to sag. I think of asking if it’s lawful to render tribute to Caesar or heal the sick on a Sunday, but I see it’s not necessary. He collapses into a rainbow puddle of words:
    THE RUINS, AUTOPSY OF FIRED, BESTRIDED REAL LIVES, TOO. WHAT PRUNE OF ‘IF’, OR ITS LESSER GOODNESS? THE RUINS, AUTOPSY OF FIRED, BESTRIDED REAL LIVES, TOO, FOR HE HAS FOUND IT’S SMOKE-RE-THATCHED, MAKING IT WHY MIST-DEALER’S BRAWNY. MY OTHER’S EVIL. ENDS. REQUEST EDITOR’S READING DEVICE.
    One level down there’s this detective business. I’m sitting stupefied by fumes from the coal grate, picking my nose and listening to him, Whoms, drone on about some notion about free will:
    ‘…. it’s a puzzle, Whatson. We find the man responsible for a particularly ghastly murder and he turns out to be a madman—not responsible for his actions. Yet we call the killing itself an irresponsible act…I ask you!’
    I suspected my friend the sleuth had had a calabashful of his special smoking mixture, and so was far from responsible for what he said at the moment. Fixing my eyes on an unfinished sampler upon the wall, I resolved not to answer.
    The sampler read—or seemed to read, in the dimness:
    HE RUNS, A TOPSY OF FIRE, BESTRIDE REAL LIVES, TOO. WHAT RUNE OF ‘F’, OR ITS LESSER GOODNESS? HE RUNS, A TOPSY OF FIRE, BESTRIDE REAL LIVES, TOO, FOR HE HAS FUND IT’S MORE THATCHED, MAKING IT WHIST-DEALER’S BRAWNY MOTHER’S EVIL. ENDS. REQUEST EDITOR’S RE ADVICE.
    (THE MIND REELS)
    and alone on the island. My only companion is a stuffed parrot. Breaking teeth off my comb to keep track of the days. Today a plane went over. It didn’t respond to my signal fire, unless you can call skywriting a response:
    HE RUNS TOPS OF FIR, BEST IDEAL LIVES, TOO. TUNE OF FORTLESSNESS? HE RUNS TOPS OF FIR, BEST IDEAL LIVES, TOO, FOR FUN I’M RE-THATCHED, MAKING IT WHISTLER’S BRAW MOTHER’S EVIL. ENDS. REQUESTED TO READ VICE.
    These mystery letters began blowing away at once, leaving:
    HE RUNS TOPS OF F BEST I AL LI ES, TOO.
    E FORTLESSNESS? HE RUNS TOPS OF F BEST I AL LI ES, TOO,UN RETHATCHED, MAKING IT WHISTLE BR OTHER’S EVIL. ENDS. REQUESTED RE D ICE.
    This isn’t working out at all. I’d hoped to tell the story but the pen has to trace its own shadow…the story includes the world around the story and the story in it’…say A writes a story about an imaginary land, and A’ writes about some wholly fictitious ‘historical’ event, and A” writes about or hints at, some fabulous