Whoa. Fuckin'....whoa.
Don't know how many times I have let Frank Herbert
absolutely fuck my mind, but I keep coming back for it. The author of Dune
and, perhaps more importantly, mastermind/creator of the Dune universe,
wrote Destination: Void, which kicked off the WorShip series that
included 3 others (all other 3 co-authored with Bill Ransom).
In an undated near-future scenario, astronauts are sent to
the Tau Ceti galaxy to begin colonising a habitable planet. Sounds like a
simple enough plot, until Herbert tosses in that 6 prior missions have all
ended in disaster, the technology for such a journey is either in its infancy
or does not exist, the astronauts are genetically (strategically) placed clones
(with clone colonists in hybernation tanks on-board) and have dozens of
replacements for each of the four full-time positions out of the thousands of
bodies inside said tanks...and biggest of all...semi-self-aware-computers.
It actually is a very short book and a very short read, but
many of the paragraphs and Herbertian tirades are in regards to something I
just cannot wrap my brain around: the logic of creating a self-aware computer.
I'm sure that if I were a computer nerd and made wiring up computers and trying
to gain them a consciousness a hobby of mine, plus had a firm understanding of
human psychology and the biology of the brain, that I could follow along no
problem. Let me just throw a few phrases out there that sound like Chinese to
me:
nerve-net simulators; electroform inputs of nerve impulse
groups; flux impulses in four dimensions; inhibitory roulette cycles; black box
– white box transfer;
Why? Why can't I understand any of this? Maybe it is just me
being an idiot and I will shut up about it.
The good news is, however, that this takes nothing away from
the book. As I did not fully understand what was going on with the wiring of
this system, I appreciated it as an effort, a means to an end, to get a
self-aware computer constructed. And that is exactly what all this is, so it is
not imperative to the plot. But once shit starts getting constructed and
happening...whoa man, hold on!
The first brains, the organic mental cores, which are crude
versions of humans' early attempts at constructing self-aware computers, have
human brains acting as the emotional/reactionary/survivalist side of the ship's
computer. They all go mad, and are destroyed. The astronauts are then
completely on their own save for the others in hibernation. When I had this
much of the book in my brain's grasp I told myself this is basically what 2001:A Space Odyssey would have been if it were fucking great.
Instead, Herbert spends the next 180 or so pages (of 200,
mind you) fucking with the reader on what it means to be conscious.
Just soak that in for a second. What does it mean to you? This discussion could
go on for years, and has. It has evolved since the first philosophers. Even
before Diogenes the Cynic helped us bridge the gap between man and animal.
To me it has always been signified by goals. Seeking more
than survival and reproduction, but setting up goals for ourselves.
Aspirations. Shit like that.
But this book does not stop there. Not only is the question
a constant issue amongst the crew and constant theme throughout the book, but
there are other, brilliant, typical Frank Herbert ideas thrown in there to help
get your brain motivated and thinking of new, novel, ideologically challenging
concepts.
It was interesting to me that the ship's Psychologist is
also the ship's Chaplain, for example. Why? Because psychology is not much for
an exact science, and has assumptions associated with it and diagnoses that are
based on historical symptoms and behaviour of the human. Religion is not so
different from that, now is it? He also comments later on that both Religion
and Psychology are methods of healing, specifically healing people's brain or
intellect. I can attest to this. Because when one feels uncomfortable with an
anxiety brought on by substance abuse there are two overwhelmingly popular
choices people make to seek treatment: Religion (e.g. Jesus, e.g. Being born
again) and medical (e.g. psychological) treatment. It happens like that,
not just limited to those two but much more often than not. Honestly, it does!
Another great moment is when men are trying to teach the
computer life and death by teaching it what it means to preserve a life
dependent upon its systems – in this case a farm animal in gestation/fetus
phase that the colonists could use if they land at their destination – and the
computer decides to kill it, just to learn its limits, learn of its own
behaviour and maybe even test its own powers. Well one of the most hopeful men
on the crew for this test working out is the Life Systems Engineer. And
of the people on this crew, of the four awake, of course the Life Systems
Engineer is going to have the most trouble seeing past this self-aware-computer
initiated abortion. And it shows.
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Moments like this happen in a Frank Herbert novel within a
sentence or two, and it is all thanks to his amazing ability to develop characters.
You see more of what is going on inside their heads than with any other
story-teller. The female working in the group of four has a much different but
equally as interesting role. She is a clone placed on board because of her
natural ability to lead, care for others, and juggle several responsibilities
at once. As such, her independence is driven by certain chemicals and offset by
others that showcase her caring side, and whatever it takes to match these
Herbert explains that it inadvertently forces her to be extremely sexually
active by nature. She takes chemicals to reduce her sex drive, but she also
experiments, due to the pressure of the situation, with chemicals that enhance
her awareness and help her ponder as the crew tries to wrap their minds
around consciousness. The taking of
these drugs displaces those that reduce her sex drive, and soon enough she is
conflicted by constant sexual thoughts, fantasies and desires.
Seriously, for such a short book the character development
is incredible. I could go on, but I won't. Instead, I'll just say that everyone
should be reading plenty of Frank Herbert, and once you get accustomed to his
style, then you can delve into this one, because it is complex and difficult to
follow but extremely brilliant.
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