As the human race evolves

Is our world in great flux. Following the COVID-19 outbreak, the world is uncertain and volatile. We have to cope with the new norm and face the flux resulting from the pandemic.

As the human race evolves, social etiquettes also change as we negotiate with what is acceptable in the presently fast moving landscape of tech world and era of social media.

Months ago, I was trying to resolve an outstanding matter at work and the officer in charge had since retired. I was told that the department in Kuala Lumpur had taken over the portfolio . I asked for the phone number of the new officer-in-charge, I was given another  local  number to call. I had to call this other local number with a view to get the phone number of the person-in-charge in Kuala Lumpur. You would think that in this era of technology, every piece of information is easily accessible, particularly within the same bank. When you press a general contact number that requires you to press 1 and 2 then 1 and 2 or 3 or 4 and if you accidentally press the wrong number or disengage, you have to start all over again. These institutions are talking about protecting our data when we know very well how easy our data is floating around. If only we could go back in time to see how things were done previously.

 

I find that with automation and technology, due to demands of modern living, humans are becoming robotic in that we seem to be losing basic common sense and awareness of our behaviour. As we are compelled or strive to succeed in life and be thriving individuals, we neglect to examine our consciousness or comprehend our ever fluid sentient mind and reflect on  thoughts that go through or missing from our heads. In  Machines Like Me, Ian McEwan has created  humanoid  characters that come with  consciousness. 

Machines Like Me is a science fiction set in alternative 1982 London where Britain has lost the Falklands War to Argentina, Margaret Thatcher battles Tony Benn for power and Alan Turing, the British mathematician and computer scientist  is still alive. There are a few themes to juggle with hence the novel is not a book that I am able to  read in one sitting, particularly when I read several books at any given time.

In the story, thirty- two-year-old Charlie Friend dodges full-time employment and survives by playing the stock and currency markets online. He lives in north Clapham, studied physics and anthropology. When Charlie  comes by some inheritance  from his mother’s estate, he buys Adam, one of twenty- five cutting-edge humanoids, twelve “Adams” and thirteen “Eves” built to serve as “an intellectual sparring partner, friend  and factotum” who can wash dishes, make beds and “think’ . Charlie is in love with his neighbour, Miranda Blacke who lives above his flat. Miranda has to work on a dissertation on nineteenth-century Corn Law reform and its impact on a single street in a town in Herefordshire. She is twenty-two. Despite the age gap, Charlie sees a future in them and he begins to court Miranda by inviting her to co-author the personality for Adam.  Miranda's father Maxfield Blacke is a famous writer whose physical health is failing but his mind remains sharp. He lives in Salisbury and whenever she returns from her visit, he listens to her describing his pains. He tells Miranda that he wants to meet her father. She wants Adam to come too. 

The story is narrator in Charlie’s voice.

     ‘ I was among the optimists, blessed by unexpected funds following my mother’s death and the sale of the family home, which turned out to be on a valuable development site. The first truly viable manufactured human with plausible intelligence and looks, believable motion and shifts of expression, went on sale the week before the Falklands Task Force set off on its hopeless mission.’

‘ Every moment of his existence , everything he heard and saw, he recorded and could retrieve . He couldn’t drive as yet and was not allowed to swim or shower or go out in the rain without an umbrella, or operate a chainsaw unsupervised. As for range, thanks to breakthroughs in electrical storage, he could run seventeen kilometres in two hours without a charge or, its energy equivalent, converse non-stop for twelve days. He had a working life of twenty years.’ 

When Miranda suggests that Adam will go along with them to visit her father, he is apprehensive. He muses,
  ' She had assumed joint ownership, just as I'd hoped. But an encounter between Adam and an old-style literary curmudgeon like Maxfield Blacke was hard to envisage. I knew from the profile that he still worked in longhand, detested computers, mobile phones, the Internet and all the rest. Apparently, he didn't , in that priggish cliché, 'suffer fools gladly." Or robots.' 

In anticipation of the meeting with Miranda's father, Charlie decides to prepare Adam so he can pass off as a person.  He takes Adam out and about. Their first expedition is to walk 200 yards to their local newsagent. It is hilarious.  

Miranda has a secret and Adam warns Charlie about it. When confronted, Miranda decides to tell Charlie and Adam about her secret. As the plot thickens, Adam demonstrates that he has a superb mind, not only he reads literature and has got his mind round Dirac’s quantum theory, he also composes haikus. But he is ill-equipped to understand human decision-making process and he has been inflexibly programmed in such a way that  “truth is everything” thus he will do what he ‘thinks’ is right by the rule of law regardless of extenuating circumstances.

An interesting and thought-provoking read that explores buyer’s remorse and the moral ramifications of artificial intelligence.  A mind-bending story that questions what makes us human and whether humanoids could actually possess conscious existence or  ever overtake the humans.

Like or Unlike

 It seems to be a common trend that former  school friends tend to look up each other with the hope to re-connect with one other several decades after leaving school. It can be nice to see some of these friends particularly those with whom you were once  close to  and  have since drifted apart as we became  caught up with each of  our own lives. But quite often I find that such connections can be contrived as it is doubtful if we can ever take our friendships from where we left as if all those years had not passed us by. While these friends endeavour to show that friendships that we forge during school days can withstand the test of time, I have my reservations.

‘Like’ written by Ali Smith took much longer than the time it normally takes for me to finish reading a book. The writing is very good but it is a little heavy going particularly when I cannot  relate to the characters though the theme is familiar in that it is about two childhood friends whose stories are told in two separate parts of the book. The book begins  with describing Amy Shone , a single mother with a seven year old daughter, Kate Shone and they live a nomadic life. Amy seems to have lost her ability to read and write and from reading the second part of the story told through Ashling McCarthy as she reminisces, we know that Amy has a glamour past and was a Cambridge scholar in her young days.  The story leaves many questions unanswered but the author’s prose is fabulous. Smith writes,

‘Amy Shone. A surname like that will haunt your life. Everything becomes something you did better then, before, in the shining days. But not if you don’t let it .’

‘Snow is a good idea. Snow will cover everything, that’s its grace. Lie quietly everywhere, quieten everything, cool everything to a standstill, blow into the barky crevices of trees, fill the spaces between the light low blades of the grasses, bend and hold them down, settle without question over anything cold enough left in the open. Good dry snow will fall without sound and leave everything white. Up here it can cling for days to the sides of houses and along the tops of walls and fences, depending on the direction of the wind.’

After reading Smith’s debut novel, I resumed reading The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion. It was a light read and the characters are endearing. Then I moved on to reading Amstersdam by Ian McEwan, the book that won the Booker Prize for him in 1998.

Amsterdam is about two friends whose friendship was tested at the time when they should really need each other. Both of them had high regards for their own aptitudes  and commitments in the  work they had respectively made a career in. Vernon Halliday was a newspaper editor while Clive Linley was a musician. Both Clive and Vernon were two old friends who shared some similar attributes and common interests, one of which was that their former love, Molly Lane had died after losing her mental faculty and they  felt that the feisty  girl they once had an intimate relationship  with would have killed herself rather than ended up perishing in that manner.

“  Brain –dead and in George’s clutches,” Clive said.

After witnessing the unceremonious death of their former lover, Clive and Vernon became weary of their own deteriorating health and made a pact between themselves that they would assist one another in their euthanasia should they suffer the same fate as Molly.  That raises the morality issues about euthanasia that is made legal in Amsterdam.  Both friends somehow turned to  hating each other when they could not agree on some other morality questions. What happened was that Vernon had been given some pictures by  Molly’s husband, George Lane. Those pictures were taken by Molly of one Julian Garmony,  the foreign secretary who was about to challenge the prime minister at the next election.  Julian happened to be one of  Molly’s lovers too. These pictures might just ruin  Julian Garmony’s chances of winning at the next election. Vernon planned to publish them although Clive had objected strongly as he had felt that it was definitely not right for Vernon to violate the private arrangement between Garmony and Molly. Clive argued that printing these pictures would simply carry out what George wanted and it was an act of betrayal for Molly. After the row, Clive regretted.

‘Perhaps he had been too hard on Vernon,who was only trying to save his newspaper and protect the country from Garmony’s harsh policies. He would telephone Vernon this evening. Their friendship was too important to be lost to one isolated dispute. They could surely agree to differ and continue to be friends.’

It also dawned on Clive that  there had always been some kind of imbalance between him and Vernon.

‘Put most crudely, what did he, Clive, really derive from this friendship? He had given, but what had he ever received? What bound them? They had Molly in common, there were the accumulated years and the habits of friendship, but there was really nothing at its centre, nothing for Clive. A generous explanation for the imbalance might have evoked Vernon’s passivity and self –absorption. Now, after last night, Clive was inclined to see these as merely elements of a larger fact – Vernon’s lack of principle.’

Both friends are absolutely egocentric and petty. Although I do not find the plot convincing and the characters likeable, the writing is superb and the description of the characters credible as  some men can be self- absorbed,vindictive and calculative and that such men have a tendency to put the blame of their failures on others  and  are inclined to adopt a no holds barred approach when they are vengeful. Amsterdam poses the reality question about friendships between two long time friends and the story leaves you cold and feeling bleak about how reliable friends can be.

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Conundrum

Mock Turtle Soup, The Fat Duck

Mad Hatter's Tea Party, The Fat Duck Tasting Menu

Thoughts flow in and out of our minds. Apart from improving one’s command of the language one is reading in, reading helps one to string together one’s thoughts and  discover things about oneself . For me reading definitely helps me to identify and formulate  my thoughts about things in general.

If you are bothered or distressed about something, you may find it difficult to switch off your mind and focus on what you read. When reading is a hobby, it is a pleasure. If you are too busy, you have no time to read a book from back to back, perhaps you can try to read something short or just a paragraph or two whenever you can. That is if you want to. I used to welcome the time when I had been kept waiting for my girls when they were held back in their respective classes. I even looked forward to the time when I had a  dental appointment or some routine medical check up as that was the time I get to read what I wanted to read. That was when I managed to get a moment to read a page or two of some good writings. It was not the best way to read a book but if I had not done that I would never get around to reading any books for more than a dozen years. Whenever I had to do the supermarket run in my suburb, I used to grab a coffee at the Starbucks outlet where the supermarket was located so I could sit in one of their sofa chair for twenty minutes or more to read some pages of whatever book I was reading then before I sped through the grocery shopping which was the purpose of my trip. I was dividing my time into different segments so I could get mini breaks to read. 

I  have the habit of reading two or three books contemporaneously. A decade ago, there was this one time when I had to do some laundry, a task I found terribly uninspiring.  I reluctantly picked up the dirty clothes around the house and decided to do a quick wash of the clothes before going to work. While the clothes were being washed in the machine, I had a quick shower and got myself ready for work. Then while waiting for the clothes to spin dry, I wanted to catch up with one of  the novels  that I was reading then. While I distinctively remembered that I had  the book with me when I gathered the clothes, I could not locate the book. When the washing machine stopped spinning, I found bits of paper stuck to all the clothes. I had thrown the book into the machine as I loaded the clothes. Incidentally, the book that I had thrown into the wash  was The Dirty Girls’ Social Club. It is a novel written by Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez about six Latina women friends who regularly meet after they have left Boston University and they nickname themselves ‘Sucias’ . Twice a year, every year, the sucias show up for their meetings  of the Buena Sucia Social Club.  The women’s stories are told by Lauren, Elizabeth, Sara, Rebecca, Usnavys and Amber in first person narration that I had found interesting. It is sassy and fun like Sex and the City but the characters are more credible as they have added sorrow.

Nowadays I have more time to read the books I want to read but  I still cannot get  enough time to read as much as I would like to. Also these days it can be a little inconvenient when I happen to step out for lunch armed with a novel and forgetting my reading glasses. I now realize why some people do not read as much when they get older due to poor eyesight. But seriously, what is a slight inconvenience when I can rectify it by wearing reading glasses. It is time to embrace growing old with grace.

It has been more than a week since the plane MH 370 went missing and the incident has sent and continues to send tremors throughout the whole world. While it is heart warming to see how countries amidst their differences have stood together to search for the missing plane and how people from different faiths and ethnic groups  pray for the safe return of  its crew and the passengers on board, it is definitely a harrowing experience for people around the world.

The unresolved tragedy reminds me of the passages from the novel “ Saturday” written by Ian McEwan. Saturday, February 15, 2003, Henry Perowne,  a successful neurosurgeon unusually wakes before dawn, drawn to the window and filled with a growing unease. As he looks out at the night sky, he is troubled by the state of the world and he witnesses a burning plane from his bedroom window .

‘The plane emerges from the trees, crosses a gap and disappears behind the Post Office Tower. If Perowne were inclined to religious feeling, to supernatural explanations, he could play with the idea that he’s been summoned; that having woken in an unusual state of mind, and gone to the window for no reason, he should acknowledge a hidden order, an external intelligence which wants to show or tell him something of significance. But a city of its nature cultivates insomniacs ;it is itself a sleepless entity whose wires never stop singing; among so many millions there are bound to be people staring out of windows when normally they would be asleep. And not the same people every night. That it should be him and not someone else is an arbitrary matter. A simple antropic principle is involved. The primitive thinking of the supernaturally inclined amounts to what his psychiatirric colleagues call a problem , or an idea, of reference………’

“ …..Among the terrified passengers many might be praying – another problem of reference – to their own god for intersession. And if there are to be deaths, the very god who ordained them will soon be funereally petitioned for comfort. Perowne regards this as a matter for wonder, a human complication beyond the reach of morals. From it there spring, alongside the unreason and slaughter, decent people and good deeds, beautiful cathedrals, mosques, cantatas, poetry. Even the denial of God, he was once amazed and indignant to hear a priest argue, is a spiritual exercise, a form of prayer; it’s not easy to escape from the clutches of the believers. The best hope for the plane is that it’s suffered simple, secular mechanical failure.”

The Splendour of Love

Various contemporary writers shared their views about what literature could tell them about love in the article “ A Sentimental Education” published by New York Times recently.* In the French class last Saturday, we had to give our opinions as to whether we agree or disagree with the statement: L’amitie est preferable a l’amour. This is a difficult choice. Both are essentially about loyalty and acceptance. Friends probably can accept you the way you are if they like you enough but the kind of love we expect from a partner or spouse or lover may change in its character over a period of time as passion or love based on sexual attraction can be delusive. We all know about infatuations, puppy love, crushes and sometimes we may even find ourselves in love with the concept of love when we are young.

I sometimes think about my mother whose life seemed sad to my cousins, children of my mother’s sister  who is suffering from dementia and children of my mother’s brothers and also everyone who had known her for her modesty. She was devastated and became depressed when she had to deal with the reality that my dad had been unfaithful and his mistress had borne him two other children, a son and a daughter. What happened to my parents’ marriage had created an impact on my sister and me, in one way or another.

“ I certainly believe we all suffer damage, one way or another. How could we not, except in a world of perfect parents, siblings, neighbours, companions? And then there is  the question on which so much depends, of how we react to the damage: whether we admit it or repress it, and how this affects our dealings with others. Some admit the damage, and try to mitigate it; some spend their lives trying to help others who are damaged ; and there are those whose main concern is to avoid further damage to themselves, at whatever cost. And those are the ones who are ruthless, and the ones to be careful of.”  - Julian Barnes writes in ‘The Sense of an Ending’.

As children, who are we to judge? I feel sorry for both my parents and  I believe  that both my parents must have suffered greatly for what had happened . Through reading I have become more empathetic about human nature and through reading I understand humanities a little better though I do not need literature to tell me about the impermanence of love. My sister found the journal that belonged to my late dad which is now amongst my possessions. My late dad had written in his journal about how he had been  smitten by my late mother. He kept a journal in the beginning of their courtship and it was incredible that he had kept it for thirty over years . My dad’s journal had somewhat given me a kind of  resolution to my parents’ union.  Even though I had already learnt about how illusive love is since my teenage years and that love can change, I still believe in stories with happy endings. Perhaps I want to believe in whatever that gives mankind inspirations and hope .

I rarely read poetry but I would like to quote a few lines from 'Dover Beach' a poem by Matthew Arnold that was produced at the end of  ‘Saturday’ the novel written by Ian McEwan.

Ah,love , let us be true
To one another! For the world, which seems

To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
.....................................                                   

Saturday is a story about Henry Perowne, a neurosurgeon who is a happily married man who wakes up before dawn on February 15 2003 and from his window he witnesses a burning plane as it heads towards Heathrow. That particular Saturday begins with an unease that materialises in the form of events that happen subsequently on that same day. Perowne is a scientific  man and he does not read fictions as he wants the world explained factually and not reinvented as stories. His father in law is a famous poet who has first introduced his daughter into the literary world. For some years  his too literate daughter has been guiding his literary education and he submits to her reading lists  as his means of remaining in touch with her as she grows away from her family even though he thinks he has seen enough death, fear, courage and suffering to supply half a dozen literatures.  A very profound and thought-provoking story indeed.

*http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/09/books/review/a-sentimental-education.html?emc=edit_tnt_20140206&tntemail0=y&_r=1