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Unrelated, but one of my favorite quotes from PKD is this one from Now Wait for Last Year: --- “All right," Eric agreed. "If you were me, and your wife were s

Unrelated, but one of my favorite quotes from PKD is this one from Now Wait for Last Year: --- “All right," Eric agreed. "If you were me, and your wife were sick, desperately so, with no hope of recovery, would you leave her? Or would you stay with her, even if you had traveled ten years into the future and knew for an absolute certainty that the damage to her brain could never be reversed? And staying with her would mean-" "I can see what it would mean, sir," the cab broke in. "It would mean no other life for you beyond caring for her." "That's right," Eric said. "I'd stay with her," the cab decided. "Why?" "Because," the cab said, "life is composed of reality configurations so constituted. To abandon her would be to say, I can't endure reality as such. I have to have uniquely special easier conditions." "I think I agree," Eric said after a time. "I think I will stay with her." "God bless you, sir," the cab said. "I can see that you're a good man.”

dr-detroit 5y ago
Chilling when you think of all the demi humans that "walk" around in 2021 with those big plastic smiles.
ameen 5y ago
Thank you for sharing this. I've often wondered how some folks deal with misfortune, take it in stride and work through them than abandon all hope for an easier route. Perseverance and Endurance are a rarity in today's society.
- BobbyJo 5y ago
  > Perseverance and Endurance are a rarity in today's society. No, they're just quiet.
  - nataz 5y ago
    This comment needs to be internalized by everyone who has ever worked in a collaborative environment, or God forbid manage a team of people. For all the hard charging, 10x programer, I am a builder let me work folks out there...Empathy is hard to learn, but you'll be a better person for it. I promise.
- phailhaus 5y ago
  How are you measuring perseverance and endurance? I find that such claims tend to be completely made up, based on some "sense" you get from hearing a couple of viral stories.
Thaxll 5y ago
Very similar to the great movie Arrival. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Story_of_Your_Life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Story_of_Your_Life
- darkerside 5y ago
  Based on the incredible work of Ted Chiang
- mdorazio 5y ago
  Note that the meaning in the book was almost wholly changed for the film. A big part of the book was that by learning to think 4-dimensionally (via the alien language), the scientists found that free will did not exist. The narrator had no choice in how to act with her child - she was simply acting out a predefined narrative... "I suddenly remembered that a morphological relative of 'performative' was 'performance,' which could describe the sensation of conversing when you knew what would be said: it was like performing in a play." ... "Before I learned how to think in Heptapod B, my memories grew like a column of cigarette ash, laid down by the infinitesimal sliver of combustion that was my consciousness, marking the sequential present. After I learned Heptapod B, new memories fell into place like gigantic blocks, each one measuring years in duration, and though they didn't arrive in order or land contiguously, they soon composed a period of five decades. It is the period during which I know Heptapod B well enough to think in it, starting during my interviews with Flapper and Raspberry and ending with my death." The movie left this key message out almost entirely.
  - garmaine 5y ago
    That was the conclusion of the movie. I remember because I hated it so much. It destroyed the story imho.
    - taneq 5y ago
      I thought in the movie it was cast as her choosing to accept it and cherishing the time they'd have left together? Maybe I missed the predestination theme (or maybe it was just implied... although you could say it's implied for any story involving travel or communication between different times.)
jacobolus 5y ago
You may enjoy this recent article about Stephen Glass (infamous news fabulist) whose wife suffered from early-onset Alzheimer’s. https://airmail.news/issues/2021-12-4/loving-lies https://airmail.news/issues/2021-12-4/loving-lies
- eqth 5y ago
  walled
  - jacobolus 5y ago
    Put in foo@example.net (or whatever) as your email address and you can read it.
joebob42 5y ago
The cabbies take is bizarre to me. Surely choosing to leave is part of reality, not a rejection of it? Why should living in reality require acceding to circumstances at every opportunity? Unless I misunderstand the context and this quote is meant to be ironic, which seems possible.
- plattenbau 5y ago
  Unfortunately, stories like this are not meant to be taken with the harsh, practical engineer's brain. You're supposed to taste it in your soul, appreciate the message, and move on.
plattenbau 5y ago
I think I'd like to unsubscribe from all the "Unrelated, but ..." distraction top-level replies to top comments. Please just stop.
- mPReDiToR 5y ago
  Opposite reaction. Something that pings a neuron in another brain may be the second step in a chain to me which leads me to interesting and unexpected lines of thought. If it bothers you, depending on your client, theres a "collapse" button at the bottom of posts so you can personally skip on entire threads as soon as you know it's not for you. Other people have different values so I, without rancour, say "carry on" to grandparent.
rpaddock 5y ago
I lived that in he Real World, for nearly 30 years. The saga of my late wife is now part of the documentary Pain Warriors. It can be watched for free on Amazon Prime and TubiTV. What has become known as Karen's Journal is required reading at Duke school of Medicine to educate doctors about the reality of Chronic Pain. In the end the Medical Establishment failed her and she killed herself to stop the pain. Details on that here: https://www.kpaddock.com/pw https://www.kpaddock.com/pw

dr-detroit 5y ago

Chilling when you think of all the demi humans that "walk" around in 2021 with those big plastic smiles.

ameen 5y ago

Thank you for sharing this. I've often wondered how some folks deal with misfortune, take it in stride and work through them than abandon all hope for an easier route. Perseverance and Endurance are a rarity in today's society.

BobbyJo 5y ago
> Perseverance and Endurance are a rarity in today's society. No, they're just quiet.
- nataz 5y ago
  This comment needs to be internalized by everyone who has ever worked in a collaborative environment, or God forbid manage a team of people. For all the hard charging, 10x programer, I am a builder let me work folks out there...Empathy is hard to learn, but you'll be a better person for it. I promise.
phailhaus 5y ago
How are you measuring perseverance and endurance? I find that such claims tend to be completely made up, based on some "sense" you get from hearing a couple of viral stories.

Thaxll 5y ago

Very similar to the great movie Arrival. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Story_of_Your_Life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Story_of_Your_Life

darkerside 5y ago
Based on the incredible work of Ted Chiang
mdorazio 5y ago
Note that the meaning in the book was almost wholly changed for the film. A big part of the book was that by learning to think 4-dimensionally (via the alien language), the scientists found that free will did not exist. The narrator had no choice in how to act with her child - she was simply acting out a predefined narrative... "I suddenly remembered that a morphological relative of 'performative' was 'performance,' which could describe the sensation of conversing when you knew what would be said: it was like performing in a play." ... "Before I learned how to think in Heptapod B, my memories grew like a column of cigarette ash, laid down by the infinitesimal sliver of combustion that was my consciousness, marking the sequential present. After I learned Heptapod B, new memories fell into place like gigantic blocks, each one measuring years in duration, and though they didn't arrive in order or land contiguously, they soon composed a period of five decades. It is the period during which I know Heptapod B well enough to think in it, starting during my interviews with Flapper and Raspberry and ending with my death." The movie left this key message out almost entirely.
- garmaine 5y ago
  That was the conclusion of the movie. I remember because I hated it so much. It destroyed the story imho.
  - taneq 5y ago
    I thought in the movie it was cast as her choosing to accept it and cherishing the time they'd have left together? Maybe I missed the predestination theme (or maybe it was just implied... although you could say it's implied for any story involving travel or communication between different times.)

jacobolus 5y ago

You may enjoy this recent article about Stephen Glass (infamous news fabulist) whose wife suffered from early-onset Alzheimer’s. https://airmail.news/issues/2021-12-4/loving-lies https://airmail.news/issues/2021-12-4/loving-lies

eqth 5y ago
walled
- jacobolus 5y ago
  Put in foo@example.net (or whatever) as your email address and you can read it.

joebob42 5y ago

The cabbies take is bizarre to me. Surely choosing to leave is part of reality, not a rejection of it? Why should living in reality require acceding to circumstances at every opportunity? Unless I misunderstand the context and this quote is meant to be ironic, which seems possible.

plattenbau 5y ago
Unfortunately, stories like this are not meant to be taken with the harsh, practical engineer's brain. You're supposed to taste it in your soul, appreciate the message, and move on.

plattenbau 5y ago

I think I'd like to unsubscribe from all the "Unrelated, but ..." distraction top-level replies to top comments. Please just stop.

mPReDiToR 5y ago
Opposite reaction. Something that pings a neuron in another brain may be the second step in a chain to me which leads me to interesting and unexpected lines of thought. If it bothers you, depending on your client, theres a "collapse" button at the bottom of posts so you can personally skip on entire threads as soon as you know it's not for you. Other people have different values so I, without rancour, say "carry on" to grandparent.

rpaddock 5y ago

I lived that in he Real World, for nearly 30 years. The saga of my late wife is now part of the documentary Pain Warriors. It can be watched for free on Amazon Prime and TubiTV. What has become known as Karen's Journal is required reading at Duke school of Medicine to educate doctors about the reality of Chronic Pain. In the end the Medical Establishment failed her and she killed herself to stop the pain. Details on that here: https://www.kpaddock.com/pw https://www.kpaddock.com/pw