Things keep happening.

We usually use things in this sense to refer to an event(s) or (the mythical) fact(s).
Very Aristotelian.
We also narrate what we thing has happened - but in fact is still happening - through
sequences of the same assumption: this happened so this happened, in a causal way; this
happens, in our poor linguistic tentative to express being; this will happen (why not go
to the future?), in the predictable sense of a learned lebenswelt. All very Zenian.
But that is, of course, the humanly perceptional viewpoint. We cannot see the microjoules
neither than we see the vibration cause by the transfer of such joules, and loss, with
the sidewalk and then with whatever is underneath forever until the inevitable victory of
entropy.
Entropy is small to us. Short. We se lightning bolt but are physically incapable of
perceiving the microsecond explosion between atoms of oxygen in and around the point
where that beautiful white crack forms. Itself not very lasting, the bolt is appropriate
to understand: it is happening long before we assume it happens and it is still happening
long before we can perceive its influence and in ways even the extensions of men are in
their infancy.
Interjection: "of course things stop happening, such as smoking a cigarette. You light
it, suck on it this the tobacco is spent and the act ends.
Response: In no way it works like that. As the paper and tobacco are spent in their
purpose at hand (smoking) they transform part of themselves into one thing, the smoke,
and another part into another thing. Ash.
Its our narrow lebenswelt together with the limits of our physical (and even
technological) forms of perception that create the clever illusion of the act. The
inhaled smoke will be another thing soon, as it is absorbed by the lungs and yet another
when it reaches the brain. The ass will become common dust; lighter them feathers, though
eventually invisible, this carbon monoxide snow flakes will become part of the air bubble
euphemistically called atmosphere, either airborne, pollution as the heavy air of
industrial revolution factories, or drop invisibly where the waves of air permit,
becoming at first the thin layer of everyday dust, than, as they keep being, undisturbed,
theyll grow thicker, resolidify as graphite or some other arrangement of carbon and
oxygen.
How very Heraclitian. No river. Im often invade by these exact thought: Heraclitus plus
modern science equals no river. Why? Modern science demands as dogma: replication of
results. The experiment entering the river can never be replicated, says, and hes right,
Heraclitus. How come other experiments are? Even those, for the anal reader, that involve
tremendous numbers of variations?
An answer: I would dare. Its the same illusion: no scientific is ever really replicated.
It is another instance of similar happening.
Entering the river has entropic consequences just as the example of the cigarette.
You can never enter the same river twice. But can enter twice into the river. That is
sciences replication of results.
And they also keep happening. Avoid the word being said someone, maybe MAurice
Blanchot. It is unavoidable because it is the only existing and accorded term that
properly engulfs this too unavoidable meaning of happening: it keeps going. Entropy is
always transference. Lavoiser has yet to be denied: nothing is created, nothing
disappears. Dominoes falling?
In this Lavoiser is of no use: the expenditure (and that remains, Monsieur Bataille) is
never Zenos arrow. Point by point. Linear. It is the aero and spatial engineering of a
very professional laser printed arrow: its does not cut through the air. It interacts
with it - part of the potential energy transferred by the pulled bow gets lost' in this
interaction. Not lost. Is dislocates the air, its very matter. Aerodynamics: we consider
a more effective arrow one that looses the least possible amount of energy in this
interaction.
Then poor Zenos arrow does not occupy at each moment or duration a specific space. Time
does not exist. And it cannot be fragmented. It is the never-stopping. And, even more
importantly than that: if the eye confuses a fast camera can show perfectly that the
arrow flies as a rupture rubber band. Also interacting with the air and interfering with
the direction and energy potential itself: the archer is not transmitting the potential
force of the bow to a perfectly straight moving object, but a flexible one.
Entropy is, to recall Blanchot once more, as a bonfire or the wind, but also the real
insidious force behind everything. An equation would simply a mathematical utility, a
tool: we can already see, even if only intellectually, and nobody saw it as clearly as
those hundreds of thousands in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, that theres already an unified
theory. A theory of everything.
Id go as far as to say this theory came before many others and appears through the
broken lips of Heraclitus: no same river. Change.
Thermodynamics will even say: heat is the agitation of the molecules. A state of he
matter is, in fact, motion. All is (mystically or not) in motion. To say towards
something is to jump in these pitfall weve been very informally trying to expose
(metaphysics).
E pur si muove? The facts are, in fact, beyond us. In this the metaphysical is undeniably
unescapable. We may be able to reach the absolute, but only together and not to pass
judgement, nor belief, just to state historical fact, humans are good at working together
for certain times and in relatively small groups (compared to the entirety of the
population of the planet, especially today, but fairly certain do ascertain that this has
always been somewhat valid, axiomatic even).
The why at the beginning I flinched at the word: this mythical piece of remembrance
called fact. Some are indeed facts: my head will never smash the wall behind my desk.
Other, in the other hand, are narratives. They may or may not have taken place, but they
usually get to us as happenings, things that happened. The rock fell. It is told as a
telling of a fact, as something that happened. Happened? We said before. Theres no past
tense for this verb outside of common language. The ends of things are uncertain to us.
The burned wood of a bonfire, used either by happy campers in an US National Park or by
the first men: the thousands of years that separate this humans dont give any idea to
their immediate natural senses of what happens with the burned wood. Lavoisier calls: it
did not disappear.
In contemporary terms we could gather enough sensor machinery to have a fairly certain
idea of what happens to most of the burned wood (imagine such ridiculous and yet
revealing task). But not all of it. Certainly not all. Remember? Absolutes. Lets not
endeavor into this, another pitfall (the refusal of metaphysics by the assumption that
science and reason can or will eventually be able to explain everything - which, by the
way, is just another face of metaphysics itself). The problem is, ignoring the senses of
absolute will certainly lead to immeasurable absences

And yet to watch and to wake, to keep the ceaseless vigil over the immeasurable absence
is necessary []*

Do things occupy space?

The question is to be read in most senses: things as anything, even thoughts, even things
that mark or construct space (such as buildings: more floors enable us to occupy linear
vertical space that was, theres no other way to put it, air, as in the constituent of
the atmosphere in 3D space). Occupying must be followed to the letter: taking up space,
being engage in an activity, to live or inhabit a place (that is usually land), to hold
your position, to take control of a place, usually by force, and more recently its Occupy
Wall Street derisions have been appearing in online dictionaries (such as
dictionary.com's sixth meaning for the word: 6. (Usually initial capital letter) to
participate in a protest about (a social or political issue), as by taking possession or
control of buildings or public spaces that are symbolic of the issue (http://
www.dictionary.com/browse/occupy?s=t).

To possess

What is possession? seems more like a know-your-words question that any sort of passage
leading to deeper ponds and larger meadows of investigation. But this is an illusion; by
asking ourselves this basic question we are immediately faced with the myriad questions
parallel to it and even those that intersect or pass exactly through the middle (in fact,
at the middle of the asking phrase we already find being, operator to essence, ontology,
epistemology, and teacher of existence).

To answer this, I think, we must first comprehend the phenomena that could and are marked
by this notion. And, to comprehend these phenomena we must, in them, comprehend the idea
os possession.

When does it start? When do we start possessing? Well be shamelessly materialistic here
(we prefer, just as Bataille did): when do we become the owner of an object. This

* Maurice Blanchot, Writing of Disaster, mais ou menos pgina 156 (ibooks e notas).
notebook is mine, this is my notebook, this notebook belongs to me, this notebook
is my possesssion. The my thing or thing of mine already meets, first, the even
broader and problematic question of belonging, but he also turns on itself, showing us
that the word in itself (possession) refers to a situation of ownership (this is mine)
the ownership in itself, and, surprisingly, the thing that is under the action of
ownership - my possession.

When does it end? When does some object stops being yours? When does belonging is no
more?

To possess may be confusing, and free. To belong certainly has more corners: a step
outside pure grammatical materialismo, we as humans belong to a species, race, religion,
etc. Its a part of our sense of being in general (identity) but it also marks very in
very specific ways that which we are to ourselves (ipseity). And, above all, belonging
means recognition.

Does possession also have these markers? When we own, lets say, a car or a house, State
documents are produced to prove that relation of ownership. You literally get a piece of
paper, signed and notorized, by a representative of the ruling system that says the house
and terrain in which this house can be found belongs to this person. It says, this car,
wherever and IN THE POSSESSION OF WHOEVER IT MAY BE, belong to this person.

Thus, ownership, possession and belonging are not interchangeable. Or at least not
always. You can own a car that is stolen by a person that now posses a vehicle that does
not belong to him or her. You can rent a house, pay monthly so that the owner allows you
to posses the house, but it does not belong to you. A monument, at its delivery, is owned
by nobody, nobody posses it but it belongs to the State (be it a city, state or nation) -
even when directly commissioned to an artist that receives payment for it.

This may appear to the reader and a digression about possession, ownership or belonging,
but it is a gateway to the material heart of one of the most important things happening
in the world in the last 100 years, and, more specifically, in the last 20 or 30. Why?
Well, because pretty soon, because of their ubiquitous nature, electronic media will
appear as an example and files and documents, digital ones will also face the same
questions. Do I own this text file? This blog post? This photos that I posted on
Facebook: who possesses them, to whom do they belong?

This will certainly happen as we approach the fact that owning, possession, and belonging
are markers for action an usage. I can ride my car, with few exceptions and if I have gas
on it, anytime I want and I can let anyone use the car, if it pleases me. You cant start
to belong (unless in the few examples of initiation, usually connected with religion or
joining a political party or official association - this goes from eating Sunday crackers
and a sip of wine, to physical mutilation and the reception of a piece of paper, not
rarely with your photo and signature, that attests to your belonging). Birth and social
mobility/immobility get to the scene of this perfect crime as soon as the perpetrator has
done his deed and, at once, long after the investigators can get a chance to collect
evidences or understand the sequence of events.

Born black, that person will die black. The example is not so clear as we consider gender
due to the moral revolution that has normalized not only homosexuality, but the social
and medical reality of transgender - gender reassignment. Although, at the genetic level
Paula will always be Paul, in the sense that she, as she transforms socially and
physically into a man, this transformation does not change the fact that a drop of blood
would show this person to be a male (XY).

But this is useless hair splitting. The fact is, belonging, can start even before birth
or as soon as it happens. When you are born, usually, of course, and, again, with few
exceptions, you become the beneficiary of whatever your parents own. Inheritance. Of
course as a new born you can't actively possess anything, you cant make use or determine
the usage of such and such things. But if your parents die a day after you are born,
orphanhood may leave you alone in the world, given to the care of strangers or close
relatives, but immediately the possessions of said parents will become your possessions
(of course the legal maze here will give usage, rarely anything close to ownership or
possession, or at least the obligation of maintaining those things, be they things or
money, until you reach the age determined to be the one where you stop being a child and
starts being an adult).
We belong. And we search for belonging: family building could be (dangerously and
simplified) interpreted as forced belonging. Be any kind of family, it usually involves
spouses and offspring. Marriage forces one person to belong to the other (nowadays mostly
in a superficial and emotional kind of belonging, but not so long ago and still going own
in many not-hidden-at-all parts of the world, marriage actually means ownership of the
man over the woman - a form of possession indeed, where, by law, he can make any use of
her, in the confides of the ethics and limits of said laws with usually a strong
religious background), parenthood goes further: in a very common sense example, my father
and mother created two humans (my brother and me) and by creating us immediately received
us the belonging chain that is family is general.

We are possessed. The word also means something such as possessed by rage, or courage,
and is a very popular euphemism for sexual intercourse, usually between man and woman in
an heteronormative manner. He possessed her right there, on the kitchen floor is a
phrase that we can with fair certainty expect from those little paperback book series or
even in more high brow (how I hate this term, though its useful to describe the
undeniable differences contained in the production, commercialization, and reception of
media products) literature such as Marquis de Sade or Henry Miller.

We are (were) owned. Slavery is, sadly still a very cruel reality. The ownership of man
over man: Amnesty International, de U.N., initiatives such as The Human Trafficking Map
and many others show that at least 21 and as much as 46 million people are, in all
possible aspects of the definition, slaves. Kevin Bales, in his 2000 book Disposable
People - new slavery in the global economy, estimates 27 million slaves. But that was 17
years ago (or more, given that the very profound research contained is his book is one
that would take a long time, making the writing and releasing of the book capable of
being even decades apart).

Slavery, though, seems not to be the only form of humans owning other humans. In modern
countries it appears as social, economic, ethnic, religious, etc. exclusions and ever
more unjust worker laws and ever less syndicates or unions to protect workers. Slaves by
debt is already a widespread term in the US.

And, on top of the semantic and epistemological difficulties faced by these words, we
call ourselves a consumer society. Consume, consumption: of course every society ever
has consumed (food, raw materials, etc.), but ours defines itself by this. Its unveiled
objective is that people buy, adquire, consume, use, re-use. The arendtian inversion of
theory and prxis has, somewhere, in the last 50 years, has become one between production
and consumption. To produce is unimportant (and who or how it is produced even less
important).

The Apple release date lines to purchase a slightly better version of something that you
already have is so telling in this. You watch a documentary like Blood in the
Mobile (2010), by Frank Piasecki Poulsen, that show in such a raw way how the essential
materials for electronics come from wasted countries, such as the Congo. Adam Curtis 2013
series All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace, in its third and last episode,
also focuses on this. The data concerning slave labor nowadays is heavily concentrated in
this mid-African countries, given freedom by their European colonists since, at least,
the 1950s but no international support of any kind. Up for grabs scraps of nations,
mostly controlled by corporations that extract the minerals - in All Watched Over we
are even reminded that the fission materials used in the bombs that annihilated Hiroshi
and Nagasaki came from the soil of Congo and Rwanda.

Despite this slight detour, the question remains: what is possession? Here it could be
put: is the Congolese nation a possession of Congolese people? Is a country such as
Brazil, so obviously manipulated by external international influence (to the point where
Assanges Wikileaks released material attesting to the fact that the now president,
Michel Temer, has been on the payroll of the CIA as a C.I. (confidential informant) for
decades. Neither Temer nor the CIA denied this. Since the Second World War, actually,
these kinds of things have been continuous and ever deeper. From Allendes assassination
to the military coups that happened in most of the Latin American countries, to the point
where historians such as Hobsbawn referred to the governments in the continent during the
1960s, 70s, and most of the 80s as puppet governments.
Now the sense of possession, in a very close way meaning usage, ownership, and rights,
has slightly travelled further. This is my book has become this is my country. You
can rightfully claim to own a book, but claiming ownership over a country means belonging
and being, although small, an integral part of what makes this (arbitrarily) defined
space a country or nation. In democratic countries this goes even deeper: we own the
country because it is the individual that votes for representatives.

LUDONARRATIVE DISSONANCE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHmivGmkjJw
How games work with narratives
intentional disobedience
games can do something very different from other media (like movies or
books), in narrative terms: it can tell the player to do one thing and expect him or her
to disobey
a sense not of expectation in a common sense, but be prepared to alter its
own narrative structure due to this lack of compliance: this seems to enter more in the
realm of choice, since we are not talking about a 2D characters with the choice or
telling from the game jump the hole. If you jump, you carry on; if not, you die. This
is more about the game telling you jump the hole and by not jumping theres ANOTHER PATH.
Theres limits to the expectation and, so, limited choices with projected outcomes. This
is, lato sensus, the perfect simulacra to which authors such as Baudrillard pointed so
ferociously. It seems like you can choose, like theres dissonance: but its just a
jukebox machine with the titles scratched off - the quarter can give you a limited number
of chance songs. This allows, permits, enables the simulacra: a will of chance.
this interaction in the game
Games are constantly telling us to do one thing and then waiting to see if
we actually do it
Going against the contract of simulated friendship (as in killing NPCs in
Dark Souls that are queued as friendly) can open other paths, items, plots. But is it
INTENDED? Can we, in self named Role Playing Game, assume anything is intended in such a
sense? Maybe the fact that you do not chose what you are, you are the chosen undead or
unkindled one, may in itself assume that you should pursue the adventure that seems to be
discovering what it is to be such personas in this established world. But can we go as
far as to talk about anything really intended, prospectived? Intentional? Theres nothing
in the start of the game that suggests that the Crestfallen Warrior, or Lord of Pessimism
as hes dubbed, is a friend. He offers cryptic information in a very annoying and
offensive tone. He prompts no possible questions that you can make.

"Well, what do we have here? You must be a new arrival.

Let me guess. Fate of the Undead, right? Well, you're not the first.
But there's no salvation here. You'd have done better to rot in the Undead Asylum
But, too late now.
Well, since you're here Let me help you out.
There are actually two Bells of Awakening.
One's up above, in the Undead Church. The other is far, far below, in the ruins at
the base of Blighttown.
Ring them both, and something happens Brilliant, right?
Not much to go on, but I have a feeling that won't stop you.
So, off you go. It is why you came, isn't it? To this accursed land of the Undead?
Hah hah hah hah"

He supplies, on the first time you talk to him the basic (and given the nature of the
scenarios and accessibility to places, bosses, enemies, the real dissonance - the
immensely more powerful than you foes in the many paths where so easily the player can
stray or even stuck - wherere really talking basic here). He cares little about your
mission, be it whatever fate of the undead means or whatever else, little about the
fulfilment in itself of the task and even derrogatorilly laughs at you.
When you die, and you will, youll become ever more hollowed. It is the curse of the
undead and is explained in some detail later. But, as the game is very hard, a first or
even second time player will die long before they find out about this or even the second
bonfire that serves as a checkpoint (the place where you reappear when you die). So
youll leave Firelink Shrine, be killed, and reappear at Firelink Shrine.

Oh, your face! You're practically Hollow.

But who knows, going Hollow could solve quite a bit!
Hah hah hah hah
Hm, what? Restoring your humanity?
Well, there are a few ways to go about it
Collect it bit by bit from corpses, or you can butter up a cleric, and get yourself
summoned.
And the quickest way, although I'd never do it, is to kill a healthy Undead, and
pillage its humanity.
Coveting thy neighbour is only human, after all!
Hah hah hah hah
What are you looking at?
Don't try anything clever. You might regret it.

Going hollow can solve quite a bit: youll become a mindless zombie. He explains how to
regain your Humanity. He even doubts your morality: to kill a healthy Undead, as if
such a thing could be, and pillage its humanity. He baits you, first your morality,
integrity, your character. This is far more complex than intended play. Just this part of
the dialogue can already bait anyone to something like: I'm going to kill this guy, who
cares? But he even has a follow up. Don't try anything clever. You might regret it.

As I said before, straying is more intended than any other mechanic in this game. And
straying usually lead to portions of the scenario and of the narrative that are either
filled with hugely more powerful enemies than you are at the start of the game or
inaccessible points (where, of course, you need someone, something or some specific time
to enter). With the Lord of Pessimism this is true also. He is at the start of the game
ridiculously more powerful than you. Only tricks, luck or a very skilled player can kill
him at this point of the game.

- Killing everybody is also a correct way to play. Correction? Here we

cluelessly pair correction, the correct way to play the game that will lead you to
victory, to the end of the story, with intention.

Of course FromSoftware, as hard as the game is, has at the core of creating a game the
clear intention that players play and win.

- even in negative reaction, even the game pushing back agains misbehavior, is
content

- far denser package for meaning than other forms

This is what is profoundly askew in not properly bridging intentionality with correctness
in reading videogames. And even more worrying when procedurality in called forth as a
raft that can either turn the gap transposable or even completely bridge it. These shores
may even be touched by completely different bodies of water. In the specific case of the
DS series, harsh decisions such as eliminating passive NPCs is unpractical, to say the
least. Of course the mechanics of the game allows you to trick NPCs into holes and
cliffs, but this usually entails trial an error - a persistent negativity in following
the rules that sometimes becomes inevitable because once attacked and NPC may become
hostile and act every time like a normal adversary of the game: it will immediately
attack you.

The Cresfallen is a good and terrifying example of getting stuck. More powerful than you,
hes right there by the bonfire. Even if you escape him, youll have to escape him again
(though I think he disappears after two or three times).

The only intention that can be fully mediated between author, game, and player is that
the game be played. Correctness recalls earlier less complex games (tough sometimes as
difficult as modern ones, if not even harder). A game such as the DS series has limited
mechanics, limited paths. The only full intention the author or authors of the game could
have in mind is that these paths and possibilities be explored. And this recalls
procedure. Do this, get that. Do that, get this.

If therere choices, than procedure becomes choosing (and for a full completion, playing
a second - and even third time) and non-linearility becomes parallel lines. First
playthrough, second playthough, etc. IF at a certain point you can choose one of two
weapons or paths, theres no intention here: the player will choose one, follow it to its
completion. Lets say the chosen object is two keys: hell open one and move to the next
choice or inevitability. Since this specific game does not contain a full failure
alternative (all roads lead to Gwyn), the player can simply start a completely new game
or a second, harder run of the game but in possession of most of the items collected in
the first run since the beginning of the game (which makes obliterating the Crestfalen
warrior a banal action - so, to briefly go back: now you can know what happens if hes
killed just as you meet him, already accessing a different path.

The second time, you choose the second key and follow it to its completion (which will
inevitably be the Kiln of the First Flame and the final battle with Gwyn).

And even then: beaten Gwyn disappears and in the center of the room theres a bonfire.
You can lit or leave. On DS2 you can take the throne or leave. DS3 has three endings: you
light the fire, you steal it to yourself and become a sort of second Gwyn or you let the
fire fade. Interconnected, these games contain the strange fact that you can let the
world end in the first one. So no other game should be. The author decides, in an extra-
diegetic and, of course, commercial and proper of videogame language, decides for you.
You did light the fire, even if you never played DS1 before DS2 ou 3. So the world kept
going until the fire started to fade again (the second game) and again the author decides
for you: no matter you decision or decision in the game, the fire will burn until the
third game.

Said to be final one, its theme is more strongly concentrated on the thousands of years
that separate the present of the game from the original DS and, more importantly than
that: this linking of the fire might as well be the last. Ash seeketh embers: theres no
flame in the dialogue. You are not simply an undead: you are, as the woman narrator says,
not even worth of being ash. As if the fire would not bother burning you.

VG seem indeed to be larger containers for meaning if analysed in such a way: the pre-
story of the game can call upon the player specific meanings and even feelings. Why am I
at once chosen and discarded? The beginning of DS3 is astounding, visually in that: an
abandoned, a ruin of a cemetery, mostly full where bodies have no more land to be buried,
so theyre burned and everything is covered in ash (if you play close attention, the
first enemies you find are covered in it and it shakes of them when they awake, stand,
attack, are attacked.

In this you rise from ash: a clear phoenix reference and transposition. The bird is
reborn from the ash; you are expelled by it. A deject and a reject: unfit even to be
cinder.

Ash, kindle, cinder, ember. The only intentionality in what has been dubbed ludonarrative
(the inseparable relation between gameplay and the story of the game) is to instill in
the player a sense of warmth: in relation to the other games in the series, this is
essential. The linking of fire, the kiln of the first flame, even the demons in DS3 are
lukewarm (the Demon King, an optional boss, by the end of the battle becomes grayish, as
if the fire that once burned in him went out). Theres even the introduction in the game
mechanics of frostbite: basically ice weapons, that in the same category as bleeding or
poison, not only hurts the enemies but incapacitates them in some way (their stamina gets
reduced and recovers more slowly, makes them slower and more easily manageable from a
one-on-one stand point).

Intentional disobedience: the usage of disobedience is, at best, frivolous. The game
might be producing queues and even orders, but they are indications: not explicit orders.
In fact, to claim disobedience is to enter the realm of authority and in no way can the
game actually and factually exact authority over the player. You might never kill a
certain boss or access a certain area if you dont follow these indications, but the only
thing resembling authority is the fact that, as the gamer, usually you want to win. To
beat the game. And from the first installment it is clear that you can beat the games in
many ways. As you beat the last boss you are given what? A choice. In DS3 you can even
choose during gameplay to follow specific storylines (or questlines as they are usually
dubbed) where you pledge yourself to a certain meaning construction, as with Yuria of
Londor and her prophecy that you are not an unkindled one, but the future lord of a new
Londor (the original land of the Gods from the first game). She arranges your ritual
marriage (a chilling scene where you sacrifice an NPC called Anri, that is a woman if you
choose at the beginning of the game to be a man, and a man if you choose to be a woman)
and she pleads:

"Our Lord and Liege.

I prithee play the usurper.
When the moment cometh to link the fire, wrest it from its mantle.
The Age of Fire was founded by the old gods, sustained by the linking of the fire.
But the old gods are no more, and the all-powerful fire deserveth a new heir.
Our Lord of Hollows, it shall be, who weareth the true face of mankind.

Following her storyline will take the player to the Usurper of the Fire ending in which
in neither link the fire nor let it die out. You take it, wrests if from its mantle, as
she says for you own usage and becomes thus the new lord of Londor. A new god, a second
Gwyn. The Lord of Hollows. You appear in a cutscene surrounded by people dressed as
Yuria and they all hail you as the new lord of Londor, in fact, the lord of a renewed
Londor. Ideologically speaking, this shows theres, hidden in the game, a hegemony strife
between those, from many backgrounds, that believe the Age of Fire will or must end and
others that believe the fire can be linked indefinitely.

Even more interesting is the fact that if you follow the path that takes you to the
dislodged-in-time-firelink-shrine. Its not really a secret, after defeating the Dancer
of the Boreal Valley, a tremendously beautiful boss that protects the entrance of the
Lothric Castle, you can choose to climb the ladder and go straight forward, into the
castle, or turn to the left and reach the Consumed Kings garden. A poisonous garden that
the player can clearly see was once beautiful. Protect but slugs, completely consumed by
curse enemies, the garden takes you to to Oceiros, the consumed king of Lothric. As you
kill him, this mutated man that is part dragon (actually, crazed by his fascination with
the dragons of old) you can find a secret path the actually takes you to a scenario with
the exact appearance of the Cemetery of Ash where you rose in the start of the game. But
theres no sun. All is covered in darkness, the enemies are much more ruthless and
eventually you end up facing Gundyr again. But now hes called champion Gundyr, not Iudex
(making reference to the fact that this is Gundyr in the time in which he himself tried
to link the fire and failed, becoming Iudex: the judge and guardian of the Firelink
Guardian).

Beating him leads you to a sort of out-of-time extinguished Firelink Shrine, populated
only by the immortal Shrine Handmaid and where, in a secret room you can finde an item
called The Eyes of a Firekeeper. When given to the Firekeeper that tends your Firelink
Shrine, it open up the possibility of the End of the Fire ending. Instead of usurping or
linking it, you let it fade and end the so-called Age of Fire. She, the Firekeeper,
though, tells you that she sees now bright spots in this darkness to come. The light, the
fire, will come back. Some sort of new world awaits in the darkness.

In DS1 and 2 you are also called upon by NPCs to let the fire (in the second installment
represented by the throne that you must take from the wretched queen that has been
consumed by darkness) die out. Release this cursed world from its curse, says one NPC.

So, you are given myriad choices of moral and agency actions, but theyll necessarily
lead to this final choice. You can even, during the End of the Fire ending in DS3, choose
to kill the Firekeeper as she takes the flame in her hands. It is a terribly violent
scene in the game: you strike her and youd strike any enemy but youre taken to a
cutscene where you make sure she is dead by stepping on her head and taking from her the
fire. The fire dies out, you to do not usurp it, as in Yurias questline, but the scenes
are slightly different, almost indicating that the evil, the curse, will be reborn in
whatever age or world comes after this one. When you do not kill her, the blackness at
the end of the cutscene has small luminous dots.

First of all, you cant escape the choice. And hardly during a first run (if you dont
cheat and read the infinity of paratexts on the Internet) the player can obtain or even
gather the pieces to reconstruct the story of the game. This is why disobedience is not,
by far, the correct term. Neither is correctness. Correctness is mandatory: you must to
somethings to progress in the game. For example, you must ring the bells in DS1: while
the second bell is unrung you cant even access most of the game. Theres no way to reach
the Queen in DS2 without the Kings ring and youll never reach the Kiln of the First
Flame, where you face the Soul of Cinder, the final boss of DS3, if you dont collect the
ashes of past cinder lords reawaken by the ending of fire and that, with the exception of
Ludleth, refuse to play their part and link the fire.

The narration at the beginning of DS3 clearly states: When the link of the fire is
threatened, the bell tolls, unearthing the old Lords of Cinders from their graves. She
goes on naming them and saying that the Lords will abandon their thrones. Mad, cursed,
blinded by power, each one of this four main bosses in the game, cannot be convinced to
take their place in the thrones of the Firelink Shrine. So the player is forced, in order
to fulfill his mission, in every way that you choose, to destroy them and bring back
their cinders. As if they are burned. Rested on the thrones, these cinders can open the
way for the end of the game.

In a way, it is no different than any game where you must collect certain items in order
to progress. Beat bosses and castles in Super Mario in order to reach Bowser and the
Princess hes constantly kidnapping or, even simpler, adquire a key that will open a
door. The procedural aspect is there. The limits of agency are there. Defining the many
decisions that will eventually end in the same thing - the end of the game - as a form of
non-obedience is, again, frivolous and a shallow interpretation. Much more than this, the
DS series is a story-puzzle, impossible to be fully fulfilled in one run (many decisions
are either/or; such as life), but indeed the game shows how privileged the videogame
language-form in terms of meaning and agency.

Killing NPCs usually have consequences, though in some cases youll have to destroy that
character that once helped you, sold or gave you items, even helped through the summon
mechanic of the game to beat bosses and stages. Why? Because the NPCs have stories of
their own. In DS1 for example, you meat Petrus of Thorland. A cleric knight, his errand
is to protect Rhea of Thorlund, the younger princess of the house Thorlund (one of the
last great families left). But you meet him alone and he claims to have lost his party
and Rhea. Youll find out hes a dubious fellow: he can let you join the Way of the White
Covenant and sells you miracles, but as you go down the Catacombs beneath the Firelink
Shrine youll find Rhea and discover that Petrus is a coward, a traitor. If you save
Rhea, shell settle in the church in find pretty soon in the game, and when you tell this
to Petrus he gets enraged and shows his true side. He says she is "not worth her salt
without her family name and if you get killed by him here, he will even admit: Too bad
for you, I'm a wolf in sheep's clothing. If you dont or cant save her, hell pretend
to be sad, heartbroken even.

Meaning is constructed through engagement and sequentiality. Since Aristotle this is

known. Liars, cheaters, falsifiers and two-faced characters are common plot devices. DS
turns this sideways and even upside down by presenting apparent friends that are really
unsavory villains, villains that end up helping you, unpleasant figures that eventually
show themselves to be true heroes devoted to their missions, and even seemingly dumb or
silly characters (none more than Siegward of Catarina, in DS3, or his original version,
Siegmeyer in DS1): a dumbstruck knight from this land named Catarina, the wears an armor
undeniably similar to an onion (this his nickname onion knight). Siegward, if his
questline is followed, not only supplies you with one of the best armors in the game
(though and extremely silly one) and is of great help when facing Yhorm the Giant
(Siegward and Yhorm were once great friends in battle and life and Yhorm made Siegward
promise that if the Giant King of the Profane city was, as a Lord of Cinder, ever
consumed by the dark or the curse, that he, the Catarina knight, should pursue and
destroy him - he even gives Siegward the Storm Ruler, and special sword that the player
can also possess - it is somewhat hidden in the boss room - and that makes defeating
Yhorm absolutely easier (it has a skill, the special ability of weapons, that produces a
tremendous cut-like wave the weakens Yhorm, usually bringing him to his knees and
stopping him from moving, defending or attacking).

In one of the many said moments in this game, as you defeat Yhorm with the help of
Siegward, the onion knight thanks you again for you help, salutes you with a drink (hes
always drinking and in many moments of the game presents you with a bottle of Siegbrau,
and alcoholic beverage from the land of Catarina that restores health points and cures
frostbite). If you pay attention, after talking to him and walking towards the bonfire
that appears as Yhorm dies you can see Siegwards head drop. He sleeps or is sleeping in
many encounters, but this time youll find out he went into eternal sleep: hes dead.
Reloading the game or moving to another area and them returning youll find his Storm
Ruler and armor where he was sitting. If it is simply a leftover from his death or a
proposital gift left for you, its up to the player to decide.

Meaning construction is rarely semiotic in the DS series. It is hermeneutic through and

through: from choices to the consequences, its up to the player to give, make, find,
derive, assemble meaning.

Is Yuria a villain? In the first DLC of DS3, Ashes of Ariandel, the final boss is Sister
Friede. After killing her if you talk with Yuria she admits Elfriede was her sister and a
traitor of Londor. Sir Vilhelm, if you are following Yurias questline he mentions Yuria
during the possible dialogues with him. Hes tone is derogatory and if you attack him as
soon as you find him by the door of the cathedral he even says what is Lady Yuria
thinking. If you try to keep talking to him he says Go on, carry on for Lady Yuria and
Londor with the same tone. The player can derive from this that theres an ice-thin
peace between the sisters (one free into the world, the other exiled inside Ariandels
Painting). A frozen war between the renunciation of the world by Friede and the creature
that inhabit the painting and Yurias desire to restore Londor and that the fire be used
for that purpose. Inside the painting, the fire is almost taboo: this is clear because
the scenario in mostly a frozen wasteland and many enemies possess frostbite-causing
weapons. The final fight with her has three stages: first her and her scythe. She jumps,
becomes invisible, perform critical attacks. As she dies, father Ariandel, chained to a
chair with a golden bowl in his lap goes crazy and the scenario burns, to the point that
the wall cave in and the room becomes much larger. He frees himself and aimlessly roams
the room hitting the floor with the bowl that now is in flames and dripping with melted
metal or lava. His fire resurrects Friede and you must face them both in a very
meaningful symbolism: she with her frostbite attacks and scythe and him with the lava
dripping bowl. Eventually they both will die (a good strategy is to focus on father
Ariandel, since he is basically aimless) but theres a third stage.

She resurrects herself and Blackflame Friede and now inflicts fire, dark and frost
damage. It is, indeed, one of the more challenging boss from the series. As she her body
is being engulfed in black flames you can still here Ariandels word: When the Ashes
aretwo, a flame alighteth. Thou'rt Ash, and fire befits thee, of course. Is Friede
also an unkindled? One seduced by this path laid down by Ariandel, outside of the world,
hidden in the painting? Her first resurrection certain resembles when, after dying, you
awake back again at the last bonfire you rested at.

And if youre following Yurias quest and is defeated by Friede shell specifically know
that you are an undead and tell you to return to Yuria. Since you can play the DLC after
beating the last boss of the normal course of the game, you can already be the Lord of
Hollows, leader of Londor, and she will also know this saying "Return Lord of Londor. You
have your own subjects to attain to. If youre not following Yuria's questline she says
Leave us be, ashen one. For that is thy place of belonging or Leave us be, Ashen one.
Sweep all thought of us from thy mind. As thy kind always have. If you still in the
middle of Yurias questline, shell change the last sentence: "Return from whence thou
camst. Yuria surely awaits thee.

No direct mention of any sort of agreement appears in any dialogue, but it can easily be
derived from these: Ariandel is to be left alone, the outside world should deal with its
own problems and if Friedes sister has chosen the path of Londor, she and her followers
should tend to that. It is implied that there might be a third sister, Liliane, and that
the three were the founders of the Sable Church of Londor - the cult followed by Yuria
and, in this possible interpretation, betrayed by Friede in favor of Ariandel and
escaping the world of fire.

No order - neither in the sense of mandatory action nor in the sense of form, regulation
or structure - is presented. Theres not even a space for disobedience: there are hidden
paths, alternative bosses, but as you touch the remaining piece of painting in Gaels
hand (the way to enter the DLC) your goal is to beat the scenario, enemies, collect
items, find the secret passage that opens in the cathedral the place where Ariandel is
and that is it. The meaning content is either somewhat obvious or completely up for
grabs. Again: not semiotically, but hermeneutically. Its up to the player to decide the
nature of the relationship between the sisters (if you dont talk to Yuria you might
never even find out they are sisters! And if you are not following Yurias questline, you
might not notice theres a connection between Londor, Yuria, Ariandel and Friede).

Again: the options turn into a single demand - youll have to play the game more than
once and follow different paths, make opposite or different decisions. And depending on
the questline (since weve been talking about Yurias, lets continue), you can break it
by making a simple unknown mistake. When you reach the scenario called Church of Yorshka,
youll again find Anri (if you talked to him in the Catacombs of Carthus before - another
questline and one that gets enmashed with Yurias). Hell talk to you. In the corner of
the room youll notice a statue slightly different than the others, kind of out of place.
If you attack it you will, unknowingly, killed Yurias agent sent to kidnap Anri in order
for the sacrifice/marriage ritual to take place. This will break the questline and Yuria
will leave the game. Same goes for deciding to kill Anri at any point where you meet him/
her. "For what Lord taketh no spouse? She says when you are prompted to go find her in a
secret passageway in the Anor Londo scenario.

abduct
[ab-duhkt]
verb(usedwithobject)
1.
tocarryofforleadaway(aperson)illegallyandinsecretorbyforce,especiallytoki
dnap.
2.
Physiology.tomoveordrawawayfromtheaxisofthebodyorlimb (opposedtoadduct).

Just this week I watched that movie Extraordinary: The Stan Romanek Story (2013), by Jon
Stumple. The movie is about this guys that has lots os proof that he has, at least since
TWO THOUSAND, being followed around, investigated, and abducted by aliens.

It is a very well produced and seemingly sincere in its intent to give Romanek a voice
and impartially show some of the 193 pieces of evidence that he claims to have.

Abduction is the preferred word used by those not only mildly interested in what has been
doubly called as ufology" and paranormal studies (a split that reflects very clearly
the two forming ideologies that compose these phenomena - not the being taken by aliens
or extra-dimensional beings, but talking, writing, seriously considering and, we cant
rule that out, living these contact situations, but the groupings, meanings and senses,
stories and feelings generated around the idea - and, of course, the belief that such
things do occur in the worlds). Derived mainly from the word abductus, it generally means
forcible removal [of]. It is a transitory verb: to abduct something. To rob it. But, as
abduco, abducere, abduxi it lives as detach, attract away, entice, seduce, charm, lead
away withdraw.

It is certainly the word of choice for those that believe themselves and are engaged in
convincing others that they indeed have been taken away to a spaceship or some place or
another dimension (even completely confusing mash-ups like a spaceship that exists
together with our dimension, but in another dimension, the is imperceivable by humans and
their technology - Ill have to look this up to find the right episode of some ufology
show from the History Channel I watched years ago, but, as I right, I make no promises.).

Being lead away it connotes kidnapping, the most common word to refer to the criminal
act of forcefully taking a person (lets not forget throughout this excursion that taking
a person is a very transitive expression: it refers to the removal of said person -
usually by force or cohertion, taking from a place and an equal forceful taking to a
place, supposedly from where this person cannot escape or get out). But it also connotes
enticement, seduction: with no subterfuge in mind, no hidden intentions, no knife to
slide between the ribs of the ecstatic hit of an assassin in some cheap novel.

Arent we all somewhere and in sometime of our lives abducted? Whiskered away by myriad
things, actually, most of the time? Attention span is what is called. What ends this span
is not always the behaviorist limits of perception and brain functionality. We are
literally taken by glances, thoughts, events. It is not attention span - its the chain
of thought: its links ever being bent and closed just so that another link comes and gets
bent and closed.

This resonates with being lead away. The chain grows, link after link, pulled forwards
and lead away from its original place (or form) - the simple unconnected first link - by
the very fact that more than one ring exists.

To move away from the axis of the body or limb. This medical definition could have been
written by Innis or McLuhan.

THERES SOMETHING BEAUTIFUL IN RIGOR AND RIGIDITY. LIMITS THEY ARE. VERTICALIZED.
PNEUMATIC TUBES: CYLINDERS ISSUED BY THE WAY THINGS ARE, RECEIVED BY AND EXPLOSIVE YET
ANTI-CLIMATICAL RECEPTION THAT EITHER ITSELF FOLLOWS THE EDICT OR GIVES IT AWAY TO THE
CHAIN THE WILL TAKE IT WHERE IT NEEDS TO BE.

Cooperation

Cooperation is with a high degree of certainty, without any social experiments,

observation or historical evaluation.

We can barely stand each other. That is, of course, true. We do like and love a small
group of direct objective people during your life (many by the mere and random
association of birth - you dont choose your family, aint that right?). More and more,
due mostly to the even more recent re-revolution of interpersonal communication (I talk
about that somewhere here), we get to have meaningful (sometimes deeply meaningful
relationships) with people that are part of our lives for very short periods (that German
boyfriend you had during his year studying abroad) or are and remain for the remainder of
live forever distant. Completely mediated. Films/shows such as MTVs (kind of mesmerizing
and terrifying at the same time) Catfish continues on showing the environment of
catfishes: the bottom, if we are to 1. Abruptly judge the reasons behind the very real
stories that not only shows like these, but true headlines and lengthy judicial processes
have proved to be real; 2. Make a very obvious moral judgement that is fundamentally
empty. These people are doing wrong against others, taking advantage, be it emotional,
financial and even socially.

A Homer Simpson duh always comes to mind when I see, hear, read this type (see: type!)
of duet.

And, my, oh my, isnt that the main component of the narrative that makes competition
what it is today? Ubiquitous in the very function as language and language as
function of society in general. Ever more failing is the prevalent interest of most. The
economic boom/crash cycles attest to this: the unsaid laws that governed the governors,
the pursue of the public or common good have long been replace by groups interests. Id
go as far as to say that because unsaid (though said to exhaustion), these more-
invisible-than-usually-invisible-laws-are were never put in practice in any shape or
form. Interest, specific small-groups has always led initiatives that involved the
betterment of what has ever changing been called public or common. More than that: no
proof is needed of me and so and I would certainly not be afraid to go even further and
claim that since the maybe long before than the so-called Ancient World of Sumerians,
Egyptians, Greeks and Romans, Man has always been commanded by a sort of council. Today
it would be more accurate to even refer to it as a sort of consortium: but lets not
stray from the original home office, the original cathedral, the altar, pyramid, rally,
movie theatre or social upheaval - the walls of Lascaux.

Mind you, its age is dubious, other examples also reveal so clear and magnificent
manifestations of manhood (not the sexual one, the manhood that means the very thing that
makes man, man) as we understand today. Lauscaux will appear here, as much of what else
will appear or disappear, as a vulto. The specifically portuguese meaning of the word to
be precise.
Originally latin, the word vultus means face, the expression or looks that a face can
assume. In its modern spanish meaning it still refers to face, in French we find more a
very more frightening avilir: to debase someone. Impossible not to say: in hilaritate
vultus regis, vita: clementia ejus sicut imber serotinus (mentioned by Garver and Phelan,
Rome and Religion in the Medieval World: Studies in Honor of Thomas F.X. Noble, 2014,
Burlington, Vermont, EUA, 2014).

Is not the because of the rule that the light is usually shone?

Vulto in portuguese has devoloped a furtive collections of meanings that challenge the
and accompany the original Latin meaning.

Most commonly, vulto means that which can never be fully perceived for it occupies or
inhabits (be it real or not, and in this I mean: a material thing or a simples
impression), the limits of perception. It is something the a person thinks it saw or
thinks it heard, either in motion, standing still (not rarely staring right back) or
just when it moves and completely disappears or cannot be thought to be there anymore).
This shadowy thing is articulate in many usages: real and objetive ones, such as I saw
his vulto and knew he would come through the corner or Behind the windows I clearly saw
a vulto and immediately knew there was something lurking outside.

In every meaning. It can be found in literature being called upon to describe even
thoughts and emotions, sometimes even in common language it can be heard being almost
ironically paired with its original Latin meanings: a vulto of a face or i could
swear I saw a vulto of sadness in her eyes". A vulto-thought. A vulto-face. A vulto-
feeling. Not of a face or expression, but of something outside perception itself or the
lack of language available to each and all of us to describe the thing perceived. From
visions of saints to alien sightings, vulto is a common word for that which I cannot
identify or even be sure to have seen, felt, heard, touched.

Not used very much anymore, it also referred to fame. Especially individual fame. A
vulto" was as instantaneously recognized - as is the English language not rarely we say
The Great Personalities of History or The World.

Finally, and strangely, it still also means importance in itself.

I apologize to any and all readers if this excursion has been somewhat inconsistent. I
assure (sorry again, I make no assurances here. That is another lie, I will assure things
in other parts. Sorry for all) that everything will make sense. Or some kind of sense. Or
at least will lead us all to think about the duality cooperation/competition isn
completely different terms than the utilitarian, ideological, functional, and especially
gullible ways this matter has been regarded.

Ok. Cooperation.
But cant we stand each other? "Who are those stand-ins here for this though-experiment?
is actually the question we should ask if we are not dealing with any form of direct
objetive data (I, personally think, 1. its impossible to obtain said data with a) the
question do we stand each other? b) a corpus which to investigate - people to watch,
live with, ask questions, test their behavior, torture them (any moral, amoral and imoral
alternative passive of generating some kind of hard results - think of torture - what a
horrible thing to ask a reader - the torturer will certainly emit data. Even if the data
is no information; the torturers will know that torture, be it in general or that kind of
torture, does not work, either in general or with this particular person). 2. It is
somewhat, and I leave my mea culpa here, impossible to think of the question can we/do
we stand each other? Without a) perceiving there are an each other that exists and had
been existing in many ways for a long time and b) automatically having an empathic
experience that will put you, me, people you know, in the shoes of this stand-ins.

So: do we stand each other? To a degree. Theres still war, theft, murder. People that
will never get along through the duration of their lifetimes and, due to the human
condition, will most certainly procure ways to transmit such dislike (to be mild) onto
their children and their childrens children. Of course, in the same way there will be
people - maybe the same people - that will instill likeness onto bread regarding specific
subject and even phenomena. Even the individualistic rupture lived since when some guy
pointed to a timeline and said huh, the things that come before the things that come
after this are inherently different in an aspect that I will call non-modern, thus naming
the time that comes after this point modernity did not changed this and from the
desperate attempts, from cybernetics and its hippie-ecological influence to the so-called
post-foucaltian French comprehensive sociology and it assumptions of the landing in the
not-yet-properly-named-overtaking of modernity by and even more modern modernity it is
completely visible, are the new testaments.

As arid as the old.

All still takes place in the light of the king. Of the leader or leaders. Its their
vulto (as importance and not face) that matters. The light is, inversely and conversely,
this shadowy, corner-of-the-eye thing.

re-revolution of interpersonal communication

semana 23 de maio, 2017

trump fecha acordo de 110 bilhes de dlares em armamento com os sauditas

so os rabes que querem armas. o acordo foi de mais de 110 bilhes de dlares em
armamento prum pas que tem FUCKING 2 MILHES DE KM QUADRADOS com a FUCKING POPULAO DA
GRANDE SO PAULO.

pessoal TEM QUE SER VESGO ou algo assim, pq no pode se ser to cego. os rabes j nem
vendem mais o leo por dinheiro, ELES DIRETAMENTE VENDEM POR ARMAS. Um fucking F-16 (que
no nenhum F-35 e seus 800 bilhes de dlares) CUSTAVA EM 1998 18 MILHES DE DLARES.

a grande questo "who's working for who in the real bottom line?" a meu ver. pq que
nem a China no boom dos 90s. eles fabricavam produtos sob um regime de cmbio artificial
e com obteno duvidosa (to say the least) de matria prima. vendiam pros EUA, que
enchiam os bolsos do politburo por apenas o segundo necessrio para eles comprarem
"bonds" DO FUCKING GOVERNO AMERICANO. Imagina hoje, quase 25 anos disso rolando direto,
se o politburo diz assim: "oi, tudo bem. eu gostaria de SACAR TODOS OS MEUS BONDS
IMEDIATAMENTE. Obrigado?

e com quase todos os pases diretamente envolvidos assim. os britnicos no geral talvez
tenham o mais arriscado ainda que mais seguro acordo: verrrry good partners, ei. como os
canadenses.

e os sauditas: "no venderemos mais leo para esses americanos infiis" e da eles no
tem armas e a ltima monarquia absolutista da Terra finalmente deixaria de existir num
massacre de trocas de famlias e guerra civil que vazaria para todos os pas da regio
(vale notar: deixando os americanos ainda mais sem leo).

e os americanos! "no compraremos mais leo desses fundamentalistas que ns sabemos muito
bem financiaram (se que no tudo junto! e os americanos financiaram ATRAVS DELES ou
junto com eles) o 11 de setembro. da os saudis ficam sem grana, sem armas, e a mesma
coisa da anterior.

Quero antes explicar uma coisa: eu no aceito mais em governos ou naes nos seus
sentidos mais, digamos, comuns. China seria politburo: eu no penso que existam MESMO
essas instituies mais. Talvez em certo sentido nunca tenham existido: ptria, nao,
tribo e agora a gente sabe, at etnias so farsas perpetradas pela percepo e pela
convivncia que gera todo o tipo de lao entre indivduos e grupos de indivduos (e por
grupos me refiro a pequenos conjuntos, no como as marxianas "classes"). Entretanto eu
acredito, e veja bem, estou usando as palavras "penso", no sentido de algo que eu tenho
bem fundamentado e que poderia por horas dar exemplo (nenhum deles mencionando os
utopistas tecnolgicos dos anos 90) pra provar que o Estado-Nao, tanto enquanto pas
como governo (seja que tipo for), no existe mais, e "acredito". Eu acredito que existe
dinmica econmica e geogrfica suficiente para que hoje no mundo exista (ah, as palavras
da moda) algum tipo de rede de grupos: chamemos eles de "powers that be".

A minha pergunta sobre esse "credo" que tambm uma desconfiana. A falta de lgica de
certos acontecimentos scio-econmicos e os "aquedutos" de benefcios (dos mais variados)
que variam tanto quanto so numerosos me fazem acreditar que por trs de Trump,
politburo, rei saudita e uma outra infinidade de lderes com alguma importncia bvia
geopoltica existe no "grupos", mas num sentido bastante especfico esses "powers that
be"; essa rede que controla tudo.

Um exemplo seria: sabe os filmes de ao ou de conspirao? Em que um vilo ou viles

planejam tomar o mundo "meio que sem o conhecimento explcito do 'mundo em geral'? Pois
. tipo "Invasores de Corpos" s que tipo, j rolou. Sem coisas presas nas tuas costas
ou no crebro: sem que precisemos ser manipulados. Como diria Orwell durante alguma
"seance": "eu nunca imaginaria que as pessoas trabalhariam em seus empregos ordenados e
absurdos e usariam o pouco dinheiro para colocar dentro das suas casas os equipamentos
que o governo usaria para monitor-las

Eu duvido que "famlias" como Rockefeller com Rothschild ou mesmo, exagerando, as

famlias reais de grandes naes em grandes e famosos perodos histricos tenham de
qualquer forma "verdadeira" sido ou atuado de prpria volio enquanto lderes.

Fazendo piada com Plato, mas nada a ver com a caverna dele, acho que nunca samos das
cavernas. It's always an Elder Council, it's just that the word Elder can mean many
things.

Esses conselhos tem agendas e a aplicao dessas agendas j envolve necessariamente os 3

pontos necessrios manuteno de sua posio como conselho: excluir, treinar,
upgradear.

Tu exclui aqueles "no teu caminho" ou que nem fazem diferena mesmo: e exclui no sentido
mesmo de extermnio por carelessness ("haha, olha aqueles nazistas imbecis e suas
fbricas de morte!") e exclui, da no sentido de "reduzir qualquer funo subalterna",
it doesn't even fucking matter who.

Tu treina. No a pensar, criar, inventar, inovar: essas coisas at esto envolvidas, mas
so "instrumentalizadas". a classe do meio. No realmente produz mas produz a
produtibilidade.

Dessa classe mediana tu seleciona um para "upar", pra ser "chantilly": gelado, instvel,
por cima e sempre em vias de se misturar indelevelmente das camadas inferiores.

A crise do print

. a realidade real@_pedroreis1m1 minute ago

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Um tweet ou post de FB s vezes fica segundos "no ar".

. Tem quem "printe".
. "Um durar pra sempre" bem mais transparente

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. a realidade real@_pedroreis2m2 minutes ago

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O print talvez real e essencialmente seja aquela materializao da fala que a escrita
tanto buscou. O banal, semi-temporrio, tornado eterno

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. a realidade real@_pedroreis3m3 minutes ago

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"tal coisa est acotecendo"

. antes? \_()_/
. agora? tirou print, mandou p amigo q mostrou pra outro q de pnc postou em
grupo do FB

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. a realidade real@_pedroreis7m7 minutes ago

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Ando espantadssimo como as pessoas agora so contidas, tu v que ela pensa antes de
responder uma msg, um tweet.

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Tudo dito na internet em qualquer espao dissimulao. Vivemos na era do "terror do

print. At esse tweet dissimulado. Ando espantadssimo como as pessoas agora so
contidas, tu v que ela pensa antes de responder uma msg, um tweet. "tal coisa est
acotecendo"
antes? \_()_/
agora? tirou print, mandou p amigo q mostrou pra outro q de pnc postou em grupo do
FB
Um tweet ou post de FB s vezes fica segundos "no ar. Tem quem printe". "Um durar pra
sempre" bem mais transparente. Qualquer coisa dita, com qualquer forma de encriptao que
seja ao ser recebida (num iPhone) pressionando-se Home e Lock ao mesmo tempo aquela
imagem naquela pequena tela se torna uma foto (nada diferente das elocubraes de
Didi-Huberman ou, ainda antes, e por outro vis, de Jacques Aumont; ambos sempre estaro
impossibilitados de negar a durabilidade, transmissibilidade e o carter de recorte que
aquilo que chamamos Fotografia tem, talvez, em sua prpria essncia.

Por outro lado o print uma foto de mais do que imagens, pois os dispositivos mostram
mais que imagens. Mostram imagem, mostram vdeo. E mostram texto. As redes sociais tendem
a ser (equivocadamente) confederadas como discursivas porque so largamente compostas de
texto (o Twitter j foi e ainda pode ser, escolhendo-se opes que no abrem links e
portanto no abrem as imagens, apenas texto). De fato, o Twitter poderia ser nada
diferente do que o IRC foi no incio dos 2000, especialmente se ignorarmos a no
linearidade causada pela presena de um sem-nmero de links que acompanham cada tweet.

O print talvez real e essencialmente seja aquela materializao da fala que a escrita
tanto buscou. O banal, semi-temporrio, tornado eterno.

_____________________________________
Princess Earth; princess earth.
The land itself. Dry land, where you can disembark. Get yourself out of the bark, the
dry impenetrable wood that protects you from drowning in the passage. At the same time,
its impenetrability is a prison.

Has any body been anything BUT a prison?

Isnt the material in itself the prison?
Isnt the thing, the thing-that-is-a-material-thing-that-exists-in-the-world, o
definidor?
A instncia mxima da atualidade da condio de existncia (o determinismo, em si mesmo:
o nico verdadeira e iluminadamente inescapvel e, no fim, o nico realmente possvel) e
ao mesmo tempo o objeto DEFINITIVO de todo o pensamento, que liberto ou no, busca,
ofusca e afirma o/um TRANSCENDENTE?

Princess Earth will take nothing of these offenses. Shell silently just deny herself;
just be something else, pretend that she isnt looking or hurting. She will cry, her
tears will be devastation. She will mourn and her mourning will be the still sea of
History trapped in a crystalline surface of demoralizing and impossible suffering.

Immanent bonds.
Permanent bonds. Bonds that even if interior, are made by THE exterior because they are,
themselves and in themselves, a BOND. A ligament. It requires that THIS, be it an it
or an I, be CONNECTED to a THAT, be that an it or an I. A bond requires some sort of
COMMUNICATION: between a this and a that.

Arent the most immanent of all the possible bonds hyper? Hyper-bonds: bonds that we are
a part of, but that are in and of themselves outside the possibility of interfacing.
Bonds beyond our ability to negotiate. Beyond our ability of INTER-ACTION. We are subject
(even subordinated) to them (be they as simple as air, sunlight, nourishment, etc.), in
forms that we cannot ever deny. Actually, their DENIAL would most certainly be our
undoing.

But lets not go all cosmological: the familial and societal bonds are as hyper as the
sun or nourishment - in fact, they are often in the way of these necessities. Be it
prison, that deprives man from the necessity of movement and exposure to the light of the
sun, be it the economical systems that have prevailed throughout what we so frivolously
call History, with the expected hegelian capital H.

We are in inevitable ways connected and in communication with those that have beared
us. Mitocondrial DNA and all that stuff that now we know about and that are inevitable
things that we inherit from our bearers. Be it diabetes or pancreatic cancer, baldness
or crooked teeth, red hair, and earlobes: they are all gifts that are pushed onto and
into us by the mere material fact that the biological phenomenology of birth is
constituted in our bearers and exists in our genetic possibility TO EXIST. It is what it
is: those genes have formulated each of us and we are (at least so far) BOUND TO THEM.

BONDS AND BOUNDS are familiar words. Id say companion words. It always is childish to
affirm such things as that what binds also separates, as if frontiers and barriers, as
material objective realities and metaphors, were not ALWAYS porous. But bonds are bounds
and bounds are bonds: bonds are constituted in the boundary creation process - an
immanent process but, of course, also a metaphysical and ideological process - and bounds
are the result of the agreements in these very metaphysical and ideological processes and
the SECOND LEVEL agreements, for example, by different groups or experiences of different
metaphysical and ideological processes. This is the kingdom of sun worshippers, and its
BOUNDARY is the limit with the moon worshippers kingdom or something like that, but with
sometimes more complex racial and, not rarely, ethical compromises and relationships. So:
bounds too are made of bonds.

Complex or not, WE ARE FORMED by this extreme situation, this LIMITI-SITUATION, that is
the interconnection of bonds and boundaries and the limits of the possible. Action is,
surely, guided by pragmatic logic, but it is in no way LIMITED by it. Action belongs to
the realm of the possible (and the impossible) and even though it is born of bonds and
immanency, it is the new in its most accurate assumption.

Only in actualizing" can Man bring what isnt into being. Isnt that so?

Princess Earth: she is the battlefield of the war for existence. What can be tries to
come into being, what is tries to continue being, what cannot be infects the possibility
and imagination. As what-can-one-day-be.
____________________________________________________
Da ponta do galho cai a fruta. Ela exala seu cheiro e atrai seus predadores; eles no a
predam, eles a ajudam. Um pequeno mamfero, um pssaro, insetos. At mesmo as bactrias e
esporos que recobrem tudo: algum a devorar e deixar em algum lugar uma semente. A
semente, dura, indigervel, praticamente inescrutvel.

Deixada, ela se enterra. Na terra, lama, lodo, fezes. Impenetrvel ela se deixa porosa:
devora o que estiver ao seu redor, bebe da humidade os minerais suspensos em gotculas
infinitesimais de gua. Alimenta-se da placenta vegetal que lhe foi outorgada pela
rvore-me. Divide-se at que seu invlucro se parte e ela gesticula rumo ao calor e, por
isso, luz.

Ela o resto do invlucro e aquele pequeno ramo que rasga a casca dura. Dura? Mas se no
impenetrvel, exatamente, penetrvel, rompvel. possvel que ali se forme um PORO, um
orifcio, ainda que imperceptvel, na superfcie daquele corpo.

____________________________________________________
a cegueira incrvel que est no corao dos argumentos sobre a tcnica entre os
anunciantes
(OPERAES DE MIDIATIZAO: DAS MSCARAS DA CONVERGNCIA S CRTICAS AO
TECNODETERMINISMO, 2016, p.18)
Esses argumentos,

esses que esto no corao dos argumentos sobre as tcnicas estariam no. De fato pode-
se argumentar que diretamente infervel que aqui se afirma que o prprio modo de ser
desses argumentos, aquilo que lhe mais central e no que mais se baseia tanto entre e
dentro das dinmicas publicitrias e do pro-profit entertainment quanto entre e, supomos,
dentro dos mediadores, termo terrivelmente traduzido por atores miditicos*.

Esses argumentos valorizam categorias verdadeiramente interessadas na promoo de

tcnicas? A traduo que faz ser o mesmo technique que tcnica o technique que
tecnologia, como o dispositivo material j perdeu de vistas a circularidade fantstica e
correta do que est sendo dito.

A tcnica independe. De tudo. Ela , em absolutamente qualquer sentido de ser. Ela

depende do todo, mas apenas no que isso indica o horizonte impossvel que o todo em si
e que expressamos na palavra todo. Como todo o resto que no tcnica e aquilo de que
ela composta ou organizada em si mesmo, o todo est em fluxo. A tcnica do Homem, mas
ela tambm o ser do Homem.

Ela um rio, mas um que a nascente nunca se esgota. Um que a nascente parece utilizar a
prpria vazo para gerar ainda mais vazo: se fosse possvel imaginar, ela seria
piramidal e tentacular. Essa fonte na verdade estaria numa sempre expanso baseada em si
mesma.

Alguns jogos de videogame lucrariam muito com essa ideia e muitos j lucraram construindo
cenrios ao mesmo tempo tentaculares, se open worlds a sandboxes, de builders a puzzles.

O de onde vem, aquilo que segura cada degrau novo da construo, ao mesmo tempo esse
degrau novo. De fato, poderia-se, se ignorarmos as reverberaes scio-econmicas
envolvidas nesse processo, at se tecer o argumento de uma estrutura de pirmide
invertida. Olha quanto foi baseado, em termos puramente materiais, apenas no
desenvolvimento do uso do fogo. Entretanto, as hordas em holocausto nunca foram tanto as
madeiras e fsseis (matematicamente, quantitativamente e materialmente, claro que sim:
queimamos provavelmente muito mais biomassa do que a humana j ocupou no planeta; mas
deixo esse dado para alguma futura descoberta casual ou uma vertigem de informao). As
hordas eram homens.

* Terrvel traduo. Absolutamente terrvel. Quem fez isso obviamente quis agenciar a entrada de um
modismo intelectual da mesma natureza ao que criticado no texto: trazer a idia de uma
epistemologia imensamente abrangente para uma tmido corpo de teorias sobre diversos tipos, modos e
possibilidades de sistemas, especialmente entre agentes ditos volitivos e no-volitivos, para no
cairmos no precipcio lamacento de definir o que humano e o que no-humano. Talvez tratemos
disso adiante, em outra poro desses escritos.
A tcnica prescinde porque o fogo que queima na sua caldeira o Homem: o fogo que
literalmente queima na caldeira do Homem e o manteve vivo pela ltima era do gelo e,
sejamos francos, em toda a histria ou Histria conhecida, tambm ela tcnica. Arguir
que a tcnica (e aqui poderia-se dizer, inclusive no, at mesmo essencialmente, tambm
aquilo de material que ela e tem e produz) que a tcnica se alimenta do Homem talvez
pisar perto demais de um foo chamado abuso dos conceitos vegetativos. Ou, no caso, das
naturezas simbiticas e parasitrias dos seres vivos.

No o mais sugestivo que a humanidade torne-se cada vez mais tcnica (e se vamos usar o
termo tecnolgico, como na pssima traduo do texto, para indicar os objetos de uso
tcnico) quanto mais tcnica se torne? Mais do que sugestivo, no seria lgico?

Realmente pouqussimas coisas podem categoricamente ser afirmadas sobre a natureza

humana, cite-se-a de que autor ou artista se quiser. Entretanto, penso que uma sim: nos
transformamos. um universal bastante comprovado que mesmo destruio massiva se segue
algo que no o mesmo que era antes e ainda assim ainda . No-ser, ter-sido, ainda-ser.
Todos esses regimes so governados pela mesma hifenizao que do mesmo tipo: poder-ser.
O no-ser poderia ter-sido? O ainda- poderia ter se tornado no-ser? E ele ainda rege,
talvez a realmente magnnimo, naquilo em tudo se torna por tudo, pelo todo, estar,
parece-nos, eternamente no movimento do tempo.

o tempo que permite ou movimento ou o movimento que revela o tempo? Uma pergunta para
outra hora.

quilo que deixa de ser, que passa do ao no--mais, sempre se segue um outro . Da
Queda do Imprio Romano e o mantenimento da arregimentao scio-poltica e por um bom
tempo econmica em grandssima escala no seu corpo clerical que jamais perdeu-se e
manteve-se at hoje no que um pequeno pas at a putrefao da vida microscpica
unicelular mais simples que existe, do corao das estrelas ao dinamismo impossvel da
complexa vida natural que habita o planeta, o todo, aquele, esse horizonte, o mximo que
consigo ver, digamos assim, est sempre mudando.

Qualquer um que j tenha sido prisioneiro sabe bem que a parede jamais ser escavada por
ele em sua vida, mas se cem homens habitassem aquela cela, talvez um dos dedos do
centsimo primeiro conhece a liberdade.

Qualquer um que tenha cursado um mnimo de geografia sabe que os prprios continentes nos
quais nos penduramos hoje moveram-se ao longo da idade desse pequeno planeta centenas de
quilomtros. Aquela mxima de Herclito, de que jamais se pode entrar num mesmo rio
serve, dado-se tempo, literal e materialmente, ao todo. Como no clssico documentrio
Cosmos, com Carl Sagan, to iconicamente colocou, objetivamente ns somos feitos de star
stuff. A caldeira, talvez bastante literalmente, que nos fundiu foi o nosso pequeno sol,
que se constitui de um pequeno acmulo de outras stuff" num determinado momento ainda
anterior e essa stuff" tinha sido outra stuff" antes e ainda outra antes.

Como horrorizadamente descobrem todas as crianas: at ns seremos mastigados, devorados,

digeridos, expelidos. Ns estamos aqui porque fazemos essas funes.

O carter entrpico do todo que a verdadeira cegueira. Na pior comparao possvel:

como qualquer culto. Ele se consome ao produzir aquilo que os arquelogos anos depois vo
catalogar. Na melhor? Se no foi Prometeu que trouxe o fogo dos deuses, mas essa centelha
propriamente humana, porque ela no haveria de mastigar, devorar, digerir, expelir
enquanto cresce e consome aquilo que pode? O corao da tcnica talvez no seja to
diferente do de qualquer estrela: sua imensa gravidade empurra dura para seu centro duro
e quente e de l ou o mesmo expelido, acossados pelas presses colossais, ou funde-se.
O principal produto do Sol o hlio (nome to apropriado e bem escolhido) fruto da fuso
dos tomos mais simples de hidrognio que compe a maior parte esmagadora da matria da
estrela.

Seria um abuso dos conceitos astrofsicos pensar a tcnica exatamente como o Sol? Self-
suficient, or at least apparently or lastly enough to seen that way, because of its very
nature? No h uma gravidade exorbitante perpetrada pela tcnica? No o fogo que atrai
o Homem para aquele mtico crculo de homens, para ali se aquecerem e viverem melhor,
exatamente esse allure? Essa coisa que puxa?
Dos diversos sacrifcios, a poesia o nico de que podemos manter, renovar o fogo
(Bataille, Experincia Interior, p.192).

_____________________________________
I GOT SUNSHINE IN MY POCKET: media are hyper-things

In his 1964 book Signs, Merleau-Ponty recovers a concept originated in Huangs

(1955) introduction to child psychology. This concept is that of hyper-things.

Media, as much as human thought thought in general, is inexhaustible as a means to be

sufficiently known.

Hyper-things are those phenomena and properly things, material things, that can
never be fully known and, just as well, are an intrinsic part of everyday life that can
never be directly accessed. Take the sun as an example. Sol, our star, is ours just and
only in the directly opposite sense that we cant imagine unhuman things expressing
possession. Sol is very likely the source of most of the materials that not only compose
us humans but most of the inanimate materials as well. Its heat and light determine
quality of life. If the Earth was just a little bit farther or a little bit closer
(little bit being here, maybe, hundreds of thousands of kilometers) all the planet would
be was either a frozen rock, like most of the planets after us, or a burning desert, like
the planets before us. Sol-3 is the optimal orbiting position for a temperate and mild
climate. And, as it seems, for life.
But we just manage what the sun gives us. We can, of course, create roofs and
walls and even manipulate life itself, especially vegetation, to protect us against its
heat, its light, even its radiation but as we scrap knowledge about the nature of stars
through astrophysics and sub-atomic physics we find ourselves decisively impotent. We
counteract the sun. We dont interact with it. It is, as it is, forever out of our reach
that we cant simply abdicate this relationship. Even the controlled environments of
space crafts and space stations are readily made to sustain solar radiation, solar winds,
extreme changes in temperature.
The materiality of the sun is one that is hyper, it is beyond or over.
But Sol is a privileged example. What other things are or have become hyper? The
epistemological dilemmas of trans, post, super and hyper have populated since the late
70s most or, in a negative way as well, all of scenery of western thinking. But did it
ever concentrated its gaze upon the hyper-things that were always there and, maybe, the
new ones that sprung from those emergencies? Phenomena such as the ubiquity of media
have been dealt with by many schools of thought and many more authors with different
notions of the centrality of these dilemmas. But has hyper-media been transposed to the
realm of hyper-things? Has media in any sense at all become hyper? And, most of all, has
it in its plurality coalesced in a sort of hyper-thing?
If we chose to start from a somewhat banal point, such as Nick Couldrys
affirmative that life has become life in the presence of media, we find ourselves
starting after a turning point that is as hard to define as it is indispensable to note.
This seemingly banal phrase encapsulates the awe, euphoria, dread and horror that has
accompanied western thinking since, at least, the Industrial Revolution and, at best,
since Gutembergs press. In a very objective way these sentence summons, summarizes, and
clarifies what Benjamin has dubbed the age of mechanical reproduction.
Media has indeed become the way of life. It is not frivolous or hasty to say:
media, in all its forms, from printing presses to electronic-digital devices have become
ubiquitous. They populated every facet of life. In the sense of Borges map-makers, media
has indeed covered the whole world and more. The digital page-content available at any
minute through a cellphone or computer would in fact cover the Earth many more times than
its geographical size. It has been said, in fact, that if printed in direct size the
content of the normal daily used and read Internet would occupy more than the entire
cubic size of the livable atmosphere.
What would the astronaut experiencing the overview effect deduce from this sight,
right?
Tendo absolutamente nenhuma garantia de eloquncia ou perpetuao, me propondo a comear
a colocar no papel algumas consideraes gerais. Quero falar dos meios. Da mdia. Mas em
todos os seus pormenores, quero uma recuperao, quero um recorte amplo. Quero e no nego
praticamente a v tentativa de um mapa borgeano: um do tamanho daquilo que cartografa.
Muito vejo pequenas cartografias, estudos especficos, pequenos, minsculos, sobre o
mini; sobre o neutrino do universo incontido nesse conceito, nunca sobre a gravidade ou
as foras nucleares fortes. Quero apresentar em forma inclusive: quero que qualquer um
possa tirar algo de uma obra, mas tambm no. Esta uma obra especfica queles que se
pretendem por a pensar sobre a mdia e os meios e aqueles que buscam ou buscaro se
iniciar em operar essas mdias e esses meios ou a estud-los enquanto recorte especfico,
escolar, seja de um estudo duro ou macio.

Na primeira fila da pea que buscarei desenrolar em alguns captulos que se

seguem, h um crtico muito ansioso e ele, antes mesmo que - pretensamente classicista
como sou - o coro possa introduzir as cenas iniciais e seus componentes, j interpela-me,
o autor, que divulgue a mais sacrossanta e impretervel das essncias da ao humana
sobre e sob esse orbe: senhor autor, desculpe-me interromper sua pea, mas no programa
entregue audincia no consta nada sobre o seu mtodo. Como, o senhor precisa
urgentemente responder, seremos capazes de compreender ou mesmo passivamente acompanhar
os desenrolares que pretende nos apresentar? Ao ouvir a pergunta eu, enquanto autor e a
pea virtual aguardando sua atualizao, calmamente dirijo-me ao meu diretor de cena e
peo que ele escolte o crtico at o hall de entrada no teatro e lhe consiga um saco de
pipoca e um refrigerante. Ao segurana do teatro eu peo que busque novamente no
backstage se este maldito mtodo est por l e peo que meus informantes entre a equipe
de ajuda de palco digam-me se os atores andam fofocando a esse respeito.
Ao me assegurar de tudo e perceber que o crtico est de volta em seu assento,
mastigando as consequncias sob a camada exterior do milho da fervura da gua em seu
interior, mantenho firmemente em mente que o mtodo aqui se trata apenas de erros e
acertos, de tentativas e opes. Agarro-me aos axiomas de John Dewey e Hannah Arendt:
nenhuma ao minha poder ser antecipadamente antecipada. Agarro-me, portanto,
incerteza e a mnima sabedoria de um recm-doutor numa rea inicitica e, diriam seus
crticos mais ferrenhos, pattica das Cincias Sociais Aplicadas.
Se for (e eu j fui a alguns) aos orculos da minha era, estranhamente tendo a
receber a mesmssima resposta que Scrates deriva do escrnio que lhe fornecesse aquele
em Delfos: eu nada sei. Acho que s poderia afirmar o saber e a sabedoria disso e afirmar
que incorrerei, para uns, em saltos incautos, para outros desabarei por barrancos de
coerncia. Pouco importa.
No terei a prepotncia de que pretendo aqui um anti-mtodo. Proponho, alado
desde Sneca aos cursos do College du France de Michel Foucault, at a biografia de Chris
Hadfield, ex-comandante da Estao Espacial Internacional, um overview effect. Uma vista
de cima com os aguados olhos que me forem permitidos desenvolver atravs das obras,
ideias e autores que aparecero aqui. Por vezes penso que poderemos, como um satlite que
l as placas de um carro numa rodovia, nos permitir aumentar o maior, por vezes, como
homens planando em pedaos de metal, poderemos finalmente conectar as imensides e
ignorar o que, do cho, parecem fronteiras to bem demarcadas e obstculos to plenamente
insuperveis.
Propomos ento o hiper. Como as hiper-coisas que Merleau-Ponty de Huang (1964).
Mas esse hiper, ah, ele no faz aluso sua traduo mais comum, ordinria e
contempornea. No o hyper de Hiperon, daquele que alto apenas. Para que
pudssemos em nossa era ver as mais elementares das partculas que constituem o universo
foi preciso um aparato de mais de 27 km de comprimento, enterrado em mdia a 50 a 175
metros de profundidade, embaixo do solo de dois pases diferentes (Frana e Sua). Para
que possamos compartilhar instantaneamente com o mundo nossas mais banais selfies pr-
requisito a existncia de uma praticamente imensurvel (at pela parte material dela que
, na falta de um termo melhor, secreta) infraestrutura que envolve desde simples
eletrodos e cabos de cobre ou nquel at satlites em rbita e milhares de km de cabos
subaquticos. E existncia dessa imensurvel infraestrutura se deve s caractersticas de
um sem-nmero de materiais e ao labor e trabalho humano em acessar (minerao), formatar
(metalrgica), aplicar (distribuio) e compreender (cincia) esses mesmos materiais.
H que se guiar por um movimento pendular ou pulsante. Do nfimo (quem pode
definir o que verdadeiramente nfimo?) ao gigantesco (mesma pergunta) e no no sentido
de agrupamentos. No na cansada discusso sobre partes" e todos" e idealismos estreis
que buscam definir uns pelos outros sem nunca verdadeiramente confrontar a variedade de
entidades com as quais no temos verdadeiramente nenhuma experincia direta; sem
nunca admitir aquilo que est no horizonte de nossa percepo (Merleau-Ponty, Signs, p.
99). Ao hypo e ao hyper no se pode imputar comparatividade: o pequeno infinitamente
pequeno, ao que parece, e o grande, infinitamente grande. Quarks e a idade do universo:
duas unidades intrincadamente separadas.
E entre o grande e o pequeno temos que fazer a mdia. O medium vem de medius: ao
mesmo tempo no meio de e aquilo que ambguo. O medium tambm aquele que fica
entre, no meio, mas estar-no-meio e tambm, mais importante, aquilo que tornado
pblico.

Quando Dewey se vale do tomo em The Public and its problems para arguir sobre a
inutilidade e esterilidade da diviso indivduo/sociedade - que poderia substituir
perfeitamente a dicotomia parte/todo, ele foca o eltron. Paradoxo material da
existncia: sabemos onde est, mas nunca quo rpido se move; sabemos o quo rpido se
move, mas nunca onde est ou para onde vai. Parece boiar no ar rarefeito dos conceitos,
mas o eltron um servo das foras essenciais do universo. Atrado pela gravidade,
movido pelas foras nucleares, expulso explosivamente dos ncleos dos tomos que, como as
mais gigantescas estrelas, no so capazes de sustentar a si mesmo - de fato, as foras
do universo que no possibilitam. O urnio cospe fora seus eltrons; o plutnio; os
istopos todos. The natural decay of matter que hoje o cdigo, o relgio de Rosetta,
capaz de medir cronometricamente a existncia.

Se uma estrela que queima hidrognio, um prton, um eltron, precisa derreter essa
matria essencial e ela tambm regurgita na vastido do cosmo. A imagem da estrela como
fbrica da matria: que simetria absolutamente fantstica, no apenas entre o micro e o
macro, mas tambm da coincidente intuio quase onipresente do credo religioso ao redor
do Sol (o verdadeiro nome do nosso sol, assim como habitamos Sol-3). As aurolas dos
santos nos centenrios vitrais e milenares lugares de culto cristo atestam sobre a fora
desse credo: quando Constantino converteu-se, exigiu que seu antigo Deus-Sol, nem Apolo
nem Sol, nem R nem Hiperio, sobrevivesse nos crculos de luz solar emitido pelo topo de
todas as santidades e beatitudes.

Interessantemente, essa intuio provou-se a mais sbia das descobertas. De fato, em

certo sentido, todas as elocubraes do grande quarteto pr-socrtico (Tales, Anaxmenes,
Herclito e Anaximandro) somam-se ao tomo indestrutvel aristotlico. A gua 75% do
homem e sua composio depende necessariamente da matria solar (hidrognio e o abundante
oxignio expelido e produzido, respectivamente, pelo Sol). O fogo a queima, a
verdadeira consumao: o Sol pode no queimar como o fogo atmosfrico, sua chama
danante, mas da energia que o ser do fogo - da troca que se torna visvel na
combusto de um combustvel e um acelerante (ar, calor, combustvel) - que tudo feito.
na excitao atmica que existe o ser-a do fogo e do calor. O ar de Anaxmenes o
prprio combustvel do fogo e, ao p da letra, a despeito de ser composto de uma mirade
de detritos, basicamente nitrognio, hidrognio e oxignio. Nem o aperon () de
Anaximandro escapa comprovao intuitiva, pois no que do que quer que seja feito ou
sejam feitos, o cosmo e seus habitantes habitam um ser-a marcado apenas pelo devir de
que, dando-se tempo, todas as combinaes podem vir a acontecer. Sem limite, seria uma
apropriada traduo de ; gua, e seu ciclo infinito; fogo, a metfora viva das
trocas energticas; o ar, tomado como atmosfera, pai dos troves e me de todos os
viajantes, at aqueles que no so Homens. O tomo aristotlico profetiza o indivisvel,
mas visto aos olhos do quarteto, antev de fato o prprio da divisibilidade. Com
oito, quatro, duas ou apenas uma bolinha de encaixe: no interessa o quo minsculas
forem as peas desse Lego, nem o quo complexa seriam suas ligaes, o que importa, a
prioristicamente, a humildade de confrontar isso como o mais nico, aporstico e
perplexo ponto de partida.

Se Sol que engenheiro desse orbe, o meio com que ele perpetra esse engendro o vcuo.
A natureza detesta o vcuo? No. A natureza o vcuo. Como o vcuo que produzimos
atravs de nossos sistemas respiratrios para sugar refrigerante de dentro de uma lata
atravs de um canudo. Nada como o ar dentro do canudo; apenas gravidade. Uma grande,
rodopiando como uma imensa pia industrial, deixando que alguns rastros de si mesmo, suas
sobras, seus dejetos, voem nos ventos criados pelas exploses 70 mil vezes maiores que
nosso planeta. Ventos. O Ar de Anaxmenes na verdade o vento solar, a expulso
violentssima de matria que lana seus detritos com acelerao o bastante para se no
escapar completamente, passar a orbitar a estrela. O fogo do prprio Sol; os gregos
confundiram-se. O fundidor, o metalrgico do universo no o trovo de Zeus, mas o
martelo eternamente fumegante desse Hefesto-Sol. A cada batida, as fagulhas que voam e
iluminam a escurido - inclusive aquela feita no de no-luz, mas de no-matria. E no
a gua aquilo que resfria a lmina sob o martelo do ferreiro e sada da fornalha? At as
usinas nucleares se valem dela para resfriarem as hastes de plutnio.

O Sol ainda tem mais a oferecer. Se ele ilumina porque as reaes que o compe emitem
ftons. Ns vemos ftons. Ao deitarmo-nos numa noite escura mas sem nuvens somos capazes,
com nossos crebros primatas e nossos rgos simples at em comparao com nossos
comparsas terrestres, de literalmente ver ftons. Os vemos todos os dias. At um nascido
cego capaz de distinguir se est no escuro ou ao sol. A pele v os ftons. E no o
fton o equilbrio perfeito entre os quatro senhores precursores de Scrates? um
visvel invisvel, como o ar! a encarnao da duplicidade: onda e matria - como o
fogo, que apenas o oxignio demonstrando o efeito das trocas energticas por detrs (e
que envolvem) dele e simultaneamente como a gua, que ela mesmo ar (vapor), mas rocha
e lquido. Ilimitada, ela viaja inesgotvel pela idade inteira do universo.

Cada vez que um desses ftons chega, se essa palavra a correta, at ns ele um
atestado da kenopsia que sem dvida ser a caracterstica marcante da Terra, pois a do
universo. , o vazio, e , o olho obsidiano dos arco-ris, a categoria de
familiarizao. Uma atmosfera visivelmente invisvel, delirante e desesperada de um lugar
que geralmente movimentado com pessoas e mudanas e que agora, abandonado e silencioso,
permanece apenas como imagem remanescente de uma populao negativa. No so as estrelas
os marcadores sempiternos dessa negatividade? No sem os teores mltiplos que encontramos
ao derivar qualquer coisa do Grego, tambm o anoitecer. Its the twilight of
emptiness: ao operarmos atravs do percepto o agrupamento, o chunking, aniquilamos essa
manh. Operamos o entardecer, como o anoitecer: a sada de um regime para o outro. Do
diurno ao noturno, do desperto ao adormecido e, adormecido, submerso no seu prprio ser-
quem-se-: quem est em viglia para garantir que o mundo ainda est l?

Nos termos de Eugene Thacker, a confuso que o crepsculo do vazio faria com que
perguntssemos: no nosso-mundo, que co-operao ou interao verdadeira temos com aquilo
que subscrevemos como crepsculo (que literalmente traduzi-se, tanto em sua fonte
anglofnica quanto do latin crepusculum ou crepusculascentis)? No mundo-em-si-mesmo, no
qual estamos lanados, em que dependncia estamos sempre em funo das funes
crepusculares (a at nos seus sentidos metafricos)? No mundo-sem-ns haver crepsculo?
Pode existir luz e no-luz sem um medium? Afinal, no orbe terrestre o anoitecer de uma
nao o amanhecer de outra e assim ser enquanto ele rodopiar em seu eixo e orbitar o
sua estrela paterna?

______________________________
O eu em San Junipero

Acho que diferentemente de muitas das pessoas que eu conheo e pela internet eu
fui o nico a me focar num aspecto diferente do episdio San Junipero da terceira
temporada da srie anglo-americana Black Mirror, recentemente comprada pelo servio de
streaming Netflix.
Enquanto muitos se focaram (louvalvemente) no romance entre as personagens
principais, eu fiquei literalmente paralisado o tempo todo sobre certas questes
logsticas, legais, objetivas e, francamente, existencialistas.
Especialmente aps as discusses entre Kelly e Yorke acerca do marido de mais de
40 anos de Yorkie, interpretada por Gugu Mbatha-Raw, que decidira, quando sua hora
chegou, no migrar para a (por enquanto) praia paradisico-idlica-fantasmagrica e
multi-epocal San Junipero.
 Povoada por cadveres, a cidade migra de dcada em dcada, idilicamente. Tudo, da
carne ao concreto, das rvores ao ar, ali, naquele lugar, objetivamente indestrutvel.
Alguns lanados on debauchery, outros vivendo vidas normais. De festa em festa ou, na
verdade, absolutamente de o-que-voc-quiser para outro o-que-voc-quiser. Utpico,
distpico e niilista numa mesma forma de ser (ou deveramos falar, interpelando Foucault,
nos modos possveis de se ser?).
A srie no mostra, focada no romance entre Kelly e Yorke e na deciso de Kelly em
migar, para ficar com Yorke, ou no, e seguir seu marido na crena, e no no saber, de
um afterlife, mas completamente plausvel que qualquer formao social possa se tornar
atual dentro de San Junipero, desde que ela (a princpio, pelo que a srie deixa dizer)
ela seja social. At mesmo uma estrutura Lord of the Flies pode ser arranjada, nem que
cruelmente e rompendo com as leis dos homens que ainda devem vigorar no mundo real fora
de San Junipero; a volta simblica aos estados hobbesianos e lockeanos de natureza pode
se dar at mesmo por desastre.
Por outro lado, estruturas como clubes da luta, estratificaes sociais (baseadas
em raa, mrito, origem, proeza, you name it) podem surgir e evanescer to rpido quanto
o ciclo de uso dos que ainda no migraram.
A minha paralisia tornou-se uma torrent e consegui identificar um nmero de
assuntos, de perguntas, na verdade:
- Quais leis imperam em San Junipero? deveria ser a primeira, mas isso, na
verdade, pouco importa, especialmente se comearmos essa indagao pelos aportes
materiais. Aparentemente voc pode inclusive decidir quanta dor, prazer ou qualquer outra
sensao sentir l dentro (o que, psicologicamente, talvez resolvesse alguns se no
muitos das patologias mentais que nos assolam - imagine controlar a sua ansiedade com um
nob, como o volume de um fone de ouvido?! Agora imagine que algum, fora do seu
controle, que tem o dedo real no boto de volume real? Ainda assim, o que primeiramente
chamou-me a ateno derivou exatamente do romance. Outros vivos, chamemo-os assim,
habitam, ainda que apenas temporariamente SJ. H ainda no mundo real algum tipo de
preconceito, seja de que natureza for, contra, por exemplo, a homossexualidade de Yorke
(o que gera o acidente que a deixa durante a vida toda paralisada). No poderia Yorke
delatar, portanto, a homossexualidade de sua parceira Kelly? Uma possibilidade
visceralmente inconcebvel dentro da concepo dos personagens e, obviamente, de seu
relacionamento. Entretanto, uma possibilidade completamente cabvel na composio
inclusive uma de uma peripcia narrativa do prprio episdio. Esse processo, e no seus
elementos, podem se repetir com outras diversas facetas. Confisses testamentrias podem
ser vazadas, de vivo para migrado e da desse migrado para outro vivo, constituindo um
trfico de interesses e informaes que poderia, facilmente, beneficiar investimentos e
aes econmicas. Pode-se ganhar o prestgio, que Foucault menciona entre os gregos e
romanos, e, se fizermos uma comparao trans-histrica, inclusive com alguns dos mesmos
elementos (especialmente a independncia de tempo decorrente da independncia do labor
arendtiano). Pode-se com ele parresiar, foucaulteanamente, mas no igualmente
concebvel que se use o prestgio, a ascendncia, como ferramenta de organizao social?
As pessoas so convencidas, seja pela retrica seja pela razo, seja pelos fatos. Isso
acontece. Os precedentes inclusive pessoais comporiam uma bem humorada lista que iria
desde meu pai s acreditou que a estante que ele montou desmoronou quando ele chegou em
casa at em 1822 a Igreja Catlica finalmente concedeu oficialmente que o planeta Terra
gira ao redor do Sol. Ento, a pergunta seria mais bem formulada da seguinte maneira:
qual o regime de ligao entre as leis reais e as aes em JN? Voltaremos a isso.
- Quando eu estou conectado a SJ, eu sou como Neo antes que Morpheus o libertasse
da Matrix. Certo? Algo como o cogumelo de Playtest" evolui para as mltiplas tecnologias
de olhos ou de extrao ou solidificao da memria (como em The Entire History of You
ou numa das histrias de White Christmas) e permite uma experincia verdadeira
imersiva. Aquele corpo o seu corpo. Eu, depois de um determinado perodo de tempo ou se
assim eu desejar, posso me desconectar. Eu sou ainda um ser humano vivo no mundo humano.
Como Kelly. Um doente terminal mas em completa posse de seus elementos e poderes mentais.
Para interpelarmos um hegelianismo que talvez fosse ainda mais pertinente na pergunta
anterior, somos ainda cidados legais. Mas e quando assinado o contrato com a empresa,
conglomerado, instituio, ora bolas, religio que de facto So Juniper, que opera San
Junipero, o que passamos a ser? Sem que ele seja diretamente ou at mesmo indiretamente
focado, aqui constri-se um paralelo inescapvel entre o uso e reteno de dados
fornecidos por usurios sites de redes sociais, em especial o Facebook. Ao postar
contedo considerado pela comunidade de editores (chamemos eles assim, ainda que sua
atuao se aproxime cada vez mais de ou a aplicao de algoritmos que buscam por
palavras-chaves ou formatos-chave que esto dentro dos contedos considerados proibidos -
pornografia, apologia ao terrorismo, etc. - ou a atuao das comisses de censores em
regimes autoritrios do sculo XX) como inapropriado, o usurio pode ter sua conta
bloqueada e inclusive excluda (existem muitos casos de contas deletadas, juntamente com
todo o seu contedo, da rede de compartilhamento de fotos e micro-vdeos Instagram). Quem
so os moderadores de San Junipero e quem modera os moderadores? Essa pergunta leva
necessariamente prxima.
- Essa forma migrada naquela simulao ali, aqueles uns e zeros como
costumeiramente gostamos de simplificar a informtica, trate-se de mim mesmo ou de uma
cpia, como a que Matt, interpretado por John Hamm, em White Christmas coloca dentro de
um ovo e faz de inteligncia que controla a automatizao do domiclio do original
daquele eu ou a outra que faz com que confesse um assassinato? Alis, ao assistir a
White Christmas j se fica curioso sobre o regime social e legislativo que protege,
regula (ou no) essas cpias. Diferente do ovo, San Junipero uma experincia
principalmente social. Entretanto, quem so esses scios? Por exemplo: esse eu-migrado
o mesmo que o eu que existia um segundo antes da minha morte? Teria eu um certificado de
bito fsico e se um dia resolvesse me desligar de San Junipero (como dito por Yorke
ser possvel) a teria uma espcie de certificado de bito integral? Meus herdeiros ficam
com meus bens ou tem apenas usufruto deles, visto que eu, enquanto residente de San
Junipero no posso mais desfrutar deles diretamente deles (ainda que eu possa, atravs da
conexo com os ainda-vivos que visitam SJ, administrar esses bens como um senador romano
que comanda sua villa sem ter os ps nela h um bom nmero de anos). Que direitos o
habitante permanente de San Junipero tem? Essa pergunta leva necessariamente, novamente,
prxima.
- Theres no cloud. Its just someone elses computer. E se esse computador
falhar, for destrudo, ou, ainda mais interessantemente, se a San Junipero Incorporated
falir? Se suas dvidas forem sustadas com seus bens fsicos, digamos, por exemplo, os
servidores nos quais agora voc existe? Se eles forem liquidados para uma empresa que
recicla servidores? De fato, quem cuida desses servidores? Se eles forem upgradeados eu
serei tambm? A mente humana conhece 5 (talvez seis, sejamos metafsicos por um momento)
sentidos; quem disse que vivendo em San Junipero algum no invente um stimo? Meu plano
de cobertura cobre upgrades? Eu sou eu ou eu sou uma cpia de mim que eu deixei para
trs (sejamos, novamente, metafsicos)? (Sejamos tambm existencialistas) o que fica
para trs, por mais exatamente, inconfundivelmente indiferencivel do que era quando
apenas visitava San Junipero, o eu-mesmo? Esse ser-eu que sou eu?
Sinto-me compelido a fazer um interldio quase-cmico: h um filme chamada O
Sexto Dia (The Sixth Day), com Arnold Schwarzeneger, que trata de clonagem. O ttulo faz
obviamente meno ao tema bblico, Deus criou o ser humano no sexto dia e depois
descansou, e ao tema do filme, a proibio da clonagem completa do ser humano. rgos,
animais domsticos e de consumo, so frequentemente clonados. Acontece que o personagem
de Arnold, um piloto para um servio futurstico de voos curta distncia, atende um
cliente bilionrio, Michael Drucker, interpretado por Goldwyn, que morto durante um
atentado no seu remoto chal de esqui. Adam Gibson, o personagem interpretado por
Schwarzeneger, acaba ferido, mas no morto (ou algo assim, realmente no me lembro
direito), s que o bilionrio esconde o segredo de que ele clona sim humanos (ele ,
afinal de contas, o Steve Jobs da clonagem, s que com uma pitada de evil genious, um
tropo tpico de filmes de filmes de ao e de fico cientfica da poca do final dos
anos 90 incio dos 2000, recoberta de desconfianas sobre os newly-minted billionaires of
the tech world). Os, portanto, viles acabam clonando Adam Gibson por engano. Gibson,
claro, encontra seu clone, eles ficam amigos, porque na verdade no h nada de errado com
o clone fora, claro, o fato de ele achar com toda a certeza do mundo que ele Adam
Gibson. No clmax, aps um ataque, o vilo mortalmente ferido mas ele ativa outro de
seus clones. Esse clone, incompleto, devemos mencionar (ele todo defeituoso, a pele e a
cartilagem e os poros mais exteriores do corpo no acabaram de se formar), simplesmente
assassina o Michael Drucker mortalmente ferido. A cena interessante: o mortalmente
ferido Drucker, que j era um clone (lembra que ele morrera no atentado no chal? Pois
ele tambm j tinha morrido antes, de cncer) ativara o clone e ainda assim ele fica
realmente surpreso quando o clone simplesmente pega uma arma de cima da mesa e o mata.
Enquanto isso Gibson est lidando com algum dos viles num corredor cheio de clones
prontos para serem ativados boiando em suas cmaras de suspenso, todos em branco,
esperando apenas o DNA de um doador e uma cpia do crebro atravs de uma leitura de
retina - sim, eu no estou brincando - para se tornarem aquele ser-humano com as memrias
at o exato momento do digitalizao (retinal scan).
O clone de Drucker obviamente no sobrevive e Gibson 1 e 2 destroem toda a
operao de clonagem humana. Gibson 2, o clone (eles sabem qual o clone ou no porque
todos os clones tem marcas na parte interna da plpebra que contam quantas vezes aquele
indivduo j foi clonado - sim, novamente, eu no estou brincando: alguns dos capangas
tem 4 ou 5 marcas), decide ir para a distante Argentina e aceita deixar a famlia que ele
sabe ser sua com Gibson 1, o original. Ele vai tentar viver uma outra vida.
 O filme anedtico, no apenas pelo exagero e inexplicabilidade da sua
especulao acerca da tecnologia e da sociedade futura, mas tambm pelas atuao no
muito convincentes dos atores e por todo o arco narrativo que surge quando Gibson
descobre, que o cachorro da casa, Oliver, morreu. Tendo filhos pequenos, ele e a esposa
discutem substituir Oliver por um clone, para que assim a morte seja imperceptvel para
as crianas. Ali comea o questionamento do eu-Gibson sobre a natureza e as consequncias
da clonagem. O Gibson-1 se sente compelido a obedecer a natureza, dar a lio
imprescindvel de vida sobre a morte aos filhos e talvez adquirir um novo cachorro. O
Gibson-2, insuspeito, claro, de que um clone, decide clonar Oliver.
Entretanto, a anedota nos serve exatamente para essa pergunta: qual o registro
desse eu-cpia? No um eu-para-o-mundo, como seria o ser no espao e na ao pblica ou
coletiva. No um eu-com-os-outros. Um simples compilador de arquivos DOS j no
permitia dois arquivos com o mesmo nome. Ele forava o usurio a nomear Arquivo" e a
cpia qualquer outra coisa, nem que fosse Arquivo-cpia (como costume os sistemas
operacionais da Apple nomearem hoje as cpias como Arquivo(copy) ou Aquivo(2)). No
existindo mais o original, o eu-corpo, segue o eu-cpia, que eu-eletrnico, sendo eu-
mesmo? No ouvir, apenas a ttulo de exemplo, ocorre [] uma espcie de automatismo do
trabalho do lgos sobre a virtude, sobre a alma; [automatismo] que ao mesmo tempo
devido existncia das virtudes e natureza, propriedade do lgos
verdadeiro (Foucault, HdoS, p.300). O lado passivo de ouvir.
O que entra nem sempre decidido. possvel continuar construindo memrias, at
mesmo no seu sentido mais lato de mnese, no seu sentido de estar sendo sempre movido por
algo exterior, de ser algo que realmente compartilhado e construdo no ser-junto e no
apenas na gravao, na recordao. Qual a medida dessa cpia? Esse eu-cpia pode ser
capaz de mudar a si mesmo, como se muda um programa de computador, reformulando as
sequncias alfanumricas que constituem os vrios tipos de cdigos, e poderia ela assim,
acessar toda a nossa memria? Ou, melhor, a memria do eu que est sendo copiado? O eu-
cpia seria um hiper-eu, e no no sentido apenas de simulao (afora ao fato de que no
caso em mos o eu-cpia sempre ser apenas um cidado de San Junipero, o que quer que
isso queira dizer, enquanto que um visitante tambm um cidado da sociedade em geral),
mas no sentido literal de uma totalidade. Ou o mais prximo que a interface capaz de
copiar possa chegar de uma totalidade que jamais pode ser exatamente circunscrita.
Ou, ento, esse eu-cpia difernete. No, ao invs de mais, naquele primeiro
sentido que salta aos olhos quando se l hiper, menos, ou menor, mas diferente.
Necessariamente, portanto, um outro-eu. Um eu-mesmo objetivamente como um outro. Um
outro-eu.
Anedoticamente, a cpia de um personagem de fico, especialmente cientfica,
bastante comum - The Twilight Zone, Star Trek, romances como Solaris, de Stanislaw Lem,
entre tantos outros compem uma lista de vrios approaches ao campo da duplicao de si.
A pergunta aqui diferente; duplicao de si seria uma matria na qual circunscrever os
episdios White Christmas e certamente The Entire History of You. Quem esse eu-que-
perdura?
Teologicamente vejo-me forado a comentar: imagine sua alma, em qualquer depois da
vida que voc quiser acreditar, vendo a si mesmo, ou, a esse eu-cpia, seguindo com sua
vida em San Junipero? Vivendo por centenas de anos, passando por upgrades, revoltas,
lutas por direitos, quem sabe at o direito de, de alguma forma, computadorizadamente se
reproduzir ou voltar a condio fsica plena (corpos artificiais, robtica avanada,
bioengenharia, etc.). Encontrar um jeito de acessar o seu eu-objetivo, reorganizar e ao
mesmo tempo readaptar o que agora um cdigo, com o cdigo de um outro-eu-cpia,
criando-se assim um ser original, entretanto nascido de cpias. Um verdadeiro QUE SE
ORIGINA AUTENTICAMENTE DA CPIA. Ou simplesmente optando por deixar-se San Junipero da
mesma maneira que se entrou: uma cuba gesta um novo corpo e voc faz seu download,
voltando a ser um ser humano de carne e osso. UM NOVO ORIGINAL? A CPIA DA CPIA DA CPIA
e voltamos ao original? Voltamos a um original.
Uma sociedade em circuito: da carne mquina e de volta carne? Ou, melhor: uma
sociedade em circuito - como Orwell jamais previu que ns fossemos lojas de eletrnicos
para munir nosso dia a dia de cmeras facilmente acessveis pelos mais variados grupos de
pessoas, incluindo corporaes e os Estados, acho que os Wachowskis tambm falharam em
antecipar que migraramos para a Matrix por vontade prpria, com planos de pagamento,
parcelamentos e sempre buscando novos upgrades.
Seria como adquirir um apartamento condominiado em Nova Iorque, com pesquisas na
sua vida privada, entrevistas, vistorias, etc.? Comisses julgando quantos por cento
tero acesso a San Junipero Plus, ou San Junipero Heroes, onde voc pode ter superpoderes
e enfrentar construtos de inteligncia artificial no primeiro verdadeiramente imersivo
jogo de RPG, que pode levar uma vida inteira! Ser que existiro votaes para excluir de
alguma situao inusitada algum membro inusitado de um grupo inusitado de pessoas
escolhidas inusitadamente?
Comida, moradia, alimentao, deslocamento. A totalidade material da condio
humana resumida a energia eltrica e supercondutores. Movimento de eltrons e arranjo
apropriado de tomos.
Ser que eventualmente migraramos todos, deixando zanges automatizados capazes
de serem controlados de dentro e preparados para a manuteno e expanso das torres
refrigeradas que armazenaram ento nosso mundo inteiro (no. Nosso mundo-cpia) em
miniatura.
Mas miniatura em que perspectiva?
Na cidade em que cresci h um pequeno parque chamado Mini-Mundo, que inclusive
inspirou (acho) o ttulo do livro de um grande amigo. Tratava-se de uma coleo de
reprodues de cidades e moradas e habitats e construes humanas, mas numa escala
infinitamente pequena. Um adulto seria menor que a tampa de uma caneca esferogrfica.
Tudo no mais nfimo detalhe. Das expresses faciais cuidadosamente esculpidas e pintadas
at o funcionamento do maquinrio de trens e a arquitetura de pequenas vilas italianas e
alems (eu cresci numa zona de colonizao talo-germnica).
A cada ano tudo parecia menor e eu mais um gigante frente a tudo aquilo.
Como devemos medir a miniaturizao?
Devemos medir a miniaturizao?
Entre os astronautas muito conhecido o termo overview effect (que se traduziria
em portugus pelo lastimvel efeito de viso geral). O termo faz referncia a um tema
frequente na filosofia dos Antigos entre os sculos III a.C. e IV d.C: o ver as coisas de
cima. Claro que, h 400 km de distncia (ou at mesmo os mdicos 62 km necessrios para
se atingir a linha de Karman), as elocubraes de Sneca, Epicuro e outros contemporneos
tornam-se surpreendentemente objetivas e literais. Hoje, em certo sentido, aplicativos ou
sites como o Google Earth j proporcionam largamente uma experincia mediada (ainda que
muito esclarecedora) que se assemelha. Os drones aproximam ainda melhor. Aquele literal
helicptero de controle remoto que voc (se tem a mesma idade que eu, um pouco a mais ou
um pouco a menos) sempre sonhou durante a infncia. Porm, no se tem presencialidade.
Ainda que o drone tenha cmera, no se est de fato l com seu prprio corpo. No a
presena no globo terrestre, mas a avassaladora presena fora dele. No vcuo, o vacuum, a
falta de, a vacncia, o desocupado. Agora ocupado pelo astronauta atravs de alguns
centmetros de metal e plstico, preservado ali pela mais meticulosa imitao da
superfcie terrestre, controlada, hoje e sempre, pelos mais avanados mtodos
computadorizados. Navegao: me da bssola e do astrolbio. Navegao espacial: me do
microcomputador e dos sensores. No consigo evitar de pensar que o astronauta tambm
nunca realmente est no espao, excludas as gloriosas (desculpa, no esconderei nunca
minha inveja) EVAs ou extra-vehicle activity (atividades extra-veiculares), quando
literalmente cada ser humano est separado do completo nada do espao (tudo bem, tudo
bem, j sabemos que no nada) por uma roupa de poucos centmetros e um cabo que o
prende estao ou ao veculo no qual est.
Seria San Junipero to transparente como aquelas fotos em qualidades imensas
produzidas desde a Estao Espacial Internacional? Ou seria, igualmente, to opaca sobre
as nuances que compe essa paisagem to abismalmente esttica que o globo que gira em
volta de si mesmo a 48 metros por segundo e 30 km/s ao redor do sol.
A paradisaca San Junipero , estranhamente, aversa metfora da navegao
espacial. Nem nosso corpo se mantm. Nudez que certamente deixaria at aqueles mesmos
antigos, de Plato a Sneca, verdadeiramente enrubescidos. A cambiante San Junipero
tambm, paradoxalmente, muito familiar ideia e aos sentimentos mais comuns associados a
comunalidades e sociabilidades de todas as vertentes que poderamos ser colocadas sob o
termo-guarda-chuva de utopia. Especialmente se pensarmos nas iniciativas histricas em
prol dessas mesmas comunalidades e sociabilidades quando nem artifcios hierrquicos e
nem necessidades laborais interviram na constituio (ainda que abstrata) e aplicao
desses princpios. Que tipo de movimentos populares podem surgir e insurgirem-se de
dentro de San Junipero? Que tipos de movimentos sociais so passveis de se efetivarem em
ideias e prticas visivelmente arraigadas quando determinadas e determinantes (para no
dizer mesmo as primeiras) condies e necessidades bsicas humanas esto pelo menos
imediatamente sanadas?
Tomando-se Hannah Arendt um pouco literalmente: Homem no s aquele que fala,
aquele ser poltico, aquele ser que pensa e pensa a si mesmo, ele igualmente aquele que
necessita comer e defecar, dormir e descansar, infundido de necessidades libidinais.
Assim, o Homem tambm aquele que labora e cuida de si mesmo (ainda que seja um pomposo
real cuidado em cada aspecto da sua vida por uma criadagem extremamente dedicada e
passiva; o pomposo sempre precisa se deixar empomponzar).
 O eu-cpia pode fazer essa afirmao sobre si mesmo? Sua manuteno eletrnica se
d de fora. Se San Junipero , no mais laico e mais cotidiano comentrio ou descrio
possvel, um programa de computador e seus usurios, especialmente os permanentes, so
cpias de seres humanos, de eus, que existiam mas que no existem mais (no se fala no
episdio sobre especificidades do tipo possvel se copiar integralmente para San
Junipero e seguir vivendo" ou "a cpia uma forma de assassinato? Que quer dizer, "s
morrendo que uma cpia integral pode ser feita? Voltaremos a isso, mas importante
demarcar desde j que a ideia de que s morrendo pode-se fazer uma cpia integral,
permanente e durvel de uma pessoa pode obscurecer e em muito qualquer provocao feita
sobre eu-mesmo e eu-cpia, permitindo que se levante uma mscara: como um acabou, ele
deve necessariamente perdurar no outro, deixando escapar que outros artigos possam ser
articulados nesse encontro de eus", como, por exemplo, perdurar por outro, atravs de
outro, pelo outro e at mesmo com outro). Essas cpias existem em determinados
servidores (theres no cloud, its just someone elses computer) e algum ou algo precisa
fazer a manuteno desses servidores, afinal, nada escapa entropia: mesmo os mais
modernos supercondutores, computadores, equipamentos, sistemas de manuteno atmosfrica,
etc., no escapam de se desgastarem ou serem desgastados. Algum deve colocar leo e
eventualmente substituir as engrenagens dessa mquina de homens.
Estaramos ento falando de uma diviso social? Viveramos finalmente na forma
literal os vivos para os mortos como tantas comunidades humanas quiseram inculcar atravs
de suas formulaes morais, sejam elas laicas ou sobrenaturais? Seria San Junipero a
pirmide destinada a cada Fara de si mesmo?

A Morbidade da Televiso (The Death-Age of Television)

Que a TV tenha constante e metodicamente exaurido os modos narrativos literrios

do romance em seu sem-nmero de formatos no apenas uma constatao bvia, afinal o
rdio e o cinema percorreram e ainda percorrem esses mesmos caminhos. O que no to
bvio conectar os modos narrativos apropriados pela TV como um encadeamento temtico.
De forma alguma propomos uma teleologia da televiso. Longe de ns. Terreno
pantanoso demais. Assumir a ideia de que podemos constituir uma ideia ainda que muito
geral sobre os usos da TV intil. Mas se sem esquecer as condies, contextos e
programas de produo e consumo da televiso no ltimo meio sculo ultrapassarmos, de
certo, esses dois campos - produtores e consumidores - atingiremos por uma outra via o
campo que investiga o modo como o modo de vida se organiza e organizado pelos modos de
narrar o mundo. Se o mundo-em-si do real' -nos to absolutamente externo e inacessvel
como o vcuo, -nos permite ter impresses dele.
Entre vast wasteland e a mirror put by society to society, duas definies
praticamente apcrifas desse meio de comunicao, do sinais do esquecimento, entre
outras tantas caractersticas, do encadeamento lgico. A televiso no um meio de
comunicao fora do sentido estrito tcnico-cientfico: ela sempre um ambiente. A
emissora, os produtores, os pblicos: todas as investigaes contemporneas, srias e
devidamente embasadas denotam essa verdade que essa altura j deveria ser plenamente
auto-evidente. O exemplo mais privilegiado em fins de 2016 e incios de 2017 deve ser o
servio de streaming Netflix. No h quem no tenha se confrontado com o servio
personalizado: todo o encadeamento produtivo, legal, criativo, etc. que constitui-se por
detrs de um sistema de distribuio audiovisual encapsulado na personificao. Vocs
j viram a srie nova do Netflix?
Mas ele a situao-limite: imensos monlitos, as emissoras norte-americanas nos
anos 1960 eram percursoras inclusive do que hoje no jargo tcnico das agncias de
publicidade tratamento ou identidade de marca. Quando no incio dos 1960 a emissora CBS
muito literalmente demitiu Rod Serling de sua prpria srie de TV, The Twilight Zone, a
qual era o criador, produtor executivo e roteirista-chefe, a justificativa dos altos
escales era que a srie no mais condizia com a identidade e a imagem da CBS (Carol
Serling, buscar citao). Claro que na verdade a demisso, que estranhamente no incorreu
no cancelamento da srie e nem mesmo na remoo do nome de Serling das posies de
roteirista-chefe ou produtor executivo, era baseada em picuinhas e temores oriundos dos
anunciantes (um deles, vendia fsforos e ficara horrorizado que nos futuros de Serling as
pessoas acendem seus cigarros com isqueiros!). Marc Scott Zicree menciona outros tantos
rumores. Aqui TTZ serve-ns como segunda situao-limite: a qualidade inegvel da srie,
seu sucesso e indescritvel influncia na cultura popular ocidental, mesmo na poca em
que fora produzida, no justificava seu no-pertencimento ao thos televisivo e cultural.
Em outras palavras, TTZ no era um elo lgico (ainda) do encadeamento narrativo que a
televiso enquanto fenmeno cultural total precisava no momento.
 Bonanza fora o campeo nos anos 1964-1965 de audincia segunda a Nielsen Media
Research. Nos anos anteriores? Beverly Hillbillies. Um pouco antes? Gunsmoke. O Velho
Oeste (a traduo mais completamente desconexa e absurda j perpetrada do ingls para o
portugus em termos mnimos de lgica!), o Western, o desbravamento. Ainda antes, o
programa mais assistido (e um dos mais consistentemente assistidos ao longo da histria
da televiso) era I Love Lucy.
O encadeamento da narrativa geral da televiso era radicalmente outro. Todos
estavam, claro, imensamente preocupados com os vermelhos infiltrados, com os perigos da
morte nuclear, de uma Terceira Guerra Mundial, das transformaes scio-polticas. As
emissoras e os anunciantes tambm estavam imensamente preocupados com isso e a fora com
que o lobby poltico opera nos corredores de Washington durante essa poca (incertamente
definida entre o meio dos anos 1950, o incio do fim do boom ps-guera, e certamente
definido pelo final dos anos 1960 e os levantes estudantis e populares) atesta isso
amplamente. De fato, alguns dos melhores dramas e intrigas polticas modernas no cinema e
na literatura se originam dessa ou por causa dessa era. O niilismo poltico, a
desistncia frente ao abismo, tambm.
Aliens were all good and well as long they were stand-ins for hellish communists!
Essa a lio histrica que faliu TTZ, Outer Limits e outras tentativas de
entrada dos gneros do estranhamento cognitivo (Suvin) na televiso. Ela devia reafirmar
que estamos corretos (aqui, ns sendo os americanos, os ocidentais, os democratas, os
desbravadores, os capitalistas), apresentar modelos especficos de moral e justia e,
mais do que isso, belissimamente encerrar suas histrias com a dramtica tristeza da
existncia individual ou com um bonito lao tambm chamado final feliz. O prprio Serling
sabia muito bem disso: toda sua carreira tinha sido marcada at ento por filmes e peas
para a TV (no esqueamos que nos anos 1950 ainda havia teatro ao vivo televisionado) que
lhe valeram pelo menos metade dos Emmys que ganhou.
O encadeamento, Rod, era outro. Dos xerifes do Velho Oeste iramos para os
detetives e policiais das cidades superlotadas ( engraado rever a literatura da poca,
dos anos 1960 e 1970 onde crticos desesperam-se pela superlotao das cidades; hindsight
is always 20/20). Se a TV ia ser ensinar a viver, ah, como todas as tradies de tcnicas
e cuidados de si e dos outros, desde pelo menos trs sculos antes de Cristo, ela tambm
ser ensinar a morrer. Se Lucy comicamente salvaria-nos de nossas vidas igualmente
patticas e desastradas ao nos ensinar como amar, como respeitar as diferenas, como rir
e zombar sem ser ofensivo e derrisrio (Lucille Ball e seu marido diegtico e real, Desi
Arnaz, nunca esconderam que jamais cederiam comdia preconceituosa, racista, ablesta
ou de gnero - o que, claro, no impede Lucy de zombar do sotaque cubano de Arnaz e nem
os papis de gnero estarem muito bem estabelecidos), haveria que algum tambm ensinar-
nos como morrer. Afinal, ainda que achemos que a mais totalitria mensagem emite um edito
de trabalhe para o Estado at morrer, se a vida se tornou programtica, h que existir
um programa para a morte tambm.
Poderia-se, como articulum, dizer que a televiso, essa entidade enigmaticamente
plural que se fazia ever so present and invasive, determinaria que seu encadeamento
durasse 10 anos. E por 10 anos os shows mais assistidos foram esses. Mas inevitavelmente,
como tudo, os pbicos tambm mudariam (por causa, a despeito da televiso ou uma
combinao de ambos?). As perfeitas e hermticas vidas privadas de Lucy, os
incorruptveis caadores de irredimveis do Velho Oeste, no eram mais o suficiente. A
fronteira a ser desbravada, ainda que o Homem cravasse seu falo em outro orbe (outra das
mais assistidas transmisses de TV da Histria), ainda era a do imediatamente pblico e
privado.
A vida dos vizinhos sempre mais interessante que as peripcias da novela, eu
lembro de uma vizinha minha dizer. Midiaticamente talvez nada balize melhor o comeo
dessa virada, uma que fora, devemos ressaltar caso isso no tenha ficado abundantemente
claro, por muito negada e ignorada pela prpria fora interna monoltica das emissoras,
seja o assassinato de Catherine Susan Kitty" Genovese, em maro de 1964, no bairro do
Queens, em Nova Iorque. Morta facadas no ptio central de um conjunto habitacional, os
vizinhos de Genovese no apenas no ajudaram, mas fecharam suas janelas (o New York Times
na poca afirmava que quase 40 pessoas teriam testemunhado o assassinado e no ajudado
nem ligaram para a polcia). Ou assim diz a lenda. Anos depois o irmo de Genovese viria
a pblico dizer que a polcia fora chamada, diversas vezes, e que simplesmente decidiu
no aparecer pois, segundo ele, devia se tratar de uma disputa domstica* .
Kitty fora esfaqueada mais de uma dezena de vezes e, antes de morrer, foi
estuprada. Winston Moseley acabou preso quatro anos depois e entre muitas peripcias -

* http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3266599/Brother-Kitty-Genovese-28-year-old-brutally-raped-
stabbed-death-New-York-City-1964-says-screams-help-NOT-ignored-case-poster-crime-bystander-
apathy.html
que envolvem fugir da custdia policial em 64, participar dos protestos prisionais na
priso de Attica, em 1971, e se formar em Artes e Sociologia enquanto preso - acabou
morrendo na priso em maro de 2016, depois de muitos pedidos de liberdade condicional.
Genovese a terceira situao-limite: TTZ e sua relao com a emissora, Netflix e
sua revolucionria plataforma que compatibiliza uma mundializao da televiso e ao mesmo
tempo cuts off the middleman if statistics e Genovese e a absoluta trivialidade do abuso
de gnero (Moseley admitiu que seu motivo para o ataque fora matar e estuprar uma
mulher ou, because I felt like killing a woman), a banalidade do mal ignorado com
janelas fechadas ou pela inrcia da polcia que no costumava meter sua colher no
relacionamento dos outros.
Ao fim da era de Ouro (ouro-dos-tolos, a meu ver), a televiso embarcaria numa
viagem de mais de 40 anos dentro do gnero da aventura. A bandeira dessa nova era teria
que ser o arqutipo de Sherlock Holmes se, ele mesmo, no fosse apenas o Scrates de
Conan Doyle.
A era que viria era a do detetive extico e da morbidade - est enquanto no
apenas o modo substantivo do mrbido, mas como mrbida idade; a death-age.

-
A verdadeira mudana

Impetrar aos avanos tcnico-cientficos e ao desenvolvimento econmico acelerado pelos

novos mercados internacionais de commodities e investimentos financeiros (portfolios,
trusts, bancos e at Ponzi schemes) como causa das transformaes scio-histricas
contemporneas no de maneira alguma leviano. uma daquelas poucas causalidades
histricas que beira o banal: muito difcil contrariar a base desse argumento, de que o
capitalismo e a cincia, unidos, ergueram o humanidade.

Afinal, qualquer leitura sria sobre estatsticas bem fundamentadas sobre

condies, qualidade e expectativa de vida em absolutamente todo o planeta se conclui na
averiguao de que houve avano. Menos natimortos, menos recm-nascidos mortos, mais
alfabetizados. Certos pases beiram agora em meados dos 2010s em atingir o dobro da
expectativa de vida e a despeito das inegveis crises administrativas que envolvem os
sistemas de sade (universais) europeus e sua herana que se tornou maldita do Welfare
State assim como os privados (EUA, especialmente) e a falncia verdadeiramente moral de a
tragdia da morte, quando subvertida pela cincia mdica, incorre na falncia literal (de
certo, o mesmo poderia ser argumentado acerca dos sistemas de ensino).
Apenas que um homem vivo afundado em dvidas ou que para ser mantido
operacionalmente vivo precisa de apoio contnuo da comunidade scio-econmica da qual faz
parte ainda so, no seu sentido mais pervasivo, vivos. No ano de 2016 meu av materno
faleceu aos 82 anos. Fumante inveterado durante a juventude, nunca foi atleta e ainda
sobreviveu ao cncer no intestino (que jamais o impediu de comer o que quisesse). No
funeral dele havia uma foto grande, restaurado dele na companhia de seu pai, meu bisav,
que nunca cheguei a conhecer. Ele morrera com 62 de idade. A semelhana entre os dois j
me era conhecida, com fotos do bisav quando nos seus 30 anos espalhadas pela casa de meu
av, assim como fotos do meu av com a mesma idade. A vertigem emocional do funeral no
me impediu de perceber: meu bisav, que morreu aos 62, h mais de 35 anos atrs, era
exatamente igual ao meu av deitado pacfico em seu caixo. Algum de fora do contexto
das relaes familiares e imaginando que ambos habitaram com a mesma idade o mesmo espao
certamente afirmaria que a diferena de idades entre eles no poderia ser maior que 5
anos, se tanto.
Alm disso, meu bisav colecionava uma ficha mdica to se no mais longa que a do
meu av; nada to grave quanto um cncer, mas problemas crnicos pela vida inteira
(inclusive alguns herdados por este que lhes escreve), doenas hoje em dia erradicadas
(se os anti-vaxxers norte-americanos permitirem) como sarampo e que, tambm hoje sabemos,
deixam sequelas.
Ento fui olhar fotos do meu av paterno, que faleceu h alguns anos com tambm
prximo dos 80 anos. Ele talvez no seja um caso muito exemplar, porque aos 75 ainda
cuidava das poucas cabeas de gado, galinheiro, chiqueiro e ovelhas que possua em sua
propriedade na cidade serrana de Canela, no interior do Rio Grande do Sul. Alis, lembro-
me claramente de nem 3 anos antes de sua morte ele estava colocando cercas de arame
farpado, envoltas em colunas de madeira pesadssimas que ele manejava com uma facilidade
inigualvel.
Fui olhar fotos desse meu av quando ele tinha os 60 anos que meu pai est para
fazer ao final de 2016. Aos 60 anos o meu av seguia parecendo o pai do meu, s que do
meu pai aos 60 anos. Meu av no tinha um fio de cabelo que no fosse branco e nem um
canto do rosto sem as marcas indelveis da deteriorao da pele. Meu pai, comparando sua
fotos, apenas ficou com o cabelo mais branco. Ele ainda tem a mesma aparncia fsica (um
kgs a mais, claro, uma cara mais de cansao tambm) que ele tinha h 15 anos.

-
sci-fisplaining inside science fiction

a FC audiovisual e comercial, qualquer comentarista concordaria, um sanduche de

metforas. uma pilha composta por camada superiores e inferiores intercambiveis (falamos
aqui de um sanduche de po de forma), recheadas por diversos recheios, complementados
por condimentos, eles tambm, diversos e intercambiveis (ou, melhor, intercombinveis.
Afinal, nem todo mundo gosta de maionese, mostarda, ketchup).
o po branco fatiado o estranhamento cognitivo. Ele fecha essa construo:
precisa ser manuseado; precisa acobertar, na verdade, o que est por baixo. insulate it.
No por isso que o conde ou duque ou lorde Sandwich colocou as fatias de carne entre os
pedaos de po? Para que suas mos no se engordurassem e, principalmente, no
engordurassem suas cartas?
o recheio, ah!, esse fica a cargo da funo da intriga narrativa. Se estiverem
entre tiros de feisers, plugados em realidades virtuais ou em clubes de sexo para
sobreviventes de acidentes de carro, duas pessoas apaixonadamente se beijando sero um
romance (no no sentido do livro, if you know what I mean).
aos condimentos serviria melhor um exemplo: eles so os efeitos. Absolutamente sem
valor alimentar e igualmente absolutamente saborosos. as propagandas da Globo nos anos 90
anunciavam filmes como Jurassic Park ou qualquer outra FC da moda como um show de
efeitos especiais. No. Mais que efeitos, eles so prefeitos. Como uma mostarda forte,
no interessa como voc comer, o pungente estar l. Voc sequer precisa estar atento a
ele.
a srie Star Trek, falando dela absolutamente no geral mas, mais especificamente,
sobre suas reencarnaes desde o final dos anos 80, so um excelente exemplo. o po a
prpria realidade que ser povoada pelos personagens. um futuro, centenas de anos no
futuro, uma viso da humanidade, semi-utpica? no. so as espao-naves e as centenas de
raas aliengenas e os mistrios do universo. esse o estranhamento: o deslocamento. ele
isola todos os outros componentes da srie. no matter what happens or to whom, its in
space.
o reconhecimento cognitivo, que em ST is practically a given, o recheio. a
matria ou crtica de jornal chamaria de fator humano. o que , sempre, uma tautologia.
so os relacionamentos interpessoais. a trama.

estranhamente, a FC contm a si mesma. por isso a comparao com os pes de forma

fatiados de um bom e simples sanduche. seus recheios, entretanto, ao serem devorados e
dependendo de suas caractersticas, no ficam presos. Se no segurarmos o sanduche
corretamente, as folhas de alface picada, as fatias de salame, at as gotas dos
condimentos vazam. Pingam no nosso colo.
estranhamente, de novo, a FC contm a si mesmo ao narrar-se e ser narrada: ela
precisa dentro de sua intriga explicar. explicar, explicar, explicar. explicar os
fundamentos de sua fictional science, mas ela precisa explicar a si mesma. o leitor, a
audincia, no precisa ser elucidada sobre como opera uma nave intergaltica. no. ela
precisa entender the science fictional in the science fiction. Por que existem naves?
Essa uma pergunta muito mais fundamental. Uma que nem percebemos que fazemos at a ns
mesmos quando assistimos Luke Skywalker destruir a Estrela da Morte. Por que esses
personagens/ncleos tem esse tipo de interao com outros personagens/ncleos? a
pergunta da intriga. E a intriga da FC necessariamente diferente daquela que
histrica e peculiarmente familiar e estranha quela que se configura nos modos
ficcionais (e at mticos; tomando-se aqui que o leitor no seja como eu e ache que
necessrio em determinado momento se confrontar diretamente com o mito como fico,
saindo detrs do decoro atesta para com os crentes e das justificativas antropolgicas
que fundamentam o mito como realidade porque seus crentes - nunca sabemos quantos nem
quem verdadeiramente - acreditam que realidade).
abramos mo dos aliengenas, robs e mutantes. peguemos a obra Os
despossudos (The Dispossessed), de Ursula K. Le Guin.

2.
Force of Nature episode of TNG:
_____________________
a coabitao de geraes

no sculo XIX, a expectativa global de vida para os homens era 40 anos e para as mulheres
42. os dados, claro, so absolutamente restritos aos pases europeus e a Amrica do
Norte. melhor: os dados relativamente confiveis.
em 2015 a WHO concluiu* que a mdia global de expectativa de vida era de 71.4 anos. a j
com dados demogrficos milimetricamente disponveis.
30 anos em dois sculos. os culpados? inmeros e bvios demais para serem listados.

certamente a primeira vez na histria geral (natural e Histrica) do planeta que

qualquer animal ocupa o planeta com tamanho espectro de geraes coabitando. meu av
faleceu aos 83 anos. ele estava trabalhando, numa quarta-feira, passou mal pelo final da
tarde, foi ao hospital e foi internado. no sbado faleceu. no seu funeral, ao lado de seu
caixo, uma foto dele jovem com o seu pai, meu bisav. um parente disse que a foto fora
tirada alguns meses antes do meu bisav falecer aos 69 anos. Ele parecia na foto mais
velho do que meu av dentro de seu caixo.

a crise previdenciria mundial no apenas consequncia, mas centralmente SUBTERFGIO

dessa outra crise. Vive-se cada vez mais e cada vez melhor. A interminvel guerra mundial
que assola pases africanos e rabes no afeta em nada os dados gerais de uma humanidade
global: os quase 300 mil mortos desde 11/09/2001, no Iraque e em todos aqueles pases,
no afeta em nada a realidade globalizada de que as doenas so cada dia menos
problemticas, no sentido de serem problemas sem soluo, e a industrializao da
alimentao, ainda que tenha criado seus prprios e graves problemas, resolveu
massivamente aqueles outros problemas que a Histria do Homem trazia consigo desde a
antiguidade. Escorbuto, desnutrio, deficincias vitamnicas graves: nem se ouve mais
falar disso nos centros urbanos. Plio, sarampo, caxumba, varola, tuberculose, at mesmo
os nveis de infeco pela doena do sc. XX, o HIV, all have halted.

_____________________
o cancelamento de Star Trek original

se a influncia de ST absolutamente inegvel, como atesta qualquer entrevista com algum

engenheiro ou astronauta da NASA ou com Martin Cooper, o inventor do celular que no se
poupa de admitir que sua ideia de um telefone mvel era amplamente escorada nos
comunicadores da srie, seu cancelamento deveria receber o mesmo tratamento.

a criao e apresentao de um bem cultural no pode ser analisada sem que

contextualmente se coloque igualmente quando da audincia tirado esse bem. nessa era de
ampla disponibilidade quase impossvel pensar coerentemente o que uma srie
desaparecer por quase uma dcada e a ressurgir via syndication. outra coisa que no mundo
absolutamente plural de hoje e com exigncias cada vez mais plurais em relao aos bens
culturais de consumo e sua inerente pluralidade - tnica, cultural, etc. - tentar
imaginar as razes que levariam executivos de televiso a cancelar algo to horizontal e
profundamente influente na cultura ocidental.

ainda assim, foi. em 69, com apenas 3 das 5 temporadas planejadas ( in its five year
mission), a srie cancelada e segue-se um hiato de dez anos, at quando 79 a franquia
retorna com o primeiro e no muito bem sucedido filme. da ento parece que o mundo
estaria pronto. quanto se v isso dito: depois da sequncia de filmes Roddenberry
engata The Next Generation e at o final da dcada de 2000 ST povoar as telas domsticas
e comerciais, com mais uma boa meia dzia de filmes que logo seriam substitudos por
verses renovadas dirigidas por JJ Abrahms, comeando em 2009 e seguindo at 2016, com
Justin Li dirigindo a terceira continuao. e claro com ainda mais 3 sries derivadas de
TNG: Deep Sapce Nine, Voyager e Enterprise. no mesmo ano, Netflix e CBS anunciam
Discovery. Nova srie da franquia, executada por essa parceria e com previso de estria
para 2017.

o que nos diz ento, menos a influncia da srie e seus temas e crticas, to
profundamente bem tratados por uma verdadeira legio de acadmicos e crticos sociais, e
mais o cancelamento dessa verdadeira fora cultural? O que nos diz o cancelamento de uma

* http://www.who.int/gho/mortality_burden_disease/life_tables/situation_trends/en/
srie ao final dos benditos anos 60, alis, apenas um ano aps o milagroso vero de 68, e
uma srie que muito abertamente tinha a pluralidade e a unio dos pontos de vistas,
raas, culturas sob o prisma de uma vida ps-capitalista?

a onde melhor se desenham as elocubraes contidas no as pessoas no estavam prontas

que geralmente acompanha as explicaes causais grosseiras para o cancelamento da srie.
deveras: um iowano branco, jovem e bonito beijando uma mulher negra Bantu??? um mestio
aliengena de sangue verde e com orelhas pontiagudas fazendo gestos hebreus??? essa
hindsight view cegante. estreia e cegante.

outros fatores scio-polticos bem menos, digamos, bvios me parecem mais diretamente
envolvidos a. mais perigosa do que a ideia de uma tripulao eficiente e multi-racial/
multi-cultural a de um mundo possvel ps-capitalista. tanto vemos que o abrao do
capital envolveu rapidamente todas aquelas raas parodiadas. massacrados cotidianamente
por racismo e violncia, as populaes negras dos EUA indubitavelmente receberam os
louros do capitalismo, ainda que pelo menos como validao de uma emergente contra-
cultura - diramos em especfico a musical. ainda assim, talvez em 50 anos nada se
compare emancipao incorporada pela famosa Tenente Uhura. talvez a eleio de Obama
pudesse ser aqui um marco, se ele no tivesse sido um presidente to absolutamente
previsvel e to frio quanto incluso de minorias e expanso imperialista.

O teste de Farpoint Station seria um que muito dificilmente a humanidade do sc. XXI
seria capaz de passar.

____________________
Science fiction music: from Daft Punk to Rios funk

While Daft Punk is overtly science fictional, Rios funk is surreptitiously. This
funk is specifically computer generated, just as the sounds of Daft Punk.

____________________
The political construction of worldviews: political world, scientific world, science
fiction world

Is it not the political the one or at least one of the main actors in the play of
creating fiction?

_____________________
Chunking e a compleo de lacunas

Juntamos para formar sentido, mas nem sempre esse juntar completamente
encadeado. Nem sempre achamos no mundo as partes; ento as inventamos ou
reaproveitamos.
______________________
A Straight Line from Lascaux to Instagram

Is there not a very linear (and procedural) connection between the millions of
pictures posted daily on Instagram (as an example, other social media could be counted
here - maybe Twitter and monasteries) and the ancient cave paintings? To suppose, as
Bataille in the cradle of humanity shows, that those paintings had immense worship
potential is, at least and begin with, impose a certain post-Greek/Roman/Medieval view in
the very heart of the first men (Ill use this term a lot, and maybe start explaining it
here: I refer to the pre and post-Cambrian settlements (be they more permanent or not) of
proper humans. Homo sapiens, just like us.
The Cave of the Castle (Cueva de el Castillo), is Spain, probably contain the
earliest (discovered so far) example of cave paintings.

Lines and more lines of red dots. Incomprehensible to us now, but even resembling
code. Lines with four, with three, with two dots, swaying through the walls for more than
40 thousand years and maybe, some scientists argue, made by proto-humans*.
More than their proper meaning, hidden from us by a curtain of 40 thousand veils,
one meaning is maintained: we were here.

* http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2159197/Cave-artwork-Spain-confirmed-oldest-
Europe-40-800-years-old-painted-Neanderthals.html
 In The Cave of the Hands, La Cueva de las Manos, in Argentina (said to probably
have been made by women* ), this message is even stronger. Cryptic handprints, like a
child in kindergarten would probably do by the hundreds, cover the walls of the cave. Not
be so McLuhanian, but is not the hand the human organ? The essential human organ? Does it
not contain the opposing thumb said to be the apogee of evolution?
We can avoid assuming, but can presume: they too may felt this way. In Batailles
Cradle of Humanity, the author shows and talks about many examples (especially in Mobile
Art) of an apparent taboo against the face. Ceramic dolls, human figures on walls and
planks: nothing with a face, and the capacity for the details of a face was already
there, as we can see in the intricacies of the very known Lascaux paintings.

So, no faces, but hands. Almost perfect animals and humans shown like shadows. Again,
Bataille considers that the hierarchy was man -> animal -> divinity (be either a god or
gods or nature itself sitting at the highest point). He remembers us that

* http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2451442/Earliest-artists-women-claim-researchers-
study-cave-paintings-reveal-majority-prints-female-hands.html
anthropologists, archaeologists, and such, have never reached a clear consensus about the
reasons for the paintings and two explanations ended up rivaled against each other: the
first, more in line with Levi-Straussian and structuralism reveal - they paint the ox or
bull as a homage, as a funeral, a proper burial for a creature that was hunted and eaten.
A second one, seemingly more methaphysical, as it seems like a form of ancient magic,
theorizes that the wall paintings are callings: when an ox is painted, the painter wished
through the painting that the invisible forces of chance (that long before the Age of
Reason have been thoroughly rationalized) would help him in the next days of hunt.

Such detailed animals that the human shown in Lascaux, dead under the ox it must have
been hunting, is commonly called Birdmand, as his/her body is human but with a head
that undeniably reminds us of a bird. What a wonder must be and, for me at least, it
still is, to watch that small animal gliding above everything.

But outside presumptions, assumptions, and especially such shallow semiotics, all this
paintings need not be interpreted in their signs or meanings: their message as posterity
is obvious. We were here, we existed, we lived.

Is it not that that social media, especially Instagram (our example at hand), does? In a
post-Age of the Mechanical reproduction way? Im here, I exist, I do things, I live.

Not very differently than the motif of such ancient caves, Instagrammers have a tendency
to post pictures of food and drinks (these almost took over Instagram, becoming a very
recognizable joke where you would sit at any given restaurant and watch and the waiter
delivers the plate to the table on your side and the person takes their cellphone and
carefully frames the plate of food, takes a picture and posts it on IG with captions such
as yummy followed by a list of hashtags - # - saying food, instafood, the type of food,
such as chinese food, followed by many other terms.

The line between Lascaux and IG is merely thinned by the algorithm: Lascaux, for example,
was discovered, by chance, by two boys chasing a dog. A persons IG account is, we could
say, thrown at you when using the app by the automatically generated suggestions based on
likes, based on friends, based on an infinity of measurable data about your own behavior.
Likes surfing? Here are hundreds of surfing themed accounts, accounts by famous or
everyday surfers.

As it is more than probable that in some way these caves were inhabited, the images too
were thrown at the humans that lived there.

And both are efforts (in this, examples will abound) of humanizing what is not properly
human. Plain walls, cold and empty: painted by the light of fire, the caves became proper
places. Built, not just there. The exchange of electrons, the tide we navigate and
control in order to transmit electronic information: just as plain, cold and empty, ones
and zeroes become a beautiful and in some sense immortalized Californian sunset (my
brother just moved to Palo Alto, and hes landscape posts on IG made me immediately think
of that example). Everyone, since a small collective of humans was probably the author
of the paintings in Lascaux, could see them. If they slept in the caves, as they go to
sleep and a bonfire dimly lights the walls. Everyone, in the sense that every and any
person with a computer or cellphone with internet access, can see my brothers view of
that moment* (lets not enter the pitfalls of photography, composition, etc., just now).

Although we must not stray too far away from, theoretically, what posterity means and,
pragmatically, from the fundamental differences of what might have been the society that
painted those wall and the society that now commercializes and recommercializes user
content as entertainment for other users. The piglet must not preoccupy itself with rent
or bills living in the farm; hes not the tenant, hes the wage. Or will, eventually, be.

Maybe a milking cow would be a less grim example. But you get the picture.

* Actually, they cant, because his account is protected. So everyone' really means the people he
accepted as his followers. Which, strangely, makes for, maybe, an even better example: only his
small collective can see his posts. And its pretty safe to say, due to material archaeological
evidence, that if the collective living in that cave in what today is called Montignac met other
humans they probably either mingled, becoming one set, or warred each other.
Thus we must also search for the paths that lead to behavior (as deep as the instinctual
or ritualized behavior and as superficially as everyday consumption and the unavoidable,
invading presence of advertisement and even design itself).

Gadamer affirms that historical consciousness is a properly modern phenomenon (actually,

set of phenomena). The main reason given by the philosopher is that only in modern times
we reached what he would not name - globalization - but that gave us enough material that
is kept and maintained, organized and distributed, as to make humanity very much aware
that it did not sprung from mud shaped by divinity neither did its specific kinship has
not formed itself or been formed ex nihil: they have stories that constitute a History. A
tale, be it factual (wait, didnt we just invalidated facts?) or almost fully mythical
and mystical, that explains the coming to be of a community or, if we take science as
simply a different and modifiable kind of tale, even the coming to be of mankind as a
type of creature that inhabit a kind of planet in a part of a galaxy that is part of
cluster and so on.

Personally, I tend to side with Jrn Rsen: this consciousness is simultaneous with
consciousness in itself. If we bridge metaphysics, in, as we said, denying that facts can
exist, all history, History or story is mimetic and fictional. The very uperceivable
nature of time (Einsteins more than ubiquitous time does not exist) serves here as
proof. In fact, exactly because we got to know this nature through sense-data and
intellect. Thus, consciousness.

I hate how useful and yet essentially false comparisons between brain and computers are,
but its not possible for a PC computer to operate without sense-data (the software
implanted in its material basis) and without the material basis being able to perform its
computing tasks (the exchanges of electrons). There might be a consciousness that does
not need or have software, but will it intellect, as a verb? It has been (in many forms
ad by many authors) conjectured that a purely intellectual consciousness could exist, but
what would it intellect with no sense-data?

A child sitting at a table is a good example too. The infant can move its arms, but
aimlessly, until something is put in front of him or her. Lets say wooden blocks. Now
the child can see, touch, bang against the table and here the sound the wood makes, and
so on. A childless table, filled with wooden blocks would, for lack of a better word,
just sit there.

Sense-data and intellect are the interacting poles that make for what we define as
consciousness (even though a satisfactory definition of this phenomenon has never been
reached either by philosophy or modern science - it we are allowed to speak the everyday
tongue and separate these things that are, undeniably, never really separated: philosophy
is the mantle that covers everything). When we first get burned we are informed very
painfully of an axiom: fire burns. Its an exothermic reaction that consumes its fuel and
oxygen that far surpasses the resistance of skin, thus destroying it, thus generating
pain. This is sense-data: perception. Through it we intellect: lets not do THAT again.

The same would be valid for pleasure experiences, but reversed, and for necessary
experiences, such as hunger or eliminating waste: I must do THIS again.

The again leads us to repetition and back to intellect. By mimesis we learn from our
bearers, lets say, the minimum, but its only by repetition that we master these minima
and only by repetition that we can, again, intellect over and over about the actions and
perceptions. One midday sun has not taught Eratosthenes in 180 b.C. that the Earth is
round and can be easily measured. Thousands of them lead to a specific one the enable the
duo intellect/sense-data to put together the light travels in a straight line and if
so, does it reach the Earth as it reaches a surface or a sphere?.

This detour (and, as I said and will say again) is not at all for naught. Sense-data and
intellect allowed the Lascaux painter to understand paint - a material that could be
applied onto a surface of any kind and would resist the humanly natural perception of the
passage of time. It allowed him or her to cheat what him or her perceived as time. 40
thousand years after the death of the painters of the Cave of the Castle the hand prints
are still there, maybe as clear as the day they were done. Geological coincidences have,
of course, preserved this ancient cave paintings from the faster entropic processes of
being directly and constantly exposed to light and changes in the atmosphere. But they
did persist for 40 centuries.
Many may have been forever lost by equivalent but contrary geological coincidences.

Given the presumption that no such disaster might happen, what is now called cloud
computing (which in simple terms is allocating software and hard data in servers,
dutifully protected and cared for, and accessing these through terminals, devices that
access these servers via the net and download just the necessary or needed data) pretty
much falls in the category of the beneficial geological coincidence. The site/software/
app Dropbox is a perfect example: every file is immediately uploaded to their servers
becoming, if the user so desires, undeletable* . Other services such as these have existed
for some time now. Virtual backups, space in another persons computer as it is
jokingly (and pretty literally) called.

In a very post-Age of Mechanical (now digital) Reproduction twist: doubly now will the
Lascaux caves survive. It would not be skittish to say millions (if not billions) of
reproductions of those paintings now exist. Thousands (if not millions) accessible
through a simple Google Image Search of the word Lascaux or the phrase cave
paintings. Secondly, modern archaeology will endeavor to artificially preserve and even
restore the paintings, making sure no geological coincidence is involved in their lasting
(this is already very real, with very limited access to the caves and, at least since the
1970s, with the requirement of full body protection gear so that the air we breath out
and the skin we naturally always flake does not become dust and influence the controlled
atmosphere of the caves - some deeper parts, Bataille remarks, are as sealed as a space
capsule, with temperature, humidity, etc., all thoroughly controlled so as to deny the
entropic processes that could destroy the drawings.

* Modern astrophysics has its share of non-beneficial coincidences to tell. Solar flares, magnetic
pole inversions, gravitational drift, or even your run of the mill asteroid could inevitably destroy
must if not all electronic data. Steps are being taken to protect the core of the internet from such
physical or electromagnetic disaster, but these would not, so far, protect the terminal nature of
todays networks. The devices would still be destroyed beyond repair by a magnetic storm generated
by a solar flare (never terrifying enough to remember that these are pretty common and basically
unpredictable).