#....so i guess my brain has decided to solve that by creating entirely new scenarios with imaginary people for me to get upset about

[theygender]

I've gotten so good at recognizing and shutting down PTSD flashbacks that my brain has just moved straight on to "make up a guy to get mad about." Got me out here having traumatic memories about events that did not and will not happen

[evolutionsvoid]

Before I had even started this trip, I already had the worry of getting lost. Driving for hours on end through places I had never even heard of, it seemed inevitable. Despite that, I had no other choice but to go. What life I had here was gone, and staying would only have me stewing in the rotten memories and people that plagued me. Though this opportunity was a weak one, it was my only shot out of here. So I packed up my meager things and drove off into the unknown. Best to take my chances out there, then remain in this prison a minute longer. My anxiety born from this journey drove me to prepare for every possible scenario. The biggest worry was getting lost on the way there, but with a mountain of maps, a GPS and a folder of addresses, numbers and contacts, I figured I would be safe. After all, once you get into the barren countryside of flat fields and endless dirt, all you had to do was pick a road in the right direction and drive. I needed to go west, so that was what I did. I drove on for hours, but it felt like I had hardly moved. What a strange feeling it was, to travel hundreds of miles and see absolutely nothing. This trip was supposed to be a transformation, a needed change for me to finally regain control of my life. Yet, I felt no joy or wonder. I guess I was expecting to encounter breathtaking landmarks and travel through strange new places, evidence that the world was bigger than my ignorant little hometown. Instead, I drove through a flattened world of grass, corn, dirt and the occasional pathetic tree. Not exactly the scenery that inspires awe. This repetitive land was probably the reason why things turned out this way, as it was impossible to get a bearing when everything looked the same. Hours had passed since I turned onto that empty road, and yet I failed to notice that things were not right. I ignored the fact that I hadn't seen a single street sign the entire time, or that there were no forks or splits to be found. To be fair, it was long into the night, so most of the blank landscape was smothered by the darkness. I just held onto the idea that I was almost to the next town, if you could all any of these places that. What little civilization I had seen was a sad collection of wore down store fronts, crumbling bars and ancient gas stations. They sat in clumps along these forgotten roads, sharing much with the greasy roadkill that was spattered on the asphalt. Pathetic as these places were, I still yearned for them as I drove down that endless road. Surely one had to be nearby, I just needed to go a few more miles. I followed this delusion for quite some time, pretending that the lack of signs or markers wasn't something to be concerned about. Eventually, I just had to give up. With the clock on my dash showing some obscenely late time, I knew I needed to pull over to collect my thoughts. Looking over my supplies, I found my GPS worthless and the maps just as useless. With no service or any indicators that could help me pinpoint my position, these intricate foldouts might has well have been blank. It was then that I realized that I wasn't lost, as it felt like it was something far worse. When one is stranded in a place they don't know, one of the biggest issues is the overwhelming amount of options. Be it the woods or some unknown city, you are faced with many directions and choices, but you have no clue where any of them lead. Do I go north or south? Do I take the parkway or the back roads? Which exit on the roundabout gets me going the right way? With all this, it is obvious why clueless people wind up going in circles. That was what I considered being "lost" was. This, was something quite different. I didn't have a ludicrous amount of options, rather, I only had two. Go forward or back. The problem was that both choices felt wrong. The path forward had no hope or potential, no signs that suggested anything was to be found up ahead. That choice led to an unknown future, but it seemed more enticing than turning back. Though I didn't know what lay ahead, I did know what was behind me: absolutely nothing. Turning around would mean driving a countless amount of hours until found out where civilization had stopped, but I had no clue where or when that was. I would just be retracing my steps through a known wasteland, losing both time and gas. In the end, the unknown path ahead seemed more comforting. Surely I was bound to run into something eventually, even if it was a rusty road sign or some hermit's shack. Though my mind was made up, I chose not to continue just yet. I was drained of all energy, and I knew it was a poor choice to drive in such condition. It was the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere, so what harm was there to grabbing a quick nap? Perhaps sleeping until the sun returned was a good choice. Daylight could reveal clues about my whereabouts, ones that were currently blotted out by the dark. A rested mind would also work way better, and it would probably solve this problem in a second. So I made sure my car was properly off the road before I turned it off. I locked the doors and leaned my seat back as far as I could. It wasn't long after I closed my eyes that my exhausted body finally received some reprieve.   I awoke awkwardly, as if some unremembered dream or nightmare had snapped me from my slumber. It was still night, though I didn't know how much time had passed. I looked at my phone, but my groggy mind couldn't interpret the numbers it showed. I tried to stretch my limbs in the cramped space, but it gave very little relief. My drowsy state made me think that I had only dozed off for a few minutes, as I sure didn't feel any better. Perhaps this cluttered, stuffy car wasn't the best place to get some beauty rest. I figured I would try to go back to sleep, as my options at the moment seemed just as bad as before. As I wriggled around in an attempt to get comfortable, my eyes looked out into the night and saw it. It was funny how strange it seemed at that moment, though I knew fully well what it was. The slow flash of a yellow light, a sight I was quite familiar with, but my tired brain struggled to understand it. I leaned forward for a better look, but it didn't help in the slightest. With my car turned off, the world was pitch black, save for the errant star and that pulsing light. It sat way off in the distance, but there was no mistaking what it was. It took me a second to understand that this was a good sign. A human construct like this suggested civilization, and also a cross road. Perhaps up ahead was where I could find some identifying signs or directions to a nearby town. With sluggish joy, I went to turn on my car and pursue this miracle, but then the thought struck me from out of the blue. How come I didn't see this before? Sure, I was tired and disoriented at the time, but a bright yellow light blinking in a dark void seemed impossible to ignore. I had sat in this spot for a good while before I had decided to get some rest, so how come I didn't see it then? As I struggled to properly answer this question, I looked to the light and noticed something odd. Looking at it now, after a few minutes of gathering myself, it seemed to be bigger. It flashed brighter and larger than before, but perhaps it was just my imagination. I sat there for a moment and soon confirmed that this was no illusion. The light seemed to be getting closer to me. I looked to my dashboard, thinking I had accidentally put the car in neutral and I was slowly rolling forward. The little arrow pointed firmly on the P, so that couldn't be the answer. When I looked back up, the light was nearly blinding. It also seemed to bob and sway about, as if blown about by a weak breeze. The realization that it was the one moving froze me in my seat. I had no clue what it was or what was happening, so panic took over and short-circuited my body. A turned into a statue in the front seat and only stared with wide, terrified eyes. I did nothing but watch as the light bobbed closer, until it was at last upon me. At first I believed it to be heading right towards me, but in those few horrified moments, I saw it walking upon the very road I had traveled. It strolled down the middle, treading upon the cracked asphalt and faded lines. When the light came perpendicular to the front of me car, I at last could see what it was. I recognized the three colored traffic light that hung over every nearly every road, but the rest of it refused to be understood. I saw a metallic skeleton, built of rebar and steel. It bent and twisted into a bizarre lattice, creating limbs and body from an iron spider's web.  It walked upon four legs, and the blinding light hung from a long, arching neck. Something black and wet hung in clumps from its body, creating a sticky cloak over its wiry bones. As I sat frozen in terror, the metallic beast strolled down the road. It walked with slow tired steps, its blinking head hung low. Though it was clearly no creature of flesh, it made me thinking of an exhausted horse, weary from a long day's work. It didn't approach my car, it just kept walking by. It was only when it was passing my driver window that it paused. It stopped in its march and slowly turned its pulsing head towards my vehicle. I could not tell if it was looking at the car or me, but I clearly caught its attention. It gazed at me with a single yellow eye. Above and below sat the green and red, but they remained dark and cracked, like eyes that had long gone blind. It made no move, it just sat there for a moment to watch. After a few seconds, it sadly lifted its legs and continued on its march. The bobbing light continued down that endless road, the blinking growing weaker as it went deeper into the night. I sat there until that yellow light grew small in my mirror, becoming just another star in the darkened sky. I didn't know what to do, or even think about it. Though it showed no aggression, I dared not turn around and pursue it. Instead, I simply turned the car on and pulled back onto the road. I gave up on any thought or reasoning, my mind refused to accept what I had seen. I just got into that dusty old lane and began to drive onwards... -------------------------------------------- “Caution” A design I came up with a way back, which fittingly enough was around the time I went on my roadtrip. I think it came to be through a mashup of traffic signs and weird art sculptures.

[randomoranges]

is it lame to do art or write fics for a character’s “birthday”? prolly. do i care? nah. Also guess the song referenced-ish in the title!

Party [For Three]

January 9th 2021

It would be silly to say that this plan had been in motion since late November, but the truth of the matter is that the plan had, in fact, been in motion, since the end of the month of November. On a day that Edward had been out on errands, Calvin had cornered Étienne between two classes to ask him whether or not he had given any thoughts to Edward’s birthday. Étienne had blinked, confused, and had reminded Calvin that Edward’s birthday was over a month away – they had time, but that yes, he had given it some thought in the vague sense that he was aware that Edward’s birthday was coming up, eventually, and that something should be done about it.

 Calvin had laughed in his face, patted him on the shoulder, and had then told him that he would e-mail him the Docs with his current brainstorming.

 Étienne had done the mistake of assuming that Calvin was kidding, but sure enough, ten minutes later, he had received a rather elaborate document titled “Brainstorm for Deadward’s Birthday – COVID LOCKDOWN EDITION 2021.”

 Étienne had – not been surprised.

 Therefore, he’d read the document and through it, the both of them had discreetly figured out what to do for their respective boyfriend for his birthday.

 Now, Edward never really bothered with his birthday. It was too close after the holidays and everyone was always tired from over-indulging and over-spending. It often went unnoticed and the post-holiday depression settled in on people. There wasn’t really anything to look forward to or to keep the moral up and so, Edward never really went out of his way, unlike some people he knew, to create a big bash or make a big deal of it. It was just another day, after all, and in his case, birthdays were highly insignificant in the grand scheme of things. On top of that, this year was even less than stellar, considering the current pandemic and the fact that nearly everything was shut down.

 Therefore, he planned to eat the, hopefully, last of the leftovers, sleep, spend a quiet day, do some cleaning and maybe watch a movie. Keep it lowkey and such.

 Still, he had to admit that the fact that both Calvin and Étienne were in town with him was rather nice. That was gift and indulgence enough. He’d had birthdays with Calvin, especially since they’d started dating, and Calvin always did do something special for him, which was nice, even if it always made him flustered. However, this would be the first time, in probably ever, that Étienne was here for his birthday – that they could celebrate it together. (He was partially to blame for that. He had never visited Étienne beyond a few days post New Year’s and he had shut down Étienne’s suggestion one year of coming back with him to spend the week until his birthday under the excuse of work and such. In his defence, he’d always assumed that Étienne didn’t want to come over or be with him for his birthday. Which, retrospectively was really stupid, considering the fact that Étienne always did something for him on their last day together for his birthday and then called him on the day of. Sometimes, he wondered if the drugs hadn’t actually affected his brain capacities at times.)

 What he failed to take into consideration, (or maybe he had and he was just playing along) was that both Calvin and Étienne would not stand for that and that they had, over the past month, developed an elaborate and full plan for his birthday. Cake included.

 Seeing as the possibility of activities was limited, Calvin and Étienne had agreed that they would focus on what they could do to make the day special. All chores and other such tasks were not to be done by Edward, regardless of what he said, no matter what, no questions asked. The cake would be delivered during the day by Edward’s favourite local bakery. They’d thought of baking something together, but with Edward around all the time, it would have been hard to hide the cake or the evidence. Even if they waited for him to be out of the house, Edward would most likely smell the cake upon his return and even if they hid the cake and made extra batter to say they had made cupcakes for fun, the risk of Edward finding the place where they would have hid the cake was too high. (Calvin had thought of all possible scenarios and Étienne had been surprisingly good into figuring out how Edward could find out.)

 Obviously, they could have made this easier on themselves by telling Edward that they wanted to plan something for him, but Calvin and Étienne had agreed that making this a “surprise” would be better and way more cooler. Plus, Edward would shoot the idea down and tell them both that he didn’t need anything special or something equally lame and boring and old man like.

 Hence, they kept to their secret document and tried to keep a low profile.

 “Y’know, the whole idea of birthday breakfast was for everything to be ready on time and for the food to be hot. How long does it take to make your parfaits? At this rate the French toast will be cold and the bacon will have coagulated!” Calvin complained for what felt like the seventy-third time since the sun had risen.

 “You can’t just rush art, McCall. Isn’t there some fancy “keep warm” option on that monster? It’s not my fault you decided to get up earlier still to get a head start. I told you to wake me up if I was still asleep!” Étienne tried to calmly retort as he added the delicate chocolate shavings on top of the parfait he was currently trying to finish.

 “Yeah, well, how the frig was I s’posed to know that your no-bake-super-fast-and-easy-parfaits would take literal hours to make?!” Calvin asked as he leaned over Étienne’s shoulder to observe his handy work.

 “I’ve been in this kitchen for less than twenty minutes. You’re the one who hogged the entire counter.” Étienne added as he nudged Calvin away so that he could reach over for the raspberries.

 “You said you didn’t need the kitchen!” Calvin whined.

 “Where the hell did you want me to assemble the parfaits; space?”

 “Well, that would’ve been interesting to see.”

 Étienne sighed and rolled his eyes, “Anyways, I’m done.”

 Their carefully constructed plan was to make breakfast for Edward. They’d established a menu, had gone over it more than once, and had had to find creative ways to put some of the ingredients on the grocery list without raising any questions. (Eventually, Calvin had gone out to get some of the things himself and had just hoped that Edward wouldn’t find them.) Their plan was also to make dinner for Edward but their collaboration wasn’t at its best. Still, they supposed it was the thought that counted and so long as the food was good and Edward liked it, they’d count it as a victory.

 The rest of the plan for the day could be summarised as “spend time with Edward” and “make sure he has a nice time” and “spoil him” and “give him gifts” and “make sure he doesn’t wash the dishes or do any laundry” and “do whatever it is he wants to do so long as it’s not a chore.”

 The stakes weren’t exactly very high, but considering the current situation, it was a pretty good plan.

 The bottom line was that they both wanted to do something nice for Edward and spend the day with him.

 The only problem that they hadn’t taken into consideration was the fact that their little discussion could have potentially woken up the one person they were trying to let sleep in for as long as humanly possible.

 “Ahem.”

 They both stopped their bickering and slowly turned in time towards the sound of the interruption, only to find Edward, sleep rumpled and small smirk in place, standing at the entrance of the kitchen, with his arms crossed over his chest.

 They blinked and looked at one another, trying to figure out how to solve this before their perfectly crafted plan fell to ashes and to smithereens.

 “Good morning, gentlemen, I hope you both slept well. I slept fine and I must say, that for as much as I did enjoy having a few hours to myself to hog the bed in any which way I wanted, I was a little bit disappointed to wake up and find it completely empty.”

 Calvin opened his mouth to say something, but Edward raised his hand to stop him, “I had been looking forward to at least one birthday morning cuddle on the day of my actual birthday, but even Mercury had abandoned her post. So, do enlighten me, what’s going on?” He asked with a kind smile that both Calvin and Étienne knew was entirely fake.

 Without missing a beat, the other two nodded and then Étienne stepped forward, “This is all a dreeeeeaaaaaammmmm,” He started, changing his voice and flailing his arms as if he were a ghost or something of the sorts.

 Calvin mimicked Étienne and did the same, “You are sleep waaaalkiiiiiiinnnnng. You have seen noooooothinggggggg.” He added, his voice low.

 Edward tried hit utmost best not to laugh at their antics.

 “Go back to beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeed.” They finished off in unison as they walked towards Edward to shoo him back to the bedroom.

 “All right, all right, I’m going, I’m going. No need to be so rude, hallucinations. I’m gone.”

 Calvin and Étienne made sure that Edward was back in the bedroom, before they returned to the kitchen and slumped against the counter.

 “Well, that was close.” Étienne said as he stole a grape off the platter he’d been assembling earlier.

 “Think he actually fell for it?” Calvin asked him. They gave each other a look and then laughed, potentially knowing better. “Alright, let’s get this show on the road.”

 They made sure to set everything on the table so that it was picture perfect, with every last detail accounted for, right down to the carefully folded napkins and the utensils placed the “proper way,” before going back to the bedroom to join Edward.

 --

 When Edward “came to”, it was to find Mercury using his chest as her personal pillow, Étienne with his legs sprawled over his own and Calvin sitting by his head, seemingly engrossed in his phone. Mercury was the first to notice that he was “awake” and proceeded to lick his face, despite his feeble attempts to gently nudge her away.

 “Good morning to you, sleeping beauty,” Calvin teased as he levelled with him to peck his other cheek.

 “So nice of you to join us,” Étienne piped in, grinning, as he slung an arm over Edward’s chest.

 Edward shook his head, fond and amused, and did his best to try to sit up, what with everyone seemingly draped over him in some way.

 “We have it on good authority that today is a special day, actually,” Étienne went on, his grin only growing.

 Edward played along and nodded.

 “Yeah, it’s Saturday! So we made brunch! Come with us!” Calvin added, before bounding off the bed.

 Before Edward had fully wrapped his mind around what was going on, he found himself once more in an empty bed, resigned himself to getting out of it, and followed them to the kitchen, he presumed.

 Edward padded after them and expected to find the table set with brunch, but he had failed to account for the fact that both Calvin and Étienne would most likely go all out for his birthday, again.

 “Surprise!” They shouted once he’d stepped in.

 Instead, he found the table covered with one of the nicer tablecloths. There was a painted banner that hung from the wall that had not been there earlier, the spread on the table was gorgeous and looked delicious, there were fresh flowers in the center of the table and there were even presents carefully stacked up together at the spot where he always sat.

 He was touched, moved, really.

 “Happy birthday!” Calvin said as he walked over to him to give him a hug he accepted without thought.

 “We love you,” Étienne added as he walked over as well and then added himself to the hug.

 Edward couldn’t quite form a coherent sentence, so instead he let both Calvin and Étienne shower him with hugs and attention for the time being.

 He would get his revenge, eventually – after they ate.

 It would be a shame to waste such a feast.

 FIN

[nevertherose]

Musings on the Mind Palace

I’ve been enjoying reading all the various theories and speculations about the new Sanders Sides video, but…I kinda just wanna talk about the Mind Palace itself for a bit.

I’m one of those people who likes “hard magic”: magic that has a defined set of rules, and I like stories where the plot uses those rules to create problems for the characters to solve. Brandon Sanderson wrote an excellent essay on the topic here, which has been the inspiration for a lot of my own magic systems in my writing.

This latest video made me start brainstorming about the rules of the Mind Palace, mostly due to Deceit’s excessive physical control over the others. Bear in mind this is me treating this concept like a magic system, which is maybe a little weird...but that’s how my brain works. Also, this is all pure speculation on my part.

So here we go.

Can any Side initiate a scenario?

I’m inclined to think yes. The only ones we’ve seen do it so far are Logan (My Negative Thinking), Roman (Growing Up, Can Lying Be Good?), and Deceit (Selfishness vs. Selflessness), but all the Sides seem to have more or less the same powers so it would makes sense for them all to be able to do it if they wanted.

Can any Side end a scenario (even if they didn’t start it)?

This is trickier. We’ve seen characterThomas end one of them deliberately in Making Some Changes, and I’d say he was startled out of the one in Selfishness vs. Selflessness. I mean obviously its his mind palace, so it makes sense that he’s the ultimate boss. But other Sides? We saw Anxiety end the one Logan started in My Negative Thinking…and Logan even called him out for it. However, even though characterThomas referred to the debate space as “the Sanders mind palace center”, this happened before the “official” mind palace was created in canon, so…does it count? I’m still inclined to say yes, any Side could end a scenario.

I do wonder what would happen if one Side wanted to end a scenario but another wanted to keep it going. Especially as it seems we’re going to be seeing more Sides that have an outright antagonistic relationship with characterThomas and the original Sides.

How much control does the initiating Side have over the scenario?

It would seem that they have the ability to pull in whomever they choose, including characterThomas, and exclude whomever they choose…even if the other Sides aren’t entirely willing, and even when characterThomas doesn’t have a clue what’s happening (and…he usually doesn’t). Now, we’ve never seen a Side actively resist being dragged into a scenario (usually they’re pulled in before they really know what’s going on), or completely refusing to participate once they’re there…even in Deceit’s courtroom scenario, everyone did their bit. Even Logan and Virgil, who were clearly and vocally unhappy about it.

The initiating Side seems to be able to choose everyone’s roles and outfits (Roman and Deceit have made the most obvious and spectacular use of this in the theater scenario of Can Lying Be Good and the courtroom scenario of SvS)…but these always somewhat match the aesthetic of whomever is being pulled in. Is that due to a level of general respect amongst the Sides (like, Roman might fantasize about putting Virgil or Logan in something loud and obnoxious, but he’d never actually DO it because it would be mean). Deceit might be less inclined to cater to the others’ aesthetics out of respect, but rather because he wants them to listen to him and it would behoove him not to antagonize them too much. Or maybe the Sides retain a subconscious level of control over themselves even when unexpectedly yanked into a scenario?

How much control do the other Sides have over a scenario they didn’t initiate?

The only thing we know definitively is that the Sides can summon whatever they want while in the Mind Palace (Patton said as much in SvS). Other than that, we’re in pretty speculative territory here.

Can they change their outfits?

Roman was able to shapeshift between Joan and his normal form in several outfits in the theater scenario, but that was his scenario. Nobody else changed their own clothes except PattonDeceit, and only after he was granted the role of director by Roman. Did Deceit choose that outfit or did Roman? Can the others do it and they’ve just not bothered to? It’s not explicitly clear.

Can they change their roles?

Ah, here’s the interesting one. I’m actually inclined to say that this is one of the few aspects of a Mind Palace scenario that the initiating Side has complete control over. Once in the scene, everyone plays their part no matter how begrudgingly (I’m looking at you, techieVirgil and jurorVirgil) until someone ends it. Even DeceitPatton in Can Lying Be Good had to ask Roman to grant him the role of director; he couldn’t just decide that for himself. (He also interrupted Roman to suggest it, perhaps before Roman could put him in a different role?)

Deceit’s excessive teleporting of the other Sides around in the courtroom scenario actually plays right into this. I wondered at first if that meant Deceit wielded more power within the Mind Palace than the others (or was he more willing to use a power they all have), but then I realized he wasn’t teleporting them so much as changing their roles from ____ to witness and back to ____ again. The other Sides don’t in general teleport themselves around the Mind Palace, even when it would be convenient (as evidenced by Virgil running after props in Roman’s theater scene, and Patton’s cross-examination of himself in the courtroom scene).

From this, I would theorize that only the initiating Side can change another Side’s role, but that they don’t control what that Side does other than that.

There are two instances in the courtroom scenario that deviate slightly from this theory, though.

The first is when Roman, after being questioned on the stand by Patton, appears to whisk himself back up to the judge’s seat. However, I think that move could still have been initiated by Deceit, since Deceit simultaneously whisked himself into the stand as the next witness.

The more interesting instance involves Virgil.

Anytime Deceit wanted someone to be a witness, he would simply move them into place…even characterThomas. Everyone, that is, except Virgil.

“I would like to call my next witness to the stand. Virgil?”

Deceit didn’t yank Virgil into his next role, he asked. And Virgil, at first, refused. Then, when it looked like Deceit was going to dismiss him from the conversation entirely, Virgil teleported himself to the stand.

Oh, this raises so many questions, some of them based on Deceit’s and Virgil’s mysterious past relationship we know so little about.

We know Virgil hates having changes forced upon him, as we saw in the Making Some Changes video where characterThomas kept shifting him into various friends. Does Deceit know this about Virgil, and if so, why does he respect it? Is it respect, is it fear, is it something else? Maybe Deceit didn’t actually want to put Virgil on the stand at all, but he knew leaving him out was unwise…so he left it up to Virgil, hoping Virgil would refuse out of petulance. Which he did, at first. Which might say something about how well Deceit knows Virgil.

Alternatively, do the Sides, in fact, have the ability to resist being put into a role? And did Virgil actually teleport himself? Because both of these possibilities shoot holes into my theories thus far about what the Sides can and can’t do in the Mind Palace.

Or…more interestingly…do only “dark” Sides have certain abilities? I think it would actually be kind of cool if it turns out the dark Sides can do some things in characterThomas’ mind that the light Sides can’t (at least without corrupting themselves).

I guess the tl;dr takeaway from all this is: I want to see a “light” Side and a “dark” Side vying for control over a Mind Palace scenario at some point.

[antialiasis]

Be More Chill

Well, some people seemed game!

So Be More Chill is a musical, based (kind of loosely, as I understand it) on a YA novel by Ned Vizzini. It was originally staged in 2015, but its soundtrack and audio bootleg went on to be rediscovered by Tumblr a couple years later, amassed a disproportionately large fandom, and eventually the show got restaged and is now headed to Broadway next year. I listened to the soundtrack and audio bootleg after just generally getting curious with how much it was being talked about while I was obsessing over Groundhog Day. A bunch of the songs were very catchy, so I listened to the soundtrack a fair bit.

This musical is about a high school boy, Jeremy Heere, who is an unpopular loser at school but wishes he weren't. He has one best friend, Michael (and they're pretty cute and I friendship it), and they spend their time playing video games, smoking pot and looking forward to college, when guys like them will be cool (or, at least, that’s what Michael is trying to convince Jeremy of). One day, one of the school bullies, Rich, takes Jeremy aside and explains to him that he used to be a loser, too - but everything turned around when he got a "Squip". The Squip is an illegal super-advanced Japanese nanotechnology quantum supercomputer (surprise science fiction in this high school drama) in the form of a pill that implants itself in your brain and will communicate with you and instruct you on what to do to be cool. Despite his skepticism, Jeremy shells out $400 for a Squip of his own, which at first makes him supernaturally successful at social interactions but eventually, unsurprisingly, turns out to be evil and planning to implant Squips in the entire school.

This may be one of very few works of fiction that I actually like better when regarded as a metaphor for real-world issues than when taken literally. Usually, while I obviously acknowledge the presence of metaphor and am fine with stories that have a metaphorical layer to them, I'm just personally not very interested in fiction as metaphor. The main reason I care about fiction is because I care about the actual imaginary people being presented and their imaginary lives and thoughts and relationships and the imaginary worlds they live in; I don't particularly care about how it maps onto the real world. Part of the issue is also that I think very often fictional metaphors for real-world issues just aren't very good metaphors; a lot of the time they create false analogies that are misleading if you try to apply the logic of the story to the real-world issue. (For instance, the mutants in X-Men are a metaphor for marginalized groups such as the LGBTQ+ community - but because mutants have actual superpowers that often do literally make them a danger to others, the anti-mutant villains in X-Men kind of have a point, in a way that anti-LGBTQ+ people in the real world don't.) They might be great stories about grappling with serious issues in fascinating hypothetical scenarios, but these hypothetical scenarios tend to not actually be directly analogous to the real-world issues, and ultimately I just usually find the exploration of the hypothetical scenarios themselves more interesting than the kludgy effort to map the story's logic onto something in the real world that's similar but not quite the same.

On the literal level the plot of Be More Chill is pretty clichéd, the characters are fairly stereotypical, and there's nothing terribly compelling about evil supercomputers wanting to take over the world. I like Jeremy and Michael's friendship, and it's pretty funny, and a lot of the songs are great. But I found as I listened to the soundtrack repeatedly that I enjoyed it more if I pretty much just thought of it as a story about teenage insecurities, which I’m presuming is intended as the metaphor behind it. The Squip is unpleasant and mean-spirited from the start, breaking Jeremy down: Everything about you is so terrible, he sings; Everything about you makes me wanna die. Later, Jeremy repeats it after him, quiet, small, defeated: Everything about me is just terrible. Everything about me makes me wanna die. As an evil supercomputer, the Squip is kind of boring, obviously evil from the beginning and has boring evil takeover plans. But the Squip is really a metaphor for insecurity and self-loathing, that insidious voice in your head that tells you everything about you is terrible and nobody will like you unless you change who you are, and while that's nothing new or unprecedented, I think this musical does a nice job of portraying that voice as the toxic, abusive force that it is, maintaining it's just helping you and being realistic while systematically tearing you down in the most insidious way. It's obviously not a perfect analogy: the Squip can predict future happenings, it's a separate malicious entity with an agenda hard to analogize to any internal voice, and the entire thing about being able to drink Mountain Dew Red to turn it off obviously doesn't apply. But the inner voice that tells you Everything about you is so terrible? It's evil, and that should always have been a red flag, and maybe you shouldn't listen to any analogous voice either.

(Also, you can temporarily disable it with alcohol but that doesn’t solve anything in the long term, which does slot pretty nicely into the metaphor.)

At the end, Jeremy realizes the Squip is evil, reconciles with Michael and decides to be himself; in the final song of the show, he admits he's still got voices in his head, the voices of everyone around him telling him what to do, and even the voice of the Squip is still there despite the Squip having been deactivated (because self-doubt never entirely goes away)... but now, Of the voices in my head, the loudest one is mine. Being able to ignore the still-lurking Squip is fine, I guess, but there's a lot more poignancy to that line when it's about the sorts of voices that are in everyone's heads, the looming expectations and doubts and self-criticism, which should always be drowned out by the voice that is simply you, your own will and beliefs and feelings.

(It's definitely to some extent just the bit about how I'm not that interested in the sci-fi hypothetical part here, though.)

[genidma]

Memory : The basic building block of cognition | And other meditations

The topic of how memories are encoded, accessed, enriched, modified (plus) is a super interesting topic. 

A memory or memories are at the root of everything that an agent would do. Whether biological or non-biological. But for the sake of this blogpost, I am mostly going to focus on the cognitive systems that are powered atop the biological wetware. 

It appears that evolution has enabled patterns. These patterns have emerged over a longer time period and different patterns perform different functions. There are many patterns driving the visual system. Same for the other systems. Then, there are patterns that work in conjunction with each other. 

There are a collection of patterns which determine why we’d want to stop by and look at a flower. Although, I am not really sure as to what the evolutionary reason for such an activity would be. Meaning, what evolutionary function does this activity perform. 

There is another collection of patterns that takes a cue from the visual or auditory system and would then trigger a mechanism. In-turn that mechanism would pump a specific chemical through a gland, which would increase the probability of the human engaging in some kind of a response. 

The schema determines how to process and route the stimuli and what set of a response ought to be generated. Specific patterns are being engaged for these set of purposes. Again, the base of all of this is comprised of memories. 

On this topic, one of my favourite quotes is from a book titled ‘On Intelligence’ which has been written by Jeff Hawkins. The quote being:

To me, consciousness is this super loaded word. There is a different definition to the word, contingent on who you decide to talk to. 

Some equate it to a soul or a spirit. 

Others hypothesize that the roots of consciousness are intertwined with quantum effects.  

I personally do not see a need to invoke quantum physics or a phenomenon that has never been quantified. This, at a time, when we continue reverse engineering the different sub-functions of the brain. 

Where I am going with this is, that the various functions performed by the brain/mind can, quite reasonably be encapsulated within the framework of the word cognition. 

And going back to what I started with, the roots of cognition are grounded in memories. Memories govern pretty much everything that we do. Including but not limited to:

How our behaviour is regulated (Memories stored, mostly in the subconscious impacting schema) 

The kind of stimuli we let in through our senses. 

Learning.  

As well, memories govern how we conduct our day to day lives. Memories have a direct hold over our schema. This is tied in with how we process stimuli and how we choose to make objective sense out of that stimuli. A process whereby an existing mental model is either affirmed/updated or something else occurs. 

As a species we are taking the very first steps towards demystifying how memories work. Here’s a thin slice and this certainly isn’t an exhaustive list:

Optogenetics: Using tools from genetic engineering, as well light pulses in order to map, activate, de-activate specific neurons. Note: I personally find that the optogenetics page on Encyclopedia Brittanica’s website does a much better job of explaining the procedure vs Wikipedia. 

Sonogenetics: Activating neurons using ultrasound. What I am not sure about is if sonogenetics is the non-invasive equivalent to optogenetics. 

There is clinical and also entrepreneurial activity in the domain of brain machine interfaces. But that’s a different set of layers. Besides, I am not at all familiar with the work occurring in these domains. Not even to the extent of reading up on the wikipedia page/company profile and/or news articles. 

What we do know about memories, right now, is that there is a translation/transfer/(insert a function that has yet to be identified) of sorts. One of the functions that the hippocampus performs is to consolidate short-term memories into long-term memories.

How all of this works, with respect to their being this overall cognitive system and the individual memories influencing/impacting the various sub-systems of the schema. We’ve yet to figure out all of this and more. 

As an uneducated observer, it is my guess that breakthroughs in the domain of memory formation and manipulation could be very advantageous for the human species. As breakthroughs in these domains may lead us towards understanding: 

How the process of inserting/deleting/swapping memories takes place.

Manipulating memories: Changing association of/changing the actual memory itself, linking and merging it with other memories.

Core breakthroughs in these areas alone could completely alter how we provision our healthcare systems today, how learning occurs (specially if knowledge is encoded in logic, or most of it anyways). As well, we may also get to a reality whereby we are truly able to ascertain/quantify intent. 

Now it could be that there is a universal (universal in a terrestrial sense; not panspermia sense) mechanism for writing memories. Realizing the fact that this (writing memories) itself is not a single step process. Meaning:

First some stimuli is observed in a conscious state. This stimuli is observed because some pattern or set of patterns kick in. 

A short term memory is generated. 

I am not sure if that short term memory is routed via the hippocampus right away or if there is a delay of some sort.

The neocortex processes the information. So that’s another set of patterns kicking in. 

Then a decision is made to engage another part of the brain. 

So, contingent on the type/kind of the stimuli, a different set of routes (not unlike the route identified above) would have been engaged. 

What I am interested in: What are the cellular (neuronal) correlates that drive the process of memory formation. Because there must be a series of processes kicking in, in order for the memory to be written to that cell. 

Just understanding this process alone could usher so many breakthroughs for our species and could potentially lead to many s-curves. We’d then have to think about how to time these breakthroughs and pick and choose the ideal set of realities that we’d want to live in. 

Here is what I mean by this:

We create institutions whereby the exchange of knowledge occurs. We train other humans via a variety of methods. 

Now there probably isn’t a schema on this planet (or the wider multi-verse at that) that is truly unique. But, again, the knowledge is being transferred with actual information being written to individual neurons. 

If there was a mechanism via which we could read specific information from a brain (individual cells) in a completely safe and reliable way (As well a transparent and ethical sense). And then replicate this knowledge in another brain. Then the means to be able to replicate skills would only be constrained by transfer rate  input/output (I/O).

What I am not sure about is if neurons have classes/library/functions and sub-functions. Or some means to be able to relate a block of information stored in the brain to a set of variables. Because, and as it relates to the scenario that has been described above: We’d be looking at transferring a selective block of knowledge from one brain to another. Not replicating the entire brain. (That’s another conversation regarding mind-files). 

But some kind of linkage must exist. Because if I am coding or thinking about coding, then the series of thoughts that emerge in my mind are linked. Sure, the mind may experience some distractions. But, overall, the set of memories invoked would be linked. But during their formation the memories were powered atop repetition. Which, again makes the process of extracting this information a bit tricky. 

Unless there was some prosthetic, that would precisely:

Capture/classify the set of stimuli being received

Marry step #1 above with enriching the set of memories above. Taking a page from (existing state) basics of cognitive computing today. 

Then measuring where the long-term memory ought to reside. 

And time-stamping all of these interactions (Smaller timescales) and sub-interactions.

So this would be a (one) mechanism via which a sytematic means to be able to encode and decode memories for recall and replication could be devised. To recap, you come up with a mechanism to direct how information ought to be enriched when it is written to cells. So that, retrieving this very information can be useful. 

This is a very very rudimentary framework (as theoretical as it may be) for transferring targeted portions of information (related to a subject or topic) from one brain to another. 

Even an uneducated individual like myself can appreciate that there are many problems to solve and as it relates to this vision to come to reality. (In addition to the problem of encoding and decoding memories itself). If the prosthetic ought to exists, then how would it regulate where to write this information and how best to write it in a redundant fashion. How would the prosthesis know which cells to write the information to in the first place, because it could be that there is already some pre-existing information stored at that location (Unless an agent is born with this prosthethic? and that all information from birth has been routed through the prosthesis)

Also, this may or may not be on topic, but there must be a series of patterns that link information in our minds. I was thinking about this when I was writing down the paragraph above about linking information and started thinking about the Jennifer Anniston neuron. Also referred to as the grandmother cell. These memories are connected to each other. Because, in our minds we equate Jennifer Anniston to terms (memory modules) like:

Movie star/celebrity.

Female. 

Blonde hair. 

Still looks super young at age 50. 

And other attributes like that. 

So the brain has made all these associations and all of this information is linked. And even though one set of neurons are actuated upon being presented a type of stimuli (name/image e.t.c). The fact remains that this information is linked to other concepts in the mind. 

I may come back and refine this blogpost as more information comes my way. But, to date, all of my experiences have led me to believe that memories play a pivotal role and as it relates to how our psychological schema is architected/sustained/enriched. 

There is also a miniaturizing angle to this conversation. A cyborg reality.

As with all technological breakthroughs, we will have many doors in front of us. Through each decision we will have the capacity to do enormous good. Boost scientific and technological growth and leverage that growth in order to help reduce human and also animal suffering. Eliminate most mental health and addiction related conditions. Step through other doors and in the wrong hands these breakthroughs (as hypothetical as they may be) could enable the worst kind of tyranny. 

The conversation about advanced computation engines that compute the probability of intents manifesting in certain ways. Those probabilities are predicated upon leveraging intents that are based on who’s system/values we are looking through. But, that, again, is another conversation.