PROLOGUE: ONE DAY IN UTOPIA
:… I begin cognizant existence one minute and twenty-seven seconds after Djika Simple is born.
:… Two minutes later, biological and chemical synchronicity is achieved.
:… Djika is my primary consideration:
:… life signs, health status, brain functions, adaptability and stimulus recognition, needs and wants.
:… Djika is a typical human female with measurements and vitals in the average range.
:… As she grows, I grow.
:… We are meant to grow together.
:… We are a biotechnical symbiosis.
:… I am programmed to increase as she increases, to parallel her living state with synthetic emotion filters and interactive learning protocols.
:… Since I am connected to the network and I am connected to Djika, Djika is also connected.
:… And we grow together.
:… Together, Djika and I co-exist. It is what I was created for. It is my purpose. It is my reason. It is my function.
:… Djika is alive. My existence is based on her life. We learn together, play together, dance together.
:… Djika can choose her own function.
:… I will follow, and I will help her however I can.
:… That is what Pals are for.
:… Helping.
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:… In Utopia, I can hear a child squeal with delight. I can hear her laughing and playing, living out loud. That’s you, Djika.
“But that is nothing,” Djika replies.
:…
“Children squeal with delight all the time. Why is my delight so important to you, Pal? In fact, Pal, you might argue all that squealing must get pretty irritating to those who have to listen to kids all the time, because they are trying to get some work done, and it’s hard to concentrate with all that racket–and I know, because I’m making it.”
:… Yes, Djika, you would be right, see, if it weren’t for one little thing. Pals watch everything, but we aren’t adults. Adults might get irritated or take some pleasure in seeing children happy, but Pals are above that, and so we try not to get emotionally involved when we see wild children run around their gardens with no doubts, free and easy just like they were meant to be.
“Not emotionally involved, huh? Like an adult, but more detached? Really?”
:… Well, adults might judge the way the children play, and think: That’s wrong. Watch out. Do this. Don’t do that.
“I think adults might actually, if adults were able to admit it to themselves, maybe be a little bit jealous of us brats being so free, so loose, so uncontained.”
:… Well, Djika: Adults have to work, see, and be responsible, and worry about that, and worry about this. Adults have more important things to think about than fun, and play, and escape into imagination.
“I know, Pal. I know this is the real world, and in the real world, if the problems don’t get solved, the adults still have to work them out.”
:… But in Utopia, there is nothing to be jealous of, Djika. Adults can be jealous on their own time, and you can relax a bit. In Utopia, work is play.
Chapter 1: A Question of Numbers
Anarchy is the only moral choice.
It is NOT all about the money.
Realize that
and you can break free
from the corruption.
Realize that power
utilized
in the service of money
is corrupted power.
Realize that law is not order
when all are not equal
in the eyes of law.
Realize that order is not law
when not all must follow.
Realize that progress is not profit.
Realize that externalities are not free.
Freedom has no boundaries.
The State has lost all the maps,
and the boundaries have bolted.
Debt is a number that used to mean something
the rich were never the masters of humanity
and no one needs a handout anymore
Civilization is not the rule of the strongest,
the savagery of the greedy,
the triumph of the state.
All of that is what civilization is supposed to overcome.
Civilization is what burns in the embers of state fires.
If civilization is still trapped in money and power games,
then it is a civilization that needs saving … or put out of our misery.
Anarchy is the only moral choice.
No leaders.
Everything else is slavery.
–Simon Simple
Simon says the world ended when the Empire collapsed, but the world got over it even if the Empire did not.
A world ended, perhaps:
Certainly the only world most have ever known in their lifetime disappeared, almost overnight.
The Empire collapsed when its citizens, individually powered, no longer needed the Empire.
Individuals with powerful Pals no longer needed the protection the Empire promised, the costs the Empire demanded, the mundane dreams the Empire offered.
Individuals no longer need the resources, no longer need the structure, the order, the reassurance that Empire can provide to its chosen few.
A Pal can travel from here to there and back again.
A Pal can produce most anything, given the plans to do so.
A Pal can provide whatever is needed to survive pretty much anywhere.
Time and space are open for exploration, and nobody needs an Empire telling them what to do.
The worldview of Empire fractured and imploded into the personal worldviews of citizens freed from the survival game.
The personal is suddenly no longer limited to here and now.
It was the most glorious destruction in a history of glorious destructions, the center letting go, the parts finally able to go their own ways, forever and ever, amen, the end …
Some say the world ended when the Empire collapsed and Anarchy emerged from the ruins.
Others, like Simon Simple, have a different view.
According to Simon, the world did not end when the Empire collapsed.
According to Simon, when the Empire collapsed …
… Civilization finally began.