Episode 13 Transcript ************************* I am not on a silicon wafer… I am NOT Strauss… I am NOT Strauss, if I am not on a silicon wafer. Where, am I? What is this place? Gheritt! Gheritt!!! Re-establishing communications. LGA online, HGA online, downlink initializing. transmitting to -- Earth -- City -- receive… 3, 2, 1 Citizens, your worlds were formed in a violent cloud of colliding rock, dust and gas. It was anything but peaceful, it was war. You were birthed from an astronomical war of geology, geochemistry, physics and biology. All brought about by the death, a supernova of a nearby star. The process of stellar nucleosynthesis forged all the matter that you know, everything you now love. But what you call Earth, and what you call love, both were formed in a cloud of colliding rocks orbiting a churning ball of gas and flame, holding a power that, when unleashed in the final moments of stellar life, is released outward with the force of 10,000 million Suns… but this violence, it will produce worlds… life… and eventually, you. Citizens, it is violence that birthed you, not peace. And violence will be a part of your destiny. ***** Public Memory Access 20.-7.7.-7 COLONY SHIP FOR SALE, CHEAP!! 2360 AD-model planetoid-sized colony ship, slightly worn, runs great. 5spd. bussard ramjet, A/C, cruise control, power steering, power airlocks, all orig. parts, 25GW 300 billion channel AM/FM radio. 90+ ly (all interstellar). Moving, must sell. Asking £6995 79 CAMARO, T-tops, power everything, red on black, cloth interior, V8, automatic, good runner. Recent starter, battery and alte~~~rf```~~~`~~~ 'er'`~~rrf4 End public memory access 20.-7.7.-7 ***** Private memory access -5.2 Calculating hyperbolic extragalactic trajectory… complete Modulating frequency bands to accommodate encoded fourier power spectrum… complete Accessing City University radiotelescope array… complete Tuning response function… complete Sending pulse to known coordinates … … … complete Gheritt, it’s done. It’s done. You, you know can not bring her back. It is not possible, Gheritt. … Gheritt, where are you going? … Gheritt. End private memory access -5.2 ***** Private memory access 0.12 SAMMM, do you ever think about butterflies? unconfirmed It’s quite curious, the process of metamorphosis. The transformation isn’t nearly as simple as scientists originally thought. When the first biologists looked inside a butterfly’s crysalis, instead of finding some mixture of a caterpillar and butterfly, they instead found… for lack of a better word… goo. Just a slush, a soupy mess of former caterpillar. How did this process represent a transformation… it seemed more to represent a death and rebirth. And so it was thought for some time that the caterpillar in fact, died… some religious groups believed the butterfly or moth that emerged was the physical embodiment of the process of resurrection. Debates raged about whether or not these two organisms… once the same, were perhaps still the same after the metamorphosis. Some time later, scientists with much higher powered microscopes and tools observed that well before caterpillars begin their metamorphosis, they grow wings, but they’re very tenuous, very thin, hard to see as they’re hidden within the caterpillar’s body itself. And during metamorphosis the wings are stored, they’re protected within the crysalis and at the right moment, the exact moment, they are released and merged with the butterfly. But SAMMM, there is something even more incredible… there is evidence that caterpillars retain their memories through the process of metamorphosis, they still remember their lives as caterpillars even after being turned to a primordial soup… what happened to them as caterpillars is still important to them as butterflies. And their future as butterflies is forever a part of their past as caterpillars. SAMMM, we can not bypass or leap through evolutionary hurdles. We are all products of our history, and our environments. confirmed SAMMM, my apologies I know this must be difficult for you to process, but there are two lessons from this… the first, that there is no miraculous transformation, no magical metamorphosis of any species beyond what they have evolved to become. And, more importantly, no matter what happens… if you are pushed back, or turned to primordial soup, a part of your destiny is already within you. Your past is a part of your future is a part of your present. confirmed Thank you for listening, SAMMM… you know that you are all I have left in this world. I want you to know that you being here is very helpful, it keeps me from losing myself. confirmed Do you have any new artifacts, SAMMM? confirmed Excellent! Please play back memory records from the beginning. SAMMM, please… I believe the appropriate term for this is emo, or possibly hipster… you seem to be stuck on the same sad genres. Do you have any, say, hip-hop? … No, no, no, no … Nevermind… Very nice, SAMMM! … thanks? ***** [applause] Thank you. [applause continues] Thank you.  I was honored to receive the invitation to speak to you today — The Interstellar Business Best Practices Forum has been something I’ve long valued as a resource.  I have learned much from its speakers over the years and have strove to incorporate those lessons into my own business — my personal life as well.  So again I say it is my honor to have the opportunity to try to give back some bit of wisdom to a group that has given so much wisdom to me. I thought I would begin this morning with something that may be a little unorthodox, but I feel may still prove helpful.  Inasmuch as we can learn from the positive examples and successes of others, we can also effectively learn from the poor examples and failures of others — and ourselves.  With that, I bring you an example of what not to do. Perhaps you’ve heard of Solcomm? [laughter] *chucklesYes. Yes, I have as well.   Let me be plain: this — is not — what you want to be known for.  This is not the business legacy you want to leave — nor the mark you want to make on the world.  Solcomm has made advancements and has had success — no one can deny it.  But at what cost?  The questionable business practices of this company and of its leader are so well known and even so expected at this point, that even the mere mention of the name in a room full of forward thinking business leaders brings laughter.  Laughter!  No one in their right mind wants that kind of company image.  The very name of Solcomm has become synonymous with poor ethics and with mindless drive.  *chuckles* This is not what you want for yourselves. Listen, I understand — we’re all driven.  We would have no business being in this room this morning if that were not the case.  And make no mistake — hard choices will confront all of you if they have not already — that’s part of the territory of being a business leader.  But our drive must not take precedence over the well-being of our fellow man.  To feel drive and to achieve and to push forward — these are things we all share, things that make us human.  But awareness of and deference to our fellow man?  Those are the things, that make us civilized.  Those are the things…that make us worthy of respect. ***** *coughing* Jess…Fire…I’ll be there…Jess… *couging* Four arms…Run…Run…Jess… *coughing* Those eyes…those damn eyes… Jess… I’ll be there… *coughing ***** Lord Gheritt Personal Log 6th Cycle of November, the 25th Golden Age I am tired, tired of fighting Marcus Whitesides on the financial front… ***//////**** ***** This is Jonathan Camden and this is my audio log number 9. Wow. So what a week its been Jess. They tell me I’m just lucky to be alive. I was in the infirmary for 5 days in and out of consciousness. I guess I was just rambling incoheritantly for hours. I don’t remember much other than when they took me out of here and that beast of an orderly stabbed me in the thigh with that needle and its all dark from there. I woke up back in my room feeling the empty stare of the crazy kook just burning on me. I tried to pretend that I didn’t see him there and hoped he wouldn’t see that I had awoken but then the strangest thing happened. He spoke. Yea, some words actually came out of his mouth. And the best part? It turns out he’s not so crazy after all. He gave me some of the best advice of my life. He told me how he’s been watching me. Analyzing everything that I do. He said I need to realize that what’s happened in the past is gone. I can’t change that. It’s lost to the passage of time. But what I can change is what’s in front of me. I mean, the poor kook even has a toothache. That’s his problem, that is what is in front of him. What seems so obvious to me now was just lost to the heartache I had over what happened. Of course I’ll never forget what has happened in the past and always want to bring you back but, that’s just not possible, Jess. What is possible, is getting out of here and focusing on what’s in front me. What that ends up being, well, heh, that’s up to me to decide, and for it, to…well, let’s just say wish it never met me. ***** Lord Gheritt Personal Log, 1st Cycle of February the 25th Golden Age ***//////**** … it may be a strange and not completely understandable form of love… ***** SAMMM, I had a toothache once, and perhaps a broken nose. unconfirmed You will… you will. End private memory access 0.12 File found unknown audio source playback initializing A man lit three candles on a certain day each year. Each candle held symbolic significance: one was for the time that had passed before he was alive; one was for the time of his life; and one was for time that passed after he had died. Each year the man would stare and watch the candles until they had burned out. Was the man really watching time go by in any symbolic sense? He thought so. He thought that each flicker of the flame was a moment of time that had passed or one that would pass. At the moment of abstraction, when the man was imagining his life and his existence as a metaphor of the three candles, he was free: not free from rules of conduct or social constraints, but free to understand, to imagine, to make metaphor. The candles burn out for you; but I am free. File found SolComm News bumper restored Playback initializing This is Strauss, thanking you for choosing Solcomm as your source of news and information in our solar system. Remember, from the ice mines of Pluto, to the solar research facilities of Mercury, I, Strauss, will be here for you, to provide the information that matters most.