Words. Are they tools, or do they just enslave us?

I still remember the days when words flew. Light as feathers. Or leaves. When their weight was not yet overwhelming. When they were able to flow. Just flow. Like a river.

Not that I regret the road that made them the way they are now. Or rather the path that took them somewhere else. Because that is what happened, right? The further away words are from us, the heavier they feel, because you simply need to use a higher amount of energy to bring them to you. To write them. To force them to be here. It doesn’t even matter if literature purists find this explanation preposterous and impossible to understand. Come on guys and girls, this is writing and art and freedom - so stop living within your stupid, closed-box rules. You really can do everything, if only you open your eyes to the real world.

I suppose it’s as simple as this: words are complicated living beings. They have their own will, their own flavors, their own destinies. Even if they make it look like they are not. They look like they can be enslaved, but that will never be more than an illusion. Words enslave. That's what they do. And they create complicated illusions.

So where does this wide-spread idea of words and books and literature being wonderful for humans come from? Why do people believe that reading a book is indeed better than living your own life? Why are words so important?

The more you actually think about this, the stranger it feels. Why don’t we question such ideas? How can we simply agree with the fact that an activity which isolates us from the World (reading) and that makes us dwell on ourselves and on what we feel - and that indeed stimulates the construction of a world which tends to deviate from reality (whatever that is) - is good for us? Do we really feel better after reading an entire book? How do we act towards people after doing that? Is that sense of “I know much more now” really positive for us and for those around us? How is “feeling important” good for us?

On the nature of human beings: are they intelligent?

[Background and Aim:] We report on recent progress towards understanding the nature of the primitive-technology dominant life forms found on the Planet 45-34B-3. Recently, many studies have argued that such life forms may indeed be marginally intelligent, mostly based on single-case studies or on their inferred technological progress.

[Method:] In order to test such claims, we have undertaken the first direct experiment with such life-forms, after carefully assessing their societies and economics, and, particularly, their odd-believes in what they call "God(s)". The experiment was carried out using the robotic-explorer45 (RB45), currently in orbit around 45-34B-3. For one 45-34B-3 orbit, (RB45) undertook 10 near-landings in carefully selected regions over the entire planet in order to obtain a significant sample and followed a carefully planned experiment. RB45 synthesised a sample of 100 different "products", most of which would be easily recognizable by such life-forms and can be classed as (but adapted for the local cultures and economies): i) Essential and survival products (food, water), ii) Advanced knowledge (in the local form of books and digital media), iii) Money (paper notes), iv) Medicine (non-existent cures for the most life-threatening diseases ), v) Arts (music, books, paintings) and vi) Weapons (guns, pistols, knives); these products were all selected as they seem to be somewhat valued throughout the planet, but also because their relative value [within the context of their societies] is very easy to obtain.

[Results:] The results fully reject the possibility of such life-forms being significantly intelligent as a whole, and show that such conclusion is valid throughout the planet. Indeed, more than 99% of the 100 000 life forms which were presented with the 100 different products did not hesitate in collecting the least valuable items (iii - Money), followed by the second-least valuable item (vi - Weapons). Moreover, they also ignored all the other items completely, until they had collected all the green paper and weapons, and they shown clear signs of joy. Interestingly, even in 2 regions which were clearly flagged as in an extreme need of food, such item was only picked as a third choice.

Nevertheless, we also find that 1% of the 100 000 life forms show evidence of intelligence, carefully analyzing all the products and picking them in the logical order of their real value based on the society they live in.

[Conclusions:] We therefore conclude that, whilst life-forms in 45-34B-3 are almost completely non-intelligent (~99%), their apparent technological and knowledge advances are fully driven by the ~1 % of their entire population. Based on this scenario of a significant technological progress of a society which is completely dominated and ruled by non-intelligent beings, we estimate that such life-forms will destroy themselves in 160±15 years.

Cosmic Crisis: Star Formation Decreases Drastically

Cosmic Crisis: Star Formation Decreases Drastically

Confessions of an Energyholic Old Universe

Confessions of an Energyholic Old Universe

Now boarding Spaceship Universe 30-By: prologue

Now boarding Spaceship Universe 30-By: destination everywhere

Its first journey through the humanly un-imaginable, perhaps infinite, certainly amazing Universe over 30 billion years. Give or take.

Before you board:

The first word. The hardest thing to write down if you think too much about it, but probably the easiest one if one does not. And yet, regardless of how easy or hard it may be, it is an essential - fundamental - building block with which we write books. Ideas. Papers. Stories. Movies. Because for us humans, every story has a beginning. And it often starts with a word. Even when it is as dull, as silly, or as plain as a word can be.

Obviously, no-one knows if the Universe started with anything that might resemble a word. So whether or not the Universe struggled to get its first word written out in order to kick start its existence is not only a matter of pure speculation/crazy-talk: it is also something we will never be able to know. Or test. At least based on what we think we know today. But, of course, there are things we can test. And experiment. And sort of know.

Which really brings us to where we should start this journey. A journey which, by the way, you are mostly welcome to take. It will be a dazzling and wide journey through our Universe and arguably most of what it contains. Be prepared to time-travel billions of years into the distant past and into the distant future. Be ready to space-travel billions, trillions of miles/kilometers (not sure how your mind works). And, most of all, make sure you question everything along the way.

Note that this is a journey which is available to everyone, and that requires little to no previous knowledge. This is not going to be a journey that reinforces how good/intelligent/knowledgable you are, quite the contrary. So if you feel like you are “too good” for what comes next and you feel like you know “all this already”, feel free to just skip the relevant chapters, or leave this book completely. Maybe in the future you will realize that there’s no such thing as being “too good” for anything and that this will never be about talking down to you (but rather talking at the same level with everyone!) you will come back. You will be most welcome then as you are now.

In the ship you are about to board - if you dare - there is no captain, and the crew is here to be questioned and doubted (so please, think, re-think and question everything!). The ship you are about to board is not made of anything solid; quite the contrary. It is made of what science is made of: an ever-changing mix of materials which although being always the best we can achieve, is never finished, never perfect, never concrete solid. And the only way we can make sure the ship functions is if we keep questioning it along the way, finding out all the weak spots, all its possible holes. So that we can continuously improve it.

 You should expect this book to take you through a series of journeys and stories, thoughts and discussions about our Universe and our place in it. We will find out what we think we know about it and the many things we know we don’t know. Obviously the things we don’t know we don’t know will have to be mostly excluded from the trip. For obvious reasons.

 Being somewhat planned by a human, the next few journeys (chapters) that you may be tempted to take (read) will undoubtedly be biased and very incomplete. They will often point you towards real-world analogies and visual impressions as a way to (hopefully) better understand the hugely complex phenomena and processes that we will witness whilst traveling. Obviously, you should never take what you see/read/think literally, even when it is incredibly tempting. Also, if at some point you happen to have an amazing OMG it all makes sense now moment, you should make sure you stop and question what you are feeling: does it really make sense, and is that really a good thing? As you will witness, while OMG moments can great, they often lead us to underestimate how much we don’t know, and to go with our natural attraction towards making sense of the World, even when it doesn’t, or even when we haven’t even seen the entire picture.

You should also feel free to take your journey through a completely different itinerary, by reading the chapters in a different order. That encompasses one of the more important ideas that will be present wherever and whenever we go: order, logic and our need to have things making sense is, as far as we know it, human, but not necessarily Universal. Forget about recipes, fixed sequences/order, and feel the freedom of picking your own road.

So if you dare to board this ship made of an ever-changing mix of substances/ideas that can both time- and space-travel billions of years and trillions of miles/km, and are willing to go all the way back to the Big Bang and witness the birth of the first stars, galaxies, and see all that’s happen ever since, through the sensors of this truly imperfect and human spaceship, then please be my guess.

Welcome aboard. Please note this is going to be a bumpy ride.

Now boarding Spaceship Universe 30-By: chapter 1

The ship: spaceship Universe

Since you seem to have the necessary courage, curiosity or ingenuity to come on-board (or maybe you just have some free time and want to have a look?), you should really get to know the ship we will be traveling in. Or on. Or with. Depends on what you prefer. It’s your choice.

Ok, so you have heard a little bit about the ship before, but that certainly isn’t enough. Remember, we are about to go back and forward in time (billions of years!), and our “traveling” will take us both to the very beginning of space-time as we know it, but also as far into the future as possible. We will visit distant planets, get out of our own galaxy, and travel through the Universe. We will cover billions, trillions, quadrillions of kilometers or miles at a given time, whenever we go from A to B and then jump to C. So shouldn’t you know a little bit more about what we will be traveling in/on/with before we go on such a mind-blowing journey?

Think of it as an airplane safety demonstration. Literally. Imagine whatever cabin crew members you prefer - speaking whatever language(s) you find most informative, and wearing the clothes and giving out the smiles that make you feel truly available to listen. Made-up or not, men or women - maybe a mixture of them. They can be as old or as young as you like, and/or you can mix them at will. It’s really up to you. But make sure you picture every lazy and/or sophisticated haircut, every walking sound. Including the way their lips move as they now talk among themselves. In a minute or so, they will start telling you about this unique ship with all the state-of-the-art features that will assure that the various journeys will be as smooth and enjoyable as humanly possible. Still, before they do that, you should definitely name them. Believe me, they will become much more real if you do it. You can call cabin crew member 1 whatever you want, and cabin crew members 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 also whatever you like. You can even make up names for a much larger team, or - if you think that’s appropriate - name them all the same.

Ready? Welcome aboard.

- Ladies, gentleman, and all life forms aboard, - says cabin crew member 2 - a very good morning. And a very good afternoon. And a very good evening. We hope you can hear us loud and clear, and that our message is being fully understood in whatever language you prefer. We are here to tell you a about the safety features of our spaceship Universe that we will be using today. Please take a couple of minutes of your time and pay full attention, even if you are a frequent flyer in similar spaceships. This is important.

- Our spaceship today is not being piloted by anyone in particular - continues cabin crew 3, now taking the lead -, but it is indeed being piloted by all of us. This may sound a little bit confusing, but as you will soon find out, this is truly the safest way to travel through the Universe. It allows each and every one of us here in this spaceship the chance to question and decide on the direction, the speed, the amount of time being travelled backwards or forwards, which galaxy or planet or star we are heading to, and to pick which route to take.

- Indeed, this spaceship is not at all like an ordinary ship - announces cabin crew member 1, coming out of nowhere - because unlike ordinary ships, you are free to get out and come back in at will. At any time. And when you do it you will be able to freeze time. So even if a year passes in your perspective (your rest-frame), we will all still be here, exactly when and where you left us. Unless you want to fast forward or to your preferred time/destination.

- But as you probably already expect - adds cabin crew member 3 -, we are obliged to comply with all the international rules of safety for all life-forms and capable-of-thinking non-life forms. We would therefore appreciate your full attention regarding these.

Are you really still picturing the complexity of the cabin crew members, as they try to provide you with some really important information about what you have just stepped into? Have you even considered the possibility that they are not life-forms, but perhaps very advanced robots? Would you prefer to picture them as somewhat humanoid, but clearly alien? Are they all relatively close to you? Can you distinguish between their voices? Do they have particular accents? Are you already questioning their “rules”?

However you picture them, you should still focus on the complexity of their gestures, on the emotions on their faces, the unique ways in which their bodies, hands and eyebrows (if you picture them with hands and/or eyebrows, of course) try to ease the communication. This will warm up your imagination, complex thinking and will get you deeper into this journey (and you will need all of these for what we are about to go through). Most importantly though, it will stress the fact that communicating is not just about words or pure information. And regardless of all the information that the cabin crew members will tell you next, you should also remember that while rules are great (they will provide you with some) - as long as they are simple, only a few, and they work well for everyone - they must be understood instead of remembered. But you must also remember that part of being human, and thinking/feeling, in general, is being capable of both creating and disobeying rules. So really, now that cabin crew member number one, clearly the funniest-looking of them all (or did you picture he/she differently?) is walking slowly towards you to brief you a little bit more, try to focus on why, rather that what.

Maybe next time you hear something similar on an old-earthy-like airplane you will do the same (i.e., you will concentrate on why), and maybe even ask yourself “why don’t they tell people that they shouldn’t inflate life vests inside of the airplane because that can make it harder/impossible for them to go through the emergency exit, instead of just saying you must not inflate your life jacket inside of the airplane?”.

- At the end of this spaceship - and by that cabin crew member number 1 means at the end of this book - you will find more specific information about all the destinations that our spaceship will be going through today, their proposed order, and what to do in the case of an emergency.

- Most of all - continues cabin crew number 4 -, you really should not leave the spaceship without making at least one single question about what you have heard, thought, seen or imagined. That is because a journey without a question or a challenge is a journey that has no meaning, and this journey, almost by definition, is supposed to be meaningful. So before you leave this spaceship (which, by the way, and as we said before, you can leave at any moment) just ask yourself a question. Doubt something. Ask. Think. It can even be about the use of a particular word. But it can also be about what makes up this ship. About why you are picturing me the way you are right now. As our journey carries on, you will probably be inspired to ask arguably much more compelling/deep-meaning questions about why do we think we know what we know. What makes up most of the Universe, why our galaxy is the way it is, or exactly why should you be reading this and taking this journey.

- And yet, every question is an important question - says cabin crew member number 3. It’s not just about the fact that there are no dumb questions. You see, this spaceship, this time machine, will only have fuel to travel trough space-time if you ask questions. This thing works on questions,  on curiosity, on doubt, on wealthy skepticism, and if at any time you think you have all the answers, it will simply disintegrate, and you will either disintegrate with it, or go back to a life with 100% certainties where you think you know everything and are certain of it. A life which is based on a complete and utter lie.

- So please, in the interest of your safety - continues member 2 - do not stop asking questions and never leave without one. Open your mind, but look carefully at every single thing that you let in. The bottom line is that you should not discard anything in advance, but you should also not take anything for granted.

- As you will soon find out, or perhaps re-discover, while making sense of things makes us feel better and more secure, it often leads us to believe we know a lot, when we clearly don’t. And there are very little things which are more potentially dangerous than a belief that is not backed up by anything.

- Whenever people believe in something it does become real for them.  It is real. And that’s not just a problem of having a weak, vulnerable spaceship: it’s the perfect recipe for a huge spaceship crash, killing not only everyone on-board, but perhaps the native life that exists in a foreign world we might be visiting. So take this simple note with you: whenever you feel like everything makes sense, or whenever you think you know a lot about something, press “delete all”, because most likely you are being fooled by your own brain and its passion for order, while, in fact, you still don’t know anything at all.

- So, again, welcome on-board. We appreciate your business and hope you have a very nice trip with us.

Kindle books in portuguese / Livros Kindle em Português

O Outro Mundo - Contos (PT Version) (Portuguese Edition) by David Sobral

Antologia de contos premiados para amantes de ficção e ficção científica/fantástica, sobre o nosso e muitos outros mundos.
Inclui: O Homem que decidiu ser Deus, A mulher que não corria riscos, O sabor amargo das vitórias, O Diário de VX-4010-dh (I), Rumo a SD-GS2056: a Era dos Descobrimentos Espaciais e GR - Gerador de Realidades, entre muitos outros.


Visões de um Outro Mundo (Visions of a Parallel World - PT Version) (Portuguese Edition) by David Sobral

Há um Universo paralelo mesmo aqui ao lado, e está prestes a colidir com o nosso... quanto tempo falta para um novo Big Bang?

Rui William é um brilhante estudante de engenharia física, com uma vida sem excessos, até que uma caneta amarela lhe desperta o interesse, na montra de uma papelaria, e faz com que a compre. Ainda que com reservas, não consegue resistir à aparente vontade do objecto, aventurando-se assim no mundo da literatura, em busca de algo que o rigor matemático não lhe consegue dar. Com isso cria uma personagem, Johanne Ribeiro, mas essa rapidamente se começa a confundir com a realidade. As coisas tornam-se ainda mais estranhas quando recebe um telefonema de uma Johanne, tal e qual a sua personagem, que afirma ser de um outro mundo. Será o universo mais excêntrico do que Rui alguma vez imaginou, ou estará apenas a enlouquecer? Terá a caneta algo a ver com tudo isto?
Rui pediu aventura na sua vida, mas nunca esperou que lhe dessem algo assim…

Guinsberg (Crónicas dos Gravitões Rebeldes - PT Version) (Portuguese Edition) David Sobral

Afonso, um jovem hacker português, nunca pensou que a sua incursão pelos computadores da NASA conseguisse ter sucesso… Mas ao fazer o download de um diário, escrito por uma habitante da cidade de Guinsberg (Natasha), Afonso toma contacto com uma civilização verdadeiramente avançada. Uma sociedade que está prestes a dar um importante salto evolutivo: a criação de uma mente global, que implicará o fim da individualidade em prol do bem comum. Uma sociedade futurista e utópica, onde a nanotecnologia, as redes informáticas e os sistemas bioinformáticos levaram os habitantes a um grau de progresso inimaginável. Neste cenário, o passo seguinte, pelo qual a maioria dos cidadãos anseia, depende apenas da derrota de um grupo de rebeldes que se bate pelo individualismo. Todavia, quando o grupo de cidadãos apontados pelo computador central para derrotar os rebeldes – liderado por Natasha – está prestes a vencê-los, algo de inesperado sucede, e a autora do diário é transportada para junto de Afonso, de uma forma que o deixa à beira da loucura.

Natasha, a habitante de Guinsberg, habituada a um controlo total por parte de milhares de nanorobôs, e a uma ordem perfeita no que a rodeia, ver-se-á forçada a lidar com uma sociedade em que os estímulos e os impulsos incontroláveis abundam – num mundo caótico, onde há fome, pobreza e ódio – sem no entanto desistir do seu grande objectivo: procurar uma forma de regressar a Guinsberg e integrar a mente global, que ela espera ser já uma realidade, com a derrota dos rebeldes. Mas será também no seio deste mundo ocidental do início do século XXI que ela descobrirá tudo aquilo que a sua sociedade nunca lhe permitiu ver ou sentir, e que reflectirá profundamente sobre tudo aquilo em que sempre acreditou.

A vida de Afonso nunca mais será a mesma, sobretudo porque a detecção dos seus actos, por parte dos sistemas de segurança da NASA, e a necessidade de proteger Natasha, fará com que se veja obrigado a revelar um enorme segredo que ele esconde do mundo, desde sempre…

Whispers of a Lost Dream (Pedaços de coisa nenhuma - PT Version) (Portuguese Edition) by David Sobral

Whispers of a Lost Dream é a história de um conjunto de personagens que contam na primeira pessoa o mundo angustiante e intolerável em que estão mergulhados, e que vão revelando, palavra após palavra, os sonhos que perderam pelo caminho, e os laços que porventura os uniram no passado. Haverá esperança, mesmo quando nada faz sentido?

"A vida é feita de pedaços – de inúmeros pedaços de coisa nenhuma. Pedaços vazios que nos rodeiam e nos prendem, pedaços de nada que nos sufocam no vazio de viver.
Só na memória há um pouco de luz, um pouco de ar puro, uma esperança que resiste, ano após ano, década após década, como se no mundo existisse a palavra que só poetas e escritores sabem pronunciar correctamente: a eternidade. Sim, parece que em mim existe algo de eterno, como se um pequeno ponto de luz possuísse uma força inimaginável, capaz de resistir às incontáveis investidas cruéis da parte do mundo, e como se esse pedacinho de mim fosse realmente imortal.
O mundo torna-se difícil, mais e mais árduo, a cada segundo, a cada minuto, hora, dia (porque na realidade o tempo é agora apenas uma confusão inultrapassável). É impossível viver. E só de o pensar, só de reflectir na palavra que há tanto deixou de fazer sentido para mim – viver –, sinto de novo as paredes do quarto a descerem sobre a minha mente em fúria. E eu sou as paredes, incertas e brancas. Sou o quarto sem rumo, a casa, a noite. Mas não sou eu, não sou a minha mente pensamento ideias, não sou nada, não sou ninguém não sou não sou não sou!... "


http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=ntt_athr_dp_sr_1?_encoding=UTF8&field-author=David%20Sobral&search-alias=digital-text

What to Expect when you live in an immunodeficient Society

Expecting present-day capitalist societies and the ever-growing financial/economic groups/companies to result in world-wide growth and progress is pretty much the same as expecting cancer to result in healthier and stronger organisms. 

And yet, while the general approach to cancer is to try to completely remove it and/or target it/"kill it" in the most aggressive ways possible, the general approach towards the ever-growing financial/economic groups/companies is to actually feed them even more, "pet them", bail them out, and tax the general public even more to make that possible.

Clearly, our society is not only immunodeficient, it's also stupidly suicidal.