July 2009 Archives

One hapless Googler (or Binger) made his or her way here seeking that arcane knowledge.

I imagine it would be remarkably similar to having your eyes sucked out by, say, George Soros. Only less wealthy and leftist, with more corpsey odors and horror.

Hope that helps.

Harlan Ellison once described to me his idea for the gestation period for a story - or any piece of writing: Harlan suggests that it's like having this little motor, flashing-light thingee that you've created, but rather than putting it on show, you just pitch it into the swamp of the unconscious that every real writer depends upon. Down there under the algae scum in that swamp, the little idea-machine - useless by itself - begins to connect to other things already already lying in the dark. Writers are the ultimate scavengers. As Henry James (a friend of Harlan's from the old days, I think) once said - "A writer is a man on whom nothing is lost." Walking along the boggy shore, the writer finds new things to toss in - a human skeleton, a 1948 Buick V-8 engine, a worn Stetson, a 3-gallon vat of carbolic acid, part of the wooden case for a 1932 Philco floor console radio, some used junkie hypodermics, a chewed-red deer's leg separated from the carcass, iPod earbuds - and all the time your original flashing, blinking thingee-idea is down there melding, joining, connecting, growing. Finally, often when you least expect it, this . . . THING . . . pulls itself up out of the swamp scum and comes lurching and dragging its parts and killing blades through the primordial ooze and onto dry land.

That's when you can start writing about it.

Dan Simmons

I'm international! Translation of my Sumerian Pot bit is in print and on site: Letras Libres.

I had a peculiar transition from sleeping to waking this morning or, to be honest, this afternoon: for a long series of moments, the light filtering through the closed blinds, the scents in the air, and the sounds of birds all meshed with the emotions that clung to me as I emerged from a dream, and suddenly I was young. It was, I think, somewhere around 1978, a summer weekend, school's out. I tried to gather it all into myself, to maintain and capture the sensations, but it dispersed into fragments of shredded cloud as I grasped at it.

The experience was especially peculiar because it wasn't so much a vivid memory as a state of being. But my recognition of this, and the subtle thought that if I remained somehow existentially motionless I could manifest it into permanence, and wake up seven years old again, was enough to puff away the sensations. I woke up fully and was me, now. How unfortunate.

This recent New Scientist article describes the research of Szabolcs Kéri of Semmelweis University in Budapest. He's studying a a gene involved in brain development called neuregulin 1, which has been linked to a slightly increased risk of schizophrenia. Furthermore, a single-letter mutation of DNA that affects how much neuregulin 1 protein is made in the brain has been linked to psychosis, poor memory and sensitivity to criticism.

But here's the really interesting bit:

People with two copies of the neuregulin 1 mutation - about 12 per cent of the study participants - tended to score notably higher on these measures of creativity, compared with other volunteers with one or no copy of the mutation. Those with one copy were also judged to be more creative, on average, than volunteers without the mutation. All told, the mutation explained between 3 and 8 per cent of the differences in creativity, Kéri says.

[...]

Kéri speculates that the mutation dampens a brain region that reins in mood and behaviour, called the prefrontal cortex. This change could unleash creative potential in some people and psychotic delusions in others.

Intelligence could be one factor that determines whether the neuregulin 1 mutation boosts creativity or contributes to psychosis. Kéri's volunteers tended to be smarter than average. In contrast, another study of families with a history of schizophrenia found that the same mutation was associated with lower intelligence and psychotic symptoms.

The stereotype is that genius is close to madness, and this work seems to suggest that the same mutation contributes to both creativity and psychosis: if you're a smarter mutant, you'll write poetry and music, or create sculpture and paintings; if you're a not-so-bright mutant, you'll just be unpleasantly mad and huddle on subway gratings in the winter, using the steam to hide from the Great Dragon.

Kéri's work came to mind after I'd tumbled out of bed and contemplated my odd transitory state while upright and awake. How much more effort would it have taken, I wondered, to slip over the precipice and lose my current self in that ephemeral state of being? What kind of effort would it have taken? If that isn't achievable, what do I need to do to recapture that state of being as a sort of emotional texture map, something I can overlay onto the wire frame of my current state? Would it be madness to do so?

To me, these are important and practical questions. Because for just a few minutes this morning, the world and I were full of venturesome possibility, and I was at peace with the coming day.

---

¹NEO: My computer, it... You ever have that feeling where you're not sure if you're awake or still dreaming?

CHOI: Mmm, all the time. It's called mescaline. It's the only way to fly.

I make music from time to time, in the corner of my living room by the window. If'n you're innarested, here's a small selection of tunes, in various states of disrepair:

• Ba-Bow
• Limerence (Falls in Waves)
• Mucking About
  
• Kaleidoscopic

(For those who've asked--yes, that's me all by my lonesome, and no loops were injured in the making of these toonz. 'Cept the drums. Tough to fit a full kit in the apartment.)

...and then it started going fantastic because there was robot fucking.

These days you've got to have your priorities in order. You're either going to spend the evening as though its highpoint is in fact going to be the teflon-based lube that you've used to saturate the brand-new chain of the shiny rebuilt drivetrain on your antique carbon fiber bicycle, or--when 660 pounds of chromed and servo-driven love machine drops through the ceiling in a burst of mad-science plasma and shattered plaster--you're going embrace the possibilities of mechanical cock. The choice is obvious, or should be.

That's a life lesson, that is. You'll thank me later.

I used to work in a bookshop, long ago. A recovery bookshop, actually, which was more than a little ironic considering the relationship I had at that time with my brain and the various chemicals that could make it do interesting things. I say you haven't quite lived until you've handed someone their bronze 20-year recovery medallion while tripping balls.

That's all behind me now, but as the famous sage has said, wherever you go, there you are, so I've still got the same brain, haven't I, and even if it's no longer the quivering science experiment it once was, every so often it'll go tits up and then I've got to hang around and wait for it to get its act together. Plasticity takes time, people!

Big sigh.

Anyway, the Spanish-language translation of Sumerian Pot is due out any day now, which ought to be good for a laugh, and there are other things percolating here and there in vague and dissatisfying ways that haven't got any punch, Gerald, are you even listening? You're not going to keep them entertained with promises unless things are exploding somewhere, and if you keep frightening off the pyrotechnicians this whole circus is going under.

So much work to do, so little inclination.