gemini://thurk.org/blog/386.gmi

The switch that was eventually implanted just above the double fold of fat at the base of Shambal's neckline had been planned for ages. It was his own design, in fact, for he had foreseen his future condition. He was never pleased with what he foresaw, but, always the pragmatist, he took steps to perpetuate his *soul*.

Shambal's concept of *soul* was shaky, sure, but basically, he meant the sphere of personality that engorged itself slowly (and sometimes even quickly) since the dawn of consciousness. A computer could drink its entirety in and regurgitate sequences at any time.

I call it a switch because i prefer the word *switch* to the flat and uninventive *button*. Those insipid writers who dare to use the latter are, in each of my tales, tall or not, boiled in their own faeces. Fuck um.

The *switch* learns because it can gage the delight or despair of each creature that puts it to use. Therefore, it selects from the acumen of Shambal's life-knowledge to produce phrases. Initially, it might resemble a *random fortune generator* such as the olden *fortune* shell command in old *UNIX* systems from the father planet. Not so, however! The *switch* learns from the delight or despair of its carers, their neighbours, visitors from zones abroad, and so forth.

Yes, Shambal's land was finally repopulated. I'll get around to that story another time.

One could say that the *switch* generated *platitudes*. Of course, the expressions were not *platitudes* when they were first vomited forth from the corpse-lips of Shambal's mouth, but became *platitudes* over time. Eventually, they came to be part of the *shibboleth* that defined the new culture of Shambal's old land. Generation after generation, and even after the corpse-thing that was Shambal stopped functioning, these *platitudes* solidified. Eventually, some were even seen as something like *commandments*.

You don't want to know what happened to the wife

Topics: nostalgia, shambal, shibboleth

2016-05-26