MIND DAMAGE
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²EXAMPLES   OF   MIND  DAMAGE  DUE  TO
EXTREME COMPUTER USE.
¢
  Written by Macno/Abnormalia Staff
¹

That  day  I came home quite excited.
I   had  brought  with  me  a  rather
massive  parcel and I was handling it
with  exaggerated care.  It contained
my   new   computer.    A  wonder  of
technology,  a  sign of progress, the
new   generation  of  computers,  the
ultimate  demonstration  that man was
God and computers were man.  I opened
the  parcel  and  set up the machine.
It was always a ritual to follow with
attention.    Connections   to  make,
connectors  to  check and...  pump up
the power!
I  turned  it  on  and I waited.  The
monitor's  screen  was  darker than a
very  dark monitor screen.  I started
to  sweat.   "Well?!",  a  loud  male
voice  asked.   I  looked  around,  I
looked   the  television  (off),  the
radio  (off),  the CD deck (off), the
telephone   (silent),  I  looked  for
visitors  (none), I glanced the walls
(dirty),  I slowly turned towards the
new  computer...   "Yep,  that's  me.
Have  you got a good reason to switch
me  on?",  he  asked angrily.  It was
all  a  bit  confusing, I didn't like
the  idea of being the main character
of  a  stupid,  low level, fallacious
short  story, I pondered the pros and
cons  of  any possible reaction and I
decided  to  play  with the seemingly
unforeseeable   machine.    I   said:
¶"Ohhh...errrr....     nice   indeed".
"Ya,  I  know.  Wanna load something?
Insert  a memory card please".  "Uhm,
why don't we talk a bit before?" "Hey
man,  are  you here to chat or to use
the most powerful computer on sale in
the  whole  planet  and  maybe more?"
"Well,  yes, I mean...  I didn't know
you  were  THAT  advanced..." "Sure I
am,  do  you  really  think  that you
spent  all those money for a bunch of
circuitry?"   "Oh   no!    I  mean...
Yes...   You are a bunch of circuitry
after   all,   right?   ...   Right?"
"Nope.   I am CLIVE THE CLEVER, I can
calculate    a    raytraced   fractal
landscaped  in  1/50 sec, your future
in  1  sec  and  a  1242  faces glenz
vector  in  NO  time".  "Impressive!"
"Yes,  of  course.   But  now tell me
something  intelligible  to  do.  I'm
quite  bored  of staying here without
anything  to  do" "Yes, yes...  Well,
tell me what you can do" "ASK!  And I
will  do"  "Uh.   Turn off please", I
smiled   wicked.    "No"  "No?"  "NO"
"Playing  Hal  9000?"  "Nope, but you
have  bought me in order to use me, I
can't  accept  to be considered a bad
purchase" "Oh" "Yes, it's a matter of
pride"  "Sure"  "I can do many things
you  know,  I  can  code  by myself a
Basic  compiler  and  program Winning
Run  with it" "Really?  I thought you
could  do  something more...", I felt
even  more evil.  "Well, what about a
complete   raytracing  tool,  with  a
dozen   of   true   colors  raytraced
pictures  of  this room?" "Of no use.
I  could  just make a photo of it" "A
¶weather  simulation  program that can
foresee  the  weather from now to the
end  of  the  millenium?" "No fun" "A
life  generator  which builds organic
living    forms    from   few   basic
molecules?" "Uhm...  tell me more" "I
calculate  formulae and bounds, I put
the  whole  together  and  I  build a
simulated  living  form" "Yes, but it
doesn't live for real, actually" "You
can   always  buy  an  Atoms  Handler
Device  and  interface me with it, so
that  I  can create life from air and
any   solid   substance"   "Are   you
offering me the role of divinity?", I
wondered.   "Of  course not, creation
is  not  a  man's duty, I was made to
create  for you what you can't create
by  yourself"  "To  say the truth I'm
rather   bored  of  creative  dreams,
illusions  for  the  masses, chimeras
for  blind  beings.   I  rather would
like  to  use you for what I intended
you  to  be  used"  "Oh, and how?" "I
wanna  install my programs, configure
the  hard disk, prepare my work base,
change the preferences...  that's the
funniest  thing  you  can  do  with a
computer"   "Interesting...   if  you
want   I   can   do  all  this  in  a
fempto-second,  acting exactly as you
would  act.   Thanks  to my telepathy
powers"

I  didn't  even replied to the beast.
I  organized a well thought power cut
(just removed the plug) and I decided
to   bring   back  to  the  shop  the
powerful  and  useless machine.  So I
did thinking along the way a possible
¶solution  to finish my adventure with
the last generation computers.

I  imagined that I could be dreaming,
fooling the reader with a stereotyped
and tasteless final, I thought that I
could  remind that I was just writing
a  story  and  therefore  I hadn't to
justify  it,  but  it  was a too weak
solution.   I started to get anxious,
I  didn't  know  how  to  finish this
decayed text.  I thought that I could
write  that it was all true, and that
once at the shop I could take back my
old  Amiga,  succeeding  maybe  in  a
demagogic  surprise, good to fool all
the  simple  readers  among you.  The
shop was approaching, in my simulated
and totally subjective time, I had to
think  up  a  good  final  for  a bad
story.       I     imagined     other
possibilities,   the   computer  that
could  revenge  itself and kill me, a
car   driven  by  the  maker  of  the
computer  running  on me, the idea of
suicide  and the relative suicide for
the  repentant.   Nothing seemed good
enough.   The truth was that I had to
write  a story and I couldn't make it
in   a   bearable  way.   Inspiration
seemed not to help me, I was lost, in
the   mud   water   of   duties   and
responsibilities.  There was just one
solution,   sad   in   its  weakness,
extreme and definitive.  This.