Gregory searched for Jethro online and found a dozen of his articles. The lawyer read a few of them and told himself the writing and photography were mediocre. The same night at a convenience store, Gregory saw the latest International Geographic issue on a magazine rack. On page twenty-two, he read another of Jethro's stories, a piece about hitchhiking through the Srinagar Valley with a detachment of army tanks. A photo showed that instead of camera equipment, Jethro was carrying a backpack filled with fifty kilos of rice for the starving Kashmiri Pandits, whose fields were too mired in landmines to safely farm anymore. It made Gregory’s domestic life as a lawyer in Queensbury seem meager.
Gregory often ended his thoughts about Jethro with plans of the mega-yacht he was going to buy when he moved back to the coast. The attorney daydreamed about finding Jethro on the high seas and sailing circles around him with his sleek new 100-foot vessel. Then Jethro's hand-built teacup would be foolish and inept—a rusty tin can fit for a poor boy who didn't have what it takes to make it in law or politics.
Like all superficial showmen, Gregory lived inside of others’ opinions and never considered what it would be like outside of them. His feelings emanated not from himself, but from blockbuster Hollywood movies; from his friends’ choices in cars; from dramatic courtroom pictures in popular glitzy magazines; from his church’s manipulative version of sin; from his mother-in-law's taxing Epicurean style; from the demanding professional expectations his father held for him; from his wife's nagging reproach about whether he was good enough or not; and, of course, from Jethro Knights’ refusal to offer him any respect.
Chapter 9
Jethro Knights and Zoe Bach were sitting in the shade on rusty foldup chairs outside the Kundara hospital tent. He was wearing ripped jeans and a black T-shirt, clutching his worn journal in his hands. She was wearing light blue scrubs spotted in blood, the result of a successful operation on an Indian soldier who had arrived earlier that morning with life-threatening shrapnel wounds.
Zoe turned to Jethro and asked, “Aren't you worried you'll miss something if you don't die? Something possibly amazing? You—the explorer who sails the world, and reads everything he can, and wants to leave no stone unturned?”
“I doubt there's anything there, afterward,” answered Jethro. “Otherwise, it would hardly be worth it to call myself a transhumanist.”
“Dying and being a transhumanist have much more in common than you realize,” Zoe answered sharply. “Death is the ultimate arbiter of life, a perfect expression of the soul of the universe. Perhaps death is even the ultimate journey for the transhumanist to undergo. Accepting death and where it leads has nothing to do with not being a transhumanist.”
Jethro sighed. “You know Zoe, I don’t really understand your issue with death. You seem obsessed with it.”
She looked at him, shocked.
“My issue? Are you being funny? Look in the mirror sometime.”
“But you're obsessed with what it might do for you.”
“And you're obsessed with what it might not do for you.”
“Yeah, well that sounds far more reasonable since we're actually living on the life side of the death issue.”
“Jethro, that's just what your mind tells you to think. We might be stuck in some vortex where we've already died, and are reliving our lives in a nanosecond in some laboratory vat. Or more likely, a parallel universe where our greater minds have recreated all these realities using unknown quantum technology. Or maybe we’re just controlled experiments of super-intelligent aliens from one of the hundred billion galaxies in our universe that contain planets capable of supporting life. Or possibly we're just dreaming and still asleep in bed. And one morning we’re going to wake up and be late for our job flipping hamburgers, or maybe running a country as its president. Or maybe fighting as a soldier in Kashmir.”
Zoe stared at him, wondering if she was making any impact. “You've said it yourself—if we reach immortality in the future, and we're a million years older than we think, and a million years more evolved, then why can't all these things take place? They probably have. And it would be wise then to die, to meet our greater self, our larger destiny. To meet each other again, in more amazing forms. If that's the case, then why don't we just speed up the process and kill ourselves? Or at least cryo-preserve ourselves right now? Though I think the suicide option is the most romantic,” she said, her lips forming a deliberate smirk.
“Now you're really scaring me.”
“And your naivete scares me,” Zoe fired back.
“I'm not saying you're wrong; however, I've told you again and again about the Transhumanist Wager. For me, it's the only reasonable choice to make and to follow in life. There's nothing else that makes sense.”
“Ugh. Not that again.”
“Yes, that again. What's there not to agree with?” asked Jethro. “The Wager is the most logical conclusion to arrive at for any sensible human being: We love life and therefore want to live as long as possible—we desire to be immortal. It's impossible to know if we're going to be immortal once we die. To do nothing doesn't help our odds of attaining immortality, since it seems evident that we're going to die someday and possibly cease to exist. To attempt something scientifically constructive towards ensuring immortality beforehand is the most logical solution.”
“I’ve told you already—it's not that I disagree. The logic is fine. It's that I just don't like it that way. Do you understand? I just don't like it. It doesn’t feel like me. And what I like and feel is more important than being logical or sensible about something.”
“Come on. That's the biggest cop-out ever. That's what religious people say; that’s what the Christians, the Hindus, and the Muslims say. It's the same blind argument as their leap-of-faith positions. They want you to dedicate your life and subjugate your reasoning to some mentally ill carpenter that lived two thousand years ago. Or to some blue-skinned deity with four arms. Or to the teachings of some suicide-prone warlord with twelve wives. All because they like it and it feels right to them. Their beliefs are absurd, completely lacking sound judgment.”
“It’s an acceptable position, Jethro, even if they're fools. It's their right to think and feel that way. And it's your right to think and feel otherwise. There's no right or wrong here.”
“Yet, when they found out you helped cryo-freeze some of your atheist patients at San Aliza, evangelical Jesus freaks threatened to kill you and keyed your car. Is that their right?”
“Philosophically, yes; legally, no. That's what the government and its various institutions—like the judicial system and law enforcement—exist for: to keep all parties protected.”
“But Zoe, they're often not doing that. These vacuous institutions, and the individuals or oligarchies that run them, mostly just protect their own interests; specifically, their conservative likes or dislikes. And they usually do so blindly and stupidly, led by irrational feelings and erroneous ideas, especially if they’re religious—which is just about all of them. How people and institutions act based on their likes or dislikes—when it’s stupid and irrational, when it’s biased by heritage and cultural positions, when it’s steered by centuries-old religious tenets, when it’s so obviously anti-progress—should not be tolerated anymore. This is the twenty-first century. Not only is it dangerous in a world with suitcase-sized dirty bombs, anthrax-laced postal letters, and 25,000 armed nuclear missiles pointed in every direction, but it’s also very wasteful of our potential on this planet.”
“I understand where you’re coming from, Jethro. But that’s not realistic in our world. Not with so many nations, governments, institutions, cultures, viewpoints, faiths, and especially, individual egos around the globe, all clumsily tangled together and in constant conflict.”
“The conflict stems from people’s ignorance and the cowardice to overcome that ignorance.”
“I’m not sure about that. It could simply come from their indifference, a general nonchalance about achieving something be
tter or more significant in their lives. Not everyone can exist as functionally, rationally, and as strongly as you can, dedicating their existence to a logical conclusion like aspiring to immortality because they love life. Not everyone wants the best and highest in themselves, Jethro. Not everyone should.”
“Think about what you’re saying. That’s insane if people don’t want to live for the best and highest in themselves. Yet more importantly, what then? What’s their wager in life? What’s their motive for living? What are most people on Earth even doing other than goddamn consuming, polluting, and overbreeding? Should they really have the right to be stupid, irrational, wasteful, destructive, and backwards? Pulling down the world—my world—with them?”
“Yes, if that’s their destiny,” Zoe replied, almost blasé about it. “If that’s what they like or dislike. If that’s what they feel like doing. And if they have the power and initiative to do so. But I don’t think they will sink our world—your world. At least not too much. Because people like you will do something about it.”
Jethro shook his head, frustrated. She simply refused to make a stand, even when her own safety and existence were concerned.
Zoe pulled her rusty chair across the dirt to be closer to him. She was almost grinning. “Don’t worry, baby. Everything will work out in the universe, one way or the other. You'll see. There’s a beautiful plan already in the works. A magnificent cosmic wager not yet understood. Whether you acknowledge it or not. Whether you like it or not.”
Jethro turned away from her. How could someone be so irrationally optimistic, he thought? Is she toying with me? With herself? She's taken her art of positive thinking way too far. Her infallible belief in universal quantum mechanics—with a dash of Zen—was enmeshed in her core psyche. It was indispensable to her; it bridged gaps in reason whenever they were expedient.
“You’re killing me,” he said.
“Not as much as I will one day.”
There was a long, uncomfortable silence. Zoe watched the afternoon sun shower rays over Kundara. Jethro let her premonition pass without discussion. It was just like her to throw in a clairvoyant Zen bomb right as the conversation was nearing a tense close.
“You know I partially agree, or at least I technically defer to some of what you’re saying,” he said finally. “I do believe in people's rights and actions if there's power behind it. But that bears a perilous promise. Because if so it goes for the world, then, definitely, so it goes for the transhumanists. Eventually, we will win. The smarter and more powerful entity will triumph over others, whether they like it or not.”
“Sure,” she said, with smugness. “At least for the time being. But my deeper point is that all the wagers, rights, likes, dislikes, and feelings of the world are determined by a plethora of possibilities, any of which might happen, can happen, and probably should happen. And formulas along the way that people devise for guidance and action—like yours—can easily fail. There may be an anomaly or a black swan that no one saw coming, that no calculation foresaw or computed, regardless of how logical or proven everything seemed.”
He threw up his arms. “You’re making this utterly difficult.”
“Baby, I just don’t think you’re accounting for the universe being spectacular enough. It’s far more elaborate than you give it credit for. I’m in love with transhumanism too—just not in the inflexible, hard-nosed way you are.”
He gave up. There was no point in discussing it any longer. Besides, she was right in her own crazy way. There was no arguing against her. She could prevail in the short term by remote default. She could prevail in the long term by remote default. There were exceptions to nearly all rules. Especially, when not all the rules appeared logical. Some people, like Zoe Bach, managed to live their whole lives under special stars, feeling their way through the universe’s jagged disparity, prospering despite unfavorable odds.
But living that way wasn't practical or rational, at least not to Jethro. The landmine click sounded in his head.
Jethro believed life took place in a statistically relevant and consequential universe. And it was no place for blind optimism when you were sure to die someday. It was no place for allowing stupidity and irrationality when you had one shot to live forever. The battle was on for his existence. That's where he was. Growling.
************
The following month, Jethro Knights and Zoe Bach embarked on a three-day trek in a remote part of the Kashmiri Himalayas, an ascent of Tultican Peak. They chose the hike because they would be far away from the war. En route were only peaceful Buddhist villages and remote monasteries. They even went without a guide. Jethro carried an external frame backpack with supplies and food. Zoe carried the tent and water.
After spending the night near an ancient Jain temple, Jethro and Zoe continued towards Tultican Peak the following morning. Even though the summer air was chilly 13,000 feet up in the mountains, snow from nearby glaciers was still melting. The trail became muddy and treacherous as it followed thousand-foot cliffs, steeply winding its way towards the top, where a legendary Himalayan vantage point awaited. Jethro, who let Zoe lead so he could watch her closely, soon insisted she tie to him with a fifteen-foot rope, in case one of them fell. He became progressively more worried about her as the hours passed. She wasn’t careless in her hiking, but the terrain demanded a healthy dose of caution. She possessed none, tromping on wobbly rocks and occasionally slipping in the mud. Once, she barely caught herself before stumbling over a sheer drop-off. Out here, Jethro thought, one wrong step and it's sure death. There would be no chance of survival. Even getting to a fallen body could prove impossible.
The couple spoke little during the long day of hiking. Jethro purposely avoided conversation. Twice she tried to make him divulge his feelings about their relationship, when they stopped for a drink on the path. Jethro was not prepared to do that yet. His heart was a puzzle. The conflict in him, between her Zenlike acceptance of the universe and his aggressive, egocentric views on transhumanism, was growing. A dangerous tempest was gathering in their future. He knew it. She knew it. Zoe wanted to rip him apart and help him find peace, wanted to show him there was no conflict and never could be. There was just their love. And fate. Jethro disagreed.
Near sundown, exhausted, they camped alongside a cliff. Jethro held Zoe tightly throughout the entire night. Four feet away the mountain dropped off sharply. Even going to the bathroom was dangerous. In the morning they cooked a small breakfast and packed up. After three hours of walking, they reached the small Hindu shrine atop Tultican Peak. Jethro sat down cross-legged near the edge of a rock face, looking like a Buddhist monk, absorbing the panoramic vista. Miles below them, an alpine forest merged into the lush agrarian-dominated Srinagar Valley. The war and its constant shelling were far away now. They were nearly 20,000 feet up in the sky. It felt like the tip of the world. Except for K2, all other mountains in sight were below them.
He was glad to be finished hiking for now. The mood between them was dour. And watching Zoe on that cliff was nerve-wracking. He sat, trying to soak in the peaceful spectacle of nature, his safety rope still attached to her.
Zoe stood directly behind him for a long time, carefully watching him, observing the locks of his shaggy blond hair. Her eyebrows were slanted inward. She imagined what his thoughts were—and she was right.
“Why are you so afraid, Jethro?” Zoe asked.
She paused when he looked back at her, frowning.
“Ugh. Okay, my mistake. I'll rephrase that. Because I know you don't really feel fear. You would never grant the universe so much sway over you. So why are you so worried, Jethro?”
“Because I don't want you to fall or get hurt.”
“Or yourself,” she insisted.
“Of course, that too. But I'm not worried about myself right now. I have all the power over myself that I need.”
She stared at him, her pupils edgy. “Of course. That's it: power over yourself. Classic. It's so hard for you to be in l
ove, baby. Always trying to control and retain that power. But when someone else is in the picture, wow, does it change—and change quickly.”
Jethro continued looking forward and whispered, “Yes, it certainly does. It's shocking me too. This awareness of someone else. And, the inevitable question: What to do about it?”
Zoe felt an urgent need to get through to him now that he was talking. She walked rapidly to the edge of the cliff, so that her toes were almost hanging over it.
“Are you going to be able to do it, Jethro Knights?” she asked.
“What do you mean?” he answered, trying to keep calm, watching her at the edge of a 5,000-foot precipice, irate she was testing him again. He was grateful she was still attached to him by the rope; however, there was no guarantee that he could hold her in the slippery mud near the cliff if she went over.
“You know exactly what I mean. This is excruciating for you. People don't fight love or existence like you do. Are you going to keep me in your life? Or am I too much for you, the lone transhumanist wolf?”
“I don't know,” he answered quietly, a sharp wind almost drowning out his words. “I want you in my life. Of course, you know I…I have feelings for you.” He almost said it: I love you. But not yet, he told himself. Not yet. Because then it would all be over for him. Right now, he might still be able to escape and justify his romance with her as experience—just a pivotal new adventure. The most amazing one.
Jethro glanced tensely at the faraway mountains and said, “I just don't know if I can live my life as a transhumanist and also be with you. The two worlds clash, and merging them may be impossible. I might be too selfish for love.”
“Selfish is the wrong damn word. You may be too hardheaded.”
“That too. But damn it, Zoe, can you step back from the cliff now? You're doing this purposely,” Jethro said finally, angrily.
Instead of backing away, Zoe nudged forward, her toes now perilously over the edge. She had only moved five inches, but the energy in the air changed instantly, dramatically. Both of them knew it.
The Transhumanist Wager Page 10