And it's terribly abstract types i2 (the other internet) on its own, wishing expectantly for something more concrete, though digitised.

No criticisms please, type the jays, for this is a solemn moment when we let go of what was, become empty for a while and give thanks for what brought us to this point of contemplation and of trust in the universe.

Letting go of the theory and remembering the inexperience of i2 we suddenly realise in our real eyes that these words are all there is to link our past to our future.

But past and future are not things as much as names for fragile memories and expectations. The only reality is the present moment and in this we must act while we can or else the lives we could have lived may never happen.

At this the writer closes his real eyes while still listening to the universe. He takes off his wristwatch and waits for whatever sound will determine what he types next for this is his own connective moment....

Putting his fingers to his nostrils he hears the sounds of his breathing and thus the presence of continued life amidst the other sounds of traffic and of the computer disc which then stops for a moment. All these things he sees as cosmic. Opening his eyes he notices that the desk light shines without sound and that what it illuminates is silent also. He realises that the connection between sight and sound, as between each and every other phenomenon, exists more in his thoughts than in things more 'external'.

Encouraged by the quotation marks he lets these words become the reality neither truly inner nor outer and he wonders if this is the moment to resay what he has thought many times but has never written very clearly.

You do not need permission to write here whatever comes to mind types the intelligent rock - please continue while you can, we've been waiting for millennia for some thoughts on connectivity.

Feeling that the rock doesn't know what it's talking about he decides to write his fragile notions of connections between outer world and inner consciousness, though those two concepts are the very things he wants to question...

Look at me, he types, not knowing if these voices have real eyes or even real years (tut, tut) - perhaps they read computer code as their reality?

Look at me. What you see is not me but your own pictures of my exterior and each of your pictures is different. What each of you sees is thus your inner world, your own mind in its creativeness, constructing the world as you see it. Perhaps you see me as digits.

Similarly, he types, what I see and take to be the external of others is my own interior view - for there is no other that I can.

From this it follows in my theory that there is no inner world, no consciousness as 'thing' or as object. Equally there is no outer world either, just changing similarities and the changing differences between what one person sees and others do or don't.

How are we doing, type the words, are we bearing the load?

Well enough for a beginning type the voices of jay and of the rock and enough words for this screenful types the link to i9 (i2 to i9 are parts of a fiction yet to come online).

(these pages are designed to be read with the window set to two-thirds of the screen width)

atlas

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