In the year 2055 Bill Waters decided to buy a new car. Doing great at his job as a psychoanalyst of malfunctioning artificial minds, Bill could afford a car with the latest and greatest features. So he went to the local car dealer to shop for a car.
Bill encountered no humans during this shopping expedition. The job of a car salesman had long ago been replaced by mobile robots that could answer any questions a car buyer had, and also make the right kind of sales pitches.
"So I want a car with the latest and greatest features," said Bill.
"I'll tell you about a feature that all our autos have," said the robot. "It's the self-repair feature. No more of that nonsense of going to an auto repair shop when your car gets banged up. All our cars will automatically fix themselves after damage."
"That's great," said Bill. "And what about automatic driving?"
"Our cars have that," said the robot. "You can drive and watch 3D TV at the same time."
"Is there some other cool feature I can get?" asked Bill.
"Well, there's one really cool feature that is new this year," said the robot. "It is zoom-in windows."
"Zoom in windows?" said Bill.
"That's a new kind of window that can act like binoculars," said the robot. "If you interact with the window in a certain way, your view will zoom in, and you can see very clearly something that is far away."
"Wow, that sounds great," said Bill. He bought a car that day with all of the features the robot had mentioned. He had not bothered to bring any money or credit cards, but there was no need for such things. A quick retina scan was used to positively identify Bill, and then the purchase funds were transferred from his bank account.
Bill drove off in his fancy car, eager to test its auto-driving system. While the car drove by itself, Bill watched his favorite program on the car's 3D TV.
But when he inadvertently pressed the foot brake on the car, the auto-driving system turned off. The car gave a warning that the automatic driving was turning off. But being very absorbed in the details of his 3D TV program, Bill ignored the warning.
The car now required manual driving, but Bill wasn't aware that it did. Very soon the car crashed at high speed into a tree. Bill lost consciousness.
When Bill awoke, he seemed to be okay. If it had been thirty years earlier, Bill would have got out of the car to inspect the damage caused by hitting the tree. But Bill assumed that the car's automatic repair system would fix any damage caused in the accident.
Bill realized he did not know where he was. At first he thought about finding his position using the car's mapping screen and GPS. But then he thought to himself: why not try out the car's fancy zoom-in windows?
Bill drove a little way to an intersection, and then tried using the zoom-in window that was the front window. He held down some widget on the window, causing the window's view to zoom-in. Soon he could see what was at the end of the road, far away. Bill saw a Dead End sign.
"No point going down that way," Bill thought to himself. Next he tried the zoom-in window on his left. He held down some widget on the window, causing the view to zoom-in. Soon he could see what was at the end of the road, far away on his left. Again he saw a Dead End sign.
Bill repeated the procedure, using the zoom-in window on his right. Soon he could see what was at the end of the road, far away on his right. Once again, it was a Dead End sign.
"I can't believe all these Dead End signs I'm seeing," Bill thought to himself. There was one window left to try: the rear window. Again, Bill held down some widget on the window, causing the view to zoom-in. Soon he could see what was at the end of the road, far behind him. Again he saw a Dead End sign.
"Every road around me leads to a Dead End sign," Bill thought to himself. "What does this mean?"
Suddenly he had a chilling thought. Maybe the zoom-in windows were acting in some symbolic way. Bill thought to himself: when I hit that tree, maybe I was killed, and maybe all these Dead End signs in the zoom-in windows are telling me that I'm already DEAD, and that I've reached the END of my earthly life.
Suddenly something spooky happened. The sun roof of the car opened, even though Bill had done nothing to open it.
Bill looked up through the sun roof. Above him he could see a strange sight. The clouds seemed to form into a kind of tunnel. At the end of the tunnel was a light. The light had a strange mystical look to it. It looked like no light Bill had ever seen. Bill felt as if the strange light was somehow beckoning him.
Just then Bill felt himself rising upward, and passing through the hole of the sun roof. Bill felt himself pulled through the tunnel. It all happened so fast that Bill could not tell whether it was his physical body rising up into the sky, or only his soul. Looking back for an instant at the car far below him, Bill thought to himself that he would never see that car again.
No comments:
Post a Comment