In the Blink of an Eye

Post by **kailhofer** » July 08, 2004, 06:23:28 PM

Ha! A good warning to us all about just how easily our identities could vanish in a flash of cyber smoke. Was the photograph at the end meant as some kind of trophy for the thief? I couldn't tell if this was meant as foreshadowing of more torments at a later time. Nate

K._Vesi · Post by **K._Vesi** » July 10, 2004, 12:32:22 PM

I think this is also a warning about how everyone is unknown in the electronic age. People do not know each other as intimately as they used to. We are strangers to each other. I think the fly camera is used to prove that the "job has been done". Obviously he was framed and the person who was given the task of framing him needed to prove that he was successful. But I also like the idea of a trophy picture. Kathleen

Post by **Robert_Moriyama** » July 14, 2004, 04:35:45 PM

This was a Twilight Zonish piece with a none-too-subtle moral (another 'what goes around comes around' tale), with Black, who was once a beggar, and who now ignored the fake beggar, losing everything he had gained through his ruthlessness. It seemed a bit odd that after several weeks, Black's staff (who had made his travel arrangements) hadn't yet traced his whereabouts ... imagine the excitement if Donald Trump or Bill Gates went missing! The story leaves us with unanswered questions: who was the false beggar with the robo-flies? His thoughts regarding hono(u)r (U.K. spelling) implied a personal revenge motive of some kind, but his access to sophisticated technology indicated that Black had not ruined him financially. Black presumably must have offended the man or his family in some other way (not hard to imagine, given Black's obvious qualifications as a right bastard) ... The 'beggar' must also have known how tightly interwoven the security systems designed by B.L.A.C.K. were -- that a miskeyed ATM code would trigger events that would disable Black's phone and cause his room to be emptied and locked, and that Black's dependence on his underlings to handle details would leave him unable to provide any contact information to verify his identity. And did the 'beggar' cause the power glitch that scrambled the biometric scan, or was it just an incredible coincidence? One aspect of this story that no one else has mentioned is that it serves as a warning about ANY kind of 'zero tolerance' system. With human judgement and compassion eliminated, a single error had catastrophic consequences ... Robert M.

Post by **Robert_Moriyama** » July 14, 2004, 04:51:28 PM

A question to Mr. Burnham: why did you choose to only describe the beggar's ethnicity, and denote him as "oriental" to boot? did you mean Asian? I think the O word has taken on certain negative aspects over the years, that's all. also, nobody else was described in that manner, so i was curious to know why.

Lee

As an 'Oriental' myself, I didn't find the reference offensive. Of course, I never understood why Charlie Chan was offensive to people of Chinese ancestry -- he talked a bit oddly, but he was always THE SMARTEST GUY IN THE ROOM! I think the ethnicity of the beggar was intended to resonate with his reference to hono(u)r -- he wasn't ruining Black's life (at least until his corporate lackeys figure out what happened to him) for money; he was doing so to restore his or his family's 'face' after Black somehow offended him/them. Robert M.

Post by **Robert_Moriyama** » July 22, 2004, 06:44:41 PM

... unfortunately, one of the bonds that tie all of humanity together is racism.

Lee

Spike Lee (the filmmaker) has said that it is impossible for a black man to be a racist. He has expanded on that statement by noting that blacks have not historically been in a position of power, so have never been in the same relative position with respect to other groups as whites have been relative to blacks. Nonetheless, even different subgroups (tribes) in Africa often treat each other with contempt and hostility (the Hutu and Tutsi(?), etc.); Asians themselves view non-Asians as inferior; and so on. No doubt Cro-Magnons and Neandertals engaged in racist behavior, if they ever crossed paths. (How many Neandertals does it take to light a fire? None, they have to wait for lightning to strike. Bwa ha ha ha!) Robert M.

Post by **kailhofer** » July 22, 2004, 07:01:32 PM

No doubt Cro-Magnons and Neandertals engaged in racist behavior, if they ever crossed paths.
Robert M.

Researchers at the John Radcliffe Institute of Molecular Medicine in Oxford say that the so-called “ginger gene” which gives people red hair, fair skin and freckles could be up to 100,000 years old. They claim that their discovery points to the gene having originated in Neanderthal man who lived in Europe for 200,000 years before Homo sapien settlers, the ancestors of modern man, arrived from Africa about 40,000 years ago. Their paths crossed, but perhaps not in a racist way, as the gene could only have filtered down to us from interbreeding. Nate

Post by **Robert_Moriyama** » July 22, 2004, 07:06:51 PM

I thought I read somewhere that studies of mitochondrial DNA (or something like that) seemed to indicate no interbreeding had taken place (or may have been impossible)? Robert M.

Post by **kailhofer** » July 22, 2004, 08:00:58 PM

I thought I read somewhere that studies of mitochondrial DNA (or something like that) seemed to indicate no interbreeding had taken place?

This is getting further off track, but here's a link to a site that seems to debate interbreeding with Neanderthals at great length, if you're interested. It was a hot topic among academics. http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/ ... r> Nate

D.J.Burnham · Post by **D.J.Burnham** » August 10, 2004, 11:45:54 AM

Thank you for all the feedback for “Blink” and sorry for taking so long to respond. You can access the original full version on the Short SciFi page of my website and that may clear up any confusion - I was asked to cut to the point where the action starts and although I tried to retain the key points, I can see how certain subtleties and character/plot developments were lost:- http://homepage.ntlworld.com/daveandsue ... br> The story was inspired by the UK Government’s recent interest in biometric data for id cards. The fly camera was indeed evidence of a fait accompli, but also a snapshot to directly echo the appearance of the ‘Beggar’ outside the Bank - who in turn knew of Brent’s whereabouts in a complex plan to undo him. As the story was presented it does appear to be an obvious rags to riches and back again story, but in the full version (it was edited for appearance in Aphelion) it is slightly more subtle, as Brent was the product of an earlier Governing Elite’s failure to address the issue of poverty. The beggar was in disguise to orchestrate revenge. Black’s staff hadn’t traced him, because most didn’t even know they worked for him, and he was so paranoid about keeping his true identity quiet, in order to pull off the big deal, that instructions for the flight/hotel etc. had been passed from one to another before finally being executed. The false beggar was one of the displaced executives of a Japanese electronics company which Brent had acquired through a unscrupulous takeover bid (see full version). The false beggar just got lucky - he knew the immediate events of a miskey, but had hoped for an inconvenience that would delay Brent - it worked out better than he could have imagined. Despite the lack of detail and explanation the concept of “Honour being restored” was meant to allude to that (well spotted Robert). The power glitch was indeed “just an incredible coincidence.” “One aspect of this story that no one else has mentioned is that it serves as a warning about ANY kind of 'zero tolerance' system. With human judgment and compassion eliminated, a single error had catastrophic consequences ... “ - absolutely. Ethnicity probably wouldn’t have come up if the full version had been published. The false beggar was Japanese, but purely because I chose a Japanese electronics company as Brent’s first takeover bid; and that because I conjectured that the future global economy/market would most likely seen a shift from the current strong Japanese position. I am happy to say that there isn’t a racist/sexist/homophobic bone in my body. Thank you all again for your interest, and I hope that you enjoy the full version of the story (if you find time to read it). Cheerio for now, D.J. Burnham

Aphelion

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