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Marina Fradera

Laura Kelly-Bowditch

Sarah Bechdel

Setting: Darwin’s 200^th birthday. Postmodern setting. The table is set for four. On each dish there is a card.

Whitman enters.

Whitman: “An unseen hand also passed over their bodies/It descended tremblingly from their temples and ribs…” It seems I’ve happened upon a table! Why am I here? Perhaps it is the feast of life! …But where is the food?

Dennett arrives via crane.

Dennett: Ah! Smooth landing.

Whitman: How did you get here?

Dennet: Isn’t it obvious?

Whitman: … No.

Dennet: It’s crane, you fool!

Whitman: But it’s not attached to anything.

Dennet: It’s based in the design space. Cranes can do the lifting work our imaginary skyhooks might do, and they do it in an honest, nonquestionbegging fashion. They have to be designed, built, located on a firm space in existing ground. Skyhooks are miraculous lifters, unsupported and insupportable. Cranes are no less excellent as lifters, and they have the decided advantage of being real.

(They stare each other down.)

Whitman: Logic and sermons never convince; the damp of the night drives deeper into my soul.

(Siri arises.)

Siri: (yawning) That was a really weird dream…. Wait a minute. Am I still dreaming?

Whitman: Welcome to the Design Space!

Dennet: (signing) No you fool! This isn’t the design space! It’s the space where the Library of Babble is built. You know; probablilities, algorithms, cranes. It’s all there.

Whitman: You have truly seen wonders! Would you like to hear about my multitudes?

Siri: This is all very interesting, and I’m sure unconsciouslly I will recall this later, but I really must be waking up from this dream. Is there an off button or something?

Whitman: Isn’t it miraculous that we all arrived at the same place, at the same time?

Dennett: It’s not miraculous at all. Clearly it’s been logically determined that we all arrive at this specific place for a specific purpose.

Siri leans over and discovers her name card.

Siri: My unconscious must be playing tricks on me…my name is on this card.

Dennett: That’s not possible! I’m sure there’s a perfectly logical reason that your name is on this card. …And my name is on this card…

Whitman: Me too! It’s destiny!

Dennett: There’s no such thing as destiny! We weren’t meant to be here…

Whitman: But you just said there was a reason…

Dennett: Yes! A logical one!

Siri: Do you contradict yourself? Very well then, you contradict yourself.

Whitman: No! No! I contradict myself!

Siri: You’re kind of crazy, but I like you.

Whitman: I like you too. Maybe you’re one of my multitudes. I think I remember you…

Siri: You know, Danniel Dennet once proposed that dreams might not be real, that they aren’t experiences at all, just false memories that flood us when we wake up…

Dennet: Yes! In fact, I did.

Siri: That’s discredited now… THOROUGHLY. So maybe we did meet. Maybe we didn’t.

Dennet: Has anyone seen my crane? I think I’ve lost it. It was just there a second ago.

Siri: And I was just asleep a second ago.

Whitman: And a new blade of grass emerged from the Earth a second ago. What lovely China!

Siri: Yes. The table is set for four. But we’re only three. Odd.

Dennet: And it appears to be someone’s birthday. It’s not my birthday. Is it either of yours?

Whitman: Every day is my birthday. Each day a new beginning, the birth of multitudes.

Dennet: Enough with this multitudes crap!

Sir: Hey! Don’t talk like that to him! At least he’s not trying to make sense.

Dennet: Okay. Okay. I’m going to overlook that last comment. If it’s not any of our birthdays, then whose birthday is it?

Siri: The fourth plate.

Dennet: Exactly!

Whitman: Grand! A chance to celebrate!

Dennet: But who is this fourth person?

Siri: Maybe there’s something we all have in common and fourth person does too. Let’s share what we know about ourselves. We can all listen for patterns, strains of feeling and associations that may… lead us to figure out who the fourth guest is.

Dennet: Excellent logic. I’m a professor at Tufts, a grandfather and an avid fan of campfire songs.

Whitman: I’m originally from Long Island, but I’ve been traveling across AMERICA, drinking in my surroundings and the symphony of human life!

Siri: No, no, no. I mean what do you KNOW about yourself? For instance, I’ve come to think of consciousness as a continuum of states, from fully awake cogitation to daydreaming to the altered consciousness of hallucinations and dreams. Like the one I was having before I arrived here.

Dennet: I hate people who talk about their dreams like they’re reasons for things. That’s just a skyhook. Cranes on the other hand serve better purposes.

Siri: Didn’t you lose your crane?

Dennet: I’ve just misplaced it! Why must you discredit me with all your psychoanalytical babble? If a ... brain were truly capable of non-algorithmic activity, and if we have such brains, and if our brains are themselves the products of an algorithmic process ... an algorithmic process (natural selection in its various levels and incarnations) creates a non-algorithmic subprocess of subroutine, turning the whole process (evolution up to and including ... brains) into a non-algorithmic process after all. This would be a cascade of cranes creating, eventually, a real skyhook! ... The position is, I guess, possible, but ...

(During this rant, Siri falls asleep and Whitman wanders about, eventually discovering a strange device

Whitman: What does this button do?

(A GIANT image of Darwin appears. He speaks.)

Darwin: WHO DARES DISTURB MY SLUMBER?!

Siri: Dear GOD. WHAT THE HELL? … Papa? Is that you? Far?

Dennet: No you idiot! It’s the most important man of the past 200 years! It’s… it’s Charles Darwin!

Whitman: Oh Captain! My Captain! Rise up and here the bells!

Siri: 200 years…? Wait. Is it your birthday?

Dawrin: Oh gracious me! I completely forgot! Yes! Indeed! It is my birthday. Thank you for all arriving at my little soiree.

All three: WHAT?

Darwin: Yes. I’ve invited you all here to celebrate!

Whitman: I celebrate myself! Why not celebrate you, too?

Siri: I’m failing to see the logic here.

Dennet: Quiet woman! How dare you question Darwin! You should be bowing!

Darwin: Get up you groveling idiot! They’re only theories, after all.

Siri: I note my growing irritation with you. These are the pieces that won’t fit: Why did you invite US specifically?

Darwin: You haven’t guessed yet?

Siri: It must be the beards right?

Darwin: No! No! While we’re on the subject, you two must really stop copying my style. Next you’ll be floating around in a Beagle feeding finches in the Galapagos Islands!

Whitman: That sounds like it would be lovely.

Siri: I didn’t mean to get us off track, but could my question, please.

Dennet: Yes! Please, oh great one! Why are we here?

Whitman: I thought you said the crane…

Dennet: Shut up!

Darwin: All of you shut up. We four are a grand experiment to explore how diversity is fundamental to all levels of organization, in both biological and cultural systems. You see, we’re all talking about the same things we’re just telling different stories. Walt, you find the connections between all people. Siri, you find the connections within yourself. And Daniel…

Dennet: Yes? What is it I do?

Darwin: You’re… really excited. But you also find the connections between evolution and humanity’s place in the universe. You see, you are all bridges. You tell different stories to create coherent narratives to unify the many thoughts, feelings, many genes and many memes that make up LIFE.

All three: (look look to each murmuring understanding)

Darwin: Now, this IS a birthday party, so I’d like to employ my favorite aspect of human cultural evolution. Walt, if you please.

(Walt presses the button, linking us to Youtube. A smashing number begins to play and the four have an awesome dance party.)