Occasional Tales

Baby or hot potato? Janet and John want to have a baby, but can’t. They do have the money for in vitro fertilisation with donated sperm and an egg, and they hire the womb of Edith Honeydew, who gives birth to a baby, which is called Sam. When Mr Spick, the consultant, phones Janet and John, he finds that they’ve split up and don’t want the baby. Nor does Ms Honeydew when Mr Spick phones her. And when the IVF company tracks down the donors of the original genetic material, one can’t be found and the other isn’t interested. The problem is, whose baby is it? The answer in my mind is Janet and John’s; not that this is a satisfactory answer. You could simply treat Sam the Baby as if he was something you’d bought at a shop, but while returning a book or DVD is one thing, returning a baby is quite another. He’d have to be offered up for adoption unless Mr Spick took the matter to court, which could well rule that Janet and John, the original purchasers, were responsible for the child. The bi

And in with the newer. Mrs Green is about to go on holiday when finding that she’s pregnant, she has the embryo removed and deep frozen so that she can have it re-implanted afterwards. But while she’s on holiday, she meets someone else and decides not only to divorce Mr Green, but also to have her new paramour’s baby instead. And she has the original embryo destroyed much to Mr Green’s disgust. The removal of the embryo in the first place seems a little strange and somewhat indulgent, but it doesn’t appears to be reprehensible. The destruction of the original embryo without Mr Green’s consent seems unethical. On the other hand, what’s he going to do with the embryo? Find a surrogate of some sort? A very understanding girlfriend? But if Mr and Mrs Green can’t agree on the fate of the embryo, whose cause wins the day? The party who wants to keep the embryo? Tomorrow’s scenario is another from the Big Book of Unwanted Baby Stories.

And the excuses. The excuse which the nurse peddles for using Toni as a life support machine is pregnancy, which would require her to support another life just as she’s supporting the other patient. But Toni would seem to view pregnancy, whether it was planned or not, as a natural phenomenon against which this contrasts as something unnatural. Anyway, at this point, they start questioning her mental state, recalling a blow to the head and how her relatives thought she’d be in favour of the doctors’ actions. they sedate her and leave her in a coma-like state for the remaining five weeks. But when they revive Toni, she’s ashamed of her refusal to play her part and thanks the staff for all their help. She even gives the biotechnologist a big bunch of flowers. (In a moment of extreme irony, which I’m adding for my own amusement, the man reacts badly to the pollen and dies.) Did the doctors do the right thing after all? Their excuse for sedating Toni sounds a little specious, but perhaps we

It’s like The Matrix. Toni Chestnut gets knocked down by a car and eventually comes to in hospital where, she’s told, she’ll be for six weeks. But she soon realises that she’s actually all right. When she starts trying to disconnect herself from the machines, the doctors stop her because her kidneys are actually being used to help another patient. They weren’t able to ask her for her permission because she was unconscious when the decision needed to be made. Toni wants her body back, but the doctors explain that the man she’s helping is a biotechnologist who has developed strains of rice that help millions. And he has a girlfriend and three small children. Toni is unmoved and wants the machine to be disconnected from her. Should she be disconnected from the machine even if the other patient dies? On the one hand, the doctors needed someone to keep the other patient alive and Toni happened to be unable to give her consent; on the other, once she’s conscious shouldn’t the doctors acquies

The confusing Father Black. Mrs Mauve contracts a form of flu which will result in her baby being blind. Although she could have an abortion, she decides to have the child anyway.[ 1 ] Mrs Brown also catches the same flu and is warned against getting pregnant in the following six months or risk her child also being born blind. But she ignores the doctor’s advice. Father Black, who’s supposedly an expert on morality, says that both women have done the right thing. But is he right himself?[ 2 ] Mrs Blue is in the same position as Mrs Mauve, but knows of a herbal remedy which will protect the foetus. Yet she’s not prepared to stump up the money (the grand sum of 50p) for it. But Father Black accuses Mrs Blue of betraying her unborn child and condemning it to a life of disadvantage. She says she won’t play God with its life.[ 3 ] Who’s right and why has Father Black changed his tune? I don’t know. Personally, I think Mrs Mauve should abort the foetus and try again, but it’s her choice. Mrs

Green and red. Can something be red and green at the same time? I assume that this means the thing can simultaneously red and green without these being discrete colours or some wavelength in the visible spectrum which stands halfway between them ( somewhere between orange and yellow ). As far as colours are concerned, such a thing isn’t possible, although I can imagine some state in which the colours shimmer a bit like an animated blend function in a graphics program. According to the book, there are things which can be in two complementary states simultaneously such as negative numbers which, when multiplied together, produce a positive number, but which can have square roots. Unfortunately, I think Cohen has misunderstood i. Also, I don’t think this is necessarily an example of something being X and not X simultaneously. I’m not sure. If anything, specific opinions may contradict our general outlook. Think of Dave “Lost my bike again” Cameron. He’s a Tory, but I believe he’s very pro

Is he bald? Well, let’s see. In one version of Uncle Angel’s historical novel, Brush with a Comb, (which is set in the future) we read Louis XXVI was so hirsute that people said his head had been mugged by a shrub. But in a later draft we read “Look out!” muttered one of the guards through the side of his mouth. “Here comes King Chrome Dome.” Of course, the reviewers noted that Louis XXVI seemed to be both bald and not bald, the novel being somewhat inconsistent on this point. I think the question is pointless. If the King of France doesn’t currently exist, then it’s not currently possible to answer the question. Is snow white? Yes. I assume that because the basic building block of snow is ice, which is clear, that there’s some physical property which makes snow appear white once crystals form flakes. It’s probably like clear plastic which, once you’ve folded it a few times, becomes silvery and translucent. Are all bachelors unmarried men? Only if we’re using the word to mean “man who

Unicorns’ horns How many horns do unicorns have? Er, one. Apparently this is a question concerning facts about what doesn’t exist. Alexis von Meinong (1853 - 1920) distinguished between those things which have existed or do exist and those which have never existed or no longer exist. He then distinguished types of relationships such as that between the colours red and green which is real, but doesn’t exist.[ 1 ] Then there’s the matter of factuality. If someone state a fact, we can say it’s true. The implication seems to be whether truths about things which have never existed can really be true. Even although unicorns don’t exist, there are certain ‘facts’ about them – single horn, equine in appearance, quadriped. Meinong thought that truth was a human construct even if facts were eternal. I’m inclined to agree. The truths of the past are not always the truths of today even if the fact is still the same. Notes 1. I’m guessing that he’s talking about things that we perceive such as (abs

Three, but… No, six, er… Well, as far as each hare is concerned, it has two ears even although the picture has three hares and three ears. They perpetually chase each other round in a circle because there’s nowhere else for them to go. And that’s about it really. No more pictures. Just yet. Anyway, it seems we have a few minutes before today’s problem comes to a conclusion. We could always talk about the three hares a bit more. For example, what do they symbolise? They’re common on churches in some areas of England. The book suggests that they might represent the trivium of grammar, rhetoric and logic, or the Trinity. But I wouldn’t be surprised if they represent something that pre-dates Christianity, the meaning of which has been long since forgotten. Of course, it’s wrong to assume that this image couldn’t have been imagined anew in the Middle Ages since it’s not unique to Europe and thus not unique to a particular time either. Actually, here’s a twist – the ears form an impossible

But does the ladder mind? Another of Escher’s cunning pictures of the impossible. This one, Belvedere , is done by taking two rectangles and turning one 90°. In reality, that would form a cross, but on paper, one rectangle will merely be above the other in spite of its orientation. I don’t find this picture quite as satisfying as Waterfall because the columns to the left and right of the ladder, supporting the upper level, look wrong, just as the one to the left of the figure at the other end of the balcony seems wrong because both rest on something that is forward of their position. But if the columns were allowed to sit where they ought to be (at least in two dimensions), the illusion of the picture would probably be spoilt. I also note that the picture is based on a skewed, flattened hexagon. Also, I suspect that the two tiers would have to be tilted if you attempted to do this in reality even although they look horizontal in the picture. (In an unrelated exclamation, it seems that

But you have to love the architecture. I’ve always liked this picture using Penrose impossible triangles. Even if this really was possible in three dimensions, the water would have to go uphill, thus appearing to make the picture impossible on two counts. I also note that this is a reverse capital sigma (Σ). I’ve seen the triangle itself done in three dimensions, but it can only look real when viewed from the right direction. Basically it’s three pieces, but the two at either end are angled away from each other. When you rotate the structure to make it look like a triangle, it’ll seem to be an impossible triangle. Who said two dimensions were boring? Anyway, more of the same tomorrow.

Just where do you think you’re going? The white birds fly towards the night and the black towards the day. My brain is too mediocre to work out what metaphorical (or metaphysical) import these tessellated flocks might have. Opposites attract? Night will become day just as day will become night? Between black and white, there is a spectrum of shades of grey so that only what is extreme can be absolute? An artist’s purpose is impossible to fathom? Looking at the book may resolve the intention that the author had when he included the picture in it? Well, according to Martin Cohen, the birds are swooping down to become part of the landscape while that produces more of them. I looked at the picture (the thumbnail above) and more readily saw the birds emerging from the landscape, which is, I think, how I’ve seen it in the past. I don’t see some sort of cycle here, but that’s just me. Apparently one physicist thinks this is a good model for the nature of the universe in that there ended up be

Please click on the link to download it. It seems that Mr Megasoft got over the whole atomic watch thing and had children with his girlfriend before vanishing into space on his space yacht. As the kids subsequently discover, their father had been intending to leave his money to a computer called Deep Thought. It ends up in court where the children’s lawyers argue that Mr Megasoft couldn’t leave his money to a computer because it wasn’t alive. Mr Megasoft’s lawyers argue that as a thinking machine, the computer should be given the same rights as organic thinking machines and even ask to be allowed to cross examine the children to see whether they’re thinking beings or merely going to produce programmed responses. They claim that Deep Thought can think and have views for itself. But can they prove it? I don’t see how they could successfully prove such a claim. My laptop sits here on the desk and does what it’s programmed to do (well, at least as far as Vista works properly). It never off

With the lovely Cassandra. Cassandra is forecasting great losses for the Greeks if the sea battle ( ναυμαχία , as they say in Greek) goes ahead. But since the enemy had already sent the Greeks an invitation to which they’d RSVPed, the admiral thought it would be rather rude of them not to attend. [ Paraphrasing scenarios is one thing, but you're just making this up . –ed.] Unfortunately for the Greeks, Cassandra’s forecast was accurate, and when the accuracy of subsequent prophecies became known, the Greeks took to consulting her before any military engagements. But the admiral wasn’t so pleased and got a couple of sophists and a couple of philosophers to undermine Cassandra’s credibility. As Euthydemus proved, sophists were idiots, but the philosophers had an idea. They suggested that because the future hasn’t happened, Cassandra’s forecasts must be false. Also, if the admiral had conducted the battle a little differently, the outcome would’ve been different, thus invalidating the