Peace on Earth

“But I’ve told you, professor,” I interrupted him, “the skull wasn’t touched, it was a new weapon, a weapon of the future, designed not to kill but only to give the opposing army a total and remote cerebellotomy. Every soldier, his brain severed, would fall like a puppet whose strings are cut. That’s what I was told at the center whose name I cannot divulge. By accident I was standing sideways, or sagittally, as you doctors say, with respect to the ultrasound-inducing field. But this is only conjecture. Those robots work in secret, and the effects of the ultrasound aren’t clear…”

“Be that as it may,” said the professor, looking at me with kindly, wise eyes from behind his gold-framed glasses. “Nonmedical circumstances need not concern us right now. As for the number of minds in a callotomized individual, there are eighteen different theories, each supported by experimental evidence, therefore none of them wholly wrong and none of them wholly true. You are not one, nor are you two, nor can we speak of split personalities.”

“Then how many am I?” I asked, surprised.

“The question is poorly phrased. Imagine twins, who from birth do nothing but saw wood with a two-handled saw. They work well together, otherwise they would be unable to saw. Take the saw from them, and they become like you in your present state.”

“But each twin, whether he saws or not, has one and only one consciousness,” I said, disappointed. “Professor, your colleagues in America gave me plenty of such metaphors. Including the one about the twins and the saw.”

“Of course,” said McIntyre, winking at me with his left eye, and I wondered whether he too had something severed. “My American colleagues are as green as a field of corn and their metaphors are a dime a dozen. I mention the twins one on purpose; it comes from an American and is misleading. If we were to show the brain graphically, yours would resemble a large letter Y, because you still have a homogeneous brain stem and midbrain. It’s the downstroke of the upsilon, while the arms of the letter are the divided hemispheres. Do you understand? Intuitively one can see —” the professor broke off with a groan because I kicked him in the kneecap.

“Sorry, it wasn’t me, it was my left leg,” I said quickly. “I didn’t mean to…”

McIntyre gave an understanding smile, but there was something forced about it, like the grimace of a psychiatrist who pretends that the madman biting him is a fine fellow. He pulled his chair back a little.

“The right hemisphere does tend to be more aggressive than the left,” he said, rubbing his knee. “Would you mind keeping your legs crossed, and arms too? It will make our conversation easier…”

“I’ve tried, but they go limp. Anyway that upsilon business, excuse me, doesn’t explain anything. Where is the consciousness — under the division, on it, over it, where?”

“That cannot be precisely determined,” said the professor, still massaging his knee. “The brain, Mr. Tichy, is made up of a great number of functional subsystems, which in a normal person connect in various ways to perform various tasks. In your case the highest systems have been permanently disconnected and thus cannot communicate with each other.”

“And about subsystems too I’ve heard a hundred times. I don’t want to be impolite, professor, or at least my left hemisphere, the one talking to you now, doesn’t, but I’m still in the dark. I walk normally, I eat, read, sleep, the only problem is I have to keep an eye on my left hand and leg because without warning they’ll misbehave. What I want to know is who is misbehaving. If it’s my brain, why am I unaware of it?”

“Because the hemisphere that’s doing it is mute, Mr. Tichy. The center of speech resides in the left —”

On the floor between us lay wires from the different instruments McIntyre had used to examine me. I had noticed my left foot playing with these wires. It looped one, thick and shiny black, around its ankle, but I didn’t think much about this until suddenly the foot jerked sharply backward and the wire turned out to be wound around the legs of the chair upon which the professor was sitting. The chair reared and the professor crashed to the linoleum. But he was an experienced doctor and disciplined scientist because he picked himself up from the floor and said in an even voice:

“It’s nothing. Please don’t be concerned. The right hemisphere is the one with spatial ability, so it’s adept at this type of function. I would ask you again, Mr. Tichy, to sit well away from the desk, the wires, everything. It will facilitate our deliberation as to the therapy indicated.”

“I only want to know where my consciousness is,” I replied, freeing the wire from my foot, which wasn’t easy because the foot pressed hard on the floor. “Was it I who pulled your chair out from under you, and if not I, then who?'

“Your lower left extremity, governed by the right hemisphere.” The professor adjusted his glasses on his nose, moved his chair farther away from me, and after a moment’s hesitation stood behind the chair instead of sitting down. Which of my hemispheres suspected that the next time he might counterattack?

“We could go on like this until Judgment Day,” I said, feeling my left side tense up. Uneasy, I crossed my legs and my arms. McIntyre, watching me carefully, continued in a pleasant voice.

“The left hemisphere is dominant thanks to the speech center. Talking with you now, I’m speaking to it; the right side can only listen in. Its capacity for language is extremely limited.”

“Perhaps in others but not in me,” I said, holding my left wrist with my right hand, to be safe. “It’s mute, yes, but I’ve taught it sign language, you see. Which wasn’t easy.”

“Impossible!”

The gleam in the professor’s eyes, I had seen it before in his American colleagues, and immediately regretted telling him the truth. But it was too late now.

“The right hemisphere can’t conjugate verbs! That’s been proved…”

“Doesn’t matter. Verbs are unnecessary.”

“All right, then. Ask it, please, I mean ask yourself, what it thinks of our conversation? Can you do that?”

I put my right hand in the left one, patting it a few times to pacify it, because that was the best way to begin, then made signs, touching the palm of my left hand. Its fingers began to move. I watched them for a while, then, trying to hide my anger, put the left hand on my knee, though it resisted. Of course it pinched me hard on the thigh. I didn’t retaliate, not wanting to wrestle with myself in front of the professor.

“Well, what did it say?” he asked, imprudently leaning forward from behind the chair.

“Nothing really.”

“But I saw myself that it made signs. They weren’t coherent?”

“Coherent, yes, very coherent, but nothing important.”

“Tell me! In science everything is important.”

“It said I’m an asshole.”

The professor didn’t even smile, he was so impressed.

“Really? Ask it about me now.”

“If you wish.”

Again I addressed my left hand, and pointed at the professor. This time I didn’t have to pat it; it replied immediately.

“Well?”

“You’re an asshole too.”

“Is that what it said?”

“Yes. It may not be able to handle verbs but it can make itself understood. I still don’t know who is speaking. Speaking with fingers or lips, it makes no difference. In my head, is there an I and an It as well? And if an It, how is it I don’t experience what it experiences even though it’s in my head and part of my brain? It’s not external, after all. If my consciousness was doubled and everything confused, I could understand that — but this, no. Where did it come from, this It? Is it also Ijon Tichy? And if so, why do I have to speak to it indirectly, by signs, professor? And why does it cause me so much trouble?” No longer seeing any sense in reticence, I told him all about the scenes on the subway and the bus. He was fascinated.

“Blondes only?”

“Mainly. They can be bleached blondes.”

“Is this still going on?”

“Not on the bus.”

“Elsewhere?”