21/28 December 2019 | New Scientist | 41punishment. Love elevates me,
an extremely selfish man, to
lofty heights.
Jian Jian speaks first, though.
Unexpectedly, she says what I
prepared to say to her, word for
word: “I’ve been turning this over
in my head for a long time now.
I think we should break up.”
Lost, I ask her why.“Many years from now, I’ll still
be young. You’ll already be old.”
It takes a long moment for me
to understand what she’s saying.
Then I realise what the look on her
face as she was walking toward me
had meant. I had mistaken her
solemn expression as her having
guessed what I was about to do.Laughter bubbles through me.
It grows until it is loud and
pitched at the sky. I am such
an idiot. I never considered what
era this is, what temptations
appear before us. When I stop
laughing, I feel relieved. My body
is so light, I might float away.
At the same time, though, I’m
genuinely happy for Jian Jian.
“Where did you get so much
money?” I ask her.
“It’s just enough for me.” Her
voice is low. She avoids my gaze.
“I know. It doesn’t matter. I
mean, it takes a lot of money for
just you, too.”
“My dad gave me some. One
hundred years is enough. I saved
some money. By then, the interest
ought to be sizable.”
I guessed wrong. She doesn’t
want Gene Extension. She
wants hibernation, another
achievement of life science that’s
been commercialised. At about
50 degrees below zero, drugs andan extracorporeal circulation
system reduce the metabolism
down to 1 per cent of normal.
Someone hibernating for
100 years will only age one.
“Life is tiring, and tedious. I just
want to escape,” Jian Jian said.
“Can you escape after a
century? By then, no one will
recognise your academic
credentials. You won’t be used to
what society will have become.
Will you be able to cope?”
“The times always get better
don’t they? In the future, maybe I
can do Gene Extension. By then, it
will surely be more affordable.”
Jian Jian and I left without
saying anything else. Perhaps, one
century later, we can meet again,
but I didn’t promise her anything.
Then, she will still be her, but I’ll be
someone who has experienced
another 100 years of change.
Once she leaves, I don’t hesitate.
I take out my cellphone, log into
the online banking system, and
transfer 5 million into the Gene
Extension Centre’s bank account.
Although it’s close to midnight, I
still receive a call from the Centre’s
director right away. He says that
the manipulations to improve my
genes can start tomorrow. If all
goes smoothly, it will be over in
a week. He earnestly repeats the
Centre’s promise of secrecy. Out
of the Gene Extended whose
identities have been revealed,
three have already been murdered.
“You’ll be happy with your
decision,” the director says.
“Because you will receive not
just over two centuries but
possibly eternal life.”
I understand what he’s getting
at. Who knows what technologies
may arise over the next two
centuries? Perhaps, by then, it’ll
be possible to copy consciousness
and memory, create permanent
backups that can be poured into
a new body whenever we want.
Perhaps we won’t even need
bodies. Our consciousnesses will
drift on the network like gods,
passing through countless sensors
to experience the world and the
universe. This truly is eternal life.
The director continues: “In fact,if you have time, you have
everything. Given enough time,
a monkey randomly hitting keys
on a typewriter can type out the
complete works of Shakespeare.
And what you have is time.”
“Me? Not us?”
“I didn’t go under
Gene Extension.”
“Why?”
After a long silence, he says,
“This world changes too quickly.
Too many opportunities, too
many temptations, too many
desires, too many dangers. I get
dizzy thinking about it. When all
is said and done, you’re still old.
But don’t worry.” He then says
the same thing Jian Jian says.
“The times always get better.”
Now, I’m sitting in my cramped
apartment writing in this diary.
This is the first diary I’ve ever kept.
I’ll keep diaries from now on
because I should leave something
behind. Time also allows someone
to lose everything. I know. I’m not
just a long lifetime. The me of two
centuries from now will surely be
a stranger. In fact, considering it
carefully, what I thought at first
is very dubious. The union of my
body, memory and consciousness
is always changing. The me before
I broke up with Jian Jian, the me
before I paid the embezzled money,
the me before I spoke with the
director, even up to the me before
I typed out “even”, they are all
already different people. Having
realised this, I’m relieved.
But I should leave something
behind.
In the dark sky outside the
window, pre-dawn stars send out
their last, pallid light. Compared
to the brilliant sea of street lamps
in the city, the stars are dim. I can
just make them out. They are,
however, symbols of the eternal.
Just tonight, I don’t know
how many are like me, a new
generation setting off on a
journey. No matter good or bad,
we will be the first generation
to truly touch eternity. ❚Former power plant engineer Cixin Liu
is China’s most cherished sci-fi writer.
He is translated here by John Chu“ I’ll keep diaries from
now on because the
me of two centuries
from now will surely
be a stranger”