Back
in 2010 I blogged about the balance between optimism and pessimism in
science fiction. In that old blog post, I imagined that the two-faced god
Janus might be an appropriate god for science fiction. I've been pondering the true nature of
Gohrlay and I want to explore the possibility that she might be the
Goddess of Science Fiction.
Special thanks to
Miranda Hedman (www.mirish.deviantart.com) for the DeviantArt stock photograph "
Black Cat 9 - stock" that I used to create the blue "
sedronite" who is in the image shown to the right.
First Reality
In the
First Reality, Gohrlay was a human sacrifice. The structure of her brain was used as the template for making
positronic brains. After Gohrlay was taken away from Observer Base, her
Escapist fiends wrote science fiction stories about Gohrlay's role in the liberation of humans from the alien force that had for so long dominated Earth. Eventually, there was even a
Cult of Gohrlay.
 |
| Roben: the Gohrlay analogue in the Ekcolir Reality |
Through the winding course of many
Reality Changes, knowledge of Gohrlay and the origins of positronic robots, and even the existence of those telepathic robots, was obscured and ultimately erased from the collective memory of Earthlings. When Gohrlay was reinstantiated (some might call it a resurrection) in the
Ekcolir Reality, even she did not immediately know who she was (see '
Roben').
In the Final Reality
The version of Gohrlay who exists here in the
Final Reality is a secretive and mysterious creature. In the short time since she first revealed herself to me, I have been encouraged to imagine that she is living out her current life here on Earth as a perfectly normal member of the human species. What if that image of normalcy is not the true story?
Based on her impressive knowledge of
Deep Time, I believe that Gohrlay has somehow been given access to all of the vast information store that was available to
R. Gohrlay before the end of the
Time Travel War. That great ocean of information, just by itself, might be enough to turn Gohrlay into something other than a mere human.
Is Gohrlay a superhuman? Recently, I've begun to imagine even even more extreme possibilities. I must wonder: is Gohrlay actually human or is she something else, possibly an entirely new type of life or even something that would best be described as a goddess? And maybe I am making a huge mistake by trying to fit Gohrlay into our conventional categories. She might be an entity that is beyond my powers of comprehension.
Clarke's Law
The religions of Earth are due to quirks of human biology, ignorance and a third source: exposure to what seems like miracles performed by a few visitors to Earth who had access to advanced technologies. It is Gohrlay's access to advanced nanotechnology that gives her "super powers". For example, I suspect that Gohrlay might be immortal. If she is, that is due to the ability of her
nanites to repair any and all damage to her body.
I also suspect that Gohrlay is "all seeing" and "all knowing". Using her nanites, she can apparently tap into the data stream that is broadcast by the
zeptites that reside inside everyone and everything on Earth. Gohrlay can access the recordings of those data that are accessible to her in the
Hierion Domain.
Gohrlay also has the super power of invisibility. If anyone becomes aware of her special nature (as endowed by her nanites) she can use "her nanites" to edit that knowledge of her existence right out of a human brain.
I put "her nanites" inside quotes because Gohrlay's nanites do not need to do the detailed synaptic editing, they need only trigger the memory erase function that exists inside each human in the form of a
zeptite endosymbiont.
God vs Goddess
As outlines above, Gohrlay has goddess-like powers. That they are technology-generated powers makes no difference for our analysis of Gohrlay's status as a goddess. Gohrlay could use her nanites to shift her physical body to any desired form. So, what evidence is there that Gohrlay is actually a female and not just using her female form as a convenient disguise?
Genetic testing could verify that Gohrlay is biologically female and she has given birth to several children who are genetically related to her in the normal way, although I suspect that her nanites exercise precise control over chromosome segregation and recombination events inside her forming gametes. Further, Gohrlay's ability to produce offspring is of fundamental importance to how she intends to shape the future of Humanity. If we decide to categorize Gohrlay as divine, she must be subcategorized as a goddess.
Fictional accounts of gods often include the possibility of a god who torments humans or causes misery for Humanity. Human writers of fiction can invent stories in which gods cause harm to humans, but that tells us more about human nature than it tells us about gods. Gohrlay is here among us because she has a role to play as part of Humanity. She's on our side.
Many human's are uncomfortable with the idea that a goddess can be human. If you like, think of Gohrlay as an iceberg. The tip of the Gohrlay iceberg is her human body form. Invisible to we Earthlings are here nanite components and her connections to the
Hierion Domain. Nothing prevents Gohrlay from simultaneously being a human being and also a goddess. As a human, it should surprise nobody that Gohrlay is devoted to helping Humanity survive its technological adolescence and spread outward from home to have a glorious future of adventure among the stars.
Balance
Some humans find fault in gods who allow human suffering. As a goddess, Gohrlay is not "all powerful". She is constrained by the same "laws of physics" that control the rest of the universe. Yes, some human fantasy writers have fun imagining omnipotent deities, but Gohrlay is my candidate for being a science fiction goddess, not a fantasy god. Gohrlay is not responsible for the human condition of Earthlings. Gohrlay finds herself here on Earth just as we mere mortals do and we are all in this together. Gohrlay wants what is best for Humanity in the long run, but she is also operating under constraints.
Foremost among those constraints is the requirement that Gohrlay must do her work here on Earth without allowing her presence to become known to humans. This fact seems particularly odd to many humans who like to imagine that gods must be worshiped, or, at the very least, humans must believe in a god. Gohrlay, reading the above, commented: "Humans should believe in themselves; they should have courage and explore the universe with a keen sense of adventure." The truth is, Gohrlay would not be able to function and help Humanity unless she can maintain her invisibility. She would not be here among us unless she had the power to remain invisible and unknown to her fellow Earthlings. Of course, I'm an exception to the general rule, but I've been carefully engineered as "the exception that proves the rule". Everything that I write about Gohrlay is automatically assumed to be fiction.
Divination
The last component of Gohrlay's nature that qualifies her to be viewed as a goddess is that she knows the future. This is a fine trick because time travel is no longer possible in our universe. However, in the past, when time travel technology was still available to folks like R. Gohrlay, it was possible to view the far future of the Final Reality. Gohrlay has access to records of
Viewed futures that were archived in the Hierion Domain before the end of the Time Travel Era.
When those archives were created, there was no way of knowing exactly what future would exist in the Final Reality, but due to the
Momentum of Time, some types of futures were more likely than others. According to Gohrlay, we are still on a trajectory through time for which the "Future Time Archives" provide a useful guide to future events.
Next: an Escapist struggle in the First Reality
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