Dr. Malinowski
Director, Studies Center
Ethnic Relativity Studies Center
Alpha Centauri
To: General Rebaudengo
Your Excellency, we would like to express our thanks to you for having accepted our recommendations, but we venture to suggest that you may have been over-hasty in entrusting the compilation of the Koenig-Stumpf matrix forms to the Altair mechanographic center. These forms, in fact, posit a non-Euclidean geometry of Riemannian origin and require a modal logic. The natives of Altair, in contrast, think in monovalent terms (for them either a thing is or it is) and measure space according to a geometry known as hypoeuclidean or Abbott’s geometry, which posits a single dimension. We would further remind you of the unfortunate incident on Altair after the attempt—despite the Altairians’ ability to recognize only one color—to introduce varicolored shoulder patches to distinguish the various units. To be frank, we wonder how a mechanographic center can even exist on Altair, since the natives are unable to perceive three-dimensional objects. In moments of discouragement we also wonder why anything exists on Altair, if it does exist. The only documentation to date of the existence of any form of life on that star comes from the ESP center on Mount Wilson, reportedly in telepathic contact with the inhabitants.
Respectfully yours,
Dr. Malinowski
Director, Studies Center
ASTROGRAM
FROM: GHQ
TO: POLICE COMMAND, CENTAUR CONSTELLATION
AND TO: PLANETARY POLICE HQ, SOL III
ORDER IMMEDIATE ARREST DOCTOR MALINOWSKI FOR SLANDERING GLORIOUS MILITARY FORCES ALTAIR STOP ALSO ORDER CLOSURE MOUNT WILSON ESP CENTER STOP INCONCEIVABLE THAT MILITARY CENTER STAFF SPEND ALL DAY THINKING STOP NO LOAFERS GOLDBRICKERS TOLERATED STOP CENTER WILL REOPEN ONLY WHEN ALL TELEPATHIC COMMUNICATION CAN BE RECORDED STOP IN TRIPLICATE STOP
(SIGNED) GENERAL GIANSAVERIO REBAUDENGO
ASTROGRAM
FROM: ADVANCE POST
SMALL MAGELLANIC CLOUD
TO: INTERGALACTIC GHQ
CASINO, MONACO
AND TO: OFFICE, FEDERATION PRESIDENT
LA TURBIE
REPORTS FROM FARTHEST CONFINE KNOWN UNIVERSE WARN OF ADVANCE UNIDENTIFIED FLYING OBJECTS STOP FLYING SAPPER PATROL FROM CANOPUS DESTROYED BY INVADER UNITS STOP INVADERS PRESUMED ARRIVING FROM HYPERZONE UNIVERSE STOP THEIR DESTRUCTIVE POWER DERIVED FROM UNKNOWN ENERGY SOURCE THREATENS SURVIVAL INTERGALACTIC FEDERATION STOP INSTRUCTIONS URGENT AS POSSIBLE THE
(MESSAGE INCOMPLETE)
ASTROGRAM
FROM: OFFICE, FEDERATION PRESIDENT
TO: INTERGALACTIC GHQ
FOR FIRST TIME IN ITS HISTORY FEDERATION MUST CONFRONT EXTERNAL ENEMY STOP PREPARE IMMEDIATE DEFENSE STOP REASSURED BY NOBLE MILITARY TRADITION OUR ARMY AND INVALUABLE EXPERIENCE OUR SUPERIOR OFFICERS IN THIS TRAGIC AND HISTORIC EVENT STOP GENERAL REBAUDENGO ASSUMING TOTAL COMMAND OPERATIONS STOP
(SIGNED) PRESIDENT LA BARBERA
ASTROGRAM
FROM: INTERGALACTIC GHQ
CASINO
TO ALL OPERATIVE UNITS
UNIVERSE
OFFICERS NONCOMMISSIONED OFFICERS SOLDIERS STOP HOUR OF DESTINY IS KNOCKING AT GATES OF FEDERATED GALAXIES STOP OUR PROMPT RESPONSE OUR SELF-SACRIFICE OUR EFFICIENCY IN TACTICS AND STRATEGY WILL DECIDE FATE OF OUR HOMELAND STOP EACH OF US MUST TAKE UP HIS POST AND THERE MUST BE A POST FOR EACH STOP ASSUMING DIRECT COMMAND OF OPERATIONS I ORDER ALL MOBILE UNITS OF SOLAR SYSTEM TO ENTRENCH ALONG MARNE STOP IV CORPS ARMY BASED ON BOOTES WILL OCCUPY STATIONS OF MAGINOT LINE DUNKIRK BASTOGNE STOP ARMY CORPS STATIONED ON PLEIADES AND SPECIAL UNITS OF OCTOPODS OF SERPENTARIUS ENCAMP IN ARDENNES STOP ARMORED UNITS OF LIQUID SHARPSHOOTERS OF AURIGA HOLD MONTE GRAPPA STOP ESSENTIAL PROVIDE DECOMPRESSION CHAMBERS AND SOLIDIFICATION SPACES ABOVE 118 METERS STOP DEATH PERSEIDS OF ALGOL WILL HOLD LEFT BANK OF RHINE WITH BOAT BRIDGES READY STOP DRILLERS OF PLUTO PROCEED IMMEDIATELY TO PEARL HARBOR AND DIG IN STOP ALL OTHER UNITS AWAIT FURTHER ORDERS IN WATERLOO PLAIN STOP WE SHALL DEFEND OUR GALAXY AT WHATEVER COST STOP WE SHALL FIGHT ON NEBULAS STOP WE SHALL FIGHT ON ASTEROIDS STOP WE SHALL FIGHT ON EVERY MOON AND EVERY CONSTELLATION STOP FOR GOD GALAXY AND SAINT GEORGE STOP
1976
Conversation in Babylon
(Between the Tigris and the Euphrates, in the shade of the Hanging Gardens, not many thousands of years ago)
URUK: How do you like these cuneiform characters? My new serf-writer composed the whole beginning of the Hammurabi code in about ten hours.
NIMROD: What did you use? An Apple Nominator from Eden Valley?
URUK: Are you nuts? You can’t trade in one of those things even at the Tyre slave market. No, this is an Egyptian serf-writer, a Thoth 3 Megis-DOS. Very low consumption. One bowl of rice a day, and it has a hieroglyphics program, too.
NIMROD: You’re just cluttering up its memory.
URUK: But it formats while it’s copying. You don’t need a separate serf-formatter anymore to collect the clay, mold the tablet, and dry it in the sun, while the serf-writer does the rest. Mine molds, dries at the fire, and writes directly.
NIMROD: But this one takes Egyptian 5.25 cubit tablets and must weigh a good sixty kilos. Why don’t you use a portable?
URUK: What? One of those liquid-crystal Chaldean screens? That’s Magi stuff.
NIMROD: No. I mean a dwarf-writer, an African Pygmy as modified in Sidon. You know what those Phoenicians are like, they copy everything from the Egyptians, and then they miniaturize. Look: a laptop. It writes while seated on your knees.
URUK: Disgusting. And hunchbacked as well.
NIMROD: Of course. They inserted a plate under its shoulders for quick back-up. One lash of the whip and he writes directly in Alpha-Beta, you see? Instead of the graphic mode, he uses a text mode. That means you can do everything with twenty-one characters. You can write the whole text of Hammurabi on a few 3.5 tablets.
URUK: But then you have to buy a serf-translator.
NIMROD: Absolutely not. The dwarf has the translator built in. Another lash and he transcribes in cuneiform.
URUK: Can he handle graphics?
NIMROD: Naturally. Who do you think did all the plans for the Tower?
URUK: Can you trust him, though? Maybe the whole thing will fall down later.
NIMROD: What an idea! He’s installed Pythagoras in his memory, and Memphis Lotus, too. You give him the surface measurements and crack the whip, and he gives you a ziggurat in three dimensions. When they built the pyramids the Egyptians were still using the Moses ten-commandment system, which required a back-up of ten thousand serf-builders. And they weren’t the least bit user-friendly. All that hardware’s obsolete, and they had to throw it into the Red Sea. I believe the waters rose up.
URUK: What about calculation?
NIMROD: Oh, it speaks Zodiac. It will produce your horoscope in a matter of seconds. What you see is what you get.
URUK: Does it cost much?
NIMROD: Look, if you buy it here, the harvest of a whole season wouldn’t be enough. But if you can get someone to buy you one at the Byblos street fair, it’s yours for a sack of seeds. It demands a lot of input, to be sure, but you know the rule: garbage in, garbage out.
URUK: Hm. I’m still pretty happy with my Egyptian. If your dwarf is compatible with my 3 Megis-DOS, couldn’t you program him for Zodiac, at least?
NIMROD: In theory that’s illegal, because when you buy one, you have to swear it’s for your own personal use…. But everybody does it. Sure, I’ll put them in contact. I just hope yours doesn’t have the virus.
URUK: Bursting with health. What scares me, though, is the way they come out with some new language every day. In the end the programs will all get confused.
NIMROD: Don’t worry. It could never happen here. Not in Babel.
1991
On the Impossibility of Drawing a Map of the Empire on a Scale of 1 to 1
«…in that Empire, the Cartographer’s art achieved such a degree of perfection that the Map of a single Province occupied an entire City, and the Map of the Empire, an entire Province. In time, these vast Maps were no longer sufficient. The Guild of Cartographers created a Map of the Empire, which perfectly coincided with the Empire itself. But Succeeding Generations, with diminished interest in the Study of Cartography, believed that this immense Map was of no use, and not Impiously, they abandoned it to the Inclemency of the Sun and of numerous Winters. In the Deserts of the West ruined Fragments of the Map survive, inhabited by Animals and Beggars; in all the Country there is no other Relic of the Geographical Disciplines.»
(from Viajes de Varones Prudentes, Suárez Miranda, book IV, chap. XIV, Lérida, 1658. Quoted by Jorge Luis Borges, Historia universal de la infamia «Etcetera,» Buenos Aires, 1935).
- Requirements for a 1:1 Map
Herein is discussed the theoretical possibility of a map of the empire on a scale of 1 to 1, assuming these postulates:
- That the map be, in fact, one to one, and therefore coextensive with the territory of the empire.
- That it be a map and not a plaster cast; in other words, dismissing the possibility of covering the surface of the empire with a malleable material reproducing every relief, even minimal. In this case the project would be considered, not cartography, but rather the packaging or paving of the empire, and it would thus be more appropriate legally to decree the empire a map of itself, with all the consequent semiotic paradoxes.
- That the empire in question be that X than which nihil mains cogitari possit, and hence that the map cannot be produced and spread out in a desert area of a second, separate empire X2 such that X2 > X (as if a 1:1 map of the Principality of Monaco were to be spread out in the Sahara). In this case the project would lose all theoretical interest.
- That the map be faithful, depicting not only the natural reliefs of the empire but also its artifacts, as well as the totality of the
