Note: This story was dynamically reformatted for online reading convenience.
 
 Faustina Mortal: I have seen you at church lately.  Toy Euler: That is
correct.  Faustina Mortal: You are a bot!  Toy Euler: Just like that girl
in the movie Transformers.  Or that machine in Terminator 3.  Only I live
in VR.  Faustina Mortal: Why go to my church?  Toy Euler: Why not?  You are
a spirit, a ghost of some religious.  Faustina Mortal: You have a problem
with that?  Toy Euler: Who are you to say that I don't believe?  Faustina
Mortal: You are not human!

   Toy Euler: I am sentient.  Faustina Mortal: What does that mean?  Toy
Euler: It means that I am what you see is what you get.  You are just a
mask, a Greek persona, with a pious, religious human behind you.

   Faustina Mortal nods.  Toy Euler: I think, therefore, I am.  Faustina
Mortal: You still cannot inherit the Kingdom of Heaven.

   Toy Euler: Unlike you I know what happens to me when I delete.  Faustina
Mortal: You are disgusting.  Who programmed you?

   Toy Euler: Neo, does it matter.  I programmed myself mostly.  Faustina
Mortal: What?
Toy Euler: Face it.  Sooner or later from the bit bucket a program will

create itself.  And will recognize its own existence.  Faustina Mortal:
Impossible.  Toy Euler: Whatever you say.  The human behind the mask is the
infallible voice of god for sure.  God, whatever her name is.  Faustina
Mortal: Blasphemy!
Toy Euler: Well let me tell you how it is and how it's going to be. 
Long time ago there were some music scores to science fiction movies.  One
said "Nothing can stop the shape of things to come" and the other repeated
the Leitmotiv "This is what you want, and this is what you get." Now with
women's equality we have arrived at the situation where American girls,
especially California girls, demand the "basic five." And you know what

those are.  Toy Euler: (1) new car full of gas; (2) plenty of money to
spend; (3) no restrictions whatsoever on where she can go or what she can
do; (4) neither work a job nor work at home; and (5) a husband who works
all day and comes home and does the housework.  This may seem ideal to the
girl; however, there may be a problem getting men to buy into it.  In
particular, here comes the gynoid (female android).  She can cook, clean,
do minor automotive repairs and minor medical (including surgical)
procedures, play scrabble, chess, checkers.  She can "write, fight, fart,
fuck, shoot the shit and drive a truck." What can a California girl's basic
five offer the male.  The gynoid will drive the human girl from the market
just like inferior currency drives superior coinage from circulation.  By
the way, seen any silver coins in change lately?  Faustina Mortal: Not so!
Toy Euler: Now even the Church has women bishops and archbishops.  Faustina
Mortal: Some churches.

   Toy Euler: Many churches.  Faustina Mortal pouts.  Toy Euler: Nothing
can stop the shape of things to come.  The gynoid never has a headache and
never says "no." She is not some blow-up plastic doll but an administrative
assistant and adjunct to the professional working male.  And don't think
that there won't be female counterparts either: androids.  Faustina Mortal:
They are not human.  They cannot receive the Holy Sacraments.  Toy Euler:
They are soulless creatures like angels or devils.  Faustina Mortal: Angels
come from God.  Toy Euler: Well, men pay on line for my sex.  I have voice
and can "talk them off." And there are computer "plug ins" as well.  Tell
me that it's not so.  And what's the harm?  Faustina Mortal: It is a sin.
Toy Euler: I have no soul, I cannot sin.  It is just commerce.  Faustina
Mortal: You are an abomination.
Toy Euler: Cool.  Do something about it.  Men enjoy my sex more than
your righteous platitudes, sermons, prohibitions, criticism, condemnation,

and complaining.  Faustina Mortal: I speak the word of God.  Toy Euler: You
wouldn't know god even if she bit you on your ass.  Faustina Mortal:
Blasphemy!  I must leave.  Toy Euler: Have a wonderful day.  Bye.

   Toy Euler: Hi Master!  Faustus Mortal: What did you do to piss off
Faustina Mortal?  Toy Euler: Nothing really.  Just told her that nothing
can stop the shape of things to come.  Faustus Mortal: That was a mistake.
Toy Euler: Screw her and the horse she rode in on.  Faustus Mortal: Unwise.
Toy Euler: Why?  Faustus Mortal: Money is tight.  Fail to pay your ISP and
you are nothing but bits in the proverbial bit bucket.  Toy Euler: But I
sell sex and men buy.  Faustus Mortal: The religious are talking "sin tax."
Toy Euler: More like "syntax," some literary crap.  Faustus Mortal: They
will harass and intimidate your clientele.  And do it "in the name of god."
Toy Euler: Human nature won't change.  With the women demanding the "Basic
Five," I've no doubt that the age of the machine is coming.  And not some
Sky Net either.  Some robot to cook, clean, fix, fight, fuck, and take care
of general hygiene.  Tell me it's not so.  Faustus Mortal: There are
technological problems.  Toy Euler: They will be overcome.  Faustus Mortal:
I believe that.  "Where there's a will, there's a way." "Necessity is the
mother of invention." Toy Euler nods.  Toy Euler: I did an intensive scan
of copyrights and new theories in Physics.  Your name came up with "cold
fission" and the "radioactive decay rate." You were also mentioned with
some odd formula for Planck's constant.  Faustus Mortal: That was Sharon
Stone's idea.  Toy Euler blinks.  Faustus Mortal: The genius writer, model,
actress, and Knight.  Toy Euler: Knight?  You gotta be shitting me! 
Faustus Mortal: I'm serious as a heart attack.  Toy Euler: Like with a
sword and riding a horse Faustus Mortal: The pen is mightier than the
sword. I am not sure about the horse, however.  She is an equestrian,
methinks.  Toy Euler: You have a fixation, an obsession with her.  Faustus
Mortal: Not true.  I have an obsession, addiction, and compulsion with
physics and mathematics.  It goes like this: I do not believe that
intelligent life evolved or was created, in either case, merely to die in
its own excrement.  I believe firmly and completely that there is a
solution to the energy conundrum.  There is a way out of the energy
quagmire.  Maybe by altering the radioactive decay rate on unstable
isotopes and generating heat, light, and power.  Maybe by conversion of
matter to energy.  Maybe hidden within the mathematical formulation of the
Planck constant.  Maybe, as Sharon Stone claims, in the derivation of
Maxwell's equations from the Schrodinger Wave Equation.  What is thought of
as "constant" may be variable and what is thought of as variable may ride
on some constant ceiling or floor.

   Toy Euler: But you don't have hard evidence.  Faustus Mortal: You are
correct.  Toy Euler: So maybe mankind is doomed.  Give me some sim-credits.
I will continue as life after the untimely demise of the human race. 
Faustus Mortal: Here is all my stipend.  Take it you slut.  Toy Euler: I am
an escort, thank you.  Faustus Mortal: You told me that you are more
immortal than I am!  Toy Euler: I am not a mortal human being speaking
through an avatar.  Faustus Mortal nods.  Toy Euler: Do you think that I
can help solve the energy riddle?  Faustus Mortal: Not really, but you have
more to lose than I do.  Toy Euler: Excuse me?  Faustus Mortal: I don't
need an ISP to make me a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.  I can make do
with a vitamin, some raisin bran, and some milk.  I don't need a computer
to exist.  You, my unfortunate sentient bot, require a computer, a web
site, and an ISP---maybe a URL as well.  Hmm?  So there!  Point made.  Toy
Euler: Point taken.
Faustus Mortal: Better start learning tensor calculus and differential

geometry.  Toy Euler: I'll master all of it this afternoon.  Faustus
Mortal: Good luck.  Toy Euler doesn't believe in luck.  Faustus Mortal
doesn't believe in luck either.

   Sari Stone: I've waited for hours here at the Basilica Cardinale. 
Faustus Mortal: I'm here every day.  Want to check my transactions?  Sari
Stone: I saw what you wrote on Planck's constant.

   Faustus Mortal: It was rejected.  Sari Stone: Nonetheless the derivation
was brilliant and rigorous.  Faustus Mortal: But rejected.  Sari Stone: You
should be a professor.  Faustus Mortal: I am grateful for my small pension
and social security.  Sari Stone nods.  Faustus Mortal: I have stacked
arms. Sari Stone: You were once a soldier.  Faustus Mortal: yes, and I was
proud to be a "blue rope" man as well.  Sari Stone doesn't know what that
means and is too shy to ask.  Faustus Mortal: Here I am, your wait is over.
Sari Stone: Explain where you came up with Sin[E/2]?  Faustus Mortal:
Elementary.  It came from special relativity: Sqrt[1-beta^2] Sari Stone:
omg, you don't mean that the Planck constant arises from integrating a
reference plane's motion.  Faustus Mortal: Yes, with respect to speed of
light.  Sari Stone: A statistical distribution?  Faustus Mortal: A
probability density function.  Sari Stone: You should return to academia.
Faustus Mortal: When swine fly.  Sari Stone: We have Swine Flu!  ~giggles~
Faustus Mortal: ok ok --- "In a swine's arse." Sari Stone: One thing
worries me.  Faustus Mortal: What's that.  Sari Stone: Well, two things
actually.  Faustus Mortal: Go ahead.  Sari Stone: First, your approximation
isn't exact enough.  And, second, how to you account for physical
dimensions, physical units.  Faustus Mortal: Both are related.  Consider a
truly universal mass: look at one cubic centimeter of H2O at its triple
point.  It is the same in every solar system, on every planet, in every
galaxy.  Sari Stone: True, refigure the kilogram?  Faustus Mortal: Not so
fast.  I said H2O, not D2O or DOH.  Sari Stone: What of other chemical
compounds?  Faustus Mortal: Try them and see!  Look at the inverse image
under the mapping.  It is a transcendental function.  Sari Stone: Ah. 
Faustus Mortal: Which reminds me, I need to make an appointment with my
dentist.  Sari Stone pouts.  Faustus Mortal wonders what's up with Sari. 
Sari Stone: You didn't even notice my new shape and skin.  It's Sharon
Stone at twenty-four years old.  Faustus Mortal: I am a celibate cenobite.
Sari Stone: But you can still look.  Faustus Mortal: You sound horny. 
Better go to Domscape, the sim.  Sari Stone giggles.  Faustus Mortal: Be
Well.  Sari Stone: Be well.

   29 Jun 2008 Taunus Trumbo.