2005 short story loosely about P-zombies
post by Airedale · 2010-11-24T18:12:15.828Z · LW · GW · Legacy · 3 commentsI thought some of you might enjoy this 2005 story published in Asimov's:
Second Person, Present Tense by Daryl Gregory (plus some of the author's notes on the story)
The story involves a a drug that (for a period of time) turns someone into a P-zombie.
It's currently available for free on the Asimov's page, but it may only be there temporarily.
3 comments
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comment by cata · 2010-11-24T22:57:42.505Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
A neatly written story. After the immediate setup, the thing that struck me most as unusual and intriguing is that the author assumes a qualitative difference between, on the one hand, "having access" to your memories and experience (and your other brain function) and, on the other hand, really having that experience be a "part of" you, helping to construct your personality. I'm not sure that difference makes any sense at all, but it fits with the picture he paints of a mind that is just composed of little actors with internal structure, one of the actors being your "self."
comment by Manfred · 2010-11-24T22:13:28.018Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
Gregory's version of consciousness seems to be pretty causally important to me. After all, when your consciousness changes, you act like a totally different person!
So the story doesn't end up being about p-zombies, but is still pretty interesting. Or, perhaps, is interesting because it's not about p-zombies.