Flash! Fiction 3 by Peter McMillan - HTML preview

92

The Dissertation

I was taking my lunch on the Common, and I overheard a conversation. Normally, I don't eavesdrop, but I have this new cell phone with a stealth sound amplifier, and I really wanted to try it outdoors.

It was incredible! I could hear everything ... 50 feet away! On a bench facing the fountain was an old couple. He was snoring and she was muttering something to the pigeons. A young woman was chasing three little boys who were chasing geese and then being chased by the geese. Then, there were these two ... from the college it looked like.

One spoke agitatedly. He was a graduate student ... in Philosophy and Neurophysiology. The other one had that professorial look about him — elbow patches, bifocals hanging around his neck, wispy white hair and a raspy baritone.

"Brain in the vat," I heard quite clearly, and that got my attention. I'd studied it when I sat in on one of those night school courses you see advertised in the subway. Sounded like mad science sci-fi not Philosophy, but all us guys in the class thought it was kinda cool —

in theory. What if the 'external world' IS created by our minds or brains and what if we could create one of our own choosing?

"We have to do this. It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity," said the student.

"It has to be carefully thought out. We can't be rash and take needless risks," said the professor.

"But you said yourself, Professor, there's never been a better time."