The Great Phone Directory of the Earth and neighbouring planets: Chapter 8
Chapter 8
- You're telling me that if you look out of the phone booth you see three billion people there?
- ...and one hundred sixty-eight million, four hundred thousand eleven, seven hundred and twenty-nine.
- And what are they doing?
- They are waiting.
- Waiting for what?
- For you to tell me something useful.
- I think I have already explained that there is no way for me to help you, I'm afraid.
- Yes, but anyway, if you do not mind, I would prefer to wait until this conversation ends to tell them. I really don't want them to get depressed.
- But we don't know how long this conversation will last...
- Exactly.
- So they have no idea that you got lost in the middle of the galaxy and that nobody is coming to pick you up?
- Exactly: right now I am smiling and nodding my head as if you were giving me the most valuable life-saving information.
- Of course. Why don't you also make the "ok" sign with your thumb, come on!
- I could, for sure, if our race had thumbs.
- You have no thumbs?
- No.
- Not a very pleasant thing.
- It's quite uncomfortable, actually, but you get used to it.
- We brag about being an evolved species precisely because we have opposable thumbs.
- I didn't quite get that one: you think you are more civilized just because a finger sprouted in a weird place?
- It didn't sprout. It was already there. At one point it changed of place and became, as I was saying, opposable to the other fingers.
- So, if I have understood correctly, you decided you have the right to rule over your planet only on the grounds that you are the only race provided with an opposable thumb.
- No, no, hang on: also monkeys have opposable thumbs, you know.
- What are monkeys?
- In theory, they are the animals we descend from: a long time ago, we were monkeys.
- You mean that an animal is something that has not evolved.
- Erm... No. Let's say that it has evolved independently, in a different way from us. A little less.
- Animals cannot do the same things that you do?
- Not really. Let's put it this way: an animal understands less things. You tell an animal to bring you the slippers, and the animal will bring you the slippers. It recognizes only a few words, a few precise orders.
- First of all, I really don't understand why is it so important for you that an animal brings you the slippers.
- That way we don't have to make the effort to get up.
- You mean that slippers are located at quite a distance, usually?
- No, they may be in the other room, but this is not the point.
- Now, you tell me what the point is.
- Well, to begin with, that animal is happy to bring us the slippers.
- Is it happy for real, or just making you believe so?
- No, I would say it is happy.
- And how can you tell?
- Well, each animal has a different way to show it. Dogs, for instance, wag their tail.
- What does it mean?
- They move their tail very rapidly.
- And how can you tell that when they move their tail very rapidly it means they are happy?
- It's our own conclusion that they are.
- Have you ever asked them?
- Dogs - and all animals in general - cannot speak.
- And this gives you the right to draw conclusions on their behalf?
- Well, no...
- Or to ask them non-sense things like to bring you the slippers, as if slippers could not come over by themselves?
- Could not... what?
- Call them. Just call them, and watch them coming.
- The slippers?
- Sure.
- Slippers are not alive.
- You are kidding, I hope.
- They are lifeless things.
- You are telling me that you, as a habit, wear dead slippers?
- No, hang on...They are just... things... made of fabric. They were never alive before. We buy them already as they are.
- Already dead.
- You mean that yours are alive?
- Alive and kicking.
- You just call them, and they will come?
- No, that's not enough...
- There, I knew it!
- ...You have to say "please", of course.
- And then it is possible for you to wear them?
- Only if they feel like it.
- I see. Anyway, I wanted to assure you that our slippers don't get killed.
- You wait for them to die?
- No, no, we're on the wrong track here, I really can't make myself clear. Like before, with the opposable thumb thing.
- I think I have understood perfectly. You consider your own race superior to any other on the planet on the basis of groundless reasons and alleged anatomical advantages.
- No, you're wrong here. The advantage of having opposable thumbs is not at all relative: it is, probably, one of the things that has enabled us to evolve and to learn how to handle and manufacture objects... We need our hands, more than our feet - that have no opposable thumbs - to survive.
- But you told me that even monkeys have got hands.
- Exactly.
- So, what's the difference between you? They have no feet?
- No. Well, yes, they have no feet. They have two other hands instead.
- Ha ha! Monkeys have four hands!
- Yes, well, everybody knows.
- So this means no less than four opposable thumbs against your scanty two.
- Yes, exactly.
- See I was right?
- ...and one hundred sixty-eight million, four hundred thousand eleven, seven hundred and twenty-nine.
- And what are they doing?
- They are waiting.
- Waiting for what?
- For you to tell me something useful.
- I think I have already explained that there is no way for me to help you, I'm afraid.
- Yes, but anyway, if you do not mind, I would prefer to wait until this conversation ends to tell them. I really don't want them to get depressed.
- But we don't know how long this conversation will last...
- Exactly.
- So they have no idea that you got lost in the middle of the galaxy and that nobody is coming to pick you up?
- Exactly: right now I am smiling and nodding my head as if you were giving me the most valuable life-saving information.
- Of course. Why don't you also make the "ok" sign with your thumb, come on!
- I could, for sure, if our race had thumbs.
- You have no thumbs?
- No.
- Not a very pleasant thing.
- It's quite uncomfortable, actually, but you get used to it.
- We brag about being an evolved species precisely because we have opposable thumbs.
- I didn't quite get that one: you think you are more civilized just because a finger sprouted in a weird place?
- It didn't sprout. It was already there. At one point it changed of place and became, as I was saying, opposable to the other fingers.
- So, if I have understood correctly, you decided you have the right to rule over your planet only on the grounds that you are the only race provided with an opposable thumb.
- No, no, hang on: also monkeys have opposable thumbs, you know.
- What are monkeys?
- In theory, they are the animals we descend from: a long time ago, we were monkeys.
- You mean that an animal is something that has not evolved.
- Erm... No. Let's say that it has evolved independently, in a different way from us. A little less.
- Animals cannot do the same things that you do?
- Not really. Let's put it this way: an animal understands less things. You tell an animal to bring you the slippers, and the animal will bring you the slippers. It recognizes only a few words, a few precise orders.
- First of all, I really don't understand why is it so important for you that an animal brings you the slippers.
- That way we don't have to make the effort to get up.
- You mean that slippers are located at quite a distance, usually?
- No, they may be in the other room, but this is not the point.
- Now, you tell me what the point is.
- Well, to begin with, that animal is happy to bring us the slippers.
- Is it happy for real, or just making you believe so?
- No, I would say it is happy.
- And how can you tell?
- Well, each animal has a different way to show it. Dogs, for instance, wag their tail.
- What does it mean?
- They move their tail very rapidly.
- And how can you tell that when they move their tail very rapidly it means they are happy?
- It's our own conclusion that they are.
- Have you ever asked them?
- Dogs - and all animals in general - cannot speak.
- And this gives you the right to draw conclusions on their behalf?
- Well, no...
- Or to ask them non-sense things like to bring you the slippers, as if slippers could not come over by themselves?
- Could not... what?
- Call them. Just call them, and watch them coming.
- The slippers?
- Sure.
- Slippers are not alive.
- You are kidding, I hope.
- They are lifeless things.
- You are telling me that you, as a habit, wear dead slippers?
- No, hang on...They are just... things... made of fabric. They were never alive before. We buy them already as they are.
- Already dead.
- You mean that yours are alive?
- Alive and kicking.
- You just call them, and they will come?
- No, that's not enough...
- There, I knew it!
- ...You have to say "please", of course.
- And then it is possible for you to wear them?
- Only if they feel like it.
- I see. Anyway, I wanted to assure you that our slippers don't get killed.
- You wait for them to die?
- No, no, we're on the wrong track here, I really can't make myself clear. Like before, with the opposable thumb thing.
- I think I have understood perfectly. You consider your own race superior to any other on the planet on the basis of groundless reasons and alleged anatomical advantages.
- No, you're wrong here. The advantage of having opposable thumbs is not at all relative: it is, probably, one of the things that has enabled us to evolve and to learn how to handle and manufacture objects... We need our hands, more than our feet - that have no opposable thumbs - to survive.
- But you told me that even monkeys have got hands.
- Exactly.
- So, what's the difference between you? They have no feet?
- No. Well, yes, they have no feet. They have two other hands instead.
- Ha ha! Monkeys have four hands!
- Yes, well, everybody knows.
- So this means no less than four opposable thumbs against your scanty two.
- Yes, exactly.
- See I was right?
English translation by Paola Corazza
© 2009 Gianluca Neri - All Rights Reserved