How to Be a Hero in an RPG

Since becoming the proud parent of an rpg (and faced with the usual paternity-suit sticker shock), I, Dmitri Gheorgheni, have made certain observations about the behaviour of my fellow Researchers in cyberreality which might – I say might – possibly have some nodding resemblance, a soupcon, perhaps, to the problems some of us face in what I have learned to call RL. (Although I question the accuracy of the term – how do you know you’re not a brain in a vat, Professor Putnam?)

Teleportation - An Inside Look

As someone - I can't quite remember who - once said, the secret to flying is to throw yourself at the ground and miss. Teleportation (or quantum locomotion, if you prefer) operates on a similar principle - forget that you have a body.

The first thing that is difficult for those who were brought up on planets to understand is that you are not your body. Those beings raised in a eco-dependent biosphere have trouble believing this, because it is counterintuitive. After all, you came into existence on the planet as the result of some sort of reproductive process on the part of your parent or parents, be it sexual congress, spawning, cloning, or simply spitting on the sidewalk¹. You live within the biosphere, subject to its laws of energy exchange, requiring food and liquid to maintain your body², and then, finally, your body gives out, and you die - that is, you disappear from your native biosphere, and all your friends and relatives are unhappy, and hold a funeral³. And, as far as anyone within the biosphere can tell, that is that. End of story.

The truth of course is quite different, as it so usually is in these chronicles.