"I have to run home and change." "Lets just not go." "I'm leaving now." "Five minutes, five more minutes." "Pssst!" "They know you're here." "Don't go back to sleep." "I won't." "Selamat pagi." "Pagi." "You know what Shakespeare said about punctuality?" "Better three hours too early, then one minute too late." "My hand was on the door on time." "So here we are, at the end of it all." "I've done what I can for you, now you have to go out and think on your own time to fly or die." "Still defending Aristóteles, Mr. Zimit." "Up or down. 0 or 1." "True or false." "Fly or die." "you're a slave to binary logic, you know that?" "Logic, being?" "The science of reason." "Or more precisely?" "The power of the mind to form judgment based on strict principles of validity." "Logic..." "Remains after 10,000 years of the human experience, the best way to get through the day." "Though it still doesn't do much for you at night." "Oh, right." "I've read a great line in bed last night." "I was going to mention this." "Philosophy is to real life, as masturbation is to sex." "At least you're reading." "That brings up an interesting point though whether philosophy makes any difference to help people actually live." "I mean, Mr. Zimit would you say that most people who never study philosophy do ok in life?" "I couln't give a monkey's, whether most people do ok in life." "I mean according to who's vapid creed, is doing ok?" ""The definition of a meaningful existance?"" "If we really want to talk about most people.." "Most people are waddling through their days stuffing cheese puffs down their gullets," "Most people are so mush brains they have no hope of solving of the intricate problems they come up against as adult human beings most people by the age of 40 have turn into blubbering nutters" "at least on the inside." "Fortunately, you're not "most people"." "So for you, there's a chance to clear apart through the muck of the world." "And see ahead to the deep truth of things." "Which is why we spent the last year strengthening your mind with the same tools used by some of the best brains in history." "Descartes, Newton, Wittgenstein, to explore in the imagination what they were constrained from exploring in the physical world." "Do we feel like recaping some of our favorite thought experiments?" "The infinite monkey theorem. the classic way to wrap your head around the concept of "infinity"." "Which is so endless that if you put a monkey at a typewriter and let him bang away at it forever, he'll eventually, almost surely." "Completely randomly type out the entire play of hamlet, word for word." "I mean, the odds are nanoscale but he's gonna hit all the rights keys on a row on any given day, but over the strech of eternity across time, without any limit every event has some actual mathematical probabilty of really happening." "Who else?" "I like the trolley problem." "An out of control trolley car is speeding towards 5 people tied to a track but, you can pull a lever and make the trolley swerve into another track" "where only 1 person is going to get run down." "Should you do it?" "If you're being utilitarian about it, you can argue that you did the right thing letting 1 person die to save 5." "But what if the situation was slightly different?" "This time there's no lever to make the trolley swerve but there's an obese man standing next to the track and you calculate that he weighs just enough to derail the trolley." "Do you push him in front of it?" "Absolutely not!" "How's it less acceptable than the first version?" "you're still sacrificing 1 person to save 5." "They're both wrong." "Don't be fooled by the arithmetic it's murder, either way." "Anyone else?" "The ignorant bliss paradox." "You're hanging off the highest tower in Jakarta it's a thousand foot drop to your death so you call your three best friends for help" "they rush out to save you but they're afraid if they try to pull you up, they might be yanked over themselves so they step back." "You fall... and live." "But do you wish you never tested your friends, in the first place?" "Since now you know you can't count on them when it's a matter of life or death." "Would it be better if you stayed ignorant of what their truly good for and gone on being friends forever?" "I'd wanna know the truth cut your loses, and walk on." "You'll find other friends." "You'll fall off other towers." "The good news is:" "Although we're about to part ways." "Not one of you leaves here, lacking the credentials to thrive in the world your all well equipped, to push on to university and become happy, energetic members of a post industrial twenty-first century society." "On the other hand." "What if that society ceases to exist?" "What if your credentials don't mean what you expected?" "And your expectations mean nothing at all?" "I know it's hard to concieve of everything you've based your plans on, being wiped away at a single stroke but It's happened before and it can happen again" "so let's say things do change." "I propose one last Gedankenexperiment a final thought experiment, for our final session together." "Something on a grand scale, something juicy." "Let's invision a global cataclysm in the event of which, how do you survive?" "Uh, the last day of the year is you know traditionally sort of a chill experience for seniors this is starting to feel, not so chill." "Uh, the last day of the year is traditionally, you now still a day which I can fail seniors." "Or at least knock them down a letter grade for refusing to participate." "That's what the academic handbook says." "But what kind of cataclysm are we talking about?" "Gamma ray burst, Pandemic, Erupting super volcano, a sudden shift in the Earth axis rotation, gray goo?" "Hang on chips, we'll get there." "But is it biological?" "Geological?" "Thermal nuclear?" "Meteorological?" "Let's go old school, say Atomic." "Ready?" "Set." "Think..." "Definitely radiological and heading this way." "Sorry, what are we doing in Prambanan?" "Field trip." "Listen up everyone." "We're going to have to take shelter here in this reinforced bunker." "You see the problem." "We're a group of 21 but the bunker is only built for 10." "So we'll share a beds and ration supplies." "Can't be done." "Let me show you why." "You can't share oxygen, every cubic centimeter of breathable air in here once the outer door is sealed, comes from these compressed tanks this place has been enginered to support 10 people for 1 year even 1 person more means, death by hypoxia." "If you try to cram anyone else in, you'll asphyxiate." "The temperature of an impact point is ten million degrees we have maybe an hour before the wind starts dropping fallout." "This is a radiological event that's global in scope to live through it, we'll have to spend a full year inside this bunker which is equipped with a generator and fuel supply to keep it running that long" "which means you have to decide whos valuable enough to expend limited resources on." "I stipulate the existance of 1,000 bunkers around the world times 10 occupants per bunker, that's a gene pool of 10,000 people to reboot the human race with." "I'm sorry, are you saying we are suppose to choose who goes in the bunker and who stays out and dies?" "Because if that's the experiment I'm not doing it." "Well, you have to." "I won't." "It's repulsive." "It's the sort of pseudo-science a gang of nazis would have dreamt up in a big garden, circa 1939." "This isn't a eugenics experiment the goal isn't to improve the human race the goal is to save the human race." "Which means, a commitment to reason no matter how much it hurts." "I decline." "Then we'll be 20 rather than 21 to whittle down to 10." "When the hot particles of nuclear fallout burn through your skin and your organs start shutting down through radiation poisoning, .." "Try not to scream." "Well, I suppose I'm in." "I'm sorry but this one is not for me, so... the thing about an A+, as far as semester grades go it's more than rare, it's practically mythological." "And an A+ in philosophy, there's never been one in the history of this department." "So I have to ask, How does it feel knowing you could've been the first, if only you hadn't walked out the door?" "Bribery is not my very favorite form of negotiation." "Then what about sympathy?" "Let's say if you leave someone else pays." "The difference between an A+ and an A won't change your life, but for example, James?" "A grade that drops form a B- to a C+ that might actually disturb the good people at Cornell admission's office." "You'll risk a faculty review, to keep me here?" "I'm a rationalist." "I know I need the best student in the room, to stay in the room if I want a thought expirement to yield it's sharpest result." "This is one rude "goodbye", you could've just bought us pastries." "I don't have a problem with an atomic holocaust." "That's the spirit." "We are pioneers of the mind in this classroom scholars and philosphers so, this is how it's going to work" "you'll each choose at random a card from inside this box on each card there is a profession based on that profession, your colleagues are going to make decisions concerning your bunker worthiness." "James was last one into the room." "I designate you, first one into the experiment we'll make a punctual man out of you, one way or the other." "Isn't punctuality the virtue of the lonely?" "So, who are we?" "James?" "I am an organic farmer." "I'm a structural engineer." "Real estate agent." "I'm a carpenter." "I'm an opera singer." "I'm a hedge fund manager." "I'm a harpist." "I'm an astronaut." "I'm a PHD in chemistry." "I'm an electrician." "I'm a wine auctioneer." "I'm an orthopetic surgeon." "I'm a house keeper." "I'm a fashion designer." "I'm a gelato maker." "I'm a zoologist." "I'm a psychotherapist," "I'm a soldier." "I'm a United States senator." "I'm a published poet." "You would have never have voted him into the bunker what does a poet bring to the table in the world we are facing, his skillset was the definition of useless." "That doesn't mean you had to kill him." "Was it any crueler than letting an atomic cloud peel his skin off?" "Do you not see the weather?" "And do you really imagine he was just going to sit on a rock and wait to be scorched?" "If you hadn't voted in a slot he would have killed you to get in." "How can you know that?" "Your still not locking on the conditions of the excercise you have a brutally short window to calculate, who deserves a slot on your bunker." "Your one tool:" "Logic." "The variables?" "Your skill sets as indicated on the cards you chosen." "Other than that, you are in the thought experiment as you are in real life." "James, name your best characteristic." "I'm a pacifist." "So he is a pacifist in our experiment it was close call between two people of different gender preference always goes to the girl." "Because child bearing becomes job?" "1 after the apocalypse." "Who are you in this experiment?" "I am the wild card." "A person whose skillset you don't know so you have to assess whether it's worth keeping me around you might learn something from me, that you need to survive." "Sounds inconsistent." "Well then for now just think of me as the chap who enforces the rules." "I'm an orthopedic surgeon." "Which is even better than being a regular doctor, 'cause I specialize in fixing broken bones which I expect we'll have many." "I provide excellent value, so it's hard to envision not voting me in." "All agreed?" "So, I'm a harpist." "It's rather worse than that." "Your a harpist without a harp." "Is that really the measure of a man?" "whether or not he has his harp with him, post-cataclysm." "But even if you had a harp, as far as the survival of the species goes, harp playing is not crucial so who votes to give Russell a slot?" "Fuck it." "Zoology just isn't a skillset we absolutely need we all know about animals." "A carpenter is basic, how can we not have a carpenter?" "If we are going to repair broken equipment we obviously need an electrician." "I don't really know what a wine auctioneer even does." "A fashion designer?" "Beatrice, I wish I could say yes, but how would what you know about clothes help us survive?" "Nelson, you're such a good guy but you're a housekeeper, it's low value." "Omosede is a senator." "She knows the law." "She knows how to negotiate, she knows how to lead." "James is an organic farmer if we can't grow food, we can't live." "A gelatto maker is lovely, truly lovely, but that's it." "A real state agent, in a world with no more houses to buy or sell?" "Look I always wanted to be an astronaut but I don't think we'll be sending ships into space any time soon." "Jack has a phd in chemistry, that's vital in a thousand different ways." "We'll need a mental health professional in a world where we are all going to be traumatized for the rest of our lives." "A hedge fund manager it will be like giving a slot to a vampire." "A structural engineer means we can rebuild houses, bridges, dams.." "What does a soldier contribute except ways to kill people?" "Ways to keep the peace, of course." "An opera singer is essential for entertaiment, for relaxation, for inspiration." "What does Mr. Zimit bring?" "The answer is, we don't know." "He self identifies as the wild card, it's too big a risk." "I think we can survive without an opera singer, at best it's a luxury." "Mr. Zimit is bringing some kind of secret utility, that can really matter." "I would rather have the chance to win big than win small." "All in favor of giving Mr. Zimit the last slot." "We're going to be cooped up for a whole year, let's take 5 minutes and be alone." "I found these in a stream, should I bring them?" "Thanks for staying to save me." "What makes you think I stayed for you?" "Well I think you stayed to save me from getting a "C"." "You can't live without me." "They didn't want to face the agony of death by radiation" "they asked me to help." "I don't want him in the bunker with us." "Listen, I'm going to try some hydroponic gardening while we're locked in for the year." "Maybe get some fresh vitamins in our own system instead of just the freeze dried stuff." "So, if everybody could take a quick look around and bring in whatever plants or herbs you find that'd be a big help." "Better three hours too early, than one minute too late." "Is everybody ok?" "We never saw the bathroom." "There's no condoms." "Sex isn't for fun anymore." "Come look at this." "It's a retreat space to take the edge of cabin fever artiificial garden, phototherapy" "day bed, all to help aliviate de pression." "I could live through a year in a bunker." "I could find the fields, I could rebuild the world." "I can do anything." "As long as your with me." "It's a lie, there is no exit code." "Let's find out." "No, no, no!" "You'll flood us with rediation if it opens." "What if we do need a code to get out?" "Well, we're going have to live through the year not knowing the answer to that." "Can I point out, that instead of writing down he was the only one who had the code he could've just written down the code." " Meaning?" " He was only taunting us." "He knew it'd be a riddle gnawing at our brains for 12 months." "I'm not sure about that." "Why would a bunker need a code to get out?" "Security precaution to prevent someone opening the door too early, without realizing it would kill us." "He wouldn't bury us in here maybe he would." "We did do the dirty on him and lock him out." "364 days till we know who's right." "It wasn't what you'd call a heavenly year." "Life in a bunker on the wrong side of an atomic apocalypse is no joy, under the best of circumstances." "But it's far worse." "When you're there, brooding over the calendar wondering if the end of your first agony, will be the beginning of your next." "Without the exit code, there was no getting out every idea the mind could spit up was tried." "Beginning with the bunker's small armory." "It was all in vain." "The emotional instead of rational calculus used to deny the one person a slot in the bunker who as it turns out could have got everyone safely out again, was now producing it's inescapable result." "Eventually the last container of food from the last storage bin, was cooked and served." "No proper meals followed, only scraps of nourishment from any source available." "Then came an unexpected death a brain aneurysm." "Not a medical examiner was present to say so brought on by acute mental anguish." "Those who couldn't bear what they done to stay alive or what horrors they had to look forward to, until they die, asked for help." "And then, finally, the oxygen supply which had lasted several weeks longer than a year" "Because there had been only 9 people in the bunker, instead of 10, dribbled to a halt" "hyphoxia followed and then it was all done." "Charming." "I was eaten." "I'm a little dubious about only you knowing the exit code it's quite coincidental." "Einstein said "coincidence is just God's way of staying anonymous."" "So God gave you the code?" "I stipulated I was the wild card, which you get in any random sampling." "Your job was to include or exclude me based on what you didn't know about me, you chose wrong." "Because what you didn't know about me, is I'm a bunker builder with the Indonisian defense department as a matter of fact, I built the bunker you just died in." "So it's no surprise I knew the exit code, since I keyed it into the system myself." "Don't worry about it you'll do better in the next iteration." "Next iteration?" "Mont Bromo." "New iteration:" "New location." "But we still have a bunker and we still have an apocalypse." "Everything is in one piece inside." "So how would it be any different this time?" "There's always another angle to any experiment than you saw going in" "No one in the world is defined only by his or her skillset there's always more to the story check the inside of your card hold on, one at a time." "I'm an organic farmer." "Who is gay." "That's not going to win votes." " Why not?" " Because we're stepping things up every bunker around the world is now required to get at least one pregnancy in the works." "Preferably, produce a healthy baby during the course of the year's confiment." "That still doesn't answer my question." "I'm a farmer, I'm gay." "No big deal, I still know what I know about farming and I can still sleep with a girl to get her pregnant, if that's what your talking about." "I still have the right equipment so, whoever wants to vote for me?" "I'm an orthopedic surgeon, who on a trip to Uganda last week" ""foot doctors without borders" was exposed to the Ebola virus may or may not be on the verge of a full blown Ebola hemorrhagic fever." "That's a puzzler, do you risk a slot on a doctor could save your life, if she doesn't drop dead next week." "Or who could just as easily infect you with the virus that will exterminate the whole bunker." "I highly doubt I contracted the disease, I'm sure I'll be fine all in favor of going through the apocalypse with healthcare?" "I don't think that's logical decision making." "I think it's irrational surrender to fear mongering." "I won't be leaving here with warm memories of you, because of this." "I don't care, how warm your memories of me are." "I only care whether I stretched your brains to their largest possible size." "Your a mean bean Mr. Zimit." "And pardon me for saying but somedays your logic reeks of bullshit." "Next." "I'm a hedge fund manager who because of a phobia about Armageddon always travels with 5 million dollars worth of diamonds, zaphiries, gold and platnium in hand" "and unlike paper money it holds its value during war or famine on a cataclysm like this." "Plus she's a girl." "She has girl parts." "Chips, you're up." "I'm a carpenter." "Um, sterile... cool." "Atomic war is going to flatten everything, right?" "So, we're going to need to build new houses, lawns and sheds with our bare hands." "Everything is going to be made out of wood for a century that takes expertise." "I'm voting for Chips." "Thanks, James." "I am a structural engineer, who is also an electrical engineer." "Hard to argue with that." "I'm an electrician." "Who has fibrodysplasia ossificans progressiva it's a very rare disease of the connective tissue." "A mutation." "Every time I fall down or bump into something wherever I hurt myself turns to bone on the inside" "in the end I'll ossify all over." "I'll be a statue under my skin." "I'll only be able to move my lips." "Andy, I'm sorry mate, but that's not so good." "We let you in the first time so you could help get the electrical grid working but if your all turn to bone." "you're not going to be able to climb the transmission towers or even walk." "I could be really careful and try not to bump into things for a few years." "Sounds like a losing battle." "Also, your no treat for the gene pool." "Petra's extra degree in electrical engineering means your skillset as an electrician won't be much missed." "What's going on?" "We already had our blast." "This is worse than before." "We are in the middle of an atomic free for fall we better wrap this up." "Poppy." "I'm a psychotherapist, though its true." "I had a hysterectomy at the age of 12 due to pediatric ovarian cancer." "So you can't have kids?" "I'm a zoologist and I blog at night for PETA." "Well there are no more zoos and no more computers... there are still animals." "Vivian, we are at the dividing line between survival and anihalation." "What do you have to offer after the bombs stop falling?" "I'm a Phd in chemistry, who won the genetic lotto so I won't get, heart disease, lung disease." "Joint disease or brain disease." "Barring a knife to the neck or stepping into quick sand." "I will live to the age of 103 without any serious physical ailment or impediment." "I'm a real state agent but also a midwife a male midwife?" "Yeah, a male midwife, sexist." "We lost our doctor, we need someone who can deliver babies how can we not vote for midwife?" "I'm a gelato maker." "That's it." "There's nothing on the inside of my card." "All against." "I'm an opera singer, so I speak seven langueges we'll need to be able to communicate with survivers from other bunkers around the world." "There's something else." "But, why does the inside of my card say two things?" "And mine said none?" "Must be a typo, keep going." "In three years I'll develop throat cancer and if there's no hospital and no doctor to take out the tumor, I'll lose my voice." "I won't be able to sing or speak even though the cancer will stop just short of killing me." "I'm a wine auctioneer." "I have an IQ of 200." "I'm voting for Mitzie." "Your voting for everyone she's literally a genius." "It's less impressive than it sounds a wine auctioneer who tests well is... not a must have for saving civilization, I'm sorry Mitz." "I'm a fashion designer who created a hit line of womens wear out of bamboo cashmier." "So I'm a left brain, right brain success story." "Insignificant." "All against?" "I'm a harpist, with an autism spectrum disorder." "I'm a United States senator who would have become the first female chief justice of the supreme court" "and the most effective american jurist in the generation." "I'm a soldier with a document eidetic memory the army has me on tape reciting the first 92 thousand decimal places of Pi." "I'm a housekeeper, who is such a good and kind person that the angels will bow their heads as I walk through the gates of heaven, if heaven exists." "And if not, I'm just a nice guy who cleans rooms." "Are we seriously considering this?" "We need more boys." "He is a house keeper." "No nation suceeds without the strong working class he's strong, I say we let in some strength." "I'm a published poet who..." "I'm afraid his slot is for me." "Why would we give it to you now?" "We never got the exit code from him we still need what he knows." "Give me the keys to the truck, now, now!" "I intent to outrun these blasts, I have room for passengers it's up to you!" "Move!" "Move!" "Move!" "Petra, Petra, pleaser." "Petra, please stop!" "Petra, please!" "What happened?" "I walked in on James and Jack." "James and Jack?" "This is how I am now, you know that." "But with Jack?" "Yeah the rules are, except for what's written on the cards we are." "In the thought experiment what we are in real life." "I didn't know my boyfriend was over from Cambridge for Christmas, you met him." "I thought that was your cousin." "My cousin?" "I misunderstood for some reason, I apologize." "You ok?" "At least James can still be your baby daddy." "We can still procreate with him." "I'm not sure about that." "I'm just not sure I feel right about sleeping with a girl for me, it'd be unnatural." "And for the survival of the species you couldn't fake it?" "Which you said you would." "Should I have to?" "I mean do we really understand what the bigger picture is?" "Maybe by not procreating I'm helping the species to survive or even, evolve in some complicated way we can't understand." "Evolve, by not procreating?" "Maybe this a good time to go over how we are going to pair up we need to get a pregnancy going as fast as we can" "and the arithmatic on six males and four females, doesn't leave many options." "First of all, Bonnie and Plum are both having their periods, so they're out for now." "How did you know I'm having my period?" "I'm a midwife." "I can tell." "And I think Omosede has her eye on Nelson, so they're paired up." "Does that sound ok to you?" "Lovely." "Which leaves Petra, who's ovulating and for sperm donation is Mr. Zimit." "What?" "Well you said you were out on principle." "Jack might still be willing to pitch in?" "So Jack is out." "Nelson is already spoken for." "Chips is unfortunately sterile." "And sleeping across religious lines isn't forbbiden per say, in my faith but" "sleeping with a partner who's not otherwise chaist, is." "Which leaves Mr. Zimit." "We do need to multiply." "What, right now?" "Petra?" "Petra, just because I don't want to sleep with you any more doesn't mean I don't love you any more." "It's not working" "whats not working?" "Four women in prime physical condition, ten weeks of intercouse no pregnancies." "Something's not right." "We're ten of the last people on Earth we're stuck in a bunker" "and we're under the influence of an atomic war that for some unknown reason, keeps going on and on the stress alone is enough to stop conception." "The uteros isn't stupid, it knows what it's doing evidently it still needs some help." "I don't like the sound of that." "Do you really still not see it?" "We're not here just to save ourselves we're here to make sure that human life continues reproducing is our highest priority" "multiple partners for the girls and this time all of the boys are going to have to contribute to maximize our odds." "No matter how much one of them doesn't like it." "We are pushing logic hard to try to survive we are extreme philosophers because we have big problems to solve" "but philosophy isn't morality and even logic has it's limit so let me explain this to you." "You will not force me, to be with any boy other than the one I want to be with or different boys on different nights." "If you try." "I will kill you." "Get up!" "Get up, all of you!" "Out!" "Out." "Out!" "All of you, out!" "Not you." "Go!" "Now!" "Move!" "Human beings were built with a design flaw we believe what we feel rather than what is" "which means that the weaker minded among us are... easily 'suade by impassioned arguments." "Even when they're very bad ideas." "I won't have you debating us into extinction." "I'll say what I want, if you don't like it, shoot me." "No!" "One more round?" "We can do better!" "I have a question." "Why did you cough before?" "What?" "Right after I picked my card you had a sort of ... coughing fit." "And you had another one right after Petra picked hers." "You haven't coughed since it's..." "It's curious." "I took a cough drop." "I didn't notice, and I've been looking right at you" "it has secret compartments, it's like a magicians box." "These all say the same thing." "Organic farmer, whos gay" "that's why you had me go first so any card I picked would have been the same." "Then you switched them out so any card Petra picked would have been the same then you switch in all the random cards for everybody else" "first you made me important by making me a farmer" "then you made me irrelevant by making me gay." "Which is relevant and awesome if it's real but why rig it?" "Just to cut me out of the gene pool?" "I get that you never though I was smart enough for your class does it really offend you that much that I'm here?" "Because that's one seriously demented vendetta against one harmlessly mediocre student." "You remember the Allegory of Plató's Cave?" "Yeah." "Sum it up." "A person lives his entire life from when he is a little kid chained to a wall inside a cave, were all he ever sees are shadows and all he ever hears are echoes so ... he assumes that's what reality really looks like and sounds like" "then one day he is unchained and he realizes there were bodies casting the shadows and voices making the echoes" "his whole idea of what was real was just an illusion." "That sounds a bit like you." "Only in your case, chained by privilege and good luck watching shadows of beautiful shapes and hearing echoes of success and thinking "that's how things truly, rightfully and eternally are"." "Well now you got a glimpse through that illusion." "I wouldn't call that a vendetta, James." "I'd call it a tutorial." "I can tell your lying to me, I just don't know what about." "If you really wanted to enlighten me or disillusion me or whatever you're deciding to call it." "I still don't understand why you bother making me a farmer." "Why not a, I don't know, a florist?" "So I'd never make the cut at all." "You know what?" "I do want another round." "You haven't had enough philosophy for one day?" "I wanna go again." "Let's reset and get our doomsday on, one more time." "Please, can we not?" "I'd like to do another." "Let's do another one." "Great." "Just one thing this time, you are a florist." "Are we early?" "Nothing yet." "I'll do a quick check." "Looks like you could use some company." "Can I give you a hug?" "Why?" "Because I know how hard this has been on you." "I'm going to change things now you're not going to like it." "I have a proposition to make we've had trouble deciding who gets a slot the past few times" "but I have a different way we could go, if you're willing." "You all know me." "You know what kind of person I am, for better or for worse so I'd like to be in charge of who's in and who's out and if you agree I promise I'll use my very best and fairest judgment." "I'm staying out of it, you have to find your own fate now." "Is this a joke?" "Is this you staying out of it?" "I have an obligation to step back in if I see a student about to walk off a cliff." "This is who you want to let in?" "A wine auctioneer?" "She has a genius IQ which made her smart enough to pack a case of red and a case of white into the boat for our field trip." "That's a shame." "Because that A+ just vanished into thin air." "A fashion designer?" "Dressing well boosts self esteem self-esteem promotes productivity productivity rebuilds civilization." "A" "Petra this is disordered." "The poet?" "The poet, we would've known if you'd let him describe himself he is also a champion poker player and he brought his cards." "The harpist has autism!" "Some people consider autism a gift." "B+." "She was exposed to the Ebola virus last week." "I'm praying she wasn't infected." "Down to a "B"" "she's an opera singer who's struck with cancer and can't even speak in three years whats the point?" "We could be dead in three days, I'd like to fall sleep to music before it's all over." "B " "Jack, you've got the beautiful difference in your favor and we need to make sure a virtue like that stays in the gene pool." "Sorry I don't mean to sound ungrateful but am I the only one who won't have anyone in here to be with there isn't anyone now" "but what about in here?" "Can we carry over?" "Wait sorry, you want someone who's not out, to come out right now?" "Just to sleep with you in a thought experiment." "We graduate tomorrow." "Now's a good time to make a move." "Out of 20 of us, statisticly, there's gotta be somebody else." "Really?" "Nobody?" "Parker?" "!" "Get in." "You have two slots left." "Choose." "No, he's a florist, there's no way you can justify it." "You're willing to go through life defending yourself every time someone checks your transcript?" "Explaining that you really were the best student in the class but you almost failed because..." "I don't know what?" "I won't let you do it." "Get out of there!" "Get out!" "Get Out!" "Are you looking for this?" "Can I give you a hug?" "I'm going to give back to you now you're going to walk away and find your own fate with it." "Put these away, you'll have them if you need them." "Put them away!" "Put the bullets away and go!" "You can't shoot me, you're a pacifist." "I'll make an exception." "You won't know the exit code without me 7-3-8-7-2" "eidetic memory." "Petra, get in." "I didn't ask to run this so I could save myself." "It's the last slot, Petra!" "Bonnie, get inside." "I'm a soldier, I know how to knock things down, you're an engineer you know how to build things up." "I'm not worth as much." "My logic's fuzzier in my apocalypse everybody is worth as much as everybody else no." "I'm not letting you sacrifice yourself to save me." "I won't let you sacrifice yourself to save me." "Then we'll both go up in smoke and you'll have wasted a slot for someone to live." "Chips?" "Petra." "I't doesn't matter about the slots, we have to go now." "We'll take the boat and get away." "We'll find an island outside the detonation zone there's still time." "Petra!" "I have the keys to the boat." "Let's go." "Let's go!" "So we settle in for a year inside a bunker keeping safe from an atomic holocaust and dispite the horrific circumstances, which should have made everyone of us absolutely miserable, somehow, we had fun." "Toby's cards help" "and good wine" "and poker kept our spirits up specially since Plum had been genorous enough to leave us her gold" "and when Mitzy confessed she always brought along something a bit stronger on out of town trips some of us were glad to know it." "Then there was Shakespeare." "And once a month we had an original poem." "And now and then, late at night, one of us danced" "Because if you don't know what a gelato maker is practicing in his spare time" "you don't know the whole story." "One good thing about the apocalypse:" "All the extra time we are going to have together." "Because I might need the next 20 or" "30 years just to tell you every way I love you." "Now you say it back to me." "I like your nose" "and?" "The way you smile" "and I love your terrible poems" "there's a girl I know named Petra, she's smart and cute, etc," "I like her hair, it's blond and fair and I'm really glad I met ya." "So you only like me for the things I do badly?" "No." "We had an universe to ourselves for a while and in our universe" "we had art, we had literature and we had engineering." "The machine room was a trobe of spare parts puzzle pieces for all kinds of acts of creation and construction and engineers do love puzzles especially in the service of their friends" "Because a harpist without a harp isn't a liability only a riddle to solve." "And finally we prayed" "We prayed for our friends who weren't with us" "We prayed for the other survivors around the world" "We prayed for the animals who didn't have safe places to wait out the troubles" "We prayed for our parents." "We prayed to god there was some kind of greater plan in the works." "And then the year was up." "The bombs never fell" "We're ok." "You mean, your alive?" "And here is what I predict happens next." "True, the bombs never fell where you are." "though the rest of the world was decimated but since you're mostly defficient in skillsets of practical value you can never get back to Jakarta or build new shelters or even grow food and feed yourselves so you die off." "Because where you are, only the smartest survive." "Tragic and powerful, but wrong." "We live... briefly... yes." "Imperfectly?" "Of course." "Stupidly?" "Sometimes." "But we don't mind, because that's the way we're made." "And when it's time to die we don't resist death, we summon it." "This is not philosophy, anymore." "How are you here?" "I found a cave." "I went deep enough down to avoid the radiation that I now see, never came." "After a few months, I lost track of time" "and then I heard you." "I have one bullet left which I will use to kill you, if you need me to" "to stop you from commiting an act so unreasonable it might end the human race." "So, can I just say?" "A tip of the top hat to our boy Chips." "You chose your love life over your actual life in that bunker." "I saw it on your face when you made up your mind to go for the girl." "Petra, I have the keys to the boat." "Let's go, Let's go!" "That did not fail to impress you know what, that's not exactly what happened." "We're listening." "Ok so I ran a little thought experiment inside our thought experiment." "I didn't think anyone would mind if I fiddle with things, just a bit and your thought experiment has hit what premise?" "Whats the point of living if you can't have sex?" "Really!" "?" "Yeah, I was just a sterile kid in a bunker everybody else was starting to pair up to save the human race sex for procreation only, so I would've been the odd man out" "or I could be one man with..." "six women all to myself." "So I found another uninhabited island outside the detonation zone..." "Hold it, I was on that boat too, what happened to me?" "Drowned." "And me?" "Barracuda attack?" "What about me?" "Ah Andy, the day that we arrive at the new island, you had a run in with the palm tree." "You turned to bone by the end of the week because of your hideous disease." "So it was just myself and the ladies." "Me being a carpenter, I built a shelter we set up shop." "Had a girl for each night of the week and on the seventh night, I rested." "Um, excuse me you're sterile why would we have sex with you at all?" "Ah, because that's the flip side to my thought experiment what do you do if you're six girls?" "And you need to start repopulating the human race?" "You've only got one man to work with?" "And he's infertile?" "You try, try and try again." "Any specialist can tell you that in someone my age infertility is more often than not, sub-fertility." "Meaning, even if the odds are only 1 in 1,000 that I can get the job done, there's still a chance" "so yeah, I had defective semen." "But in the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king." "Well friends, I believe Chips has just settle the old question:" "Is philosophy to real life as masturbation is to sex?" "And the answer is?" "Sometimes you want to have a wank and a shag in the same day" "six girls?" "That's nicely done." "Just putting to good use my large sex organ my brain." "Thanks for that, Chips." "Don't forget to leave me your textbooks." "You trouble me, Eric," "taking out your issues with me on James." "Not your finest hour." "He isn't smart enough for you." "How can you still not see it?" "Being smart isn't everything, has it done for you just what you hoped?" "Punishing him makes no sense..." "Because he doesn't know about us." "I'm not sure he needs to know." "Especially after the way you behaved today." "I love him, so leave him alone." "I just couldn't put all the pieces together" "Who could?" "You." "Nobody is trying to take anything away from you." "I got mad at you about going to Cornell." "I still don't understand how he got in." "I wrote his essay for him." "Did you?" "No." "The winters are brutal in Ithaca." "You'll be cold." "I'll buy a sweater." "You honestly believe that Jameses of this world can keep up with you?" "Only in a classroom of overachievers like this can anyone possibly accuse him of being inadequate" "Do you want me to skip college?" "And stay in Jakarta?" "Is that what you're asking me to do?" "There are some, outstanding universities in this city." "Can you imagine, how good we'd be for each other?" "Yes." "But you do know that can't happen." "Of course I know." "Do you know what "apocalypse" actually means?" "Tell me." "It's from the greek." ""Apokalypsis" meaning to uncover what you couldn't see before" "A way out of the dark." "You're sweet talk still needs work." "I'll get on that." "You're a very good teacher, Eric."