"The Possibility of an Island" ""The prophet in Wallonia" "The love of Elohim"" "How wonderful man is!" "In a single human brain, there are more possible connections between nerve cells... than there are molecules in the entire universe." "How wonderful man is!" "In the depths of ourselves, as Spinoza said, we think and feel as though we are eternal!" "...that the wearing out of our bodies; sickness;" "wrinkles; deterioration... are just accidents." ""When I was a child," said St. Paul," ""I spake as a child," ""I understood as a child, I thought as a child:" ""but when I became a man," "I put away childish things."" "My friends, my very dear friends..." "You are not yet children." "You are not even babies!" "You are just formless larvae, roughly hewn." "But you are about to become vibrantly coloured butterflies!" "You are about to be born!" "The whole of Humanity is about to be born!" "My friends, my very dear friends..." "believe me..." "The physical evolution of man is finished, yes." "But his spiritual evolution is just beginning." "Two thousand years ago, Jesus announced the Good News on the streets of Palestine." "And look what's happened, two thousand years later, in Palestine." "The Prophet came before his time." "The promise was not kept." "I am here to announce to you the realisation of that promise." "I have come to offer you eternal life!" "May I?" "Sure." "We are in step with the March of Time." "67 euros and 40 cents." "This little wine is pretty good." "God has left." "He's vanished." "Without God, man cannot survive." "So people are waiting for something else." "They no longer believe in anything." "They have nothing more to say, nothing further to pass on." "Are there any rational reasons left to bear a child, huh?" "For a man?" "People have not resigned themselves to death." "Mankind is unable to resign himself to death." "It is against his nature." "" " You, uh... you don't eat your peppers?" "" " No, go ahead." "I can't digest them." "" " Where are we tonight?" "" " Charleroi." "Charleroi!" "So what's going on?" "Well, I think the box is dead." "" " What box?" "" " Well, the gearbox!" "You mean that we won't get there tonight by eight?" "" " You think we'll get there by eight?" "" " Definitely not." "No, we won't be there by eight." "Three years later." "Let me know how you are from time to time." "" " Yes, of course." "" " Hmm, I don't believe you." "I'll write to you every day." "" " Take care." "" " Don't worry." "" " What do you intend to do now... exactly?" "" " Well, take a guess!" "Why not just live, eh?" "Can't you see I'm fed up with your whole thing?" "I'm going to try and live a normal life." "More and more people all over the surface of the planet are trying to live normally." "All of them try and live a normal life." "6 billion... 8 billion... 18 billion..." "What we are trying to do here, is to prepare the next step." "Because there will be a next step!" "There will be something after humanity!" "Something... different... better..." "Well, that's fine." "I shall leave without true regret an existence which has brought me no effective enjoyment." "Considering death, we reached a state of mind... which accorded with the text of the monks of Ceylon." "That sought by the Buddhist of the Lesser Vehicle." "Our life, at the time of its disappearance..." "is like a candle flame we extinguish..." "We can also say, in the words of the Supreme Sister, that "Our generations succeed one another," "as the pages of a book."" "A few years later, I got an alarming letter from my father." "He asked me to come to his bedside as soon as possible." "We can admit it: it's an old crate!" "The landscape is really beautiful, eh?" "I was very surprised by the prices." "Can you believe that I only had 399 euros when I left Brussels?" "It's a sort of package..." "Accommodation, excursions, uh... all-inclusive for the entire week, and even the drinks are included." "It's really cheap, isn't it?" "My wife left me last year... and since then, I decided to travel." "It's much better than moping at home." "Just imagine - she moved in with a guy who's not even 23 years old." "I told her:" "listen girl, you do..." "You do whatever you like, uh... please yourself, but I am not sure he's going to stay with you for long." "Wait and see what happens when you become old and ugly." "Anyway...." "Well, have we got a hotel, then?" "Are we organised?" "Welcome!" "Did you have a good trip?" "We were a little shaken by the end, but let's say it was almost pleasant." "Your name, please?" "" " One person?" "" " Yes." "" " I've also rented a car." "" " Okay, for car rentals... go to the end of the parking lot, and you'll see the counter." "Thank you." "Well then, I'll see you at the hotel!" "We'll have a drink by the pool!" "Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, welcome to the Miss Bikini Contest!" "Have we got some pretty girls for you today!" "" " Now what's your name, honey?" "" " Ilona." "" " Ilona!" "Where are you from Ilona?" "" " Budapest." "Ilona from Budapest." "That city's hot!" "And tell me Ilona, who's your rival in today's Miss Bikini Contest?" "" " Dacha from Kiev." "" " Dacha from Kiev!" "And tell me Dacha, you think you got what it takes to become..." "Miss Bikini?" "Now tell me, how old are you sweetheart?" "" " Fifteen." "" " Fifteen!" "" " Is that all?" "" " Yes." "I'll have to wait!" "Floor 43." "Sorry son..." "we're gonna be late for the next town." "What's going on?" "You're leaving already?" "Actually I did not come here on vacation." "To tell you the truth, there is a sect that settled here in the west of the island." "A sect?" "But... what kind of sect?" "One that believes in extraterrestrials." "Actually, one that believes extraterrestrials will bring us eternal life." "What?" "You'd be involved with those people?" "Yes, I knew them before..." "You could well have been indoctrinated in there, you know?" "You know, it's just one of those things - it's not uncommon." "Do you have a mobile phone?" "Of course, like everybody else!" "I brought my GSM!" "So it starts with: 00 32 for Belgium 478 161, and again 161." "Why do you want my phone number?" "Just, uh... to be able to contact you, just in case." "By the way, I've written down everything I know." "All right." "Any trouble finding the place?" "It was okay." "How long have you been settled here?" "About two years." "" " Wait for me, I'm going to announce your arrival." "" " Okay." "Help me!" "Some water." "Feel better?" "I saw you in a dream..." "three days ago!" "You were on a building site..." "ALGECO amid a wasteland sitting behind a desk, a telephone next to your hand no documents on the desk only the telephone." "And you were hesitating to phone..." "Where was this?" "It was after the end of the world." "Right after the end of the world." "The heater was turned all the way up..." "It was hot!" "And you?" "How's life?" "Hi!" "I don't understand where you're going." "" " Will he really come or not?" "" " But of course he'll come!" "A week, ten years, three months, uh two days, one day!" "Go down and talk to him." "I'll explain later." "What we call our personality our ideas, our traits, our memories... all these are formed through neuronal circuits, and gradually strengthened by an accumulation of sodium and potassium ions." "At the moment of death, when the electric current stops circulating in the brain, all those connections vanish in minutes." "What we must manage to do, is to store the neuronal structure in the form of a what we call an engrammatic imprint, to re-programme the brain of the new body." "So it must be stored on... on the computer?" "In a way." "What you see there, is an engrammatic imprint which was conducted on myself last week." "The figures are concentrations of sodium and potassium ions... measured in different parts of the brain." "We do the same thing for every follower when he joins the movement." "So what is scrolling on the screen is a simplified image of your brain, right?" "The problem is that, at present, the most powerful computers we know how to build... have only a billion circuits, whereas a medium-sized human brain, contains a hundred billion neurons, each of which may establish tens of connections with adjacent neurons." "There is of course another problem which is that, unlike computers, the neuronal structure evolves continuously throughout life." "Do you really believe he might succeed?" "I used to believe in it as much as you do!" "In any case, he believes in it." "And the other one up there, has always believed in it." "And you, do you believe in it?" "We have 80,000 followers today worldwide." "We are present in 64 territories." "Tomorrow, we'll receive national delegates... to celebrate, together... the thirtieth anniversary of the announcement... of the message of the Elohim." "And you no longer need the Elohim?" "!" "But I believe in Elohim!" "Do you have an idea of the size of the universe?" "Can anyone seriously believe that we are the only intelligent species in the universe?" "What difference does it make?" "I believe that a religion cannot exist without belief in something superior... to humanity." "Oh well, that's what I think." "I'm dying Daniel." "Tomorrow at the anniversary evening I am going to announce to the delegates that for me... the moment has come to leave this embodiment." "I am also going to announce them the coming of a successor who will have to carry the message and who will lead Humanity... to eternal life!" "My successor, will be you." "Say!" "I'm very glad to see you!" "" " Here!" "" " Thank you." "As you can see, I haven't opened it." "So, how's it going?" "Is the hotel nice?" "To be frank..." "I'm only semi-happy with my stay here." "...having arrived to find the tennis courts under renovation, the golf course still unfinished..." ""All-included" they said." "What a letdown!" "I was disappointed by the excursions." "As for the activities I'll spare you the picture, eh?" "Grab the tiger's tail, push the monkey..." "Yes, but in the end we get tired pretty quickly, eh?" "No, all this has been quite boring." "In fact, I'll be happy to get back to Brussels tomorrow!" "What do you do in Brussels?" "" " Well..." "I'm a police inspector." "" " Ha, I would not have guessed!" "I know." "You can't tell at first glance." "I'm here for pleasure though." "I don't deal with sect-related matters, anyway." "There are colleagues of mine who do that full time." "We have a lot of sects in Belgium, you know." "We're not spared from that either." "But never mind." "So..." "You don't think that this is a dangerous organization?" "No." "No, on the contrary." "Go figure." "One wonders if our life is truly better than theirs." "I'd be curious to know." "But, basically, what are these people proposing?" "Immortality." "That's one thing we all want to believe in, eh?" "It serves as fodder for religions." "They're all the same." "Well, in this case, uh... they are supporters of more..." "scientific methods." "" " You mean, uh... cloning?" "All that stuff?" "" " Not really cloning because they want to directly create new human beings in their adult form - in young but grown-up bodies." "I see..." "Eternal youth, to put it plainly." "Yes, it is a beautiful dream." "Yes, but if it is not the same individual and it remembers absolutely nothing," "I don't see what we can get out of it, eh?" "Well, that's exactly the point... they want to transfer the contents of the brain, to preserve its thoughts and memories." "You seem to really believe it, eh?" "I do." "And I think that science will manage to do it." "We have always lived with aging and death." "We've come to think of it as the human condition." "But, basically, these are only technical problems." "Good grief!" "I think people are going to listen to us." "Anyway, they have no choice anymore." "The prophet has represented these prehistoric scenes so well, with its massacres and cannibalism in the semi-darkness of this gallery." "The cities of the future will be ruled by cannibals and predators." "They will be everywhere." "I can imagine Mexico, the city of my soul, as a large nameless metropolis" "E383, B27... pervasive chaos; total chaos." "It terrifies me!" "For my part, what moves me even more, is the parallel that the prophet draws between prehistoric woman and the modern woman." "Her solitude is identical, but for one detail:" "The little dog." "It is only a little mummy's doggy;" "a domestic pet." "Exactly - the dog symbolises civilization." "The authentic progress; unconditional love." "I love your new perfume." "The dog is the wolf's successor." "As for us, we are creating Humanity's successor." "Smile at me." "Your lips are like two morning stars." "Oh please, Carlichou!" "Eternity is within our reach." "Once man is able to create life, we will be in a new millennium." "As always, the prophet is right." "The prophet gives us more than hope." "He gives us certainty." "No?" "Indeed." "My friends." "My very dear friends!" "Welcome, from the bottom of my heart." "On this very night," "I will go through death." "Professor, wait!" "" " May I ask you something?" "" " Yes, of course." "Tell me the truth." "Sorry?" "Are you sure you can do it?" "You doubt it?" "Soon, you too will have this power of going through death!" "Where I go through, soon, you will follow... behind me." "My friends." "My very dear friends!" "Small children!" "Listen to me carefully!" "Death does not exist!" "Only life is real!" "Are you ready?" "Yes." "In reality, it took three centuries to reach the goal... that Miskiewicz had set, right at the beginning of the 21st century." "But the first generations of neo-humans, were created through cloning process, from which they sought to free themselves much sooner." "The final phase of The First Decrease, that is to say, the melting of ice that was supposed to lead to the immersion of the whole Asian continent, with the exception of Tibet... and divide by twenty the Earth's population... took place at the end of the 1st century of turmoil." "The neo-humans, protected by a fault-proof security system, and equipped with a highly dependable and productive system... and an independent communication network," "shoud have survived that trial period without any problem." "They shoud have survived with the same ease until The Second Decrease... brought upon by The Great Drying-Up." "The disappearance of human civilisations... that occurred throughout The Second Decrease... was marked by the resurgence of tribes, and of barbaric habits and cults." "A violent and lawless future was awaiting mankind." "Many were already aware of this even before the onset of the first turmoils." "The fact that they knew in advance could not have allowed men to prepare, nor even to think about, a solution." "Humankind, teaches the Supreme Sister, had to realise its destiny of violence... until the final destruction." "Nothing could have saved it, assuming that such a rescue was even desirable." "Come on." "Up to now, I have never seen any trace of the large predators." "And it is mostly in tribute to an ancient human tradition that I kindled a fire, every night after I pitched camp." "Fox easily returned to the atavisms acquired by the dog, ever since it decided to follow man... many millenniums ago, before returning to its place at the side of the neo-humans." "I still have not have understood what humans meant by Love." "I still have not have understood the multiple and conflicting meanings they gave to this word." "However, after these few weeks of travelling through the inner lands," "I've never felt myself so near Love." "I had reached innocence, a harmonious and absolute state of mind." "I was happy."