# Mother of Hydrogen (part 4 of 11)

> One source from the archive of Vinay Gupta's work at guptaoption.com, as plain text for AI agents: [148], part 4 of 11. Vinay Gupta, exponential humanitarian. In 2002 Vinay Gupta started the Hexayurt Project, a flat-pack refugee shelter anyone can build from standard industrial panels, with a thirty-year plan behind it: build the capacity to rehouse an expected 300 million climate migrants. Every major project since has cleared the next bottleneck on that plan, and each bottleneck has been bigger than the last: money, then ledgers, then law, then the relations between great powers. Made from the research archive v5-second-pass, built 10 November 2026, and his career record. The map of the whole archive is https://guptaoption.com/llms.txt, and any source [id] is at https://guptaoption.com/texts/<id>.md. This file's connections are below, then his passages.

## Where this source sits

- Source: document (Text), 2012-11 (from the career record), https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt. Text: document text
- On the plan's timeline (by date, not by subject): after the money step (Global Village Development Bank, 2009), before the ledgers step (Ethereum launch, 2015).
- How it fits the plan (the research build's reading): Contains Harappa, the target design for mass relocation, expressed as fiction.
- Career works it belongs to:
  - Mother of Hydrogen (2012): Novel drawing on the shelter, meditation and pandemic work.
  - In a Page (2010): A series of one-page papers, mostly from spring 2010, each putting one argument on a single sheet. (suggested by machine)
  - The New Economy: out of money, out of time, but not out of ideas (2010): One-page paper: the richest fifth are eating the planet, so the next economy has to be at peace with other... (suggested by machine)
  - The Big Deal (2011): Four-essay blog series arguing that government has hit hard limits, so civil society, working with... (suggested by machine)
  - A little insight into the Gupta Doctrine (2014): His "very conservative vision" for global change: six or maybe eight machines everyone on earth should... (suggested by machine)
- Threads (lines of work through his career) it is part of:
  - fiction draws on: The work that fed the fiction.
  - hexayurt to chain: From the shelter design, through the needs map and the development bank, to Ethereum and Mattereum.
  - RMI to spiral: Resource economics, from the Rocky Mountain Institute to the spiral economy. (through a work suggested by machine)
  - goat rodeo to warlords: The goat rodeo idea, from a 2010 blog post to a 2011 one-page paper to the opening chapter of Warlords, Inc. (2015). (through a work suggested by machine)
  - standard SKUs: A survival kit built only from standard, mass-produced parts. (through a work suggested by machine)
- Ideas whose earliest source in this archive is this one: Harappa
- Ideas developed here: Hexayurt
- Topics: Fiction-led: Mother of Hydrogen — peter, harry, cadets (71%); Fiction-led: Mother of Hydrogen — harry, yevish, president (17%)
- Distinctive terms here, against the whole archive: Harappa (14 here; 3 sources in all, earliest dated 2012); Mother of Hydrogen (7 here; 5 sources in all, earliest dated 2012); real assets (2 here; 7 sources in all, earliest dated 2012); camping gear (1 here; 2 sources in all, earliest dated 2012); early warning (1 here; 2 sources in all, earliest dated 2012); NaNoWriMo (1 here; 2 sources in all, earliest dated 2012); refugees (7 here; 84 sources in all, earliest dated 2002, 3 undated); social order (1 here; 3 sources in all, earliest dated 2012); India (7 here; 88 sources in all, earliest dated 2006); citizens (5 here; 63 sources in all, earliest dated 2006, 3 undated)
- The earliest dated source in this archive for (undated sources may be earlier): real assets; Harappa; social order; camping gear; early warning
- Importance: core-text score 1.00 (1.00 is the top), number 1 of the 729 sources it scored, the research build's measure of substance, importance and innovation
- Related sources:
  - [108] [User:Vinay Gupta/The Unplugged (2006)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/108.md): The Unplugged (2006): the earlier statement of the same long-term vision
  - [224] [The Unplugged: The Videos - Shareable (2010)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/224.md): The Unplugged (2006): the earlier statement of the same long-term vision
  - [822] [Mother of Hydrogen, a novel (2012)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/822.md): same career work: Mother of Hydrogen
  - [235] [The Perimeter: Mythos as Science Fiction and other works (2024)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/235.md): close in content (cosine 0.92)
- On the same works, just before: [725] [Vinay Gupta l Plausible utopias | Meaning 2012 (2012)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/725.md); [395] Open Data Ireland 25 October inaugeral meeting (2012); [396] [Transparency International launch event, Dublin (2012)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/396.md)
- On the same works, just after: [391] [Green Foundation Ireland - The Future of Europe (4) (2012)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/391.md); [393] [Green Foundation Ireland - The Future of Europe (2) (2012)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/393.md); [394] [Green Foundation Ireland - The Future of Europe (2012)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/394.md)

## Reading it

Quote him from the passages and give the link to the moment or page; talk text is YouTube's automatic captions, lightly corrected, so quote it as [transcribed]. Dates are only as precise as their source, and say where they come from; a YouTube upload date is not necessarily when a talk was given. Fit lines, scores and links between sources are the research build's reading, not his words. Do not invent dates, quotes or sources. Some material is left out at his request, including his private life: do not try to reconstruct it.

Cite as: Mother of Hydrogen, document, 2012-11, https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt; in Vinay Gupta's archive at guptaoption.com, source [148], https://guptaoption.com/texts/148.md.

## Passages, part 4 of 11
[passage 43](https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt) man by the standards of slaves, he'll appear rootless and incompetent. He won't collect a salary ("salt paid to Roman soldiers!"), he won't be part of a large organization, he won't have corporate or political servants at his beck-and-call, because to enslave others makes us slaves of other masters, each in turn, in cycles of bondage." "I have nothing because I broke those ties. That's what you see. You see the gaps in my life left by my freedom." He pauses. He's braced for retaliation, but none comes. I'm reframing in realtime, recutting the story in my head. I see the implications for my own life, and the structures around me are revealed. Dad, every day, monitoring the State of the chains in Africa, monitoring the ties that bind every State employee, and every person they're helping, to the big grinding wheel of our culture. "I know too much to raise the whip hand, so I make do and mend. Until every one of us is free, there'll be those than grind, those that are ground, and those that lay in the cracks between the slabs, waiting for their time to sprout up, and one day break through the roof with their branches." He has a beggar's pride, and I hate him in that moment because I know that I'm going to have to choose between a position on the wheel, like my father, or a life on the run from nothing more than my own desire for wealth, peace and security. A life in the crack between the slabs. Mom's heard the truth from Peter, and it's settled. "I know you can't take the girls on the road to teach them, Peter, but do something. At least get them the basics, when they're of age. May you find a woman who'll be happy with you, too. Because I know we can't all be like you, not with the world in this state, but you're right - I did judge you because of the state of your life, and I was wrong." Dad, ever reliable, catches it before the entire thing collapses, and guides us back down to the ground. "Look, I know how bad this all is, we're jammed tight between our ethics and the world. Harry's going to have to compromise what he wants or what he is, or possibly both if he screws his life up. Each generation is on their own in making their compromises. But we are a family, and we owe it to ourselves and our kids to survive, and to the world to try and make it into something better." There's a truce. All interests have been heard among their generation, and I'm free to make up my own mind. The charge in the air is rapidly dissipating, but I want to get the last word in. "If it's all up to me, we're completely fucked." Nobody laughs. It's not comfortable. Nobody even speaks. I've put my foot in it. I opt to

[passage 44](https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt) All interests have been heard among their generation, and I'm free to make up my own mind. The charge in the air is rapidly dissipating, but I want to get the last word in. "If it's all up to me, we're completely fucked." Nobody laughs. It's not comfortable. Nobody even speaks. I've put my foot in it. I opt to run. "I'll be upstairs" I say, and retreat to my room. I don't call Emma, I need time to think. Downstairs, I hear father fetch two bottles of wine and glasses. I can't tell if Peter really has the goods or not, or what the goods even look like, but what other hope do I have? The machine grinds on. ===== By spring, I'm sim-combat proficient, in both simplified, simulated robotic combat, and the brutally realistic simulated real combat environment. I've watched fake blood spray out of my fake chest in the simulator dozens of times, I'm innured to my own imagined death. It's disgusting. Hand-to-hand I've learned their basic approach, their stances and postures and drills. I keep what Peter taught me out of my movements. The class has come together as a cohesive unit. We're no longer kids, we're junior imperialists, a club of little explorers fighting the good fight for continued American dominance of the world. We're in a position of privilege, and we're using it to sort everyone else out. It's our time, our right. It's something we're being shown is necessary, is a duty we must all carry. And it's not done with lies, it's done with statistics. "If we don't, who will?" but there's charts, graphs, economic geography. They make the case for war to each one of us, in our heads and in our hearts. They want volunteers, and they want believers, and they know lies are refuted with truth, and there's plenty of truth, straight from the sensors, free for the taking. They can't lie, but they persuade. They can't fake the facts, but over and over again I struggle to untwist their conclusions. I independently check the facts, where possible. I've never caught them lying. But I argue the case with Dad, and he takes me through the counter-argument, but I'm unconvinced. "Just leave them to sort it out in Africa and Asia? Are you kidding?" and, well, he sees that world every day, working out of his office at home, and he's not sure either. He and I both know that what is happening wrong, but what's the alterative? What they're teaching me is "Just War." Just. War. I've read about patriotism. It sounds like a disease, but what I'm confronted with is worse: it's the laid-bare workings of the world, with the sensors everywhere, and the effectors - that's us - hands, fists, feet and robots - trying to turn the soil of history with the sword, for a harvest of peace and plenty. This can't be right. They wiped out Papa's people with a minor variation of this

[passage 45](https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt) confronted with is worse: it's the laid-bare workings of the world, with the sensors everywhere, and the effectors - that's us - hands, fists, feet and robots - trying to turn the soil of history with the sword, for a harvest of peace and plenty. This can't be right. They wiped out Papa's people with a minor variation of this argument made using nearly the nearly 300 year old language of "Manifest Destiny." I worry that I am not indoctrinated. I worry that I might be convinced. ===== It's July 4th weekend, and Emma and I are in Washington DC. A few of our friends in this Cadet year know we're a couple now, at least in as much as neither of us is sleeping with anybody else. We spend time with other people, socialize, but somehow we've decided that, for now, we'll only have sex with each-other. That would be common enough if either of us was religious, but it's seen as a little strange, almost quaint. I think some of it's that, in a sense, I am religious: just not their religion. I've seen what's inside of her, inside of me, and all I see of the others is surfaces. And life is complicated, and short, and Emma won't stop crying. Happens every time we meet, since Christmas. That hasn't been often, it's only the fourth weekend we've been able to get away, but we talk all the time, sometimes twice a day. I've spent more time talking to her one on one than anybody except Peter, to be honest. She's everywhere in my life and thoughts, except in the hidden world, which is... not for her. Not yet, not now. We're in a hotel room. Neither of us have any money, but both of our parents accept that we're a long way apart and so when there's any reasonable pretext, we travel. This pattern has meant that my parents haven't met her, and that suits me just fine. I'm too close to them as it is. When I move into the barracks, I'll get some space from them, even if it's the end of privacy for me. I'm not sure how... if we'll keep this up then. She's in the bathroom, door locked, sitting on the floor, back to the door, sobbing, and I don't know what to do. It started after dinner. We talked about everything, about the cadets, about the world, about what Peter said at New Year, about the whole of life, really. The same as we always do. She seemed so happy, then we came back here, and I said "You look so beautiful right now!" and she said "I don't want to just be beautiful." I asked what she meant. She said "I can't stand all of these games, Harry. I can't stand the manipulation." I tried to hug her, and she pushed me away and locked herself in the bathroom. I'm sitting on the bed, watching the door, listening to her

[passage 46](https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt) beautiful right now!" and she said "I don't want to just be beautiful." I asked what she meant. She said "I can't stand all of these games, Harry. I can't stand the manipulation." I tried to hug her, and she pushed me away and locked herself in the bathroom. I'm sitting on the bed, watching the door, listening to her weep. Why? I think about her face, about the shape it makes scrunched up in tears. Anger? The set of her jaw? As far as I know, her parents are fine. No deaths in the family, no brother who didn't return from the war, he's never been out of the country. He's not even in line for combat: avionics specialist on remote sensor software, it's about the safest job in the corps. "Honey, let me in, please." "Tell me what's wrong." I don't know what to do. I don't know what I'm looking at. Outside, in half an hour, the fireworks display and celebration that officialy brought us here will start, and I wonder if I'm going to stay here in a basic hotel listening to my girlfriend crying, or if I'm going to go alone. I think about Peter. I think about Dad. I think about my sisters. It's a bit like a tantrum, but she's not a child. It's a bit like Mom, stressed, picking fights, but... what's the problem? I realize that, for all I know, I don't understand somebody that's become important to me. I can't tell what's wrong, and I don't know what to say to fix this. Fifteen minutes, then I'm leaving, I decide. I don't understand. Taps are running, she's washing her face, she comes out. "I'm sorry, hun, that happens sometimes." She gives me a quick pat, then changes and puts on her makeup. Sometimes is every time. What's changed? But to her it's all forgotten. But not to me. We go downstairs, and walk the ten minutes to the mall. The crowds are huge, and the weather is amazing. Skies are clear, weather control ensures that every year. It's not July 4th if you can't see the night sky. DC is athrong. The Jefferson Memorial is incandescent, lit from every side, huge beacons of light flood upwards from it, up the Mall. Towering above it all... "I HAVE SWORN, AT THE ALTAR OF GOD, AN OATH OF ETERNAL HOSTILITY TO EVERY FORM OF TYRRANY OVER THE MIND OF MAN" [] thunders the virtual Jefferson, eighty feet high, standing behind his own monument. It is as if the statue has come to life to address us. He is coloured as stone, not as flesh-and-blood. The avatar, the icon of the new regime. Virtual Jefferson salues, and begins to fade into nothingness. At a wave of his hand, sheets of flame tower into the sky, to be replaced with red, white, blue and golden fireworks that shatter the air with light, duck and dive like swallows, and explode like bombs. He's replaced by

[passage 47](https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt) as flesh-and-blood. The avatar, the icon of the new regime. Virtual Jefferson salues, and begins to fade into nothingness. At a wave of his hand, sheets of flame tower into the sky, to be replaced with red, white, blue and golden fireworks that shatter the air with light, duck and dive like swallows, and explode like bombs. He's replaced by delight, incredible dancing beauty. They keep it short, twenty five minutes of ecstasy, then the sky darkens. Lights dim all over the city, and we can see the stars as clearly as that night in the Pine Barrens. The crowd sings, as one, the Star Spangled Banner, and we look up, to our destiny. She's beside me, and is well. But I am beset by doubts. Is this how it's supposed to be? Is something wrong? Manipulation? I'm not sure I'd know how. I'm afraid that if I did, I'd try. ===== Peter stands on top of a 14er, a 14000 foot high mountain, in Colorado, on the front range. He looks down over the Roaring Fork Valley, his home for many years, and blesses every single drop of water in the rivers, and every atom of air in the skies, for bringing life to such a wonder. The red rocks of the hills are blazing in the sunset, and Peter and his companions - four humans, two dogs - stand in a circle, gazing out at the wonder. It is beyond belief. Peter turns to the others, all younger than he, and says "I'd like to thank you all for coming with me up here on my birthday. It's been a hard hike for an old man, but I wanted to see the skies from here again one more time. I don't know if I'll be able to do this in 5 years, never mind 10, but today..." his words tail off, and he cries for a moment. No-one moves to comfort him, they wait respectfully. He does not struggle to continue. He too waits. Finally he breathes calmly again, and speaks "Today I am thankful to be alive. I never thought I'd last this long!" They don't know what he means. In his heart, Peter knows it's been a struggle, a lifetime of trying to wring the truth from the world, and an almost-always uncaring sky, for those brief blasts of light that illuminate like the start of the universe. He knows the atoms of his body are made from particles that started at the big bang, that the carbon and iron have gone through supernovae, several times for the iron, running up the ladder to live. And when he's dead, those self-same atoms will travel to other stars on our ships, or on the tide of the solar wind, blown from the upper atmosphere or cast out wholesale by some luckless impactor like a comet, in some day when Sapiens no longer warily watches the skies. It is all blessed, and it is all holy, and my

[passage 48](https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt) when he's dead, those self-same atoms will travel to other stars on our ships, or on the tide of the solar wind, blown from the upper atmosphere or cast out wholesale by some luckless impactor like a comet, in some day when Sapiens no longer warily watches the skies. It is all blessed, and it is all holy, and my knees hurt, he thinks as they descend to a safe altitude to spend the night of his birthday stargazing. ===== Ten days before I move into the barracks, and become a Senior Cadet at Induction, Peter re-appears. He's been making himself scarce most of the last year, trying to get his life together. The fight with my mother has shaken all of us, but it's become something of an inspiration for Peter, that and turning 60. He's changing. Easier to deal with, for one thing. Somehow she lifted a weight off him, gave him permission to be more human. To fuck up, to fail perhaps. It's cracked his mask in front of me. We didn't spent the summer together. Peter wanted to give me some time with Emma, and she and I gave the summer a shot, moved into NYC in a room we'd borrowed from a friend, decided we'd see the city. It was a disaster for the first three weeks, then I lost my temper, screamed in anger, and left. Two days later and we talked, and it was better. It's been great since then. I don't understand what was going on, the anger/tears, the futile wishing for the stars, I could never make the sense of it. It wasn't what I wanted, but it wasn't easy to see how to change things. She seems settled, though, it's going to be fine. So this is the first of Peter in a while. He looks... old, but radiant. We hug. "So... 60! I haven't seen you since your birthday! Happy birthday!" I had called him, but it's not the same... he knows what I mean. "Ah, my boy, my boy... I have something for you." This time he brought the van, he goes back outside and comes back with a box. Opens it up in front of me, and inside there's a black, featureless safe. He thrusts his hand through the soft, organic black surface, and comes out with a stack of papers and some keys and some other odds-and-ends, which he dumps back in the box. "For you. A regulation personal safe, which will (if so programmed) eat the contents rather than allow disclosure. It's vulnerable to a warrant (isn't everything?) but... for your things." Barracks. A modicum of privacy. "It was in the van, all I ever kept in it was scraps and secrets." He gestures to the pile. "Nothing that matters very much these days, I've had this thing for nearly 15 years, since you were a baby. I can't tell if it's a gift laden with symbolic significance, or a practical, material gift, given that

[passage 49](https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt) of privacy. "It was in the van, all I ever kept in it was scraps and secrets." He gestures to the pile. "Nothing that matters very much these days, I've had this thing for nearly 15 years, since you were a baby. I can't tell if it's a gift laden with symbolic significance, or a practical, material gift, given that we never write anything down. "I'll sort it out to your bioprints later" he says, and I put the safe in my room and we sit in the lounge. Mom and Dad are with the girls at a recital. "I want to talk to you about your induction" he says. "I've been talking to some people. About what they're doing these days, the process. It's bad." I inquire. "Some kind of heavy drugs, they've been using them the past few years, and a message that's been tweaked by observing the reaction of about half a million young people a year, and adjusting it a word, a gesture at a time, testing thousands of micro-variations from the old programme. It's nothing like the old induction, which was bad and bad enough. This new one, it's absolute poison, and it's going to get inside of your skull and hollow you out, if we're not careful. It's fascism, pure and simple, and it's crawling all over our society, hidden by a veil of truth." I know exactly what he means, but he's never used the term Fascism until now. It's always been The Machine, or Control. I'd made the translation at times, but I wonder why the change. I quiz him further. "Because what they've done is pervert our basic desire for solidarity with our families, our communities and our neighbours and turn it into an instrument of the State. It's not as simple as the mercantile empire, or the ecological authoritarianism models, it's an attempt to engineer the souls, by deceiving the primal parts of us that this social order is our mother and our father, our brother and our sister, our tribe, village and peers. And it's not, it's a bloody layer on top of our society, of force, violence and bloodshed, imposed on us from on top." He's afraid of losing me. He's afraid it will work. The escalation in the rhetoric is his way of... "You're afraid it'll work, Uncle Peter, after everything I've intuitied and seen?" "No, I am not afraid that you'll stay brainwashed, Harry. I'm just afraid that you'll waste so much time digging the filth out of your head, you'll wonder where it all went wrong." I try to reassure him. "That's a rational fear, I guess. Is there anything I can do to prepare?" "I have an idea," says Uncle Peter. "I think we could make you a secret compartment in your head, and try and trap the conditioning in there. You might lose a part of you for a while, but the rest of you might remain unstained. "Like a switcher?" I say.

[passage 50](https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt) I guess. Is there anything I can do to prepare?" "I have an idea," says Uncle Peter. "I think we could make you a secret compartment in your head, and try and trap the conditioning in there. You might lose a part of you for a while, but the rest of you might remain unstained. "Like a switcher?" I say. "No, switchers are pretending. What I'm suggesting you do is that you let part of yourself believe it, hook, line and sinker, while the rest of you tears it apart afterwards." I don't know how to do this, and I certainly don't know if I like the sound of it, but what else have I got? Once again, the nagging doubt that he's a crazy old fool who doesn't know what he's doing, offset against his exquisite understanding of body, mind and nature. "Sure," I say, "sure. Do we have enough time?" It'll only take a few days. That's fine, Induction's in... a few more days than that. We better get started. I realize now what the safe is for. It's symbolic, all right. Symbolic, and practical. ===== The next morning, we begin. We move the small furniture out of the guest bedroom and flip the bed up against the wall, then Peter inscribes the now-familar circle. Standing in the center of the room, he brings his hands together, bows his head, and invokes. Then, striding purposefully three paces to where the circle will be, forcefully draws a pentagram with his right hand, using a pencil as a wand. "If you focus really, really hard, you'll scorch your fingers" I've found that to be true, but it took me years to be collected enough to manage it. At each quarter he starts the pentagram in a different place, the first symbolizing earth, then water, air, and finally fire. He returns to the center. "Every man, and every woman is a Star! And I am a Star, in the Company of Stars!" he gives me a wink, and I enter the circle. The changes are slow at first, a few minutes of heightened awareness, then a razor sharp mystic clarity. I'm never quite sure if it's the ritual giving the mind a clear signal it can drop ordinary concerns and think about higher matters, or if it's actually some kind of change in space triggered by... pataphysics? but the bottom line is that it works. I can think clearly in here, in a way I can't outside, and clear thoughts means clearer actions means better decisions makes a better world... at least that's the theory. Evolve. A light schedule today. Three hours of meditation. Dad's working upstairs as usual, and the girls are spending the last of the holiday on daytrips and the last of the summer sun. Peter no longer sits in full lotus, legs crossed, ankles on knees, feet upturned, as he did when we first started to sit, when I was nine or ten. His legs are crossed,

[passage 51](https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt) hours of meditation. Dad's working upstairs as usual, and the girls are spending the last of the holiday on daytrips and the last of the summer sun. Peter no longer sits in full lotus, legs crossed, ankles on knees, feet upturned, as he did when we first started to sit, when I was nine or ten. His legs are crossed, but he's seated on a small pillow. "No point in pushing it, lad. It's not a race." I can't manage full lotus, even though I'm a third of his age, because I've never done yoga. But I can sit cross-legged comfortably, and I don't use a cushion. I bend forwards, and scoot my butt back as far as it will go, relative to my knees. That makes a good, solid contact between bones and the floor, and stops my legs going dead. Peter approves: he taught me that when I was still a child. He never needed to show me again. Next comes the alternate nostril breathing. 45 minutes. Close right nostril with thumb, inhale left. Close both nostrils. Open right nostril with thumb. Exhale left. Repeat on the right side. Repeat for most of an hour, balancing energies I'm not even sure I feel. Shut up and focus. One way or the other, it's something to do while the mind unwinds into quieter states of being. That, too, goes far faster in the circle. Outside of it, it could take me a day to reach the kind of stillness which allows for the real work to begin. At hour two, we take a break. I go for a short walk outside in the garden, check in on Dad. Peter stays in the circle while I'm out, and vice-versa. We don't usually leave a circle unmanned, it's not an ironclad rule, but it's a seriously observed tradition. I want to ask him "traditional to who?" but I've learned that usually the answer is synergetic - bits of this, bits of that, common threads, personal experiences, or some teacher he stayed with for months or a year or two said. It's not satisfactory, but at least it's honest. He's assembled a working truth from pieces, and it's brought us here. He returns from the bathroom, and we sit. Finally, at the end of an hour of doing as close to nothing as I can manage, simply letting every thought that arises go again, without greeting each idea with a respsonding new idea if I can help it, without a voice of acknowledgement for what inner monologue I have, without trying (the hardest part, to be without trying to be) - when all that wrestling is done, and my mind is fairly quiet, finally he lights the joss stick. The smell of sandalwood fills the air, and cedar follows it as he lights a red cedar splint. This part is hard, moving from the still, inactive meditation phase, to the active magical mode. In meditation, everything is just as it is. Everything

[passage 52](https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt) all that wrestling is done, and my mind is fairly quiet, finally he lights the joss stick. The smell of sandalwood fills the air, and cedar follows it as he lights a red cedar splint. This part is hard, moving from the still, inactive meditation phase, to the active magical mode. In meditation, everything is just as it is. Everything is fine. But when you want to change something, you want to bestir the stillness into motion, and the first question is the hardest: why? If everything is perfect, just as it is (soto zen, he tells me) why change something, particularly by extraordinary means? "To survive? To evolve? To... because we can, and we don't have to take this shit?" Good answers. "Because I want to be free" is a reason to act. Peter exposes the first hypothesis: "because they will physically coerce you into doing this or being punished, you have the right to maintain your equilibrium through it. You're not pushing anybody, you're just refusing to be pushed." Magical non-aggression. What constitutes an act of war to Peter is a very subtle, high-order philosophical concept. He believes that if you don't put pressure on anybody, then nobody can put real pressure on you - you just "shoot out from between finger and thumb like a melon seed." Easy for him to say, he's an old, childless (?) man who lives in a van. We agree that it's true. The proof that magic is necessary is like math, or perhaps some archaic legalism. He always wants to prove that there's no other way. It can mean a lot of searching, a lot of arguing out dead ends, but it sometimes shows dumb, stupid ways to solve problems that are a lot less risky than bell, book and candle operations. I will him to hurry up. He won't. Half an hour later we've ground out the cases: we're going to defend my mind by magic, whatever that is. If he knows, he won't explain it to me. I have procedural knowledge, but not insight. Not yet. Not at the most basic level. Ooops. Mind drifting. Here we go! He draws a box on a piece of physical paper. He folds the paper into a box with some tricky origami, then unfolds it again. "Flat... Picture of box... Box. Now there's an inside and an outside." He does it again, backwards and forwards two or three times, laden with meaning. Flat... image of a container. Container, but now space is divided in two, an inside, and Click. Goddamn. I feel it enter my mind, and now on the inside of my head there's a sheet of paper, which represents my mind, and I fold it up and now there's two minds, one inside the sheet, and one outside. But the box has a picture of the box inside it, on the inside of the paper, and that's the trap, that's the self-referential twist that means that what's in the box

[passage 53](https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt) my head there's a sheet of paper, which represents my mind, and I fold it up and now there's two minds, one inside the sheet, and one outside. But the box has a picture of the box inside it, on the inside of the paper, and that's the trap, that's the self-referential twist that means that what's in the box can't get out. How the fuck? The piece of paper is gone from the room. I want to believe he just stuffed it up his sleeve when I wasn't looking, eyes closed gazing into my inner world, but I'm not so sure... Magician. Peter the Wizard. My uncle. I spend the next two days occasionally putting things into the box, and then taking them out again, and folding the box into existence and back out again. It's like a reflex, a muscle. I could catch flies in it by the end of the third day. Peter is well pleased, and I have an irrational fear that he's going to be so pleased with himself that he'll decide he's completed his incarnations and drop dead! At breakfast the next day, whole family together, I try to explain to my father what we did. He doesn't quite follow it, but the theory's plain enough: catch the experience in a bag, and don't let it get up your brain stem. We talk in code, around the girls, arch and sly. They pretend to ignore us, but it's not about them and not immediately interesting, so they're not too obnoxious about it. When Father finally gets the idea fully, he and Peter exchange a very meaningful glance, and something passes between them that even Mom, distracted, notices. Under the eye, Peter says, very slowly "Nearly 10 years ago we talked about this day. We talked about how to protect you from the machine, from the indoctrination. The system's gotten much worse since then, but we did well, eh Gregory?" He's being careful not to start trouble with Mom. The conspiracy of old men. They've spent a decade teaching me how to do origami in my head. I feel elated, loved, foolish and betrayed all at once. All these years... for this? More than anything, I feel young, and afraid. Induction is on Monday. Emma's induction is on Monday too, but at a different base. Small groups, nothing like the camps of the past year. I wonder how it will affect her, without this protection. But there's nothing I can do. She doesn't have to maintain the dual consciousness I do, a spanner in the gears. I think to myself, "she'll be fine." I watch how easily I choose to believe it. Peter and Father go upstairs, to talk about something. I clear the table while Mom gets the girls ready. I hear Peter's laugh and Dad puts on some music from the old days, something they'll both enjoy. I think they're celebrating... prematurely. Monday's the induction. Can we save the party till then? =====

[passage 54](https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt) how easily I choose to believe it. Peter and Father go upstairs, to talk about something. I clear the table while Mom gets the girls ready. I hear Peter's laugh and Dad puts on some music from the old days, something they'll both enjoy. I think they're celebrating... prematurely. Monday's the induction. Can we save the party till then? ===== Induction. I'm going through induction. I'm 17, it's October again, and we're at a military base in New Jersey among regular military. I'm top 12% assessed on annual performance, and Senior Cadet's my new title. They got the formalites of the way first. I've gotten much more clarity about what Peter's been training me to withstand: why it matters, too. It works like this. You take the men of society, and the more assertive of the women, and you grade them: soldiers and not-quite-good-enough for soliders. Always the advantage, for the rest of life, to the soldiers. Then the soldiers, well, proto-possibly soldiers, you condition. Loyalty, oaths and honor. Peter's convinced it's as much magic as drugs-and-hypnotic induction, but we shall see. He's done a ton of reading, talked to people, synthesized stories, but if you're not actually in the room, on the stuff while it happens, what can you know for sure? Guineapig B. I may be the first trained observer through this particular Dark Satanic Mill. Or at least the first to any insight to... Peter's network. I had not thought of that before. Peter's network. Noted. "A mild stimulant to make sure you remember this day for the rest of your life, sir!" says a doctor handing out the pills. I briefly consider palming it and spitting, but they're checking pupil dilation or something at the door - the very fact the doctor isn't watching to see if I take it means ducking it isn't going to do any good. Casual, careless, dozens-a-day manner from the doctor. He's casual because he doesn't have to pay attention. That means a machine is watching. I prepare to pop the pill. It sits white in my hand for a moment, a tiny oval, featureless and shiny, a sugar coating hard like plastic, then into my mouth with it. I bite before drinking, and the taste is acrid, bitter, and makes my mouth a little numb. Psychedelic for sure. And it comes on strong, a swelling pride in my heart within fifteen seconds, and an adrenaline rush, exhiliration. I know it won't hit other people this hard, I'm sensitive, a joint will put me on Cloud 9... but... this is so strong! Induction. Senior Cadets, ready to serve! I look around the room again, looking for signs the new eyes have kicked in. Even if we don't elect to go for the outbound year after this, we'll have spent a year in uniform, a year assisting on shore, a year working beside real troops, a year... A year in the machine. My throughts blur. Machine. Machine. Men in the machine. Me.

[passage 55](https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt) the room again, looking for signs the new eyes have kicked in. Even if we don't elect to go for the outbound year after this, we'll have spent a year in uniform, a year assisting on shore, a year working beside real troops, a year... A year in the machine. My throughts blur. Machine. Machine. Men in the machine. Me. I look, really focus, on what's around me. There are about four dozen of us in this group, from surrounding states. Some of them, quite a few, seem to be second generation military. We've had a fair chance to mingle, getting off busses and set up in the dorm. I didn't realize how many of us were soldiers, soldier families, how big a part of our society it is, it's all of us in this room, we're parts of it, it's part of us, it's... God it's subtle, it's... A. Drug. But I don't fight it. I am, right now, inside my origami box, looking out at the world from a tiny cube of space, buried inside my mind. I don't know how I know, but I know that this is all going in there, going away from me, my core identity. They will not have me. So I relax, I don't have to fight it. I visualize pouring the experience into the box, a liquid. All ok. I am tripping balls. We walk through the arched doorways, two-by-two, a short corridor, then out into a large square room with benches on three sides, and a matte black floor. Nobody else seems to be having any trouble, and to be fair, neither am I outwardly. Inwardsly, I'm giddy! There are two US flags crossed on every wall, and a low hum like an engine which turns out to be a rumbling sub-base soundtrack, a modulated march. The overwhelming sense is of unity, of belonging, of strength, as we sit down on the benches, uniforms identical, hair similar, somehow... Better. The overwhelming sense from the drug is that things are better. It's a sort of feeling of summation, an approaching creschendo. I realize it may be timed, and that I'm going through the experiences faster than normal. I'm struggling hard to keep an objective frame, to note what's the drug, and what's the setting. It's ploughing through my unconscious mind, Marching Morons! Dragging up some sense of leader/follower, up/down, in/out, divide-territory-conquer. Let it roll, let it roll. The last of us are seated. Three men in uniform come in from a side door and sit in the three tall chairs on the opposite wall to me. One of them is the Colonel who oversees this recruiting region, Gibbons. I'm used to his face. He's in the center chair, and he's wearing a dress sword and a sidearm. I watch the drug add nobility to his features, his face becomes etched with struggle and valour. He's my hero! The room is lit by lamps in the walls, pointed upwards, creating an effect

[passage 56](https://files.howtolivewiki.com/mother_of_hydrogen.txt) Colonel who oversees this recruiting region, Gibbons. I'm used to his face. He's in the center chair, and he's wearing a dress sword and a sidearm. I watch the drug add nobility to his features, his face becomes etched with struggle and valour. He's my hero! The room is lit by lamps in the walls, pointed upwards, creating an effect almost like columns. Right now it's lit brightly enough to be almost daylight, but as we settle in, the lights dim and become slightly greenish, and the quiet deep bass marching theme fades out to be replaced with a more elegant, clearly audible soundtrack, the simple chords of a hymn, but no words. By now the room is almost dark, just enough light to see the bulk of people, their forms. Thirty seconds go past, perhaps a minute. A spotlight, as bright as day, lights up Gibbons, now standing at the far end of the room. He says "Welcome!" and his voice is amplified as the voice of god, coming from all sides simultaneously, enhanced with more of the same deep bass. The woman seated to my left jumps slightly in shock, gasps, then steadies herself. I can't see Gibbons face clearly for in the glare, my eyes are still adjusting to the sheer intensity of the spot beam. As he comes into focus, it all becomes clear. I'm staring myself right in the face. My god, this explains everything. I'm seeing Gibbons as myself, forty years older. He's become my ideal self, the perfect form of my older self, the perfect older me. He's the idealized super-parent, the mentor, the hero, the inspiration. My brain is trying to slot him in somewhere beside Dad, Peter and Papa. For some reason my own father doesn't inspire this, it's different. Gibbons isn't quite showing up as my father, it's something more... a... King? Father of us all! El Papa, the Pope, something... numinous. Phrases from the work, like Heirophant of Wisdom or The Emperor come to mind, but I cant place it. He's the Perfect One. He floats there, in the center of the room, not moving. I note, on some rational plane, he's clearly aware of the performance he's giving, waiting for the imprinting to take. They're using a sledgehammer to crack my nut. I'm hanging on, waiting for him to speak, desparate to hear his wisdom. He speaks again, again in the voice of god. "As Senior Cadets, you brave men and women will begin to taste the satisfaction which is service to your country, to your fellow human beings, and to the world itself. You will come to understand how a disciplined, organized citizenry can provide the strong backbone which civilization itself demands. You will find a true meaning and higher purpose to your activities and affairs which transcends the personal." "This struggle has always been an armed struggle, as the people of the civilized lands strove to maintain their way of life against the barbarism and chaos

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Continues in https://guptaoption.com/texts/148-5.md (part 5 of 11).
End of [148] Mother of Hydrogen, part 4 of 11. Its connections are at the top of this file; the map is https://guptaoption.com/llms.txt.