"Levinson, Paul - Dr Phil D'Amato 02 - The Consciousness Plague 1.0" - читать интересную книгу автора (Levinson Paul)

"...Poetry was likely initially invented as a memory-aid," McNair was saying. "Rhymes are Velcro of the mind. According to McLuhan, poetry became appreciated as an art form only after writing made oral memory unnecessary the Iliad and the Odyssey shift in their roles from textbook histories to epic entertainment. Not everyone was happy about this in the ancient world. In the Phaedrus, Socrates worries that the written word will cause everyone's memory to atrophy. Fortunately or unfortunately for him, his pupil Plato troubled to write this wrong prediction down...."
This guy was good.
Ah, there she was! I finally caught sight of Claudia in a quarter-profile of red-brown hair, in a row near the front and off to the side. She was seated next to a woman with a light green scarf. That would be Amy Berman, Claudia's friend and a graduate student here. She had told Claudia about McNair....

THE THREE OF us waited for him after the lecture Amy had taken a course with McNair at UCLA last year. "Shall we repair to O'Neal's for suitable libation?" McNair asked after the introductions were complete. I like the use of "repair" in that way.
"Yeah," I said, and we all repaired.
Alas, my cough seemed beyond repair this night, but I did my best to keep it in check with alternate sips of wine and water.
"So, Amy tells me you recently had a memory loss," McNair said to Claudia.
She nodded, and gave him the details. I offered my bit.
"Yes, I can see how that sort of thing could be distressing, especially to a police officer," he said, sympathetically. "But I never heard of a cough or a flu causing any sort of amnesia. It probably was psychological I don't mean to make light of it, I'm sure it was real to you but that would be my guess, speaking as anthropologist and not a physician, of course,"
"Is there any connection you can think of, in history, between illness and memory?" I pressed.
"Well, plagues, of course, can jeopardize institutional memory, if they're savage enough," McNair replied. "The Black Death killed as much as three-quarters of the population in some parts of the world in the fourteenth century a century before the printing press. Must have wiped out at least some unrecorded advances in knowledge." He sipped his cognac.
"But that would be knowledge lost through the death of individuals," I said. "Like the solution Fermat claimed he had, but never published. Those things are fascinating to think about. But I'm really wondering, instead, about any epidemics on record that seemed to take away an evening, an hour, from those afflicted. Because " I coughed several times, harshly, as if to underscore my question. "Excuse me." I took some water. "Because I'm concerned that might be happening now."
McNair regarded me. "Do you have any evidence of this? Beyond anecdotal testimony like Claudia's and your friend's? I'm not belittling what they experienced, but surely as a scientist you "
"Of course " I coughed again. "Of course you're right to want something more substantial. But so far it's all sub-rosa. Odd instances." I took some wine, "I have a friend in Atlanta who's looking into it."
"My daughter had an odd experience like that," Amy said. "She got an A on an anthropology test, and swore she had no memory of taking it."
"Really? You look too young to have a daughter taking an anthropology course!" I blurted out.
"Thank you." Amy smiled. "I'm thirty-four. Mindy is thirteen, and she's in a special gifted program."
"Well, I'm glad to see the program offers courses in anthropology!" McNair said, beaming.
"Did Mindy have the flu or a cough before that incident?" I asked, and of course started coughing again.
"Hard to say," Amy replied. "The kids have been in and out of the doctor's office ever since that heat wave in January...."
I realized that I was feeling more feverish myself. I pushed back my chair and made to leave. The place smelled of fine spirits, but I needed fresh air. "I better get back home," I said. "To bed."
McNair cleared this throat, and nodded in commiseration. "I think I've got a little itch in here, too," he said.
We exchanged cards.
"Good to meet you wonderful lecture," I said to him. "You too," I said to Amy. "Thanks for arranging this," I said to Claudia, and walked out of O'Neal's, coughing and eyes tearing. I took a few breaths and hailed a cab.
Jenna was on the phone when I got home. I looked at myself in the hall mirror horrible.
I picked up a tape recorder sitting on a shelf, and carried it into our bedroom. I had heard a lot of interesting things tonight ideas, theories, possibilities. I didn't want to forget. I rasped what I could remember into the tape recorder. Ridiculous way to live.

I AWOKE IN a sweat the next morning, with Jenna's cool hand upon my brow.
"You've got it full-blown," she said. "Here's some ginger ale, and I'm taking you to the doctor."
"Too bad they don't make house calls anymore." I lifted my head from my clammy, clingy pillow.
"Well, at least your long-term memory's intact," Jenna said. "Uncle Eli told me they haven't been doing that since the seventies."
"Marcus Welby was the last one," I said.
"Who?"
"TV doctor from the 1970s," I said. I swallowed a little ginger ale. It felt like broken glass going down sad commentary on the state of my throat.
Jenna took me in a taxi to Dr. Steinbuck's, on East Seventy-eighth.
"Good thing the insurance is paying for this," I groused, and strove, in vain, to find a comfortable spot on the paisley-upholstered couch in the waiting room. "He'll charge a small fortune to say, 'Well, it's probably the flu, can't tell for sure, doesn't matter anyway, and here's a prescription for Omnin just to make sure pneumonia doesn't set in.' " I coughed, then shivered.
Jenna rubbed my shoulder.
"Dr. D'Amato?" Nan, the receptionist, called out after what felt like a month and a half. I often wondered how many patients had died in this, and other, waiting rooms, waiting to be seen. Well, maybe I didn't wonder about that too often, but the thought had occurred to me. At least some hapless schmuck had to have died that way. I could just see being called in as an investigator on that case....
I took off my clothes, as told, and put on that pathetic piece of wrapping paper they give you in doctors' offices. I coughed and shivered some more.
Steinbuck finally came in, with a smile. "Phil, haven't seen you in a while. How are you doing?"
"Not good. Otherwise I wouldn't be here," I replied, and smiled back.
"Well, let's see what's going on," Steinbuck said, and gave me the full exam cold part of the stethoscope on my chest, tapping my back, looking in my ears and eyes, the whole enchilada. "Well," he said at last, "it's probably the flu that's going around. We can't tell for sure, but it doesn't really matter. The important thing is that your lungs seem clear and your breathing's okay means pneumonia hasn't set in. That's what we want to avoid."
I nodded.
"No point playing around with this, though," he continued. "You hear about our new secret-weapon antibiotic, Omnin? We'll put you right on that."
I nodded again. "Have you heard of any memory loss associated with this flu?"
Steinbuck looked up from his prescription pad. "No. Why? Have you been having any problems with your memory?"
I shook my head no. "So far, so good. And just to make sure, I took the trouble of reciting yesterday's recollections into a tape recorder before I went to sleep, and it jibed completely with what I remembered this morning."
He regarded me. "Good," he finally said. "But why were you worried about losing your memory in the first place?"
I told him about Jenna and Dugan and Claudia.