The Terminal Experiment - Robert J. Sawyer Page 0,1
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Publisher’s note: This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either
are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any
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Manufactured in the U.S.A.
LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION
Sawyer, Robert J.
The terminal experiment / Robert Sawyer.
Originally publ.: New York : HarperPrism, 1995.
978-0-14-317511-7
I. Title.
PS8587.A389835T4 2009 C813’.54 C2009-905533-3
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For Ted Bleaney
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Contents
Cover
Praise
Title Page
Dedication
Author’s Note
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
AUTHOR’S NOTE
The Future Is Now
These days, I’m best known for FlashForward, my novel that is the basis for the ABC TV series of the same name. But that book didn’t change my life the most; this one did. The Terminal Experiment made my career when it won the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America’s Nebula Award—the “Academy Award” of the SF field—for Best Novel of the Year.
I received that award on April 27, 1996, at a gala banquet aboard the Queen Mary off Long Beach, California. Right after my win, John Douglas, an editor with the company that had produced the original edition of this book, said to me, “You’ve gone overnight from being a promising newcomer to an established, bankable name.” And John was right; my days as a struggling writer ended then and there.
I wrote The Terminal Experiment in 1993, setting it in the then far-distant year of 2011. Although the story is told against a backdrop of the online universe, when I was writing it the Internet was new to most people and the World Wide Web hadn’t yet been invented.
Even though I was an early adopter of online technologies—I’ve been on the Internet since 1983, have had a Web site (indeed, was the very first science-fiction writer to have one, at sfwriter) since 1995, and have been blogging since before the word even existed—neither I nor anyone else foresaw the current world of Google and Flickr, Facebook and Twitter, Wikipedia and YouTube (although my latest novels, Wake, Watch, and Wonder, which deal with the World Wide Web gaining consciousness in the present day, do embrace our modern reality).
For this new edition of The Terminal Experiment, I thought about changing the dates mentioned in the book, about removing the dates altogether, and about updating or revising the many references to computing and online life. But I ultimately decided not to alter the text. Yes, that means this book is now an odd snapshot of the way one writer thought the future of computing might unfold, but that’s the smallest part of what The Terminal Experiment is really about. Mostly the novel is an exploration of timeless conundrums: Do we have souls? Is there an afterlife? Does God exist? And—to me, the most intriguing of all—can science ever help us find the answers to these questions?
ROBERT J. SAWYER
MISSISSAUGA, ONTARIO
SEPTEMBER 2009
In the last analysis, it is our conception of death which decides our answers to all the questions life puts to us.
DAG HAMMARSKJÖLD (1905–1961)
UNITED NATIONS SECRETARY GENERAL
PROLOGUE
December 2011
“What room is Detective Philo in?” asked Peter Hobson, a tall, thin man of forty-two, with hair an equal mixture of black and gray.
The squat nurse behind the desk had been absorbed in whatever she’d been reading. She looked up. “Pardon?”
“Detective Sandra Philo,” said Peter. “What room is she in?”
“Four-twelve,” said the nurse. “But her doctor has ordered that only immediate family members should visit.”
Peter began down the corridor. The nurse came around from behind the desk and gave chase. “You can’t go in there,” she said firmly.
Peter turned briefly to look at her. “I have to see her.”
The nurse maneuvered in front of him. “She’s in critical condition.”