Chapter 35 "The Blacklist" - sailing to the sea of chance
There is a book that I saw again and again in various bookstores in Shanghai and Beijing, and even in places selling mainland edition books in Taipei City, and I finally bought it, but just like the cheap western novel that Killer Keller bought, he was attracted by it. It is limited to the line of words on the cover that touches the scene: "He rode thousands of miles to kill a stranger."I also bought it because of its title, but the statistical discussion of its content was never interesting to read, so this book has only kept sending me the same message over and over again, which is the four numbers on the cover. Large characters, "Tame Chance".
Accidentally, a super troublesome thing that is unpredictable and difficult to control.
"Taming Accidental" is indeed a good title, but it only has very mediocre content. Such books are actually quite common. When you are young, you will be very angry with the author, and you will feel cheated when your hopes are raised, but they are vain. But now you know and sympathize with it, and you even probably predicted the result when you saw the title of the book.Like you, the writer is tempted by the same big question that we have no ability to answer. Maybe he is more courageous than you. At least he is willing to immerse himself in fighting a battle with no chance and dreaming an impossible dream. , reaching out to the unreachable stars of heaven—good title, because the question is real, even urgent, and troubles a considerable number of people; There will be an answer, as far as human cognition is limited.
Like two parallel lines extending forward, people answer questions and discover them at the same time. One of the reasons why human thinking is in a difficult situation is that our ability to discover problems (and create problems) is far better than our ability to solve them. The ability to ask questions is like an unfair race. We do know more truths than our predecessors, but at the same time we are more confused, confused and uncertain than them.We are more uncomfortable, less likely to believe that we are happy, more prone to physical and mental disorders, outbursts of neurosis, and even suicide. Not all of them are true, because we have dug more gaps in our lives and become our own traps, and we have accumulated more unsolvable problems that weigh heavily on our hearts.
What will be the pattern of the relationship between chance and our life?What I think of, one is what biologists say, we live surrounded by tiny life invisible to the naked eye, soaked in the ocean of microorganisms; the other is what physicists say, every day, hundreds of millions of Neutrinos bombard and penetrate our bodies, and one or two of them will stay in our bodies—this is how our human life continues to be immersed in the ocean of endless opportunities, and continues to be undetected. What is quite different from being bombarded and penetrated by chance is that people are aware of the existence of chance earlier, but they don't feel too troubled at the beginning.
Here, we roughly divide the history of the relationship between humans and chance into three stages: At first, we thought it was negligible, just as the existence of neutrinos did not pose a threat to our lives. We are concerned with cause and effect, order, and certainty under the chaos of chance; then, we gradually know that influence or destruction exists, but we still believe that it can be tamed, such as eliminated by statistics As a special case, we use probability to capture its trajectory and so on, just as we have believed for a long time that we have the ability to dominate all life, and through some invention or mechanism (such as antibiotics) or even over time, we can completely eliminate them; finally until now, we Gradually realize its greatness and tenacity in the defeat, and more importantly, its subjective status in the history of life rather than a set-up. The categories that causality and order can dominate are not only limited but also suspicious, and more often just It is only a temporary assumption of people. This is what Levi Strauss said: "Disorder rules the world."
Let's stop here first.
, this is the second book in the Brock Killer Keller series, and the way of writing has changed a bit here. The role of Taoer, the murder agent who was invisible on the other end of the phone line and often only heard by her, became more serious. Keller's relationship gradually changed from vertical instructions to horizontal partner conversations, changing Keller's lonely but neat solo performance into an endlessly entangled pas de deux.
It started with Keller's mission that was full of worries and always haunted by shadows. There was nothing wrong with this assassination operation. The method, the family photo provided by the client and a second-hand gun, to the cheap motel where he lived.In the hotel, first a drunk came to find the wrong person, and then was disturbed by the upstairs tenants so that he could hardly sleep, and Keller, who changed the room and used earplugs, after completing the task in a somewhat impetuous but professional manner, Unexpectedly, he found out that there was a murder in his original hotel room. A pair of cheating men and women who moved in were black-gunned on the eve of Keller’s packing and leaving and became lovebirds. Is this a manslaughter towards Keller, or is it jealousy? Is it purely a coincidence that the aggressive husband followed the trail and found the innocent love murder?
As a result, Keller began to enter "a certain state".
Keller couldn't help but think of Andrea, who slept with him and took away his dog named "Soldier" without warning. A girl with a professional identity—this time, what troubled him was no longer the big existential issues, where did I come from, where did I go, who were my parents, what is the relationship between me and the fucking world? What kind of absurd relationship and so on, this time the problem is not such a violent psychological "terminal illness", but some kind of mold on the spiritual level, Hong Kong foot or something like that, it doesn't seem to be fatal, but it makes people feel very itchy all the time.Cracks began to appear in Keller's professionally controlled, orderly world that could not tolerate any surprises, and he was at a loss to feel the impact of chance and chance again and again.
And this time, under some kind of accidental guidance, of course, he was no longer looking for a psychiatrist who also practiced in the professional order, but a mysterious astrologer and psychic—the most interesting thing is that the scientific The psychiatrist failed to decipher his secret through the treatment process. The psychiatrist who wanted to take advantage of Keller in the last book and finally flew down from a tall building as a superman found out his true identity through other channels; However, in our common sense, we can see that Keller was born with a "murderer thumb", and Keller, a Gemini, has a typical dual personality.Keller is extremely gentle and calm but strange that "there is so much violence in life"...
Don't ask the common people and ask about ghosts and gods, what exactly does Bullock want to do when he writes novels?
The character of Taoer is like Joe Durken in the Scudder series and Catherine in the Rodenbaud series in the past, but to put it bluntly, he is not as sincere and relaxed as those two. It’s hard to guarantee when she will turn her face and deny anyone—of course, Tao’er is behind the oriole and sincerely guards Keller, but I think she is still firmly guarding Keller’s career rather than Keller’s emotions. She destroys everything enough The people and things that unraveled Keller's killer world, she resisted without blinking the increasingly threatening chance and chance in Keller's life, we can say that Tao is the strongest link between Keller and the killer world , holding Keller from drifting back to the normal world built by chance and chance.
It can also be said that this group of novels that still barely belong to general reasoning detectives is held back, and they are not allowed to drift into the vast real life where logic, order, and causality are powerless to rule.
Mystery novels, from the perspective of the stage evolution of human thinking history, are some kind of fossil phenomenon that resists real time.The speculative novel appeared in the middle of the nineteenth century, but its writing philosophy is based on the rationalism of a full hundred years ago, even earlier, Plato in ancient Greece.Plato is a representative figure of the first stage of the relationship between man and chance. He does not think that the various opportunities and chances that no one can ignore in the real world are of any importance. Even as the debate unfolds in the book, Plato feels that the clutter of the real world is incompatible with his clean kingdom of rational order, and his decisive disposition is to erect four high walls for his kingdom of reason, All things that do not obey the orders of order are expelled together with poetry, literature, myths and legends.This is his closed Utopia construction, and it became the accusation against him severely by the future scientist Karl Popper. Popper’s famous book "The Open Society and Its Enemies" listed the three major sinners of the open society in the history of thinking, Plato is the one who takes the lead (of course, Popper's scientism tendency is actually another closed way of thinking, but his importance is limited and he cannot be listed as the fourth enemy after Marx).
Mystery novels resist the erosion of chance by adopting Plato's closed method.We know that reasoning writing has its writing rules that it swears again and again. Up to SS Van Dyne’s 20 rules of reasoning writing are the culmination of all of them. Intuition, no mysteries, no emotion or literary descriptions (literal descriptions are only required for their simplicity and functionality), and so on. This is what Plato did for his ideal state of perfect order. Suspicious people and things that come by accident or infection by accidental germs are all ruled out, N95 masks, hand washing and disinfection, and home isolation.And we often see the world where mystery novels take place, such as closed rooms, isolated islands surrounded by the sea, old castles or resort hotels with the only suspension bridge cut off from the outside, or a train trapped in a frozen uninhabited wilderness like that, which means that there is nothing that cannot be controlled. The fact that a stranger could enter means that there was no chance of intrusion by any accidental element.
Are you aware of accidental penetration?Of course there is, otherwise there is no need for such a tense defense.Should we face it squarely?I really want to, but it is very difficult. How can it live in peace with order and causal logic?Therefore, the existence of chance in classical mystery novels can only be decoration, a smoke screen, some kind of text interest, or the tail of a foreshadowing.The most extreme example is probably the book "The Last Case of Trent", which finds a beautiful combination, compares the truth built by chance with the reasoner's causal logic, and stands firm against the red flag. Laugh loudly at the reasoning kingdom in the safe closed reasoning kingdom, but only this time is not an example, the rest, still can only say bluntly: "I don't believe in coincidences." Trent, who went down to investigate the case, also obediently went back to be an obedient citizen of the kingdom.
From this point of view, the hard-line American Revolution is an adventure of mystery novels officially facing the real and accidental world, so we always say that it has entered the orthodox and general novel field to a certain extent.
General literary novels (and even all literary works) do not have the protection of four walls of prohibition on types, and have always had to float and sink in the great waves of chance and chance. Therefore, for a long time, literary scholars have been playing the role of The enemy of order, but its efforts are not necessarily popular.Philosophers want to build a large system, scientists want to pursue the truth that causes and effects are clear and do not roll dice, religionists want to promote the eternal order of the universe, and more frighteningly, the real rulers want to order everything to leave no room for wild imagination, literature has to suffer To be scorned, lashed out, banned, exiled, or even exterminated is bad luck.
Literary novels get along with chance, but if you want to choose a novel that most positively reveals the boundless and decisive power of chance, my personal answer is Tolstoy's immortal masterpiece. I believe this is not my wishful answer That's all.
It writes about Napoleon's French-Russian battle in Moscow. The highlight of the book is the Great Battle of Borodino before the fall of Moscow.In this famous fragment in the history of novels, Tolstoy mobilized almost all the characters in the novel to gaze and analyze the battle with more than one million soldiers on both sides, including Duke Andrei who was unfortunately seriously injured in the battle but seemed to understand, including wandering Pierre on the edge of the battlefield, including Natasha and Mary who were waiting anxiously in the rear, and Napoleon and Kutuzov, the commanders-in-chief of the French and Russian armies, etc. Tolstoy felt that this was not enough, so he finally jumped out by himself, As a historian, directly discussing this battle in the text of the novel is just like the two warring parties. No matter whether it is reasonable or not, the novelist will bet on all the weapons that can be used.
Here, Tolstoy "restored" the complex, chaotic, and bewildered appearance of a battle of millions of people, and disintegrated the orderly description and clear after-the-fact explanation of the battle by historical historians, especially for the commanders of both sides. However, Yu Chest's ability to master battle formations and foresee is even more scornful.Tolstoy thought that when a war comes together, everyone is too busy to save lives, and everyone is left with isolated points in front of their eyes. The left side does not know the right side, and the front does not know the rear. The outcome of life and death must be decided in the blink of an eye, and the message is true or false. Indistinguishable like bullets flying around but powerless and far away, no one has the opportunity to see this battle clearly. In fact, the soldiers on the front line see only one or two enemies who want to kill you. Commander, they can only guess and wait for the result.In the novel, Tolstoy described the bewildered reaction of Napoleon and Kutuzov even more poignantly. They didn't even know where to invest their reserve troops, and they didn't even know how to judge the news of victory or defeat.
This is the result of the joint participation and decision of more than a million different wills, encounters, and reactions of the wise, the foolish, and the mediocre. Tolstoy doesn't even use the slightly mysterious word "accidental" to explain it.He firmly believed in the existence of "the chain of cause and effect", and every effect has a preceding cause, but the trouble is that the number of causes approaches infinitely large, and the weight of each cause approaches infinitely small, which is what Tolstoy said The "differentiation of history", you have to gain insight into the results and discover the laws of history, it is theoretically possible, through the art of "integration of history", find the sum of the infinitely small.But this is impossible, because no one can fully observe and fully record the infinitely many reasons that are as small as the sand in the sea of stars in the sky, compare them, string them together and calculate them. There is endless cause and effect, so it can only be regarded as accidental.
Isaiah Berlin praised Tolstoy's ruthless historical insights as "corruptive skeptics", but we can go back to the source and say that this thing that erodes human beings to construct order, grasp the truth, and predict the future is precisely Due to these inexhaustible chances, Tolstoy is just a clever and honest man who speaks the truth.
Those who can appreciate chance and face chance are only novels and even literature, but people have too many needs in life, and they cannot live by eating novels alone, including Tolstoy himself.
Let me copy a passage, please bear with me if it is a bit long: "A professional critic of military science, very seriously wants us to confirm that Kutuzov should have transferred the army to the Karaga road long before he arrived in Ferri. There are people in the world who have offered such strategies, but the commander-in-chief of the army, especially at this moment of life and death, proposed not one but dozens of plans to him, each of which was well-founded in terms of strategy and tactics, and compared with others. It seems that the commander-in-chief's business is just to choose one of these options. However, even so, he can't do it, and the time will not be given. Let's imagine that on the 28th, someone offered him a plan to go cross-country to Kara However, at this juncture, an adjutant of General Minori came flying and asked whether to send him to face the French army or to retreat?... The manager came to ask for instructions, where should the warehouse be transported? In Petersburg, the courier brought the tsar's decree, which firmly refused the possibility of abandoning Moscow... The commander-in-chief himself also needs sleep and rest. When the medal was awarded, a certain hero who was ignored came to complain, The residents of the area petitioned for protection, and the reports of the officers sent to patrol completely contradicted what those who had been sent before; a spy, a prisoner, and the scouting general all gave different accounts of the enemy's position. Did not understand, or forgot that the Commander-in-Chief had to operate under these unavoidable circumstances... Well, when was this issue decided? As early as Trisha, in Smolensk; most obviously, on August 2 On the 14th at Hivertino everything was decided. On the 26th at Borodino and the retreat from Borodino to Ferri, every day, every hour, every minute, was decided. Decided."
This passage vividly and accurately reveals Tolstoy's choice of belief in life in the future - when accidents are so complicated and huge that they exceed the limits of individual will and cognition of people, forcing people to the quicksand of completely uncertain thinking When it can no longer be tolerated, it will easily appear in another word, becoming "fate", becoming "will in the dark", or adding a little more necessary emotional comfort, it will become the foreknowledge and predetermination of all these things. the "God".
The strongest corrosive will corrode even its own container. This is another novelist Vonnegut's favorite joke. It is not difficult to invent a universal solvent, but what is difficult is to use it to contain it.Tolstoy, who hated all abstract concepts all his life and went deep into the details of entities, finally dedicated his life to the greatest abstraction, the monotheism of Christianity—in this way, have we also gone back and explained the strange trend of the killer Keller this time, explained Why did he ask for help from the mysterious art of fate.
Does it make us more curious and less convinced, how can this novel that has almost completely eroded the rules of genre fiction writing continue to be written.
In the previous volume, what plagued Keller was a professional moral crisis; but in this volume, what tortured Keller was the collapse of his professional order and closed world-the former was clear and specific, but there was still a Time to slowly sort out and think clearly, the latter seems to be vague and shapeless, it seems to be just people's wild imagination, but it is urgent and real in feeling.Putting aside the comparison of the writing results of the two novels, just looking at this point, we have to say that Bullock is indeed a keen and accurate writer.
When chance becomes the subject, it cannot be deleted or tamed, and the order can only retreat to a certain extent as an artificial product and become a disposable thing. This opened a gap for Weber's famous disenchantment of history and forced some people to return to Ancestrally turning to religious mysticism, but it also shines a ray of light for Weber's pessimistic rational "iron cage", but this hope, this salvation of freedom is not pleasant, and it is better than being imprisoned in the four walls of order with peace of mind. greater risk.Sailing in the ocean of chance, the history of biological evolution tells us that most species are swallowed by the waves of chance, and only a few successfully reach the other shore. This requires not only courage, but honestly, luck.