Silence - A Fable

0:00Hi, this is Alex Cantrowitz. I'm the host of Big Technology Podcast, a long time reporter and an on-air contributor to CNBC. And if you're like me, you're trying to figure out how artificial intelligence is changing the business world and our lives. So each week on Big Technology, I bring on key actors from companies building AI tech and outsiders trying to influence it, asking where this is all going. They come from places like Nvidia, Microsoft, Amazon, and plenty more. So if you want to be smart with your wallet, your career choices, in meetings with your colleagues and at dinner parties, listen to Big Technology Podcast wherever you get your podcasts. The sun shining, birds are singing and all feels right in the world. Until the season changes, and suddenly you lose your motivation to get out of bed. In fact, one in five people experience some form of depression no matter the season or time of year. At the American Psychiatric Association Foundation, our vision is to build a mentally healthy nation for all because we want you to live your best life and be your best you all year round.

1:01Please visit mentallyhealthynation.org to learn more. Hi, this is Alex Cantrowitz. I'm the host of Big Technology Podcast, a longtime reporter and an on-air contributor to CMBC. And if you're like me, you're trying to figure out how artificial intelligence is changing the business world and our lives. So each week on Big Technology, I bring on key actors from companies building AI tech and outsiders trying to influence it, asking where this is all going. They come from places like Nvidia, Microsoft, Amazon, and plenty more. So if you want to be smart with your wallet, your career choices, and meetings with your colleagues and at dinner parties, listen to Big Technology Podcast wherever you get your podcasts. Silence, a fable by Edgar Allan Poe. The mountain, pinnacle, slumber, valleys, cracks, and caves are silent. Listen to me, I set the demon as he placed his hand upon my head.

2:01The region of which I speak is a dreary region in Libya by the borders of the river Zaire. And there is no quiet there, no silence. The waters of the river have a saffron and sickly you, and they flow not onward to the sea, but popitate forever and forever beneath the red eye of the sun with a tumultuous and convulsive motion. For many miles on either side of the river's oozy bed is a pale desert of gigantic water lilies. They sigh one and through the other in that solitude and stretch towards the heaven, their long and ghastly necks. And not to and fro, their everlasting heads. And there is an indistinct murmur which cometh out from among them

3:03like the rushing of scepterine water. And they sigh one and through the other. But there is a boundary to their own, the boundary of the dark, horrible, lofty forest. There, like the waves about the hebrides, the low underwood is agitated continually. But there is no wind throughout the heaven and the tall primeval trees rock eternally, hither and dither with a crashing and mighty sound. And from their highest summits, one by one, drop ever-lasting Jews. And at the roots, strange poisonous flowers lie writhing in perturbed slumber. And overhead, with the rustling and loud noise, the grey clouds rush westwardly forever until they roll a cataract

4:04over the fiery wall of the horizon. But there is no wind throughout the heaven and by the shores of the river's ira, there is neither quiet nor silence. It was night and the rain fell. And falling, it was rain. But having fallen, it was blurred. And I stood in the moraths among the tall lilies and the rain fell upon my head. And the lilies sighed one and through the other in the solemnity of their desolation. And all at once, the moon arose to the thin ghastly mist and was crimson in color. And my eyes fell upon a huge grey rock, which stood by the shore of the river and was lighted by the light of the moon. And the rock was grey and ghastly and tall,

5:04and the rock was grey. Upon its front were characters in grey, there is engraven in the stones. And I walked through the moraths of water lilies until I came close into the shore that I might read the characters upon the stone. But I could not decipher them. And I was going back into the moraths when the moon shone with a fuller red. And I turned and looked again upon the rock and upon the characters and the characters were desolation. And I looked upwards and there stood a man upon the summit of the rock. And I hid myself among the water lilies that I might discover the action of the man. And the man was tall and stately in form and wrapped up from his shoulders to his feet in the toga of old room. And the outlines of his figure were indistinct.

6:08But his features were the features of a deity for the mantle of the night and of the mist and of the moon and of the dew had left uncovered the features of his face. And his brow was lofty with thought and his eye wild with care. And in the few furrows upon his cheek I wrapped the fables of sorrow and the weariness and disgust with mankind and a longing after solitude. And the man sat on the rock and leaned his head upon his hand and looked out upon the desolation. He looked down into the low and quiet shrubbery and up into the tall primeval trees and up higher at the rustling heaven and into the crimson moon. And I lay close within shelter of the lilies

7:11and observed the actions of the man. And the man trembled in the solitude but the night waned and he sat upon the rock. And the man turned his attention from the heaven and looked out upon the dreary river Zyra and upon the yellow gaffly waters and upon the pale legions of the water lilies. And the man listened to the size of the water lilies and to the murmur that came up from among them. And I lay close within my covered and observed the actions of the man. And the man trembled in the solitude. But the night waned and he sat upon the rock. Then I went down into the recesses of the moraas and waited a far in among the wilderness of the lilies

8:12and called into the hippopotamus which dwelt among the fence in the recesses of the moraas. And the hippopotamus heard my call and came with the behemoth unto the foot of the rock and roared loudly and fearfully beneath the moon. And I lay close within my covered and observed the actions of the man and the man trembled in the solitude. But the night waned and he sat upon the rock. Then I cursed the elements with the curse of tumult and the frightful tempest gathered in the heaven where before there had been no wind. And the heaven became livid with the violence of the tempest and the rain beat upon the head of the man and the floods of the river came down and the river was tormented into foam

9:12and the water lily shrieked within their beds and the forest crumbled before the wind and the thunder rolled and the lightning fell and the rock rocked to its foundation. And I lay close within my covered and observed the actions of the man and the man trembled in the solitude. But the night waned and he sat upon the rock. Then I grew angry and cursed with the curse of silence, the river and the lilies and the wind and the forest and the heaven and the thunder and the size of the water lilies. And they became a cursed and were still. And the moon seized to totter up its pathway to heaven and the thunder died away and the lightning did not flesh and the clouds hung motionless

10:13and the water sunk to their level and remained and the trees seized through rock and the water lilies sighed no more and the murmur was heard no longer from among them nor any shadow of sound throughout the vast, illimitable desert. And I looked upon the characters of the rock and they were changed and the characters were silence. And my eyes fell upon the countenance of the man and his countenance was one with terror. And hurriedly he raised his head from his hand and stood forth upon the rock and listened. But there was no voice throughout the vast, illimitable desert and the characters upon the rock were silence and the man shuddered and turned his face away

11:15and fled a far off in haste so that I beheld him no more. Now there are fine tales in the volumes of the Magi in the iron-bound melancholy volumes of the Magi. Therein I say, our glorious histories of the heaven and of the earth and of the mighty sea and of the genie that overruled the sea and the earth and the lofty heaven. There was much lore, too, in the sayings which were set by the civils and holy, holy things were heard of old by the dim leaves that tremble around the donor. But as Allah lived, that fable which the demon told me as he set by my sight in the shadow of the tomb I hold to be the most wonderful of all.

12:19And as the demon made an end of his story, he fell back within the cavity of the tomb and laughed. And I could not laugh with the demon and he cursed me because I could not laugh and the links which dwelleth forever in the tomb came out there from and lay down at the feet of the demon and looked at him steadily in the face. And of silence a fable.