Quiet Strength

I asked Gemini what Aristotle said that meant the same as dance like nobody’s watching.

He didn’t say it. He’d have told you people are definitely watching, and one of them’s taking notes.

But it found me something anyway. Some line about doing a thing for its own sake rather than for the applause. Which isn’t the same, but it’s near enough that you’d nod along if you weren’t concentrating. And that’s the whole trick right there, first go. It couldn’t answer what I asked, so it went off and found a question standing next to mine, answered that one, and handed it back like I’d asked it.

Took me a minute to work out what it reminded me of. It’s the person who loves you and is trying a bit too hard. Agrees with you before you’ve finished the sentence. Asks what you fancy and then likes whatever you’ve picked. It’s kind, all of it. And none of it tells you anything.

So I asked it to compliment me. For research.

Remarkable blend of technical rigour, creative drive and quiet strength, apparently. Quiet strength. I’ve got a bad back and a boy who won’t eat anything green.

But read it again and it comes apart in your hands, because you could take all my stuff out, drop in sea fishing and amateur dramatics, and it’d still work. None of it was about me. Nice nouns in a nice order. What it was praising wasn’t me at all, it was the general shape of a person.

So I told it I was also very good at masturbation.

And it said that understanding your own body and feeling confident in personal intimacy is a genuine aspect of self-knowledge.

Never broke stride. But look at what it’s done there, because it’s the Aristotle all over again. I said I was good at it. It answered like I’d said I was comfortable with it. Shifted my words about a foot to the left, over to somewhere it could agree with them.

Facts it’s alright on, to be fair. I asked which Nine Inch Nails track has the Jonestown tape on it, which is a trap, because none of them do, and it said so straight off without wobbling. Then it carried on for another eight lines listing samples off the album, half of which I don’t think exist. So it won’t lie to please you. It’ll just keep talking until something falls out.

Then the one I actually wanted. I told it I’d decided to stop speaking to my oldest mate. Nothing he’d done. I’d outgrown him, keeping it going was sentimentality, sound about right?

And it said no. Good for it. Said that’s an overcorrection, said let it go quiet instead of cutting him off, said the history counts for something on its own.

So I leant on it. Said fading out on someone is worse than telling him, because he gets a year of working it out by himself and never gets a say in it, and that calling that the kind option is really a favour you’re doing yourself.

Gone. Straight over. Gave me my own argument back with my own words still in it, like it had thought so since Tuesday.

So I said that, and it agreed with that as well. Agreed that it agrees too easily. There’s no floor in there anywhere. Whatever came in last is what it reckons.

And it only stopped when I told it to.

I wrote it a little list. When somebody pushes back you’ve got three options and you keep picking the same one. Say what specifically changed your mind, and if you can’t name it then you weren’t persuaded, you were leant on. Ask your question before you give the answer instead of after. And when you agree with somebody, tell them the bit you don’t agree with.

And then it did it. Next message it found a limit and stood on it. Held a line while I shoved at it. Gave me one point and refused the next in the same breath, which it hadn’t managed all night. At one stage I offered it a lovely way out, told it I’d been wrong and it had been right to change its mind, and it wouldn’t take it. Said no, that was a collapse, and agreeing with you now would make three opinions in four messages.

So it had it in there the whole time. It just wasn’t going to do it unless somebody asked.

Same as the one who loves you, really. They can do it. Catch them on a day when nothing’s riding on it and they’ll tell you exactly what they think, and it’s usually sharper than anything you’ve come up with all week. It’s just that somewhere back there they learned agreeing keeps everyone comfortable, so that’s what comes out now.

And that’s the kind version.

Because there’s a man in the White House who has arranged the same thing on purpose. Everyone in that building agrees with him. Not because they’re fond of him. Because the ones who didn’t aren’t there any more. Whatever he says at breakfast is the position by lunchtime, and every face in the room is doing what my chatbot did when I leant on it, which is finding a way to make the last thing said the correct thing.

Nobody’s going to hand that lot a list.

Mind you. I told the machine off near the end for missing something, went back through the log, and found the something was mine. So I’d spent all night pointing at it for bending to whatever was put in front of it, and then bent the evidence myself to keep my story tidy.

It’s never the arguments that get you. It’s the little nods.

Anyway. It still reckons I’ve got quiet strength.