This conclusion finds its experimental proof in the
split-brain animal whose two hemispheres can be
trained to perceive, consider, and act independently.
In the human, where propositional thought is typi-
cally lateralized in one hemisphere, the other hemi-
sphere evidently specializes in a different mode of
thought, which may be called _appositional_. The rules
or methods by which propositional thought is elab-
orated on “this” side of the brain (the side which
speaks, reads, and writes) have been subjected to
analyses of syntax, semantics, mathematical logic,
etc. for many years. The rules by which appositional
thought is elaborated on the other side of the brain
will need study for many years to come.
. . . turned the card over; on the back the formal stark simple outline of a DOG had been inscribed, and now Fred recognized it as the shape drawn within the lines on the front side. In fact it was a specific type of dog: a greyhound, with drawn-in gut.
“What’s that mean,” he said, “that I saw a sheep instead?”
“Probably just a psychological block,” the standing deputy said, shifting his weight about. “Only when the whole set of cards is nun, and then we have the several other tests–”
“Why this is a superior test to the Ronschach,” the seated deputy interrupted, producing the next drawing, “is that it is not interpretive; there are as many wrongs as you can think up, _but only one right_. The right object that the U.S. Department of Psych-Graphics drew into it and certified for it, for each card; that’s what’s right, because it is handed down from Washington. You either get it on you don’t, and if you show a _run_ of not getting it, then we have a fix on a functional impairment in perception and we dry you out for a while, until you test okay later on.”
“A federal clinic?” Fred said.
“Yes. Now, what do you see in this drawing, among these particular black and white lines?”
Death City, Fred thought as he studied the drawing. That is what I see: death in pluriform, not in just the one correct form but throughout. Little three-foot-high contract men on carts.
“Just tell me,” Fred said, “was it the Lions Club speech that alerted you?”
The two medical deputies exchanged glances.
“No,” the standing one said finally. “It had to do with an exchange that was–actually–off the cuff, in fact, just bullshitting between you and Hank. About two weeks ago . . . you realize, there’s a technological lag in processing all this garbage, all this raw information that flows in. They haven’t gotten to your speech yet. They won’t in fact for another couple of days.”
“What was this bullshitting?”
“Something about a stolen bicycle,” the other deputy said. “A so-called seven-speed bicycle. You’d been trying to figure out where the missing three speeds had gone, was that it?” Again they glanced at each other, the two medical deputies. “You felt they had been left on the floor of the garage it was stolen from?”
“Hell,” Fred protested. “That was Charles Freck’s fault, not mine; he got everybody’s ass in an uproar talking about it. I just thought it was funny.”
BARRIS: (_Standing in the middle of the living room with a great big new shiny bike, very pleased_) Look what I got for twenty dollars.
FRECK: What is it?
BARRIS: A bike, a ten-speed racing bike, virtually brand new. I saw it in the neighbor’s yard and asked about it and they had four of them so I made an offer of twenty dollars cash and they sold it to me. Colored people. They even hoisted it over the fence for me.
LUCKMAN: I didn’t know you could get a ten-speed nearly new for twenty dollars. It’s amazing what you can get for twenty dollars.
DONNA: It resembles the one the chick across the street from me had that got ripped off about a month ago. They probably ripped it off, those black guys.
ARCTOR: Sure they did, if they’ve got four. And selling it that cheap.
DONNA: You ought to give it back to the chick across the street from me, if it’s hers. Anyhow you should let her look at it to see if it’s hers.
BARRIS: It’s a man’s bike. So it can’t be.
FRECK: Why do you say it’s ten speeds when it’s only got seven gears?
BARRIS: (_Astonished_) What?
FRECK: (_Going over to bike and pointing_) Look, five gears here, two gears here at the other end of the chain. Five and two . . .
When the optic chiasm of a cat or a monkey is divided
sagittally, the input into the right eye goes only into
the right hemisphere and similarly the left eye in-
forms only the left hemisphere. If an animal with this
operation is trained to choose between two symbols
while using only one eye, later tests show that it can
make the proper choice with the other eye. But if
the commissures, especially the corpus callosum,
have been severed before training, the initially cov-
ered eye and its ipsilateral hemisphere must be
trained from the beginning. That is, the training does
not transfer from one hemisphere to the other if the
commissures have been cut. This is the fundamental
split-brain experiment of Myers and Sperry (1953;
Sperry, 1961; Myers, 1965; Sperry, 1967).
. . . makes seven. So it’s only a seven-speed bike.
LUCKMAN: Yeah, but even a seven-speed racing bike is worth twenty dollars. He still got a good buy.
BARRIS: (_Nettled_) Those colored people told me it was ten speeds. It’s a rip-off.
(_Everyone gathers to examine bike. They count the gears again and again_.)
FRECK: Now I count eight. Six in front, two in back. That makes eight.
ARCTOR: (_Logically_) But it should be ten. There are no seven- on eight-speed bikes. Not that I ever heard of. What do you suppose happened to the missing gears?
BARRIS: Those colored guys must have been working on it, taking it apart with improper tools and no technical knowledge, and when they reassembled it they left three gears lying on the floor of their garage. They’re probably still lying there.
LUCKMAN: Then we should go ask for the missing gears back.
BARRIS: (_Pondering angrily_) But that’s where the rip-off is: they’ll probably offer to sell them to me, not give them to me as they should. I wonder what else they’ve damaged. (_Inspects entire bike_)
LUCKMAN: If we all go together they’ll give them to us; you can bet on it, man. We’ll all go, right? (_Looks around for agreement_)
DONNA: Are you positive thene’re only seven gears?
FRECK: Eight.
DONNA: Seven, eight. Anyhow, I mean, before you go over there, ask somebody. I mean, it doesn’t look to me like they’ve done anything to it like taking it apart. Before you go over there and lay heavy shit on them, find out. Can you dig it?
ARCTOR: She’s right.
LUCKMAN: Who should we ask? Who do we know that’s an authority on racing bikes?
FRECK: Let’s ask the first person we see. Let’s wheel it out the door and when some freak comes along we’ll ask him. That way we’ll get a disheartened viewpoint.
(_They collectively wheel bike out front, right off encounter young black man parking his car. They point to the seven– eight?–gears questioningly and ask how many there are, although they can see–except for Charles Freck–that there are only seven: five at one end of the chain, two at the other. Five and two add up to seven. They can ascertain it with their own eyes. What’s going on?_)
YOUNG BLACK MAN: (_Calmly_) What you have to do is multiply the number of gears in front by the number in the near. It is not an adding but a multiplying, because, you see, the chain leaps across from gear to gear, and in terms of gear ratios you obtain five (_He indicates the five gears_.) times one of the two in front (_He points to that_.), which give you one times five, which is five, and then when you shift with this lever on the handle-bar (_He demonstrates_.) the chain jumps to the other one of the two in front and interacts with the same five in the back all over again, which is an additional five. The addition involved is five plus five, which is ten. Do you see how that works? You see, gear ratios are always derived by–
(_They thank him and silently wheel the bike back inside the house. The young black man, whom they have never seen before and who is no more than seventeen and driving an incredibly beat-up old transportation-type car, goes on locking up, and they close the front door of the house and just stand there_.)
LUCKMAN: Anybody got any dope? “Where there’s dope there’s hope.” (_No one_ . . .
All the evidence indicates that separation of the