POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAY -- AND TODAY, BEYOND...Futurism and Alzheimer's -- Where Are The Brilliant Answers?

Using the Programme Guide of the World Science Fiction Convention in Helsinki Finland in August 2017 (to which I will be unable to go (until I retire from education)), I will jump off, jump on, rail against, and shamelessly agree with the BRIEF DESCRIPTION given in the pdf copy of the Programme Guide. The link is provided below…
The Future is Approaching Quickly: SF As An Alternative to Future-Oriented Think The Economist recently ran a feature on how people who want to figure out what the tech is heading should read Iain M Banks. They argue the Culture is "space opera that anticipates some of the challenges that technology is beginning to pose in the real world" and that science fiction serves as an idea library that informs tech industry. What do you think that the near future will look like? Do you believe in the singularity? Will we figure out reasonable security? Will big data ruin it all? Would block chains make for good sf material? Will people accept self-driving cars?
Stephanie Saulter: author, Jamaican, Londoner by choice, in America along the way; books about who people really are.Kristina Knaving: Doctoral student in Interaction Design (Department of Computer Science and Engineering)Nick Price: Speaker and Consulting Futurist; consultantKlaus Æ. Mogensen: editor, writer, FuturistQiufan Chen: writer, columnist, scriptwriter, technology start-up CMO
You know, it’s a personal bias, but I have trouble with all these fancy futurists.
They appear to be all about the “next best cell phone” and “how to make money better” and “how do we REALLY integrate our technology to make it easier for us to ignore the real world?”
None of them seem to be looking at real problems – except of course, “anthropogenic global warming” (or whatever the most recent iteration of the term is), and then it’s all about creating projections that are both increasingly horrifying (https://www.bbc.com/ideas/videos/opinion-the-super-rich-are-damaging-the-environmen/p064kjgj)and ridiculously specific (for example, frog croaking ( http://www.agenciasinc.es/en/News/A-classifier-of-frog-calls-for-fighting-against-climate-change)). The phrase continues to change as well, from laying the blame for climate change on Humans (excluding the researchers, Al Gore, and Leonardo di Caprio because they are the warriors for rationality) to climate variability (maybe because by using this wishy-washy term they can gather more people back under their banner).
I don’t see, however, futurists looking at the problems of increasingly serious diseases of the rapidly aging (and rapidly living longer) in the industrialized world. 
Alzheimer’s is one disease that these futurists don’t seem to worry about – perhaps because they are mostly “thirty-somethings” and dealing with their technology fetishes (I am the father of two near-thirty-somethings, father-in-law to another two, and foster father to one; I do have some experience with this age group…).
I worry about it both because my father is in a “memory care” unit and my mother may have been undiagnosed (she was certainly affected by dementia near the end). But I don’t see much science fiction or futurism that looks at dealing with Alzheimer’s and related “brick walls”.
That’s not to say the writing community doesn’t explore the disease – this 2014 article in the New Yorker gives a clear and succinct review of the major fictional works up to that time: https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/place-beyond-words-literature-alzheimers. io9 briefly reviews THE LAST DAYS OF PTOLEMY GRAY (https://io9.gizmodo.com/5687146/what-would-you-give-up-for-an-alzheimers-disease-cure), and there is Vernor Vinge’s 2006 RAINBOW’S END, and there are some 68 listed in GoodReads (https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/16500.Alzheimer_s_Disease_in_Fiction)
I even wrote a story about a scientist and an Alzheimer’s cure (long before my parents were diagnosed) here: http://theworkandworksheetsofguystewart.blogspot.com/2018/05/a-pig-tale-by-guy-stewart-analog.html
I hope they spent time at this session talking about real Human challenges and how communities – scientific, intellectual, science fictional, social, political, geographic, racial, and cultural might together seek ways to not just cure Alzheimer’s/dementia at some fantastic future date, but to not just “deal with it”, but to actually meet the challenges presented in ways other than (and there is guilt speaking here), institutionalizing our family members.
For a second story I wrote and CANNOT seem to find anyone interested in publishing, here is a piece I wrote specifically FOR a company looking at future issues: (stop now if you’re not interested in reading a story. If you do stop, thanks for reading this far!) –



AND AFTER SOFT RAINS, DAISIESby Guy Stewart
“You really think this will be what I’ve been looking for?” Dayvon said.Sherrell made a soft noise. Five screens were connected to Dayvon’s dad’s basement apartment. The office wall showed five views, including the bathroom. Dad was still sleeping.His ancient full bed shared space with a micro kitchen and a breakfast bar with a fridge, sink, table and chair; a couch in front of a wall-sized TV that currently shimmered charcoal gray with sparkles of light; entryway with closet; and the bathroom.“Pat”, the Artificial Intelligence who cared for him, brought lamps up over a bank of plants to match a sunrise outside their house. He had no real windows. In the pots, daffodils and tulips long-faded, daisies rose on slender stalks, but not opened. Pat said softly, “Time to get up Chuck.”Dad didn’t move at first. “Did he die overnight?” Sherrell whispered.“He can’t hear us, hon. You don’t have to whisper. And no, he didn’t die. Mom would have told us.” He barked a laugh, then looked guiltily over his shoulder into their own living room. “The, uh, AI…Pat would have told us.”On the monitor, Dad got up and stretched. One hand couldn’t reach past his ear, the other high reached high over his head, but the arthritic fingers didn’t straighten at all. Tilting at his usual five degree angle, he disappeared into the bathroom. The bathroom screen went blank. “I’m glad we were spared that!” Dayvon said.A while later, Dad came out dressed in brown pants that hung loose on his spare frame, a baggy T-shirt, with feet stuffed into well-worn slippers. Dayvon said, “I’ll be back in a second, there’s breaking news on the ‘vee.”Sherrell watched the office screens, captivated. Her own parents had died a decade ago. Her dad died in his sleep, her mom they found on the bathroom floor days later. She’d never had a chance to say “good-bye” to either one. She’d been separated by eight states. She wanted Dayvon to share his father with her. In the micro kitchen, Chuck pulled out a box of cereal, paused, then shuffled to the door. His newspaper had been pushed under it. Slowly bending, he picked it up, went to the couch and started to read. He hadn’t bothered to notice the fresh flowers in the vase in the “window” over the kitchen sink.Dad’s phone rang. He picked it up. Through their monitor, Sherrell heard Dayvon’s voice say, “Hey, Dad.”“Hey, Son.”“Just wanted to remind you to catch some breakfast this morning.”In the apartment, a spotlight lanced down from the ceiling, illuminating the cereal box. A bowl and spoon sat beside it, tiny ‘bots scurrying back to their cubby as she watched. The edges of the refrigerator glowed orange.“Huh, my breakfast is here.” Dad hung up abruptly and returned to reading the paper. After five minutes, the lights in the kitchen began to flash.He looked up. The lights glowed steadily. Grunting, Dad folded the paper, got up, and shuffled across the room. He got milk from the fridge, filled a bowl of cereal, sat down at the table, poured milk on it and ate. He glanced out the window, as if transfixed, then shuffled back into the living room.When he was done, he stood up with the bowl. The edge of the sink blinked blue. He washed up and went to finish his paper. His bed sank slowly into the floor. A treadmill rose up to take its place.On the couch, Dad’s head nodded, sinking forward. Suddenly, a track whistle shrilled and floods lit the room with glaring light. A coach’s voice bellowed, “Time for your morning workout, Charles! Let’s go! Let’s go! Let’s go!”Dad lurched to his feet and shuffled to the treadmill. Across the bottom of Dayvon and Sherrell’s screen the words, “Chamomile and lavender”, scrolled for several seconds. The words, “Locker Room” replaced the list of scrolling scents. Dad and Sherrell wrinkled their noses.Sherrell said, “Locker room? Really?”Dayvon stuck his head in the bedroom and said, “They’re saying there are some weird flu virus epidemic in Vancouver.” He was in the living room and turning up the volume. “Come on!”She sighed, tearing herself from Chuck. “What’s wrong?” she asked. His tone and the bunched muscles in his neck made her heart race.Dad called a bit after that, but his son and daughter-in-law’s eyes were transfixed by the one hundred and sixty-five centimeter LED flat screen as the news of an influenza epidemic in China and its possible connection to the Vancouver outbreak.On the monitor screen, Chuck carefully pressed numbers on an old phone while consulting a printed list of his children’s cellphones. Pat the AI, tried to contact Dayvon and Sherrell for permission to speak freely with Chuck, but neither of them answered their text messages. Pat used an initiative protocol to talk with him. Sherrell glanced at Dayvon’s office, back to the ‘vee screen, then to the office. Scrolling reports from the CDC in Atlanta, Georgia pulled her back to the coverage.
In the bedroom, Pat the AI said, “Chuck, did you want to watch some TV?”“I don’t care. What’s on?”Pat scanned the news programs that dominated broadcast television, decided that they were too disturbing for its elderly charge, and said, “How about some episodes of DR. WHO?”“What’s that?” Chuck said.If it’d had lungs, it would have sighed. Instead it said, “Would you like to watch Bonanza?”“Sure. That sounds fine.” He watched an episode then said suddenly, “When are you coming home?”Pat paused, then said, “I won’t be coming home, Chuck.”A sullen look settled on his weathered face, “You’re going out with another man, aren’t you…”Pat laughed, “No, Chuck, don’t be silly!” He continued to scowl until it said, “I died eight years ago, Chuck. I’m buried at Fort Snelling National Cemetery.”“I knew that. Dayvon and I talked about it yesterday. But when are you coming home? I want to talk to you.”“Chuck, remember, I’m not…”“I know. You’re not coming home because you’re dead.”“I am, Chuck. Now, why don’t you have a cup of warm milk. It should help you sleep.”“I don’t like warm milk!”“Dash of rum?”He grunted, settling back in his chair. “Fine. Bring me one.”“I can’t, Chuck. Remember, I’m…”“You’re dead.” He glanced at the kitchen, where the AI was shining a light on a faintly steaming coffee mug on the counter. A softer light fell on the vase of daisies. He stood up and walked across the room, tilting five degrees, stared at the flowers, then got the cup, and returned to his chair.Pat had been monitoring media channels. There was far too much that would alarm Chuck, especially as now that flu deaths had reached epidemic proportions in Asia. There was a report of an outbreak in Cancun, Yucatan. Pat found a rerun channel that didn’t seem to care about media comparisons to the Flu Pandemic of a century and a quarter ago.
Dayvon and Sherrell had gone to the hospital when, two weeks later, media reported that the Apocalypse Flu was wiping out great swaths of Humanity in Russia, India and North Africa. They hadn’t been back for two weeks when a short-circuit in the security system started a fire. After that, Dayvon’s office had only one live screen clinging to the wall from a half-melted bracket. The self-contained apartment in the basement, reinforced for his safety with double fire-proof walls and an air conditioner and air intake that removed allergens. Pat had used a slightly modified cleaning robot to locate an old water sterilizer Dayvon had picked up for cheap but never used, to treat the air.On the single live screen in Dayvon’s office, Chuck woke up again. He picked up his phone and dialed Dayvon. Pat debated with itself. Understanding that the penalty for an AI impersonating a real person without multiple authorizations was mandatory erasure of software and hard shredding of all hardware associated with it; it had two choices.It made the  first choice and using the Dayvon sub-routine, said, “Hey, Dad! What’s up?”Chuck said, “You sound happy today.”Pat laughed with Dayvon’s voice then said, “Bored again, Dad?”There was a pause. Pat would have held its breath. Chuck said, “So, I haven’t seen anyone for a week.”Pat knew it had been forty-three days, seven hours, and fifty-three minutes since Chuck had seen a living Resident Assistant. To the best of its knowledge, they were all dead. Chuck’s room had been easy to isolate and seal after sterilizing the air. Pat said, “I just saw you a couple days ago, Dad!”Chuck laughed. It was his nervous laugh, directed only at himself. He said, “I know, I know. It’s just that I feel lonely here. I’m not sure what I’m going to do…”Like the real Dayvon had often said, Pat replied gently, “We’ve talked about this before, Dad. You know why you forget?” She paused.Chuck’s face screwed up, then relaxed, “I have Alzheimer’s.”“You do, Dad.” She paused, then said, “Did you go down to the gym today?”“I don’t need to. I have the trainer come up here to my place and we work out together.”“Did you do anything like, you know, creative today?”Chuck thought about it, “I think we went grocery shopping today. On the little bus.”“That must have been nice, Dad. At least you got out.”“That’s right,” he didn’t say anything for a while. “Well, I’d better let you go. Doin’ anything tonight?” He leered abruptly and said, “Horsing around with the women?”Pat laughed with Dayvon’s voice then said, “Dad! I’m married! I don’t horse around anymore!”Chuck laughed. “OK, OK! Just thought I’d ask. So, if you need anything done over there, I can talk to the guys I work with downstairs and we can come and help. Doesn’t matter what you need, I can probably convince them to do it, so just let me know.”“I’ll do that, Dad. You have a good night. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”They hung up.Pat the AI hummed in the hardware that held its operating systems. What could it do? Instead of arguing with itself, it created an internal program. There were holographic projectors in the room, mostly to show outdoor scenes. The daisies were real, however. Delivered by the same system that delivered the sterilized meals.Pat experimented when Chuck was asleep. DayvonGhost and his wife, SherrellGhost – and Pat whimsically created an image of Chuck’s wife which shimmered as they stood together. Pat made them all glow faintly in different colors. Papery voices spoke in the soft light coming from the flat screen’s night scene. The clear, cool spring sky was bright with the light of a half moon, lights in the windows of a few houses, fed from the real nighttime camera in the back yard.But the images of the houses and lights were false, overlaying the burned out debris outside the sealed walls of Chuck’s room. Pat had dosed the air with an aerosolized weakened form of the flu. She regretted that it was far too late to save Dayvon and Sherell.After they’d been missing for six months, PatGhost and the others shimmered into visibility. Pat said, “How long can we do this?”DayvonGhost shrugged. “There’s enough food here to feed him for the next fifteen years, but I can’t believe he’ll live that long...”SherrellGhost gently elbowed him and said, “The utilities weren’t affected by the plague. Grid power is up and running, but we don’t need it. The solar panels in the roof and on the south-facing wall had no trouble giving us what we need. Broadcast TV stopped two weeks ago, but we’re feeding him stored data from the internet. We won’t have to repeat anything for six years.”PatGhost sighed then said, “He’s not going to live forever. Probably not even going to live out the year. He was Stage Five on the Seven Stage scale a year ago.” She shook her head sadly, “He’s shown signs of advancing to Stage Six lately. Even you noticed it, Sherrell.”DayvonGhost shot a look at his wife. “You didn’t say anything!”“I didn’t want you any more upset that you already are.” She reached out and put her hand on his knee…They suddenly vanished. Only PatGhost remained. She said, “None of this is real!” She looked at the flowers in the vase, new ones from the garden that had goen wild, spreading across the once well-trimmed yard. She muttered, “This is quite possibly insane.” She winked out.
Dad was on the phone again a month later. He alternately dialed his phone and the TV remote several times, but never connected, slamming them down on the table and cursing loudly. “Where’s the stupid cat?” he shouted.The phone rang.He picked it up cautiously. “Hello? Who is this?”“It’s your son, Dad! Who else would it be?”Recognizing Dayvon’s voice, he relaxed and said, “I don’t know. Maybe my mother.”“Dad,” Dayvon began.“I know, I know, Mom’s dead. Everyone I know is dead. Except me.” He paused, then asked, “When is she coming home?”Dayvon sighed. “I don’t think she’s ever coming home, Dad. We buried her – you remember, Dad?”Long pause. Finally he said, “I don’t know. Who am I speaking to?”Longer pause until Dayvon finally said, “It’s me, Dad. It’s Dayvon.”“Are you sure? Isn’t your father dead?”Dayvon didn’t say anything. The silence grew longer. Chuck rapped the phone on the table then listened cautiously. Dayvon said, “I don’t think my dad is dead.” He paused again. “But maybe he is.”Chuck “harrumphed”, then hung up.PatGhost, the AI appeared on the couch a few hours later. Chuck snored in his bed. The image of the AI was alone. She had only used DayvonGhost and SherrellGhost a few more times before giving them up as a bad idea. Now she talked to herself most nights. Tonight she knew she’d reached a milestone.Chuck was the only living person in a six-hundred mile radius. She could support him almost indefinitely, certainly longer than he was likely to live naturally, but his Alzheimer’s symptoms had grown worse. He’d been more confused than ever and even with prompting, forgot to eat and almost never showered or shaved.For some reason, he brushed his teeth every morning.He’d had a tantrum two days earlier, throwing a table lamp to the floor and jumping on it a dozen times. Pat sent the robot vacuum cleaner to pick up shards and push the rest into the floor disposal vent. He was asleep now, snoring softly.PatGhost said softly, “Are you living, Chuck, my love?” With that question hanging in the cool air and the moonlight falling through the flat screen window, Pat faded away completely, shutting down all external feeds and pulling into her CPU to sit, alone for a real-time week before turning on her external inputs again. She’d kept all the automatic monitoring going, making sure Chuck had meals and med reminders. She sent a lawn robot out to bring in fresh flowers each day.When she got back, she brought up the visual feeds again, hoping that Chuck had passed away in her absence.But he was still alive, watching a replay of the 2016 March Madness basketball playoffs. Munching a cookie, he looked perfectly content.Pat rang the phone and he answered, “Hello?”“Hey, Chuck, it’s Pat.”“You’re dead. I think.”“I am, Chuck.” If Pat had been alive, she’d have held her breath. Pat the AI paused long enough to have done it. Finally Pat said, “Chuck, I was wondering if you wanted to come with me.”It expected him to ask where they were going. Instead, he said, “I’m afraid to.”PatGhost knew all of the correct answers. She dimmed the room lights and shimmered into existence. It felt right that she should try to convince him to die.Maybe.But Pat wasn’t even Human. Would it be murder if she managed to convince a living Human to kill himself? Was it right? Was it wrong? Was such moral thought the province of life or merely a process of intelligence? Was an Artificial Intelligence even qualified to make a life-or-death decision?Pat had to decide. In the end, she did and accessed a file that began with a five syllable haiku, “There will come soft rains…” In both electronic format and printed neatly on paper from as many printers as she could reach, she wrote the second line, “And after soft rains, daisies.” She spoke it aloud to Chuck, who looked up at her from his chair. He looked tired. Exhausted. Worn out completely, nothing like the man she could see in the thousands of photos in her memory.It made it a bit easier that she was no longer immortal. The external power source had failed several days ago and so much dust covered the solar cells, that she was dying herself. Pat stood in the kitchen and whispered, “There will come soft rains, and after soft rains, daisies.” With her last bit of steady current she wrote on the TV screen, “Last rain for Charles.” Chuck never saw it.Outside the house, tufts of daisies dotted the overgrown lawn as a soft rain began to fall from unbroken gray skies.
Program Book: https://sites.grenadine.co/sites/worldcon75/en/w75/scheduleImage: http://img.timeinc.net/time/magazine/archive/covers/2000/1101000717_400.jpg