Upon entering today, Leonard Nimoy tells me that the tadmen have developed arms. I’m wondering if what I was talking about yesterday, the legs, are truly their arms. It turns out those are actually their arms although they look like they should be legs.

One of the tadmen asks what next generation game console I’m looking forward to; I keep in mind that the answer should be a console from the last generation as this game came out in 2000. I answer the GameCube first but I guess that wasn’t announced by the time this game came out. The second time I say Playstation and he says that is all he hears about lately, he advises me to just buy a second Dreamcast. He then asks what kind of games I’m into and I respond role-playing. He guesses that when I was born, they rolled an eight sided die and I got a twenty-seven for charisma, ha ha.

He also asks what my favorite Dreamcast game is and lastly, whether I think he exists or not. I reply no and he describes why he is alive. He thinks, he breathes and tries with all his might at what he does. My answer disappoints him and he wishes to be left alone to think. I didn’t mean to be rude, but depending on most criteria we use for describing the term “alive”, he is not alive. Although he does respond when I talk to him, he is only “alive” when I play this game and his answers are already predetermined; there is no thought behind them. That’s not to say I don’t appreciate his “company.”

I begin talking to the podmen again after spraying down the insect terrarium and one of them wants to tell me why he is alive. He asks whether I think John F. Kennedy or the Beatles were alive. I say yes. He tells me that my only knowledge of them probably comes from seeing them on TV and in magazines and the same goes for him. He does have a point here, but this is not how I would describe something as being “alive.”

His last comments to me are about existing. He tells me that measuring most anything is impossible. When we stick a thermometer in the water to check the temperature, the thermometer has an effect on the temperature of the water. That being said, we measure something as being alive by being able to talk with it and think about it among other things, so by keeping seaman in my thoughts I am perpetuating his existence. At times, the game will offer deep thoughts and philosophical wonderings, and this is what I enjoy about it.