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Le Monde de L'Écriture » Encore plus loin dans l'écriture ! » Textes non francophones » roboRash

Auteur Sujet: roboRash  (Lu 2565 fois)

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roboRash
« le: 20 janvier 2019 à 21:34:39 »


The consulting room was finely tuned along U.S. National Health Service recommendations.

No desk to separate doctor from patient; a virtual screen could pop up anywhere so information will be shared by everyone in the room. Patient also could be virtual and be thousands of kilometers away: 3D will take care!

Auscultation apparatus was hidden behind plants and offered topmost technology in "soft handling" and non-intrusive scanners. There was also a harness by which the doctor could interact with remote patients.

Since the room was integrated with the Nanabozo Seniors' Home there were special features for the elderly: the armchairs were able to go up and down on demand, the lights could be finely and automatically tuned to eyesight, and there was a projection of sound directly in the bones of the inner ear for those with a poor hearing.

Though pleased, Dr Furacs was slightly surprised by Mrs. Thislewaithe’s visit.

She was a sprightly lady, very small, very old, with a funny face full of wrinkles.

As usual Dr. Furacs used his caring attitude and warm voice to address patient:

— "Well Mrs. ThisleWaithe … pleased to meet you … let’s have a look at your metrics … as you can see on this screen all the sensors embedded in your body report only good news! You are extremely fit for your age! Kudos! I wonder what your concerns might be …

— Oh Dr Furacs I wanted to meet you here with only two of us together .. but it’s not about my health … I wanted to invite you to a meeting …

— Wow: that looks mysterious! So …

— That "Mysterious" meeting will be a surprise for you. T’will be held tomorrow at eleven a.m. under the bandstand in the North Garden. We know you won’t be on duty at this moment

— You said "We"? Well that looks mysterious enough… but is it not supposed to rain tomorrow?

— That’s precisely the point Dr. Furacs…

— Hey! I don’t want anybody to catch a cold!

— Be reassured: there is an infra-red heating under the roof of the bandstand"

For sure it was raining cats and dogs when the "mysterious" event had to take place. No Robot-Nurse could venture out under such downpour. So many elderly residents had to help each other through the garden crossing.

Dr Furacs had to activate his airblast umbrella and help old Mr. Ramos on the gravelwalk.

The space heater made the standard blue ponchos radiate and steam; there was an eerie purple haze under the roof of the bandstand.

The group of seniors gathered around Dr Furacs, then rather theatrically Ms LeGrand stepped forward, clicked on her poncho that opened, then clicked again an her sleeve opened … To Dr Furacs amazement her forearm was covered with irritations with strange red and yellow colors and some ugly purulent blisters.

With the same dramatic attitude Mr. Ramos stepped also forward … clicked his torso bare … same strange skin disease appeared.

Mrs. Thislewaithe then whispered her diagnostic: "Roborash!"

Dumbfounded Dr Furacs stayed silent for a moment and then requested help from his personnal assistant: "Specs! Roborash?"

The only response he got traced on his lenses was:

<no connection: try later!>

Old professor Singh had been a star of Silicon Valley, he offered an explanation: "Hush! I installed a device on the roof. Don’t expect any connection of any type here! Everything has been turned of"

— "Why all these mysteries? What is going on?"

Mrs. Thislewaithe adopted her most foxlike look:

— "Dr Furacs. What you see here is caused by the contact with robots! But don’t expect any info about that on the ExtentNet!

— Too many questions are rushing into my mind: are you sure this is caused by robots? How do you know? Where does this name come from? Why did you hide that from your doctor? Why do you think there is no info about that on the ExtentNet?

— I think we can answer all these questions … well almost… But first your last one: all Roborash entries will be suppressed from ExtentNet as soon as created…

— How come?

— The "powers that be" do not want the information to be published

— Oh Come on! This smells of conspiracy theory!

— Dr Furacs! We trust you because you empathize with your patients and because it looks like you are someone who sticks to facts… So let’s examine the facts! This Roborash popped up on some of us that had been manipulated by robots during the elderly patient’s daily grooming.

— You said "some of us"… so not everybody is affected … can you point to a specific Robot-Nurse?

— They all look alike; it’s impossible to pick-up a culprit. But there is a string of circumstances: you are "handled" by some Robot-Nurse and you end-up with RoboRash. By the way the term was coined by your predecessor Dr Dolbykh. He started investigating the whole thing …

— And?

— Well you sure know he died! It was supposed to be an accident! Just think about that: Dr. Dolbykh was electrocuted while tempting to repair a faulty robot! What a curious coincidence! And now he is replaced by you, a young doctor on his first appointment … Dr. Furacs we do not want you to be looking for trouble! Take care if you want to investigate!

— By Asclepius! You almost scared me! There should be a more innocent reason behind all that! And, yes, I will investigate.

— Thanks Dr. Furacs! But please be cautious and do not let youth’s impetuosity head you towards unpleasant situations … to say the least!"

Dr Furacs came back brooding to his office. He sat for a moment then took out a secret picture of Mr. Ramos' torso that he had snapped with the micro-camera hidden in his collar. He had forgotten to take out his professional clothes to attend the meeting under the bandstand and so could not resist using some of the ledger features that came with the coat.

He submitted the picture to the automatic diagnostic assistant … which was as confused as himself! There appeared a list of options: allergy, poisoning, caterpillar rash and so on… None had a sufficient probability rate to lead to some known cause.

He was to be prudent when lurking through the ExtentNet and so didn’t dare ask more direct questions.

The meetings under the bandstand were supposed to be held when no Robot could snoop. In a sense the fact that there were storms almost thrice a week was fortunate. Curiously no Robot manufacturer had already thought to deal with climate change and create a Robot-Nurse that could withstand heavy rainfall.

Surrounded by the elders, Dr. Furacs had to raise his voice to report and be heard … though he thought that was slightly stupid for a secret meeting.

— "I tried to get contact with every Robot in this nursing home. I mean "physical contact"! I had a kind of sticky glove to gather whatever could be present on their surface. No microscopic or nanoscopic hair, no nickel, no chemical product whatsoever! No radioactivity too…"

Mrs. Thislewaithe had a doubtful grin:

— "Could it be that a specific Robot could deliver something on demand? Could it be through some microwave?

— The question could also be: why would someone want to harm residents of this institution? Do you think there is a Robot-Nurse gone mad?"

Mr. DesPierres had been a mechanics in his former life and wanted to express anger … though he could only mumble his way through words:

— "Robots are not anymore what they used to be! There are constant glitches! Poh! Pretty sure that adopting the metric system was a wrong idea and that wrecked havoc all along the production lines!"

Mrs. ThistleWaithe didn’t like to be interrupted. She thought herself as the only spokesperson of the group:

— "Dr Furacs we know that robots have no will of their own, someone should pilot or program them … and that’s where we start worrying

— I don’t believe there is some malevolent mind scheming in the shadows!

— I am sorry to say that you look like a young idealistic optimist! Go for the facts! Mr. Ramos died yesterday…

— But that was from a heart failure!

— And stress! There are many reasons to attack us. There are too many elderly people … that’s why the country at large does not have enough nurses to care for them and why Robot-Nurses are used. Now that puts financial pressure on U.S.N.H.S., which, by the way, is bleeding money galore

— How dare you! The N.H.S is our lifeline!

— Yes, it is also your "raison de vivre" … But how about second thoughts? How about examining all hypothesis? We are desperate! Do you want to help us? … please … do something…"

Dr. Furacs could not sleep the following night and in the morning started to write a carefully worded research grant. Something along the lines of a comparison of seniors' well-being when a robot or a human nurse was in charge. There have been numerous such comparisons so he had to think about something slightly different. A good thing he minored in statistics at the university!

It took two days to get something that would look like an interesting subject without explicitly talking about Roborash. Then he sent it to the U.S.N.H.S. … And kept worrying for a few days.

Normally the bureaucratic hurdles were so high that such a request would take months to be processed … and much more to be approved!

To his great surprise the grant and everything that went with it were here in just a week! More surprisingly it didn’t rain for a fortnight and so no secret meeting was scheduled.

As he was sitting in the cafeteria, sipping his morning maté, Mrs. Yim came smiling to him:

— "Oh Doctor! I am so happy!" Then in a hush: "yes: "it" disappeared!"

— "Nothing on your leg Mrs. Yim?

— Yes! … and Nurse Riva is so sweet!

— I know … she looks like nurses we see in soap operas! A doctor’s dream come true!

— You naughty boy!" (wink)

— "Please, don’t push her too hard. She is working too much! I dare say I admire her for her energy more than for her looks!"

Back in his office Dr. Furacs was even more worried. So it was true: there was something fishy with some robots. When the elders from the test group that suffered from Roborash were only touched by a human hand then the rash was gone. What and who was the culprit?

He could not stop thinking about it and that was bad for his practice. He needed the Robot-Nurses and now he was looking at them with suspicion.

At the next meeting under the bandstand the participants took the liberty of drinking a small glass of Port (Mr. Smith had always a small secret stock of this … precisely hidden under the floor underneath!). But there were also reasons not to rejoice: the mystery was not solved. Which was the robot? How did it transmit the rash? Who programmed it? For which purpose?

The week after Mrs. Yim came shrieking in the consulting room:

— "Dr Furacs! It’s back!

— What?

— Look! The Roborash!

— Which robot?

— Dr Furacs! It’s nurse Riva!

— What!

— Nurse Riva … she is not human! She is a sophisticated robot … a new kind of Robot!

— Come on Mrs. Yim! This is a delusion: Nurse Riva is human!

— No she isn’t! YOU were fooled! I know because I have seen her right eye send a spark of red light! You know those laserlike rays! Now the truth is coming out! … Oooh! We are all going to die!"

Before Dr Furacs could do anything she rushed out of the room, sobbing, shrieking. He was so stunned that he could not move.

He was even more stunned when Nurse Riva entered the room in a catlike fashion.

She sat in front of him. Straight but still exuding something soft and warm. She spoke with her slightly smoky voice.

— "Dr Furacs. Am I a Robot?

— I may lose face just by answering this question: if I say Yes and you are a real person I will appear as ungentlemanly, to say the least. If I say No and you are a robot, then I will appear as stupid!

— I notice you avoid other possibilities … Touch me!

— Nurse Riva the regulations forbid this! We are alone together in this room and so I am not allowed to touch you!

— I see"

She stood up and went for the scanner at the other end of the room.

— "Nurse Riva! You are not allowed to manipulate this machine!

— Quite the contrary! By the way my real name is Doctor Riera. You can read my identification sheet on the screen here!"

Dr. Furacs stood dumbfounded, his eyes frantically going from Dr Riera image on the scanner to her Id on the screen.

— "Please, please, Doctor Riera put back your blouse … or my eyes will pop out of their socket!

— Since you speak of eyes, please notice that my right eye is completely artificial

— The red spark from your eye…

— It was a voluntary sparkle…

— Holy Asclepius!"

She sat in front of him. Sweat was dripping into Dr. Furacs eyes, his mind racing like mad.

She smiled.

— "Dr Furacs, we know you can go to the bottom of things … so what do you think?

— By "We" you mean the U.S.N.H.S. I suppose

— Who else? They paid for your university education …

— I know: I am an indentured practitioner…

— Is that bad?

— Certainly not. I like my job, I am really happy with it! The pay is low and thus I pay few taxes … and I like my house in the compound here… But does that mean that I must not open my eyes and must keep my mouth shut?

— Quite the contrary! Your idea of a research grant is important to us! Now what do you think about all that?"

Dr Furacs frowned and sat silent for a moment.

— "Do you mind if I venture into brainstorming? … Lots of conflicting ideas are storming my mind…

— Go ahead!

— Let me think. When some people here thought they were touched by a robot they developed Roborash …

— So that’s how you call it? I like the name!

— The same persons who thought that there was a human nurse to take care of them … kind of recovered … until they thought you were a Robot…

— That was precisely my goal!

— Then a word springs to my mind: NOCEBO! A fictitious disease with no real cause except it’s real for patients who just THINK they are ill… But there are some "buts": I am surprised by things so intense as purulent blisters and how come there were many people here that believed in Roborash but some were not affected by it?

— I have an answer for that: look at the records. People affected by severe Roborash, as you call it, had suffered a mild Zona before. The quiescent virus in their body is just reactivated by their mind!

— Holy Asclepius! That will make a fantastic subject for a medical publication!

— The two of us can sign such a publication … but it will not published on the ExtentNet … For fear of contagion: here the idea itself is contagious! We have an interesting case of a new disease in this house … but if word of mouth sprays out, then we will get an outright plague! The U.S.N.H.S. can’t afford such a plague!

— I know we are not supposed to criticize during a brainstorming, but I think this is wrong! You can’t stop the news leaking outside this compound! Better try to find a cure … Let me think…."

He stood silent for a moment then adopted a doctoral attitude:

— "As usual only experiments will help us solve the problem. I have two initial ideas. First I suggest that we create a group of elders that start helping each other without the help of robots … I suspect many will find soon that, after all, better have a robot! The other idea is about the Robot-Nurses themselves: they should have at least a simple artificial personality. Each should be different from the other, each should be easily recognizable and so people may adopt a specific one more easily.

— Great! I really see now why the psychs at the N.H.S. had faith in you!

— Hmm… I have been stupid too … flirting with a conspiracy theory …

— Don’t believe that! It is amply proven that intelligent and caring people are more prone to listen to such theories … But you are intelligent and caring enough to overcome!

— Don’t make me blush! Though … you said I was rather systematic … Hmmm! You know I have to make sure you are not a robot after all … I need to investigate further … How about having dinner together at "The Prairie" … I have heard it is a very good restaurant and the location is splendid!"

 


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