"Doctor, what would you say if I told you the translation was
unbelievable; that it couldn't be seriously entertained by any man?
What if I said that it would take the sanity of any man who believed
it?"
"I would say that it might well be incorrect."
He took some papers from his pocket and laughed excitedly, slumping
down in the chair. "This is the complete translation in idiomatic
English. I'm going to let you read it, but first I want you to consider
a few things."
He hid the papers behind the back of his chair; his face became even
more boyish, almost as if he were deciding on where to put the tipped
over outhouse.
"Consider first, doctor, that there was a total projection of three
hundred and sixty different characters. The same number as the number
of degrees in a circle. Consider also that there were eighteen
different orderings of the characters, or nineteen counting the
alphabetical list. The square root of three hundred and sixty would lie
between eighteen and nineteen."
"Yes," I said. I remembered there was something significant about the
numbers, but I wasn't at all sure that it was this.
"Consider also," he continued, "that the communication was through the
medium of a sphere. Moreover, keep in mind that physics accepts the
path of a beam of light as its definition of a straight line. Yet, the
path is a curve; if extended sufficiently it would be a circle, the
section of a sphere."
"All right," I said. By now the patient was pounding the coin against
the sole of one shoe.
"And," he said, "keep in mind that in some sense time can be thought of
as another dimension." He suddenly thrust the papers at me and sat back
in the chair.
I picked up the translation and began reading. The patient sat stiffly
in the leather chair on the other side of the desk. Nervously he
pressed a coin into the palm of one hand.
"Just start anywhere," I said, "and tell me all about it."
"As before?" Without waiting for an answer, he continued, the coin
clutched tightly in one hand. "I'm Charles J. Fisher, professor of
philosophy at Reiser College."
He looked at me quickly. "Or at least I was until recently." For a
second his face was boyish. "Professor of philosophy, that is."
I smiled and found that I was staring at the coin in his hand. He gave
it to me. On one side I read the words: THE STATEMENT ON THE OTHER SIDE
OF THIS COIN IS FALSE. The patient watched....