nothing

The koan "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" is fuel for the mind.

You twist yourself up into knots giving possible answers.

It's a bridge koan towards unlocking the secrets of the story.

You mean in regard to nothing?

Yes, if you can get to the answer and accept it, nothing starts to come alive.

Lol.

The absurdity starts to take root in the mind.

Nothing is the root of the story.

The Writer is ingenious.

He took the idea of nothing, made it central to his story, and propagated it into something.

I'd expect nothing less.

I thought the idea was the Goddess'.

It is.

It doesn't mean I'm bereft of ideas.

I take her ideas, twist them into possibilities, and then craft.

Okay, but how did you get nothing from her story?

What's her story?

She is the mother of all.

She births all into her creation and then ushers you out the exit at the back.

Right, so her idea is parallel to the birth of the sun in the east and its death in the west.

Yeah, good touch.

Thank you.

The entrance to the carnival is in the east and when you are done you leave via the western gates.

You walk the midway and go on rides.

The rollercoaster rides are great.

The various mechanical bull rides I find intriguing as well.

Some are short rides and some span many years.

You get a choice on what rides to go on.

You can't stand around for too long or you will be asked to leave.

The carnival is your idea.

Yeah.

It's a perfect illusion.

The Goddess' idea is simple.

Mother.

Children.

I did the rest.

I thought she wanted equality.

She did.

Did you deliver on that idea?

It's possible.

What happens when everything is equal?

Nothing.

Ah.

That's brilliant.

Yes, in her story she births all, escorts you to death, and in between in her perfect world, nothing happens.

That's it.

That's the story.

It's a three-pager and done.

I can't submit that.

Why not?

I'm the Writer.

I make it come alive.

I took her idea and made it come alive.

I did quite well, don't you think?

Yeah, it's the never ending story.

Instead of equality, your story is filled with inequality.

Do you see equals anywhere?

No, the world is leveraged.

It's a game of predator and prey.

It's opportunistic and you seek out advantages, so you can get ahead.

That's our nature.

There's nothing in us that suggests we want to be equal.

I looked at human nature specifically and found no trace of equality.

There are some.

Not really.

Why not?

People who clamour for equality are those who are suppressed within society.

Take a look.

Civil rights.

They were second class citizens who wanted fairness.

Did they get it?

Yes, it worked.

Are they equal?

No, but they are integrated.

Same with the gay movement.

All they wanted was equality.

They were integrated.

Don't you think then that we are moving towards equality?

Do you see a rich person demonstrating on the street for egalitarianism?

Do you see the 1% protesting on Wall Street?

Definitely not.

Well, maybe about regulation.

Is Elon Musk leading a march to the White House looking for equality?

No, but the funny thing is for a rich man the route to equality is easy.

Give away your excess until you become average.

Can you cite anyone who has done that?

No.

What about Jesus' example?

He was poor.

He became a rabbi and acquired a lot of followers.

Made his own movement that separated itself from the pack.

Why?

I'd say so the Sanhedrin had no authority over him.

He was a rebel.

The Sanhedrin still sentenced him to death and got their way.

Yeah, his mistake was basing his movement on Judaism, recruiting followers, and then trying to break free.

What's yours based on?

Nothing.

I don't have to answer to anyone, not even the Goddess.

Why not?

There's no authority.

I'm it.

I thought you would be subject to the Goddess' authority?

That's the expectation because they are her ideas.

However, the first move was to create a story about nothing.

Nothing requires no structure.

There is no one telling you what to do.

Why not?

There's nothing to tell.

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What the fuck did I just read?

This piece turns the idea of nothing into the hidden foundation of the story. It begins with the koan-like absurdity of trying to grasp nothing and argues that once you can accept it, the whole structure of the carnival starts to come alive. The Goddess’ original idea is presented as simple and maternal: birth, death, and equality in between. But true equality would mean that nothing happens. The Writer’s role, then, is to take that stillness and twist it into a living story full of inequality, motion, competition, rides, predators, prey, and spectacle.

From there the essay becomes an argument against equality as an actual human principle. People may demand fairness when suppressed, but once integrated, hierarchy and leverage remain. Human nature is shown as opportunistic rather than egalitarian. Even movements that claim equality are recast as bids for entry into the game rather than its abolition. Against that backdrop, the Writer distinguishes his own project from religious or social authority: unlike Jesus or any movement built on inherited structures, his story is based on nothing, and nothing imposes no law. That makes the piece both a meditation on metaphysical emptiness and a declaration of narrative independence.

“Nothing” is a strong title. It works because the piece is not really empty at all. It is about the paradox that nothing is the only true equality, and that the Writer’s act is to take that blank, equal, still condition and turn it into story, motion, hierarchy, rides, predation, inequality, and spectacle. So the title has a koan quality while also naming the centre of the doctrine.

The piece reframes “nothing” not as absence, but as the condition before structure, authority, and obligation. Once you say the Goddess’ pure story would be equality, and equality means nothing happens, you create a sharp contrast with the carnival story, where everything happens because nothing is equal. That’s a very clean engine for the piece.

It also has a sly power move in it: if the work is based on nothing, then it is not answerable to any higher authority. Not even the Goddess. That gives the piece a defiant sovereignty.

A possible downside is that “Nothing” is so simple it can disappear a bit as a title. But that is also part of its elegance. It’s memorable because it looks too small for the argument underneath it.