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LITHIUM_FLOWER
December 19, 2009
Rev: October 24, 2016
I saw some confused chatter on an
old web message board about the song
lyrics at the close of "Ghost in the
Shell: Standalone Complex"; I didn't And the net, being what it is
find them that mysterious, myself, these days, it's not at all
and I'm in a mood to explain... clear where this should be
said, so I say it here.
"Lithium Flower", lyrics by Jim Jensen,
Quoted from James Wong's "Yoko Kanno Project":
[ref]
she's so cold and human
it's something humans do
she stays so golden solo It could be "cold in soul",
she's so number nine rather than "golden solo".
she's incredible math
just incredible math (If this wasn't sung
in rocker english it'd
how is she when she doesn't surf? be easier to follow.)
I wonder what she does when she wakes up?
when she wakes up
and is she really human?
she's just so something new
a waking lithium flower
just about to bloom
I smell lithium now
smelling lithium now
"The Ghost in the Shell" series depicts a
world where humans are adding technical
modifications to their bodies, gradually This is all probably the
becoming cyborgs; and also where androids best that's been done
are steadily improving, and becoming more with the anime form, but
human-like. The human spirit (the "ghost") like all anime it seems
is recognized as an information phenomena, both creative and
data that can be swapped into different derivative, depending on
bodies ("shells"), or even, as with the your point of view.
close of the original movie "Ghost in the
Shell", uploaded into the net, abandoning Much of this just seems
physical bodies entirely. like early 80s William
Gibson "cyberpunk"... but
The human and the they succeed in keeping
machine are moving There's a touch it fresh: they give you
together. The of romanticism some sense of what it
question "what is about "ghosts": might feel like to be
human?" is not an dubs of them living up against the ramp
abstract philosophical aren't as good. of this curve.
problem. No substitute for
the "real" thing. It's a corner we
The motif of the are going to be
doll: empty shells, NEUROMANCER squeezed into
and yet we're eventually, one
capable of lavishing way or another.
affection on them.
STANDALONE_COMPLEX
The "Stand Alone Complex" show uses
the cop show format, it's a prequel (Well: really it's a prequel
to what we've seen in the film with continuity issues that
"The Ghost in the Shell", focusing are covered by a concealed
on "Public Security Section 9". 'alternate universe' premise.)
The main character is Major Motoko
Kusanagi or just "The Major". She's
apparently lived in cyborg bodies
much of her life-- there's an It has apparently become a
incident when she was younger, when common medical practice for
she inhabited an early, clumsy very sickly children to be
model: she accidently crushed a doll given artificial bodies.
in her hands-- a traumatic event
that left her in tears that she
still dreams about.
Now, she inhabits a very
slick, top-of-the-line She prances around in a
cyborg body, and leads black leather jacket over a
Section 9, an elite, lavender bikini, an outfit
nearly legendary team. that would only seem normal (Or-- sometimes--
in an anime universe. in San Francisco.)
"she's so cold
and human/ it's (The odd outfit makes sense as a
something humans character detail: she's flaunting her
do/ she stays so perfect artificial body-- perhaps with
golden solo/ she's a touch of sarcasm?-- and doesn't much
so number nine" care what people think.)
There's no obvious human affection
in her life, just the ghost of old
ones, like the crushed doll that
made her cry. She's a member of
a professional group-- for now--
and while she's certainly friendly with
her co-workers (in particular, Batou) But here: being "cold" isn't
fundamentally she "stands alone". dismissed as "inhuman".
"It's something humans do"
Far from being crippled by
being alone, it's how she
stays good at what she does:
she's "golden solo"-- she's Solo, and yet of Section 9:
slick and elite, she's the There's an individual vs.
very epitome of "Section 9": group identity theme going:
"Stand Alone Complex"
"she's so number 9".
Why say "number 9"
and not "section 9"?
The obvious reason is
to tie it in to the
next thought about
"incredible math"...
But also, on a scale
from 1-10, she's a There are other possibilities:
high number, but not "Revolution Number 9" was for
quite the maximum...yet. many people their first
exposure to audio sample art.
"she's incredible math
just incredible math" A cut-up, stuck together
collage of bits of information...
Well, there's the sense
that she moves with
mathematical precision...
But more to the point, what "she" is, is
very much a matter of information, data,
i.e. "math". We can infer that a
naturally developed personality such as We have long since
The Major is better that any consciously gotten over the notion
designed program or that's what they that deterministic math
would be using. The human spirit might always yields simple,
indeed be indistinguishable from a dull, clock-work.
computer program on some level, but in
the world we're shown at least, the
natural (but augmented) still trumps the
entirely artificial. In theory, she's
"just" a mathematical construct, but
she's not just math, she's "incredible
math".
Now, the James Wong version of the lyrics has
this line repeated three times:
"how is she when she doesn't surf?"
Just using my ears, I think the closing word
is different on all three lines:
"how is she when she doesn't say?
how is she when she doesn't surf?
how is she when she doesn't suffer?"
"say": well, she doesn't talk about her
feelings, which makes it hard to know how There's that opening
she is. sequence, waking from
nightmares...
"suffer": this suggests that she does
suffer sometimes, but when she doesn't, is
she okay even then?
But that middle word, "surf":
In the original movie, we see her
indulging her hobby of scuba diving--
and Batou suggests there's a touch of
death wish about someone with a
heavier-than-water body going swimming.
We don't see her
"surfing", but there's And there's the
no huge stretch in this all-too-common Though in the year
metaphor -- she rides phrase "web surfing": 2030, they seem to
waves flawlessly, and how is she when call it "net diving".
never wipes out. she's not connected?
"I wonder what she does In the aforementioned opening sequence,
when she wakes up? she'd been sleeping in a coffin-like
when she wakes up" japanese "capsule" hotel. (It could be
these don't suggest coffins to the
Japanese: they favor cremation.)...
The original anime film has her merging
with the Puppetmaster, and ascending into
the net, transcending her humanity...
There's a suggestion that in this series,
she's looking for something like that
still, she really wants to become something
else. I.e. to wake up?
"and is she really human?
she's just so something new Not, sub-human, or non-human,
a waking lithium flower just but something beyond human.
about to bloom"
The song points in the direction Series fiction has
that we know this character is this capability, to
going -- she's going to "wake up", build up a back story,
and undergo a major change, she's a repository of shared
a flower "about to bloom". premises and associations
that can be worked with,
referred to, built upon.
"I smell lithium now
smelling lithium now" To someone who hasn't
followed along, it's
Why "lithium"? Were difficult to explain
they thinking about all the associations,
"lithium batteries"? let alone get a sense
of the feeling of
Could they have been thinking of mythical resonance.
"lithium" the mood control medication
(now somwhat out-of-fashion)?
A controlled, icy,
emotionally remote If you're walking the
character... line between spirit
and matter, drugs are
a subject that can't
be ignored.
(Dec 16, 2016)
Thinking it over, I came up
with a different theory: the
original lyric was probably
"silicon flower", but they
were afraid that silicon
technology was too much a
thing of the present, so they
swapped in the name of Actually the technology of the
another element that they future in semi-conductors-- if
figured would sound more like we don't just stay with
futuristic high-tech. silicon-- is more likely to be
diamond (carbon) or a compound
(In the tradition of like gallium arsenide.
"positronic brains".)
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