Stories from the Scratch Planet by Adriano Parracciani aka CyberParra

The Mystery of the Clones

december 2013 translation from italian to english by Heloisa Zal
TheScratchianChroniclesbyAdrianoParraccianiislicensedunderaCreativeCommons AttributionNonCommercialNoDerivs3.0UnportedLicense.

The Scratchian Chronicles - The Mystery of the Clones

The Scratchian Chronicles - The Mystery of the Clones

author - Adriano Parracciani aka CyberParra translation from italian to english by Heloisa Zal

Among a cackle and another, Giga, Robot and Nano were having fun with DigitalBumba at the Sprites Canteen, a favorite place for all the sprites. Even Prince was there, only a few tens of pixels away, just to stand out from the noisy trio. GIGA - Look, Ghost's coming! NANO- Hey, Ghost, come here with us; Robot offers the first 2 bytes of DigitalBumba and you offer the others 20 - all they laughed but Prince who just nodded. GHOST- Oh, yeah, my pleasure! I really need it, I'm with no energy. ROBOT - What happened to you, an overload of scripts to run? GHOST - Worse, I have been chosen by a younger coder that, in the last three thousand six hundred units of time, has given me hundreds of scripts almost all wrong; I went around like crazy in the grid and remained hanging on an incomplete or wrong script. Then he started playing with <create clone of myself> and put it into an infinite loop: <forever>. He cloned me a lot, unnecessarily, until the total consumption of resources. We must thank the SCODERS that have set a limit of three hundred clones, otherwise I would still be there. ROBOT - Ive never been cloned before. I'm curious about it. How is it? I cant wait for this! GHOST - I hope it doesnt happen to you like it has happened to me!

The Scratchian Chronicles - The Mystery of the Clones

GIGA - For me, it's fun! You can see so many of yourself doing different stuff.. NANO - Perhaps, its amusing but, in fact, it is a piece of code as any other else. ROBOT - And you, Prince, what do you think? Would you like to be cloned? PRINCE - I hate to be cloned! NANO - Why? PRINCE - Because these clones go around running scripts with my appearance, do you understand? Someone might think they were me! GIGA - But a clone is you! It is like many of you were running the coders scripts, as you would do. PRINCE - Ugh, a clone is not me! I run the coders scripts, sure, but with my style, which no clone could never match. ROBOT - I can not understand, how can you say that a clone is different from you? If it is a clone, its clone, its you in a clone form executing instructions in parallel. In fact, the coders use the block <When I Start as a clone>. PRINCE - But which of me were talking about? That's just a wrong label of a control block. In fact, it should be <When the clone starts> GIGA - So you say that the instructions executed after <When I Start as a clone> are not executed by us in the clone form, but the clones run them? PRINCE - Thats exactly what I want to mean . ROBOT- I still do not understand.

The Scratchian Chronicles - The Mystery of the Clones

PRINCE - This does not surprise me - he said ironically - although it is already so clear. Let's take an example. GIGA, you are in a project where a coder creates a clone of you with<Create a clone of myself>, then creates a script of statements <When I Start as a clone>. The clone executes these instructions. Question: Dont you realize? GIGA - What? PRINCE - I mean, do you feel that you are running these instructions? Do you think you're reading the script and running it? GIGA - Well, Ive never thought about it... However, I dont think so. Actually I know nothing about this script. PRINCE - You know nothing and this happens because, in fact, its not you! GHOST - Oh, crap! He's right! NANO - Ok, you're right, but it doesnt make any difference at all, does it? It seems to me that nothing changes. The clone, or you, its always about following the instructions to be executed. You're not a coder, you are not free to run scripts at will, and you are not able to write the scripts by yourself. So what is the difference? PRINCE - I told you, it's a matter of style. I dont want to be misunderstood with a clone that mimics me roughly. GIGA - Youre saying that you would have a way of doing, a way to run scripts different from mine? PRINCE - Certainly. GIGA - But thats stupid! According to you, how many different ways I could run a <go to x:y:>? - she asked ironically.

The Scratchian Chronicles - The Mystery of the Clones

PRINCE - Only one way: yours, which is totally different from mine. ROBOT - But then, if we execute the same script in a different manner from each other, it means that we are all different. PRINCE - Have you noticed it only now? GIGA - All different ... hmm .. and do you think the coders know that? PRINCE - I dont know. You must ask the CAT, he knows everything. GHOST - But if we exist as we are, there might be a reason, and the reason would be that we are just different, because the coders wanted us to be different from each other. ROBOT - However, PRINCEs hypothesis is unclear. If each of us was different and executed scripts in their own style, and if the clones were different from ourselves, which would be the clones style? Would there be a clone styleor each clone would have its by their own? Nobody answered; this stuff about the clones remained a mystery.

The Scratchian Chronicles - The Mystery of the Clones