met free Chapter 126 Curse of Knowledge
Chapter 126 Curse of Knowledge
The next day, Shi Qiang and Luo Ji completed the discharge procedures.
"After being discharged from the hospital, it takes about a month to recover. Avoid spicy and oily foods, and do not do strenuous exercise. The body of a hibernator is still quite weak after hibernation and needs a period of time to adapt."
After listening to the doctor's repeated instructions, the two finally received their discharge certificates.
As soon as they stepped out of the hospital, they were shocked by what they saw.
Azure sky, bright sunshine, lush green grass, and... those tree-shaped buildings in the distance.
Above them, flying cars sped through the city. All of the city's industrial facilities were built on top of it, leaving only the ground to nature.
This also gives the city a more sci-fi feel.
The ecological environment of the entire city is much better than it was before the two hibernated.
"My God, I haven't seen such a blue sky in so long, it almost feels unreal," Da Shi said, looking up at the sky.
"Because it really is fake."
A female voice sounded behind the two of them.
Luo Ji and Shi Qiang turned around at the same time and found a woman dressed in casual clothes standing not far away.
She walked towards the two of them carrying two cups of something she didn't recognize. Although she was dressed casually, both Luo Ji and Shi Qiang could sense an extremely confident aura emanating from her.
This sense of confidence reminded Luo Ji of someone he had met before.
UN Secretary-General Jean-Claude Said.
The woman stopped in front of Shi Qiang and Luo Ji. Looking at their familiar faces, almost identical to those on the commemorative coins, the two men already knew each other's identities.
The person before me is Luo Ji's daughter, Luo Congmin, the Minister of Education and Culture of Earth International.
"Xiaomin... I... I hardly recognize you anymore." Luo Ji looked at his daughter in front of him, appearing somewhat excited.
He had many questions he wanted to ask Luo Congmin, but in the end, he could only manage to utter this one sentence.
"It's nothing, Dad, I know you."
“Over the past two hundred years, I have visited the hibernation center countless times. Looking at you lying in the hibernation pod, many times I have wanted to wake you up directly.”
"Sorry……"
Luo Ji felt somewhat ashamed that his daughter hadn't seen her biological father for over two hundred years. He could no longer fully empathize with Luo Cong's feelings, but his guilt towards her at this moment was genuine.
“It’s nothing, Dad. That’s your duty as a Wallfacer. I didn’t understand it before, but after serving as the Minister of Education for over a hundred years, I’ve gradually come to understand your difficulties, so I don’t blame you.”
Upon hearing this, Luo Ji felt even more distressed.
The thought that his daughter had lived alone in this world for nearly two hundred years made him feel even more guilty.
"Hey, you two, can you keep Versailles' voice down? It's hurting my eyes!" Shi Qiang broke the somber atmosphere by patting Luo Ji hard on the back.
"Brother Luo, stop acting all innocent after getting such a good deal. Your daughter served as president for over a hundred years, which surpasses the reign of any emperor in our time. You should be laughing, laughing, you know? Hahahaha!"
Shi Qiang's outburst completely dispelled the somber atmosphere, and Luo Congmin then handed the two cups in her hand to Shi Qiang and Luo Ji.
"Try it, the milk tea from the new world tastes almost the same as it did back in our time. That's the only thing that makes me feel better. Every time I drink this stuff, I get the feeling of traveling through time."
Shi Qiang took the milk tea from Luo Congmin and looked Luo Congmin up and down. With his years of police experience, he immediately noticed something was wrong.
"Tsk, your clothes look like you just bought them. You don't usually wear this kind of clothes. It doesn't quite suit your style."
Luo Congmin was taken aback, then gave an awkward laugh.
"As expected, Uncle Shi, you recognized me right away. I was thinking that since I'm here to pick you up, I might dress like this to make me look younger. After all, I'm only 23 years old. If I dress too maturely, I'm afraid my dad won't be able to adapt to it."
As she spoke, she pressed a switch on her clothes, and instantly, the casual wear she was wearing lost its original bright color and transformed into a neat black suit.
This garment is made of a special material that can be transformed into any desired form, and can even function as a portable computer with internet access, just like that napkin.
Immediately, the two felt that Luo Congmin's aura as a prominent political figure had been enhanced even further.
“Yes, yes, that’s right, haha!” Shi Qiang laughed.
"You remind me of those national spokespeople on the old CCTV news broadcast. You really are suited to wearing this kind of clothes."
“I’m over two hundred years old, Uncle Shi Qiang,” Luo Congmin said with a smile.
Although the cell division drug locked in her age, one's experiences cannot be erased from her eyes. Luo Congmin has been on the political stage for more than two hundred years, so she naturally appears much more mature than most people.
"According to you, I can only be your great-grandson," Shi Qiang joked.
For some reason, Shi Qiang suddenly thought of something very funny: if Luo Ji ever asked his daughter something he didn't understand, would Luo Congmin give him a reply?
"You'll understand when you reach my age?"
That's like a test-tube baby going downhill; he's had more experience than his father.
"Let's talk after we get in the car. I've arranged new homes for both of you. See if you can get used to them. If not, I can arrange for you to live on the ground."
As Luo Congmin spoke, he led the two of them toward the hangar on the roof.
“Nowadays, all cars are powered by electricity. However, in order to keep the surface clean, all the roads in the underground city were built in the sky. So you can see that apart from vegetation, there are almost no industrial products on the surface. This is also the concept we had when we designed the underground city.”
Luo Congmin activated the car's autopilot, causing the flying car to speed through the air, somewhat like a small shuttle.
"After Dr. Ding Yi solved the problem of controlled nuclear fusion, the energy problem no longer poses any threat to mankind. So we have built several power generation base stations in the city, about one every few tens of meters. They are responsible for creating an electric field in the surrounding area to power the surrounding equipment."
Listening to Luo Congmin's account, Luo Ji couldn't help but fall into deep thought.
After a long silence, he finally spoke.
"Have we still failed to break through the Sophon's blockade?"
Luo Congmin nodded slightly.
"Yes, Dad, just as you thought, we... are still under Tomoko's blockade."
As she spoke, she pointed to the azure sky.
"This sky is also fake; it's a computer-generated image. See that sun? That's our man-made fusion sun, a type of power generation facility, but it's just to make this underground city blend in better with the surface world."
"This place is practically a city made of monitors," Luo Ji said.
Lin Xuan's mirror project is almost identical to the underground city in the original work, with only some differences.
For example, in cities, one can see holographic projection statues of the five ministers, including Luo Congmin.
There are especially many statues of Luo Congmin; you'll encounter one almost every short walk.
"Looks like your political achievements are quite good, our President Luo?" Shi Qiang teased.
Luo Congmin shook his head.
"The PDC has been completely eradicated by Lin Xuan, so Earth International is an extremely democratic political system. There is no such thing as a president. The reason I was able to serve as minister of five departments for so many years is purely because of the [Knowledge Curse]."
"The curse of knowledge, what is that?"
"It's related to Lin Xuan's dream world."
Then, Luo Congmin first gave Shi Qiang and Luo Ji a brief introduction to the functions of Lin Xuan's Dream World before continuing.
"The problem arose after I took office as Minister of Education and Culture. I do not oppose the use of the Dream World, after all, it is a great advancement in human technology. However, excessive reliance on this kind of accelerated learning and memory download is like drug addiction, and there will definitely be serious consequences."
Luo Ji nodded slightly; he had a general idea of what would happen next.
"Is someone using this opportunity to target you politically?"
"As expected of my dad, he guessed right, that's exactly it." Luo Congmin sighed helplessly.
"In the third year after I voiced my opposition, someone stirred up trouble among the masses and took the opportunity to create momentum. His goal was simple: to replace me as the next Minister of Education."
"For this reason, he did not hesitate to use the masses as pawns. As long as he could successfully come to power, he no longer cared whether the future of the Mewtwo world would really be harmful."
"He promised everyone that once he replaced me as the next Minister of Education, he would open the Dream World to everyone."
"So, I lost the election. His voter support rate was at least three times higher than mine, and that person naturally became the next Minister of Education."
"After he took office, in order to fulfill his promise, he took the initiative to open up all the access rights to the Super Dream World. When I found out, I was too lazy to care and just went to Reach for a while."
"Around the twelfth year, the problems began to erupt. At first, it was in the college entrance examination results. The students in those years did a terrible job. After all, the college entrance examination that I modified mainly focused on in-depth learning and practical application. Simply downloading the memories of the Super Dream World would not only not have a positive effect on the college entrance examination, but would also make them do even worse because of the fixed memory logic in their minds."
"Then this chain reaction quickly spread to the undergraduate level. In those years, undergraduate graduation theses were almost identical, with ridiculously high plagiarism rates. A project from more than ten years ago was repeatedly used by a group of undergraduates as their graduation project."
"Ultimately, this disaster extended to the field of scientific research. Human scientific research, humanities, economy, and all other aspects almost came to a standstill in those years. Although the Sophon itself blocked human technology, humanity still made some progress at that time. Until those years, all development almost came to a standstill."
"Then, people finally began to realize that something was wrong, and a large number of people spontaneously stopped using the Dream World, but it was too late. Their children's thinking was almost completely dominated by the downloaded memories, and some of them even had an IQ of only about six or seven years old without the downloaded memories."
"Many people try to break free from this vicious cycle of downloading memories by taking medications that can cause memory loss, but this is ineffective. Even if they lose their memory, after relearning, they will eventually return to the original vicious cycle of memory loss."
"I eventually came up with an explanation through research."
"The curse of knowledge".
"The curse of knowledge?"
"The general idea is that once a person acquires knowledge, they cannot return to the state before they acquired that knowledge. For example, if you ask a college student to teach a primary school student who has not yet learned equations a math problem, it will be difficult for them to explain it clearly because they cannot return to a state where they did not know that knowledge."
As Luo Congmin said this, the corners of her mouth involuntarily turned up, because she was the only one present who knew what she was laughing about. In those years, Ding Yi and Wang Miao had suffered a lot in order to teach her math.
"Therefore, knowledge is like a curse; once you've learned it, even amnesia makes it difficult to erase your understanding of it."
"This is also why I consistently oppose the overuse of this technology. It actually limits the upper limit of a person's cognitive level, and is like a crash course in knowledge. If all of a person's knowledge is composed of the dream world, he will be forever trapped in the thought inertia of the person who downloaded the memories."
"During that period, the research department even tried to integrate it with the thought imprint to create a kind of consciousness bomb that could change people's consciousness, but it ultimately failed."
Luo Ji nodded slightly.
"If that's the case, then this technology should indeed be strictly regulated."
"Yes, that's what I've been doing all these years. It's just a pity for those kids. Almost all the students from those classes were ruined. I specially opened a new university for them so they could finish their studies. Otherwise, they might have been trapped in a vicious cycle of memory for the rest of their lives."
Luo Congmin sighed helplessly, then seemed to remember something, and suddenly said.
"By the way, Dad, can you tell me about that [spell] you used back then?"
Luo Ji was taken aback, then shook his head slightly.
That was just a joke.
When Luo Ji learned that the star he had cursed was still functioning normally, he had already given up his plan to face the wall and was ready to give up.
But Luo Congmin shook his head slightly.
"No, I feel like I can guess some of it, but it's still a little bit off."
"What did you study?" For some reason, Luo Ji suddenly had a bad feeling.
"I majored in education as an undergraduate, and later pursued a doctorate in social education, which is a combined major of sociology and education. However, this major has now been renamed... Cosmic Sociology."