In July 04, I clearly remember the time of this story, not because of anything else, the story happened on the way home of my uncle, and the purpose of going home was to accompany me for a birthday.

The weather in Province H has always taken an extreme route, which may have a lot to do with the local environment.

It's either too cold or too hot.

In July, just after the heat, the high temperature lasted from early morning to evening, and only at night, the uncle could take advantage of the wind brought by high-speed driving to cool down.

It just so happened that the car was empty, and this trip was empty, and I was supposed to wait a few more days to return to this return route, but it was just in time for my birthday, and my uncle couldn't wait a few days for business.

The boring night train life is the only way for every long-distance bus driver, but the uncle has been a chaperone for several years, and the usually unusually lively car suddenly became deserted, and he was still somewhat uncomfortable.

The car passed the highway, it is Y City, it is a few hours drive away from home, and when I entered the city, the first one to pass by is the three hospitals of the city at the intersection of the three forks - the City Psychiatric Hospital.

The mental hospital is a very depressing place, at least every time the uncle passes by, he feels so, pale with some yellowed outer walls, only some dead vines around the house, and then the silence that can crush the whole house, so heavy that every passerby can't look up directly.

It's hard to imagine how a person can live in such an environment, even if it's an ordinary person, I'm afraid that here, he will have to become a crazy psychopath.

But when the uncle passed by today's three hospitals, he felt a little different, the hospital was brightly lit, even during the day, he had never seen such a lively situation, so that the uncle once thought that he was going the wrong way.

Stopping the engine, Uncle is ready to see what is going on, this fun-loving problem! It will always bring a lot of trouble to the uncle!

He was leaning against the window and watching the situation in the hospital, only to notice that the door of the hospital suddenly opened.

A group of white coats came out, and the nurses in the psychiatric hospital were different from ordinary hospitals. Most of the men here are strong men, because the sick people are sick, and the mental workers can't be subdued.

Uncle's car was parked very close, just across a sidewalk from the hospital, so the other party saw Uncle's car at a glance, and a group of people walked towards him.

He was still thinking about whether to start the car directly and leave, but he was afraid that the other party would think that he had a ghost in his heart and did not dare to start, and he was struggling, and the other party had already arrived in front of the car.

The nurses who came over looked relatively young, did not leave any shadow of human sophistication, and in mental hospitals, they were often much simpler than in society.

Before the uncle could ask what the situation was, the other party had already spoken first.

"A patient came out today, did you see that?" The lad is more straightforward! After all, in the middle of the night, there is a bus parked on the road! Uncle shook his head, and there was a knock on the car door.

"We'll have to get in the car and check it out." The young man walked straight and pointed to the inside of the uncle's car.

The uncle thought that there was nothing to hide in his car, so he opened the car door generously.

The car door airlock opened, and a few heavily armed nurses walked up, covering it tightly in the summer, which was particularly mysterious, and the young man took out a pack of cigarettes from his pocket, handed the uncle one, and started talking, and the uncle also turned on the lights in the car casually, which means that you can check at will.

"Long distances?" The young man spoke first.

"It used to be, but now it's just helping someone else take a class! Opened a passenger transport company. "Uncle doesn't put on a score, and chats with young people.

"Not bad! Boss! The young man laughed with envy.

The uncle laughed with him. "It's just a little housekeeper, not a boss!"

"If you lose your job in the future, you can go to your place and work as a driver or something!" The young nurse patted his chest, "It's not a problem to stay up late." ”

"Oh!" Uncle also took it seriously, after all, there were not many people who took the driver's license in those days, "Can you drive?" ”

"No!" When the young man said this, Uncle was disappointed! But he continued: "But it's also easy to learn, and people live in this world, don't they rely on this brain?" What can't you remember? The young man pointed, and the inspection in the car was over.

The two said hello, the uncle handed over a business card, and the car started again.

The lights of the three hospitals were all extinguished in an instant, and he returned to the quiet old house, as if nothing had happened, and the uncle didn't take it seriously and got back on the road.

After walking a short distance, the uncle suddenly felt that something was wrong, there were faint sounds in the car, like someone's breathing, the uncle hung a low gear, the car was quieter, and then leaned into his ears to listen carefully.

The sound seemed to be very close, and the uncle riveted enough to listen, only to find that it was behind the ear, inhaling and spitting, which frightened the uncle, and the steering wheel also turned a few times, almost hitting the roadside fence.

The lights on the car were not turned on, and the uncle did not dare to turn them on, and there was a dead silence in the dark car, and he even had to hold his breath a little quietly.

He didn't dare to turn around, because judging from his current voice, as soon as he turned around, he could only see one of the other party's faces in his whole eyes.

Uncle has also heard a lot of rumors about encountering wild ghosts on a night car, but he has never believed it.

"Who?" The uncle's brain couldn't control his throat, and he shouted loudly to strengthen his courage.

There was a dead silence in the car, and there was no response at all. But the sound of breathing continued, and the uncle finally mustered up the courage and glanced in the rearview mirror.

No one! The uncle's eyes wandered around, but he couldn't see anyone.

"No need to look for it, I'm right here!" A voice suddenly sounded, and although the prepared uncle was a little timid, it was not enough to be frightened.

The voice was quite close, as if it was just a seat away from the uncle.

"I'm the one they just looked for!" It was a woman, at least it sounded like a woman's voice, coming from behind the uncle.

"But they didn't find you in the car!" Since it is a person, there is nothing to be afraid of, the uncle breathed a sigh of relief and asked, "Where are you hiding?" There's nothing I can hide from in the car, huh? ”

"I'm not hiding! I'm here in the open! She spoke calmly, without the slightest suspicion of lying.

"Could it be that they are all blind?" Although the uncle believed her words, it was still a little strange.

"Not really! They are not blind, but they are wrong. ”

The uncle was a little confused for a while, and didn't quite understand what she meant, so he hurriedly asked, "What do you mean?" ”

"Are they looking for someone? Of course I can't find it. ”

Uncle didn't understand too much, "What do you mean by that?" ”

"Because the mind cannot be found!"

The uncle was speechless for a long time, and the woman seemed to see that the uncle didn't understand much.

"Literally" The woman is very cold, but she does not snub the uncle, and there is always a sentence without a sentence.

"It's normal to listen to you! It's not like a patient! The uncle also wondered in his heart, at least he couldn't see what was wrong with her.

"Do you think everyone who comes out of a psychiatric hospital is mentally ill?" The woman asked him.

"Not really!" Uncle's answer seemed to surprise the woman, and it was quite good.

But he added: "Aren't there doctors and nurses? ”

The woman was not led astray by him, and this joke only eased the uncle's own fear a little.

The woman asked him again, "What do you think you mean by being mentally ill?" "The woman's words are becoming more and more confusing.

"I'm not studying medicine!" Uncle half-jokingly, before he said with a serious face: "I can't explain the professional explanation of mental illness, I don't study medicine, but I know one thing, their world, we don't understand, it's not normal." The spiritual world is different from us, so it's called mental illness! ”

Uncle said something about them here, and he didn't point to the woman, which was a kind of respect for her, because he felt that she seemed to be the patient who had escaped from mental illness in the mouth of the previous group.

"Why don't you understand the mind, it's not normal?" The woman's question is very sharp, so sharp that the uncle can't take it.

"Do you think it's normal to see and touch it?" The woman is somewhat aggressive.

"At least that's what most people can agree with!" He seems to have found a point of rebuttal.

"Copernicus' heliocentrism is not accepted by most people! But as it turned out, he was right! The woman began to argue, and the uncle didn't know why, every storyteller was always so knowledgeable, revealing his ignorance.

"It was just an accident!" Uncle retorted anxiously.

The woman sighed, and when the uncle heard it, he was not disappointed, but sounded relieved.

It's like you're going to tell some kind of earth-shattering conspiracy.

"The brain in the tank" The woman didn't come to the point, and the uncle was completely stunned.

Uncle drove quietly, because he understood that the woman would explain it to him clearly, and he had experienced a lot of things, and Uncle seemed to be a little sure, these were all chatterboxes, as long as they were opened, they couldn't be closed.

"The brain in a jar" is a philosophical proposition! It's also a biological experiment! The woman explained: "Or rather, it can be said to be a paradox, depending on how you look at it." ”

Uncle pouted, "It doesn't sound like a serious experiment." The name sounds a little oozing, like some kind of brutal human experimentation. ”

The woman didn't know if she was amused by the uncle's humor or ignorance, "Great discoveries are not normal in the eyes of the world, who would have thought of going to the leaning tower to test the acceleration, only Galileo, and no one would have thought that the sun would have seven colors, or Cavendish who was so bored that he calculated the weight of the earth, Newton who thought about gravity because of the fall of an apple, these people all seemed abnormal until they succeeded." ”

"They're scientists, and not every psychopath is a scientist!" Uncle knew she had something to say.

"How do you know that a mentally ill person can't be a scientist?" Seeing that the uncle was stuck, the woman seemed to be very happy and said, "Let's go back to the topic just now!" ”

The woman went on to explain, "The brain in the vat is a hypothetical experiment, you know? Hearing the uncle's answer, the woman continued, "Suppose a scientist takes out a person's brain and puts it in a nutrient cultivation solution, and connects his brain to a computer, and if his brain can continue to survive, his mind is connected to the computer. ”

In this kind of late night, talking about such a creepy topic, I am afraid that if I change someone else, I would have already escaped from the car, and the uncle also hissed lightly and did not disturb the woman to continue talking.

"The scene simulated by the computer can make him feel that he really exists." The woman paused, her throat seemed a little dry, or a little unspeakable.

"Just like we really exist?" Uncle helped her take it, carefully.

"En"

There was no talk in the car for a long time, the topic was too cold, so cold that the uncle involuntarily closed the window, but he had forgotten that it was in the hot July.

"Actually, it's like Zhuang Zhou Mengdie, right?" Uncle studied the history of ancient Chinese literature in college, and he thought a lot about ancient Chinese literature and philosophy, so he was able to calmly replace the propositions of the two, which sounded less terrifying, but the content was still the same.

"Zhuang Zhou dreams of butterflies, or butterflies dream of Zhuang Zhou? There is a problem that exists, and it is also a denial of the world, what we are in is not necessarily real, what we see may be a nightmare. The uncle seemed to be very satisfied.

"So are we abnormal, or are we mentally ill?" The woman took the uncle's words, and he realized that he couldn't escape this somewhat infiltrating topic.

"Maybe! In fact, the world is all fake, have you ever thought that it is possible that people all over the world are actually countless brains linked to a terminal, all of which are brains in a cylinder. "The more women talk, the more crazy they become.

"Think about it, did you ever feel that you were unique, that everyone else came according to their own rules! Are you the center of the world? ”

The uncle's pupils suddenly contracted, and a thin bead of sweat oozed from his forehead, and anyone with a discerning eye could see that he had agreed with the woman's words.

"Then have you ever thought that they are all programming, they are all NPCs, strings of code in the computer, you have seen other people's birth, old age, sickness and death, and you have also seen others become popular, rich and rich, only you are yourself, you are an ordinary person, death is very far away from you, ordinary and strange!"

Uncle sweat rained, "What do you mean?" Is the world all fake? Are they all manipulated? ”

The woman gave a slight "grace".

But these are just assumptions, and even if they are convincing, they are only hypothetical. There is no actual test to prove it! Uncle didn't seem to notice that his previous taboo about experiments had slowly dissipated.

Halfway through the road, the car had already entered the county seat, and was shaken by the uneven road.

It took a lot of effort for the uncle to stabilize the whole body, and the uncle was also tired of walking, stopped the car, and took out a cigarette.

"What do you think of me?" Women are always so sudden.

"What? You're a human being! What else could it be? ”

"How can you be sure that I'm a person, not what we said earlier, a program? Code? She threw out another question that made the uncle scratch his ears and cheeks.

"Do you think I must exist?"

Uncle didn't care about smoking, the freshly lit cigarette was still burning between his fingers, and it made a loud noise.

"Of course it's certain! Otherwise, is it a ghost who is talking to me? ”

"For things that you are not sure about, never believe only one side, the existence of the other side is also relative."

Uncle knew what she meant: "When you don't look at this flower, this flower and your heart will die together, and when you come to see this flower, the color of this flower will be understood for a while." These are Wang Yangming's words! Same as you mean! ”

"The popular saying is Schrödinger's cat, half-alive and half-dead, maybe you don't look at me, I exist, but when you look at me, I'm not there at all."

The woman didn't know if she was joking or what, and the uncle was worried when she heard it.

"What do you mean?" He paused, "You don't exist at all?" ”

The woman was silent, and there was no sound for a long time, and the novel heyed a few times, after all, he didn't know the woman's name, but he never found her again.

When the car arrived home, the family was very anxious.

"What's going on? Panicked? The uncle asked the family members who were around.

It was still the grandmother who explained early, "There was a murder in the city this morning, and in the city's third hospital, it was said that there was a female patient who died." The uncle was shocked, but he also told himself that it was just a coincidence.

"I heard that he was beheaded, and his head was gone, so I searched for it in the hospital all night last night." Grandma added.

The uncle chuckled in his heart, remembering what the woman said.

"This world is all fake"

I don't know why, since then, Uncle has changed a little.

Was it because of the woman who came to him later?