Preface

Nimbin and The Abstractionist is a fairy tale.

It serves as the opening bookend to The Abstractionist’s Papers, a framework for understanding reality.

Here the Abstractionist introduces young Nimbin to the Toy Maker’s model. Red Space is where you build meaning. The Blue Space is where things happen.

The Puppet King learns to account for both.

Stay curious.

Nimbin and The Abstractionist

The Toy Maker’s Model

It was Nimbin’s 8^th birthday.

To mark the occasion, the Baroness commissioned a model from the Toy Maker.

The model featured a replica of the entire world, complete with its animals, plants, and things.

The Baroness hoped that, by studying the model, Nimbin would someday become a great administrator.

When the Toy Maker unveiled the model, Nimbin was delighted!

But the Baroness immediately noticed the model’s main inhabitants were puppets.

“Unless these puppets are made human,” she said, “the toy shall not do.”

To fix the model, the Toy Maker summoned an old acquaintance, the Abstractionist.

Abstractionists, of which there are very few, specialize in solving problems in a backward fashion, and from a distance.

The Abstractionist came and made every puppet operate as human beings.

A Weeping Puppet

Nimbin enters the model.

By nightfall he doesn’t return.

The model is dark, so the Baroness once again summons the Abstractionist.

The Abstractionist produces a pair of Opera Glasses.

The Baroness puts them on. The model lights up, and everything appears blue.

She finds Nimbin comforting a weeping puppet.

A translucent red veil covers the puppet’s head, waving in the air like a candle flame.

“He feels alone because no other puppet can see him,” says Nimbin.

The Abstractionist lifts a piece of veil from the weeping puppet’s face, putting him to sleep.

The Abstractionist, the Baroness, and Nimbin exit the model.

The Baroness puts down the Opera Glasses and sees in full color.

She demands an explanation.

The Abstractionist assures the Baroness the Blue Space is well-tempered, but admits the puppets are always becoming.

There Is No Defect

The Baroness invites the Abstractionist to tea.

“Nimbin has observed significant improvements in the model. All puppets have started living much longer, healthier, and safer lives. But no matter how well the model flourishes, the puppets remain in a permanent state of dissatisfaction,” says the Baroness.

To make the puppets human, the Abstractionist explains, he added Natural Reality to the model.

“Natural Reality has two parallel layers, a bottom and a top. The bottom contains a shared Blue Space that holds all things as they are. The top is abstract, a void that can nonetheless host as many individual Red Spaces as there are puppets below,” says the Abstractionist.

“As for the alleged defect,” he goes on, “improvements are in the Blue Space and the puppets’ dissatisfaction is in their red veils. Incoherence is a disconnect between cause and effect built across layers. It’s what gives rise to the human condition you once wished upon the original puppets.”

The Baroness says Nimbin will give the Opera Glasses to the puppets so they can see the improvements for themselves.

“If the puppets realize they’re toys, they’ll try to escape the model!” exclaims the Abstractionist.

They rush to stop Nimbin.

“I already gave my Opera Glasses to the weeping puppet,” says Nimbin.

“I asked him to give them to the other puppets.”

All Hail the Puppet King!

The Baroness and the Abstractionist return to the model to recover the Opera Glasses before it’s too late, but this time they are greeted by a king.

The Puppet King was once the weeping puppet.

“When I first received the glasses, I gave them away, but other red veils could not be pierced. The Opera Glasses worked only for me. Everywhere I went I wore them, and I saw the world from the outside. On my journeys, I learned to ignite any red veil for the betterment of the Blue Space, and the puppets crowned me Puppet King.”

He laments the loneliness that afflicts every puppet.

“Wrapped inside its veil, all one can experience is a Red Space of their own making. Each puppet spends its days alone in a different abstract reality that does not otherwise exist, blindfolded to all that is shared.”

The Abstractionist assures the Puppet King that the condition can be improved by bringing The Abstractionist’s Papers into the model.

The Papers show any puppet how to shed its red veil at will.

The Baroness and the Abstractionist allow the king to leave.

Nimbin is waiting.

He can now see Red Spaces in real life, including his own, without the Opera Glasses.

The Puppet King returns to the model with The Papers.

The End.