Chapter no 1

The Rosie Project (Don Tillman, #1)

I may have found a solution to the Wife Problem. As with so many scienti๏ฌc breakthroughs, the answer was obvious in retrospect. But had it not been for a series of unscheduled events, it is unlikely I would have discovered it.

๎“e sequence was initiated by Geneโ€™s insisting I give a lecture on Aspergerโ€™s syndrome that he had previously agreed to deliver himself. ๎“e timing was extremely annoying. ๎“e preparation could be time-shared with lunch consumption, but on the designated evening I had scheduled ninety-four minutes to clean my bathroom. I was faced with a choice of three options, none of them satisfactory.

  1. Cleaning the bathroom after the lecture, resulting in loss of sleep with a consequent reduction in mental and physical performance.

  2. Rescheduling the cleaning until the following Tuesday, resulting in an eight-day period of compromised bathroom hygiene and consequent risk of disease.

  3. Refusing to deliver the lecture, resulting in damage to my friendship with Gene.

I presented the dilemma to Gene, who, as usual, had an alternative solution. โ€œDon, Iโ€™ll pay for someone to clean your bathroom.โ€

I explained to Geneโ€”againโ€”that all cleaners, with the possible exception of the Hungarian woman with the short skirt, made errors. Short-Skirt Woman, who had been Geneโ€™s cleaner, had disappeared following some problem with Gene and Claudia.

โ€œIโ€™ll give you Evaโ€™s mobile number. Just donโ€™t mention me.โ€

โ€œWhat if she asks? How can I answer without mentioning you?โ€

โ€œJust say youโ€™re contacting her because sheโ€™s the only cleaner who does it properly. And if she mentions me, say nothing.โ€

๎“is was an excellent outcome, and an illustration of Geneโ€™s ability to ๏ฌnd solutions to social problems. Eva would enjoy having her competence recognized and might even be suitable for a permanent role, which would free up an average of 316 minutes per week in my schedule.

Geneโ€™s lecture problem had arisen because he had an opportunity to have sex with a Chilean academic who was visiting Melbourne for a conference. Gene has a project to have sex with women of as many di๏ฌ€erent nationalities as possible. As a professor of psychology, he is extremely interested in human sexual attraction, which he believes is largely genetically determined.

๎“is belief is consistent with Geneโ€™s background as a geneticist. Sixty-eight days after Gene hired me as a postdoctoral researcher, he was promoted to head of the Psychology Department, a highly controversial appointment that was intended to establish the university as the Australian leader in evolutionary psychology and increase its public pro๏ฌle.

During the time we worked concurrently in the Genetics Department, we had numerous interesting discussions, and these continued after his change of position. I would have been satis๏ฌed with our relationship for this reason alone, but Gene also invited me to dinner at his house and performed other friendship rituals, resulting in a social relationship. His wife, Claudia, who is a clinical psychologist, is now also a friend. Making a total of two.

Gene and Claudia tried for a while to assist me with the Wife Problem. Unfortunately, their approach was based on the traditional dating paradigm, which I had previously abandoned on the basis that the probability of success did not justify the e๏ฌ€ort and negative experiences. I am thirty-nine years old, tall, ๏ฌt, and intelligent, with a relatively high status and above-average income as an associate professor. Logically, I should be attractive to a wide range of women. In the animal kingdom, I would succeed in reproducing.

However, there is something about me that women ๏ฌnd unappealing. I have never found it easy to make friends, and it seems that the de๏ฌciencies that caused this problem have also a๏ฌ€ected my attempts at romantic relationships. ๎“e Apricot Ice Cream Disaster is a good example.

Claudia had introduced me to one of her many friends. Elizabeth was a highly intelligent computer scientist, with a vision problem that had been corrected with glasses. I mention the glasses because Claudia showed me a photograph and asked me if I was okay with them. An incredible question! From a psychologist! In evaluating Elizabethโ€™s suitability as a potential partnerโ€”someone to provide intellectual stimulation, to share activities with, perhaps even to breed withโ€”Claudiaโ€™s ๏ฌrst concern was my reaction to her choice of glasses frames, which was probably not even her own but the result of advice from an optometrist. ๎“is is the world I have to live in.

๎“en Claudia told me, as though it was a problem, โ€œShe has very ๏ฌrm ideas.โ€

โ€œAre they evidence-based?โ€ โ€œI guess so,โ€ Claudia said.

Perfect. She could have been describing me.

We met at a ๎“ai restaurant. Restaurants are mine๏ฌelds for the socially inept, and I was nervous as always in these situations. But we got o๏ฌ€ to an excellent start when we both arrived at exactly 7:00 p.m. as arranged. Poor synchronization is a huge waste of time.

We survived the meal without her criticizing me for any social errors. It is di๏ฌƒcult to conduct a conversation while wondering whether you are looking at the correct body part, but I locked on to her bespectacled eyes, as recommended by Gene. ๎“is resulted in some inaccuracy in the eating process, which she did not seem to notice. On the contrary, we had a highly productive discussion about simulation algorithms. She was so interesting! I could already see the possibility of a permanent relationship.

๎“e waiter brought the dessert menus and Elizabeth said, โ€œI donโ€™t like Asian desserts.โ€

๎“is was almost certainly an unsound generalization, based on limited experience, and perhaps I should have recognized it as a warning sign. But it provided me with an opportunity for a creative suggestion.

โ€œWe could get an ice cream across the road.โ€ โ€œGreat idea. As long as theyโ€™ve got apricot.โ€

I assessed that I was progressing well at this point and did not think the apricot preference would be a problem. I was wrong. ๎“e ice-cream parlor had a vast selection of ๏ฌ‚avors, but they had exhausted their supply of apricot. I ordered a chocolate chili and licorice double cone for myself and asked Elizabeth to nominate her second preference.

โ€œIf they havenโ€™t got apricot, Iโ€™ll pass.โ€

I couldnโ€™t believe it. All ice cream tastes essentially the same, owing to chilling of the taste buds. ๎“is is especially true of fruit ๏ฌ‚avors. I suggested mango.

โ€œNo thanks, Iโ€™m ๏ฌne.โ€

I explained the physiology of taste bud chilling in some detail. I predicted that if I purchased a mango and a peach ice cream, she would be incapable of di๏ฌ€erentiating. And, by extension, either would be equivalent to apricot.

โ€œ๎“eyโ€™re completely di๏ฌ€erent,โ€ she said. โ€œIf you canโ€™t tell mango from peach, thatโ€™s your problem.โ€

Now we had a simple objective disagreement that could readily be resolved experimentally. I ordered a minimum-size ice cream in each of the two ๏ฌ‚avors. But by the time the serving person had prepared them, and I turned to ask Elizabeth to close her eyes for the experiment, she had gone. So much for โ€œevidence-based.โ€ And for computer โ€œscientist.โ€

Afterward, Claudia advised me that I should have abandoned the experiment prior to Elizabethโ€™s leaving. Obviously. But at what point? Where was the signal? ๎“ese are the subtleties I fail to see. But I also fail to see why heightened sensitivity to obscure cues about ice-cream ๏ฌ‚avors should be a prerequisite for being someoneโ€™s partner. It seems reasonable to assume that some women do not require this. Unfortunately, the process of ๏ฌnding them is impossibly ine๏ฌƒcient. ๎“e Apricot Ice Cream Disaster had cost a whole evening of my life, compensated for only by the information about simulation algorithms.

โ€ข โ€ข โ€ข

Two lunchtimes were su๏ฌƒcient to research and prepare my lecture on Aspergerโ€™s syndrome, without sacri๏ฌcing nourishment, thanks to the provision of Wi-Fi in the medical library cafรฉ. I had no previous knowledge of autism spectrum disorders, as they were outside my specialty. ๎“e subject was fascinating. It seemed appropriate to focus on the genetic aspects of the syndrome, which might be unfamiliar to my audience. Most diseases have some basis in our DNA, though in many cases we have yet to discover it. My own work focuses on genetic predisposition to cirrhosis of the liver. Much of my working time is devoted to getting mice drunk.

Naturally, the books and research papers described the symptoms of Aspergerโ€™s syndrome, and I formed a provisional conclusion that most of these were simply variations in human brain function that had been inappropriately medicalized because they did not ๏ฌt social normsโ€” constructed social normsโ€”that re๏ฌ‚ected the most common human con๏ฌgurations rather than the full range.

๎“e lecture was scheduled for 7:00 p.m. at an inner-suburban school. I estimated the cycle ride at twelve minutes and allowed three minutes to boot my computer and connect it to the projector.

I arrived on schedule at 6:57 p.m., having let Eva, the short-skirted cleaner, into my apartment twenty-seven minutes earlier. ๎“ere were approximately twenty-๏ฌve people milling around the door and the front of the classroom, but I immediately recognized Julie, the convenor, from Geneโ€™s description: โ€œblonde with big tits.โ€ In fact, her breasts were probably no more than one and a half standard deviations from the mean size for her body weight and hardly a remarkable identifying feature. It was more a question of elevation and exposure, as a result of her choice of costume, which seemed perfectly practical for a hot January evening.

I may have spent too long verifying her identity, as she looked at me strangely.

โ€œYou must be Julie,โ€ I said. โ€œCan I help you?โ€

Good. A practical person. โ€œYes, direct me to the VGA cable. Please.โ€ โ€œOh,โ€ she said. โ€œYou must be Professor Tillman. Iโ€™m so glad you could

make it.โ€

She extended her hand but I waved it away. โ€œ๎“e VGA cable, please. Itโ€™s six ๏ฌfty-eight.โ€

โ€œRelax,โ€ she said. โ€œWe never start before seven ๏ฌfteen. Would you like a co๏ฌ€ee?โ€

Why do people value othersโ€™ time so little? Now we would have the inevitable small talk. I could have spent ๏ฌfteen minutes at home practicing aikido.

I had been focusing on Julie and the screen at the front of the room. Now I looked around and realized that I had failed to observe nineteen people. ๎“ey were children, predominantly male, sitting at desks. Presumably these were the victims of Aspergerโ€™s syndrome. Almost all the literature focuses on children.

Despite their a๏ฌ„iction, they were making better use of their time than their parents, who were chattering aimlessly. Most were operating portable computing devices. I guessed their ages as between eight and thirteen. I hoped they had been paying attention in their science classes, as my material assumed a working knowledge of organic chemistry and the structure of DNA.

I realized that I had failed to reply to the co๏ฌ€ee question. โ€œNo.โ€

Unfortunately, because of the delay, Julie had forgotten the question. โ€œNo co๏ฌ€ee,โ€ I explained. โ€œI never drink co๏ฌ€ee after three forty-eight p.m. It interferes with sleep. Ca๏ฌ€eine has a half-life of three to four hours, so itโ€™s irresponsible serving co๏ฌ€ee at seven p.m. unless people are planning to stay awake until after midnight. Which doesnโ€™t allow adequate sleep if they have a conventional job.โ€ I was trying to make use of the waiting time by o๏ฌ€ering practical advice, but it seemed that she preferred to discuss trivia.

โ€œIs Gene all right?โ€ she asked. It was obviously a variant on that most common of formulaic interactions, โ€œHow are you?โ€

โ€œHeโ€™s ๏ฌne, thank you,โ€ I said, adapting the conventional reply to the third-person form.

โ€œOh. I thought he was ill.โ€

โ€œGene is in excellent health except for being six kilograms overweight. We went for a run this morning. He has a date tonight, and he wouldnโ€™t be able to go out if he was ill.โ€

Julie seemed unimpressed, and in reviewing the interaction later, I realized that Gene must have lied to her about his reason for not being present. ๎“is was presumably to protect Julie from feeling that her lecture was unimportant to Gene and to provide a justi๏ฌcation for a less prestigious speaker being sent as a substitute. It seems hardly possible to analyze such a complex situation involving deceit and supposition of another personโ€™s emotional response, and then prepare your own plausible lie, all while someone is waiting for you to reply to a question. Yet that is exactly what people expect you to be able to do.

Eventually, I set up my computer and we got started, eighteen minutes late. I would need to speak forty-three percent faster to ๏ฌnish on schedule at 8:00 p.m.โ€”a virtually impossible performance goal. We were going to ๏ฌnish late, and my schedule for the rest of the night would be thrown out.

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