“What about the suffering, the pain of millions of human beings who have to live through this upheaval, as you call it?”
“We cannot account for their lives, Mr. Conner. Only they can do that.”
“Well, what kind of answer is that? If you represent a race of compassionate beings, you surely won’t stand by and do nothing to avoid this tragedy.”
“What would you have us do Mr. Conner?”
“Help us.”
“How?”
“Well, to start with, we have people with injury and disease who are suffering. Do for them what you did for the Congressman last night.”
“We will of course do that, and would have done so unprompted, but that will do nothing to avert the global catastrophe. You have changed your planet’s atmosphere too radically, and too fast, Mr. Conner, and so the Earth’s climate will change as radically, and as quickly. That is what will kill off the bulk of humanity. Nothing will prevent it because there is nothing that can be done to prevent it. Once carbon dioxide levels reached a certain threshold in your planet’s atmosphere, it became inevitable that your climate would quickly destabilize, and it did. If you had taken action decades ago when you first saw early signs of climate change, you would have greatly mitigated the severity of your planet’s environmental collapse, but you didn’t.”
“Is that all you can say? You came all the way here to tell us we’re about to be wiped out, and there’s nothing to be done about it? What help is that? You say you’ll come back when it’s over with some invitation to join you, but how does that help us now? If we pass through this crises without your help, because that’s exactly what you said is going to happen, then maybe your help won’t seem so valuable when we don’t need it as much.”
“I can assure you, Mr. Conner, you will need help.”
“But you haven’t done anything to help us now. Please, I’m just asking, what’s the point of joining you if you’re not going to help us when we need it most? Where’s the benefit?”
“Protection is one benefit.”
“Protection from what?”
“Your solar system is a very dangerous place, Mr. Conner. As a courtesy to all civilizations that we add to our inventory, we monitor their solar systems for possible impact events, including yours.”
“How do you do that?”
“The same way you would. We optically scan all objects in your solar system that orbit your sun, all the way to the Oort cloud, all asteroids, all long- and short-period comets, all Kuiper Belt objects, anything large enough to pose a global impact threat, including every object in your teeming asteroid belt. These objects number in the trillions. Collision are prevented thousands of years in advance.”
“You can prevent an asteroid collision?” The Vice President asks.
“Yes”
“Have you ever done that?”
“Yes”
“Have you…ever prevented a comet or asteroid from striking Earth?”
“Yes”
“When did that happen?”
“Thirty-eight thousand years ago, when your numbers were a few scattered millions, a long-period comet passed through the asteroid belt and teased out of its orbit a massive object over twenty miles wide. It collided with another object even larger, and was ejected from its orbital path. For twenty-six thousand years it erratically orbited your sun. Crossing Earth’s orbit, it would have collided with your planet eleven thousand years ago, just as the dawn of human civilization was beginning.”
“And you prevented this?”
“Of course”
“What would have happened?”
“You’re a scientist, Mr. Conner. What do you think happens when a twenty-seven-mile-wide asteroid strikes a planet like your Earth? It would have meant human extinction.”
“You did this eleven thousand years ago?”
“We took preventative action long before that.”
A stunned silence comes over the Vice President as he tries to mentally digest the implication of what he’s just heard. If the words of his alien counterpart are true, it means literally that the human race owes its continued existence to the protective intervention of a race of beings twenty-six thousand light years across the galaxy that we had no idea existed. This is simply too much for a human mind to grasp. What exactly does one say after being told such a thing? A mere thank you seems ridiculous. As the Vice President grapples with this realization, all of coeval humanity hears, and ponders it as well. Finding it hard to believe, the Vice President asks again.
“Did you say that object, that asteroid, was twenty-seven miles wide?”
“Yes”
“That’s five times larger than the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs. Isn’t it? Isn’t that right?”
“If you’re asking if your arithmetic is correct, Mr. Conner, it is.”
“That would have destroyed the Earth.”
“It would have killed off all surface life. Over ninety percent of it was composed of iron.”
“It was made of iron?”
“That’s right Mr. Conner. Your science aptly calls such an impact a ‘total evaporation event’. When an object so large, and dense physically collides with your world, the enormous amount of heat energy released boils away all surface water, killing all indigenous life. Only specialized subsurface bacteria survive the onslaught.”
“I’m, sorry I…Are you saying a twenty-seven-mile-wide asteroid made of iron would have struck the Earth eleven thousand years ago, and you prevented it from happening?”
“Yes”
“I don’t know…that…that would’ve meant…”
“It would’ve meant the evolution of life on Earth would have to start over again. That has happened on your planet more than a few times, but at a very early point in Earth’s history, when only microbial life was present. For such a cataclysm to occur when advanced life is extant would be a pointless waste.”
“That’s…that’s hard to comprehend.”
“Why?”
“If that’s true, then we…I mean the human race wouldn’t be here if…What do you expect from us?”
“We want nothing from you, Mr. Conner, but your survival and success as an emergent species of luminary beings. Your own future is inviting you into itself. We would like to see you accept that invitation. That is all we would like from you.”
“How do we do that?”
“With, and only through, your human imagination. The living reality of a peaceful and abundant future already exists latent in the human imagination. For humans, and all sentient creatures, to imagine is to weave their future reality. Matter responds to thought, and imagination is the portal through which ideas become manifested reality. What is born to the imagination will be born into your world.”
“Who are the ones you call the Millennials?”
“They are your descendants, the first of your kind to achieve extended life spans with some individuals living nearly twenty -two hundred years.”
“What accounts for their longevity?”
“Examinations will show they all registered very high levels of plant DNA in their blood. The genetic instructions that initiate accelerated brain evolution are found in the organic chemistry of plants, especially fruits and berries.”
“So these people are vegetarians.”
“That’s correct. Generations of biomolecular interaction between plant chemistry and brain physiology eventually produced in these individuals sharply enhanced cognitive performance, and extended life spans. The bulk of humanity however, will not be similarly advantaged.”
“Why not?”
“Starting in your twentieth century, the global mass consumption of adulterated food stocks and the industrial slaughter of animals for consumption introduced chemical toxins into the human gene pool, spawning hundreds of new diseases. The countless millions who regularly consumed these foodstuffs produced offspring that were genetically damaged and prone to disease. These populations will die off in
the coming upheaval. While at the same time, to counter this general trend, a small percentage of the human population chose to avoid the chemical pollutants of an industrialized food supply. Their pristine, plant-based, vegetarian diet will confer upon their progeny immunity from the coming global pandemics. Their DNA will survive. Present-day vegetarians are the living progenitors of those we call the Millennials. The genetic intimacy between plant, and human DNA is something your science is only beginning to understand.”
“Our species has been consuming meat for hundreds of thousands of years. Are you saying it will now harm us?”
“Meat once played a vital role in supplying the protein needed for increased brain size, but when brain growth reaches a critical mass, meat consumption becomes a hindrance to accelerated brain evolution. Complexity, and efficiency are then needed, not bulk. The human brain, and physique will become smaller in the future.”
“How will that happen?”
“Through millions of years of evolution, uniquely elaborate organic molecules have developed from the complex chemistry of plants. That is what will open the door to mankind’s evolutionary future.
Over time, vegetarians whose offspring continue as plant eaters will inherit subtle molecular changes in their brain physiology, measurably accelerating, and enhancing cognitive ability. Through their genetic lineage, those who are to be called ‘The Millenials’ will eventually be descended.”
“What about the rest of humanity?”
“They will die out. The Millennials will branch off from the genetic line of Homo sapiens, and become Neo homo. Neo homo will inherit your future just as you inherited Neanderthal’s future.”
“And most of humanity has to die so that can happen, is that what you’re saying?” Vice President Conner asks.
“Those individuals who carry the genetic precursors that will initiate this profound evolutionary change in coming generations presently number fewer than one in ten thousand. They alone carry this latent genetic prototype, and they alone, are the forerunners of a new genetic line of the genus Homo. If the cumbersome bulk of present human population were to survive, it would overwhelm and repress that fragile strain of mutational DNA that is now only dimly nascent in the human gene pool. Large pools of DNA insure diversity but evolve far more slowly. Smaller populations accelerate evolutionary complexity. That will happen when global human population is reduced to under sixty million. The coming upheaval will do that, allowing a genetically superior being to inherit the planet and its future.”
“And we Homo sapiens have no part in that future?”
The only purpose of Homo sapiens is to provide an evolutionary platform for the emergence of your successor, Neo homo. Once that is achieved, Homo sapiens will become an evolutionary dead end.”
At this, the Vice President pauses, and momentarily looks away from the alien creature standing only feet away from him. He thinks to himself, is this a dream? How can this be true? If it is true, it means that billions of humans now alive have absolutely no stake, or even the smallest degree of influence, on the future of their own living descendants. This is something to dismal and forbidding to accept. To think that man, and all his achievements are no more than an ‘evolutionary dead end’ is incomprehensible. The future is universally regarded as belonging to man. Every reference to it assumes man’s place in it. Is it believable, or even possible that some other creature will inherit that future? This unpalatable question looms disturbingly in the thoughts of not only the Vice President, but also the uncounted multitudes of those watching and hearing this bizarre conversation unfolding.
Any human in the Western Hemisphere viewing the night sky or watching a television screen is experiencing something far beyond extraordinary. An almost clairvoyant sense of ineffable astonishment experienced simultaneously by so many millions of people imprints itself indelibly on the collective imagination of mankind, as common humanity witnesses a very uncommon occurrence. People are fully aware that these incredible events will likely never occur again in the same way. Yet few of them can possibly know how fundamentally the world would change as a result of what they are witnessing.
For Scott Conner the thought of being the first human to speak intelligibly, and at length with a representative of an alien civilization is not in the forefront of his mind. That would be too overwhelming to think about. He knows he is in effect a surrogate for all of humanity, and his questions must plead for the benefit of mankind. He addresses the Linesian again.
“You tell us first that we’re fated to die, and there’s nothing we can do about it, then you say it’s irrelevant because we have no future anyway. Do you expect us to accept that? Because we won’t. How can we?”
“It’s only through the life and sacrifice of Homo sapiens that the future emergence of Neo homo is possible. Homo sapiens has carried human evolution forward as far as possible. You have played your part. A new human being is waiting, poised to inherit the Earth and claim his evolutionary destiny.”
“Who is Neo homo?”
“He is your replacement, Mr. Conner. Would you like to meet him?”
“I don’t know. Seeing this creature might have the effect of seeming to corroborate what you’re saying, and…I’m not, or rather we’re not ready to accept that, but neither are we afraid of anything you can show us.”
“Then observe, Mr. Conner.”
With this the Linesian gestures skyward to the enormous image stretching across a full quarter of the night sky, and with the same detailed clarity as those images vividly seen the night before, a dramatic picture of the Earth from pole to pole comes into view, with massive ice sheets capping both poles, and dry barren deserts dominating all land masses. The sobering image seems to amplify the power of the Linesian’s words as he continues.
“This then is your world in five thousand years, a world dominated by two extremes, ice and heat, with the scattered remnants of mankind clinging tenuously at their interface. Yet through these inauspicious conditions the genetic seeds of Neo homo will survive to emerge in future human generations. Let’s move forward in time.”
The image begins to change as glacial ice retreats with a concomitant rise in sea level. Then, successive ice ages rapidly surge, and wane. Ocean levels correspondingly fluctuate, and even a slow but detectable shift in the continent’s position is seen as the tectonic plate it rests on slowly moves.
At first, the Earth gradually begins turning green again. Then the planet rapidly becomes verdant with abundant plant growth, and the image of a barren world of harsh extremes changes to one rich with the living vitality of a healthy, vibrant biosphere. The Earth has healed itself, and life once again is flourishing. The image of the continental United States literally blanketed with thick forests even in once arid areas of the southwest, gives a distinct impression that we are looking at a very different world, as our Linesian guide continues.
“It is nearly five million years into the future. Your planet’s ecosphere is once again pristine. The creature that rules this world is Neo homo. This is his image.”
Every human eye is focused skyward as the image of a diminutive childlike figure appears, an elfish looking creature whose appendages are unmistakably human, but with a face, and head that is markedly different, with a small mouth and jaw bone, and disproportionately larger eyes. Most striking of all, the forehead of this creature is wider, and projects frontward noticeably, evidently to accommodate expanded brain development. A complete absence of facial hair makes it difficult to determine its gender. Standing four and a half feet high, and weighing no more than eighty pounds, the creature gives a general appearance of being physically frail. Looking stunted and elfish in an almost comical way, Neo homo is by no means visually appealing. Yet its most prominent feature is not physical at all. The face on view with its large eyes and ears unmistakably project the image of a being with considerably heightened powers of sensory and perceptual awareness. To look at this creature is to see a being that most would cons
ider non-human. A certain level of curious ambiguity and even discomfort is felt by many in accepting the notion that this odd looking creature will someday supersede man.
The Linesian speaks again.
“This is your successor. His total numbers are no more than one hundred million, one percent of your current population. His world is devoid of hunger, disease, violence, and war. He lives in harmony with nature, and sees himself as an integral part of the complex web of life that surrounds him. This peaceful herbivore may look shy and retiring, but his depth, and mastery of technological science will enable him to travel through your solar system, and beyond.”
“You say this creature will replace us. He doesn’t look strong enough to survive in a difficult world.”
“Strength, and physical bulk are not synonymous, Mr. Conner. In a world without aggressive behavior, the thick, heavy frame, and musculature of your current human physique is an atavistic throwback to primitive beginnings. Neo homo is light, durable, and long-lived, with a life span of over three thousand years.”
As the image of this strange looking creature called Neo homo is seen simultaneously around the world, the spectators directly witnessing events in Olympic Stadium in Miami are caught up in a scene that is doubly bizarre. They are watching the Vice President of the United States conversing at length with an alien robotic machine who has just provided a stunningly panoramic visual tour of our planet’s future environmental collapse, with images of cities becoming inundated wastelands, deserts proliferating, and the emergence of enormous glacial ice sheets. All this, projected across the night sky with dramatic intensity, coupled with a profoundly disturbing narrative describing what is in essence, the fall of man. Finally to cap off this unbelievable visual odyssey, we are shown a creature that is barely recognizable as human, and told that he will inherit a future we once thought was ours. How can these things be believed, or even contemplated?
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