Calculating God

by Robert J. Sawyer

  “Well, then I don’t want chemo,” I said at once. “I don’t want what’s left of my life to be spent suffering through that.”

  Dr. Kohl pursed her lips. “It is certainly your decision to make,” she said. Then, nodding at Susan, “Both of you. But there are many misconceptions about chemo. It can also be palliative—that’s the second reason you might consider it.”

  My mouth formed the word palliative. Dr. Kohl nodded. “You may very well experience a lot of pain in the months to come, Tom. Chemotherapy can reduce the severity of the pain by reducing the size of the tumors.”

  “What would you do, if you were me?” I asked.

  Kohl shrugged a little. “If this were the States—if you were uninsured and had to pay for the chemotherapy treatments yourself, perhaps you might want to forgo them and live with the pain—although of course, either way, I will be prescribing analgesics to help with that. I like to use a platinum compound when dealing with non-small-cell lung cancer, and those compounds are quite expensive. But since OHIP will pay the entire cost of the treatments, I would advise you to have them. We’d use a platinum in combination with vinblastine, etoposide, or mitomycin-C. The platinum drugs have to be administered in hospital, but they’re the best bet with lung cancer.”

  “What about side effects?” I asked.

  “There can be nausea. You may lose some or all of your hair.”

  “I want to keep working as long as I can,” I said.

  “The chemo can help; it won’t significantly extend your life, but it may make it more productive.”

  Ricky was in school full days now, and Susan had her job. If I could continue to work, even a few months longer, that would be better than having to be home, requiring constant care.

  “Don’t make your decision right now,” said Dr. Kohl. “Think about it.” She gave us some pamphlets to read.

  Hollus believed in God.

  T’kna believed in God.

  And me?

  “Maybe I’m getting hung up on the word God,” I said to Hollus, once we were back in my office. “Certainly, if you want to propose that evolution on Earth was interfered with by an outside source, I can’t say you are wrong. After all, you yourself told me that there were intelligent aliens in this part of the galaxy as much as three billion years ago.”

  “The race from Eta Cassiopeiae A III, yes.”

  “Aren’t those the ones who blew up their moon?”

  “No; that was the race of Mu Cassiopeiae A Prime, 5.5 light-years from Eta Cassiopeiae.”

  “Okay. Well, the beings from Eta Cassiopeiae—let’s call them Etans—had a technological civilization three billion years ago, back when life was just beginning on my world. Surely the Etans could have come here then.”

  “You are glossing over a lot of time,” said Hollus, “for you said life had existed here for at least eight hundred million, if not a full billion, years prior to three billion years ago.”

  “Well, yes, but—”

  “And, of course, my own sun, Beta Hydri, had not even formed that long ago; as I told you before, it is only 2.6 billion years old, so no one from Eta Cassiopeiae could have ever visited it.”

  “Well, maybe it wasn’t the Etans, then—but beings from some other star could have come here, or gone to your world, or to the Wreed world. All the actions you ascribe to God could have been the doing of advanced aliens.”

  “There are two problems with your argument,” said Hollus, politely. “First, of course, even if you dispense with the need for a god in recent events—events of the last few billion years; events after other conscious observers had emerged in this universe—you have done nothing to dispense with the need for a designer who set the relative strengths of the five fundamental forces, who designed the thermal and other properties of water, and so on. And therefore what you are doing is contrary to the razor of Occam you spoke of: you are increasing, not reducing, the number of entities that have influenced your existence—one unavoidable god to create the universe, and then optional lesser beings who subsequently became interested in manipulating the development of life.

  “Second,” continued Hollus, “you must remember the timing of the mass extinctions apparently orchestrated to occur simultaneously on our three worlds: the oldest was 440 million years ago; the most recent, 65 million years. That is a span of 375 million years—and yet, as we have found, the lifespan of an intelligent race, measured from the point at which it develops radio, is apparently no more than a couple of hundred years before it either destroys itself or disappears.”

  My mind raced, careened. “All right,” I said at last. “Maybe the fundamental parameters were tweaked to create a universe that could give rise to life.”

  “There is no supposition involved,” said Hollus. “The universe was clearly designed to be biogenerative.”

  “All right. But if we accept that, surely simply creating life can’t be the sole goal. You must believe your putative designer wanted not just life, but intelligent life. Unintelligent life is really nothing more than complex chemistry. It’s only when it becomes sapient that life really gets interesting.”

  “That is a strange thing for someone who studies dinosaurs to say,” observed Hollus.

  “Not really. After all, the dinosaurs disappeared sixty-five million years ago. It’s only because of the advent of intelligence that we know they ever existed.” I paused. “But you are touching on the point I’m trying to make.” I stopped again, searching for the appropriate metaphor. “Do you cook?”

  “Cook? You mean make food from raw materials?”

  “Yes.”

  “No.”

  “Well, I do, or at least I used to. And there are things that you simply can’t make by throwing in all the ingredients together at the beginning. If you want to cook them, you have to intervene halfway through.”

  Hollus thought about this. “So you are suggesting there is no way the creator could have achieved intelligent life without direct intervention? Many who are religious would object to that notion, for occasional intervention implies a God who is usually absent from the universe.”

  “I’m not implying anything,” I said. “I’m just analyzing the assumptions inherent in your beliefs. Look, the dinosaurs dominated this planet for far more time than mammals have, and yet they never achieved anything even remotely like real intelligence. Although their brains got slightly bigger over time, even the most intelligent dinosaur that ever lived”—I picked up Phil Currie’s Troödon skull, now on a shelf behind my desk—“was no more intelligent than the dumbest mammal. In fact, there was no way they could ever become substantially more intelligent. The part of the mammalian brain in which intelligence resides doesn’t exist in reptiles.” I paused. “You told me that the creatures that were dominant on your planet until sixty-five million years ago—those pentapeds—were also dumb brutes, and you said that a similar situation existed on Delta Pavonis.”

  “Yes.”

  “And that your ancestors at that time were like my ancestors and the ancestors of the Wreeds: small creatures, living at the margins of the ecosystem.”

  “That is correct,” said Hollus.

  “But those ancestors did have brains capable of evolving intelligence,” I said. “My ancestors were crepuscular: they were active at twilight. And so they developed big eyes and sophisticated visual cortices. And, of course, the brain power to process the resulting images.”

  “You are suggesting that the infrastructure for intelligence can only arise in those animals at the—what was your phrase?—at the margins of an ecosystem? Animals forced to forage at night?”

  “Perhaps. And if that’s so, then intelligence can only come to fruition if the dominant, dumb animals are wiped out.”

  “I suppose,” said Hollus. “But—oh, I see. I see. You are saying conditions that might give rise to life, and even the beginnings of intelligence, could be coded into the very design of the universe, but there is no way to bring intelligence t
o the fore, to let it flourish and develop, without direct intervention.”

  To my own surprise, I said, “That’s my proposal, yes.”

  “That explains the extinctions sixty-five million years ago. But what about the earlier extinctions?”

  “Who knows? Presumably they were also required to move the ecosystem toward the eventual development of intelligence. On Earth, the end-of-the-Permian extinctions helped clear the way for mammallike reptiles—the ancestors of mammals. Their ability to regulate body temperature was perhaps irrelevant in the benign climate that existed until the worldwide glaciation that caused those extinctions. But during a glacial event, even a primitive thermal-regulatory ability would be an asset—and I rather suspect that the true warm-bloodedness, which evolved from that capability, is another prerequisite for intelligence. So the Permian extinction was a way to substantially increase the percentage of nascent endotherms, making sure they weren’t outcompeted and eliminated from the gene pool.”

  “But how could the creator force an ice age?” asked Hollus.

  “Well, if we assume he lobbed an asteroid at each of our worlds to end the Cretaceous, he could have broken up an asteroid or two in orbit to form rings around each of the planets at the end of the Permian. A ring like that, properly tilted, could substantially shade the planet, lowering its temperature enough to bring on massive glaciation. Or he could have generated a dust cloud that enveloped all of this part of the galaxy, shading all the planets—yours, mine, and the Wreeds’—simultaneously.”

  “And the other mass extinctions?” asked Hollus.

  “More fine tuning along the way. The one in the Triassic, for instance, allowed the dinosaurs, or their counterparts, to come into ascendancy on the three worlds. Without dinosaurs dominating the ecosystem, mammals—or the endothermic octopeds on Beta Hydri III, and the live-birthers like T’kna on Delta Pavonis II—would never have been forced into the crepuscular existence that fostered the development of bigger brains. It takes wits to eke out a living when you’re not the dominant form.”

  It was strange to hear the giant spider play devil’s advocate. “But the only direct evidence,” he said, “for the creator having manipulated the evolution of life once it got started is the coincidences in the dates of the mass extinctions on Beta Hydri III, Delta Pavonis II, and Sol III. Yes, possibly, the creator did similarly manipulate the development of life on the six abandoned worlds we visited, but we could find no unequivocal evidence of that.”

  “Well, perhaps intelligence can develop in this universe through happenstance,” I said. “Even by random chance, asteroids do crash into planets every ten million years or so. But you’ll never get multiple intelligent species existing simultaneously unless you jigger the timetable—and not just once, but several times. To invoke the cooking metaphor, sure, maybe a salad could appear on its own by random chance—wind blowing enough vegetable matter together, say. And maybe a steak might appear on its own—lightning hitting a cow just the right way. And you might end up with wine—grapes that had accumulated in one place and had fermented. But there’s just no way to get it all to come together simultaneously—a glass of wine, a salad, and a steak—without lots of intervention. The same might be true of getting multiple sentient lifeforms to appear simultaneously.”

  “But that raises the question of why God wants multiple sapients at the same time,” said the alien.

  I scratched my chin. “That is a good question.”

  “It is indeed,” said Hollus.

  We contemplated this for a time, but neither of us had a good answer. It was almost 5:00 P.M. “Hollus?” I said.

  “Yes?”

  “I have a favor to ask.”

  His eyestalks stopped moving. “Yes?”

  “I would like you to come home with me. I mean, let me take the holoform projector back to my house and have you appear there.”

  “To what purpose?”

  “It’s…it’s what humans do. We have friends over for dinner. You could meet my family.”

  “Friends…” said Hollus.

  Suddenly I felt like an idiot. I was a primitive being next to Hollus; even if his psychology permitted him to feel affection for others, surely he had no warm feelings toward me. I was just a means to an end.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to impose.”

  “You are not imposing,” Hollus said. “I am pleased that you feel for me what I feel for you.” His eyestalks danced. “I would very much like to meet your family and visit your home.”

  I was surprised to find my eyes misting over. “Thank you,” I said. “Thank you very much.” I paused. “Of course, I could have them come here, if you prefer. We don’t have to go to my house.”

  “No,” said Hollus. “I would like to do that. Your family consists of your mate Susan, correct?” He’d heard me talk to her on the phone several times now.

  “Yes. And my son Ricky.” I turned the little picture frame on my desk around so that Hollus could see him.

  The eyestalks converged on the frame. “His countenance is not similar to yours.”

  “He’s adopted,” I said with a little shrug. “He’s not my biological child.”

  “Ah,” said Hollus. “I would enjoy meeting them both. Is tonight too soon?”

  I smiled. Ricky would love this. “Tonight is just perfect,” I said.

  * * *

  16

  C

  ooter Falsey’s eyebrows knit in confusion as he looked at J. D. Ewell. “What do you mean, what we’re going after is already dead?”

  Ewell was still sitting on the edge of the motel bed. “They’ve got a museum here in Toronto, and it’s got some special fossils on display. Those fossils are a lie, says Reverend Millet. A blasphemy. And they’ll be showing those fossils to that great big spider alien.”

  “Yeah?” said Falsey.

  “This world is a testament to God’s handiwork. And those fossils, they either are fakes or the work of the devil. Creatures with five eyes! Creatures with spikes sticking out everywhere! You’ve never seen the like. And scientists are telling the aliens that those things are real.”

  “All fossils are fake,” said Falsey. “Created by God to test the faith of the weak.”

  “You and I know that. And it’s bad enough the atheists are able to teach our kids about fossils in schools, but now they are showing them to aliens, making those aliens think we believe the lie of evolution. The aliens are being led to believe that we humans don’t believe in God. We’ve got to make it clear that those godless scientists aren’t speaking for the majority.”

  “So…” said Falsey, inviting Ewell to continue.

  “So, Reverend Millett, he wants us to destroy those fossils. The Bogus Shale, he calls them. They’re on special display here, and then they’re supposed to travel down to Washington, but that won’t happen. We’re going to put an end to the Bogus Shale once and for all, so those aliens will know that we don’t care about such things.”

  “I don’t want anyone to get hurt,” said Falsey.

  “No one will.”

  “What about the alien? Doesn’t one of them spend a lot of time at the museum. We’ll be in a powerful lot of trouble if we hurt him.”

  “Don’t you read the papers? He’s not really there; that’s just a projection.”

  “But what about the people who go to the museum? They may be misguided, looking on all them fossils, but they aren’t evil like those abortion docs.”

  “Don’t worry,” said Ewell. “We’ll do it on a Sunday night, after the museum has closed.”

  I called Susan and Ricky and told them to prepare for a very special guest; Susan could do miracles with three hours’ notice. I worked on my journal for a time, then left the museum. I’d taken to wearing a floppy Tilley hat and sunglasses to disguise my appearance for the short walk from the staff entrance to the subway station; the UFO nuts still seemed to mostly congregate out in front of the ROM’s main entrance, quite som
e distance away. So far, none of them had intercepted me—and by the time I came out this evening, they all seemed to have gone home, anyway. I went down into the subway station and boarded a silver train.

  When we pulled into Dundas station, a young man with a wispy blond beard entered the train. He was the right age to be a student at Ryerson; that university’s campus was just north of Dundas. The young man was wearing a green sweatshirt covered with white lettering that said:

  THERE’S AN ALIEN AT THE ROM

  AND A MONSTER AT QUEEN’S PARK

  I smiled; the provincial parliament buildings were at Queen’s Park, of course. Everyone, it seemed, was taking shots at Premier Harris these days.

  When I finally arrived at the house on Ellerslie, I gathered my wife and son, and we went into the living room. I opened my briefcase and put the dodecahedron that was the holoform projector on the coffee table. Then I sat on the couch. Ricky scrambled up next to me. Susan perched herself on the arm of the love seat. I looked at the blue clock on the VCR. It was 7:59 P.M.; Hollus had agreed to join us at 8:00.

  We waited, with Ricky fidgeting. The projector always made a two-toned bleep when turning on, but so far, it was dead silent.

  8:00.

  8:01.

  8:02.

  I knew the VCR clock was right; we had a Sony unit that picked up a time signal over the cable. I reached over to the coffee table and adjusted the dodecahedron’s position slightly, as if that would make any difference.

  8:03.

  8:04.

  “Well,” said Susan, generally to the room. “I should go make the salad.”

  Ricky and I continued to wait.

  At 8:10, Ricky said, “What a ripoff.”

  “I’m sorry, sport,” I said. “I guess something came up.” I couldn’t believe that Hollus had let me down. A lot of things are forgivable; making a man look bad in the eyes of his son isn’t one of them.