If They Give You Lined Paper, Write Sideways

by Daniel Quinn

  Elaine. Martian anthropologists need not apply.

  Daniel. I guess not. But where are we at this point? We know that the story of “world history” generally accepted in our culture is false to facts. Even historians who should know better recite it without giving it a second thought. A respected scientific journal sees no reason not to include it as the introduction to an article. Where does a Martian anthropologist go from here? What is his next question?

  Elaine [after giving the question some thought]. I’d say his next question is … No, I have to say I don’t know.

  Daniel. Think about this. Aside from a relatively small minority of religious fanatics, the story of the universe as told by present-day science is generally accepted by the people of our culture. The universe was born in a “big bang” some thirteen billion years ago, and our own planet was formed about five billion years ago. Is that right?

  Elaine. Is what right?

  Daniel. That the people of our culture generally accept this story of the universe, which is not a mythological story or a religious story but a scientific one.

  Elaine. Yes, I’d say so, except, as you say, by a few religious fanatics.

  Daniel. This story, as far as the most brilliant minds of our time can tell us, is not false to facts.

  Elaine. That’s right.

  Daniel. But the people of our culture accept a story of “world history” — world human history — that is false to facts. What does a Martian anthropologist think of this?

  Elaine. That it’s odd.

  Daniel. And his question is …?

  Elaine. Why? How did it come about that …

  Daniel. Take your time.

  Elaine. How did it come about that the same people who accept without question a scientific history of the universe also embrace a false version of human history?

  Daniel. The true version of human history is that humanity did not all at once, ten thousand years ago, abandon the hunting-gathering life for the agricultural life. The hunting-gathering life persisted over three-quarters of the globe until some five hundred years ago — and still persists where it hasn’t as yet been stamped out. What is there in this true version of events that alarms us?

  Elaine thinks about this.

  Daniel. What is there in it that disturbs our settled vision of ourselves?

  Elaine sighs in frustration.

  Daniel. Don’t be distressed if the answers to these questions don’t pop right out at you. It took me years to work them out … Let’s come at it from a different angle. When did we begin to put together our version of the human story?

  Elaine. I would guess not more than twenty-five hundred years ago.

  Daniel. That’s when the foundation thinkers of our culture began to appear: Herodotus, Thucydides, Socrates, Aristotle, and so on.

  Elaine. Yes, that’s what I was thinking.

  Daniel. But of course the fundamental outline of the story might have been in place for thousands of years before that. Everyone in the civilized world knew that there was a human past of some kind. The cities the Sumerians inhabited in 3000 BC weren’t built in the previous generation or the generation before that. And they could see that the cities were growing and developing technologically. From this, they could logically project backward to a time when the cities were just villages and technologies were very primitive. But what they could not possibly imagine was that these villages were born in a revolution, the one we call the Agricultural Revolution. They couldn’t possibly imagine that, before people became farming villagers, they had lived for millions of years in an entirely different way. The hunting-gathering lifestyle was five thousand years in the past, totally forgotten by now. Not even a rumor of it could have survived for that long.

  Elaine. Yes, I see that. You called this the Great Forgetting in The Story of B.

  Daniel. So it had to seem to them that the human story must have begun just a few thousand years before, that being the period of time between those first farming villagers and themselves. On this basis, what conclusion would it have been reasonable for them to draw about the nature of humans as a species?

  Elaine. I’m afraid I can’t begin to guess what you’re getting at here.

  Daniel. It’s safe to assume that these ancients were as knowledgeable about the creatures around them as we are — probably more so. For example, they must have known that birds hunt insects and build nests. What conclusion would it have been reasonable for them to draw about the nature of birds as a species?

  Elaine. I’m tempted to say that they would conclude that it’s the nature of birds to hunt insects and build nests.

  Daniel. Of course. Birds had been doing that for as long as anyone knew. They must also have known that bees gather nectar and build hives. And what would they conclude from that?

  Elaine. That bees are nectar gatherers and hive builders.

  Daniel. That’s what bees had been doing for as long as anyone knew. And what had humans been doing for as long as anyone knew?

  Elaine. Planting crops and building cities.

  Daniel. And from that what would they reasonably conclude about the nature of humans?

  Elaine. That they are agriculturalists and civilization builders.

  Daniel. To them, planting crops and building cities had to seem as innate to humans as gathering nectar and building hives is to bees.

  Elaine. Yes.

  Daniel. The idea that humans had come into being as tribal hunter-gatherers — planting no crops and building no cities for millions of years — would have seemed preposterous to them.

  Elaine. I’d have to think so.

  Daniel. Of course we can only conjecture that the Sumerians believed that Man was just a few thousand years old and had been born an agriculturalist and a civilization builder. But it’s not conjecture that this story was still in place in our culture four thousand years later, and for centuries of years beyond that. It was the prevailing belief right through the eighteenth century that Man was just a few thousand years old and had been an agriculturalist and a civilization builder from birth.

  Elaine. Not quite from birth, but the very first human, Adam, became an agriculturalist.

  Daniel. Granted. But even in this biblical version of the story, there’s no suggestion that the first agriculturalist had been preceded by fifteen or twenty thousand generations of hunter-gatherers.

  Elaine. Certainly not. We were agriculturalists from the very first generation — according to the biblical story.

  Daniel. Now at last we’re poised to give our Martian anthropologist the answer to his first, overriding question. Current in our culture is this version of human history: Humanity is some three million years old, but nothing of consequence happened until we abandoned the hunting-gathering life and became agriculturalists and civilization builders. How did we end up with this story, prefaced by three million years in which nothing of consequence happened?

  Elaine. You’re asking me to reconstruct it?

  Daniel. Give it a try.

  Elaine. Wow. Okay. During the nineteenth century new scientific discoveries made it untenable to think that life on earth was just a few thousand years old.

  Daniel. Archbishop Ussher’s famous calculation, announced in 1654, that the human race was born in 4004 BC, became scientifically untenable. Or rather, to be safe, we can say that it became untenable to those who find scientific evidence more convincing than the belief structure on which Archbishop Ussher made his calculation.

  Elaine. Yes.

  Daniel. The result was that, among those who generally accepted the evidence of geology and paleobiology — and with it the emerging theory of evolution — the human story had to be revised. It was no longer going to be accepted that Man had been born an agriculturalist and civilization builder just a few thousand years ago.

  Elaine. No.

  Daniel. And so how was it revised?

  Elaine. It was revised to the present version: Humans were around for three million years as
hunter-gatherers, but they were of no importance until they abandoned the hunting-gathering life for the agricultural life, beginning about ten thousand years ago.

  Daniel. Why was it important to sweep the first three million years of the human story under the rug in this way? Important to the people of our culture, of course.

  Elaine. I’ll have to think about that … I guess I have to say that they honestly saw nothing of value in them.

  Daniel. Did anyone look?

  Elaine. No one that I’m aware of, but that might not prove anything.

  Daniel. You’re aware of Darwin and his importance to the history of human thought.

  Elaine. Of course.

  Daniel. It was imperative that someone make sense of the startling discoveries of the young science of paleobiology. If it hadn’t been Darwin, it would have been Alfred Russel Wallace. The existence of these findings demanded a reasonable explanation, and this explanation would rattle a lot of cages. It wasn’t going to go unnoticed.

  Elaine. True … but I’m not quite sure what point you’re making.

  Daniel. Paleobiology ultimately made it clear that 99 percent of the human story was played out before the Agricultural Revolution, but no one you can name tried to make sense of it.

  Elaine. No.

  Daniel. Let’s make a conjecture: There was no felt need for anyone to make sense of it.

  Elaine. I’d say that was right.

  Daniel. But why? Why were the people of our culture content to sweep the first three million years of the human story under the rug and leave them there?

  Elaine. Okay, I see where you’re going now.

  Daniel. But what’s the answer? I said a few minutes ago that we were at last poised to give our Martian anthropologist the answer to his first, overriding question. Now we’re there: Why did the people of our culture — the vanguard and beneficiaries of the Agricultural Revolution — sweep the first three million years of the human story under the rug and leave them there?

  Elaine [after some thought]. Those three million years of human history threatened us.

  Daniel. In what way? Now you’ve got to start working as an anthropologist. The people of our culture don’t want to think about the fact that, for the first three million years of human life, people lived as hunter-gatherers rather than as agriculturalists and civilization builders. What’s behind this reluctance?

  Elaine. It’s a threat to our self-image.

  Daniel. Go on.

  Elaine. The story we tell ourselves is that being fully human means planting crops and building civilization. This makes us the only true humans. In order to maintain our status as the only true humans, we don’t want to look at the humanity of our hunting-gathering ancestors. We want to deny their humanity. They weren’t in any real sense humans at all. They were just Stone Age brutes. So we don’t have to think about them.

  Daniel. To accord them humanity is to deny that we — and we alone — are humanity, which is an important element of our cultural mythology.

  Elaine. Yes, that’s it.

  Daniel. To be human is to live the way we live. This is the one right way for people to live, and everyone in the world must be made to live the way we live. It was our holy duty to destroy all the aboriginal cultures we found in the New World, in Australia, in Africa, and so on.

  Elaine. That’s right.

  Daniel [after a pause]. Obviously we haven’t been breaking new ground here, but that wasn’t my purpose. I wanted to give you some insight into my development as a Martian anthropologist, into the path I followed to assemble the answers found in Ishmael and my other books. I began with a rather trivial observation, that a nuclear holocaust would throw us much farther back than the Stone Age, and from there went from point to point to discover that, according to our cultural mythology, there is only one right way for people to live — our way — and that everyone in the world must be made to live this way. Globalization isn’t a recent policy; it’s been in place among us for thousands of years.

  Elaine. Yes, I can see that.

  Daniel. I think we should take a break here. I’d like to know what your reaction to this first session has been.

  Elaine. Well, I came hoping to nail down some of your ideas — to settle them in my head. And this has had that effect to some extent. Obviously we’ve just scratched the surface.

  Daniel. I’m glad it’s had that effect, but my own purpose is to explore my method, if that’s what it is. This is the question that has remained unanswered ever since Ishmael came out: How did I come to have these ideas? For me they’re just the product of hard work and inquiry, but to others they come as revelations. You can’t imagine the hundreds of letters I’ve had from people who tell me that I’ve turned their world upside down.

  Elaine. So what exactly are you asking?

  Daniel. I’m asking if I’ve given you any insight into the workings of my mind — into the workings of the mind of a Martian anthropologist.

  Elaine [after giving the matter some thought]. I guess I have to say some insight, yes. But the way you approach problems —

  Daniel [interrupting]. My “frame of reference.”

  Elaine. Yes. That remains a mystery. I couldn’t do it myself.

  Daniel. I wouldn’t expect you to at this point. We’re just beginning the journey. Before we break for lunch, I’d like to set you a challenge.

  Elaine. Okay.

  Daniel. As I pointed out a while ago, acknowledging that humanity existed for three million years before we came along conflicts with our cultural mythology, which insists that we, the beneficiaries and promoters of the Agricultural Revolution, are humanity itself. You understand that, while the Agricultural Revolution began ten thousand years ago, it didn’t end then. It’s still being carried forward today as we continue to clear land for crops to grow food for ourselves.

  Elaine. Yes, I understand that.

  Daniel. The idea that humans were around for three million years before us threatens our cultural mythology, but it threatens something much more fundamentally important than that. I want you to examine our culture like a Martian anthropologist and see if you can come up with it. To do this, you’ll have think about all the essential elements of our culture, all the constituent parts of it.

  Elaine [after another long pause]. I’m afraid I’m drawing a blank.

  Daniel. To think like a Martian anthropologist, you have to float high above and look at the whole bunch of us — Americans, Chinese, East Indians, Arabs, Europeans — to discover why affirming the humanity of our ancient ancestors poses a deeper and more immediate threat to us than anything we’ve discussed so far. I could easily lead you to it with hints, but I don’t want to do that. However long it takes, I want you to make this discovery on your own.

  Elaine [after a pause]. I guess this leaves me feeling rather at sea.

  Daniel. You came here in a passive capacity: to take in what I have to teach. But I want you to leave with more than that. I want you to leave with the ability to do what I do. That won’t happen if I just give you all the answers — or if I lead you to the answers through a carefully sequenced series of questions the way Ishmael did with Alan [in Ishmael] and Julie [in My Ishmael].

  Elaine. Yes, I can see that. But all the same …

  Daniel. Yes …?

  Elaine. It’s daunting.

  *See Appendix I.

  Thursday: Afternoon

  Daniel. Any progress?

  Elaine. You mean on the question you posed? No. I have the feeling I don’t really understand it.

  Daniel. Acknowledging that humanity existed for three million years before we came along conflicts with our cultural mythology, as you pointed out. But it poses a more dangerous threat than this.

  Elaine. To whom?

  Daniel. If I give you this, then I may as well give you the whole thing. This is probably too challenging a test for you to begin with. Don’t let it worry you. You need more experience with easier tasks.

  Elai
ne. Okay.

  Daniel. A few years ago a reader wrote to me to express his surprise at what seemed to him all the dumb questions being asked on my Web site. For him, everything I was saying seemed quite simple: Anything we humans do that disturbs the balance of Nature must be eliminated from our way of life.

  Elaine. Uh-huh.

  Daniel. What does this “uh-huh” mean? Are you agreeing with him?

  Elaine [disconcerted]. Well, yes, I guess so. In a general way.

  Daniel. In a general way. In other words, stated in a general way, what Daniel Quinn is saying is that anything we humans do that disturbs the balance of Nature must be eliminated from our way of life.

  Elaine. I take it you don’t agree.

  Daniel. Agreement isn’t the point. The two of you share a frame of reference, and that’s what we have to examine. To put it another way, the Martian anthropologist asks himself, “What’s behind this statement? What’s in their minds that leads them to say this? What are they thinking?” Or, to put it an even better way, “What does this statement reveal about their vision of the way world works?”

  Elaine sighs.

  Daniel. You’re frustrated.

  Elaine. Yes, I guess so. I came here thinking I had a pretty good grasp of your vision of the way the world works.

  Daniel. It’s not my particular vision. I mean it’s not a vision that’s peculiar to me. It’s a vision generally accepted in the world of science.

  Elaine. What’s the statement again?

  Daniel. Anything we humans do that disturbs the balance of Nature must be eliminated from our way of life.