Macrolife

by George Zebrowski

  “You went to Lea to learn. You wouldn’t have had to go if you knew what you would find.”

  He knew everything she would say. You have to risk being wrong to have a chance at being right. We grow by taking positions for keeps and acting on them until we succeed or fail. It’s a well-known theorem that error is more valuable than success, because error teaches you something new, while success teaches you only to repeat it. Success is a rut, error an exploration into the unknown. Humanity II practices this method systematically; but human minds are better at it, since they produce the most fruitful errors and are more creative as a result….

  “I’m a murderer, don’t you see?”

  “What happened was not premeditated killing, but more like warfare.”

  “What will happen to me?”

  “We have no legal agreements with Lea—there is no government there.”

  “That’s a real help.”

  Margaret sighed. He almost cringed at her show of impatience. “I know you don’t like my being explicit because it does little for your feelings, but it’s important to offer your feelings a strong alternative. Look—murder is generally wrong, but a general injunction against murder, or killing, has no force or meaning unless it can be applied in a variety of differing, even exclusive circumstances. Killing for profit is murder. Killing in self-defense is not murder. It’s a strict application of the rule against murder, because not to defend yourself would mean that you acquiesce in your own murder. Your own life comes before the attacker’s, since he initiated the situation and is responsible for it. Therefore, if you kill him you are obeying the rule against killing, because you are preventing your own murder and possibly the murder of others. The death of your attacker is incidental and entirely his fault.”

  “What about suicide?”

  “Suicide is entirely your own business, even if you get someone else to do it for you. Defense during an invasion is also not murder. The attackers are responsible for their own deaths.”

  “And what of punishment?”

  “We would never execute an imprisoned criminal. You know that. Your pursuit of the raiders came about as the result of their destruction of the village, which you could not control. Make no mistake, they were responsible for your rage, which was justified. Think of other villages you might have saved by your killings.”

  “But Jerad would not have encouraged them.”

  “They might have come anyway, as they had in the past. And Jerad is responsible for his own choices, not you.”

  John felt the tears behind his eyes. “But I didn’t have to kill so many—they had no chance against me.” Margaret’s analysis seemed too easy.

  “You used the tools at your disposal, the flitter. But all this is hindsight. Did you think at the time, or did you simply do it?”

  “I wanted to do it after I saw Anulka die.”

  “You simply reacted.” She sat closer to him and put her arm around his bare shoulders. “You were defending the one you loved, on a world where there is no law. Your outrage and punishment of the guilty was probably the only lawlike action against the raiders in centuries.”

  “I might have just knocked them off their horses…. I forgot the horses.”

  “What would you have done with the killers? They’re too short lived to change.”

  “Jerad might have understood. Now he’s dead forever.”

  “The thing to do is to recognize that the situation was very bad from the start and go on from that.”

  He turned and looked into Margaret’s eyes. “Thanks for trying to help, but it’s no good right now, no good at all. The thought of living with this, especially when I can’t get rid of it, scares me. I feel dirty and can’t get clean.”

  “The memory could be removed, but whatever would be left would be false, unless we took it all. You might think Anulka still lived. Memories are related and you would become curious about the blanks.”

  I might have saved a few of the children, he thought, if I had taken them away earlier.

  “No,” he said.

  “You see, you do value what has happened.”

  “I don’t have the right to forget.”

  “Exactly what the value of it is for you will become clearer in time. I can’t make you accept all I’ve said, but I think you will find your way to it.”

  “I disliked you, Margaret.”

  “I know, and I don’t blame you.”

  “That makes me feel worse.”

  She leaned over and kissed him. “Maybe I can try a little harder. Welcome home.”

  But as he looked at Margaret and tried to hold himself together, the thought of Anulka filled him again. Blakfar’s dying pulse beat was once more in his hand. His mouth was dry. He could not see the end of living with what had happened.

  “Come in, come in,” Blackfriar said. Tomas Blakfar’s tones rose up out of memory as John walked into the office and sat down in front of the old teak desk. The official setting reminded him again that he passed in and out of Frank’s awareness with hundreds of other matters.

  “We’re leaving this system. We’ve been in motion since this morning.”

  “No,” John said, startled inwardly.

  “We’re going to see what happened to the solar system. Our new mobile is coming with us, at least that far. Later they’ll decide to do as they please.” Blackfriar leaned back in his chair and scratched the unchanging black stubble on his scalp. “What are you going to do?” Blackfriar always managed to sound genuinely interested.

  “I don’t believe that it has all happened. The last month I’ve been going around feeling that everything is terribly wrong. I hear sounds, normal sounds, but I interpret them as if I were still on Lea’s surface.”

  “Don’t worry, you’ll get used to being home. How do you feel about linking?”

  Smoke rose from the village, dirtying the sky. Run; get there quickly….

  “I’m sorry, Frank.”

  “What about linking—how are the exams going?”

  “They say I’m fine. I don’t know—do you honestly think it will help me?”

  “Yes, I do. For one thing, you would not be locked up so much in yourself. You would share more. You would be able to compare your own mind with others and with the independent intelligence that is Humanity II. You would see precedent for your own problems on a large scale. Your own finitude and isolation would not be as great as it is now. But before you get your license, I would like you to go look at the work of Richard Bulero.”

  “You’re so sure they’ll grant me a license. Why Richard Bulero?”

  “You’ll see why when you read what he said.”

  “You’re trying to appeal to my pride.”

  “Not entirely. Biologically, Richard was your nephew, Sam Bulero’s brother’s son. If he were alive now, Sam would be your social father and twin brother. My point is that you may find a kindred mind.”

  “I’ll take a look, Frank. Don’t push me.”

  “Good enough.”

  John felt the anger coming up in himself and fought to control it. Frank seemed so calm, so trusting. John tried to imagine Blackfriar killing someone with a club or a knife. He saw a small patch of dusty ground and Anulka falling forward, toppled by the crushing blow from behind.

  Taking a deep breath, he asked, “Why don’t we have more murderers? Where are our wars, Frank, why are we so special?”

  “You seem sorry to find us peaceful.”

  “Well?”

  “We have killing, mental illness…”

  “I know, but why nothing on a large scale—what we find in earth’s history or the lawlessness on Lea?”

  “As a matter of fact,” Blackfriar said, “we have just gone through the equivalent of a war, loss of population and all. When the quarrels reached a high point a few years ago, there was nothing to do but prepare for reproducing. When I say quarrels, I mean severe internal strife. It’s usually our signal that we’ve exceeded our optimum size and should r
eproduce.”

  “You sound like you’re trying to blame me for not being interested.”

  “You’re right,” Blackfriar said, raising his voice. “The right is yours to be a recluse, but I don’t like it. It’s about time I told you that you’ve been an ostrich. You’ve gone through the whole romantic malady, including the bleeding concern with anything and everything outside your own culture.”

  “An ostrich-what’s that?”

  “A goddam bird, hides its head in the sand.”

  “Goddam?”

  “Let me get back to my point, please?”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Even though we’ve institutionalized rebellion and made the process productive, we are still skeptical about unmodified human nature, though not cynical. Thus what would be a disruption of most past societies is made to work for us. Procedural revolution makes it possible for us to absorb new approaches without undue harm to the previous society, which remains intact, minus its defectors. What I’m describing is not simple. There’s a whole new world next to ours, with enough potential surface area inside to equal the surface of an earth-sized planet. Within the next few years, half our population may switch over to it. Don’t think there is no bitterness. No one has suggested we abandon the general guidelines of macrolife, but one day that may happen, I’m afraid.”

  “Why haven’t we fallen apart, Frank, like the culture on Lea? Where’s our corruption? Surely we don’t just depend on people to be good?”

  “Not completely. Think of it this way. Planetary problems arise from economic scarcity and the misuse of political power, either from greed or from the love of power itself. On planets a small class overproduces wealth through support of research and development, after stealing the wealth from human labor, from human and animal muscle in the beginning. Then the power of this class declines, since power can no longer be bought with wealth alone, but also with ability. Finally, physical wealth is abundant enough for everyone. So where anyone of ability can rise, the system remains creative. We don’t depend on people to be good. Our society understands the causes of disorder, and our structure is such that those causes can be utilized. We haven’t tamed human nature or even modified it very much yet. We’ve channeled it. There’s nothing mysterious about our way. We’ve still got problems, but they’re our problems, belonging to our way of life. For us, mental illness arises from envy of others’ abilities, from status, when people compare their achievements.”

  “You make it sound simple.”

  “It’s very complex if you take the time to look closely. Our youth are the barbarians. Our long-lived provide stability and a radical long view of things. The long-lived and Humanity II are the living commitment to macrolife. We don’t interfere with either group.”

  “What am I?”

  “An eccentric rebel. I thought you might leave us for a dirtworld. We have our failures.”

  “I’ve never heard you talk so hard, Frank.”

  “I must. This is your chance to try again and I must present the alternatives strongly. A man named Freud once said that a society of love is possible if there is some external group to hate. In a sense that is what we’ve got. We hate the past, we hate the circumstances that so deformed the human spirit, even though those same circumstances gave birth to human intelligence.”

  “Dirtworlds.”

  “Yes. The coming to consciousness is a terrible process, proof enough of the mindlessness of nature, which must cull consciousness in such a bloody way. Energy-poor, physically in danger from other life, diseased, and subject to natural catastrophe, intelligence endures long enough to escape, to give itself a chance at a high-energy existence which is safe and creative, making a mature, long-term culture possible. In the long run nothing can succeed, nothing is absolutely safe, of course. There is no deathless fortress in which we may live forever.”

  “I feel sorry for the humanity on natural worlds,” John said.

  “But those worlds are necessary,” Blackfriar said. “We try to hold an attitude of empathy without altruism. Granted, this is an ambivalent attitude. Should we go around saving worlds? Wouldn’t they resent us? Life is isolated in nature, ghettoized to develop individually. The size of the universe serves this kind of quarantine perfectly. Interstellar travel is difficult, and that’s a good thing.”

  “But all the planets we’ve known are only scattered earth colonies, Frank. We’ve seen no others, no originals that should be left to grow in their own way, only our own bits and pieces left at different points in history.”

  “That makes no difference. The horrible irony is that a culture has to grow away from its planet, not be torn away, regardless of its origin, regardless of its conditions. The damage and dislocation would be enormous if we came in and began to plan for them.”

  “It couldn’t be worse than leaving them alone to stumble around in the dark.”

  “You really don’t give them much credit. But yes, to help is about as bad as not to help. You’re thinking that we could alleviate physical suffering. That’s true, but there would be other scars. It’s a matter of readiness. Look at the old United States. Human potential was recognized, but with little regulation. There was coercion through policed laws, but no genuine social persuasion through environmental incentives. The price in waste and disorder of natural and human resources was enormous. The finitude of the economic pie ensured that only a few could grow into their potential. It was a large number, true, but most people had no economic freedom, and they were not ready for it when it came. People worked hard to maintain a highly inconsistent physical affluence, frustrating their inner potentials. Tom Paine’s comment, that we have been given the power to begin the world all over again, is truest of macrolife.”

  “Maybe earth would have succeeded if the disaster had not happened.”

  Blackfriar was quiet for a moment. “We would have grown away from earth more slowly, perhaps.”

  “I think maybe we should gather our own.”

  “You’d have to use force—most would not want to leave the settled worlds.”

  John was silent. He was not a doer or a thinker. His limits were suddenly very clear to him, as was the alternative. The glimpse was a shock. “I’m curious about earth,” he said to break the silence.

  “So are many of us. We’re going back because enough pressure was brought to bear. That’s all we really are—an economic base supporting a clearinghouse for pressures which grow into projects. As nature once prepared us for making a living and reproducing, so a life of affluence and practical immortality must be structured to encourage individual and social projects. These become our life. Without them we become severely demoralized.”

  “Have we been successful, Frank?”

  “Not entirely. As a democracy we are a means for reconciling human differences. That’s all democracy needs to be—a framework in which people can disagree without disaster. Beyond that we process information in our knowledge industries, and they are our ultimate authorities. There is no democracy in submitting to them, except that they are open to all. As I’ve said, on the human level we have envy, influence-seeking, some murder, personal cruelties—but generally we have cooperation rather than competition, achievement rather than aggression. We attack each other through status and personal style, but there is no economic greed. The major tragedy is the individual’s too-frequent inability to find satisfying work. When his or her abilities are ordinary, there is little to do except find amusement or appreciate the achievements of others. There are still too many suicides. We seem to need a further development of the individual. There seems to be an insufficiency to life that is unconquerable.”

  “I’m just a simpleton,” John said.

  “The one thing we can’t do for you is what you must do for yourself. Every generation must rebuild the world in its own mind to feel truly at home in it. This involves reevaluation of the past, a recap of social history as the process of birth recaps biological history. Any strong attempt t
o impose a view from outside may lead to a closed mental set and a closed society when such overimpressed individuals proliferate.”

  “You think I would have been a tyrant on Lea.”

  “Even if you were good about it. Unless you had brought all the resources of a world to reclaim the planet, you would have been very frustrated working within severe limits. You would have had to educate Leans offplanet, then send them back to help—a project for a century. It could still be done—just organize the interest. There will be time.”

  “I want to see earth,” John said.

  Frank continued: “When a primitive culture is not permitted to come up by itself, or to rise to a previous height after decline, then all the courage and cleverness of intelligent beings is preempted, coopted by the superior helper. Maybe exchanges on the interstellar level should occur only among equals.”

  “You’ve made your points. I still think it’s a cruel view of history.”

  “The truth is not always kind.”

  John sat up erect. “But look—there’s so little of earth-derived humanity scattered. I still think we could gather it together.”

  Blackfriar coughed and scratched his head. “Wheeler has talked about it. Still, the changes for many of the people on these worlds would be too much.”

  John sat forward in his chair. “We could gather them on one world, maybe Lea, as a transition area. That wouldn’t be so bad a change. We could help them if they were all in one place.”

  “You’d have to force most of them to leave.” Blackfriar rubbed his chin. “Wherever they are is home to them.”

  “If we told them what we were doing…Why do you have to make so many difficulties, Frank?”

  Blackfriar looked directly at him. “I think you would spend a century just to prove me wrong, but I also think you’d end up showing that the obstacles are even bigger than we imagine. Again, this is not to say you should not try, but there’s the other thing you haven’t considered at all.”