Victor Kravets said nothing.
December 20. Well, our work together is beginning!
“Don’t you think that we went overboard with our vow?”
“?!”
“Well, not the whole vow, but that sacred part.”
“To use the discovery for the benefit of mankind with absolute dependability?”
“Precisely. We’ve realized four methods: synthesis of information about man into man; synthesis of rabbits with improvements and without; synthesis of electronic circuits; and synthesis of man with improvements. Does even one of them have an absolute guarantee of benefits?”
“Hmmmm. No. But the last method at least in principle — “
“ — can create ‘knights without fear or flaw, cavaliers of Saint George, and fiery warriors?”
“Let’s just say good people. Any objections?”
“We’re not voting yet. We’re discussing. And I think that that idea is based — please forgive me — on very jejune ideas of so — called good people. There are no abstractly good and bad people. Every man is good for some and bad for others. That’s why the real knights without fear and flaw had more enemies than anyone else. The only one who’s good for everyone is a smart and sneaky egotist, who tries to get along with everyone in order to achieve his ends. There is, however, a quasi — objective criterion: he is good who is supported by the majority. Are you willing to use that criterion as the basis for this method?”
“Hmm… let me think.”
“What for? If I’ve already thought about it, after all, you’ll come to the same conclusion — that the criterion is no good. The majority has supported God knows who since time immemorial. But there are two other criteria: good is what I think is good (or who I think is good) and good is what is good for me. Like all people who care professionally about the welfare of mankind, we operated on the basis of both — only in our simplicity we thought that we were only using the first one, and considered it objective at that.”
“Now you’re exaggerating!”
“Not a bit! I won’t remind you about poor Adam, but even when you were synthesizing me you were worried that it should be good for me (rather, what you thought was good) and that it should be good for you, too. Right? But that’s a subjective criterion and other people — “
“ — with this method could do what they thought was good for them?”
“Precisely.”
“Hmmm. All right, let’s say you’re right. Then we have to look for another method of synthesizing and transforming information in man.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know.”
“I’ll tell you what method is needed. We have to convert our computer — womb into an apparatus that continually turns out ‘good’ at the rate of… say, a million and a half good deeds a second. And at the same time, it should do away with bad deeds at the same rate. Actually, a million and a half — that’s just a drop in the ocean. There are three and a half billion people on earth and every one of them performs several dozen acts a day that can never be construed as neutral. And we still have to figure out a method of equal distribution of this production across the surface of the earth. In a word, it had to be something like an ensilage harrow on magnetrons of unfired brick.”
“You’re mocking me, right?”
“Yes. I’m trampling your dream — otherwise it will lead us into God knows where.”
“You think that I…?”
“No. I don’t think that you were working wrong. It would be very strange if I thought so. But understand: subjectively you dreamed and thought, but objectively you did only what the possibilities of the discovery permitted you to do. And that’s the point! You have to coordinate your plans with the possibilities of the work. And you were hoping to counterbalance a hundred billion varied acts of humanity a day with your little machine. And it’s those hundred billion, plus uncounted past actions, that determine the social processes on earth, their goodness and evil. All of science is incapable of counterbalancing those mighty processes, that avalanche of acts and deeds, first of all because science makes up a small part of life on earth, and secondly because that is not its specialty. Science doesn’t develop good or evil — it develops new information and gives new opportunities. And that’s all. Now the application of that information and the use of the opportunities determine the above — mentioned social processes and powers. We will give people nothing more than new opportunities to produce people in their own image, and it’s up to them to use these opportunities to their benefit or harm or not at all.”
“You mean we should publish the discovery and wash our hands of it? Well, I never! If we don’t give a damn what happens to it, certainly no one else will!”
“Don’t be angry. I don’t think we should publish and wash our hands of it. We have to go on working, studying the possibilities the way everyone does. But in the research, and the ideas, even in the dreams on project 154, you must keep in mind that what happens to this project in real life depends primarily on life itself, or to put it in a more cultured way, on the socio — political situation in the world. If the situation develops in a safe, good direction, then we can publish. If not — we’ll have to hold off or destroy the project, as foreseen by the vow. It’s not in our power to save humanity, but it is in our power not to inflict any harm on it.”
“Hm. that’s very modest. I think you’re underestimating the possibilities of modern science. We now have the capability of destroying humanity by pushing a button — or several buttons. Why shouldn’t there be an alternative method to save or at least protect humanity by pushing a button? And why, damn it, shouldn’t that method be in our field of research?”
“It doesn’t lie there. Our direction is constructive. It’s much, much harder to build a bridge than to blow it up.”
“I agree. But they do build bridges.”
“But no one’s built a bridge that can’t be blown up.”
We found ourselves at a dead end.
But he’s okay. He essentially laid out all my vague doubts in a clear — cut fashion; they had been bothering me for a long time. I don’t know whether to be happy or sad.
December 28. So, it’s been a year since I sat in the new lab on an unpacked impulse generator and thought about an indefinite experiment. Just a year? No, time is measured by events and not by the rotation of the earth. I think at least a decade has passed. And not only because so much was done — there was so much experienced. I’ve started thinking about life more, understanding myself and others better, I’ve even changed a little — pray God, for the better.
And still there is a dissatisfaction — too much dreaming, I suppose. Everything that I’ve thought of has happened, but the wrong way somehow: with difficulties, with horrible complications, with disillusionment. That’s the way it is in life. Man never dreams about where he could fall flat on his face or find disillusionment; that happens on its own. I understand that perfectly well with my mind, but I still can’t resign myself to it.
When I was synthesizing double number 3 (Kravets in civilian life), I hoped vaguely that something would click in the computer — womb and I would get a knight without fear or flaw! Nothing clicked. He’s fine, can’t argue with that, but he’s no knight. He’s sober — minded, reasonable, and careful. And where was the knight supposed to come from — me?
Jerk, dreamy jerk! You keep hoping that nature will find and hand you the absolutely dependable method — it never will. It doesn’t have that information.
Damn, is it really impossible? Is the perfected Krivoshein — Kravets really right?
There is one method of saving the world by pushing a button; it can be used in case of thermonuclear war. You hide several computer — wombs that have been fed information on people (men and women) deep in a mine shaft with a large supply of reagents. And if there are no people left in the ashes of the earth, the computers will save and resurrect humanity. That’s one way out of the situation.
Then that’s “not it” either. What is “it?” Is there an “it?”
PART THREE
AWAKENING
Chapter 19
Sleep is the best weapon against sleepiness.
K. Prutkov — engineer. A Sketch for an Encyclopedia
A quick — flowing June night: the purple sunset had gone out in the west a short time ago and now in the southeast, beyond the Dneiper, the sky was growing light again. But even a short night is a night; it has the same effect on people. The inhabitants of the shaded parts of the planet sleep. The citizens of Dneprovsk were sleeping. Many of the participants in the described events were sleeping.
Matvei Apollonovich Onisimov was sleeping fitfully. He had a lot of trouble falling asleep: he smoked, tossed and turned, and bothered his wife while he thought about what had happened. When he did fall asleep, exhausted, his overstimulated mind offered a terrible dream. It seemed three bodies killed by fire throwers were found in three city parks. Medical Examiner Zubato, too lazy to examine all three bodies, came up with the theory that all three were killed with one shot. To probe the veracity of his theory, he sat the bodies down on a marble bench in the autopsy room, arms around one another; their wounds matched up.
Matvei Apollonovich, who usually had black and murky dreams that looked as if they were an old, used film, experienced this picture in 3 — D, with color and smell; there were three Krivosheins in a row — huge, naked, pink ones smelling of meat — and they were staring at him with photogenic smiles. Onisimov woke up in protest. But (the dream had helped) he had the beginnings of a good theory when he woke up: they were boiling the murdered Krivoshein’s body in that lab! After all — a body is the most important clue and it’s risky to hide it or bury it; it could be found. And so they were boiling or disintegrating the body in a special liquid, and since this wasn’t an easy matter, they miscalculated and the tank turned over. And that’s why the body seemed warm when Prakhov the technician found it in the tank! That’s why it melted so fast, soaked as it was in their chemicals, leaving only a skeleton. The lab assistant had been knocked out by the tank, and the other conspirator — the one who was pulling all those tricks in front of him yesterday — ran off. (It was clear that the mystifier or circus performer was either using masks or else was well trained in mimicry.) And then he arranged for an alibi — he could have fooled that Moscow professor with his masks and mime. And his papers were just very good fakes.
Matvei Apollonovich lit another cigarette. And still this was no simple crime. If the perpetrators were working both here and in Moscow and there was no motive of greed, personal vendetta, or sex, then. probably Krivoshein had made a serious invention or discovery. No, tomorrow he would insist to his chief that they bring in the security organs on this case! (Although Onisimov will never know what happened, we must give credit to his detective ability. Really: not knowing anything about the essence of the case and using only the external accidental facts, he managed to build a logical, consistent theory — not everyone can do that!)
Having made the decision, Matvei Apollonovich slept soundly. Now he was having pleasant dreams: he’d been promoted for solving the case. But dreams are even less subject to our control than reality, and the investigator began groaning and tossing. His awakened wife asked: “Matvei, what’s the matter?” Onisimov had dreamed that there was a fire in the department and the new promotion list had been destroyed.
Arkady Arkadievich Azarov had just fallen asleep, and only with the help of two sleeping pills. (He’ll wake up in the morning with neurasthenia.) He was also tormented by thoughts of the events in the New Systems Lab. He had already gotten a phone call from the Party City Committee: “Another accident, Arkady Arkadievich? With a loss of human life?” How do they find out so fast? Now it would all begin: reports, commissions, explanations…. But that’s why he was a director and got a fat salary, so that he could be driven crazy! These are the things, for which he’s not responsible and couldn’t possibly be responsible, that cast aspersions on his honest, productive, positive work! Arkady Arkadievich felt alone and miserable.
“I should never have set up that lab of ‘random retrieval. I didn’t listen to myself. I mean the whole idea of random test and free — form combinations being a path that would bring truth and correct solutions to science went deep against my own grain. And it still does. The Monte Carlo Method — just look at the name! Belief in chance — what could be worse in a researcher? Instead of analyzing the problem logically and confidently and slowly reaching its solution, you try your luck, even with the aid of lab equipment and computers! Of course, you can build pseudoscientific systems and algorithms that way, but don’t they resemble the ‘systems’ gamblers have for beating the bank and which always make them bankrupt? Big deal, so you changed the name of the lab. But the essence was the same. You let it develop, because there is this tendency in world systemology. And so let it develop in our institute, too. It’s developed all right!”
Arkady Arkadievich hadn’t expressed his misgivings to Krivoshein back then, because he didn’t want to dampen his enthusiasm. He merely asked: “What are you planning to achieve… through random retrieval?” “First and foremost to master the methodology,” Krivoshein had answered, and that had pleased Azarov more than if he had spewed out hundreds of ideas.
“But he wasn’t just mastering the methodology/’Arkady Arkadievich remembered the laboratory, the setup that looked like an octopus, the expensive collection of test tubes and flasks. “He was doing some vast experiment. Could he have really been doing what he had reported on at the scientific council? But it ended up with a corpse. A corpse that turned into a skeleton!” Azarov felt revulsion and anger. “I have to put an end to experimentation; something always goes wrong! Always! Systemology is essentially a cerebral science. The analysis and synthesis of any system must be promoted! And if you want to work with computers — please do, program your tasks and go into the computer room. And basically with all these experiments,” the academician laughed lightly, calming down, “you never know what you’ve got: a hugh mistake or a discovery!”
Arkady Arkadievich had a long — time score to settle with experimental science, and his opinions on it were firm and definite. Some thirty years ago the young physicist Azarov was studying the process of liquifying helium. Once he stuck two glass stirrers into his Dewar flask, and the liquid, cooled down to 2 on the absolute scale, evaporated very quickly. Two liters of then precious helium disappeared and the experiment was ruined! Arkady accused the lab’s glass man of sticking him with a faulty Dewar flask. He had been penalized… and two years later a classmate of Azarov’s at the university, Pyotr Kapitsa, in an analogous experiment (lowering capillary stirrers into a vessel) discovered the superfluidity of helium!
Arkady Arkadievich grew disillusioned in experimental physics and came to love the dependable and strict world of mathematics. It was math that elevated him — the mathematical approach to the solution of nonmathematical problems. In the thirties he applied his methods to the problems of the general theory of relativity, which had all science enthralled; later his research helped solve important problems in the theory of chain reactions in uranium and plutonium. Then he applied his methods to the problems of chemical catalysis of polymers; and now he was head of the discrete systems direction in systemology.
“Eh, I’m still thinking about the wrong thing!” Azarov complained. “What did happen in Krivoshein’s lab? I remember last autumn he came to me, wanted to talk about something. What? Work, naturally. And I waved him off. I was too busy. Somehow you always consider things
that can’t be put off as the most important. I should have talked to him; I’d know now what happened. Krivoshein never approached me again. Of course, people like that are proud and shy. Wait — what kind of people? What’s Krivoshein like? What do I know about him? A few lectures at seminars, an appearance at the scientific council, several exchanges with other lecturers, and a nodding acquaintance.
Can I base a judgement on that? Yes, I can. I’m not so bad at judging people. He was an active and creative person. You recognize people like that by their questions and by their answers. You can see the constant thought flow — not everyone can see it, but I’m the same way; I can recognize it. A man eats, goes to work, greets friends, goes to the movies, argues with his co — workers, lends money, tans at the beach — he does it all wholeheartedly — and yet all the time he’s thinking. On one subject. The idea has no relation to his actions or daily cares, but there is nothing that will distract him from that idea. It’s the most important part of him: new things are born from it. And Krivoshein was like that. And it’s too bad that’s in the past tense — life loses something very necessary with the death of a man like that. And you feel even more alone…. Well, enough, what am I going on about?” Arkady Arkadievich looked at the time. “I must sleep.”
Harry Haritonovich Hilobok couldn’t fall asleep that night either. He kept looking at the lighted window across the way in Krivoshein’s apartment and tried to guess who was that in there. Lena Kolomiets left rapidly after ten (Harry Haritonvich recognized her figure and walk, and thought: “I should get to know her better. There’s a lot to her”), but the light stayed on. Hilobok turned out his lights, and seated himself at the window with a pair of binoculars, but the angle was wrong — he could only see part of the book shelf and the Olympic — ring logo on the wall. “Did she forget to put out the light? Or is there someone else in there? Should I call the police? Ah, the hell with them. Let them figure it out.” Harry Haritonovich yawned deliciously. “Maybe it’s the police in there investigating….”
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