Out of My Mind

by Andy Rooney

  If we survive these potentially catastrophic, civilization-ending disasters and the world doesn’t come to an end, I’ll be able to concentrate on worrying about cloning. The tinkering that scientists are doing with the genes of sheep is child’s play compared with what they’re going to be able to do with humans. And nothing’s going to stop them from cloning a person.

  The best we can hope for to end all our worries is that science will isolate the best genes and produce the perfect human being. Dishonesty will be eliminated from the human character. There will be no thieves, no evil corporate executives, no Adolf Hitlers or Saddam Husseins.

  Meanwhile, though, there’s a lot to worry about.

  NOT A LOVERS’ QUARREL

  Most of us don’t change our minds about anything important after the age of twenty. We get set in our ways early. One of the earliest mind-sets to form is about religion. Kids baptized as Catholics and sent to a Catholic church when they’re too young to understand religion usually end up as church-going Catholics for life. No young child says to a parent, “I don’t want to be a Catholic. I think I’ll be a Baptist.” Or vice versa.

  The training or indoctrination of young people can be good or bad but whatever it is, it usually sticks for life. In the 1930s, Adolf Hitler, playing on the resentment some Germans felt toward the Jews, formed youth groups that taught hate. It was those young people who became Nazis. They weren’t born Nazis.

  If all the children in Peoria, Ill. (a city I pick at random), had been brought up as Muslims instead of Catholics and Protestants, they would be Muslims now. There wouldn’t have been a lot of ten-year-olds stomping their feet saying, “I don’t want to be a Muslim. I want to be a Presbyterian.”

  One of the greatest dangers to the survival of a civilization is the rise of hatred within the culture. There have been recent pictures and articles about the extent of the training exercises in the Middle East that combine a philosophy of hate with education in murder. Young Muslims taking courses in terrorism are not going to grow up trying to win the Nobel Peace Prize. They will have been convinced in their youth that Americans are evil and that the right thing for them to do is kill as many of us as they can. There’s no hatred like the hatred based on religion.

  It’s not easy to understand why the races on earth are so different and so unable to get along. We don’t know whether there was always some basic, genetic difference between Eskimos and Africans, Asians and Europeans, or whether racial characteristics developed as a result of the differences in the environments in which humans with originally similar characteristics flourished over the centuries. However it happened, there’s no doubt that now there are fundamental differences among races. Our philosophies of government, our personalities, goals, religions and even our beliefs in old wives tales differ. And those aren’t going away.

  It’s hard to know what the United States should do about all this hatred. Spending more on weapons doesn’t seem like the best way to eliminate the crisis in the Middle East. A thousand nuclear bombs are no deterrent to a few containers of anthrax.

  I remember a college course in which I read a dialogue between two philosophers. One philosopher expressed dismay over the possible end of civilization as a result of the invention of gun powder.

  I’m a little old to worry about it myself, but I’m not so selfish that I’m ready to have this great world end with a biological or nuclear bang just because I’m not going to be around to see it.

  THE HISTORY OF HISTORY

  Last week, I attended a ceremony at the school I went to growing up for the dedication of several large brass plaques bearing the names of graduates who served in the military during this country’s twentieth-century wars.

  The emphasis was on the World War II plaque because it bore the most names. Many of us who had served were there. Someone pointed out how curious it was that the school had waited sixty years before honoring its World War II heroes. (The word “heroes” is used with increasing abandon as the years between the action and the present expand.)

  We’re all more interested in our own world, our own history than in anyone else’s. For years now I’ve been surprised and pleased by the attention being paid to WW II because it was my war. The interest in WW II was already growing before Tom Brokaw wrote The Greatest Generation. The movie Saving Private Ryan enhanced the memory of WW II. My own book on the topic, My War, has sold 175,000 copies and I’m acutely aware of how lucky I am to have had the cathartic experience of writing it.

  I say “lucky” because there aren’t many people who experienced WW II who haven’t thought of writing a book about it. I get fifty letters a year from veterans who want to write a book, or have started writing a book, or who’ve finished a rough manuscript about their wartime experiences. They ask for advice on how to get their work published. It’s sad for me because most of those efforts are sincere but seriously short of literary merit or any general interest.

  The question in my mind about both world wars has always been why my children, born after World War II ended, know so much more about it than I ever knew about World War I. That conflict ended the year I was born. It is not just our children, either. Everyone’s children know more about WW II than they know about WW I, and the only possible answer is that the methods of preserving historical information are better than they were after WW I.

  Our knowledge of ancient events is based on flimsy evidence, and often myth substitutes for history. Little was written down in ancient times and no visual or oral recordings were made to provide a record of events. What historical information we have from ancient times is based on twice-told tales handed down by word of mouth until paper was invented.

  There were some crude motion pictures taken of some of the events of World War I, but photography was still young and most of the sound-recording devices we have now were unknown.

  It’s easy to be pessimistic about civilization, but looking at the progress we’ve made in the past 100 years in our ability to preserve historical data is encouraging. If knowing history prevents our having to repeat it, then our ability to record the present for future generations is good.

  My memories of the history courses I took are of wars and the evil deeds of modern and ancient kings, dictators and presidents. Wars, crimes and disasters are always the biggest part of recorded history. Historians don’t pass down long narrative accounts of peaceful years because they’re dull and no one would read them.

  It’s a pretty good world Americans have had to live in for the past sixty years. I hope that when future generations are exposed to the history of our era they get something besides Iraq, Watergate and Monica Lewinsky.

  FAITH IN SCIENCE

  We’ve got such a good thing going for ourselves here on Earth, it would be too bad if future generations missed out on it, but things don’t look good. Biological and nuclear warfare, global warming, the AIDS pandemic are ominous.

  There’s no doubt the world is endangered and no doubt that the future of civilization rests on the work that science can do to save it. It’s only fairly recently, within the last 100 years, that human beings have understood the importance of science. Before that, they were impressed by scientific discoveries but unaware of the significance of science in the Big Picture.

  The existence of humans is brand new given the millions of years the earth has existed. Other life forms that once dominated the planet, like the dinosaurs, have disappeared. We think of ourselves as permanent but there’s no written guarantee. There are threats to human life on Earth that could end this whole ballgame we’re playing.

  There are three basic areas in which science can work for our benefit. Astronomy is crucial. We’ve got to keep studying the universe so the earth doesn’t end up getting too hot or too cold to support life.

  Second, science has to keep plugging away on health issues and finding cures and preventive measures against things like cancer, diabetes, heart disease and AIDS.

  The third area in which we need imme
diate help from science is with our environment. There’s a war going on between business and science. If we’re going to survive, we have to concede the power of deciding what to do to science, not to industry. Scientists look for solid data; industry is guessing and trying to make money.

  If we admit that it is our best hope, the next question is how to use science. Right there you have a problem because as soon as you say “use science,” there’s trouble. Science, at its best, isn’t used. Scientists should go off on their own and poke around in their labs until they find something. Pure science isn’t trying to save the world or make anything useful; it’s just being scientific.

  We’ve tried to use science by having government direct scientific study toward improving life for humans. Things seldom work out when government gets involved and tries to direct science to solve a specific problem. The first thing a government agency does is lay out a set of standards by which a department will work. Science doesn’t work within a set of standards. Discovery is outside the boundaries of standards and, if you force scientists to work within boundaries, they seldom make discoveries.

  When government gets its hands on science, it wants practical results. This practice can attract an inferior group of scientists and, first thing you know, government has science making weapons.

  The other problem with science and government is that, inevitably, the scientists are subservient to the politicians. The interests of the two groups are different, and if politicians’ interests are forced on scientists, it doesn’t work.

  Scientists ought to be given the money they need and left in a corner by themselves to work without interference or direction from anyone. They should not be given an agenda they’re expected to follow. Given a free hand, scientists will usually do the right thing.

  VOUCHERS FOR ATHEISTS, TOO

  With the new Supreme Court–approved voucher system that will pay tuition to private schools, there will be a proliferation of new institutions starting up to get in on the tax money being handed out to religious schools.

  While the majority of existing parochial schools are Catholic, a good number are Jewish and Islamic. The religion of the Muslims is the fastest growing in the United States. It is likely that the new schools will be associated with less well known religions or the growing ones interested in having government help to promote their creeds.

  I met a man with the name of Charles Ausseldorfer who told me he’s opening a school for the children of atheists. He doesn’t call the children atheists because he says they’re too young to know what they believe.

  Mr. Ausseldorfer told me his school will be called the Atheist Academy and he looks forward to the help he’ll be getting from American taxpayers.

  Mr. Ausseldorfer, 54, a former stock market analyst who became disenchanted with Wall Street—but not until he’d made a lot of money—said he’d bought an abandoned factory on the outskirts of a Midwestern city. I told him I’d like to take a camera crew out to get pictures of the school, but he asked that the exact location of the Atheist Academy not be revealed yet. Contractors are dividing the old brick building into twelve classrooms and one larger meeting room with a stage for lectures, he said.

  Tuition for the Atheist Academy will be $5,000, approximately half of which will come from tax money provided through the school voucher program. The school’s motto will be Tom Paine’s famous statement: “My country is the world, my religion is to do good and all men are my brothers.”

  Mr. Ausseldorfer was a charming conversationalist but I told him I object as much to having my tax money go to a school teaching atheism as to one teaching Catholicism, Islam or Buddhism.

  “Each school day,” he told me, “will begin with students reciting the Pledge of Allegiance without the words ‘under God.’” We’ll make it clear to our students that God is none of the government’s business and the government is none of God’s business.”

  Mr. Ausseldorfer said he hopes to have an athletic program.

  “We’ll play schools with whom we can compete . . . smaller schools representing some of the fringe religions like the Latter Day Saints and the Unitarians.

  “It will be an interesting experiment,” Mr. Ausseldorfer said, “to see if our football team can beat any of the teams whose players pray to God to win.”

  I asked whether school attendance will be restricted to atheists or the children of atheists.

  “Absolutely not,” Mr. Ausseldorfer said. “We’ll take agnostic kids, Jewish kids, Baptists, Muslims, Buddhists, Presbyterians. Like the Catholic schools, we’ll try to get children to see things our way. With those tax dollars, we’re going to promote logic, reason and good sense. We will teach courses in all the religions of the world, as well as courses in the Bible and the Koran. We hope that studying them will expose them.”

  I questioned him about whether atheism would qualify as a religion.

  “The voucher system is not restricted to religious schools, even though 97 percent of the schools getting the money are (religious),” he said. “It will be no different than the government paying tuition for a Catholic, a Jewish or a Muslim school.”

  I asked Mr. Ausseldorfer if he thought many church-going Americans would object to paying to support a school whose mission was to promote the idea among children that there is no God.

  “They may object,” Mr. Ausseldorfer admitted, “but no more than atheists object to having tax money pay for a Catholic or a Muslim school.”

  You understand of course, that Charley Ausseldorfer is fictitious.

  WAR IS HEAVEN

  Just when it seemed as though the people who make war had invented every possible device with which to kill people, we’re faced with a strange new weapon that is not a device but a method—terrorism.

  We thought we’d found the ultimate way to kill with the nuclear bomb. Now we’ve come up with an even more terrible form of warfare. Terrorism is a new way to kill. There have been isolated incidents in the past 20 years but the newness of it is the willingness of terrorists to die for their cause. Before, the enemy was as interested in survival as its victims. There were things each side knew the other would not do in combat because of some immutable law of self-preservation. The only time that unwritten law had been broken was when Japanese kamikaze pilots willingly died for their God and their country.

  Soldiers have been finding new ways to kill each other since the beginning of recorded history. They were probably finding ways before that, too. The early wars between armies in ancient Greece were clumsy battles. The front line of an attacking force was made up of men in horse-drawn, armored chariots. As the two forces clashed, hand-tohand battles were fought by soldiers behind the chariots who carried the latest tools of war-battle axes, swords, shields, spears, dart throwers and bows. Those weapons must have evoked the same fear terrorism evokes in us today.

  Somewhere around 1200, the evil Mongolian Genghis Khan put his troops on horseback. This enabled him to conquer the entire known world.

  When Genghis Khan got to China, he was temporarily slowed by Chinese fortifications and soldiers who were more intelligent than his troops. To defeat them, Khan adopted a new tactic that made use of the Chinese soldiers’ reverence for family. He captured thousands of women, children and old men, and then, when his troops advanced, Khan forced the captives to walk in front of his soldiers. This provided a phalanx that could only be penetrated if the Chinese chose to kill their own.

  Around the same time, the Chinese invented gunpowder but used it more for firecrackers than in weapons. They were ineffective against Khan’s ruthless advance and as many as 18 million Chinese, a substantial percentage of the number of people living then, were killed.

  There was relatively little progress made in ways to kill people for hundreds of years after explosion-propelled missiles were invented. The Civil War wasn’t fought with weapons much different from anything invented hundreds of years before.

  In World War I, the armored tank struck fear into the hea
rts of infantrymen, but the tank turned out to be a paper tiger, as often a crematorium for its crew as an offensive aid to the infantry.

  The Germans were the first to use a chemical weapon when they released mustard gas in World War I in front of a wind that wafted it toward French lines. The gas sickened some French soldiers but its course was so unpredictable that it was ineffective. It could drift in the wrong direction.

  Aircraft were used in combat for the first time in World War I. A German plane and one zeppelin dropped small bombs on England but neither was capable of carrying anything large enough to do serious damage. Air action was limited to the romantic dogfights between men like the Luftwaffe’s legendary Red Baron Von Richthofen and American ace Eddie Rickenbacker.

  War came of age in World War II, when aircraft capable of carrying tons of bombs could destroy whole cities. Even high-explosive bombs turned out to be a relatively inefficient method of mass destruction once the United States developed nuclear weapons and dropped two on Japan.

  When men were reluctant to die in the process of killing, it was possible to understand war. The newest threat to civilization—terrorism—is as frightening as any of its predecessors. And it won’t be the last.

  HUMAN AND INHUMAN NATURE

  When you have an enemy, as we have in the Muslim terrorists, who would gladly wipe you off the face of the earth, it’s difficult to continue believing that all men are created equal. Not the same, certainly.

  It would appear to us as though there was something basically evil about this enemy, but you can bet the terrorists don’t think of themselves as evil. They’re certain that they are serving God. Religion does amazing things to people.

  It is my not totally baked opinion that almost no one does something bad knowing and believing that they are bad for doing it. The petty thief rationalizes his thievery by thinking that the person from whom he’s stealing has plenty of money and probably didn’t make it honestly anyway. Not that long ago in this country, slavery was accepted by tens of thousands of decent Southerners who were able to make themselves believe they were doing their black servants a favor by providing them with food and shelter.