Foundation and Earth

by Isaac Asimov

  The starfield expanded with a rush so that thousands of stars pushed off every edge, giving the watchers so real a sensation of moving toward the screen that all three automatically leaned backward as though in response to a forward rush.

  The old view returned, not quite as dark as it had been on the map, but with the half-dozen stars shown as they had been in the original view. And there; close to the center, was another star, shining far more brightly than the others.

  “There it is,” said Pelorat, in an awed whisper.

  “It may be. I’ll have the computer take its spectrum and analyze it.” There was a moderately long pause, then Trevize said, “Spectral class, G-4, which makes it a trifle dimmer and smaller than Terminus’s sun, but rather brighter than Comporellon’s sun. And no G-class star should be omitted from the computer’s Galactic map. Since this one is, that is a strong indication that it may be the sun about which the Forbidden World revolves.”

  Bliss said, “Is there any chance of its turning out that there is no habitable planet revolving about this star after all?”

  “There’s a chance, I suppose. In that case, we’ll try to find the other two Forbidden Worlds.”

  Bliss persevered. “And if the other two are false alarms, too?”

  “Then we’ll try something else.”

  “Like what?”

  “I wish I knew,” said Trevize grimly.

  PART III

  AURORA

  8

  Forbidden World

  31.

  “GOLAN,” SAID PELORAT, “DOES IT BOTHER YOU IF I watch?”

  “Not at all, Janov,” said Trevize.

  “If I ask questions?”

  “Go ahead.”

  Pelorat said, “What are you doing?”

  Trevize took his eyes off the viewscreen. “I’ve got to measure the distance of each star that seems to be near the Forbidden World on the screen, so that I can determine how near they really are. Their gravitational fields must be known and for that I need mass and distance. Without that knowledge, one can’t be sure of a clean Jump.”

  “How do you do that?”

  “Well, each star I see has its co-ordinates in the computer’s memory banks and these can be converted into co-ordinates on the Comporellian system. That can, in turn, be slightly corrected for the actual position of the Far Star in space relative to Comporellon’s sun, and that gives me the distance of each. Those red dwarfs all look quite near the Forbidden World on the screen, but some might be much closer and some much farther. We need their three-dimensional position, you see.”

  Pelorat nodded, and said, “And you already have the co-ordinates of the Forbidden World—”

  “Yes, but that’s not enough. I need the distances of the other stars to within a percent or so. Their gravitational intensity in the neighborhood of the Forbidden World is so small that a slight error makes no perceptible difference. The sun about which the Forbidden World revolves—or might revolve—possesses an enormously intense gravitational field in the neighborhood of the Forbidden World and I must know its distance with perhaps a thousand times the accuracy of that of the other stars. The co-ordinates alone won’t do.”

  “Then what do you do?”

  “I measure the apparent separation of the Forbidden World—or, rather, its star—from three nearby stars which are so dim it takes considerable magnification to make them out at all. Presumably, those three are very far away. We then keep one of those three stars centered on the screen and Jump a tenth of a parsec in a direction at right angles to the line of vision to the Forbidden World. We can do that safely enough even without knowing distances to comparatively far-off stars.

  “The reference star which is centered would still be centered after the Jump. The two other dim stars, if all three are truly very distant, do not change their positions measurably. The Forbidden World, however, is close enough to change its apparent position in parallactic shift. From the size of the shift, we can determine its distance. If I want to make doubly certain, I choose three other stars and try again.”

  Pelorat said, “How long does all that take?”

  “Not very long. The computer does the heavy work. I just tell it what to do. What really takes the time is that I have to study the results and make sure they look right and that my instructions aren’t at fault somehow. If I were one of those daredevils with utter faith in themselves and the computer, it could all be done in a few minutes.”

  Pelorat said, “It’s really astonishing. Think how much the computer does for us.”

  “I think of it all the time.”

  “What would you do without it?”

  “What would I do without a gravitic ship? What would I do without my astronautic training? What would I do without twenty thousand years of hyperspatial technology behind me? The fact is that I’m myself—here—now. Suppose we were to imagine ourselves twenty thousand additional years into the future. What technological marvels would we have to be grateful for? Or might it be that twenty thousand years hence humanity would not exist?”

  “Scarcely that,” said Pelorat. “Scarcely not exist. Even if we don’t become part of Galaxia, we would still have psychohistory to guide us.”

  Trevize turned in his chair, releasing his handhold on the computer. “Let it work out distances,” he said, “and let it check the matter a number of times. There’s no hurry.”

  He looked quizzically at Pelorat, and said, “Psychohistory! You know, Janov, twice that subject came up on Comporellon, and twice it was described as a superstition. I said so once, and then Deniador said it also. After all, how can you define psychohistory but as a superstition of the Foundation? Isn’t it a belief without proof or evidence? What do you think, Janov? It’s more your field than mine.”

  Pelorat said, “Why do you say there’s no evidence, Golan? The simulacrum of Hari Seldon has appeared in the Time Vault many times and has discussed events as they happened. He could not have known what those events would be, in his time, had he not been able to predict them psychohistorically.”

  Trevize nodded. “That sounds impressive. He was wrong about the Mule, but even allowing for that, it’s impressive. Still, it has an uncomfortable magical feel to it. Any conjurer can do tricks.”

  “No conjurer could predict centuries into the future.”

  “No conjurer could really do what he makes you think he does.”

  “Come, Golan. I can’t think of any trick that would allow me to predict what will happen five centuries from now.”

  “Nor can you think of a trick that will allow a conjurer to read the contents of a message hidden in a pseudo-tesseract on an unmanned orbiting satellite. Just the same, I’ve seen a conjurer do it. Has it ever occurred to you that the Time Capsule, along with the Hari Seldon simulacrum, may be rigged by the government?”

  Pelorat looked as though he were revolted by the suggestion. “They wouldn’t do that.”

  Trevize made a scornful sound.

  Pelorat said, “And they’d be caught if they tried.”

  “I’m not at all sure of that. The point is, though, that we don’t know how psychohistory works at all.”

  “I don’t know how that computer works, but I know it works.”

  “That’s because others know how it works. How would it be if no one knew how it worked? Then, if it stopped working for any reason, we would be helpless to do anything about it. And if psychohistory suddenly stopped working—”

  “The Second Foundationers know the workings of psychohistory.”

  “How do you know that, Janov?”

  “So it is said.”

  “Anything can be said. —Ah, we have the distance of the Forbidden World’s star, and, I hope, very accurately. Let’s consider the figures.”

  He stared at them for a long time, his lips moving occasionally, as though he were doing some rough calculations in his head. Finally, he said, without lifting his eyes, “What’s Bliss doing?”

  “Sleeping, old chap,
” said Pelorat. Then, defensively, “She needs sleep, Golan. Maintaining herself as part of Gaia across hyperspace is energy-consuming.”

  “I suppose so,” said Trevize, and turned back to the computer. He placed his hands on the desk and muttered, “I’ll let it go in several Jumps and have it recheck each time.” Then he withdrew them again and said, “I’m serious, Janov. What do you know about psychohistory?”

  Pelorat looked taken aback. “Nothing. Being a historian, which I am, after a fashion, is worlds different from being a psychohistorian. —Of course, I know the two fundamental basics of psychohistory, but everyone knows that.”

  “Even I do. The first requirement is that the number of human beings involved must be large enough to make statistical treatment valid. But how large is ‘large enough’?”

  Pelorat said, “The latest estimate of the Galactic population is something like ten quadrillion, and that’s probably an underestimate. Surely, that’s large enough.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because psychohistory does work, Golan. No matter how you chop logic, it does work.”

  “And the second requirement,” said Trevize, “is that human beings not be aware of psychohistory, so that the knowledge does not skew their reactions. —But they are aware of psychohistory.”

  “Only of its bare existence, old chap. That’s not what counts. The second requirement is that human beings not be aware of the predictions of psychohistory and that they are not—except that the Second Foundationers are supposed to be aware of them, but they’re a special case.”

  “And upon those two requirements alone, the science of psychohistory has been developed. That’s hard to believe.”

  “Not out of those two requirements alone,” said Pelorat. “There are advanced mathematics and elaborate statistical methods. The story is—if you want tradition—that Hari Seldon devised psychohistory by modeling it upon the kinetic theory of gases. Each atom or molecule in a gas moves randomly so that we can’t know the position or velocity of any one of them. Nevertheless, using statistics, we can work out the rules governing their overall behavior with great precision. In the same way, Seldon intended to work out the overall behavior of human societies even though the solutions would not apply to the behavior of individual human beings.”

  “Perhaps, but human beings aren’t atoms.”

  “True,” said Pelorat. “A human being has consciousness and his behavior is sufficiently complicated to make it appear to be free will. How Seldon handled that I haven’t any idea, and I’m sure I couldn’t understand it even if someone who knew tried to explain it to me—but he did it.”

  Trevize said, “And the whole thing depends on dealing with people who are both numerous and unaware. Doesn’t that seem to you a quicksandish foundation on which to build an enormous mathematical structure? If those requirements are not truly met, then everything collapses.”

  “But since the Plan hasn’t collapsed—”

  “Or, if the requirements are not exactly false or inadequate but simply weaker than they should be, psychohistory might work adequately for centuries and then, upon reaching some particular crisis, would collapse—as it did temporarily in the time of the Mule. —Or what if there is a third requirement?”

  “What third requirement?” asked Pelorat, frowning slightly.

  “I don’t know,” said Trevize. “An argument may seem thoroughly logical and elegant and yet contain unexpressed assumptions. Maybe the third requirement is an assumption so taken for granted that no one ever thinks of mentioning it.”

  “An assumption that is so taken for granted is usually valid enough, or it wouldn’t be so taken for granted.”

  Trevize snorted. “If you knew scientific history as well as you know traditional history, Janov, you would know how wrong that is. —But I see that we are now in the neighborhood of the sun of the Forbidden World.”

  And, indeed, centered on the screen, was a bright star—one so bright that the screen automatically filtered its light to the point where all other stars were washed out.

  32.

  FACILITIES FOR WASHING AND FOR PERSONAL HYGIENE on board the Far Star were compact, and the use of water was always held to a reasonable minimum to avoid overloading the recycling facilities. Both Pelorat and Bliss had been sternly reminded of this by Trevize.

  Even so, Bliss maintained an air of freshness at all times and her dark, long hair could be counted on to be glossy, her fingernails to sparkle.

  She walked into the pilot-room and said, “There you are!”

  Trevize looked up and said, “No need for surprise. We could scarcely have left the ship, and a thirty-second search would be bound to uncover us inside the ship, even if you couldn’t detect our presence mentally.”

  Bliss said, “The expression was purely a form of greeting and not meant to be taken literally, as you well know. Where are we? —And don’t say, ‘In the pilot-room.’ ”

  “Bliss dear,” said Pelorat, holding out one arm, “we’re at the outer regions of the planetary system of the nearest of the three Forbidden Worlds.”

  She walked to his side, placing her hand lightly on his shoulder, while his arm moved about her waist. She said, “It can’t be very Forbidden. Nothing has stopped us.”

  Trevize said, “It is only Forbidden because Comporellon and the other worlds of the second wave of settlement have voluntarily placed the worlds of the first wave—the Spacers—out of bounds. If we ourselves don’t feel bound by that voluntary agreement, what is to stop us?”

  “The Spacers, if any are left, might have voluntarily placed the worlds of the second wave out of bounds, too. Just because we don’t mind intruding upon them doesn’t mean that they don’t mind it.”

  “True,” said Trevize, “if they exist. But so far we don’t even know if any planet exists for them to live on. So far, all we see are the usual gas giants. Two of them, and not particularly large ones.”

  Pelorat said hastily, “But that doesn’t mean the Spacer world doesn’t exist. Any habitable world would be much closer to the sun and much smaller and very hard to detect in the solar glare from this distance. We’ll have to micro-Jump inward to detect such a planet.” He seemed rather proud to be speaking like a seasoned space traveler.

  “In that case,” said Bliss, “why aren’t we moving inward?”

  “Not just yet,” said Trevize. “I’m having the computer check as far as it can for any sign of an artificial structure. We’ll move inward by stages—a dozen, if necessary—checking at each stage. I don’t want to be trapped this time as we were when we first approached Gaia. Remember, Janov?”

  “Traps like that could catch us every day. The one at Gaia brought me Bliss.” Pelorat gazed at her fondly.

  Trevize grinned. “Are you hoping for a new Bliss every day?”

  Pelorat looked hurt, and Bliss said, with a trace of annoyance, “My good chap—or whatever it is that Pel insists on calling you—you might as well move in more quickly. While I am with you, you will not be trapped.”

  “The power of Gaia?”

  “To detect the presence of other minds? Certainly.”

  “Are you sure you are strong enough, Bliss? I gather you must sleep quite a bit to regain strength expended at maintaining contact with the main body of Gaia. How far can I rely on the perhaps narrow limits of your abilities at this distance from the source?”

  Bliss flushed. “The strength of the connection is ample.”

  Trevize said, “Don’t be offended. I’m simply asking. —Don’t you see this as a disadvantage of being Gaia? I am not Gaia. I am a complete and independent individual. That means I can travel as far as I wish from my world and my people, and remain Golan Trevize. What powers I have, and such as they are, I continue to have, and they remain wherever I go. If I were alone in space, parsecs away from any human being, and unable, for some reason, to communicate with anyone in any way, or even to see the spark of a single star in the sky, I would be and remain Golan
Trevize. I might not be able to survive, and I might die, but I would die Golan Trevize.”

  Bliss said, “Alone in space and far from all others, you would be unable to call on the help of your fellows, on their different talents and knowledge. Alone, as an isolated individual, you would be sadly diminished as compared with yourself as part of an integrated society. You know that.”

  Trevize said, “There would nevertheless not be the same diminution as in your case. There is a bond between you and Gaia that is far stronger than the one between me and my society, and that bond stretches through hyperspace and requires energy for maintenance, so that you must gasp, mentally, with the effort, and feel yourself to be a diminished entity far more than I must.”

  Bliss’s young face set hard and, for a moment, she looked young no more or, rather, she appeared ageless—more Gaia than Bliss, as though to refute Trevize’s contention. She said, “Even if everything you say is so, Golan Trevize—that is, was, and will be, that cannot perhaps be less, but certainly cannot be more—even if everything you say is so, do you expect there is no price to be paid for a benefit gained? Is it not better to be a warm-blooded creature such as yourself than a cold-blooded creature such as a fish, or whatever?”

  Pelorat said, “Tortoises are cold-blooded. Terminus doesn’t have any, but some worlds do. They are shelled creatures, very slow-moving but long-living.”

  “Well, then, isn’t it better to be a human being than a tortoise; to move quickly whatever the temperature, rather than slowly? Isn’t it better to support high-energy activities, quickly contracting muscles, quickly working nerve fibers, intense and long-sustained thought—than to creep slowly, and sense gradually, and have only a blurred awareness of the immediate surroundings? Isn’t it?”

  “Granted,” said Trevize. “It is. What of it?”