“Well, I guess science advanced. People became more educated. They started seeing that all the genetic things might make the world better, so it didn’t bug them, not like when the Nazis were doing it.”
“Let’s not get confused with intent here, at least not yet, anyway. Was it simply a matter of time and acceptance?”
“I guess. And the fact that it was possible, scientifically to do it.”
“Because it could be done, it was being done?”
“Yeah, but I’m sure it was because of the good things.”
“Stop, no intent yet! Let’s see, take a person from the nineteen thirties, freeze them in time, bring them forward ninety years, tell them about genetic manipulations.”
“So?”
“Their reaction?”
“They probably wouldn’t like it. But I’m sure they’d come to accept it, especially if they knew of the purpose. They were too religious back then, and probably wouldn’t have understood at first.”
“What is the process of acceptance?”
“What do you mean?”
“In what ways do most beings accept something?”
“If you brought a person from the thirties to now, they’d watch TV and talk to people, I suppose, and find out from them. Like what the scientists were doing, and then after awhile, they’d get accustomed to it and it wouldn’t bother them. I mean, Jesus, there are, or were, scarier things out there like wild drivers or people with guns in their cars, things to really be afraid of, instead of some scientist in a lab coat somewhere working on his microscope.”
“You say because others, either directly or indirectly, such as through TV, have accepted it, that this person would accept it as well?”
“I mean, who gives a rip, really? Those people, the scientists, and the government, they knew what was going on. They had standards.”
“Your government?”
“You mean the U.S.? Sure.”
“And other governments?”
“I don’t know.”
“Were other governments as disciplined as yours?”
“In science? Hell, you got me.”
“Say no if you think not. Your mind says one thing, your words another.”
“Okay, damn it, probably not, not outside of the U.S. and European countries and Japan.”
“Then it falls apart already. Even without ill intent, it falls apart.”
“What falls apart?”
“The fabric that held it together. The belief. The thought that it was putrid to change human genetics. The rebellion, repugnance in one’s mind that it should happen. The first intuition that says ‘no, why do that’? It’s the ‘why do that’ that is insidious, though.”
“Why?”
“Because it begs for an answer. It asks to be convinced. It reasons. And the insidious thing about reason is that it becomes boundless in the form of rationalizing actions. You spoke of Nazis, the nineteen-thirties. Was there a ‘why do it’ there?”
“Of course, but those people were mad, they were insane.”
“Each and every German citizen? Every soldier in the army? Every guard at a death camp?”
“How do you know this?”
“I reviewed some recent earth history. That is a classic example. It goes on everywhere, on countless planets.”
“The killing of Jews?”
“No, the tolerance, the creep, the continuity, the push to rationalization. The incrementalism. The acceptance of deviation from norms of behavior. Shall I restate that? It is the acceptance of standards of behavior, of the ways in which you allow yourselves to treat each other. Ultimately, that is the killer of most worlds. Relentless technological advancements in short order almost always result in relentless access to information. The information itself becomes the focus rather than the problems of the society. Those millions of civilizations died from good intention, and more good intention, and more. Intention becomes the convenient substitute for action. Intention is nothing. Intention is the sound of death. Links to the past, the remembrance of purpose, values, underlying rules, all that fades quickly as information leads to intention and intention leads to rationalization not to act. Indeed, it is far easier to simply consume more information with the intent to eventually act than to actually take action on the incremental degradation of norms.”
“Your argument evades me,” she said, shaking her head slowly. “Technology was helping. It was. Look at all the things we had created and done in last few decades. Technologies to help people. That was progress. There were some bad things, like terrorism and stuff, but humans would have managed through that. I mean, we didn’t blow ourselves up in the cold war, and communism fell for the most part, and things were going reasonably well. Humans were moving ahead.”
“Ruleless. No rules. Don’t you see? Life is a natural system. Like any natural system, its tendency is to move toward dissolution, towards entropy if you know what I mean by that word. Then it reorganizes, restructures into a new form, and goes through a cycle of dissolution and entropy, then a new form again. This is a constant. How does a society prevent, or at least attempt to inhibit this?”
“I’m sure you know.”
“It structures itself around rules, but not just any rules, to extend its life in the very, very long term. The human problem, like so many other societies, is that the rules were lost or never even considered as people became obsessed with their technologies and what they wrought. Technologies appropriated and distanced humans from their inner voices of right and wrong. Far too easy to be manipulated when your mental plasticity became the sponge that soaked up both knowledge and lies, positive intent and negative. An easy thing to do, to avoid or never establish rules, societal norms, or a strategy for the whole species – humanity in this case. An easy thing to do to consume all things of creation, whether real or not, whether for good or evil intent, without a grounding in decency of behavior. Margot, please stay with me.”
“I’m wandering because this does nothing for me,” she countered.
“Think of the human race as one large system, say, one large bucket with wheels, that had no defined rules of behavior – like how you’d agree to treat each other. You load that bucket with information, both good and bad, and it continues to run aimlessly. What do you have in the end? Have you progressed without ever having a systematic vision and agreement for what progression meant? If the answer is ‘no’, then we find that the bucket operates in chaos and rolls off a cliff, of which there are many, and that descent becomes its final conclusion.”
“Stupid, stupid analogy. What of your perfect Das rules could have possibly saved earth?” she said sarcastically.
“The right rules are in your gut, you might say. The Das generally believe that emotions are a gift from God, the way in which God speaks to you. Emotions are the energetic interchange where logic, desire, knowledge, fear, entitlement, understanding, empathy, anger all come together. But like any energy, unmanaged and uncontrolled it will lead to entropy, the dissolution of all existence. You mentioned something about drivers. Can you explain that to me?”
“What?”
“Drivers, you had just spoken of them, and danger.”
“Oh, that. I was just saying that at least in my life there wasn’t much to be afraid of other than crazy people who drive their cars.”
“What do you mean? What would they do?”
“Well, I can’t explain too well to you, because you’ve never driven a car, at least that I’m aware. But Phoenix was horrible. People came from every other godforsaken place to my city and they’d drive like maniacs, always tailgating, like they’d try to intimidate the hell out of you, even though you were driving in the slow lane. I mean, they wouldn’t even pass you. It was like, get out of my way, what the hell are you doing going so slow, even though I’d go five to ten miles an hour over the speed limit, they’d still tailgate. Or they’d turn at left turn lights long after the light was red. I could go on, but it pisses me off just thinking a
bout it. In fact, I guess if there’s any justice, at least those people went down with the rest of the human race, too, the bad with the good.”
“Why were they allowed to do that?”
“I don’t know. No cops, I guess. They’d rather stop you for an expired tag than for aggressive driving. Too many lawyers and too much time for a cop to spend in court.”
“No cops. They were there to enforce your traffic rules?”
“Yeah, but never did.”
“Was courtesy a rule?”
“Hell, no, not in Arizona. If there was a rule, it was a rule to be discourteous. But there were rules for driving, like how far you should be from a car when you were driving fifty, or how fast you should drive overall.”
“So why did you tolerate a discourteous driver?”
“What? These people are crazies. There’d be news stories every couple of weeks about someone who’d get shot or beaten up in a traffic argument. I wasn’t about to yell at those yo-yo’s. Occasionally, I’d flip a bird if the driver got me real mad, but I’d look to see if they looked like some mean dude first, and if it was, I wouldn’t do it because maybe he had a gun in his glove box or he’d follow me home or something.”
“But why did you tolerate it?”
“Like I just said. Because the yo-yo might kill me.”
“No, no, let me rephrase this. If the earth were your earth, and you were the supreme ruler, would you tolerate such a thing?”
“No way in hell. I’d slam them with tickets, and if they were really bad, I’d put them in jail, or take their license away, or even break their legs if they had a long, horrible history. Oh, I didn’t mean that . . ..”
“Now, let me ask you, if the earth was not your earth, then whose was it?”
Margot sat back in her chair. Her chest heaved at the reminder of her driving experiences. She took a deep breath. “Wait,” she said.
If the earth was not mine, whose was it? The earth wasn’t mine. I mean, it belonged to the rich people, or governments. The earth was not mine, the earth was the earth’s.
“It was nobody’s,” she said flatly.
“Nobody’s. The earth was nobody’s. Nobody was responsible for it.”
“Um, no, we were all responsible for it, not to mess it up and stuff.”
“Then it was everybody’s.”
“Nobody’s, everybody’s, what does it matter? It’s gone now, anyway, now it is truly nobody’s earth.”
“Listen to yourself, Margot. Listen. If the earth were yours, you would have stopped the crazy drivers, right?”
“Yes.”
“And what prevented you, I mean, beyond the immediate threat of death? Could you have done something else?”
“Like take their license down or something? A lot of good that would do. The cops wouldn’t care, they’d think I was nuts to report that someone was tailgating me.”
“Then the process stops there. It becomes ruleless.”
“The only rule I know is that they shouldn’t kill you if you get mad at them for being a driving ass, but even that rule they got past.”
“And what happened to the people who did kill someone over a traffic disagreement?”
“I don’t know. Maybe they got off, given the multitude of lawyers around. Maybe they spent a couple of years in prison. You never heard about them after it happened. You just assumed they got a hand slap, maybe a little worse. Either way, you can see it sure wasn’t worth arguing with anyone if that’s all they get.”
“What is repugnant about it? That they broke the law?” Isda asked.
“No, the repugnance is that they were doing it at all. That they were trying to intimidate you with their car, maybe pressure you into going faster or getting into an accident. It was also repugnant that those who did shoot someone wouldn’t get hanged or the chair or something. That’s gross. That’s why you don’t even mess with it.”
“What is why?”
“Because it’s not worth it. It’s not. The risk or effort outweighs the potential reward."
“The risk of what? The effort of what?”
“The effort to do anything about it. The risk of having nothing happen as a result. It’s easier just to let the jackasses alone.”
“You let this issue slide by because it was easier to do that than to do anything about it. So your rules fall apart?”
“What rules?”
“What rules do you think?”
“I don’t know, bug. Nobody obeyed the speed limit, that’s for sure. I suppose that’s one rule they never, ever followed,” she laughed.
“Are there other rules?”
“Well, I think there’s one for tailgating, though I never, ever heard of anyone getting a ticket for that. I wish they could have given a ticket for rudeness or intimidation.”
“What’s the rule there? Courtesy?”
“Courtesy’s not a rule. It’s just something people are supposed to do.”
“How does that differ from a rule?”
Margot thought for a moment. “I don’t know. I don’t think that there’s anything on any law books saying a driver has to be courteous.”
“And it has to be on the law books to be a rule?”
“No, it has to be on law books to be a law, something you could get ticketed for or go to jail if you break it.”
“Then courtesy, should it have been on the law books as well?”
“How can you rule that someone is courteous when they drive? That’s ridiculous.”
“Margot," Isda replied, "don’t you see? This is where it falls apart. The essence of what you are talking about is courtesy, of setting laws in place that allow you to move traffic along with a minimum of life-threatening accidents, with consideration for proper and reasonable speed. The laws are built around this courtesy, if you will. When the rules and norms underlying the laws break down, entropy ensues. It is this lack of discipline that ends worlds like yours.”
“You’re not saying that our traffic laws were at fault for the earth’s end?”
“Yes! Yes! I am saying that.”
“Oh, that’s ridiculous!” she laughed.
“One small atom and another, eventually you have a molecule, then a cell, then a larger organism.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that you are a natural system that has organized. Think of a body that grows inside of a woman, a pre-birth child. As it grows, cells divide and multiply, all according to well-defined rules. Each atom knows how it fits, enzymes and other molecules enforce rules, your DNA is the rule book. Now, as the pre-child grows, a cell somewhere disobeys or ignores the rules, as it grows, and multiplies, what happens?”
“I don’t know. Are you talking about cancer or something?”
“Maybe, but let’s assume there are many, many cells. The organs are forming, complexity is increasing, but the complexity in and of itself causes rules to be placed upon rules. Like the need to simply divide is no longer the only need, but division with some modification is required. Now the system is very complex. The rule to divide is underlying it all, but this rule is modified in many ways or minimally obeyed as it is abrogated to some other function. For instance, the DNA that is the rule is now ignored, because some of the systems have broken away and created their own way.”
“But this is growth, that’s all. Growth and natural change.”
“Margot, don’t confuse change with good, and don’t confuse growth with rules.”
“I’m lost.”
“Are all rules good by nature?”
“No, hell no. I couldn’t say that I agree with half the laws on the books.”
“Rules, Margot, not laws. I am talking about basic rules of organized systems. Like all beings should get along with each other. Like a courtesy rule.”
“But you can’t enforce courtesy. That would be fake, and that’s even worse than no courtesy at all.” She shuttered at the thought, the memory of Geoff, his patronizing look and sickeningly sweet
tone as he told her of his exploits. “I hate fake stuff,” she said coldly.
“Can you educate about the need for it?”
“No, I don’t think so. Parents used to do that to some degree. At least on the earth, I knew very few people who were ever polite. My dad told me it used to be different. I think most people learned courtesy from videos or video games, which didn’t really teach it. In fact, I think most of my friends learned most everything they knew from video games.”
“In a society, what are its rules?”
“Laws?”
“No, rules, rules about behavior.”
“I don’t know. The Golden Rule. Courtesy rule, maybe, like don’t tread on me and I won’t tread on you. Kind of like, stay out of my way and I’ll stay out of yours.”
“That’s a distortion. What you just said is an example of something carried too far. It is the essence of over-adaptation. It is ‘I won’t bother you if you don’t bother me.’ In other words, ‘I’ll adapt to your behavior as long as it doesn’t impinge upon me.’”
“What’s wrong with that attitude?”
“No limits. Imagine a driver who is tailgating you. Is he impinging upon you?”
“Well, yes, the scumbag.”
“What do you do about it?”
“Nothing. I guess, maybe flip him off to let him know, or flick my rearview mirror up to show him I don’t care.”
“Are you adapting to his behavior?”
“No.” She thought for a moment, then put her hand to her chin. “I’m reacting.”
“What is reacting?”
“Flipping my mirror.”
“Has your reaction discouraged him from doing it again?”
“No. Probably not. I can’t ever remember seeing any of those assholes slow down after I did that.”
“Then you have adapted, not reacted. Your response was not strong enough to elicit a moment’s effect, much less a lasting one.”
Margot threw her hands forward. She was irritated. Where was all this going? She didn’t come here to hear his philosophy about how a planet died. She was here for Rovada, if anyone at all, with this bent-headed Das. “What does all of this have to do with the earth? I’m not getting your point.”
The Space Between Her Thoughts (The Space in Time Book 1) Page 20
