“If this happens, the individual advanced countries in which socialism triumphs will be like islands in a hostile capitalist and even to some extent precapitalist sea. Anxious about their own power, the upper classes of the nonsocialist countries will continue to concentrate all their efforts on destroying these islands. They will constantly be organizing military expeditions against them, and from among the ranks of the former large and small property-holders in the socialist nations themselves they will be able to find plenty of allies willing to commit treason. It is difficult to foresee the outcome of these conflicts, but even in those instances where socialism prevails and triumphs, its character will be perverted deeply and for a long time to come by years of encirclement, unavoidable terror and militarism, and the barbarian patriotism that is their inevitable consequence. This socialism will be a far cry from our own.
“In our previous plans, we had hoped to interfere in this process by accelerating and aiding the triumph of socialism. What means do we have at our disposal for such a project? First of all, we could give the peoples of Earth our technology, our science, our ability to harness the forces of nature. Their culture would thereby immediately be raised to the point where the backward forms of their economic and political life would come into such sharp conflict with it that they would disappear due to their own unfitness. Secondly, we could lend direct support to the socialist proletariat in its revolutionary struggle and help it to break the resistance of the other classes. There are no other alternatives. But can these two strategies achieve their goal? We know enough now to be able to answer definitely: no!
“What would happen if we were to give the Earthlings our technological knowledge and methods? The first to seize upon them and use them to increase their own power would be the ruling class in all countries. This would be inevitable, because they already control the means of production and command the loyalty of ninety-nine percent of all the scientists and engineers. In other words, they are the only ones who can apply the new technology, and they will use it to the exact extent that it can help them increase their power over the masses. Moreover, the new and mighty means of destruction which this technology would place in their hands would immediately be employed to crush the socialist proletariat. The rulers would intensify their persecution tenfold and attempt as soon as possible to provoke the proletariat into open combat, where they can crush its best and most conscious elements and emasculate it ideologically before the working class has a chance to develop its own new and improved methods of military force. Thus our interference would only serve to stimulate a reaction from above and provide it with weapons and unheard-of power. In the final analysis this would delay the victory of socialism by decades.
“What could we expect to achieve if we were openly to assist the socialist proletariat against its enemies? Let us assume—for the point is by no means self-evident—that it agrees to an alliance with us. In that case we would gain some easy first victories. But then? We and the socialists of Earth would inevitably be confronted by the most bitter and rabid patriotism on the part of all other classes of society. The proletariat is still a minority in even the most advanced countries. The dying remnants of the petty bourgeoisie and the most backward and ignorant elements of the masses are in the majority. It would be an easy matter for the large property-holders and their closest allies, the bureaucrats and scientists, to stir up rabid hostility toward the proletariat among these classes, because the masses are at bottom conservative and even to an extent reactionary, and they react violently to rapid progess. The vanguard of the proletariat would be surrounded by embittered and merciless enemies whose rank would also be swelled by the backward strata of the working class. It would find itself in the same unbearable situation as our colonists besieged by the vanquished peoples of Earth. We could expect countless treacherous attacks, pogroms, slaughter, but the main point is that the whole position of the proletariat in society would be extremely unfavorable, in terms of being able to effect any meaningful social transformation. Once again our interference would delay rather than hasten the social revolution.
“Thus the time for this upheaval remains indefinite, and we cannot shorten it. It is in any case going to take more time than we have at our disposal. In only thirty years we are going to be faced with a population surplus of 15 to 20 million persons, a figure that will then continue to grow at the rate of 20 to 25 million a year. Considerable colonization must take place before this situation arises, for otherwise we will not have the strength or the resources to undertake it on an adequate scale.
“In addition, it is more than doubtful that we would be able to reach a peaceful agreement even with the socialist societies on Earth, assuming that these were to arise sooner than expected. As I have already said, in many respects this will not be our socialism. Centuries of national division, a mutual lack of understanding, and brutal, bloody struggle will leave deep scars on the psychology of liberated Earthly humanity. We do not know how much barbarity and narrow-mindedness the socialists of Earth will bring with them into their new society.
“We have enough experience to perceive the great distance which separates us from the psychology of even the best representatives of Earth. On our latest expedition we brought back with us a socialist, a man of superior spiritual and physical health. And what happened? Our life proved so alien to him, so contrary to his entire psychology, that in a short while he became seriously deranged. If he is one of the best—and Menni selected him personally from among many—what can we expect of the others?
“Thus we are faced with the same dilemma: either we halt the growth of our own population and thereby impair the entire development of our life, or we colonize Earth, having first exterminated its inhabitants. I speak of the destruction of its entire population, because we cannot even make an exception for its socialist vanguard. In the first place, in the process of universal destruction it is technically impossible to single out this numerically insignificant vanguard from the masses as a whole. Secondly, even if we somehow managed to spare the socialists, they would start a bitter and ruthless war against us, because they would never be able to reconcile themselves to the killing of millions of their own kind, to whom they are bound by a multitude of often very intimate ties. There can be no compromise in the conflict between our two worlds.
“We must choose, and I say that we have but one choice. A higher form of life cannot be sacrificed for the sake of a lower one. Among all the people on Earth there are not even a few million who are consciously striving for a truly human type of life. For the sake of these embryonic human beings we cannot deny the birth and development of tens, maybe hundreds of millions of our own people, who are humans in an incomparably fuller sense of the word. We will not be guilty of cruelty, because we can destroy them with far less suffering than they are constantly causing each other. There is but one Life in the Universe, and it will be enriched rather than impoverished if it is our socialism rather than the distant, semibarbaric Earthly variant that is allowed to develop, for thanks to its unbroken evolution and boundless potential, our life is infinitely more harmonious.”
(Sterni’s speech was followed by a deep silence, broken by Menni’s call for objections. Netti took the floor.)
8. Netti
“‘There is but one Life in the Universe,’ says Sterni. And yet what does he propose to us? That we exterminate an entire individual type of life, a type which we can never resurrect or replace.
“For hundreds of millions of years the marvelous planet Earth has lived its own particular life, a life different from others. And now consciousness has begun to develop from its spontaneous forces. Proceeding through a bitter and difficult struggle from the lowest stages to the higher, this consciousness has finally assumed human forms closely related to our own. But these forms are not identical with ours: the history of a different natural environment and a different struggle is reflected in them; they conceal a different play of spontaneous forces, other contradictions, othe
r possibilities of development. The epoch has dawned when it has for the first time become possible to unite the two great lines of life. Just imagine the new variety, the higher harmony that could result from this union! And we are told that since there is but one Life in the Universe we should not unify, but destroy it.
“When Sterni showed how greatly the peoples, the history, the mores and psychology of Earth diner from our own, he refuted his own argument almost better than I could hope to do. If they were identical with us in all respects save their level of development, then one might be able to agree with Sterni: a lower stage is worth sacrificing for the sake of a higher one, the weak must yield to the strong. But the Earthlings are not the same as we. They and their civilization are not simply lower and weaker than ours—they are different If we eliminate them we will not replace them in the process of universal evolution but will merely fill in mechanically the vacuum we have created in the world of life forms.
“The real difference between our cultures does not lie in the barbarity or cruelty of Earthly civilization. Barbarity and cruelty are only transient phenomena of the general dissipation in the process of development which characterizes the evolution of life on Earth. The struggle for survival is more vigorous and intense there, nature is continually creating many more forms of life, but many more of them also fall victim to the march of evolution. This cannot be otherwise, because the source of life—the sun—provides Earth with eight times more energy-giving rays than Mars. That is why there is so much life spread generously throughout the planet, that is why the variety of its forms gives rise to so many contradictions and why the solution of these is so terribly complicated and punctuated by catastrophes. In the plant and animal kingdoms millions of species struggled violently and quickly crowded each other out, contributing through their life and death to the development of new, more perfect and harmonious, more synthetic species. The same is true of humans.
“If we compare our history with that of Earthly humanity, it seems astonishingly simple, so regular and free of errors that it seems almost schematic. The elements of socialism accumulated peacefully and unin-teruptedly as the petty bourgeoisie gradually disappeared and rose to the same level of consciousness as the proletariat. This was a smooth process, with no vacillation or sudden leaps, and it also took place uniformly in all countries of our planet, which was already organized into a single coherent political whole. There was a struggle, but people managed somehow to understand each other; the proletariat did not try to peer far into the future, and the bourgeoisie did not have any reactionary Utopian dreams. The various epochs and social formations were not mingled to the same extent as on Earth, where one can sometimes find a reactionary feudal system in a highly developed capitalistic country, and where the numerous peasantry, whose development lags behind by an entire historical epoch, often serve the upper classes as an instrument for crushing the proletariat. Several generations ago we arrived by a smooth and even road at a type of social order which liberates and unites all the forces of social development.
“That is not the road our Earthly brothers have traveled. Their path is a thorny one, full of twists and turns. Even the few of us who know the facts find it impossible to picture the insane sophistication which the art of oppression has attained in the hands of the ideological and political organizations dominated by the upper classes of the most civilized nations of Earth. What is the result? Has progress been delayed? No, there are no grounds for saying that; because although the initial stages of capitalism preceding the birth of proletarian socialist consciousness developed in the midst of confusion and a cruel struggle among various formations, that development was not slower, but more rapid than it was here, where it proceeded through a series of gradual and more peaceful transitions. The very severity and ruthlessness of the struggle inspired in the combatants an energy and passion, a spirit of heroism and self-sacrifice that were completely absent from the more moderate and less tragic struggle of our ancestors. In this respect the life of the people on Earth is higher rather than lower than ours, even though our culture is older and has attained a much higher level.
“Earthly humanity is splintered, its various races and peoples have fused with their territories and historical traditions, they speak different languages, and a profound mutual lack of understanding pervades all their relations. This is all true, and it is also true that because of these enormous obstacles our Earthly brothers will achieve their goal of uniting mankind much later than we. But if one is aware of the causes, one is in a better position to evaluate the consequences. This fragmentation is due to the immensity of life on Earth and the richness and variety of its natural environment, which together have produced a multitude of different world-views. Surely this makes Earth and her people superior rather than inferior to our world during the corresponding historical epoch.
“Even the difference in the languages they speak has in many respects contributed to the development of their thought, as it has liberated notions from the tyranny of the words by which they are expressed. Compare the philosophy of the Earthlings with that of our capitalist ancestors. Philosophy on Earth is not only more varied but also more subtle than ours. Not only is the material with which it works more complicated, its best schools analyze that material more profoundly and establish the relationships between facts and notions with greater precision. All systems of philosophy, of course, are manifestations of an imperfect and fragmented cognition and reflect a deficient level of scientific development. They represent attempts to provide a uniform description of Being by filling in the gaps in scientific experience with speculations. Eventually, therefore, philosophy will be eliminated on Earth as it has been eliminated among us by the monism of science.
“Consider, however, that many of the philosophical suppositions advanced by their greatest thinkers and by the leaders of the social and political struggle roughly anticipate our scientific discoveries. Such, for example, is almost the entire social philosophy of the socialists. It is obvious that peoples who have surpassed our ancestors in philosophical creativity can eventually surpass even us in scientific creation. Yet Sterni would have us measure this humanity on the basis of the number of righteous men—that is, conscious socialists—that can be found in its midst. He is asking us to judge that humanity on the basis of its present contradictions, not according to the forces which have generated and will in due course resolve those contradictions. He would drain forever this stormy but beautiful ocean of life!
“We must answer him firmly and decisively: never! We must lay the foundations for our future alliance with the people of Earth. We cannot significantly accelerate their transition to a free order, but we must do the little we can to facilitate that development. And if we have not been able to protect the first emissary from Earth from unnecessary suffering and illness, it is we rather than the peoples of Earth who should bear the dishonor. Fortunately, he will soon be well again, but even if his too sudden immersion in an alien world proves fatal, he will still have accomplished a great deal for the future union of our planets.
“As to our own difficulties and dangers, we shall have to overcome them by other means. We must increase our efforts to find synthetic proteins and, to the best of our present abilities, we must undertake the colonization of Venus. If we fail to solve these problems in the little time we have left, we must temporarily check the birth rate. What intelligent midwife would not sacrifice the life of an unborn child in order to save the mother? If necessary, we must likewise sacrifice a part of our life that has not yet come into being for the sake of the lives of others who already exist and are developing. The union of our worlds will repay us endlessly for this sacrifice. The unity of Life is our highest goal, and love is the highest expression of intelligence!”
(A deep hush. Menni took the floor.)
9. Menni
“I have been attentively observing the mood of the audience, and I can see that a majority of comrades are on Netti’s side. I am pleased to note
this, because my own point of view is very near hers. I would only like to add one practical consideration which I feel to be very important. It is quite possible that even if we were to attempt the mass colonization of other planets, we would find that we presently lack the technical resources to accomplish our purpose. We might build tens of thousands of etheronephs, only to discover that we have nothing to run them on. Such a huge new fleet would demand a hundred times more radioactive fuel than we use today, yet our known reserves are constantly being depleted, and discoveries of new deposits are becoming rarer. Let us not forget that radioactive matter is not only used to give the etheronephs their enormous velocity. You know that our entire chemical industry is now based on these substances. We use them to manufacture minus-matter, without which the etheronephs and our countless aircraft are only heavy, useless boxes. It is impossible to discontinue such uses of active matter.
“The worst thing of all, however, is that the only possible substitute for colonization, namely the development of synthetic proteins, may prove unfeasible because of that same lack of radioactive substances. Considering the enormous chemical complexity of proteins, it is inconceivable that our old methods of synthesizing by means of a gradual complication will ever result in a technically simple synthesis suitable for mass industrial production. You know that a few years ago we succeeded in developing artificial proteins by such a process, but a tremendous expenditure of time and energy yielded only a very small quantity of them, so that the significance of the whole project is purely theoretical. The only way proteins can be mass-produced from inorganic matter is by rapidly and radically altering the chemical composition of the substance in question, and that process involves exposing this ordinary, stable matter to the action of unstable elements. If we are to succeed in this area, tens of thousands of scientists will have to begin working on developing synthetic proteins, and they will be performing millions of new experiments. But in order to conduct this research, and, if it is successful, in order to mass-produce proteins, we will again need enormous quantities of radioactive material, much more than we presently have at our disposal. Thus no matter how we look at it, the solution to our problem depends on the discovery of new deposits of radioactive elements.
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