Hamilton’s chart, as if she might detect the answer there.
“Mmmm… He posed me a question which I must answer correctly—else he will not co-operate.”
“Huh? What was the question?”
“I’ll ask you. Martha, what is the meaning of life?”
“What! Why, what a stupid question!”
“He did not ask it stupidly.”
“It’s a psychopathic question, unlimited, unanswerable, and, in all probability, sense free.”
“I’m not so sure, Martha.”
“But—Well, I won’t attempt to argue with you outside my own field. But it seems to me that ‘meaning’ is a purely anthropomorphic conception. Life simply is . It exists.”
“He used the idea anthropomorphically. What does life mean to men, and why should he, Hamilton, assist in its continuance? Of course I couldn’t answer him. He had me. And he proposed to play Sphinx and not let us proceed until I solve his riddle.”
“Fiddlesticks!” She snapped the cigaret away savagely. “What does he think this clinic is—a place to play word games? A man should not be allowed to stand in the way of racial progress. He doesn’t own the life in his body. It belongs to all of us—to the race. He’s a fool.”
“You know he’s not, Martha.” He pointed to the chart.
“No,” she admitted, “he’s not a fool. Nevertheless, he should be required to co-operate. It’s not as if it would hurt him or inconvenience him in any way.”
“Tut, tut, Martha. There’s a little matter of constitutional law.”
“I know. I know. I abide by it, but I don’t have to worship it. Granted, it’s a wise law, but this is a special case.”
“They are all special cases.”
She did not answer him but turned back to the charts. “My oh my,” she said half to herself, “what a chart! What a beautiful chart, chief.”
CHAPTER THREE
“This we covenant in the Name of Life Immortal”
“T O THIS we pledge our lives and sacred honor:
“To destroy no fertile life,
“To hold as solemn secret that which may be divulged to us, directly, or indirectly through the techniques of our art, concerning the private matters of our clients,
“To practice our art only with the full and uninfluenced consent of our client zygotes,
“To hold ourselves, moreover, guardian in full trust for the future welfare of infant zygotes and to do only that which we soberly and earnestly believe to be in their best interests,
“To respect meticulously the laws and customs of the group social in which we practice,
“This we covenant in the Name of Life Immortal.”
Extract from the Mendelian Oath
Circa 2075 A.D. (Old Style)
Sweet peas, the evening primrose, the ugly little fruit fly Drosophila —back in the XIXth and XXth centuries the Monk Gregor Mendel and Doctor Morgan of the ancient University of Columbia used these humble tools to establish the basic laws of genetics. Simple laws, but subtle.
In the nucleus of every cell of every zygote, whether man or fruit fly, sweet pea or race horse, is a group of threadlike bodies—chromosomes. Along the threads are incredibly tiny somethings, on the order of ten times the size of the largest protein molecules. They are the genes, each one of which controls some aspect of the entire structure, man, animal, or plant, in which the cell is lodged. Every living cell contains within it the plan for the entire organism.
Each man’s cells contain forty-eight chromosomes—twenty-four pairs. Half of them he derived from his mother, half from his father. In each one of a pair of chromosomes, there are genes, thousands of them, in one-to-one correspondence with the genes from the chromosomes of the other parent. Thus each parent “casts a vote” on each characteristic. But some “votes” carry more weight than others. Such “votes” are called dominant, the weaker, recessive. If one parent supplies the gene for brown eyes, while the other parent supplies the gene for blue eyes, the child will have brown eyes—brown is “dominant.” If
“Mmmm… He posed me a question which I must answer correctly—else he will not co-operate.”
“Huh? What was the question?”
“I’ll ask you. Martha, what is the meaning of life?”
“What! Why, what a stupid question!”
“He did not ask it stupidly.”
“It’s a psychopathic question, unlimited, unanswerable, and, in all probability, sense free.”
“I’m not so sure, Martha.”
“But—Well, I won’t attempt to argue with you outside my own field. But it seems to me that ‘meaning’ is a purely anthropomorphic conception. Life simply is . It exists.”
“He used the idea anthropomorphically. What does life mean to men, and why should he, Hamilton, assist in its continuance? Of course I couldn’t answer him. He had me. And he proposed to play Sphinx and not let us proceed until I solve his riddle.”
“Fiddlesticks!” She snapped the cigaret away savagely. “What does he think this clinic is—a place to play word games? A man should not be allowed to stand in the way of racial progress. He doesn’t own the life in his body. It belongs to all of us—to the race. He’s a fool.”
“You know he’s not, Martha.” He pointed to the chart.
“No,” she admitted, “he’s not a fool. Nevertheless, he should be required to co-operate. It’s not as if it would hurt him or inconvenience him in any way.”
“Tut, tut, Martha. There’s a little matter of constitutional law.”
“I know. I know. I abide by it, but I don’t have to worship it. Granted, it’s a wise law, but this is a special case.”
“They are all special cases.”
She did not answer him but turned back to the charts. “My oh my,” she said half to herself, “what a chart! What a beautiful chart, chief.”
CHAPTER THREE
“This we covenant in the Name of Life Immortal”
“T O THIS we pledge our lives and sacred honor:
“To destroy no fertile life,
“To hold as solemn secret that which may be divulged to us, directly, or indirectly through the techniques of our art, concerning the private matters of our clients,
“To practice our art only with the full and uninfluenced consent of our client zygotes,
“To hold ourselves, moreover, guardian in full trust for the future welfare of infant zygotes and to do only that which we soberly and earnestly believe to be in their best interests,
“To respect meticulously the laws and customs of the group social in which we practice,
“This we covenant in the Name of Life Immortal.”
Extract from the Mendelian Oath
Circa 2075 A.D. (Old Style)
Sweet peas, the evening primrose, the ugly little fruit fly Drosophila —back in the XIXth and XXth centuries the Monk Gregor Mendel and Doctor Morgan of the ancient University of Columbia used these humble tools to establish the basic laws of genetics. Simple laws, but subtle.
In the nucleus of every cell of every zygote, whether man or fruit fly, sweet pea or race horse, is a group of threadlike bodies—chromosomes. Along the threads are incredibly tiny somethings, on the order of ten times the size of the largest protein molecules. They are the genes, each one of which controls some aspect of the entire structure, man, animal, or plant, in which the cell is lodged. Every living cell contains within it the plan for the entire organism.
Each man’s cells contain forty-eight chromosomes—twenty-four pairs. Half of them he derived from his mother, half from his father. In each one of a pair of chromosomes, there are genes, thousands of them, in one-to-one correspondence with the genes from the chromosomes of the other parent. Thus each parent “casts a vote” on each characteristic. But some “votes” carry more weight than others. Such “votes” are called dominant, the weaker, recessive. If one parent supplies the gene for brown eyes, while the other parent supplies the gene for blue eyes, the child will have brown eyes—brown is “dominant.” If
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