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even as he spoke he could see it was true.
"An elaborate one, but when you analyze the logic of it -- yes," ZORAC
confirmed.
Hunt nodded to himself and flicked his cigarette to the ashtray.
"Okay. What question should I be asking?"
"Forget about Minervan life and terrestrial life for a moment, and just
concentrate on the terrestrial," ZORAC replied. "Now ask why Man is so
different from any other species."
"I thought we knew all that," Hunt said. "Bigger brains, opposable thumbs,
high-quality vision all in one species together -- all the tools you need to
stimulate curiosity and learning. What's new?"
"I know what the differences are," ZORAC stated. "My question was why are
they?"
Hunt rubbed his chin with his knuckle for a while as he reflected on the
question. "Do you think that's significant?"
"Very."
"Okay. I'll buy it. Why is Man so different from any other species?"
"I don't know."
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"Great!" Hunt exhaled a long stream of smoke with a sigh. "And how exactly is
that supposed to tell us more than my answers did?"
"It doesn't," ZORAC conceded. "But it's a question that needs answering.
If you're looking for something unusual, that's a good place to start. There's
something very unusual about Man."
"Oh, how come?"
"Because by rights Man shouldn't exist. It shouldn't have been possible for
him to evolve. Man simply can't happen, but he did. That seems very unusual to
me."
Hunt shook his head, puzzled. The machine was speaking in riddles.
"I don't understand. Why shouldn't Man have happened?"
"I have computed the interaction matrix functions that describe the responses
of neuron trigger potentials in the nervous systems of higher terrestrial
vertebrates. Some of the reaction coefficients are highly dependent on the
concentrations and distributions of certain microchemical agencies. Coherent
response patterns in key areas of the cerebral cortex could not stabilize with
the levels that are usual in all species except Man."
Pause.
"ZORAC, what are you talking about?"
"I'm not making sense?"
"To put it mildly -- no."
"Okay." ZORAC paused for a second as if getting its thoughts organized.
"Are you familiar with Kaufmann and Randall's recent work at the University of
Utrecht, Holland? It is fully recorded in Jupiter Five's data bank."
"Yes, I did come across some references to it," Hunt replied. "Refresh my
memory on it."
"Kaufmann and Randall conducted extensive research on the way in which
terrestrial vertebrates protect themselves against toxic agents and harmful
microorganisms that enter their systems," ZORAC said. "The details vary
somewhat from species to species, but essentially the basic mechanism is the
same -- presumably handed down and modified from common remote ancestral
forms."
"Ah yes, I remember," Hunt said. "A kind of natural self-immunization process,
wasn't it?"
He was referring to the discovery by the scientists at Utrecht that the
animals of Earth manufactured a whole mixture of contaminants and toxins on a
small scale, which were injected into the bloodstream in quantities just high
enough to stimulate the production of specific antitoxins. The "blueprint" for
manufacturing these antitoxins was thus permanently impressed into the body's
chemical system in such a way that production would multiply prodigiously in
the event of the body being invaded on a dangerous scale.
"Correct," ZORAC answered. "It explains why animals are far less bothered by
unwholesome environments, polluted diets and so on than Man is."
"Because Man is different; he doesn't work that way -- right?"
"Right."
"Which brings us back to your question."
"Right."
Hunt regarded the blank screen of the console for a while, frowning to himself
in an effort to follow what the machine was getting at. Whatever it was, it
failed to register.
"I still don't see where it gets us," Hunt said at last. "Man's different
because he's different. It's just as much a pointless question as before."
"Not quite," ZORAC said. "The point is that it shouldn't have been possible
for Man to become different. That's what's interesting."
"How come? I'm not with you."
"Permit me to show you some equations that I have solved," ZORAC
suggested.
"Go ahead."
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"If you key in a channel-activate command I'll put them on the large
screen via the UNSA comnet."
Hunt obliged by tapping a quick sequence of characters into the keyboard in
front of him. A second later the screen above kaleidoscoped into a blaze of
colors which immediately stabilized into a mass of densely packaged
mathematical expressions. Hunt stared at the display for a few seconds and
then shook his head.
"What's it all supposed to be?" he asked.
ZORAC was happy to explain. "Those expressions describe quantitatively certain
aspects of behavior of the generalized central nervous system of the
terrestrial vertebrate. Specifically they define how the basic nervous system
will respond to the presence of given concentrations and mixes of various
chemical agents in the bloodstream. The coefficients indicated in red are
modifiers that would be fixed for a given species, but the dominant factors
are the general ones shown in green."
"So?"
"It reveals a fundamental drawback in the method that was adopted by
terrestrial animals to protect themselves from their chemical environment. The
drawback is that the substances introduced into the bloodstream by the self-
immunization process will interfere with the functions of the nervous system.
In particular, they will inhibit the development of higher brain functions."
Suddenly Hunt realized what ZORAC was driving at. Before he could voice his
thoughts, however, the machine went on.
"In particular, intelligence shouldn't be capable of emerging at all.
Larger and more complex brains demand a greater supply of blood; a greater
supply of blood carries more contaminants and concentrates them in the brain
cells; contaminated brain cells can't coordinate sufficiently to exhibit
higher levels of activity, that is, intelligence.
"In other words, intelligence should never have been able to evolve from the
terrestrial line of vertebrate evolution. All the figures there say that
terrestrial life should have got itself truly stuck up a dead end."
Hunt gazed for a long time at the symbols frozen on the screen while he
pondered the meaning of all this. The ancient architecture evolved by the
remote ancestors of the vertebrates hundreds of millions of years before had
met a short-term need but failed to anticipate the longer-term consequences.
But Man, somewhere along his evolutionary line, had abandoned the self-
immunization mechanism. In doing this he had increased his vulnerability to
his surroundings, but at the same time he had opened up the way to evolving
the superior intelligence that would, in time, more than make up for the
initial disadvantage.
The intriguing question of course was: How and when had Man done it? The
theory offered by the Utrecht researchers was: during the forced exodus of his
ancestors to Minerva, during the period that lasted from twenty-five million
to fifty thousand years ago. Twenty-five million years before, many species of
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