'And the other thing? You said there were two.
'The other? Well, your electro-encephalogram shows up a strange pattern. The main brain pattern is there and recognizable. But there is something else as well. Almost — and I hesitate to say this — but almost as if another, or other brain patterns were transposed on your own. Rather feeble brain patterns, subsidiary patterns probably would be the way to say it, showing up, but not too strongly.
'What are you trying to say, doctor? That there is something wrong mentally? Which would explain the hallucinations, of course. Which might mean there really are hallucinations.
Daniels shook his head. 'No, not that. But strange. Nothing to indicate any malfunction. Nothing that would indicate any brain deterioration. Your mind, apparently, is as healthy and as normal as your body. But almost as if you had more than one brain. Although we know, of course, that you have only one. The X-rays show that very clearly.
'You're sure that I am human?
'Your body says you are. Why do you ask?
'I don't know, said Blake. 'You found me out in space. I came from space…
'I see, said Daniels. 'But forget about it. There is no shred of evidence that you're anything but human. The overwhelming evidence is that you are.
'And now what? I go back home and wait for more of these…
'Not right away, said Daniels. 'We'd like you to stay with us for a while. A few more days. If you are willing.
'More tests?
'Well, perhaps. I'd like to talk with some of my colleagues, let some of them look at you. They may have something to offer. Mostly, I guess I'd like you to stay for some further observation.
'In case there is another hallucination?
'Something like that, said Daniels.
'This brain business bothers me, said Blake. 'More than one, you say…
'No. Just a suggestion of the encephalogram. I wouldn't worry about it.
'OK, said Blake. 'I won't.
But what was it that Brownie had asked? How many of you are there? I could have sworn, when I first looked at you, that there was more than one of you.
'Doctor, about this Brownie…
'What about the Brownie?
'Nothing, I guess, said Blake. 'Nothing that's important.
10
Excerpt from proceedings of senatorial inquiry (regional, Washington, North America) into the proposal for a programme of biological engineering as the basis for a colonizing policy on other solar systems.
MR PETER DOTY, committee counseclass="underline" Your name is Austin Lukas?
DR LUKAS: Yes, sir. I reside in Tenafly. New Jersey and am employed at Biologics, Inc. in New York City-Manhattan.
MR DOTY: You head up the research department of that company, do you not?
DR LUKAS: I am the chief of one of the research programmes.
MR DOTY: And this programme deals with bioengineering?
DR LUKAS: Yes sir, it does. At the moment we are especially concerned with the problem of developing an all-purpose agricultural animal.
MR DOTY: Would you please explain.
DR LUKAS: Gladly. Our hope is to be able to develop an animal which will provide several different types of meat, that will give milk, provide wool or hair or fur, perhaps all three. It would replace, we would hope, the many specialized animals which man has used in his animal husbandry since the Neolithic Revolution.
SENATOR STONE: And I take it, Dr Lukas, that you have some indications your research may result in some practical success.
DR LUKAS: Indeed we do. I might say that we have the basic problems licked. We actually have a herd of these animals. What we are trying for now are certain refinements. We have as our goal the development of a single animal which will replace all the other farm animals, supplying everything they now supply.
SENATOR STONE: And in this you also have some hope of success?
DR LUKAS: We are very much encouraged.
SENATOR STONE: And what do you call this animal that you have now, may I ask?
DR LUKAS: We have no name for it, senator. We haven't even bothered to try to think of one.
SENATOR STONE: It wouldn't be a cow, would it?
DR LUKAS: No, not entirely. It would have some bovine aspects, naturally.
SENATOR STONE: Nor a pig? Nor sheep?
DR LUKAS: No, neither of those. Not entirely, of course. But with some characteristics of both.
SENATOR HORTON: I think that there is no need to go through these long preliminaries. What my distinguished colleague wants to ask you is whether this creature you are developing is something entirely new in the way of life — a synthetic life, let's say — or whether it still can claim some relationship to present and natural forms?
DR LUKAS: That, senator, is an extremely difficult question to answer. One could say, in all truthfulness, that the present and natural forms of life have been retained and used as patterns, but that what we have is essentially a new kind of animal.
SENATOR STONE: Thank you, sir. And I wish also to thank my fellow senator for his quick perception of the direction in which my questioning was leading. So here we have, you would say, an entirely new kind of creature, distantly associated, perhaps, with a cow, a pig, a sheep, perhaps with even other forms of life…
DR LUKAS: Yes, with other forms of life. There may be a limit somewhere, of course, but at the moment we do not see it. We feel we may be able to keep on drafting various forms of life, fusing them together into something viable…
SENATOR STONE: And the farther you go in this direction, the farther you take this life form from its association with any present form of life?
DR LUKAS: Yes, I suppose you could say that. I'd have to think about it before I gave an answer.
SENATOR STONE: Now, doctor, let me inquire into the state of the art. You can do this biological engineering with animals. Could the same thing be done with human beings?
DR LUKAS: Oh yes. Certainly it could.
SENATOR STONE: You feel certain that new types of humanity could be created in the laboratory. Perhaps many different types.
DR LUKAS: I have no doubt of it.
SENATOR STONE: And once this had been done — once you had engineered a human to specific specifications, would that human breed true to the form you had created?
DR LUKAS: There is no question of that. The animals we have created have bred true. It should be no different with a human. It is simply a matter of altering the genetic material. That is what must be done in the first place, you understand.
SENATOR STONE: Let us get this straight now. Suppose you did develop a new human strain, then that strain would reproduce other humans of the self-same strain?
DR LUKAS: Exactly. Except, of course, for the tiny mutations and the variations which are implicit in the evolutionary processes. But that occurs even in the natural forms. That is how all life today evolved.
SENATOR STONE: And say you did create a new type of human being. Say, for example, one that would be able to exist under a condition of much higher gravity than we have here on earth, one that could breathe a different kind of air, one that could thrive on food which might be poisonous to the human being as he now exists, would you… Let me rephrase that question, if you don't mind. Would it be possible, would you say, to engineer such a life form?
DR LUKAS: You're asking only for my considered opinion, of course.
SENATOR STONE: That is right.
DR LUKAS: Well, then, I'd say it would be entirely possible. First, you would have to take into consideration all the factors involved and then draft the biological blueprint and…
SENATOR STONE: But it could be done?
DR LUKAS: Without any doubt at all.
SENATOR STONE: You could design a being which could exist under almost any planetary condition?
DR LUKAS: Senator, I must make it clear that I couldn't. The bioengineering of humans would not fall into my particular field. But yes, it does lie within the state of the art to do this. There are men working with the problem today who could do it. Not that there is any serious attempt at the moment to actually create such a human, but the problems, I understand, have been worked out.