“Genetics?”
“No.”
“Thermodynamics?”
“No.”
“Can you think of any laws at all from which humans are exempt?”
“Not offhand.”
“Let me know if you do. That will be real news.”
“Okay.”
“But meanwhile, if there does happen to be a law that governs behavior in the community of life in general, humans would be exempt from it.”
“Well, that’s what Mother Culture says.”
“And what do you say?”
“I don’t know. I don’t see how a law for turtles and butterflies could be of much relevance to us. I assume that turtles and butterflies follow the law you’re talking about.”
“That’s right, they do. As to relevance, the laws of aerodynamics weren’t always relevant to you, were they?”
“No.”
“When did they become relevant?”
“Well … when we wanted to fly.”
“When you want to fly, the laws governing flight become relevant.”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“And when you’re on the brink of extinction and want to live for a while longer, the laws governing life might conceivably become relevant.”
“Yes, I suppose they might.”
3
“What’s the effect of the law of gravity? What’s gravity good for?”
“I’d say that gravity is what organizes things on the macroscopic level. It’s what keeps things together—the solar system, the galaxy, the universe.”
Ishmael nodded. “And the law we’re looking for is the law that keeps the living community together. It organizes things on the biological level just the way the law of gravity organizes things on the macroscopic level.”
“Okay.” I guess Ishmael could sense I had something else on my mind, because he waited for me to go on. “It’s hard to believe our own biologists aren’t aware of this law.”
Lines of amused astonishment crinkled the blue-gray skin of his face. “Do you imagine that Mother Culture doesn’t talk to your biologists?”
“No.”
“Then what does she tell them?”
“That if there is such a law it doesn’t apply to us.”
“Of course. But that doesn’t really answer your question. Your biologists would certainly not be astounded to hear that behavior in the natural community follows certain patterns. You have to remember that when Newton articulated the law of gravity, no one was astounded. It’s not a superhuman achievement to notice that unsupported objects fall toward the center of the earth. Everyone past the age of two knows that. Newton’s achievement was not in discovering the phenomenon of gravity, it was in formulating the phenomenon as a law.”