Another striking example of this blind subservience of Man to instinct is to be seen in his habit of tirelessly rebuilding manheaps at certain points of the planet where they are fated to destruction. Thus, for instance, I have attentively watched a very populous island where, within eight years, all the nests were destroyed three times by tremors of the outer coating of the Earth. To any sensible observer it is plain that the animals living in these parts ought to migrate. They do nothing of the sort, but pick up once more, with a positively ritual action, the same pieces of wood or iron, and zealously rebuild a manheap which will once more be destroyed in the following year. But, say my critics, however absurd the goal of this activity, it remains true that the activity is regulated, and proves the existence of a directing power, a spirit. Again, a mistaken idea! The swarming of Men disturbed by an earthquake, as I have shown, resembles the movement of gaseous molecules. If the latter be observed individually, they are seen to describe irregular and complicated trajectories, but in combination their great number produces effects of decided simplicity. Similarly, if we demolish a manheap, thousands of insects collide with each other, hamper each other’s movements, and show every sign of disorganized excitement; and yet, after a certain time, the manheap is discovered to be built up again.
Such is the strange intellect in which it is now fashionable to see a replica of Uranian reason! But fashion passes, facts remain; and the facts are bringing us back to the good old beliefs regarding the Uranian soul and its privileged destiny. For my own part, I shall be happy if my few experiments, modestly and prudently carried out, have helped toward the downfall of pernicious teachings, and restored these animals to their proper place in the scale of creatures. Curious and worthy of study they certainly are; but the very naïveté and incoherence of Man’s behavior must force us to bear in mind how great is the gulf fixed by the Creator between bestial instinct and Uranian soul.
DEATH OF A.E. 17
Happily, A.E. 17 died before he could witness the first interplanetary war, the establishment of relations between Uranus and the Earth, and the ruin of all his work. His great renown endured to his last days. He was a simple, kindly Uranian, who showed vexation only when contradicted. To ourselves it is an interesting fact that the monument erected to his memory on Uranus bears on its plinth a bas-relief designed from a telephotographic picture showing a swarming mass of men and women. Its background is strongly reminiscent of Fifth Avenue.
In his introduction to The Earth Dwellers, M. Maurois mentions a book which delighted and exasperated me when I read it: Jean Henri Fabre’s essays on the “social insects.”
“He described some extraordinary feats performed by insects, and kept on warning the reader: ‘Do not believe there is any intelligence in all that. It’s just instinct. Bees hare no patriotism with regard to the beehive nor ants toward the anthill.’ “ And in an epilogue, Jacques Choron adds a quotation from Bertrand Russelclass="underline" “... animals behave in a manner showing the tightness of the views of the man who observes them.”
Which brings us back to the more advanced sport of watcher-watching. “The Nobel Prize Winners” is a long hard look at some engineers and scientists, by a scientist and engineer. W. J. J. Gordon, besides being the author of occasional brilliant farcical fiction in the Atlantic, Is a lecturer in the Engineering Department of Applied Physics at Harvard, and also President of Synectics, Inc., a “consulting firm concerned with augmenting the creative output of industrial research organizations.”
THE NOBEL PRIZE WINNERS
W. J. J. Gordon
We were due in Portland, Oregon, at 9:00 a.m. their time, so I made a point of getting into the diner for breakfast by 8:00. I ordered prunes, poached eggs, and coffee. Then I looked out the window and thought about last night. What had Dr. Hurlbet called his research division? Research-O-Rama? He was the boss of it—I guess he could call it whatever he wanted; but when you’re in my line you have to be more careful. No one wants a metal-fatigue expert to make jokes. I play it very no-jokes, with the pipe and the oracle-type delivery that make a client figure he’s getting his consultant service straight from God. Hurlbet is the biggest man in American industrial research, so he can get away with anything. But last night he really took off like a bird. If his picture of industrial research was true, what an indictment! Maybe he’d been fried out of shape last night and would feel like a fool this morning. Or perhaps he wouldn’t even remember. I lifted my arm to let the waiter put a clean napkin over my side of the table. It wasn’t a napkin. It rustled like paper. Hurlbet! Honest to God, I was embarrassed for him. I didn’t look up. I just pulled the piece of paper under my eyes.
It was a funny limerick—”calculus on her toes”—a little bitter, though. Still without looking up, I said, “Good morning, Dr. Hurlbet.” I heard him pull out the chair at my table and sit down.
“Good morning, Fairley.” He was cheery as anything. I sneaked a look at him. There he was, smiling. He remembered last night all right, and he couldn’t have cared less. “Perhaps you like this one better,” he said:
I really didn’t plug in, but the sound of it made me laugh out loud. Hurlbet glanced at the menu.
“The tyranny of the egg,” he said. He was off again, same as last night. He still had a hex on me.
“The tyranny of what?” There I was, playing straight man for him right off the bat.
“This is a free country, isn’t it?” he asked. I got very interested in the prunes and didn’t answer. “They say this is a free country, but every morning millions of good citizens are bullied by eggy despotism. What are you having for breakfast?”
“Eggs. Two. Poached. On toast,” I said. I wished I had ordered the trout they have on the Northern Pacific.
“See?” said Hurlbet. “You’re tyrannized.” The waiter came with my eggs and took Hurlbet’s order—orange juice, tea, and two boiled eggs. He winked at me. “Me too,” he said. “Egg-O-Rama!” That “Me too” of his got me thinking. Last night Hurlbet had told me all about how lousy his research people were, a bunch of nine-to-fivers. Then he said he was sucked up in it himself. And now “Me too” on the eggs. I wondered whether he’d thrown in the sponge and all that was left was cynical jokes.
“I better hurry,” I said. “We’re nearly there—”
“What time are you due at your first appointment?” asked Hurlbet. I explained that I was expected after lunch. “I’d like to hire you for a half day,” he said. “How much?” I go at three hundred and fifty a day and two hundred a half day. I told him. “Fine,” he said.