[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
your work. It will be work. It will be hard. You must live landside for
some years before you gain immortality.
Five years, he thought. Perhaps longer but five years was the
maximum he had allowed himself. Bearing that deadline in mind, he had
supervised the tests, rigging them, watching for vital points.
Screening thousands later it would be millions would have been a
long, difficult job except that the machinery was already set up for Sam.
The bureaus of vital statistics had records of most of the population with
all pertinent information, including psychology, heredity, probable
longevity an important point! and pathological propensity. Sam
wanted smart, tough, strong men and women certainly but one other
factor was even more important. On that the success of his scheme
depended.
He needed youngish, mature people. Because they wouldn t age visibly
in five years.
The only way to prove or disprove immortality is by the empirical
method unless
He had allowed for that possibility, too.
He said, You must live landside. Remember, I lived landside for
nearly forty years. The treatment takes six or seven years for the average
mature man. There, again, it may be because age is a virus, and the older a
man is, the longer it takes to destroy that virus. If a child is exposed to the
radiations at birth, as the Immortals children have been, only a few treat-
ments are necessary. There once more, it may be because the age-virus is
not present in the newly born. In such a case, the child grows, reaches
maturity and stops at that point, living for hunderds of years, but
growing no older.
Babies born in the Keeps from now on will have that opportunity.
With adults, it s another matter. You ll have the chance, but you ll have to
work and fight for it. Because you must be continually exposed to the
radiation for six or seven years, and that can t be done in the Keeps.
We don t know too much about the radiation yet. The radioelement
itself is present in the soil and air of Venus, but in miscroscopic quantities.
For reasons we don t understand yet, exposure to solar and cosmic-ray
radiation is necessary too. Later we ll learn more. Bight now, we know
this: we can give you the immortality treatment, but it will take years, and
you must spend those years landside, so that the action will be cumulative.
The process is too complicated to explain in detail.
It works only on humans. We know that much. Like the ancient
bacillus leprae, it affects humans but not animals. Guinea pigs couldn t be
given leprosy, which was why researchers took so long to discover the
cure.
Immortality is for humans for you. For all the Keeps. For everyone
who isn t already too old to take the treatment. But to be immortal you
must live on landside for a time. There isn t room in Plymouth Colony
for you all.
You must build new colonies.
It s the only answer. We had thought of rotating the population in
groups at seven-year intervals, but, to be fair, we would have to take the
oldest men and women still able to benefit by the radiation. And they
would remain at that age, while the rest grew older. We feel it best to
choose people at the peak of their powers mentally and physically, so that
they will remain so for hundreds of years. This way, too, the others won t
have to wait seven years or fourteen or twenty-one. As soon as you ve
expanded the colony sufficiently, another batch will come in from the
Keeps and expand the colony farther. Thus everyone will benefit
equally.
* * *
Sam studied the screens. They were swallowing it. Perhaps after five
years they wouldn t, but until then no signs of age should appear that
couldn t be explained away on the grounds of environmental influences.
Colonizing Venus naturally would change a man.
You ve got to earn immortality, Sam told the thousands. You may
be a bit confused at first in the transition from Keep fife; the administra-
tion will allow for that. But remember that you must live landside for six
years or more, and only by adapting to Colony tradition can you succeed.
Those in charge here have learned how to cope with landside. They
have authority, and you must obey them. We have our own laws not [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
zanotowane.pl doc.pisz.pl pdf.pisz.pl szamanka888.keep.pl
your work. It will be work. It will be hard. You must live landside for
some years before you gain immortality.
Five years, he thought. Perhaps longer but five years was the
maximum he had allowed himself. Bearing that deadline in mind, he had
supervised the tests, rigging them, watching for vital points.
Screening thousands later it would be millions would have been a
long, difficult job except that the machinery was already set up for Sam.
The bureaus of vital statistics had records of most of the population with
all pertinent information, including psychology, heredity, probable
longevity an important point! and pathological propensity. Sam
wanted smart, tough, strong men and women certainly but one other
factor was even more important. On that the success of his scheme
depended.
He needed youngish, mature people. Because they wouldn t age visibly
in five years.
The only way to prove or disprove immortality is by the empirical
method unless
He had allowed for that possibility, too.
He said, You must live landside. Remember, I lived landside for
nearly forty years. The treatment takes six or seven years for the average
mature man. There, again, it may be because age is a virus, and the older a
man is, the longer it takes to destroy that virus. If a child is exposed to the
radiations at birth, as the Immortals children have been, only a few treat-
ments are necessary. There once more, it may be because the age-virus is
not present in the newly born. In such a case, the child grows, reaches
maturity and stops at that point, living for hunderds of years, but
growing no older.
Babies born in the Keeps from now on will have that opportunity.
With adults, it s another matter. You ll have the chance, but you ll have to
work and fight for it. Because you must be continually exposed to the
radiation for six or seven years, and that can t be done in the Keeps.
We don t know too much about the radiation yet. The radioelement
itself is present in the soil and air of Venus, but in miscroscopic quantities.
For reasons we don t understand yet, exposure to solar and cosmic-ray
radiation is necessary too. Later we ll learn more. Bight now, we know
this: we can give you the immortality treatment, but it will take years, and
you must spend those years landside, so that the action will be cumulative.
The process is too complicated to explain in detail.
It works only on humans. We know that much. Like the ancient
bacillus leprae, it affects humans but not animals. Guinea pigs couldn t be
given leprosy, which was why researchers took so long to discover the
cure.
Immortality is for humans for you. For all the Keeps. For everyone
who isn t already too old to take the treatment. But to be immortal you
must live on landside for a time. There isn t room in Plymouth Colony
for you all.
You must build new colonies.
It s the only answer. We had thought of rotating the population in
groups at seven-year intervals, but, to be fair, we would have to take the
oldest men and women still able to benefit by the radiation. And they
would remain at that age, while the rest grew older. We feel it best to
choose people at the peak of their powers mentally and physically, so that
they will remain so for hundreds of years. This way, too, the others won t
have to wait seven years or fourteen or twenty-one. As soon as you ve
expanded the colony sufficiently, another batch will come in from the
Keeps and expand the colony farther. Thus everyone will benefit
equally.
* * *
Sam studied the screens. They were swallowing it. Perhaps after five
years they wouldn t, but until then no signs of age should appear that
couldn t be explained away on the grounds of environmental influences.
Colonizing Venus naturally would change a man.
You ve got to earn immortality, Sam told the thousands. You may
be a bit confused at first in the transition from Keep fife; the administra-
tion will allow for that. But remember that you must live landside for six
years or more, and only by adapting to Colony tradition can you succeed.
Those in charge here have learned how to cope with landside. They
have authority, and you must obey them. We have our own laws not [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]