"You have been selected as a possible candidate for admission",
said Frost. "If you do not gain admission, or if you reject it,
it will be necessary to destroy you.
I am not, of course, attempting to work on your fears. They
only confuse the issue. The process would be painless, and your
present reactions to it are inevitable physical events."
Mark considered this thoughtfully.
"It - it seems rather a formidable decision."
"That is merely a proposition about the state of your own body
at the moment. If you please, I will go on to give you the
necessary information. ( ... )
But Alcasan's mind is not the mind we are in contact with when
the Head speaks."
"Do you mean Alcasan is really .. dead?" asked Mark.
His surprise needed no acting.
"In the present state of our knowledge," said Frost, "there is
no answer to that question. Probably it has no meaning. But
the cortex and vocal organs in Alcasan's head are used by a
different mind. Now, please attend very carefully. You have
probably not heard of macrobes."
"Microbes?" said Mark in bewilderment. "But of course --"

"I did not say microbes, I said macrobes.
The formation of the word explains itself. Below the level of
animal life, we have long known that there are microscopic
organisms. Their actual results on human life, in respect of
health and disease, have of course made up a large part of
history: the secret cause was not known till we invented the
microscope.
"Go on," said Mark. Ravenous curiosity was moving .. beneath
his determination to stand on guard.

"I have now to inform you that there are similar organisms
above the level of animal life. When I say 'above', I am not
speaking biologically. The structure of the macrobe, so far
as we know it, is of great simplicity. When I say that it is
above the animal level, I mean that it is more permanent,
disposes of more energy, and has greater intelligence."
"More intelligent than the highest anthropoids?" said Mark.
"It must be pretty nearly human, then."
"When I said it transcended the animals, I was, of course,
including the most efficient animal, Man. The macrobe is more
intelligent than Man."
Frowningly, Mark studied this theory.
"But how is it in that case that we have had no communication
with them?"
"It is not certain that we have not. But in primitive times
it was spasmodic, and was opposed by numerous prejudices.
Moreover, the intellectual development of man had not reached
the level at which intercourse with our species could offer
any attractions to a macrobe. But though there has been
little intercourse, there has been profound influence.
Their effect on human history has been far greater than that
of the microbes, though of course, equally unrecognized.
In the light of what we now know, all history will have to be
rewritten. The real causes of all the principal events are
quite unknown to historians; that, indeed, is why history has
not yet succeeded in becoming a science." ( ... )

"The vocal organs and brain taken from Alcasan have become
the conductors of a regular intercourse between the Macrobes
and our own species. We did not discover this technique, the
discovery was theirs, not ours. The circle to which you may
be admitted is the organ of that co-operation between the two
species which has already created a new situation for humanity.
The change, you will see, is far greater than that which turned
the sub-man into the Man." ..

"These organisms, then," said Mark, "are friendly to humanity?"
"If you reflect for a moment, you will see that your question
has no meaning except on the level of the crudest popular
thought. Friendship is a chemical phenomenon, so is hatred.
Both of them presuppose organisms of our own type. The first
step towards intercourse with the macrobes is the realisation
that one must go outside the whole world of subjective
emotions. Only as you begin to do so, you discover how much
of what you mistook for your thoughts, was merely a by-product
of your blood and nervous tissues."
"Oh, of course. I didn't quite mean "friendly", in that sense.
I really meant, were their aims compatible with our own?"

"What do you mean by our own aims?"

[ fortsettes i neste )     ( norsk intro omtale )
Tekst fra uforkortet utgave 1983

the struggle of a little group of sane people -- against a nightmare
that nearly conquers the world.

A company of mad scientists – or, perhaps, they are not mad,
but have merely destroyed in themselves all human feeling,
all notion of good and evil –

are plotting to conquer Britain,
then the whole planet, and then other planets, until they have brought
the universe under their control.
_

( George Orwell 1945, om 'That Hideous Strength' )

"Sir," said Jane, "I know nothing of Maleldil. But I place myself in obedience to you." "It is enough for the present," said the Director. "This is the courtesy of Deep Heaven: that when you mean well, He always takes you to have meant better than you knew."

"Making things clear is the one thing the D.D. can't stand,"
replied Miss Hardcastle. "That's not how he runs the place.
(...)
"No good, Sonny," she said shaking her head. "You don't know
enough facts yet for your point of view to be worth sixpence.
You haven't yet realized what you're in on.
You're being offered a chance of something far bigger than a
seat in the cabinet. And there are only two alternatives,
you know. Either to be in the N.I.C.E. or to be out of it.
And I know better than you which is going to be most fun."

"I do understand that, said Mark. "But anything is better
than being nominally in and having nothing to do. Give me a
real place in the Sociological Department and I'll . . ."

"Rats! That whole Department is going to be scrapped.
It had to be there at the beginning for propaganda purposes.
But they are all going to be weeded out."

"What assurance have I that I'm going to be one of their
successors?"
"You aren't. They're not going to have any successors.
The real work has nothing to do with all these departments.
The kind of sociology we're interested in will be done by
my peope -- the police."

(fra 'That Hideous Strength', første uforkortede utg. 1983 -
Pan Books London and Sydney)

(forts. herfra)

"These organisms then," said Mark, "are friendly to humanity?"

"If you reflect for a moment, you will see that your question
has no meaning except on the level of the crudest popular
thought.
Friendship is a chemical phenomenon, so is hatred.
Both of them presuppose organisms of our own type.
The first step towards intercourse with the macrobes
is the realisation
that one must go outside the whole world of subjective
emotions.
Only as you begin to do so, you discover how much
of what you mistook for your thoughts, was merely a
by-product of your blood and nervous tissues."

"Oh, of course. I didn't quite mean "friendly", in that sense.
I really meant, were their aims compatible with our own?"

"What do you mean by our own aims?"

"Well -- I suppose -- the scientific reconstruction of the
human race in the direction of increased efficiency --
the elimination of war and poverty
and other forms of waste -- a fuller exploitation of Nature --
the preservation and extension of our species, in fact."

"I do not think this pseudo-scientific language really
modifies the essentially subjective and instinctive basis of
the ethics you are describing. I will return to the matter
at a later stage. For the moment, I would merely remark that
your view of war and your reference to the preservation of
the species suggest a profound misconception. They are mere
generalisations from affectional feelings."

"Surely," said Mark, "one requires a pretty large population
for the full exploitation of Nature, if for nothing else?
And surely war is disgenic and reduces efficiency?
Even if population needs thinning, is not war the worst
possible method of thinning it?"

"That idea is a survival from conditions which are rapidly
being altered. A few centuries ago, war did not operate in
the way you describe. A large agricultural population was
essential; and war destroyed types which were then useful.

But every advance in industry and agriculture reduces the
number of work-people who are required.
A large, unintelligent population is now becoming a deadweight.

The real importance of scientific war is that scientists have
to be reserved. It was not the great technocrats of Koenigsberg
or Moscow who supplied the casualties in the siege of Stalingrad:
it was superstitious Bavarian peasants and low-grade Russian
agricultural workers.
The effect of modern war is to eliminate retrogressive types,
while sparing the technocracy and increasing its hold upon
public affairs.
In the new age, what has hitherto been merely the intellectual
nucleus of the race
is to become, by gradual stages, the race itself.

You are to conceive the species as an animal which has now
discovered how to simplify nutrition and locomotion to such a
point that the old complex organs and the large body which
contained them are no longer necessary.
That large body is therefore to disappear. Only a tenth part
of it will now be needed to support the brain.
The individual is to become all head. The human race is to
become all Technocracy."

"I see," said Mark. "I had thought rather vaguely -- that the
intelligent nucleus would be extended by education."

"That is pure chimera. The great majority of the human race
can be educated only in the sense of being given knowledge:
They cannot be trained into the total objectivity of mind
which is now necessary.
They will always remain animals, looking at the world through
the haze of their subjective reactions.
Even if they could, the day for a large population has passed.

It has served its function by acting as a kind of cocoon for
Technocratic and Objective Man.
Now, the macrobes, and the selected humans who can co-operate
with them, have no further use for it."

"The two big wars, then, were not disasters on your view?"

"On the contrary, they were simply the beginning of the
programme -- the first two of the sixteen major wars which
are scheduled to take place in this century.

I am aware of the emotional (that is, the chemical) reactions
which a statement like this produces in you, and you are wasting
your time in trying to conceal then from me. I do not expect
you to control them. That is not the path to objectivity.
I deliberately raise them in order that you may become
accustomed to regard them in a purely scientific light and
distinguish them as sharply as possible from the facts."

Mark (...) was fully occupied with the conflict between his
resolution not to trust these men, never again be lured by
any bait into a real co-operation,
and the terrible strength -- of an opposite emotion.
For here, here surely at last (so his desire whispered to him)
was the true inner circle of all,
the circle whose centre was outside the human race --
the ultimate secret, the supreme power,
the last initiation.

The fact that it was almost completely horrible did not in the
least diminish its attraction.
Nothing that lacked the tang of horror would have been quite
strong enough to satisfy the delirious excitement which now
set his temples hammering.
It came into his mind that Frost knew all about the excitement,
and also about the opposite determination,
and reckoned securely on the excitement as the thing which was
certain to carry the day in his victim's mind.

( C.S.Lewis, 1945 )