Tarrant/Hanno explains to Quanah that a scientist:
"'...is a man who seeks for whatever truth lies hidden behind things. How do the sun and the stars shine? How did the earth and life come to be? What really happened in the past?'" (pp. 287-288)
The past is historical, geological and cosmic.
Quanah replies that he knows this and he also knows the consequences:
"'Thus you whites have found ways to do and make many terrible things, and the railroad runs where the buffalo grazed.'" (p. 288)
Knowledge is power. Science, "knowledge," has proved itself. After such knowledge, what forgiveness?
2 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
And in "Delenda Est" plus IS THERE LIFE ON OTHER WORLDS? we see Anderson discussing the long series of factors leading to those "whites" gaining such knowledge and power. Accidental, cultural, religious, philosophical, etc. For a book first pub. in 1963 IS THERE LIFE.... is still amazingly relevant!
China came close, in many ways, to also achieving a true science independently of Europe, but failed to do so. Some reasons for that comes to mind: the deeply rooted tradition of unity under great Imperial dynasties largely prevented the kind of fierce competition between small and large states which did so much to stimulate innovation. Another reason was religion: unlike Europe lacked a faith like Christianity which believed in the lawfulness of God and demythologized nature. Also, as Stirling suggested, the innovations made by the Chinese were spread out over long periods of time, allowing them to be "assimilated," with the Empire not being broken out of its Imperial Confucian mold.
And the buffalo still grazes on the great plains of North America! From near extinction circa 1890 the scientific knowledge attained by those whites was used to bring back buffalo numbers to a healthy level.
Ad astra! Sean
Machine guns just do what spears did, only quicker and with less effort.
Proportionately, the Second Punic War killed about as many of the societies concerned as the First World War did -- more people died on the day of the Battle of Cannae than did on the first day of the Somme in 1916.
It just took a bit longer. 17 years instead of 4.
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