Desperate Games

So it was this chapter which he tackled straight away: the education of a world freed from miserable cares and capable of rising above its lamentable condition of ignorance, provided that the central organisation did its duty by leading it in the right direction. Father Teilhard provided precious help again in illustrating his way of thinking. At the head of his study he quoted almost in its entirety, without omitting the capital letters, a passage he had read in The Phenomenon of Man, which he had remembered the night before while half asleep:

The moment will come, and it is necessary that it should come, when Man… will recognise that Science is not for him an accessory occupation, but an essential form of activity, a natural derivative in fact, open to the excess of forms of energy constantly being set free by Machines.

An Earth, on which forms of leisure are always on the increase and interest is always unfulfilled, and which will find their vital resolution in the act of making everything more profound, of attempting everything, of prolonging everything… an Earth on which, not only for the army of researchers which has been brought together and subsidised but also for the man in the street, the problem of the day will be the conquest of a secret and of a greater power,

which shall have been snatched from the body’s corpuscles, from the stars or even organised matter.

It was to enable the world to attain this great moment that Fawell devoted the greatest part of the time remaining to him. If he managed to lead the world to the point of ‘sublimation of interest’, to use Wells’ phrase2, everything would become possible. To get to that stage in a few years was not going to be easy. Wells had predicted that it would take more than a hundred and fifty years to reach this threshold, but his modern state was not really scientific. From the start he did not have a sufficiently high vision. They should be able to progress much more quickly.

After the quotation Fawell allowed himself a few more minutes of reverie, trying hard to conjure up an image of Earth at the end of the nine years. Then he gave some thought to his daughter. It was the first time he had thought about her since the start of the competition, as he was focused on the future with every fibre of his being. Ruth would definitely experience the whole glorious metamorphosis. She would not yet be thirty years old when he would be passing on the torch to another.

He trembled as he thought of what women like her and men like Nicolas Zarratoff would be able to undertake. In order for this to come about it was necessary for the task he was embarking on to be successful. It would be. Fawell swore this to himself and leaned forward on his desk.

7.

It was O’Kearn’s genius which gave definitive shape to the project for a world government and established the process of selecting its members. He received the delegation of the young scholars with the benevolence that was customary with him, except when he found himself faced with scientific heresy, in which case he could become fierce. Fawell’s three companions were not unknown to him. There was a brief introduction to the matter in hand. Realising that a visit so early in the day could only concern some important matter, he asked his former assistant to get straight to the point in his explanation. When the latter had done this in a few brief words, the great scholar showed no sign of surprise and did not protest.

‘I have often considered this eventuality,’ he said. ‘For my part, I have always thought that a world government would be necessary in the near or distant future. It was Einstein’s opinion and it is that of all wise men. But I visualised it growing out of the ruins of a war, when it would become the only chance for the world to escape death, as Wells had foreseen. You want to bring about a peaceful revolution. I could not ask for anything better. At any rate it is clear that such a government can only be trusted to the best brains, which have been developed by science. But have you anticipated the clamour that will arise as soon as you talk about abolishing separate nations?’

‘Science has already suppressed them.’

‘Certainly, but public opinion is not scientific. It’s not the first time, as you well know, that a project of this kind has been proposed. Well, all those people who have used expressions of this kind, such as world administration or world federation, whatever their merit, from Garry Davis to Einstein, all of them, without exception, were immediately regarded as visionaries, as dreamers and utopians. Even in the case of limited attempts at local concentration and coordination, on a modest scale, as was the case with Europe, there was an explosion of critical and sarcastic remarks. What’s it going to be like if you start talking about a world government?… I think that Mrs Han does not agree with me. Don’t hesitate to give me your opinion.’

‘I just want to make the comment,’ said Betty, who had not been able to repress a gesture of protest, ‘that all such criticisms were made in the name of realism. A want of realism is the usual criticism made of those who invoke the natural law of concentration and suggest speeding up the effects. The insult that they were lacking in realism was hurled contemptuously at all the supporters of a European federation. Well, I ask you Master, how could one maintain such an argument when we propose that the central administration should be entrusted to the most obvious realists in our world, that is to say, the scholars?’

‘Certain people would maintain that argument all the same, but your reasoning is valid.’

‘I think that Betty is right, Master,’ said Yranne. ‘If it is necessary, such theorists as myself could be regarded as visionaries, but not those physicists who spend their lives digging into matter and analysing it, and penetrating as deeply as possible into the very heart of matter.’

‘Nor should those,’ added Betty, ‘who scrutinise the cells of life every day.’

O’Kearn’s face became sombre.

‘Am I to understand that you also want to make an appeal to the specialists of the so-called natural sciences… to biologists and to physiologists?’ he asked with evident disdain.

‘Upon reflection, it seemed indispensable to us.’

It was obvious that the Nobel physicist did not like this prospect.

‘I believe, like Pythagoras and Einstein, that truth is independent of Man,’ he said. ‘Well, isn’t truth the purpose of scientific study?’

‘That’s what I think too,’ murmured Zarratoff.

‘And that’s what I believe as well, Master,’ pleaded Fawell. ‘But the conquest of truth is known as knowledge. And at the current stage of evolution and on our Earth at least, this knowledge needs the human brain.’

‘Without Einstein or a man of his genius,’ Betty insisted, ‘the truth which his theories embody would still be hazy.’

‘But it would nevertheless exist,’ grumbled O’Kearn.

Yet, after having thought about it, the scholar admitted half-heartedly that they might well be right and that a government of any kind should also be concerned about mankind. Moreover, with biologists and medical experts their realism would be unassailable.

‘Fine,’ he said. ‘I find your plan reasonable and I am prepared to help you as far as my means allow. But I am old. I am no longer a man of action and I foresee that it will require a lot of energy and authority to govern the world. I feel I am not capable of doing it.’

So Fawell explained to him the conclusion which they had reached: that the support of the Nobels was necessary. Only all the Nobels as a body could guarantee the success of the operation.

‘Whose idea was this?’ the scholar asked.

It was indicated to him that it was the Chinese psychologist.