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thought and possibly more than he thought. The trouble is, the quantities just
reported, at even one metal atom per molecule, couldn't possibly be enough for
what I'm thinking, unless I've missed something really important in my lessons
from Status. The four metal atoms instead of one in each molecule, as
hemoglobin has, would make it a lot worse. I'll check my arithmetic and the
numbers Status gave me, too."
"But how could something like the population implosion, with the increase in
metal and presumably in any new enzymes being slow and fairly steady, appear
so suddenly?" asked Ginger.
"That's common sense. For any pandemic, the cause, either microbe or chemical,
needs to reproduce, or at least increase, faster in the environment than it's
decreased or immobilized by the deaths of its hosts or victims. It could exist
for thousands or millions of years at an unnoticeable concentration, forming
by random reactions or mutations or human hacking, and causing too few
problems to be noticed. Most of its victims would probably die of an ordinary
cancer or traffic accident before the new symptoms were taken seriously or
even noticed. Lack of raw material would limit its expansion rate."
"You really have been reading," remarked Xalco. "It couldn't have been random.
What was steering you?"
"I don't know. I haven't read any psychology. It wasn't conscious thinking,
though. But let me finish your question. For the coenzymes, once we started
high-energy living, the supply of heavy metals being widely spread over Earth
began to increase more or less exponentially, both with rising population and
improving technology if nothing else. More coenzymes could form randomly. I
don't know whether the word mutation applies, but it sounds right. With a
wider variety of metals available to bring their concentration up, new enzymes
could suddenly reach a formation rate as fast or faster than the removal one.
They'd reach well, not a critical mass, but a critical concentration. And
remember, the deaths of
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wouldn't remove them permanently, unless you toss everyone's body into space.
"I'm all for remembering good things about people, but until now I haven't
been completely happy with keeping them around afterward. Yes, I know it's for
data purposes, Major, but I never felt very sure we'd have use for that data.
Now I see it.
"I haven't been all the way through Status's banks yet, and not even Pete
could expect ever to have time to, but I've picked up quite a lot."
Maria thought she could see where this was heading, and took a chance.
"You're going along with Seichi that this stuff is alive?"
"No. Not quite. I'd like to think it was in the chemical evolution stage
still. Half alive, we could say.
Different tar pools show different characteristics, which ought to be mostly
chance; the only selection factor so far is the ability to replicate."
"You suggest that the search be for coenzymes containing metals which have
become widespread in
Earth's environment in the last few decades, then? Or that we should have done
that if only Cheru's atom count had been more encouraging?" Maria sounded
impressed but not quite convinced. "We can certainly run analyses on our
friends and on ourselves, for that matter.
"A more serious objection seems to me that most of the iridium and hafnium and
similar rare metals now around have been circulated extensively only since the
medical problems began."
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"No." Two voices, Ginger's and Belvew's, sounded together. The sergeant might
have been deferring to senior rank, welcoming support, or being polite. "Go
ahead, Major."
"There's one heavy metal that's been around since long before high tech. We've
been spreading it for thousands of years, in pretty close proportion to the
number of people around. We wear it, and wear it
two different meanings. That's the one I'd concentrate on first. Jewelry!
Think of it. Rings, bracelets, collars, pendants, coins, all sorts of items
circulating around among human beings and rubbing off atoms all over the
planet ever since human beings liked pretty things. Never mind high tech."
"You mean ," started Maria.
Ginger became polite, too, and waited. Some did not.
One word was overlapped among the voices of Corporal Pete Martucci, Corporal
Cheru Akagawa, Lieutenant Carla lePing, Corporal Ludmilla Anden, and one
other. It was a short word, and clear to all the hearers in spite of the
overlap, but the last was the clearest. Since the Xalco speech had involved
more behavioral than physical science, Status came in a poor last, and unmixed
with other voices.
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Dobre pomysły nie mają przeszłości, mają tylko przyszłość. Robert Mallet
De minimis - o najmniejszych rzeczach.
Dobroć jest ważniejsza niż mądrość, a uznanie tej prawdy to pierwszy krok do mądrości. Theodore Isaac Rubin
Dobro to tylko to, co szlachetne, zło to tylko to, co haniebne.
Dla człowieka nie tylko świat otaczający jest zagadką; jest on nią sam dla siebie. I z obu tajemnic bardziej dręczącą wydaje się ta druga. Antoni Kępiński (1918-1972)
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