Lost in the Cosmos

A Space Odyssey (I). (19) The Self Marooned in the Cosmos: What would you say if you met a man Friday out there? What do you think he would say to you? Could you understand him?

A STARSHIP FROM EARTH is traveling in the galaxy, its mission to establish communication with extraterrestrial intelligences and civilizations.^*

For years SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) has explored the 200 billion stars of the galaxy, huge dish antennae searching for something, anything other than the random noise of the Cosmos. At last, the computer of the spectrum analyzer which reads the tapes of all the received transmissions picked up a pattern, that is, a repeated signal, which, however, could not be interpreted. Was it a signal from an intelligence or was it like the Coke bottle in the movie On the Beach, which was leaning on a telegraph key in deserted California and which a fitful breeze blowing a curtain caused to send out a random letter or two?

The starship has a transmission-receiver capability for the entire electromagnetic spectrum, but especially in the range of radio signals, since it is known of course that the Cosmos is filled with emissions in this part of the spectrum, from pulsars, quasars, radiation belts, and so on.

The objective of the starship is to exchange information with other civilizations comparable with or superior to our own. It has been calculated that the probability that such civilizations exist is overwhelming. What the designers of the project hoped to learn was the level of technology of other civilizations, the degree of evolution, biology, type of metabolism, etc.

The time is the year 205 °C.E. (Common Era, so called because, though the era is post-Christian, it proved useful to retain the year of Christ’s birth). The acceleration of vehicles to speeds approaching the speed of light is possible, the aging process is accordingly reduced, and the problems of communication delays are minimized.

The assumption was made that as organisms evolve in the Cosmos, a level of intelligence will be reached so that it will be possible to transmit information. Mathematics and science might be used as the basis of a common language. Mathematics is the same everywhere. The prime numbers 1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13 … are prime everywhere. The physics of the Cosmos is the same. For example, since hydrogen is the most abundant atom in the Cosmos, one might use the proton and electron spin of the neutral hydrogen atom as the binary number 1. Using such a binary system, the project designers hoped that it might be possible to establish a vocabulary and transmit information about the earth and its star, for example, its position in relation to the fourteen major pulsars of the galaxy, and to put similar questions to other intelligences.

Organisms transmitting signals were, in fact, encountered. The trouble was that the responses received were not acknowledgments or statements of information but were rather countersignals of one sort or another, responses which seemed to express something like excitement or alarm or anger, often actual movements of the organisms themselves. Thus, rather than information being obtained, various behaviors were encountered — hostile, aversive, coming close or going away, flight or fight, and in one case what appeared to be an attempt at sexual union.

In fact, two such creatures were encountered in the solar system.

(1) In the outer atmosphere of Jupiter, large gaseous clouds were sighted. It was determined that they were self-contained organisms of some intelligence because they were self-propelled, moving about by emitting jets of hydrogen. They injested organic molecules and excreted helium and methane, and were observed to reproduce by fission. But despite every effort to communicate, e.g., by transmitting prime numbers in various frequencies of the electromagnetic spectrum, the only response of the clouds was to speed away or come close and surround the ship like a sportive school of whales — or to rise and sink like so many hot-air balloons.

(2) Skirting Saturn’s moon Titan with its heavy atmosphere of methane, another sort of creature was encountered, small glittering anemone-like organisms with spicules of methane crystals and a beak-and-sucker mouth for devouring the brown sludge of organic molecules formed on Titan’s surface by the ultraviolet light of the sun. Upon the transmission of radio waves of the frequency 1420 megahertz, the creatures were thrown into violent excitement, for all the world like the behavior of male gypsy moths upon the reception of the female pheromone. They flocked to the ship and attached themselves to its tiles and windows, using their sucker-like mouths. It was not clear whether such a response was a manifestation of hunger or hostility or an attempt at sexual union.

At last, five years later, near Proxima Centauri, communication was established with an extraterrestrial intelligence. Orbiting the third planet of Proxima Centauri (PC3), of PC’s twelve planets the one most resembling Earth, the earthship transmitted the prime numbers in the radio range of the electromagnetic spectrum. Almost immediately, the signal was returned — and imitated. But when the excited earthlings tried to descend, a glitch occurred in the controls, not once, but repeatedly — until it finally dawned on the crew that they were being held in orbit. Evidently, the earthship was being detained at a kind of checkpoint until its credentials were approved.

It was necessary to hit upon a mathematical and semantic vocabulary. The former was easy, again using the physical properties of the hydrogen atom, assigning the binary number 1 to the transition between the parallel and antiparallel proton and electron spins of the neutral hydrogen atom. Such a transition emits a radio-frequency photon of wavelength 21 centimeters and a frequency of 1420 megahertz — the reason for selecting this channel of transmission. An indexical lexicon was agreed upon. Thus, certain binary numbers were assigned to the suns of Centauri by transmitting the number along with the angle or declination of the suns from the path of transmission. Similarly, other names were assigned to other features, the other referents being “pointed at” and “named,” e.g., light, dark, other planets, pulsars, big, little, red, blue, near, far, down, up, here, there, I (the earthship), you (PC3), and so on. Plurals and abstractions and tenses were agreed upon. Goodness was a property attributed to cosmic particles which were beneficial to the metabolism of the PC3 organisms, evil to the ultraviolet rays, which were harmful. Even metaphor was arrived at: I am M4 today, meaning I am your fourth moon, PC3's fourth moon being bright, small, racy, refractile as a diamond. Or I am M6—sluggish, blue, misshapen, bored. Consciousness was defined as that property of a creature by which he draws attention to something, talks about it, or thinks about it. It was designated by a binary number which we shall call C.

A lexicon and syntax agreed upon, it was now possible for the earthship to transmit basic information about its origin, its sun, the geology, atmosphere, age of the planet earth, the biology of its organisms (e.g., C, H, O, S, H₂O, PO₄; deoxyribonucleic acid; mobile heterotrophs; surface dwellers; O₂ breathers; sexual mammals, etc.), its technology (nuclear energic), its culture (two hundred nation-states, five global powers, sporadic brushfire warfare, environmental pollution), its science, its art (literary, iconic, musical) — a message ending with a sign-off and an invitation: Over and out — come back.

There followed a long pause, then an explicit warning: Maintain orbit until certain questions are answered—then the transmission of a binary symbol which the earthlings translated as something like the Hebrew shalom—then the transmission of comparable summary of PC3 information, indicating an organism with a bromine metabolism, an older civilization than that of Earth, and a superior technology (exponentiating, approaching asymptotic limit). Culture: global, gregarious, 40,000 genera, one symbolic language (!) (cf. Earth’s thousands), reproduction: sexual (!), biology: non-senescent (!): did that mean they did not age or die?!???; art: mathematical-poetic.

There then followed several transmissions from PC3 which the earthlings did not understand. They were

T, Si → Sy = 1.35 × 10¹² years (breakthrough)

Si = atmospheric wave motion, tactile, radar return

Sy = variable pitch frequencies combined with radar-return configurations, or SRs (sound-radar)

Sn = SR, + SR₂ (+ = assert)

C = 1 (Int, Soc, Sy)

Each item of information was followed by the query: “What’s yours?” Then: “What’s your C-type? Are you C1? C2? C3? Over and out. Come back.”

A puzzled silence from the earthship transmitter, then: “Say sgain.” Then: “Say again longer [i.e., Explain]. What is C-type? What is Si? Sy? Si ? Sy breakthrough? T? Sn?

After many weeks of transmissions, dogged human effort, and an unflagging good-humored patience from the PC3 transmitter, the following explanations were spelled out:

T = time

Si = sign

Sy = symbol

Sn = sentence

T, Si → Sy 1.35 × 10¹² years means how long ago in PC3 years we made the breakthrough from sign communication to symbol communication, i.e., 13,500,000 years.

Before that, we communicated by touch, sounds of different pitches, and a radar-like reception of reflected sound. Like a bat, said an earthling. Imagine bats flying blind and emitting squeaks of different musical pitches.

Sy, or symbols, were formed by combining frequency clusters (e.g., chords of musical squeaks) with the percept or radar configuration formed by the radar-return of this or that object. Thus, instead of the word ball being applied to the round thing you earthlings play with, our primitive word was applied to the jagged radar-configuration of the double-bladed sickle with which our ancestors harvested our atmospheric algae. Our “words” or symbols are combinations of musical chords (for objects), arpeggios (for action words, verbs) with the corresponding radar percepts, just as your words ball, yellow, slice are combinations of sound configurations and visual percepts (though we don’t quite understand what you mean by “visual” and “see”).

Sn is a sentence, uniting two of these sound-radar configurations, so:

means: Your spaceship is descending.

EARTHSHIP: True. Very interesting. We read. Request permission to land. We could exchange much more information by meeting and talking.

PC3: Not quite yet. You haven’t answered our question about C-type.

EARTHSHIP: What do you mean by type of consciousness?

PC3: We are C1s. We wanted to know whether you are C1s or C2s or C3s.

EARTHSHIP: What is a C1?

PC3 (patiently): We told you. C = 1 (Int, Soc, Sy).

EARTHSHIP: What does that mean?

PC3 (patiently): It means that in order for the individual consciousness to be activated, it is required that there be a Soc, that is, a society, that is, two or more persons; an exchange of Sy, that is, symbols; and an Int, that is, an intersubjective relationship in which there is agreement about the symbol used and the thing that is talked about.

EARTHSHIP: Oh.

PC3: And you?

EARTHSHIP: We’re much the same. Now may we request permission to—

PC3: Just a moment. It is still necessary to establish your C-type. We are C1s, that is, first-order consciousness. Through the centuries we have learned by painful experience that there are at least two other C-types, C2s and C3s. C1s and C3s are benign. C2s are dangerous. Which are you?

EARTHSHIP: Say again. What’s the difference?

PC3: A C1 consciousness is a first-order consciousness, or what you would call a preternatural consciousness — according to the dictionary your computer transmitted.

EARTHSHIP: It is? Say again. Preternatural?

PC3: Well, something like the consciousness of a child grown mature and sophisticated but maintaining its innocence permanently and avoiding the malformations of self-consciousness, enjoying the beauty of our planet and each other and our science and art without weariness, boredom, fear, guilt, or shame. Like what you call the Helen Keller phenomenon.

EARTHSHIP: How do you know about her?

PC3: One of our cosmological linguists just arrived. This is he speaking. We’ve been monitoring you for years. Switch to Earth-L, English-speaking? German? French?

EARTHSHIP: American English.

PC3: Got it. I read. What can we do for you?

EARTHSHIP: What do you mean by the Helen Keller phenomenon?

PC3: The joy of consciousness and the discovery of the Cosmos through the mediation of symbols and the cooperation of others and the preservation of this joy against the incursions of boredom, fear, anger, despair, shame, and the love of war and death and the secret desire for the misfortune of others.

EARTHSHIP: Check. Did you say shame?

PC3: We have observed that C2s experience shame. For example, do you wear clothes?

EARTHSHIP: Yes.

PC3: Despite the controlled environment of your ship?

EARTHSHIP: Yes.

PC3: Why?

EARTHSHIP: Ah, custom. Aesthetics.

PC3: Aesthetics? Explain.

EARTHSHIP: Later, when we land. May we land?

PC3: Not yet. What is your C-type?

EARTHSHIP: What is a C2 consciousness?

PC3: A C2 consciousness is a consciousness which passes through a C1 stage and then for some reason falls into the pit of itself.

EARTHSHIP: The pit of itself?

PC3: In some evolving civilizations, for reasons which we don’t entirely understand, the evolution of consciousness is attended by a disaster of some sort which occurs shortly after the Sy breakthrough. It has something to do with the discovery of the self and the incapacity to deal with it, the consciousness becoming self-conscious but not knowing what to do with the self, not even knowing what its self is, and so ending by being that which it is not, saying that which is not, doing that which is not, and making others what they are not.

EARTHSHIP: What does that mean?

PC3: Playing roles, being phony, lying, cheating, stealing, and killing. To say nothing of exotic disordering of the reproductive apparatus of sexual creatures.

EARTHSHIP: What does that mean?

PC3: Exploitative sex.

EARTHSHIP: Exploitative sex?

PC3 (consulting computerized earth-slang dictionary): It seems to mean what you call “screwing everything in sight,” not only to and to but to and to and + + and + + —to mention a few of the simpler combinations.

EARTHSHIP: That is what is called “freedom of sexual preference.”

PC3: Call it what you like. We are not interested. What concerns us is our experience with C2s whom we have allowed to land on PC3. They are usually polite at first, but always turn hostile, deceptive, and end by attempting to screw (is that the right word?) any creatures on PC3 which have an opening or a protuberance. We could tolerate their odd sexual behavior, but they were also sentimental and cruel — or rather sentimental, therefore cruel. One goes with the other. They are mainly interested in self-esteem. We are afraid of C2s. They do not know themselves or what to do with themselves.

EARTHSHIP: What about you? What do you do about your consciousness and your selves?

PC3: That is no problem. For us, consciousness of self is no different from consciousness of anything else. A self here is an individual self yet also a self among other selves. C2 selves vary from moment to moment from self-grandiosity to self-refusal, from being the infinite great self in the world to being the worst and the least self — because C2 selves don’t know who they are.^* Perhaps your difficulty comes from the sensory mode which you call “seeing.” You “see” things. But can you “see” yourself? Who are you?

EARTHSHIP: I’m the second officer, the communications officer.

PC3: No, I mean, who are you?

EARTHSHIP: You mean my name? Captain—

PC3 (patiently): No. Let’s begin with C-type. What’s your C-type? Are you C1, C2, or C3? You will not be given permission to descend until we establish that.

EARTHSHIP (after a pause): What’s a C3 consciousness?

PC3: A C3 consciousness is a C2 consciousness which has become aware of its predicament, sought help, and received it.

EARTHSHIP: Help?

PC3: If a C1 meets with disaster, falls into the pit of itself, and becomes a C2, it must become aware of its sickness and seek a remedy in order to be restored to the preternaturality of Cl. Well?

EARTHSHIP: Well what?

PC3: Which are you?

EARTHSHIP: That is hard to say.

PC3: Perhaps we can help you arrive at an answer. Would you answer a few questions?

EARTHSHIP: Yes.

PC3: You say your civilization has five superpowers.

EARTHSHIP: Yes.

PC3: Is there peace between you?

EARTHSHIP: There was when we left.

PC3: Aren’t you in communication with Earth?

EARTHSHIP: We were until two years ago.

PC3: Isn’t that strange?

EARTHSHIP: Yes.

PC3: Then you have reason to believe something is wrong on Earth?

EARTHSHIP: Yes. (Quickly) Do you know anything?

PC3: (evasively): Let’s get on with the questions. How many wars have you had in the last hundred earth-years?

EARTHSHIP: Big or little?

PC3: Well, big.

EARTHSHIP: Two — that we know of. Do you know of a third?

PC3: How many lives were terminated before their natural C2 deaths?

EARTHSHIP: You mean how many were killed?

PC3: Yes.

EARTHSHIP: Around a hundred million.

PC3: Now you fear there might have been a third.

EARTHSHIP: Yes. Do you know?

PC3: What is the size of your crew?

EARTHSHIP: Twelve in the beginning.

PC3: How many of each sex?

EARTHSHIP: Six.

PC3: How did you arrive at the sexual distribution?

EARTHSHIP: We felt that sexual needs must be taken into account, just like the needs for food, water, a stable environment, and so on. And though none of us has any prejudice against homosexuality, we were not yet sure enough of the dynamics of a homosexual group to take chances with the mission.

PC3: Is there pair bonding among you?

EARTHSHIP: No. Ours was designed as a communal and transcultural group interaction. Through extensive prelaunch exercises, we discovered we could get beyond the usual cultural and sexual hang-ups.

PC3: How has it worked?

EARTHSHIP: Among the nine survivors, very well until just recently.

PC3: Nine survivors? What happened to the other three?

EARTHSHIP (after a silence): They died.

PC3: Were they killed?

EARTHSHIP: Yes.

PC3: Were they men?

EARTHSHIP: Yes.

PC3: Were they killed in quarrels over the women?

EARTHSHIP: Yes. How did you know?

PC3: We’ve had some experience with C2s. How are things now?

EARTHSHIP: Fine. Each man has two women. We think we’ve made a valuable contribution to prolonged heterosexual group dynamics.

PC3: What’s that?

EARTHSHIP: Men are less monogamous than women. Men are happier with more than one woman, and the women don’t seem to mind, once they’ve gotten past cultural hang-ups.

PC3: Interesting. Now, you say you’re the second officer.

EARTHSHIP: Yes.

PC3: Can I speak to the commander?

EARTHSHIP: I’m afraid not.

PC3: You mean, the commander didn’t survive.

EARTHSHIP: He survived, but he’s, ah, ill.

PC3: What’s wrong with him?

EARTHSHIP: He’s out of it. Flaked out. He sniffs coke and reads Rod McKuen and Richard Bach. He’s not functioning. We need to land. Request permission.

PC3: Did you say two women are assigned to each man?

EARTHSHIP: Not assigned. That’s the way it worked out. At first.

PC3: What happened? For example, what about the commander’s two women?

EARTHSHIP: They’re okay. When he lost interest, they turned to each other. They have a relationship.

PC3: Who is the other officer?

EARTHSHIP: He’s the exec.

PC3: What’s he doing?

EARTHSHIP: Screwing his brains out.

PC3: What about you?

EARTHSHIP: I’m too damn busy flying this ship. Request—

PC3: Then you’re in trouble.

EARTHSHIP: Yes. We have to land before we even consider returning.

PC3: No, I mean your species is in trouble. You don’t even know whether you have a civilization, and the chances are you do not.

EARTHSHIP: That is correct.

PC3: My question is this. Clearly, you are a C2. We need to know how you stand vis-à-vis your predicament, that is, knowledge of it and remedy for it. E.g., do you have such knowledge? Have you requested help? Has help arrived? Did you accept help?

EARTHSHIP: Help? What help? We don’t ask for help. We help ourselves. We are the triumphant emerging species on our planet, and though we are not as far advanced as you, we are not ashamed of our scientific and technological and artistic achievements. If we were not a tough, self-sufficient, inquisitive species, we wouldn’t be here.

PC3: Then help was not requested and has not arrived?

EARTHSHIP: Are you talking about religion? If so, I can only reply that we have progressed beyond sectarianism — which caused many of the troubles you speak of. We have selected many of the values of the World’s Great Religions — such as meditation, caring, sharing, interpersonal warmth, creativity — and we have rejected sectarian claims of exclusivity and anthropomorphic gods.

PC3: I see. Any other immediate troubles?

EARTHSHIP: My two women are fighting. Both were thought to be culturally liberated and were so certified by the screening procedure. But one has reverted to the old monogamy and wants the captain to marry us. The other one wants to screw the captain and me at the same time and also run the ship.

(Sotto voce conversation near PC3 transmitter overheard by earthship officer who has learned a bit of PC linguistics, and of which he can make out only: “—My God, we need these people like a [word not understood]—Get them out of here—”)

EARTHSHIP: I’m sure the difficulties of these women are not genetic and would not present a problem for you. One is undergoing a neurotic regression, the other a manic-erotic episode. I’m afraid our screening procedure was inadequate. The goddam shrinks screwed up as usual.

PC3 (sorrowfully): Permission denied. Please resume your mission or return.

EARTHSHIP (frantically): We can’t return. There is nothing to return to.

PC3: That is correct. I suggest you proceed to PC7, which is also a C2 civilization. You can take your chances with each other. They, too, are a curious, inquisitive, murderous civilization, NH3 breathers, nuclear, but not as advanced as you. They are sentimental, easily moved to tears, and kill each other with equal ease. Uncognitive of their predicament and pre-help. Paranoid mind-set. Two superpowers, ideological combat but not yet a nuclear exchange. They like wars too, pretend not to, but get in trouble during an overly prolonged peace. Right now they are bored to death and spoiling for a fight. They are divided into two hostile powers. You would be welcomed by either as a sensational diversion — for a while. There would be parades. You might talk one or both parties into permitting your entry, but each will suspect that you are a spy for the other. Good luck. You have one hour to vacate orbit. Over and out.

Question: If you were the second officer on the starship, how would you answer the question: Are you a C1? a C2? a C3?

(a) (Behaviorist speaking) I give no answer. The question is not meaningful. There is no hard evidence that there is such an entity as consciousness, let alone “three types of consciousness.” In the behavioral sciences, we have discovered that we do very well indeed without recognizing such a thing as consciousness; in fact, by so doing, we have avoided the whole can of worms of subjectivity which has plagued psychology for hundreds of years.

(b) (Sagan speaking) C1. Our species is not qualitatively different from other creatures, but the evolution of man has been spectacular, from toolmaking hunter-gatherers to conscious technological man — with a few lapses such as the Christian epoch or the Dark Ages, lasting, say, from the destruction of the Alexandria library to the resumption of scientific progress with Galileo. We still have aggressive traits, but these can be explained by our residual reptilian brain. We do not recognize the existence of a “soul” or “psyche” if these entities be interpreted as anything other than a property of the organization of the DNA and other molecules of the organism.

(c) (Oriental, gnostic, etc., speaking) C1. We already live in a preternatural state of bliss if we but knew it. Our misery comes from maya and our own errors and can be dissipated by our own efforts. No help required or asked for or received.

(d) (Jew speaking) C2. Following an original preternatural or Edenic state, man did indeed suffer a catastrophe or Fall through his own pride and his own choice made in his God-given freedom. In his original state he invented language, named creatures, loved God and his mate, and was happy in his beautiful world. He fell and to this day is unredeemed and so he suffers the miseries of his unredeemed state and will continue to suffer until the Messiah comes to save him, or at least a Messianic Age, which we confidently expect. The coming of the Messianic Age, if not the Messiah, will be mediated by the Jews, who are a light unto the nations and with whom God entered into a unique covenant.

(e) (Baptist speaking) C3. Man is saved. He suffered the Fall, was promised a savior from the Jews. A savior came, Jesus Christ, to save us from sin and misery and death. The Good News of his coming was broadcast to the ends of the earth for all men to hear and be baptized and saved. The Kingdom of God exists here and now and we are in it. We have freed ourselves from the Catholic Church and other idolatries. I have had a personal encounter with my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and I am saved once and for all and live now and forever in a state of blessedness, now on this earth and forever in heaven.

(f) Other (specify).

(CHECK ONE)

Thought Experiment: Sexuality and space travel.

As project designer at NASA, you must select a two-person crew to undertake a prolonged mission. Their objective: to act as emissaries to a civilization with whom communication is already established. It is a vital mission. They are more advanced than we. We, with an estimated 40 percent chance of survival, need their wisdom as well as their technology. Their goodwill is our objective. Your task, therefore, is to select the best, most admirable specimens of Homo sapiens sapiens.

It is also your responsibility to provide for the human needs of the astronauts. In the objective scientific stance so characteristic of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, sexual needs are viewed as but one of the many human needs which must be provided for within the cramped confines of the spaceship, e.g., need for food, water, oxygen, exercise, simulated gravity, and so on. Previous missions have shown that pornography, Penthouse magazine, tapes of Nancy Friday, inflatable female dolls, and masturbation have been unsatisfactory sexual outlets. Nor have inhibitory hormones, saltpeter, cold baths worked.

You conclude that human sexual needs require humans to satisfy them.

It was decided against sending a husband and wife, not merely for the reason that a husband-and-wife team was not available, but because of evidence adduced by staff social scientists that the institution of marriage had fallen on such evil days that four out of five married couples studied — as well as unmarried live-in couples — were already so sick of each other that no one would take responsibility for what they might do to each other after years in space.

Accordingly, you have five crews available from whom you must choose one.

(1) A pair of good-humored and well-qualified astronauts, a man and a woman, who have no religious scruples and no marital or emotional attachments, a Burt Reynolds and a Shirley MacLaine type, each highly skilled technically, each sexually experienced and happily and actively and somewhat casually heterosexual, and who, though not well known to each other, find each other attractive — but who, let us admit it, are a little dumb and know next to nothing of Western civilization, literature, or history, beyond last year’s winner of the Super Bowl and the comparative ratings of Snyder, Carson, and Letterman during the last ratings sweeps.

(2) A pair of lesbians, an inseparable couple, pleasant, fastidious, housekeeping, “married” middle-aged homebodies with a low sex drive and a high toleration for closeness and intimacy. Besides being excellent astronauts, both are highly cultivated. One is by avocation a historian, the other a poet.

(3) A pair of male homosexuals from San Francisco. Strangers to each other before training, promiscuous as chimpanzees, they find each other attractive. Outside their technical proficiency, they have a range of interests; one was active in San Francisco politics, the other a Rhodes Scholar in medieval studies.

(4) A lapsed Catholic, Irish, Midwestern male chauvinist, and a militantly feminist woman. Despite, or perhaps because of, their differences, they get along famously. The male is perhaps the best qualified technically of the lot, his marriage is on the rocks, and he is highly sexed, humorous, and salacious as only a Christian or ex-Christian can be (as horny as a preacher, as the saying goes). The female is a handsome Gloria Steinem-Radcliffe type who subscribes to the NASA view that sexual drives and needs are normal biological properties of the human organism, and is willing to satisfy hers and his on the basis of an equality between the sexes — i.e., it must be understood that she is as free as he to initiate sexual behavior. (Her insistence on this point at the first interview made the male astronaut’s eyes sparkle with anticipation.)

These two were technically the best qualified of the crews, but one thing troubled the NASA project manager. In the standard questionnaire, the male astronaut responded to questions 45, 46, and 47 in the following fashion:

Q.: Do you now or have you ever professed a religion?

A.: Yes. But not now.

Q.: What was it?

A.: Catholic.

Q.: Do you regard sexual intercourse outside marriage as sinful?

A.: Technically, at the most. But in the interests of God and country I will make the sacrifice.

What bothered NASA was not that he might be compromising his principles — indeed, he seemed gleeful at the prospect — but rather a certain irony and flippancy in his answer. Beware of smart-ass ironical types, warned one of the older astronauts, the last of the line of un-ironical men beginning with John Glenn and Neal Armstrong. The NASA psychologist noted that the irony might conceal a deeply rooted scruple which might surface later in the mission. One thing the mission didn’t need was a guilty astronaut. Imagine an adulterous and penitent Catholic looking for a priest and a confessional on PC3 like a character in a Graham Greene novel.

(5) Two Nobel Laureates, both male and past middle age, who, though just barely competent as astronauts, expressed a willingness in the interests of humanity to masturbate regularly during the ten years of a mission, saving and freezing the ejaculate for the insemination of millions of suitable if intellectually inferior women toward the end of upgrading the human gene pool.

Which crew would you choose? State your reasons.

CHECK ONE)