Chapter 56 Chapter Forty-Four

Seldon said, "I come from an open world, sister, and so are all worlds except Trantor. The rain comes and goes; There are good and bad harvests. But here, the environment is completely controlled, and the harvest can’t be imagined. How lucky is Maiqusheng.” He began to wait.There are various possible answers to her, and his course of action will depend on how she answers them. Now she was quite comfortable speaking, and she seemed to be no longer wary of him as a man, so the purpose of this long journey had been achieved. "The environment is also not that easy to control, with occasional viral infections and sometimes unexpected bad mutations. Other times, entire crops will wither or become worthless," Raindrop43 said.

"It's unbelievable, how do you deal with this situation?" "Often there's nothing you can do but destroy the spoils, even those that are only likely to spoil. Dishes and sinks must be thoroughly sanitized, and sometimes they all have to be thrown away." "Then it amounts to a surgical operation," said Seldon, "removing the diseased tissue." "That's right." "How do you prevent this from happening?" "What can we do? We're constantly testing for possible mutations, possible new viruses, unexpected contamination or changes in the environment. Rarely do we detect a problem, but once When we found out, we immediately took extraordinary measures. As a result, there were very few poor harvest years, and even if the harvest was poor, it only slightly affected some areas. The worst harvest year in history, only a hundred years less than the average annual output 12 out of 10, but that's enough to cause trouble. The problem is that even the best forethought, and the best computer programming, can't predict 100 percent of what is inherently unpredictable."

(Seldon felt a shudder run through him involuntarily, because what she was talking about seemed to be psychohistory—in fact, she was talking about microbiological farms run by a very small number of people. And he himself, from all angles Considering this sprawling galactic empire.) This made him inevitably discouraged, he said: "Of course, it is not entirely unpredictable, there are forces that guide and look after us all." Raindrop Sisan suddenly froze.She turned to look at Seldon, her piercing eyes seemed to pierce him. But she just said, "What?" Seldon felt restless: "My feeling is that when we talk about viruses and mutations, we're just talking about things in nature, phenomena that obey the laws of nature. We're not thinking about the supernatural, are we? No. Including the power not to be subject to the laws of nature, and thus able to control the laws of nature."

She continued to stare at him as if he had suddenly switched to some strange, unknown dialect of Galactic Standard Language.She said again, "What?" this time almost in a whisper. He stammered and used some words that he was not familiar with, which made him feel a little embarrassed: "You have to turn to some kind of great being, some kind of great holy spirit, some kind of... I don't know what to call it. what." Raindrop Four-Three's pitch rose sharply, but the volume remained low: "I knew, I knew what you meant, but I couldn't believe it. You're accusing us of having a religion. Why don't you say that ? Why not use that word?"

She is waiting for an answer.Seldon, a little overwhelmed by her pretext, said, "Because that's not the word I use, I call it supernaturalism." "Whatever you want to call it, it's religion, we don't have this kind of thing. Religion is only for foreigners, it's the scum..." The sister stopped suddenly and swallowed her saliva, as if she was about to choke to death.Seldon was sure that the word she choked on must be "scum." She regained control and said slowly, in a lower than her usual soprano voice, "We are not a religious people, our country is this galaxy, and always has been. If you are religious..."

Seldon felt trapped in a way he hadn't expected.He raised one hand and made an excuse gesture: "That's not the case. I'm a mathematician, and my country is also this galaxy. It's just that I guess your country based on your rigid customs..." "Don't think like that, alien man. If our customs are rigid, it's because we're only a few million people, surrounded by billions. We've got to try to be different, so that we precious A few, so that we will not be swallowed up by your many. We must be separated from others by our hair removal, our clothing, our behavior, and our way of life. We must know who we are, and we must Make sure you foreigners know who we are. We work hard on the farm to impress you so we can make sure you let us go. That's the only thing we ask of you - let us go."

"I have no intention of harming you or any of your kind. I have come here for knowledge, as I have elsewhere." "And you insult us by asking about our religion, as if we once depended on some mysterious, empty spirit to help us do what we couldn't do ourselves." "There are many people, many worlds, who believe in some form of supernaturalism or slough-religion, if you prefer the word. We may disagree with them for some reason, but our disagreement may It was a mistake, and the chances of both sides making mistakes are exactly half and half. In any case, there is nothing to be ashamed of in faith, and my question is not intended to insult anyone."

But she didn't mean to compromise: "Religion!" she said angrily. "We don't need it." During this conversation, Seldon's heart kept sinking, and at this time he had reached the bottom.The whole thing, this expedition with Raindrop 43, turned out to be nothing in the end. Unexpectedly, she went on to say: "We have something much better. We have a history." Seldon's mood rose immediately, and he smiled.