“Take as an example a person who’s been brought up in a fundamental Christian faith. That is, a sect in which he believes that every word of the Bible has to be taken literally. Thus, the world was created in six days, there was a worldwide deluge, a Noah and an ark, God did stop Earth’s rotation so that Joshua and his bloodthirsty genocidal Hebrews could have enough daylight to defeat the bloodthirsty Amorites. Eve was seduced by a snake and in turn got Adam to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Jesus did walk on water. And so on. Like others in his sect, he ignores the vast accumulation of data establishing the fact of evolution. He reads the Bible but does not see that, though the Bible nowhere states that the Earth is flat, it clearly implies that the Earth is flat. Nor does he take literally Christ’s injunction to hate your father and mother. He ignores those. Puts them in a separate compartment of his brain. Or erases them as if they were on a tape.
“But some fundamentalists do come across evidence that they’d like to ignore. Iron strikes flint, and the spark falls on inflammable material. The fire is off to the races, as it were. He reads more of the evidence, perhaps loathes and curses himself for his ‘sinful’ curiosity. But he learns more and more. Finally, his reason convinces him that he’s been wrong. And he becomes a liberal Christian or an atheist or agnostic.
“Something in his genetic defenses made a hole or the hole already existed waiting for water to pour through it.
“In any event, he was able to use his reason only because his genetic makeup permitted him.”
“I thought you said that Homo sapiens was a semirobot,” Burton said. “You’re describing one hundred percent robots.”
“No. Robots don’t have reason. They can use logic, if they’ve been programmed to do it. But, if presented with new evidence that says that their program is wrong, they can’t reject the already installed program. Humans can. Sometimes. Nor do robots have to rationalize their reasons for the way they behave. They just do, but humans have to explain why they’re doing such and such. They construct a system of logic to excuse their behavior. The system may be founded on wrong premises, but it’s usually logical within its own frame of reference. Not always, though.
“What the Ethicals claim, and they can prove it, is that even the most genetically rigid, the most severely conditioned person has the ability to free himself—partially, anyway—from these constraints, these molds. That a few can do this but most don’t … the Ethicals say that this is a demonstration of free will. The restrained, the strait-jacketed, don’t want to change. They are happy in their misery.”
“They can prove this?”
“Yes. I’ll admit I’m not educated enough to validate their findings. I don’t understand the higher mathematics or the extremely involved biology. I accept their proofs, however.”
“There is no such thing as absolute or final certainty, is there?” Burton said. “Unless you can see clearly, as through a crystal, exactly what evidence they present, you won’t ever really know if they have the truth, will you?”
“Put that way, no. Some things have to be accepted on faith.”
Burton laughed uproariously.
The American, red-faced, said, “Unless you’re competent to do the research yourself, how do you know that what you read in a chemistry or astronomy or biology book is true? How do you know that anything is true unless you duplicate the research? Even then, you may be in error or clinging to the opposite viewpoint because …”
“Because you’re genetically inclined to it?” Burton said scornfully. “Because you’re predetermined to believe in one thing and not in another?”
“An attitude like yours makes a man believe in almost nothing.”
“Right,” Burton drawled.
“You certainly voiced enough opinions based on the observations of others while you were on Earth. Often very wrong opinions.”
“That was on Earth.”
They were silent for a while. The women were talking about their mothers. Frigate could tell, however, that Sophie was listening to them at the same time. She winked at him and made a gesture that he could not interpret.