Asimov, Isaac - Foundation Series 08 The Robots of Dawn by Asimov Isaac

Author:Asimov, Isaac
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf

Page 111

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"And how old are you?"

"Forty-five standard, sixty metric."

"I am sixty-six metric. I expect to live three metric centuries more at least-if I am careful."

Baley spread his hands wide. "I congratulate you."

"There are disadvantages."

"I was told this morning that, in three or four centuries, many, many losses have a chance to accumulate."

"I'm afraid so," said Vasilia. "And many, many gains have a chance to accumulate, as well. On the whole, it balances."

"What, then, are the disadvantages?"

"You are not a scientist, of course."

"I am a plainclothesman-a policeman, if you like."

"But perhaps you know scientists on your world."

"I have met some," said Baley cautiously.

"You know how they work? We are told that on Earth they cooperate out of necessity. They have, at most, half a century of active labor in the course of their short lives. Less than seven metric decades. Not much can be done in that time."

"Some of our scientists had accomplished quite a deal in considerably less time."

"Because they have taken advantage of the findings others have made before them and profit from the use they can make of contemporary findings by others.

Isn't that so?"

"Of course. We have a scientific community to which all contribute, across the expanse of space and of time."

"Exactly. It won't work otherwise. Each scientist, aware of the unlikelihood of accomplishing much entirely by himself, is forced into the community, cannot help becoming part of the clearinghouse.

Progress thus becomes enormously greater than it would be if this did not exist."

"Is not this the case on Aurora and the other Spacer worlds, too?" asked Baley.

"In theory it is; in practice not so much. The pressures in a long-lived society are less. Scientists here have three or three and a half centuries to devote to a problem, so that the thought arises that significant progress may be made in that time by a solitary worker, It becomes possible to feel a kind of intellectual greed-to want to accomplish something on your own, to assume a property right to a particular facet of progress, to be wiling to see the general advance slowed-rather than give up what you conceive to be yours alone. And the general advance is slowed on Spacer worlds as a result, to the point where it is difficult to outpace the work done on Earth, despite our enormous advantages."

"I assume you wouldn't say this if I were not to take it that Dr. Han Fastolfe behaves in this manner."

"He certainly does. It is his theoretical analysis of the positronic brain that has made the humaniform robot possible. He has used it to construct-with the help of the late Dr. Sarton- your robot friend Daneel, but he has not published the important details of his theory, nor does he make it available to anyone else. In this way, he-and he alone-holds a stranglehold on the production of humaniform robots."

Baley furrowed his brow. "And the Robotics Institute is dedicated to cooperation among scientists?"

"Exactly. This Institute is made up of over a hundred

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