Transhumanist Wager, The (53 page)

Jethro glared at him, livid from
the admission about Zoe Bach.

“What do you want?” he forced
himself to ask calmly.

Belinas appeared eased by the
question. He looked forward to a philosophical dialogue with such a worthy
adversary. He was in no hurry to begin the gruesome process of extracting
concessions from Jethro regarding the future of Transhumania and its
unparalleled technologies. He put down the spiked forceps.

“A cigarette?” Belinas asked.

“I don’t smoke.”

“No, of course not. That wouldn't
be very practical for a transhumanist.” He pulled a pack of cigarettes from his
pocket and took his time lighting up.

“But then again, since you can cure
cancer on Transhumania, you can enjoy some bodily vices, huh?”

“What do you want, preacher?”
Jethro asked again, harshness in his voice this time.

Belinas smiled and indulged in a
slow drag off his cigarette. He walked to a chair six feet in front of Jethro
and sat down.

“Now come on, Mr. Knights. Isn’t it
obvious? I want to do the right thing for the human race, which is to spread
God's will on Earth. And to do so I need power. Just like you. I want power so
I can control the world and push it down a righteous path—one that is short on
sin, long on submission, and devoid of people like you.”

“You want to rule the world so you
can force people into following your subjective concept of God’s supposed
will?”

“Your crude, simplistic wording
leaves so much to be desired; however, technically, yes. And ruling the world
would be easier right now if you God-killers weren't around to spread your
blasphemy. Incidentally, ruling would also be easier if America and I had the
science and technology your city possesses.”

“Why do you want to possess the
science and technology you've fought so vehemently against?”

Belinas sighed. “I have the
authority and faith to guide human beings to believe in God and live according
to His tenets. You have the gifts of science and technology—which, if left
unchecked, will lead them astray. I need all of it together in one hand that
only I can open and close as needed. Not all science and technology are evil.
But only a God-fearing man should be able to determine that. Otherwise, he
might believe he can out-think God by using his gifts.”

Jethro shrugged. “I don't
understand you people. Or why I should fear something like God. Or why I
shouldn't be able to out-think something like God. Or why I should even
consider your concept of God beyond a few rudimentary tautologies which show
it's an unproven concept in a universe of many proven things. It would be
irrational and a waste of time to make more of it. And yet, you people build civilizations
upon it, form cultures around it, live your lives for it—and then insist on
standing in the way of transhumanism, at the obvious expense of your own
well-being and evolutionary advancement.”

Belinas snickered, watching Jethro,
amused by what he considered his unconscionable naivety. He was struck by one
fundamental issue with the man: his utter lack of fear. The reverend had never
seen such confidence so perfectly manifested in any one person before, even as
this transhumanist was perhaps only an hour away from his death.

“Yet, Mr. Knights, not
understanding any of this has never really bothered you, has it? It hasn't kept
the creator of TEF and the omnipotender up at night? Not even once?”

Jethro considered it and said, “No,
I can't say it has. Not even once.”

The preacher grunted and threw his
head back. More than ever, he saw Jethro as a critical threat.

Belinas declared, “That's so
typical of your overman breed, of which you are its chief architect and
philosopher. Your problem is that you're not an atheist; you're not even an
antitheist. You're an
apatheist
—one who doesn't care to find out if he
should know God.”

“That's true,” Jethro answered
simply. “It's just not an expedient use of my time. I have too much value in my
own life for the need to consider, or want, anything else.”

“You've never been fearful you
might be wrong about that? You’ve never been afraid you might miss out on
knowing the Creator of the universe?”

“Nope. Never.”

“You are utterly classic, Mr.
Knights,” Belinas said, abruptly standing up from his chair. He began pacing
the room, his thoughts lassoing an epiphany. He turned towards Jethro and said,
“Don't you see? Your greatest failure as a human being is your total lack of
its main philosophical condition: fear. For us who know you, that is your
perfect sin. Because without the basic understanding of fear, or even caring to
understand it, you have no empathy of it, no knowledge of it. A man without
fear doesn't need God. He doesn’t need to consider God. And a man who doesn't
need to consider God—well, that's one very dangerous man.”

“Why is that person dangerous?”

“Because he’s not afraid of being
all-powerful. He thinks and acts for himself, and only himself. He scoffs at
karma and fate, caring only about how he interprets and masters his immediate
reality. He lacks the dread that pervades the whole world: the deep-rooted
phobia of playing God. It’s the specific primary fear that keeps everyone in
check, keeps everyone muted and nervous. It’s what makes a driver stop at a red
light when no one else is at the intersection. Or a thief decline to steal a
purse from a blind lady on a deserted street. Or the President of the United
States—the most powerful man in the world—attend church on Sunday when he’d
rather be watching a football playoff game. It’s what makes humanity, altruism,
and religion possible as we know it. Otherwise, everyone would just do what
they wanted, when they wanted; in other words, they would act just as God
does.”

Jethro flashed back to the moment
he walked out of Professor Rindall’s philosophy class at Victoria University.
Belinas’ articulation was spot-on. This was the essence of the world’s unmasked
collective soul, the quintessential character flaw of all societies—that people
were bred and conditioned to be afraid to do what they most deeply wanted to
do: become invincible. They were terrified to try and become the very thing
they worshiped: God. Very few in the world wanted, possessed the courage for,
or could handle, that kind of responsibility. Jethro had been warring with the
human race’s ubiquitous sheepishness for years, and Belinas knew everything
about that sheepishness; he knew everything about the blatant brainwashing and
yoking of the species’ pugnacious mind and spirit.

“The Holy Scripture says:
The
fear of God is the beginning of wisdom
,” Belinas announced, sensing
Jethro’s thoughts.

Jethro quickly raised his eyebrows.
“What drivel. If there’s any value at all in your fearmongering book of rules,
it’s the myth of Satan: the archangel who rebelled against God because he
wanted to rule the heavens himself. Apparently your God wasn’t strong enough to
scare him and his legion of demons into submission.”

The reverend waved his hand
condescendingly, as if swatting something away.

“Mr. Knights, I’m quite sure you’re
intelligent enough to understand why fear is essential for governing the human
race. The whole point is to turn people into frightened little children—God’s
children. One of the Bible’s other most venerable sayings is:
Unless you change
and become a child, you will never enter into the kingdom of Heaven
. Which
makes perfect sense when you think about it. Why would God want fearless
adversaries or troublemakers in His universe? When people are afraid, they
yield, they listen, they submit. That’s the way God likes it. That’s the way
America likes it. That’s the way
I
like it.”

“Preacher, it astounds me you don’t
believe more in the human race; that you forgo the opportunity to give people
the chance to become something more than they are today. Why must your religion
insist on so much submission, control, and scaremongering? People don’t have to
be afraid. If taught properly, some could rise up and become powerful, perhaps
as powerful as what you imagine God to be like. At the very least, they
wouldn’t be afraid to try.”

 Belinas chuckled and shook his
head. “Mr. Knights, are you joking? The human soul is made of cotton candy. No
one is going to rise up against almighty God and become omnipotent. No one has
that kind of power, intellect, or capacity. It’s completely absurd.”

“It’s
not
absurd. Every
transhumanist believes and hopes they will become omnipotent in the future.”

“Because they’re delusional
egomaniacs full of madness and subversion,” responded Belinas sharply, losing
his composure for an instant. He threw his cigarette to the ground and
smothered it with his sandal. “Besides, if nobody were afraid of being God,
then global chaos would instantly ensue. Dissolution of the world order would
be rapid and inevitable. Everything for which Christians and the West have
worked so hard over the past millennium would collapse. People would start to
clash and war with one another; not just country against country, or ethnic
group against ethnic group, but every single person versus the other. Billions
versus billions. Anyone and everyone, stabbing each other in the back for the
highest position of power they could attain. No remorse. No guilt. No fear.
Anarchist individualism ruling the streets. The future would be unpredictable
and treacherous.”

“You and your cronies haven’t been
doing your jobs as well as you think, preacher. Part of that future is already
here. The core of the sentient world has always been like that, from the
weakest species in the animal kingdom to the strongest. Every gene in our body
is imbued with this necessity to triumph the existing competition. Survival of
the fittest. You can sugarcoat reality for yourself however you want, but the
indelible nature of evolution always remains paramount. This is the main force
propelling the world forward.”

“Nonsense, Mr. Knights. The moral
and cultural mindset that religious authorities have painstakingly instilled in
the human race has been propelling the world forward. We defeated your
transhuman-friendly evolutionary theories long before they were even hatched,
by introducing a handful of maxims which the world has swallowed whole for
thousands of years. I’m sure you know them by heart too, even if you despise
them:
Love thy enemies. Man is small, but God is great. Faith is more powerful
than reason. Only a life lived for others is a life lived worthwhile. All
people are created equal. The strong have a moral obligation to help the weak.
Seek God in all things you do. Selflessness trumps selfishness. If you
understand it, it is not God. If someone strikes you on the cheek, turn to him
the other cheek too. Ignorance is bliss. Judge not so that you won’t be judged.
Whoever is the greatest among you is the least. True knowledge exists in
knowing you know nothing.
And
my favorite modern ‘hip’ one:
Love
is all you need.
”

Belinas smiled. “Do you see a
reoccurring theme, Mr. Knights? These altruistic and egalitarian ideals have
been the cornerstone of all religious and social progress in the modern world.
They’re unstoppable in their implications.”

“They’re all misleading lies, a con
game, a blatant upending of mammalian proclivity to deceive and gain control.
Are you not interested in real truths at all?”

“Those maxims
are
the
truth—God’s truths. They're the most beautiful and instrumental truths in the
world. By teaching them to the human race, we’ve leveled the playing field for
everyone, thus connecting every man, woman, and child to each other in every
way, regardless of self-worth. Equality is everywhere—and best of all, it’s
free.”

“You’ve chained every person to
each other through falsities that hinder potential. Furthermore, equality
doesn’t exist; therefore, it can’t be free. Behind everyone in the universe is
a statistical value—definable, measurable, comparable, and distinctive. A
person’s most important function in life is to plug that value—high or low,
strong or weak—into a single equation that asks the question: How can I attain
as much power as efficiently as possible? And then to pursue the answer as the
highest calling in their life.”

“Callings, Mr. Knights? I’m sure
you realize most of us have very different callings than you, such as
implementing God’s glory and spiritual instruction throughout the Earth. And to
that end, our ideas have been very sound and efficient for the world. Organized
religion’s moral and egalitarian seeds have successfully combated humanity’s
darker intuitions, as well as sprouting angelic manners for billions of loutish
souls. The harvest has been quite welcome and bountiful. Of course, it hasn’t been
perfect. We haven’t totally eliminated brute competition, selfishness,
anti-religious action, or barebones evil. Nor hunger, disease, and poverty.
Nevertheless, much of the world’s transgressions, ungodliness, and savagery
have become highly subdued. It’s safe to say that now, since mostly everyone
anywhere in the world can manage in one way or another and still pursue a path
to God with a fair measure of hope and prosperity.”

“You mean crumbs, preacher. That
fair measure of hope and prosperity is so limited and feeble, even for the
wealthiest or the most powerful of you. It still only leads to a coffin and
nonexistence. You may have achieved a small measure of control over the human
race with your lies and deception, but the tradeoff was getting the world stuck
in the age of the beggarly super-ape. And now you have no way out of it.”

“Come now, Mr. Knights,” Belinas
said sarcastically, raising his eyebrows. “Do you really think your proposal
and strategy for the world’s future is better than ours—than God’s? Consider
your aim: global mutiny of the entire human race; a spiritual, psychological,
and biological insurrection on a scale never before witnessed. You want to
challenge and overthrow nearly every righteous and civil ideal humankind and
modern progress have achieved, in order to become something abnormal,
grotesque, and blasphemous. In order to become something
transhuman
.”