Science Project

Science Project

A Short Story

                Someone – I think it was Gary Larsen with his “Far Side” cartoons – once suggested that Earth was simply a science project of God’s that He only got a “C-“ on.

                I disagree heartily.

                I think He probably got an “A” on Earth, at worst an “A-“.

                        Let’s go back in time and dimension and see what happened:

                “All right, Class. You had an assignment over the millennium, to create a world and decide on a method of supervision. Your goal was to find the best means for providing a healthy primary population for your world. Have you all finished your planets?

                        (Assents from throughout the cosmos.)

                “Wonderful. Let’s take a look at what each of you have come up with.” The Teacher turned to a deity in the corner of the dimension. “Rahvi, what did you come up with?”

                Rahvi emerged from His cloud and made His presence visible to His Teacher. “Ah, well, I felt it was most important to make sure no harm came to my creatures.”

                “Humans, Rahvi. They’re called humans.”

                “Right. Humans. Well, so I decided that the best way to keep the humans I used from harm was to control their actions sufficiently to make sure they avoided problems. So, ah, so I…”

                “So, You refused to give them free will.”

                “Ah. Yes. They, ah, do not have free will.”

                “Hmm. Well, arguably,” the Teacher says, examining Rahvi’s world, “You could say that they are physically healthy – I don’t see any signs of aberrant behavior in your humans.”

                “Thank You, Teacher.”

                “Or any other kind of useful behavior.”

                “Excuse Me?”

                “Rahvi, did You notice that even after a millennium, Your humans have yet to even start to utilize fire or the wheel?”

                “Well, sure, but eventually…”

                “Eventually? Rahvi, those inventive jumps only come from the opportunity to make mistakes. And if You aren’t allowing them free will to make those mistakes, how will they ever create those jumps? Shorten that sentence: how will they ever create?”

                “Well, I…”

                “You need to do more preparation for Your creations, that’s what You need, Rahvi. No more intergalactic billiards when You should be working on Your assignments. Do You understand?”

                “Yes, Teacher.”

                “D-plus, Rahvi. You did keep them safe in one manner of thinking.” The Teacher turned to the next student. “Zeut?” A prideful sense emerged from the dimensional rift in front of the Teacher. “Show us Your project, please.”

                “Certainly, Teacher.” A colorful blue and green planet came into focus for all to observe. “My humans have complete free will, and they obey My directions and stay on the path to success consistently. There is more creativity than My colleague’s world showed, and…”

                “Excuse Me, Zeut,” the Teacher interrupted. “Did You just say, ‘they obey Your directions’ to stay on, as You call it, ‘the path to success’?”

                Non=plussed, Zeut agrees with the Teacher’s assessment. “Yes, Teacher. As I was saying, there is more…”

                “How much ‘direction’ are You giving Your humans, Zeut? May I examine?”

                “Uh, sure, of course…”

                The Teacher became immersed within Zeut’s creation, and poked around. “Zeut? Would You please join Me in here, at this particular timepoint, if You would?” As the Teacher looked around, the addendum crept out without bidding. “I don’t doubt You’ve been down here before…”

                Zeut obeyed. He was not normally called to be obedient, but when it came to Teacher, it was necessary. He arrived in the largest community on the primary continent of His world, where the Teacher was waiting for Him.

                “I Am here, Teacher. What do You think?”

                The Teacher looked around, and without moving physically, indicated temple after temple surrounding the two Deities. “When You speak of giving the humans directions, exactly how are You communicating those directions to their primitive minds, Zeut?”

                “You see, Teacher,….”

                “You’ve been living within Your world, haven’t You?”’

                Zeut was defiant in response. “You never said that was forbidden, Teacher.”

                “It isn’t.”

                What passed for a Zeutian smile crossed what passed for Zeutian lips.

                “But it’s about as impractical a solution as You could have conceived of.” (Smile disappears.) “Rather than instill some kind of moral system in Your humans – You do know they can retain a thought for longer than most other species, yes? – You are relying on ordering them around, correcting their every wrong move, forcing them to live in fear of punishment and hope of reward. I hesitate to check on what You chose to use for a reward… let’s see here…OH, GOOD GRIEF, Zeut!”

                “They are disgusting little creatures, Teacher.”

                “They probably weren’t until you started reinforcing that kind of behavior!” The Teacher emerged from the world, disgusted at the results of the Student’s work, as Zeut followed His Instructor back to the Classroom. “This is as UN-healthy a population as You could have created, Zeut. I hesitate to fail You for this project; nevertheless, I cannot pass Your project as it currently exists. I will give You one more millennium – on Your own – to start over and try again. Flood this attempt, or burn it, or something, and start from scratch. Adsmit?”

                “Yes, Teacher? Is it My turn?” He responds as Zeut is left despondent.

                “It is, Adsmit. Please share Your project with Me, and I expect it is an improvement on the previous two?”

                “Well, Teacher, I expect it will be.” Adsmit draws His planet to the forefront of the Classroom. “This I thought was a better solution than those presented by My Colleagues. They don’t trust their humans, but these little critters are already imbued with a reasonable sense of ethics. They’ve got a pretty decent moral compass, Teacher – maybe not like the lortagrians You showed us before, but…”

                “Show Me your world, please, Adsmit.”

                “Yes, Teacher.”

                The world opened up under the Teacher’s ephemeral touch. Observing Adsmit’s world was very different from either of the two already examined – the overtly controlled humans of Rahvi’s world, the overtly-templed world of Zeut’s. There were no temples here; in fact, there were no real buildings of any kind.

                In fact…

                “Adsmit? What sort of…guidance did You provide Your humans?”

                Proudly, the Student answered, “Why, none, Teacher.”

                Nodding, the Teacher replied curtly. “That was a bad choice, Adsmit. These humans have progressed even less than Rahvi’s, and I would not have thought that possible. Have they even developed speech yet?”

                “Brr, ahh, well, it’s rather rudimentary, but, yeah, they kind of…”

                “Adsmit, without some kind of Godly guidance, human beings would take millions and millions and millions of years to come up with even the most basic societal norms. You knew You only had a millennium to complete this assignment – did You expect this to be sufficient?”

                “Um….yes?”

                “Well, You were wrong. They are barely discernable from the animal life that surrounds them. D-minus.” The Teacher looks around the Classroom, vast as a galaxy. “Do the rest of You have similarly spectacular failures to share with Us?” The lack of response is deafening. “Is there AnyOne here who utilized some sort of instruction, or punishments, or rewards? NOT…” pointing at Zeut, “of the nature that Zeut chose to utilize, mind You.”

                Amidst the silence, One of the better students finally pipes up. “Teacher?” All the attention of the multiverse of Students turns to Beezel. “I – might have something worth the Class’ time.” Beezel’s planet came to the front of the consciousness of the Class and the Teacher, Who took the time necessary to examine this project carefully.

                “My first impressions are positive, Beezel,” the Teacher begins. “I see the beginnings of a society already, and I see the signs of ethical behavior among the humans. What was Your methodology, Beezel?”

                “Teacher, very early within their millennium, I presented to them a set of Rules.”

                “As, what, a Deity?”

                “Yes, Teacher. I chose to appear as a very large human, approximately four times their size, and presented them the Rules which they must live by or risk banishment from the culture.”

                “How many Rules did You feel were necessary?”

                “I thought about that quite a lot, Teacher. I finally settled on eight hundred and seventy-three.”

                The Teacher waited until the uproar of the Classroom died off before responding. “While there is no hard and fast regulation on this, Beezel, I would strongly suggest to You that 873 is far too many rules for any mortal species to keep track of.”

                “I wasn’t sure, to be honest. Too few, too many…”

                “What happened to Your population as these rules were implemented, Beezel? Were You able to maintain a stable community?”

                “I have seventeen hundred and thirty-three humans in this community…”

                At that, Adsmit burst out with, “Seventeen HUNDRED? My world had five TIMES that!”

                “Mine was over one hundred thousand!”

                “Yes, yes, that is the problem, isn’t it, Beezel? When You keep driving members of Your community out, there comes a point when it’s diminishing gains. Look at this list of Rules: ‘stay off the grass’? That should NOT be a excommunicable offense. Neither should…let’s see: ‘wearing white after the harvest season concludes’? How important was that one? Or… oh, for goodness’ sakes! ‘Casual Fridays’? Really?”

                “Well, I wanted to set the precedent…”

                “Priorities, Beezel. Priorities.” The Teacher turned to the galaxy of Students. “But Beezel was on the right track, Students. These mortal creatures need Your guidance! You can’t just turn them loose, and You can’t control their every action! Beezel? I’ll give that a “B-plus”. Your humans are safe, even if most of them were cast out to die ostracized in the wilderness.”

                “Thank You, Teacher.”

                “Anyone else have a project worth sharing with the Class?”

                Having seen the (mostly) positive reaction to Beezel’s presentation, a Student names Redhare quickly catches the Teacher’s attention. “I believe I have the proper balance in My world, and I would very much like to share it with the Class, if I may?”

                “Proceed, Redhare.”

                With something resembling a smile, were such beings in possession of smiling parts in these forms, Redhare addresses the Class: “In a manner similar to Beezel’s, I also gave my subjects 'Rules' to follow, rather early in the time frame given to Us. After gathering the tribes together through some natural phenomena, I chose a non-human form to appear as – a gigantic talking rabbit, actually – and provided them a much simpler array of rules: twenty, which I thought was appropriate given that’s how many fingers and toes they each generally had. I assigned each rule to one of those appendages of theirs, as a mnemonic device, and that seems to have worked rather well. Not harming each other, for example, was represented on their left thumb, and so forth.”

                “Very good so far. And so, how did You enforce those twenty rules?”

                Redhare felt very confident in His answer.

                “You see, Teacher, that’s where I differed from the implementation of my Colleague here. When a person violated one of the Twenty Rules, I called to them “from On High”, as it were, and reminded them of the Rule, and that they were to follow the Rules.”

                “All right. And what if they didn’t?”

                “Then I reminded them again.”

                “Ah.” The Teacher was beginning to worry now. “And how many times before….?”

                “Before? Before what?”

                “Before You did something of consequence.”

                “Well, I believe a gigantic talking rabbit reminding them that they were continuing to violate the Rules would be pretty consequential, don’t You, Teacher?”

                “No. No I don’t. Let’s see what Your result was.”

                And, sure enough, Redhare’s population had learned very quickly that no actual punishment would ever be coming their way, so they freely violated the Twenty Appendage Rules and every other code of good behavior that one might imagine; the result was that Redhare’s world did not differ significantly from Adsmit’s, where no rules at all were ever established in the first place.

                “Redhare, do You see what I see on Your planet?”

                “Ummmm….to what are You referring, Teacher?”

                “To the rampant murdering, robbery, sexual deviance, and whatever THAT is over THERE?”

                “Oh. OH! Excuse Me, Teacher, I need to get into Rabbit Mode for a moment…”

                “No, You don’t, because not enforcing Your Rules is no better than not HAVING rules in the first place! You might feel like You’re being merciful to the little creatures, but You’re not actually helping them if there are NEVER any consequences!” Turning to Adsmit, the Teacher asked, “What grade did I give You, Student?”

                “A…. a D-minus, Teacher.”

                “Yes. Well, let’s call this one a ‘D’, then, Redhare, because at least You had the intent of rules, even if they were literally useless in practice.

                “Students, let’s look at what We’ve seen so far this Class,” the Teacher intoned. “When You create a world, and You put an impressionable, intelligent species like humans on it, there is a certain balance that You MUST maintain. You cannot go laissez faire completely, if You want something that is superior to the animals around them! But, You also cannot control every aspect of their lives, without squashing out the creativity that gives this species its uniqueness in the first place! You certainly can’t remove their free will if You want ANY sign of intelligence in them – well, You might have intelligence, but it would be YOURS, not theirs!

                “You cannot punish without providing a reward as well, and You cannot ignore punishments completely, either. With no motivation to keep from doing wrong, they will stray virulently off the path of righteous behavior, but without motivation to do right, they have no motivation, period! Beezel’s dwindling community would be gone within another millennium were We to let it continue, even if He were to cut His Rules down under, say, one hundred or so.

                “IS THERE any Student Who has all of those bases covered, and would like to share Their project with Us?”

                Two hands went up, one shortly after the other. The first was Deejt, and the Teacher called on Him first.

                “Deejt, please. I seriously doubt…”

                “No, Teacher! I promise that I have a smoothly functioning society that meets all those standards that You have just described!!”

                Despite skepticism from previous outlandish claims, the Teacher replied resignedly, “All right, Deejt. Show Us Your project, please.”

                Again, the glow of pride bloomed from a Student. “You are really going to love this, Teacher. I mean, this project is the best project You have ever…” 
               “Just – just get on with it, Deejt.”

                “Yes, Teacher.” Deejt made an elaborate scene of producing His world, which looked quite different from the rest of the planets in that it was not colored in the blues and greens which most of the previous examples had been, but rather was primarily orange with various shades of reds and browns as highlights. “I did install Myself as the planetary God, as many of My colleagues did, but I was very magnanimous in My dealings with them for the most part. They also got a set of rules – I called them “Codes”, but it’s the same thing – and if they follow the Codes over the first seventy years of their lives, I installed a second place for them to go to. If they didn’t, then they just lived out their lives and died, like all the other animals.”

                “Interesting…”

                “See? I knew You’d like it. I thought this up all Myself, too. So all the beings I put in my little world here? They all want to obey My Codes, so they can go to this second place I have set up for them.”

                “What is so appealing about this second place, Deejt?”

                “That’s the genius part of this whole set-up, Teacher! There’s nothing special about the second place. In fact, it’s just another continent on the backside of the world they were already living on! But they’ve been told that it’s special, and wonderful, and amazing, so they all try to be as good as they can be for those first seventy years so they can go to this special second place. It makes life in the main portion of the world SO much nicer for everybody!”

                Redhare made His presence felt in order to ask a question of His own to Deejt, and the Teacher allowed it.

                “Deejt, what happens when they turn seventy, and You whisk them away to the other side of the planet, and they discover it’s not so special after all?”

                “Simple. I just kill ‘em off. The lifespans of these creatures isn’t much above seventy anyway, so we’re not talking about very many.”

                “All right – quiet, please, Students, QUIET!” The Class had gotten unruly for the first time in ages, but then they hadn’t had such a heinous maltreatment of test subjects in ages, either. “So, let Me get this straight, Deejt. You have created a world with rules, consequences for good and, by omission, for bad as well, but Your presence and control have been comparatively minimal. I find Your lying to the denizens of Your world to be ethically reprehensible…”             

                “Teacher, they’re only humans! It’s not like they have real feelings or anything….”

                “You are mistaken about that, but I’ve learned in My past dealings with You that such a mistake will not have any effect on Your future actions. Regardless, I feel compelled to say that You have apparently done a better job completing this assignment than Your Classmates have, ethics not withstanding, so I am going to give You an ‘A-minus’ for Your project.”

                “Thank You, Teacher.”

                “I’ll just take a quick look at the minor detail work down on Your world…”

                “Ah, Teacher, that’s not really necessary….”

                “No, I insist. I would very much like to see the fine work You…”

                And suddenly the Teacher froze. And the tension in the Classroom grew exponentially as all but One of the Class wondered why the Teacher had stopped in mid-sentence.

                “DEEJT! JOIN Me down here, please!”

                (Did you know that the multi-universal sign of “You’re in trouble!” is the “Oooooooohhh!” that you all were familiar with in grade school?)

                “Yes, Teacher…”

                Once on the surface of the world Deejt created, it was obvious why His world was decked in oranges, reds, and browns.

                His dominant species wasn’t Human. It was Lortagrian.

                “Pray tell Me, as if I didn’t already suspect, why You chose to disobey the requirements of the assignment and use lortagrians instead of humans?”

                “Um, well, I like the color.”

                “I see. And the fact that they come pre-equipped with a strong moral compass that wouldn’t require any real work on Your part didn’t enter into it?”

                “Is that true? I wasn’t aware of that, Teacher. That does explain one or two things that I found while…”

                “This is grounds for failure, Deejt. It may be grounds for expulsion from the Multi-Dimensional School for Potential Deities, but that will be up to Administration. In the meantime?”

                        “Y-yes, Teacher?”

                “Clean up these poor creatures, find them a GOOD home, and don’t return to class until You’ve decided to obey My Rules.”

                “Yes, Teacher. Um, why do I have to find them a good home? We don’t have to do that with the humans we use!”

                “True, but lortagrians are much farther up the civilization scale. It’s against Class rules to abandon them; that’s the major reason I never use them in assignments! If You had read the Syllabus, You would have KNOWN that, Deejt!”

                “Yes, Teacher…” He responded dejectedly.

                Upon returning to the Classroom, and ignoring the Student pleas for information on the conversation the Teacher had with Deejt (and why He hadn’t returned with the Teacher), attention turned to the other hand which was raised – little Yahweh.

                “Last but NOT least, Yahweh. So far, We have not seen an “A” project…”

                “What about Deejt’s?”

                “It is no longer an “A” project,” and the multi-universal sound was renewed. “Regardless, Yahweh, what do You have to present to Us?”

                “I would like to ask You a question first, Teacher.”

                “Go ahead.”

                “I was wondering if Deejt called His ‘second place’ by the word ‘Heaven’ or not.”

                The expression on what would have been the Teacher’s face, if one had existed, was one of utter shock. “It – it was indeed Heaven, Yahweh. How did You know that?”

                “I hesitate to accuse my Brethren, Teacher, but I suspected Deejt stole that particular idea from Me, although I must say that My Own implementation is much fairer to the humans than His apparently was.”

                “Interesting. I will add that piece of evidence to the Admin evaluating Deejt’s situation.” (A third multi-universal sound was created.) “Be that as it may, would You please share Your world with Us?”

                “I Am pleased to do so, Teacher. I call it ‘Earth’, and I actually have two additional places which are sort of ‘attached’ to the project. One, as I just mentioned, is called Heaven, and the other is called Hell. I presented Myself to just a specific subgroup of humans, which I called the Hebrews, and for obvious reason nicknamed the ‘Chosen People’. To those humans, I appeared and spoke – not always in the same form, actually. Sometimes I was fire, sometimes I was smoke, sometimes, I even disguised Myself as if I was One of them to converse with an individual. But the important detail that several of Us got from Your lesson, Teacher, the one about providing a guidebook for behavior early on? I did that when I had all of these ‘Chosen People’ together at the foot of a large mountain before I led them to the land I wanted them to settle in.”

                “What about the Heaven and Hell, Yahweh?”

                “Yeah! Did You use it the way Deejt claimed to?”

                Pleased to let the Class do the interrogating, the Teacher stayed silent but indicated for the Student to answer. “Yes and no. Heaven was for those who obeyed the rules, and Hell was originally for those who disobeyed. But…”

                “But what, Yahweh?”

                Yahweh sighed, hoping to explain His thought processes clearly. “You see, I heard what Redhare was trying to say about mercy, You know? Just because someone makes a mistake should they be condemned? I started with that in mind, but it soon became clear that this was too harsh. So I gave the humans an out, if You will.”

                “And what was that?”

                “They could repent. I mean, if they simply weren’t even sorry about breaking My Rules, why bother, right? Then Hell was fine for them – I can only do so much for them if they don’t want to help themselves.”

                “Did they know that was the consequence if they messed up without repentance?”

                “I believe so. There were some outlying regions where I wasn’t sure if they did know, so for those folks I tried to give the benefit of the doubt if there was any doubt. But for the most part, yes, the vast majority of the culture of the world was well-indoctrinated in My ‘heaven and hell’ process.

                “Back to My point: if they did repent – if they were sorry and made the effort to improve – then I didn’t count it against them. But as You said to Redhare, Teacher, there has to come a point where saying “Sorry” over and over again and never fixing the problem wasn’t going to work anymore.”

                “All right. Continue.”

                “Yes. Well, the humans all have free will. And, a big chunk of them weren’t even indoctrinated at the beginning. So there was a rough period at the start when many, even most of the humans weren’t even eligible for my “Heaven or Hell” set up. So I set up a campaign for the Word to get out, where in fact one of the primary doctrines of going to Heaven was the very transmission OF the system to those who might not know about it. My goal was to give every human the opportunity to live by the Rules I gave them, of their OWN free will, and provide a reward for their success and an alternative for their failure.”

                “Very good, Yahweh. Class? Do You see what He has done on His world? His humans have complete free will. They have the ability to choose right or wrong, but they have the motivation to choose righteousness, and the reward and punishment that accompanies that. You cannot have REWARD without PUNISHMENT and expect it to be effective! That’s what happened to Redhare’s world – with no punishment, there was no motivation to seek the reward because there was no substantive alternative. Yahweh, may I see Your ‘Heaven’ and Your ‘Hell’, please?”

                “Certainly. Here You go, Teacher.”

                After a brief departure and return, the Teacher is suitably impressed. “I have to admit, Yahweh, even I would not want to spend time in Your ‘Hell’. Very well done. How successful is Your system? How many humans end up in either place?”

                “Ah, well, to be truthful, Teacher, that is where I am disappointed. Far fewer take the threat of Hell seriously than take the promise of Heaven, for some reason.”

                “Oh, dear. So undoubtedly, those who disparage the concept of Hell end up like Redhare’s population and…”

                “And behave so that they must by rule be cast into it, yes, Teacher.”

                Redhare pops up with another question. “But, You could just move those humans back up into Heaven then, couldn’t You?”

                “Yes, but then the whole system breaks down, Redhare. If behavior doesn’t consistently have the consequences We say it does, then all the consequences become ineffective. Isn’t that what happened on Your world?”

                “Excellent, Yahweh. I do believe You are ready to move on to Advance World Building. This project gets an “A”, although like You, I am disappointed by the rate of choice between Your Hell and Heaven. 
              “I know! You would think that the humans would want to choose Heaven, and take the appropriate steps to make sure they went there when their lifetimes had expired!”
        “True, You would think that. But as I was saying to Deejt earlier, lortagrians are much farther up the civilization scale than humans are. I am sure they would thrive in the world structure You have created here, and perhaps the humans will too, given enough time. But they simply aren’t that smart, and sometimes they choose the wrong alternative even when the consequences are staring them in the face.”
                To the entire Class, the Teacher concluded with, “Now, for those of You Whom I have not graded projects for in this Class session, please bring Your world forward, and leave it with Me to evaluate before our next Meeting.
            “Your next assignment will be to study about multiple personalities as they relate to Deities, and whether having more than one persona is useful or not when supervising a world of Your Own. 
             "Class dismissed.”